A Contented Person Is Independent from Circumstances
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. (4:12)
Paul expands on what he alluded to in the previous verse. The twice-repeated phrase I know how … I also know how reveals that he had learned by experience and spiritual maturity to live above his circumstances and not to let them affect his contentment. That is an important lesson for believers to learn, for it is the difficult circumstances in life that most frequently steal our contentment.
Paul’s statement I know how to get along with humble means, to be hungry, and to suffer need indicates that he had had his share of poverty. He knew what it was to get by with meager material things. He also knew how to live in prosperity, to be filled, and to have an abundance when God graciously granted him more than he needed. All six of those terms refer to the material, earthly needs of this life, not to spiritual needs.
Paul was no ivory tower theologian; he had lived and ministered in the trenches. His life was not exactly a testimonial for the prosperity gospel. The apostle’s trials began at Damascus shortly after his conversion. Enraged that Paul
kept increasing in strength and confounding the Jews who lived at Damascus by proving that this Jesus is the Christ, … the Jews plotted together to do away with him, but their plot became known to [Paul]. They were also watching the gates day and night so that they might put him to death; but his disciples took him by night and let him down through an opening in the wall, lowering him in a large basket. (Acts 9:22–25)
At Lystra on his first missionary journey, hostile “Jews came from Antioch and Iconium, and having won over the crowds, they stoned Paul and dragged him out of the city, supposing him to be dead” (Acts 14:19). Many of the Philippian believers no doubt remembered what happened to Paul and his fellow preacher Silas in Philippi:
The crowd rose up together against them, and the chief magistrates tore their robes off them and proceeded to order them to be beaten with rods. When they had struck them with many blows, they threw them into prison, commanding the jailer to guard them securely; and he, having received such a command, threw them into the inner prison and fastened their feet in the stocks. (Acts 16:22–24)
Things did not get much better for the apostle in Thessalonica, where
the Jews, becoming jealous and taking along some wicked men from the market place, formed a mob and set the city in an uproar; and attacking the house of Jason, they were seeking to bring them out to the people. When they did not find them, they began dragging Jason and some brethren before the city authorities, shouting, “These men who have upset the world have come here also; and Jason has welcomed them, and they all act contrary to the decrees of Caesar, saying that there is another king, Jesus.” They stirred up the crowd and the city authorities who heard these things. And when they had received a pledge from Jason and the others, they released them. The brethren immediately sent Paul and Silas away by night to Berea. (Acts 17:5–10)
Trouble, in the form of hostile, unbelieving Jews, followed Paul from Thessalonica to Berea: “But when the Jews of Thessalonica found out that the word of God had been proclaimed by Paul in Berea also, they came there as well, agitating and stirring up the crowds” (Acts 17:13). Forced to flee Berea, Paul went to Athens, where he was mocked and ridiculed by the skeptical Greek philosophers gathered on Mars Hill (Acts 17:18–34). From Athens the apostle went to Corinth where, “while Gallio was proconsul of Achaia, the Jews with one accord rose up against Paul and brought him before the judgment seat” (Acts 18:12). After ministering for three months in Greece, “a plot [to kill Paul] was formed against him by the Jews as he was about to set sail for Syria” (Acts 20:3). When he got to Jerusalem, Paul was attacked and savagely beaten after Jews from Asia Minor recognized him in the temple (Acts 21:26–30). Rescued from certain death by the quick action of a Roman officer (Acts 21:31–35), Paul began his long stay in Roman custody. Two years later, after hearings before the Sanhedrin and the Roman governor failed to resolve the situation, Paul exercised his right as a Roman citizen to appeal to Caesar. After a harrowing sea voyage, which included a terrifying, two-week-long storm that ended in a shipwreck (Acts 27), Paul finally arrived in Rome (Acts 28). As he penned this letter to the Philippians, Paul was again a prisoner in Rome.
