What Matters
Philippians 4:1-9
Therefore, my brothers and sisters, whom I love and long for, my joy and crown, stand firm in the Lord in this way, my beloved.
I urge Euodia and I urge Syntyche to be of the same mind in the Lord. Yes, and I ask you also, my loyal companion, help these women, for they have struggled beside me in the work of the gospel, together with Clement and the rest of my co-workers, whose names are in the book of life.
Rejoice in the Lord always; again I will say, Rejoice. Let your gentleness be known to everyone. The Lord is near. Do not worry about anything, but in everything by prayer and supplication with thanksgiving let your requests be made known to God. And the peace of God, which surpasses all understanding, will guard your hearts and your minds in Christ Jesus.
Finally, beloved, whatever is true, whatever is honourable, whatever is just, whatever is pure, whatever is pleasing, whatever is commendable, if there is any excellence and if there is anything worthy of praise, think about these things. Keep on doing the things that you have learned and received and heard and seen in me, and the God of peace will be with you.
This is our final scripture reading of our series on the Philippians before we move on to Paul’s letters to the Thessalonians, and this is the passage in which it’s clear we’re missing the juiciest parts of what actually went down. Remember, this is a letter, and we’re only getting one side of a dialogue here. As we’ve talked about over these past few weeks, Paul is writing from prison to his friends in Philippi. Throughout this short letter, he’s been making it clear that they must really think about what’s important in life, as Christians; that they must work to make God’s unconditional grace really work in this broken world; and, most importantly, they must lift each other up to work as one mind, as one body in Christ.
In this final chapter of the letter, we finally (kind of) learn what’s prompted this letter writing in the first place. Apparently there’s some big disagreement happening between two local church leaders, Euodia and Syntyche. But we don’t know what the disagreement’s about! And we’ll never know! We don’t have the letters from Philippi to Paul to tell us, and Paul never addresses it directly. Whatever the disagreement is, though, we can assume it was probably a pretty big one if Paul is taking time from prison to address it. We can also infer that clearly women don’t belong in church leadership if they’re just going to be letting their emotions get the better of them, and arguing all the time. Kidding. Of course. What we can actually assume from this passage is that Paul holds these two in very high esteem. “Help these women,” he writes, “for they have struggled beside me in the work of the gospel…” Paul is putting them on equal footing with himself. They have all worked together to spread the Good News, to build up this blossoming church. So he’s not calling these women out by name to scold or shame them; but rather, he’s making it clear that church leaders are fallible too. They are not above anyone else; neither is Paul. They are all working together, side by side, struggling for the gospel.
But still— doesn’t it drive you kind of crazy that we don’t know what the argument was about? I can’t help but wonder what kind of sermon could be written if we had the whole dialogue to analyze. I really wish I knew the conflict!
Now— I have a feeling very few of you know this about me, and I have a feeling that many of you will be surprised to find out, and I truly hope it doesn’t make you think less of me… but I am a sucker for celebrity gossip. I can’t even tell you why. I don’t even care about most of the celebrities. I mean, can’t name a Jonas Brothers song, but let me tell you—I know all the details there are to know about the Jonas brother Joe and the Game of Thrones actress Sophie Turner’s divorce.
I mention this because this passage really got me thinking about gossip. It got me thinking about whose side we end up on, whose media spin is better, who is right and who is wrong. One of the reasons this very public divorce has been so engrossing is because Mr. Jonas’ media team immediately began putting out statements not-so-slyly making it appear that Ms. Turner wasn’t a very good mom, and had been out partying all the time. But it didn’t take much for internet sleuths to find out that this was all probably a lie, or at least a big embellishment to get ahead of some bad PR on his end. It led to a huge amount of speculation about what went wrong in their relationship from people (like me) who have no business speculating about matters that should be private. And so, I’m not going to bore you with any more details of this, it’s all over the internet if you’re that interested—but you know, it doesn’t matter. What actually matters is, no matter how famous and public, these people are, they’re human. And there are innocent kids involved.
And when it comes to today’s passage, we could make up all sorts of imaginary issues these two women may have been having. We could have some kind of exercise in theology and speculate on the different liturgies or belief systems of these earliest days of Christianity (that seems kind of fun, to be honest); we could go a more negative route and assume they’re bickering about something completely meaningless, something silly that would make the men who compiled the books of Bible make broad, incorrect generalizations about women leaders in the church. There are so, so many reasons these two church leaders could have been fighting—but does it actually matter in the end?
As curious as I am to know what Euodia and Syntyche were arguing about, I have to realize it’s only a morbid curiosity. Because it doesn’t matter. In this particular case, it doesn’t seem to matter what the content was, it doesn’t matter who’s right and who’s wrong. What matters is that they figure out a way to make up and join together as one, once again, so that the community can continue to grow and do the work they’re called to do. Paul is not one to hide is strong feelings, negative or positive; if the disagreement were something he felt strongly about one way or the other about, I have a feeling he’d weigh in. But he never does.
