Philippians: Being Content
Philippians 4:10-14 - Only through Christ can we have the strength to be content in all circumstances.
“But I rejoiced in the Lord greatly, that now at last you have revived your concern for me; indeed, you were concerned before, but you lacked opportunity. Not that I speak from want, for I have learned to be content in whatever circumstances I am. I know how to get along with humble means, and I also know how to live in prosperity; in any and every circumstance I have learned the secret of being filled and going hungry, both of having abundance and suffering need. I can do all things through Him who strengthens me. Nevertheless, you have done well to share with me in my affliction.”
Philippians 4:10-14 NASB1995
Paul rejoices in the gift he received from the saints at Philippi (Epaphroditus delivered this gift). He knows they have always been concerned but lacked the opportunity to help him. Their gift is an answer to a prayer. He tells them that he doesn’t speak from want, because he has learned to be content in whatever circumstances he finds himself. In the AI image that Steve created at the top, Paul is joyfully praying for the small rations that he has been given in his incarceration.
Let’s do a word study! Content comes from the Greek adjective αὐτάρκης or autárkēs (Strong’s G842) with the following Biblical usages (this word is used once in the NT):
sufficient for one's self, strong enough or possessing enough to need no aid or support
independent of external circumstances
contented with one's lot, with one's means, though the slenderest
Paul is borrowing a word from secular Greek culture, one that the Stoics would recognize but is using it to align with his Christian beliefs. He also recognizes that he had to learn to be content in all circumstances, because this is contrary to human nature. Charles Spurgeon has good commentary on this quoted in Precept Austin:
These words show us that contentment is not a natural propensity of man. “Ill weeds grow apace.” Covetousness, discontent, and murmuring are as natural to man as thorns are to the soil. We need not sow thistles and brambles; they come up naturally enough, because they are indigenous to earth: and so, we need not teach men to complain; they complain fast enough without any education.
But the precious things of the earth must be cultivated. If we would have wheat, we must plough and sow; if we want flowers, there must be the garden, and all the gardener’s care. Now, contentment is one of the flowers of heaven, and if we would have it, it must be cultivated; it will not grow in us by nature; it is the new nature alone that can produce it, and even then we must be specially careful and watchful that we maintain and cultivate the grace which God has sown in us.
Paul says, “I have learned … to be content;” as much as to say, he did not know how at one time. It cost him some pains to attain to the mystery of that great truth. No doubt he sometimes thought he had learned, and then broke down. And when at last he had attained unto it, and could say, “I have learned in whatsoever state I am, therewith to be content,” he was an old, grey-headed man, upon the borders of the grave—a poor prisoner shut up in Nero’s dungeon at Rome. We might well be willing to endure Paul’s infirmities, and share the cold dungeon with him, if we too might by any means attain unto his good degree.
Contentment is a foreign concept in our modern world. No one, of course, wants to live in poverty and even those with plenty want more of everything. They want bigger houses and better cars and the newest iPhone and a closet full of designer clothes and the latest exciting vacation. It is a trap that we can get into so easily because of how we focus our minds. Discontentment in a material sense is driven by pride, gluttony, greed and envy. Discontentment is also a major driver of anxiety!
Discontentment can be driven by wrath - there are many who are extremely discontented because someone else has a different political opinion or belief. They can’t be content in their lives unless every “error in thinking” is corrected in every place that it appears. This is a Herculean task that will never be satisfied. A combination of material and political discontentment often leads to totalitarianism and persecution of others. We get useless and ugly slogans out of this wrath like “Eat the rich”.
Do you think being discontented had anything to do with my spaghetti chart of denominations? There were legitimate reasons historically to question something, but you will never find the perfect church in this lifetime. Again, the lack of contentment driven by angst because spiritual leaders and practices are “not quite right” results in no one being content! “I feel spiritually unfulfilled, so it must be time to change churches.” Our spiritual growth and life require some effort on our part.
This commentary by Dwight Pentecost on Precept Austin is quite apt:
Air and water are two entirely different elements or spheres, and it is impossible to have a vessel filled with air and water at the same time. One that is filled with air must have the air displaced in order to be filled with water. Similarly, if a man’s life is given over to the pursuit of material things, that life cannot then be filled with Jesus Christ. Until that love for material things is displaced, that life cannot and will not be filled with Jesus Christ. When a man gives himself to the pursuit of all that is involved in this world and makes its position and its material things his goal and his standard and the center of his life, he will not find the satisfaction that comes from making Jesus Christ the center of his life. To be content is the opposite of to be covetous, to be greedy, to be worldly, to be materialistic… The reason material things can never make a man content is that a man is never able to get enough of them to satisfy him… Someone once asked John D. Rockefeller how much money is enough. He thought a moment and said, “Just a little more than one has.” The world’s wealthiest man has yet to say, “I have enough to be satisfied.” (Pentecost, J. D. The Joy of Living: A Study of Philippians. Kregel Publications)
I’m not yet to the stage of being “content” with things. I still like to experience things like travel and I also enjoy good food but many other past distractions have been discarded from my life. I have never wanted for anything in my life, yet in looking back, I know that I was discontented way more often than I was thankful. Learning contentment is a life-long battle.
