Learning the Secret: Sermon on Philippians 4:10-14

It was the eighth day of November – just like today. But 128 years ago, it was Election Day. And that night, the president of the United States sat with his thoughts. There was nothing more he could do. And he wasn't sure he'd do it even if there were. Benjamin Harrison was 59 years old, but he felt older. Four years ago, around the same time of year, he'd run a vigorous race against incumbent president Grover Cleveland, and been overjoyed when the results poured in with a Harrison victory. A fitting way to follow in the footsteps of his presidential grandpa, after all – though William Henry Harrison had only served a month before dying in office. Benjamin had been determined to last longer than that. And he had! But now, after being renominated by a divided RNC meeting in July 1892, it was Benjamin's turn to be the incumbent – and Grover was back to challenge. A repeat of the last match. Could Benjamin Harrison win it again with the tables turned?

It had been a long four years. Wearying. Harrison often said that if he didn't know better, he'd assume a whole decade had flown by since that rainy day he took the oath of office. He described the experience of leading this nation as “one continuous strain and pull and worry” with “no pleasant break.”¹ And now, by this final year of his first term, there were rivalries and factions dividing the party – it had been a contentious fight for them to re-select him as their nominee. The economy was bad. His wife Carrie had been sickly for a while. The whole matter of politics felt like a burden, especially for someone so sensitive to the crushing weight of responsibility. That summer, he felt like a prisoner.² In August, since his wife was recuperating at a lakeside retreat, Harrison had hoped to use a trip to see her as a rare chance to give campaign speeches along the way and back. That was the plan, at least. But then he got news of a cholera outbreak in New York. And he had to rush back to Washington to lead a decisive response to the disease. He took the extreme measure of ordering a quarantine of every ship inbound, effective immediately. In so doing, President Harrison averted an epidemic, although at the cost of both angering immigrant voters and losing control over his messaging.

Then came September. His wife at last got a diagnosis for what had been troubling her. Tuberculosis. They'd had no idea. And it was terminal. Suddenly, the campaign took a back seat to the domestic concerns of the First Family. And then, two weeks before Election Day, President Harrison watched First Lady Harrison take her last breath. And only the grace of God bore him up amidst his bereavement,³ as his father-in-law – a retired pastor who lived at the White House with them – ministered to him. Letters of consolation began to pour in,⁴ and he had to admit: by this point, he was “so removed from the campaign that [he could] scarcely realize that [he] was a candidate.”⁵ And yet the race seemed like it might still break his way.

Now here he was on the night of the election, and he felt somewhat at peace, untroubled by the outcome. If he won, well, he'd feel deeply gratified by the confidence of his country, and he'd serve them as best he could. He would gladly continue to pursue the policy objectives that had marked his first term, and believed that would be very beneficial to the country. He would hardly complain. But if he lost, he'd consider it a liberation from his burdens, a chance to set political life aside and pursue “retirement and relief from care.”⁶ On that night, perhaps he felt able to handle victory or defeat alike, whichever should come.

Well, it took a few days to piece together reports and discern the direction the election was headed that year. He found that, although he'd gotten a fine majority from our good state, and hadn't fallen too short in the popular vote overall, he'd only landed 145 votes in the Electoral College. With 277, Grover Cleveland would be moving back into the White House. Benjamin Harrison took it in stride. He said he felt “no personal disappointments or griefs” in his defeat.⁷ He was simply proud to be able to turn the reins of government over in what he thought had become “a high state of discipline and efficiency.”⁸ Later, less than a year before his death, he would go deeper still. Former president Benjamin Harrison would declare in a speech in New York City that “to the word of God and the church of Jesus Christ must we turn for the hope that men may be delivered from this consuming greed and selfishness.”⁹

The ancient Philippian Christians were proof enough of that power to deliver. For the Philippians had a habit, whenever they could, of sending gifts to the Apostle Paul – bundles of supporting goods and funds meant to aid him and empower his ministry (Philippians 4:10). Paul considers responding this time to be a delicate situation. He's certainly grateful, knowing that the Philippian church is choosing to share his pain (Philippians 4:14). But his gratitude is chiefly for their attitude. It's not the substance of the gift that Paul most values; here it really is the thought that counts (Philippians 4:17). Paul wants to make clear to them that he doesn't actually need the money, because he's gained an interesting ability: “Not that I am speaking of being in need, for I have learned in whatever situation I am to be content” (Philippians 4:11).