Summing up his arduous, difficult, painful life Paul wrote,
Are they servants of Christ?—I speak as if insane—I more so; in far more labors, in far more imprisonments, beaten times without number, often in danger of death. Five times I received from the Jews thirty-nine lashes. Three times I was beaten with rods, once I was stoned, three times I was shipwrecked, a night and a day I have spent in the deep. I have been on frequent journeys, in dangers from rivers, dangers from robbers, dangers from my countrymen, dangers from the Gentiles, dangers in the city, dangers in the wilderness, dangers on the sea, dangers among false brethren; I have been in labor and hardship, through many sleepless nights, in hunger and thirst, often without food, in cold and exposure. Apart from such external things, there is the daily pressure on me of concern for all the churches. Who is weak without my being weak? Who is led into sin without my intense concern? If I have to boast, I will boast of what pertains to my weakness. The God and Father of the Lord Jesus, He who is blessed forever, knows that I am not lying. In Damascus the ethnarch under Aretas the king was guarding the city of the Damascenes in order to seize me, and I was let down in a basket through a window in the wall, and so escaped his hands. (2 Cor. 11:23–33)
In all Paul’s unique and constant sufferings, he had learned the secret of rising above them. In the midst of all his trials, he kept his focus on heavenly realities (cf. Col. 3:1–2). In 2 Corinthians 4:17, the apostle wrote, “For momentary, light affliction is producing for us an eternal weight of glory far beyond all comparison.” With that perspective, is it any wonder that no amount of pain, suffering, or disappointment could affect his contentment?[1]
12 The explanatory sentences in this verse are typically balanced, and somewhat rhythmical. He begins with the broader vocabulary of want and plenty, “I know both how to be humbled;39 I know also how to abound.” Although these will lead to the more specific matters of material needs, there is every good reason to think that by starting with these verbs, he intended, “to be humbled and to abound in every which way,” including in the specific ways he will pick up next, but not limited to these.41 After all, to be “humbled” is not the ordinary verb for “being in want”; moreover, it is a thoroughly non-Stoic word. Some Stoics may have reveled in “want”; none of them could tolerate “humiliation,” which often headed their lists of attitudes to be avoided. Whether deliberately chosen over against them or not, and that is moot, for Paul this verb not only indicates “poverty,” but embraces a way of life similar to that of his Lord (2:8; cf. Matt 11:28), a way of life that finds expression elsewhere in his various “hardship lists.”
Thus, “in every and in all circumstances,” and now in reverse order, Paul specifies: “I have learned the secret”44 of what it means “both to be well fed or go hungry, both to abound and to be in need.” Although the verb “learn the secret” is primarily a technical term for initiation into the mysteries, Paul is obviously using it metaphorically. While others have been “initiated into the mysteries,” he says, “I have been initiated into both having a full stomach and going hungry.” This passage joins others to make clear that, although Paul often ate well, he also knew very little of the cultural equivalent of our “three square meals a day.” But the addition “to abound and to suffer need” probably point—on the “down” side, as do his hardship lists—to other material deprivations or supply, such as clothing (being in “rags”), shelter (homelessness), and less material ones such as toil and lack of rest.46
What is striking, of course, is his insistence that he knows the secret of both plenty and want. His various “hardship lists” make it clear that he has experienced “plenty” of “want.” But in contrast to some of the Cynics, he did not choose “want” as a way of life, so as to demonstrate himself autarkēs; rather he had learned to accept whatever came his way, knowing that his life was not conditioned by either, and that his relationship to Christ made one or the other essentially irrelevant in any case. Where we otherwise lack direct evidence from him are situations in which he “abounded” in “plenty”—at least on the material side of things, although in this letter he may very well be alluding to the generous patronage of the Philippians, both when he and his co-workers lived in Lydia’s household and when they repeatedly supplied his material needs in Thessalonica and Corinth, and perhaps elsewhere.[2]
4:12 Having stated his contentment no matter the situation, Paul now further explains what he has learned. Using a common literary device, he begins by noting two things he knows, followed by a secret that he has learned. The focus in this verse is not on intellectual learning but rather on the experiential.19 This knowledge is not merely abstract, but rather has the sense of knowing how to do or be something.
