Transcribed by Beluga AI.
If you could turn your Bible to Philippians 4. I’ll just read two verses, Philippians 4:6-7.
6 do not be anxious about anything, but in everything by prayer and supplication with thanksgiving let your requests be made known to God. 7 And the peace of God, which surpasses all understanding, will guard your hearts and your minds in Christ Jesus. (Philippians 4:6-7, ESV)
Okay, let’s pray.
Lord, we so desperately want to have this peace. We have it in moments, but it escapes us in large portions of each day. Lord, we want this peace. We want this abiding peace that transcends all understanding. We know it only comes from Jesus.
So, Lord, we ask that you teach us how we can abide in this peace and live from this peace with you, now and forever. Thank you, Lord. We pray that you meet us. We open up our hearts wide. We pray that Jesus, as our Shepherd, you would speak, and as sheep, we would hear the Shepherd’s voice. Thank you, Lord. In Jesus’ Name we pray, Amen.
Anybody here stressed? Anybody here stressed? Yes, one. One honest person. Sister Janet’s honest. Sophia, Tim. Anybody else feeling stressed with life? Only Jim’s kids. Nobody else. Okay, Ezra? Okay. All right, Ezra. Thank you for being honest. Thank you. Thank you. Thank you for being honest.
Yes, we have some college graduates. Their future is unknown. A little potential stress, I might not show it, but I am stressed. I am stressed quite often.
Last week, which is related to stress, we said from 2 Timothy 1:7, For God gave us a spirit not of fear, but of power and love and self-control.
7 for God gave us a spirit not of fear but of power and love and self-control. (2 Timothy 1:7, ESV)
So fear and anxiety, stress is somewhat related. And if you are fearful, if you are stressed, one thing we know clearly is it’s not from the Lord. It’s not from the Lord. So if we’re feeling this, there’s something that we need to deal with. And we cannot live in stress. We cannot live in fear. And how do we deal with this?
2 Corinthians 10. I’ll just share this, not the main point, but I just wanted to wrap up the point from last Sunday.
2 Corinthians 10:3.
3 For though we walk in the flesh, we are not waging war according to the flesh. 4 For the weapons of our warfare are not of the flesh but have divine power to destroy strongholds. 5 We destroy arguments and every lofty opinion raised against the knowledge of God, and take every thought captive to obey Christ, 6 being ready to punish every disobedience, when your obedience is complete. (2 Corinthians 10:3-6, ESV)
And so if we understand that this fear is not from God, we know where does it come from. It’s obviously if it’s not from God, it’s from the other side, from the other camp, from Satan, from unclean spirits. All of the fear is originating from them.
And that’s why in Corinthians, we are to wage a spiritual battle.
And so when thoughts arise of fear, like I’m afraid, I’m shrinking back, I’m anxious, I’m stressed, the first thing we can do is we wage a spiritual battle. And we say, first we repent. I listen to the enemy. I allowed myself to be afraid. It’s not from God. I allowed myself to be afraid.
And we wage a spiritual battle. And this is how we do it. We say, I declare that I’m a child of God. Satan, you have no hold of me. I’m not afraid of you. Leave now. Leave now.
And that’s how we wage a spiritual battle. I just wanted to wrap that up from last week.
This week, I do want to talk about stress and the peace that only Jesus can give. We want to lift up all of our needs to God, and we want to thank him for all that he has already done and receive the peace that only Jesus can give.
The reason for my stress is just my need to be productive. Plus, I’m in an IT field, and so part of my job is putting out fires.
I remember when I was working for a software company before I was ordained. It was a small, 30-40 person company with a very limited budget, and so they didn’t have backups.
And this is a software company. The source code is on a single server with no backups. It was chugging along for a while, but I was warning the CEO, we need to assign a budget for this.
This is a serious thing that we don’t have a backup of this most critical server. Because if this server is lost, then their whole history and source code and everything is lost, and the company will immediately go bankrupt.
And so despite my warnings, they didn’t want to put a budget for that. They’re just barely scraping by. And around Christmas one year, I don’t remember the year, maybe 2005, 2006, the server crashed, and I remember panicking.
And so back then, there’s no AI. The Internet had just barely come online. YouTube had barely come online.
So you could Google. But there’s no answers, there’s no AI to quickly give you the answer. And just a little plug, we all want to learn a little bit of AI because AI just will reduce your stress because things that you really could not figure out before, in a very short time you have the answer. And so just use that to reduce your stress. But in any case, back then there was no AI, barely there was Internet.
And so for 50 hours straight, I was on tech support with Microsoft trying to get this server online. I didn’t sleep, I didn’t eat. 50 hours straight. It just comes with the territory.