That word Paul uses there – our Bibles render it 'content,' which is fair. But it's a word taken from the world of Greek philosophy: autarkes. There were various versions of Greek and Roman philosophy – Epicureanism, Cynicism, Stoicism – which all used this word when talking about the way to live. They knew that life could be rough, just like Paul did. A few verses earlier, Paul sums up the human condition as living in “the body of our humiliation” (Philippians 3:20). And as Paul's writing this, he's sharing the city of Rome with a Stoic thinker named Seneca, who said basically the same thing: that a human goes through this world as “a decaying, feeble body repeatedly targeted by diseases.”¹⁰ But Seneca didn't think it was more than a person could handle, if they were wise. “The wise person,” Seneca said, “is a craftsman at mastering misfortune: pain, hunger, humiliation, prison, and exile are everywhere regarded with dread, but when they come up against him, they are gentled.”¹¹ “The wise man is self-sufficient for a happy existence...” And there, Seneca uses the Latin version of the word Paul uses: self-sufficient. “For a happy existence, he needs only a sound and upright soul,” Seneca adds.¹² “If he loses a hand through disease or war, or if some accident puts out one or both his eyes, he'll be satisfied with what's left, taking as much pleasure in his impaired and maimed body as he took when it was sound.”¹³ “Happy is the one who is self-sufficient in his present circumstances no matter what they are...”¹⁴ These philosophers taught that the best way to be like the gods they worshipped was to be totally self-sufficient, to be able to be totally content and happy in any set of circumstances, because we give up trying to control circumstances and pour all that focus into controlling our reactions – our reactions, they said, are the only thing we own and for which we're responsible. To be free like the gods, Epictetus said, means “to be able to be self-sufficient, to be able to commune with oneself.”¹⁵ They wanted to be able to float from situation to situation, living above being inwardly affected or determined by what was going on around them or happening to them from outside.

The Philippians knew these philosophies. And Paul has pilfered one of their words, though he has a surprise planned with it. But first, he's saying that he's reached the level of a Stoic wise man. He's got that contentment; he's got that self-sufficiency. Paul has given up all our human attempts to control his circumstances by emotionally blackmailing the world with his reactions. Whatever happens, Paul isn't going to be changed or pushed around by what happens. Paul knows how to deal with being deprived. Paul knows how to deal with being abundantly provided for, too. He can exceed as easily as he can lack, and he can lack as easily as he can exceed. He doesn't deliberately choose one or the other; he accepts he has no control, and sees challenges on both fronts. You've probably met people who lost something they wanted and therefore changed their outlook. You've probably also met people who gained something they wanted and therefore changed their outlook. One of Paul's early readers commented that “just as being in short supply prepares one to do much evil, so too does a surfeit. … Many people don't know how to face plenty.”¹⁶ And it's true!

What Paul is saying is that if the Philippians had sent no money to pay his room and board, he'd be fine, he'd be content with the outcome. He wouldn't think of himself as needy. He could be homeless and content. He could be in a rat-infested Roman prison and be content. He could be beaten and blinded and be content. But he could be equally content if he won the lottery, if he never missed a meal, if he moved into a mansion. Neither would change him. The one wouldn't harden and embitter him, the other wouldn't soften and pamper him. Nothing is about to disrupt the care Paul shows for his soul. He can maintain the same posture in feast or fallow, in abasement and abundance, in prosperity and poverty. How? He has “learned the secret” (Philippians 4:12).

That, at least, is how my Bible translates this one word Paul uses. It's a special word. It would've sounded very odd to the Philippians, I think. The Roman world was full of cults, secret societies, that we today categorize as mystery religions. If you lived in the Roman world, you were free to steer clear of them altogether, or maybe join one, or even join a few of them if you pleased – they weren't jealous. These were religions devoted to certain gods and their most dramatic myths. People allowed to join one would be initiated into it during deeply emotional secret rituals, where they'd be shown a variety of objects and told of their symbolism and the sacred story they pointed to. And this would bestow on the initiate a secret knowledge. One Roman writer after Paul's time tells us how at first, the group being initiated would crowd together “amid tumult and shouting and jostle against each other, but when the holy rituals are being performed and disclosed, the people are immediately attentive in awe and silence.”¹⁷ One mystery initiate described the experience by saying, “I approached the confines of death... and, carried through the elements, I returned. At midnight I saw the Sun shining in all his glory. I approached the gods below and the gods above, and I stood beside them, and I worshipped them.”¹⁸ But he couldn't get any clearer, because there'd be a harsh penalty. See, it was a death-penalty offense to break the oath of secrecy and reveal the mystery to non-initiates. “The details of the initiatory rite,” one Greek explained a century before Paul, “are guarded among the matters not to be divulged and are communicated to the initiates alone.”¹⁹ That's how these mystery religions worked. And we know that some, like the Eleusinian Mysteries and the rites of the Kabeiroi on Samothrace, had some popularity in Philippi.