The first thing Paul knows is how to be brought low. This same verb is used in 2:8, where it refers to Christ humbling Himself by becoming obedient to the point of death. It was because of this ultimate act of humility that believers are to ‘in humility count others more significant than yourselves’ (2:3). In a culture that prized honor and avoided shame at virtually all costs the notion of being brought low was greatly frowned upon. In this instance Paul uses the verb to express the idea of making do with very little. His usage here may stem from the OT, where one finds multiple places that refer to a person humbling his soul (e.g., Lev. 16:29, 31; 23:27; Pss. 34:13 [Eng 35:13]; 43:26 [Eng 44:25]) or more generally in the sense of experiencing some form of hardship whether physical, spiritual or emotional (e.g., Pss. 37:9 [Eng 38:8]; 87:16 [Eng 88:15]). Paul’s point is that he has lived in circumstances that were minimal at best (cf. his list of hardships in 2 Corinthians 6:3–10), and that his emotional and spiritual condition is not tied to these realities.
The second thing Paul knows is how to abound. This same verb (perisseuō) occurred in 1:9 where Paul prayed that their love would abound and in 1:26 where he anticipates the Philippians’ boast abounding as a result of his return to them. Here in 4:12 the verb has a specifically financial sense, referring to circumstances where Paul had more than enough to meet his basic needs. Just as his emotional and spiritual condition is not tied to suffering lack, so too it is not tied to times of relative prosperity.
Next Paul reveals how it is he can live this way: in any and every circumstance, I have learned the secret. In saying that he has learned the secret, Paul uses a verb (mueō) that often refers to being initiated into the secrets of one of the mystery religions. In contrast to the many public religions and deities commonly worshiped in the ancient world, mystery religions tended to be smaller, close-knit, and more private. Often these mystery religions included secret rituals known only by those who had been initiated into the mysteries of that particular group. But this same verb could also have the general sense of being taught or instructed.22 Paul uses this verb ironically to indicate that ‘the concrete stresses and gifts of daily life are the place where Paul undergoes the mysteries, i.e., experiences the power of Christ.’ That is, in contrast to the secretive rituals of the mystery religions that initiated one into a special spiritual status, Paul describes his everyday experiences of abundance and deprivation as the means by which he experiences the power and presence of Christ in his life. The perfect tense of the verb stresses that Paul is in a state or condition that arises from learning this secret. The everyday nature of these experiences is emphasized by the expression in any and every circumstance. Paul has in view both individual events as well as various kinds of experiences that have initiated him into this secret.
The specific content of this secret is found in two pairs of contrasting experiences that together communicate the same idea. The first pair is facing plenty and hunger or more literally ‘to be full and to hunger.’ These same two ideas are paired together in Psalm 107:9, where the psalmist says of God, ‘he satisfies the longing soul, and the hungry soul he fills with good things.’ In the Sermon on the Mount, Jesus states: ‘Blessed are those who hunger and thirst for righteousness, for they shall be satisfied’ (Matt. 5:6). The final contrast uses verbs with similar semantic domains to the first contrast. Paul asserts that he knows abundance and need, or more woodenly ‘to abound and to lack.’ By stating the two extremes of having plenty and being hungry Paul encompasses the entire range of human experience. Paul likely has this secret in mind when he writes that he and his ministry co-workers are treated ‘as poor, yet making many rich; as having nothing, yet possessing everything’ (2 Cor. 6:10). The Epistle to Diognetus picked up this theme when it described the early Christians: ‘They are poor, yet make many rich; they are in lack of all things, and yet abound in all’ (5:13).