When there is an IT emergency, then everything’s on the line, and it’s kind of like you got to put out the fire. And so in my career, I’ve just always dealt with stress. When a customer calls and the website is down, it’s like there’s stress. When the server is down, there’s stress.
And so it’s just part of when you’re in certain fields. Stress is just part of what you have to deal with on an everyday basis.
I was just right before coming here on Sunday. I just went through my Asana task list. Asana is a project manager software quite popular in the corporate space, and it does a lot of task management. Of course, Gmail. I also use Gmail tasks. Every time I open up my email, my tasks are just shouting at me to take care of these things, and I keep ignoring it.
And so I just added up all the Asana and Gmail tasks, and I have 220. No wonder I feel stressed. I feel buried under these tasks. Some of these tasks are one little line, but I’m avoiding it because I understand if I try to tackle that task, it’s going to take hours, days, possibly weeks. And so I just want to avoid that one.
Some tasks I have to do every week, some every day, some every month just to keep the company afloat. And I feel good.
I check it and it disappears, but it’s a recurring task and it immediately, within seconds, it reappears and the date is just pushed back.
So out of this 220 tasks, probably a good percentage of them are recurring tasks. So they will actually never disappear, they will never go away.
And yet God’s word says Philippians 4:6, do not be anxious about anything.
6 do not be anxious about anything, but in everything by prayer and supplication with thanksgiving let your requests be made known to God. (Philippians 4:6, ESV)
So I want to wrestle with this stress that we all feel. We feel stressed because of work, we feel stressed because of school.
Some of you are stressed because you have a job that you, you’re about to graduate, and you’re wondering, are you going to be able to pay the bills?
Some of the kids here. You are trying as a high school student to go for the school of your dreams. And that’s a stressful thing, especially if you’re an Asian. Especially an Asian male in California. Really stressful.
I don’t envy you because it is a tough, tough road that you’re on, and it’s not fair. But. But that’s a lot that we have. It is a stressful thing.
As a high schooler looking forward to their college, it is a stressful thing. There are some athletes here competing in competitive soccer, competitive swimming, competitive basketball. It is stressful watching the game. I can just say things to my sons after the game, like, why didn’t you do this? Why didn’t you do this? Don’t you see that play? Don’t you? I could just say this, but if I’m in there, I know it’s so much more stressful.
You know, it’s easy for me as a father to coach because I see all the things. I understand the strategy. But to be in there in the stressful situation with people that are a foot taller, 50 pounds heavier, it is a stressful, stressful thing.
So how do we? How do we deal with all of the stress? When God’s word says, Philippians 4:6, do not be anxious about anything. The word for anxious is you’re concerned about the necessities of life. We all have bills to pay. We all have food that we want to provide.
We all have family that we want to provide for. And so there are necessities. We have to take care of them.
On top of that is future uncertainties. Given the political instability in our society and around the world, you see, like, the situation in Korea. It’s like their president has been put in jail. It’s like there is instability all around the world. And the future, it seems uncertain.
I don’t remember feeling this way when I was graduating from high school in 19. I don’t remember feeling, like, uncertain.
You guys feel so much more uncertainty in our world. The fact that there was Covid not too long ago, that the whole world could be shut down, that has never happened in hundreds of years in the history of this country.
And yet it happened in your lifetime. And if that can happen, that uncertainty, that any moment my life can be just turned off and shut down, and I will have to leave school and just shelter at home out of fear.
The fact that this stuff happened in our recent memory, I can understand why there’s just a lot of fears. Uncertainty about the future. And all of this, what it does, it distracts us. And this word for anxiety, it distracts us. It pulls us from one task, one need, one anxiety to another.
And you just feel like you’re pulled. And then you try to focus and pray, and you just can’t because you sit there for a minute and your to-do list is calling out. The future. Uncertainty is calling out the fears. Anxieties crowd in.
On top of all of this is your phone. And we just can’t be still, like endless distractions coming from this device right in the palm of your hand, in your pocket.
And so, as a Christian, we need to learn how to put this away. We need to learn how to be still before the Lord. We need to learn how to just have some quiet.
How do we do this? How do we get this peace? Anxiety? We know stress, we know fear. We know how do we get this peace? We know the answer is Jesus.
It’s his peace. But how do we get there? There’s a mysterious transition that needs to happen. And I’m trying my best to learn, okay, from anxiety, stress, fear to peace. No anxiety word. This middle transition where we. We come before the Lord.
How do we get this peace and remain and abide in this peace? First thing is we just unload our hearts. It says Philippians 4:6. We let our requests be known to God.