The word Paul uses here – “I-learned-the-secret” – is the Greek word for being initiated into a mystery religion and being exposed to that mystery, to that cultic revelation, learning the deep occult knowledge at the heart of it all. Paul has approached the confines of death (in baptism) and returned. In the darkness of his prisons, he has seen the Son of God shining in all his glory. He has approached the God who walked on earth below, the God who reigns in heaven above – the one and only God. And now Paul proclaims openly the mystery of the grand manifestation of Christ in us, in the church, in the hearts and souls of the faithful. It's this insider-knowledge, this cultic revelation, that empowers Paul's true self-sufficiency, his true contentment, of which all philosophies are at best a pale and insufficient imitation. Attend in awe and silence to the disclosure of the sacred mystery!

For the shout of the mystery is this: “I am able for all in the One who empowers me” (Philippians 4:13). That's the more literal version of the verse we all know, how “I can do all things through Christ who strengthens me.” It's a very misused verse. We tend to misuse it in a triumphalist way, as if Christ lets us accomplish whatever we set our mind to. That's not what Paul's saying here. It isn't about what Paul can do or accomplish; the word 'do' is actually something he deliberately avoids here. It's about what he can face, what he can cope with, what he can handle. And his focus is on himself onto the extent that he's an example. What Paul is saying is that Christ's empowerment, Christ's own strength, is the heart of the secret, the heart of the mystery. And through this mystery, the mystery of Christ in us, Paul can endure and thrive amid any possible circumstances, without it deforming his character or warping his attitude. Paul can go broke, and it won't change him, not even a little. Paul can win the lottery, and it won't change him, not even a little. This mystery has taken him so far above his circumstances as to render them practically irrelevant for what's happening on the inside. And that isn't about how tough Paul is, or how resilient Paul is, or how sophisticated Paul is, or how experienced Paul is, or how disciplined Paul is. It's about Jesus Christ. The mystery is that the best 'self-sufficiency' is Christ-sufficiency.

See, where Seneca says that the wise person “has placed everything in himself,”²⁰ Paul knows that the only way to do that is to put Christ in yourself, and then you've got everything. Paul's 'independence' from circumstances stems from his dependence on the Christ who moved into his heart. True freedom for the soul comes from being tethered and anchored to the indwelling Christ, being bound ever more tightly to him and thus less able to get knocked back and forth by the wind and waves of the world. Real wisdom is letting the Carpenter from Nazareth be the craftsman of mastering your misfortune and fortune alike, and having him do it from the inside. Hence, Paul does have everything necessary for the blessed life within his soul, but only because his soul first got hollowed out and filled with the invading presence of the God of crucifixion and resurrection, the God of bleeding flesh and radiant scars, who gave and reclaimed his own divine life to be all the soundness and all the uprightness of our souls.

So if Paul gets thrown in jail, his contentment is to be full of Jesus, and he's totally confident that Jesus living in him will be sufficient for the challenge of living well in jail, hungry and poor, finding a way to serve. And if Paul gets set free with lavish gifts and a fortune, his contentment is still to be full of Jesus, and he's totally confident that Jesus living in him will be sufficient for the challenge of living well in the wild with a full belly and full pockets, finding a way to serve. Whatever the case, Christ is the generator installed in the core of Paul's soul; and the power Christ generates and supplies is what fuels his response to any situation, including his inner reactions. To imitate the gods of Greece and Rome, like the old philosophers sought, is too low for Paul to aim. To have the power of Christ unleashed within him, handling the challenge in each circumstance, is vastly more freeing. Initiation into the mystery, for Paul, has meant not only the installation of Christ as his generator, but the hooking up of every wire, every cable, every reflex, to him.

And since Paul just finished telling the Philippians (and us) to practice anything and everything that we've heard and seen in his life (Philippians 4:9), Paul must want us to be wired like he is. Paul wants to initiate us into the same all-powerful mystery. It isn't just for apostles and prophets. It isn't just for elites and philosophers. The same fuel cell, the same generator, has been installed in the core of your soul, too.