Because of his ministry Paul was well acquainted with these extremes, though it was far more common for him to experience hunger and need than abundance and satisfaction. But his spiritual and emotional status did not depend on these varying circumstances. In describing his own experience, Paul is presenting himself as a model for other believers to emulate. Like David, who expressed his trust in the Lord as his shepherd (Ps. 23:1), so too Paul will communicate his own reliance upon Christ in the following verse.[3]
4:12 / Paul had had long experience of having less than sufficient at some times and more than sufficient at other times: it made little difference to him. I have learned the secret of being content, he says, borrowing a term from the vocabulary of the mystery religions (“I have become adept” is F. W. Beare’s rendering), whether well fed or hungry, whether living in plenty or in want. What Paul would have regarded as plenty may be guessed at—anything above the minimum requirements of food and clothing, no doubt. For a man brought up in Paul’s environment, his conversion meant an initiation into a new way of life. One could not be a citizen of Tarsus without possessing substantial means. But for the sake of Christ Paul had “lost all things” (3:8), including (we may be sure) his material heritage; he learned henceforth to live on what he could earn by his part-time “tentmaking” (cf. 1 Thess. 2:9; 2 Thess. 3:8; Acts 18:3; 20:34).[4]
Ver. 12 I know both how to be abased, and I know how to abound.—The Christian—
I. Expects vicissitude.
II. Knows how to adapt himself to all circumstances.
III. Is instructed by the Spirit of God. (J. Lyth, D.D.)
How to be abased:—During the periods between the paroxysms of the fever, Cromwell occupied the time with listening to passages from the sacred volume, or by a resigned or despairing reference to the death of his daughter. “Read to me,” he said to his wife, in one of these intervals, “the Epistle to the Philippians.” She read these words: “I know both how to be abased, and”—the reader paused. “That verse,” said the Protector, “once saved my life when the death of my eldest born, the infant Oliver, pierced my heart like the sharp blade of a poignard.” (Lamartine.)
The knowledge of properly using abundance:—Paul had the double knowledge, “How to be abased” and “how to abound.” The two are not distinctly separable—each in some way conditions the other. There is far too little of the knowledge how to abound. Few men who abound come asking how to abound. Men think it hard enough to get rich, but a very easy thing to be rich. No man has a right to be anything unless he has the knowledge of how to be that thing. When Paul says, “I know how to abound,” he is thinking of anything which makes life pleasant and ample—of money, of scholarship, of friendship, of great spiritual hopes and experiences. Paul did not have all these, and yet he had the knowledge of how to use them. The power by which he could rob abundance of its dangers was the knowledge of the true perfection of a soul in serving Christ. All men do not know how to be rich. The generous, sympathetic, active, kind, rich man knows how to be rich. What is more pitiable than the blunderer who holds wealth and knows not how to use it? There is also needed a knowledge of how to know truth. Here is a scholar who can give you any information, and yet you feel no enrichment. He has no deep convictions, no faith. He has grown less human. He values his knowledge as a botanist his specimens, and not as a gardener his plants. The highest knowledge comes by reverence and devotedness to God. (Phillips Brooks, D.D.)
The difficulty of managing prosperity:—Manton says: “A garment which is too long trails in the mire and soon becomes a dirty rag; and it is easy for large estates to become much the same. It is a hard lesson to ‘learn to abound’ (Phil. 4:12). We say such a one would do well to be a lord or a lady; but it is a harder thing than we think it to be.” It is hard to carry a full cup with a steady hand. High places are dizzy places, and full many have fallen to their eternal ruin through climbing aloft without having grace to look up. The simile of the trailing garment used by Manton is simple, but instructive. (C. H. Spurgeon.) I am instructed.
