Not A Suggestion!
"Rejoice in the Lord always.
Again I will say, rejoice!"
Philippians 4: 4
Individuals write out their last will and testament as an
expression of their will. Their will must be executed as
written. Three times in the New Testament epistles, the
phrase, “This is the will of God,”
occurs. These are not
suggestions but expressions of God’s will.
There are other ways of discovering God’s will through
His inspired Word—specifically, when commands are
given. For example, we discover it's God’s will for us
to
rejoice by virtue of the Greek grammar in Philippians 4:4.
Twice in that verse Paul says to “rejoice,” even saying
we're to rejoice “always.” When writing “rejoice” twice
in that verse, Paul used the imperative form of
the
Greek verb.
In other words, Paul was commanding the Philippians
to rejoice in all things, similar to the same Greek form
in 1 Thessalonians 5:18 where Paul said “give thanks”
in everything. These aren’t
suggestions; they are the
will of God for His people.
If you find it hard to rejoice in a certain situation,
you can always rejoice in knowing that God
is in
control of everything.
"We must rejoice in God when we
have nothing else to rejoice in."
Matthew Henry