This photo from Unsplash is quite interesting. Someone put a chalkboard somewhere and had people fill in a “thing to do before I die”. I can’t read some of them, but it does not appear that repentance and following Jesus is an option that any thought about, but perhaps some of them may have already taken that step. This speaks to the discontent of so many because they have to create a “bucket list”. I’ve even been guilty of that trap and still have a list of a few things that would be “nice to do”. The overwhelming influence of YOLO/FOMO (You Only Live Once/Fear of Missing Out) in ads and social media is indeed sinister and all-consuming.
Paul says that he has learned the secret of being content in all circumstances: When he had prosperity and when he had humble means, when he was filled and when he was hungry, when he had abundance and when he suffered need. What is so interesting from the commentary I read is that it is often much more difficult to be content when you have prosperity than when you are lacking the basic needs for survival. This anecdote from Precept Austin is quite humorous:
A NEW PERSPECTIVE - A Jewish man in Hungary went to his rabbi and complained, “Life is unbearable. There are nine of us living in one room. What can I do?” The rabbi answered, “Take your goat into the room with you.” The man was incredulous, but the rabbi insisted, “Do as I say and come back in a week.”
A week later the man returned looking more distraught than before. “We can’t stand it,” he told the rabbi. “The goat is filthy.” The rabbi said, “Go home and let the goat out, and come back in a week.” A week later the man returned, radiant, exclaiming, “Life is beautiful. We enjoy every minute of it now that there’s no goat- only the nine of us.” (Reader's Digest [12/81].) Contentment is more a matter of our perspective than of our circumstances, isn’t it!
Also, this advice to the rich from a sermon about contentment by Charles Spurgeon (found on Precept Austin) is tremendous:
The apostle Paul says, "I have learned, in whatsoever state I am, therewith to be content." Now some of you have, as far as your circumstances are concerned, all that the heart can wish. God has placed you in such a position that you have not to toil with your hands, and in the sweat of your face gain a livelihood. You will perhaps think that any exhortation to you to be contented is needless. Alas! my brethren, a man may be very discontented though he be very rich. It is quite as possible for discontent to sit on the throne, as it is to sit on a chair—a poor broken-backed chair in a hovel.
Remember that a man's contentment is in his mind, not in the extent of his possessions. Alexander, with all the world at his feet, cries for another world to conquer. He is sorry because there are not other countries into which he may carry his victorious arms, and wade up to his loins in the blood of his fellow man, to slake the thirst of his insatiable ambition. To you who are rich, it is necessary that we give the same exhortation as to the poor: "learn to be content." Many a rich man who has an estate is not satisfied, because there is a little corner-piece of ground that belongs to his neighbour, like Naboth's vineyard that the king of Israel needed that he might make a garden of herbs hard by his palace. "What matters it," says he, "though I have all these acres, unless I can have Naboth's vineyard?" Surely a king should have been ashamed to crave that paltry half-acre of a poor man's patrimony.
But yet so it is; men with vast estates, which they are scarcely able to ride over, may have that old horse-leech in their hearts, which always cries, "Give, give! More, more!" They thought when they had but little, that if they had ten thousand pounds it would be enough. They have it: they want twenty thousand pounds. When they have that, they still want more. Yes, and if you had it, it would be "A trifle more!" So would it continually be. As your possessions increased, so would the lust of acquiring property increase. We must, then, press upon the rich this exhortation: "Learn in your state, therewith to be content."
Besides, there is another danger that frequently awaits the rich man. When he has enough wealth and property, he has not always enough honour. If the queen would but make him a justice of the peace for the country, how glorious would my lord become! That done, he will never be satisfied till he is a knight; and if he were a knight, he would never be content until he became a baron; and my lord would never be satisfied till he was an earl; nor would he even then be quite content unless he could be a duke; nor would he be quite satisfied I trow then, unless there were a kingdom for him somewhere. Men are not easily satisfied with honour. The world may bow down at a man's feet; then he will ask the world to get up and bow again, and so keep on bowing for ever, for the lust of honour is insatiate. Man must be honoured, and though king Ahasuerus make Haman the first man in the empire, yet all this availeth nothing, so long as Mordecai in the gate doth not bow down to my lord Haman. Oh! Learn, brethren, in whatever state you are, therewith to be content.
Now we reach verse 4:13, repeated here so you don’t have to scroll:
I can do all things through Him who strengthens me.