What does that mean for our lives? I'd like to quickly run over three things. First, political situations. Think of Benjamin Harrison, and how prepared he was for either outcome, ready to handle it with graciousness. Now think of where we are today. This week, with voter participation as high as 1892's was low, in a seemingly neck-and-neck race, things have been wild. Maybe you've ignored the news, or maybe you've watched it like a hawk. Maybe you just don't care, or maybe you have passionate feelings about the electoral process we've seen. Now, barring any forthcoming surprises, most media outlets have called the race, having discerned the direction the election has gone. And maybe that outcome has you elated and hopeful about the country's future. Maybe that outcome has you saddened, concerned, worried, or even angry. Maybe it just has you feeling sick and tired of it all. But learn the secret! Be initiated into the mystery of Christ-sufficiency! Whatever has happened, and whatever's going to happen, you are able to face it undaunted and unchanged in the One who empowers you. If the next four years bring prosperity, abundance, and success – if good decisions are made, if foolish and evil policies are revoked and reversed, if the nation benefits – then Christ is sufficient for you to handle that. If the next four years bring abasement, hunger, and need – if bad decisions are made, if foolish and evil policies are enacted, if the nation decays – then Christ is sufficient for you to handle that, too. If we're initiated into the mystery, we will not be changed when the Oval Office is restocked with personnel, we will not be changed by the changing culture; we will face everything with grace.

Second, the pandemic. It's not quite a year since the first human cases were identified in China. It's been less since it reached our shores and became epidemic here. But when President Harrison talked about how four years could feel like ten, we know what he means. We want it to go away, we want badly for this to be over and done with, and we've heard so many different projections of what might happen next. The uncertainty has been challenging. But learn the secret! Be initiated into the mystery of Christ-sufficiency! If you wake up tomorrow morning and the cases have plummeted, if the virus crumbles and disappears, if we get to run out into the streets and throw our arms around our neighbors unafraid by the end of the week – that will be an adjustment from what we've gone through, it might tempt some of us to pride, but Christ is sufficient for you to handle that and not be inwardly pushed around by the outward circumstance. And if the worst projections come true, if we have to wear these masks for years ahead, if the vaccine tarries and the virus makes itself at home – then Christ is sufficient for you to handle that, too. You are able to put up with a prolonged pandemic through the One who empowers you from the inside out, the one into whose mysteries you've been initiated.

Third, our personal lives. We've endured a number of things in the recent life of our church family. We've seen some new faces become more and more regular – praise God, Christ is sufficient to steer us away from pride or from jealousy. We've noticed the absence of familiar faces that are increasingly homebound – but Christ is sufficient to steer us away from hurt or abandonment. We've lost a beloved brother, pastor, and friend – Christ is sufficient to console us 'til we see him again. We've entered financially tighter times – but Christ is sufficient to face our tightness and our lack as if it were an abundance. We're weary and staring down the long grind – but Christ is sufficient for each day and each hour, unwavering, unchanged.

Some of us, or our friends and family, are dealing with a cancer diagnosis, or awaiting results. For cancer or a stroke or any disease, Christ is sufficient – it can touch the body, but the soul has a power all of Christ. Others are going into remission or into recovery – and for that too, Christ is sufficient – he can redirect our joy to what's more ultimate, remission from guilt now, remission from death itself at his coming, when our heaven-sent Savior comes to transform the body of our humiliation to be like his body of glory (cf. Philippians 3:20-21). Some of us are suffering from dementia, or carrying the care of a loved one who is. For dementia and all afflictions of mental health, and for the burdens of those who provide care, Christ is sufficient – he can power the soul to stay unchanged when the mind ails, he can power the soul to bear up beneath the heaviness, his love can bloom where all is darkness and fragmentation.

Some of us are dealing with plans falling through – things we thought we'd be doing right now that can't happen, opportunities stolen, hopeful intentions thwarted. And for all those, Christ is sufficient – he can enrich the soul as fully in the fallow as in the feast. Some of us are prospering, all is going well – and Christ is equally sufficient for that, able to keep us as steady in the surfeit as in the shortage. In whatever we face, we can learn to be fueled by the sufficiency of Christ from within. And while we'll still feel what happens to us, the mystery unveiled in us will suffice to power us through.

Over a century after Paul, there was a man who, once an initiate of various mystery religions and a practitioner of high philosophy, went on a journey through the regions of the world – and, in each place, found the witness of Christ. Initiated into Christ by baptism and enlightened by the gift of the Holy Spirit, he found the sufficiency that no other mystery ever gave him. And he celebrated by saying:

O truly sacred mysteries! O pure light! In the blaze of the torches I have a vision of heaven and of God. I become holy by initiation. The Lord reveals the mysteries. He marks the worshipper with his seal, gives light to guide his way, and commends him, when he's believed, to the Father's care, where he's guarded for ages to come. These are the revels of my mysteries! If you're willing, be initiated yourself too, and you'll dance with angels around the Unbegotten and Imperishable and Only True God, with the Word of God joining us in our hymn of praise.²¹

For Christ, the Mystery of the Word come close to our flesh, the One who empowers his initiates, is sufficient to make you able – able to face whatever comes. Through this mystery, it can remain very well indeed with your soul. Thanks be to God! Amen.