6 do not be anxious about anything, but in everything by prayer and supplication with thanksgiving let your requests be made known to God. (Philippians 4:6, ESV)
The to-do list, we just kind of unload it. Just make them known.
God knows you have them, but just the fact that you’re bringing it to the Lord Jesus and unloading, that is a good thing.
We need to make the requests known. He knows them. But it is for our benefit that we make our requests known. We’re releasing burdens. So that’s the first step. We make our requests known. But that’s not enough. Because as soon as you make the request known, you say in Jesus’ Name. Again, you say, in Jesus’ Name, Amen. And then you start your day. And then the to-do list is there.
The fear of the future is there. The uncertainty is there. So how do we remain at peace in the midst of all of this anxiety, stress, future uncertainty?
In Philippians 4:11,
11 Not that I am speaking of being in need, for I have learned in whatever situation I am to be content. 12 I know how to be brought low, and I know how to abound. In any and every circumstance, I have learned the secret of facing plenty and hunger, abundance and need. 13 I can do all things through him who strengthens me. (Philippians 4:11-13, ESV)
So here Paul is starting to unpack a little bit more of his prayer life and the secret of his contentment. And he’s talking here about finances, which is one of the big reasons for our stress. In our world, even if you have enough, it just never feels like it’s enough.
And Paul is saying, I know what it means to be hungry and to really be lacking in food. I understand that. I also have seasons where there was abundance. Like I lived in Lydia’s house.
She was a rich businesswoman. I was ministering there for a season, and all of my needs were just supplied by this generous businesswoman. I was well taken care of, and I was just preaching the Word of God.
So he. He has seasons where he lacked a lot. He was in deep and desperate financial need. He also had periods where everything was taken care of. He had an abundance.
And Paul is saying the secret is this final verse. I can do all things through him who strengthens me.
13 I can do all things through him who strengthens me. (Philippians 4:13, ESV)
Athletes love to quote this verse.
I think Steph Curry writes it on his sneakers because of Jesus. I can make a half court shot. I can make three point shots. That’s how athletes like to take this. But simply, that’s not the way we’re supposed to apply it.
The actual literal translation of Philippians 4:13. For all things, I have strength in the One strengthening me. For all things, I have strength in the One strengthening me. So where did this strength come from to face lack and plenty, hunger and abundance? Where does that strength come from? It comes from Jesus Christ.
And it is his strength we’re leaning upon. And his strength comes into us. And so even before I come up here to preach, I know I don’t have much strength. But I asked Jesus, please strengthen me so that I can represent you well, so that they can preach for you well, please strengthen me for all things. I have strength not in myself. I have strength in the One who strengthens me. I am strong when I am weak. God’s strength is perfected in our weakness. So we’re not relying upon our skills and our effort.
We’re not straining and saying, I can do this. No, we can do it. We can face seasons of lack and not be stressed, but we can face seasons of lack. When Jesus is there and he’s strengthening us, we’re finding strength in the one Jesus who strengthens me.
Why do we need to face to be strengthened by Jesus, his divine help to face hunger and need? I think that’s a little obvious. We need that because.
Because we’re going to be tempted to collapse under the pressure and the stress that I don’t have money to pay food and put food on the table, that is very stressful.
And so we understand in those times we need divine strength from Jesus. We also need divine strength in abundance so that we don’t become led into complacency and pride and self-sufficiency.
This also requires strength so that we remain steadfast. Our faith in Jesus strong in prosperity and also in lack. It requires strength from Jesus Christ. And the promise is given here.
Philippians 4:7.
7 And the peace of God, which surpasses all understanding, will guard your hearts and your minds in Christ Jesus. (Philippians 4:7, ESV)
So we hear the promise, the peace is given, and Jesus himself will guard you with His strength.
And so my question is, how do we keep it? Like we have the peace in the prayer, but as soon as we say, in Jesus’ Name, Amen, and we rush off into our day, do we? Can we hold on to this peace? How do we hold on to it?
Isaiah 26:3.
3 You keep him in perfect peace whose mind is stayed on you, because he trusts in you. (Isaiah 26:3, ESV)
How do you keep a mind that is focused on Jesus, that is stayed on Jesus? How do we do this? How do we express our trust in Jesus consistently so that his peace consistently flows?
John 14:27.
27 Peace I leave with you; my peace I give to you. Not as the world gives do I give to you. Let not your hearts be troubled, neither let them be afraid. (John 14:27, ESV)
Jesus is leaving peace to the disciples who are afraid that he’s about to leave them. How do we hold on and keep holding on to this peace, so that no fear can grab hold of us, so that we’re not anxious and stressed?
Colossians 3:15.