Initiation into the mysteries:—Formerly rendered: “I have been instructed,” it is given in the Revised Version, “I have been taught the secret;” while Lightfoot still more adequately brings out the meaning: “I have been initiated, I possess the secret.” That is what the Greek word means. And here we have one of many examples where a word of strong heathen association is baptized afresh, and consecrated to signify a new and loftier range of thoughts. What these words meant for a serious and good man, from the heathen point of view, was that he had been admitted to communicate in the mysteries, as the great sacramental services of Paganism were called. He had taken part in solemn baptisms, expressing the need of the purification of the soul. He had listened to an awful proclamation from an officiating minister, warning off all murderers and all barbarians, and, in later times, perhaps, all atheists, and Epicureans, and Christians. For these secret sacred rites were intended only for men of Greek blood; and it was thought neither pleasing to the gods nor good for the State that strangers should intrude upon these solemnities. And then, in these ceremonies themselves, he had been made to pass through experiences which could never be forgotten as long as he lived. His imagination was appealed to both through eye and through ear. He saw the representation of wanderings through the darkness, as amidst some maze; shapes of horror were revealed, and his soul was filled with trembling and terror. He was made to pass through a kind of mental proof or purgatory. Then all was changed. There was a sudden illumination; the scenery of beautiful pastures was disclosed; there was music, and dancing, and joy; and he walked in sweet converse with the pious and the good. At the crowning point of the service he was rapt away in an ecstasy of “beholding,” a species of beatific vision. He seemed to see the meaning of life, its beginning and its end; he beheld the wicked wallowing in filth and the righteous in Paradise—a blessed climate, where all the conditions of spiritual and physical good were realized. On the whole, these sacramental services exerted a very wholesome effect upon the consciences of the people. They learned to meditate on death and eternity, on the need of the soul being prepared for its future, on the punishment of the wicked and the blessedness of the just. One of the Athenian orators, in boasting to his fellow citizens of the glories of their native land, refers to the great mysteries as imparting “good hopes for eternity.” If we ask the question how it was that these institutions died away in course of time, the simple answer seems to be that, in part, they were overcome by the superior spirituality and energy of our own religion; partly that they had themselves waxed corrupt, and had become sources of corruption, though originally good. However, the rites of which we have been speaking went on for a long time, for several centuries after Paul. When this letter was read in the Church of Philippi many, possibly all, of the Gentile members were initiated persons. And when this solemn word: “I have been initiated,” fell upon their ear, it must have vibrated in all its power through their imagination. They must have felt that their beloved teacher was giving a quite new turn to the word. The old sacramental and pictorial associations had vanished; and in place of them there was a deep, central, spiritual truth spoken of as the secret of Paul. What was this secret? It is expressed again by a single word, “content.” (Prof. E. Johnson.)
The secret of contentment:—It was the beautiful expression of a Christian, who had been rich, when he was asked how he could bear his reduced state so happily, “When I was rich, I had God in everything, and now I am poor I have everything in God.”
The value of contentment:—Contentment is the best food to preserve a sound man, and the best medicine to restore a sick man. It resembles the gilt on nauseous pills, which makes a man take them without tasting their bitterness. Contentment will make a cottage look as fair as a palace. He is not a poor man that hath but little, but he is a poor man that wants much. (William Secker.)
The secret explained:—Making a day’s excursion from Botzen, in the Tyrol, we went along the very narrowest of roads, mere alleys, to which our country lanes would be turnpike roads. Well, you may be sure that we did not engage an ordinary broad carriage, for that would have found the passage as difficult as the needle’s eye to the camel; but our landlord had a very narrow chaise for us—just the very thing for threading those four-feet passages. Now, I must make you hear the moral of it, you fretful little gentlemen. When you have a small estate, you must have small wants, and by contentment suit your carriage to your road. “Not so easy,” say you? “Very necessary to a Christian,” say I. (C. H. Spurgeon.)[5]
12. It is to be noted that this contentment or soul-sufficiency (see on 1 Tim. 6:6) is derived not from any resources which the soul has in itself. Paul is no vain boaster who exclaims, “I am the Captain of my soul.” He is no Stoic who, trusting in his own resources, and supposedly unmoved by either joy or grief, endeavors with all his might to submit without complaining to unavoidable necessity. The apostle is no statue. He is a man of flesh and blood. He knows both joys and sorrows, yet is content. But his contentment has its cause in One other than himself. The real Source or Fountain of Paul’s soul-sufficiency is mentioned in verse 13. And that Fountain never runs dry, no matter what may be the circumstances. With reference to the latter Paul continues, I know what it means to live in straitened circumstances, and I also know what it means to have plenty. In any and all circumstances I have learned the secret, both to be filled and to be hungry, both to have plenty and to be in want.