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1  Benjamin Harrison, letter to S. N. Chambers of Indianapolis, Indiana, dated 19 November 1892.  This and other quotations from President Harrison's correspondence courtesy of the Library of Congress' Benjamin Harrison Papers digital collection at <https://www.loc.gov/collections/benjamin-harrison-papers/>.

2  Benjamin Harrison, letter to W. O. Bradley of Lancaster, Kentucky, dated 16 November 1892.

3  Benjamin Harrison, Thanksgiving proclamation, 4 November 1892, in Public Papers and Addresses of Benjamin Harrison (Washington DC: Government Printing Office, 1893), 242: “He has given His grace to the sorrowing.”

4  See, e.g., R. H. Hollyday, letter to Benjamin Harrison, dated 4 November 1892; John Newell, letter to Benjamin Harrison, dated 7 November 1892; John J. Ridgway, letter to Benjamin Harrison, dated 9 November 1892.

5  Benjamin Harrison, letter to W. O. Bradley of Lancaster, Kentucky, dated 16 November 1892.

6  Benjamin Harrison, letter to Clem Studebaker of South Bend, Indiana, dated 16 November 1892.

7  Benjamin Harrison, letter to Gilbert A. Pierce of Minneapolis, Minnesota, dated 16 November 1892.

8  Benjamin Harrison, letter to John B. Allen of Walla Walla, Washington, dated 19 November 1892.

9  Benjamin Harrison, speech given on 21 April 1900, in Ecumenical Missionary Conference: New York, 1900 (New York: American Tract Society, 1900), 1:45.

10  Lucius Annaeus Seneca, Consolation to Marcia 11.1, in Seneca: Hardship and Happiness, Complete Works of Lucius Annaeus Seneca (University of Chicago Press, 2014), 16.

11  Lucius Annaeus Seneca, Moral Letters to Lucilius 85.41, in Seneca: Selected Philosophical Letters (Oxford University Press, 2007), 47.  See also older translation in Loeb Classical Library 76:309-311 and newer translation in Seneca: Letters on Ethics to Lucilius, Complete Works of Lucius Annaeus Seneca (University of Chicago Press, 2015), 295.

12  Lucius Annaeus Seneca, Moral Letters to Lucilius 9.13, in Loeb Classical Library 75:51.  See also newer translation in Seneca: Letters on Ethics to Lucilius, Complete Works of Lucius Annaeus Seneca (University of Chicago Press, 2015), 42.

13  Lucius Annaeus Seneca, Moral Letters to Lucilius 9.4, in Loeb Classical Library 75:45.  See also newer translation in Seneca: Letters on Ethics to Lucilius, Complete Works of Lucius Annaeus Seneca (University of Chicago Press, 2015), 40.

14  Lucius Annaeus Seneca, On the Happy Life 6.2, in Seneca: Hardship and Happiness, Complete Works of Lucius Annaeus Seneca (University of Chicago Press, 2014), 245.

15  Epictetus, Discourses 1.12.33-35, in Loeb Classical Library 131:97-99; idem., Discourses 3.13.6, in Loeb Classical Library 218:89.

16  John Chrysostom, Homilies on Philippians 16, in Writings of the Greco-Roman World 16:301.

17  Plutarch of Chaeronea, Moralia 81d, excerpted in Marvin W. Meyer, ed., The Ancient Mysteries: A Sourcebook of Sacred Texts (University of Pennsylvania Press, 1999 [1987]), 38.

18  Apuleius of Madauros, Metamorphoses, or, The Golden Ass 11.23, excerpted in Marvin W. Meyer, ed., The Ancient Mysteries: A Sourcebook of Sacred Texts (University of Pennsylvania Press, 1999 [1987]), 189.

19  Diodorus Siculus, Library of History 5.49.5, excerpted in Marvin W. Meyer, ed., The Ancient Mysteries: A Sourcebook of Sacred Texts (University of Pennsylvania Press, 1999 [1987]), 41.

20  Lucius Annaeus Seneca, On the Constancy of the Wise Person 5.4, in Seneca: Hardship and Happiness, Complete Works of Lucius Annaeus Seneca (University of Chicago Press, 2014), 153.

21  Clement of Alexandria, Protrepticus 12, in Loeb Classical Library 92:257.  Modernized.