“Do no worry about anything,” Paul writes. Easier said than done, I’m sure— but remember last week when we talked about the word “suffering” and how that was kind of a questionable translation choice, as Paul didn’t see what he was doing for Christ—giving up his wealth, power and status—as suffering. He rejoiced in it! He found all the meaning and fulfillment he needed in this new life in Christ, and nothing that came before mattered.
I imagine there was a lot of anxiety and hand-wringing going on in the Philippian-Christian community during this time. I imagine some people were taking sides, some people were scared to take sides, and some people were simply scared for the future, or lack of future of this growing but still-small church. But Paul tells them—this is nothing to despair about, there is no need for any suffering, no matter how difficult the situation may seem— because “…the peace of God, which surpasses all understanding, will guard your hearts and your minds in Christ Jesus.”
And this does sound wonderful, it’s a beautiful sentiment, but how do we square this with everything that’s going on in the world? With divisions that have absolutely dire and fatal consequences? You know, I think, sometimes, that’s one of the reasons I fall prey to celebrity gossip—it feels like an escape, it feels so much more low-stakes than either difficulties going on in my own life, or full-blown wars, plural, halfway across the world. It’s much easier to speculate about the private lives of famous people we see on our screens than to try to understand the political and theological reasons for and ramifications of violence in the middle east. And there is a lot of speculation, there are a lot of assumptions, a lot of kneejerk reactions. I’m seeing a lot of calls for violence, a lot of excusing of violence. I’m seeing a lot of aesthetically pleasing memes and infographics on social media, trying to explain a complicated situation or trying to convince people that they’re on the right side.
Now, I’m not up here to make a political statement from the pulpit. But I’m also not up here to say, “but it doesn’t really matter who’s right and who’s wrong,” because Israel and Palestine aren’t Euodia and Syntyche. We have the history to read up on, we have scholarly articles, we have various legitimate news sources; and yet—that doesn’t seem to stop people from making broad generalizations about who’s at fault. It doesn’t seem to stop people from black and white thinking. It doesn’t seem to stop people from completely vilifying entire groups of people because of the actions of either a powerful, occupying government or a small group of political terrorists. The bottom line is— innocent people are dying. The bottom line is, the thousands of people who will end up being hurt and killed are the people who aren’t truly represented by either of the groups taking an active part in the fighting. But that’s always what happens, right? Innocents are the ones who suffer.
Often times I have to take a step back from celebrity gossip because I realize how toxic it can really be. In the case of that very public Joe Jonas/Sophie Turner Divorce, there are kids involved. And when it comes to couples separating, the main concern should always be the innocents who will be affected by whatever loss or trauma is coming their way.
Who knows what Euodia and Syntyche were fighting about? It doesn’t matter to Paul, and it shouldn’t matter to us— what matters to Paul is that they get it together so that the innocents who have found a home in this Philippian-Christian community won’t find themselves without a faith community.
Paul, the way I see it, gives two different instructions to his friends for how to solve whatever issues are plaguing their church— the first is when he mentions his “loyal companion” should help the two women. Loyal companion was probably a reference to some kind of mediator, someone to help bridge whatever gap is widening within the church. And then, he tell his friends, essentially, to keep the faith—to keep the faith by continuing to do what is right, to continue to do “whatever is true, whatever is honorable, whatever is just, whatever is pure, pleasing, commendable.”
The world is a scary place right now. I personally went from feeling a numbness to the violence happening across the world to feeling horrified and helpless as the news just got worse—as the news came of power and water being withheld, as the news came of a forced evacuation of an entire population of peoples, with no place to evacuate to. The reality is, there is very little we can do from here. So yeah, maybe this is why I sometimes turn to my guilty pleasures of celebrity gossip. Maybe this is why I seek that escape— it’s much easier to get worked up about seemingly small dramas that have no bearing on my life than the sinful violence happening around the world.
But even then, I have to take a step back. Because that’s not commendable, true, or pleasing. As with any other division, whether between two people or two countries or territories, innocents will be affected.
Paul probably had some inkling of who was in the right and who was in the wrong between Euodia and Syntyche, but he doesn’t take a side, because in this case it doesn’t matter. He just wants his friends to remain a united front against their Roman oppressors, against the people currently imprisoning him. He just wants his friends to be able to feel safe in their new faith home. And so, he appoints a mediator, he tells his friends to continue to fight the good fight, and to trust in the peace and the love of God.
It all feels like too much. But what can we do from here? On an individual level, we can give to causes, we can protest, we can call our representatives; we can fight for causes that are pure, commendable, honorable. We can take stock of what really matters in this world, and be aware of when we’re not using the healthiest of escapes and speculating about things that just don’t matter—(like the private lives of celebrities)—but the most effective thing we can do, church, is stick together. The most effective thing we can do is to continue to work together to make this a vibrant faith community, to make this a place where no one has to worry. To make this a place where people come to feel safe and heard and loved. And if we do that, we will know that “peace of God, which surpasses all understanding,” and we will bring about that earth as it is in heaven. Amen.