Paul has learned the secret (a verb used only here in the New Testament and related to mystery). He has been thoroughly initiated into it by the experiences of life applied to the heart by the Holy Spirit. To those who fear him God reveals this mystery (Ps. 25:14). Those who reject Christ cannot understand how it is possible for a Christian to remain calm in adversity, humble in prosperity.
The words in the present passage which require some elucidation are the following:
to live in straitened circumstances
Again and again Paul had been “brought low,” same verb as used with reference to Christ in Phil. 2:8, the Christ who humbled himself. That the apostle indeed knew what it meant to be reduced to such straitened circumstances is clear from the following passages: Acts 14:19; 16:22–25; 17:13; 18:12; 20:3; Chapters 21–27; 2 Cor. 4:11; 6:4, 5; 11:27, 33. He knew what was meant by hunger, thirst, fasting, cold, nakedness, physical suffering, mental torture, persecution, etc.
to be hungry
Hunger and thirst are often mentioned together (Rom. 12:20; 1 Cor. 4:11; 2 Cor. 11:27; and cf. for spiritual yearning, Matt. 5:6). In glory there will be neither hunger nor thirst (Rev. 7:16), and this because of Christ’s submission to these afflictions for his own children (Luke 4:2).
to be in want
The apostle had often fallen behind. He had suffered from lack of such comforts as many other people would have considered necessities. He had come short. Yet, none of these things had deprived him of his contentment.
Over against the expressions indicating poverty and affliction are those referring to riches and glory:
to have plenty
Before his conversion Paul has been a prominent Pharisee. The future looked bright and promising. Paul had had plenty, and this in more ways than one. Yet, he had lacked the greatest boon of all: Christ-centered peace of soul. But even after his conversion there had been moments of refreshment when even physically he had experienced what it meant, in a sense, to have plenty (Acts 16:15, 40; 16:33, 34; 20:11; 28:2; Phil. 4:15, 16, 18), and now no longer apart from but in connection with peace of soul. Now, to carry oneself properly in the midst of plenty is no easy matter (Prov. 30:8; Mark 10:23–25). As the adage has it, “In order to carry a full cup one must have a steady hand,” Paul, however, by the grace of the Holy Spirit had been schooled to abundance as well as to want.
to be filled
This word, though used at first with respect to the feeding and fattening of animals (of which meaning there is an echo in the clause: “all the birds gorged themselves with their flesh,” Rev. 19:21), and applied to men chiefly by the Comic poets, was gradually losing its depreciatory sense and is here simply used as a synonym for to have plenty.[6]
[1] MacArthur, J. F., Jr. (2001). Philippians (pp. 300–302). Moody Press.
[2] Fee, G. D. (1995). Paul’s Letter to the Philippians (pp. 432–434). Wm.B. Eerdmans Publishing Co.
[3] Harmon, M. S. (2015). Philippians: A Mentor Commentary (pp. 441–444). Mentor.
[4] Bruce, F. F. (2011). Philippians (p. 150). Baker Books.
[5] Exell, J. S. (n.d.). The Biblical Illustrator: Philippians–Colossians (Vol. 1, pp. 359–361). Fleming H. Revell Company.
[6] Hendriksen, W., & Kistemaker, S. J. (1953–2001). Exposition of Philippians (Vol. 5, pp. 204–206). Baker Book House.
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