15 And let the peace of Christ rule in your hearts, to which indeed you were called in one body. And be thankful. (Colossians 3:15, ESV)
And there is the clue. May the peace of Christ rule in your hearts. And this is what we are called to in one body and be thankful. Thanksgiving is the key. If anxiety causes us to be split and pulled into pieces, distracted and stressed and even fearful, the peace of Christ does the complete opposite. It brings together a focus. You become one whole person.
And when you see a person at peace, you can tell right away, just being in their presence, you feel calm because that person, their mind is sound, their demeanor is peaceful, they’re just shining brightly. And it’s a very calming presence.
When you’re around somebody who is anxious and stressed, you feel it.
And in their presence you also feel anxious and stressed and fearful. It’s just. It’s just an aroma that gets expressed. You don’t even have to say it, you just feel it in that person’s presence.
And in the presence of Jesus. He brings wholeness, a sound mind. Not anxious, not stressed, not fearful, not worried, but at peace, at rest.
The key, in my opinion, is we need to do this, all this prayer, this life, with thanksgiving. Colossians 3:15.
15 And let the peace of Christ rule in your hearts, to which indeed you were called in one body. And be thankful. (Colossians 3:15, ESV)
It also was there in Philippians 4. We already read it, but let me read it again. Philippians 4:6. But in everything, by prayer and supplication, with thanksgiving, lift up all your burdens, all your requests, make them known. But do this with thanksgiving.
Thanksgiving is key. Thanksgiving is key because anxiety and worry is. You focus on the one thing you’re lacking and that becomes everything, all-consuming. And that splits you and distracts you and causes and actually pulls you away from Christ, that worry.
Because if you’re with Christ, and he is the one, the Prince of Peace, you won’t worry. You won’t be stressed.
So the fact that there is worry is stress, means all throughout the day, we’re pulling away from Christ, we’re pulling away from Christ in his presence. His peace is there, his peace flows in.
That’s why you have it in prayer, because you’re communing.
But as soon as you stop praying and you say, in Jesus’ Name, Amen, the worries come in, the stress comes in, the fears come in, and you let go of Christ. You become split and separated from Christ and divided in your heart and distracted in your heart.
And it’s because we’re focusing on the one major emergency. At any given time, we all have at least one, probably a dozen, and we focus on this thing. My school, my work, my kids, my sports competition. There’s something in our hearts that is all consuming.
Whether it’s one thing, it’s all-consuming. Whether it’s 10 things, okay, you’re split in 10 different ways, but it’s all-consuming, and you’re departing from Christ, you’re separating from Christ.
So how do we reconnect? Instead of focusing on the one thing you’re missing, the one thing they’re lacking, the one thing that stresses you out, the 1 or 10 or 12 things or 20 things on your to-do list that are causing you to be afraid or annoyed, why don’t we focus on the hundreds of things that we can be thankful for, for every one thing.
We give a request to God. I need this.
May we give a hundred thank yous to the Lord not for what he will do, but already for what he has already done. If you’re a Christian, he’s already saved you. He doesn’t owe you anything after that.
If not a single prayer from the rest of your life is ever answered, you still have enough to give Thanksgiving for the rest of your life. And if you live that way, you will be at peace. You focus on the one thing he’s done for you.
But of course, he hasn’t done just one thing for you. If you’re married, he’s blessed you with a spouse. If you have children, he’s blessed you with children. If you have clothing, he’s blessed you with the financial means to buy clothing.
He’s blessed you with a family who is blessing you with the clothing, with the food, with the shelter, instead of focusing on a few items that we’re just desperately asking the Lord that we need.
And if you really inspect the list, I bet a lot of the things on the list are not things we need because our needs are covered.
A lot of things on our list are things that are maybe closer to our greed. Like, it’s not enough that Elijah’s in a competitive basketball league now. It’s like, no, no, now he has to be a starter on the, on the basketball team. And then it’s not enough that he’s a starter. He has to be one of the best ones on the team.
Before, I’m just thankful he made it, right? I’m just thankful. Oh, oh. He made it on this competitive league. It’s great. This is varsity level sport. It’s great he can be on the bench. I’m happy now that he made the team.
Why is he on the bench? He’s good enough. He should be a starter. Now that he’s a starter, why are all these ball hogs never passing? Why does Elijah keep passing to the ball hogs? Why don’t you hold on to it?
And you see, all of this is just coming out of my grand.
And it just annoys me. Should I live in annoyance or should I live in gratitude? Thank you, Lord. Thank you, Lord. My son, he made it. Thank you, Lord. He didn’t even need basketball, but thank you, Lord. You thought he needed it. Thank you, Lord. You took care of it.