This verse has unfortunately become like a talisman for casual believers (and even some on the fence) who don’t understand the context of the verse. The things that we can do is to become content in our circumstances because we rely on Jesus. It is His strength, not ours. He provides us the strength in trials that come our way (and successes are often trials because we come to believe we did it on our own). He will not provide us with riches (as the prosperity preachers claim) like a magic genie nor will he grant us the supernatural ability to climb Mt. Everest or conquer financial markets or win an Olympic Gold medal. The things are what God has called us to do for Him in our sanctification walk.
A sermon by Steven Cole quoted on Precept Austin talks about this verse:
The all-sufficient, indwelling Christ was Paul’s source of strength and contentment. Since Christ cannot be taken from the believer, we can lean on Him in every situation, no matter how trying.
Notice that there is a need to learn not only how to get along in times of need, but also how to live with abundance. In times of need, we’re tempted to get our eyes off the Lord and grow worried. That’s when we need a trusting heart. In times of abundance we’re tempted to forget our need for the Lord and trust in our supplies rather than in Him. That’s when we need a thankful heart that daily acknowledges gratitude for His provision. Thanking God for our daily bread, even when we’ve got enough in the bank for many days’ bread, keeps us humbly trusting in Him in times of abundance.
By “all things,” Paul means that he can do everything that God has called him to do in his service for His kingdom. He can obey God, he can live in holiness in thought, word, and deed. He can ask for the provisions needed to carry out the work and expect God to answer. If God has called you to get up in public and speak, He will give you the power to do it. If He has called you to serve behind the scenes, He will equip you with the endurance you need (1Pe. 4:11-note). If He has called you to give large amounts to further His work, He will provide you with those funds. As Paul says (2Cor. 9:8), “God is able to make all grace abound to you, that always having all sufficiency in everything, you may have an abundance for every good deed.”
Notice the balance between God’s part and our part. Some Christians put too much emphasis on “I can do all things,” on the human responsibility. You end up burning out, because I cannot do all things in my own strength. Others put too much emphasis on “through Him who strengthens me.” These folks sit around passively not doing anything, because they don’t want to be accused of acting in the flesh. The correct biblical balance is that I do it, but I do it by constant dependence on the power of Christ who indwells me. As Paul expressed it (1Co 15:10),
“But by the grace of God I am what I am, and His grace toward me did not prove vain; but I labored even more than all of them, yet not I, but the grace of God with me.”
I also like what Enduring Word says about this verse:
I can do all things through Christ who strengthens me: This refers to Paul’s ability to be content in all things. To achieve this contentment, he needed the strength of Jesus Christ.
Unfortunately, many people take this verse out of context and use it to reinforce a “triumphalist” or “super-Christian” mentality, instead of seeing that the strength of Jesus in Paul’s life was evident in his ability to be content when he did suffer need.
We must always also put this precious statement of faith in connection with John 15:5: for without Me you can do nothing. With Jesus we can do all things, without Him we can’t do anything.
Paul ends this passage by commending the Philippians for sharing with him in his affliction. He is a cheerful and grateful recipient of their charity and they were likely made more joyful through their act of generosity. I’ll end this with a fun illustration from Precept Austin:
A farmer once went to hear John Wesley preach. The great leader was dealing with the question of money, and was examining it under three divisions. His first thought was. “Get all you can.” The farmer nudged his neighbor and said: “That man has got something in him; it is admirable preaching! Wesley reached his second thought. “Save all you can.” The farmer became quite excited. “Was there ever anything like this!” he said. The preacher denounced thriftlessness and waste, and the farmer rubbed his hand as he thought, all this have I been taught from my youth up. What with getting and with hoarding, it seemed to him that “salvation” had come to his house. But Wesley went on to his third thought which was, “Give all you can.” “Oh, dear, exclaimed the farmer, “He’s gone and spoiled it all!”
My next devotional examines Philippians 4:15-20 - God will supply all our needs through the riches of His Glory through Jesus Christ. There will be one more devotional after that one for the benediction ending of Philippians, then a summary of Philippians. My next series will dive into Psalm 34.
Heaven on Wheels Daily Prayer:
Dear Lord - Please help me to be content in all circumstances. I have been very blessed in my life but have often focused on how someone else was more blessed. I want to be content through Your strength in any circumstance that may arise. Amen.
Scripture quotations taken from the (NASB®) New American Standard Bible®, Copyright © 1960, 1971, 1977, 1995 by The Lockman Foundation. Used by permission. All rights reserved. lockman.org.
The Blue Letter Bible was accessed on 08/04/2025 to review the lexicon for content.
Precept Austin was accessed on 08/04/2025 to review commentary for Philippians 4:10-14.
Commentary from Enduring Word by David Guzik is used with written permission. Minor formatting changes have been made to improve readability.