Philippians 4

₁My friends, I love you and I long for you. You make me happy and I am very proud of you. I want you, the people whom I love, to keep on believing in the Lord.

₂Euodia and Syntyche, I ask that you work together and stop arguing with each other because you both belong to the Lord. ₃And I also ask you, my friend who always works with me, to help these 2 women. They have both worked hard with me to tell the Good_News to other people, the same as Clement and my other friends have done. Their names are all written in the book_of_life.

₄You belong to the Lord and therefore you must always rejoice. I say it again: You must rejoice. ₅You must be friendly and patient with all people, because the Lord is coming again soon. ₆Do not worry about anything, but pray to God about all things. Tell Him what you need and thank Him for everything. ₇You belong to Christ Jesus and that is why God will give you peace. His peace is better than anything that people can think of and it will protect you from thinking things that make you feel sad and worried.

₈Friends, I want to tell you something more. You must always think about the things that are true and good, things that are right and pure, and things that are beautiful and good. Yes, you must think of things that are good and beautiful, and all the things that we can be proud of. ₉You have learned and received things from me, and you have heard and seen how I live. You must do the same, then God who gives peace will be with you.

₁₀I am very happy and thankful that you have shown again that you think of me. I know that you were thinking of me before, but you could not show it. ₁₁I am telling you this, but not because I need anything. I have learned to be happy with what I have. ₁₂There are many things that have happened to me in my life. Sometimes I have had too little and sometimes I have had a lot, and so I have learned to be happy every day. Sometimes I have had enough to eat and sometimes I have been hungry. Yes, sometimes I have had a lot and sometimes I have had little. ₁₃It does not_matter what happens to me. Christ gives me the power to be able to do what I have to do, ₁₄but you did the right thing when you helped me when I had trouble and needed help.

₁₅You in the congregation of Philippi must know that after I went away from the province of Macedonia and started to preach the Good_News, the other congregations did not help me or care for me. You were the only ones who cared for me. ₁₆You also sent me things that I needed more than once when I was in Thessalonica. ₁₇But it is not important to me that I have received something from you. It is important to me that you will get the blessing that people receive when they help and give something to people.

₁₈I have received everything that you have sent and I have enough now. Epaphroditus brought me everything that you sent and now I have enough. The things that you sent were a sacrifice that you gave to God, a sacrifice with a lovely smell that pleases Him. ₁₉My God will give you everything that you need, wonderful things that come from Christ Jesus. ₂₀We praise God, our Father, forever and ever. Amen.

₂₁I send greetings to all the believers in the town of Philippi who belong to Christ Jesus. The friends who are here with me send their greetings. ₂₂All the believers here send greetings to you. The people who work for Caesar send special greetings. ₂₃I pray that the Lord Jesus Christ will be gracious to you all.