And just imagine if I’m just grateful instead of yelling from the sideline, stop hogging the ball. Pass the ball. I’m like, I’m yelling at Elijah’s teammates, like, just stop shooting. Give it to somebody else. And I’m thinking about my son, like, give it to Elijah.
It’s just my greed, just my greed. And this, this anxiety, this stress, this greed, it causes us to be annoyed.
And this emotional annoyance is the opposite of somebody at peace who’s thankful. you’re just always annoyed. you’re always irritable because too many things that you want, and it’s just, just so much greed.
And am I communicating the total opposite of a Christ follower? And how do we get there? How do we become a person of peace? We need to.
For every one thing you ask for, why don’t we start with just 10 things to give thanks? That’s something practical.
And then may that one thing that you need, that you ask for, you make your request known. But with Thanksgiving, all the things he’s already given to you, ten things become twenty things, thirty things, a hundred things.
The more thankful you are, the more thankful you’ll become. And your prayer will be filled less and less with, I need this, I need this. I’m greedy.
I need more and more and more. It will be, Lord, thank you. Thank you. You release your needs, you release all the greed. You repent. I’m sorry, I’m being greedy again, Lord. Sorry, Lord, I’m being annoyed again, Lord. Sorry, this emotion keeps coming out. Sorry I keep disconnecting you from Jesus. I’m coming to you again.
Gratitude is an easy way to stay close to Jesus because maybe your prayer request of praise and adoration and giving your request, maybe after five minutes you just run out of things to say.
But once the floodgates of thanksgiving start flowing from you, I think it will become an avalanche. And 10 things easily will become a hundred things.
And think of from the Heavenly Father’s perspective. You have thankful children who really trust in Jesus, his son. Think of how pleasing of a person will become in the Father’s eyes, like as, as earthly fathers when, when your children are demanding and ungrateful, it just, it just doesn’t feel good. But your kid says thank you even once without being prompted.
It just makes you want to bless them even more because they’re thankful. And so, as children of God, think of how overjoyed the Heavenly Father will be that instead of asking for 100 things that we need maybe 10% we need, 90% is greed we flipped it and we offered our request.
And that request list became shorter and shorter, and our Thanksgiving list became longer and longer. That is how we learn to stay close to Christ and allow his peace to flow in. Think of how different God would receive us.
And I want to just end with Luke 10, the story of Martha and Mary. You can read it on your own. It’s in verses 38 to 42, but it says that Martha is distracted. That means she’s being pulled away from that which is truly important.
And we get distracted by things that are actually not that important. It doesn’t mean we don’t have to do them. But when Jesus is there at your house, Mary is doing what’s right. She’s putting away her phone, she’s putting away her service.
When you’re in the presence of Jesus, you need to give him your undivided attention and not be distracted.
So we need to learn how to deal with distraction and to be in the Lord’s presence.
So the things we need to take care of, it’s. Some are warranted, of course. We need to stay on top of our school. We need to show up at work. There are things we need to do. But there are times we need to put this distraction aside and be in his presence.
And then he says, you’re anxious and troubled. It’s the same word. you’re being pulled in different directions, and you’re being troubled, meaning you’re agitated.
Think of if you have your to-do list and like all the kitchen items and the food that you have to give to the people. Think of all that list. And you’re so stressed, you’re so agitated, you’re so annoyed at your younger sister. Why isn’t she helping me?
Think of the emotional state. She’s pulling away from Jesus, even though Jesus is in the next door room. She’s pulling away. Think of the emotional state of agitation.
She’s pulling away from Jesus. She’s anxious, she’s troubled. She’s the epitome of what we’ve been talking about.
Mary, she’s learned to stay close to Jesus, put distraction aside, all the gaze of her older sister, all the people who are expecting her to serve. She puts all of that aside. She knows when it’s time. Time to focus.
How do we do this? We need to make our requests known to God. That’s fine. Bring our needs before the Lord, but increase your thanksgiving to me.
That’s practically the way that we can have more and more peace of Christ.
Okay, let’s pray.
Father, forgive us for allowing us ourselves to be anxious and troubled, distracted and annoyed, stressed and agitated. If we’re honest, this is the emotional state in which we do life aside from a few moments of prayer. No wonder this peace eludes us. No wonder we don’t stay in this state of perpetual peace that only comes from Christ.
Lord, practically, we want to give thanksgiving to you more than we ask for things. We want our thanksgiving list to grow more and more. We want to sow thanks. This is how we can stay at peace.
Thank you for Your Body that was broken for us and Your Blood that was shed. We pray that you minister to us as we close out this service. Thank you, Lord. In Jesus’ Name we pray, Amen.