Will God meet all your needs?

Here is an encouraging verse which is well loved and often quoted. Philippians 4:19 says: “And my God will meet all your needs according to the riches of His glory in Christ Jesus.”

The first question to ask is this: Who is the ‘your’ referring to? God will meet all your needs. Paul was writing to the Christians in Philippi. Earlier in the chapter, he said that he had learned to be content in every situation, including going hungry. Christians are not immune from such difficulties in this life. He spoke about how generous the Philippians had been to him, supporting him in his ministry. He assures them that he is well and does not need anything from them but is thankful for the gift they had sent him.

Listen to verses 18 and 19: “I am amply supplied, now that I have received from Epaphroditus the gifts you sent. They are a fragrant offering, an acceptable sacrifice, pleasing to God. And my God will meet all your needs according to the riches of His glory in Christ Jesus.”

Paul is giving them a blessing, a reassurance, that just as they have been so kind to him, God will also be good to them. He will supply all their needs. Notice: Not all their wants, not all their dreams, but all their needs. Although this promise is addressed directly to the Philippians, I think it is fair to say that the promise is general in nature. It’s the kind of thing Paul might have said to any Christian and I think we can embrace it as a promise to us.

In other words, although it is not addressed directly to us, we can still legitimately reassure each other that “God will supply your needs”, and not in a limited way, but according to the riches of His glory in Christ Jesus. The danger here is to assume that God will give me all the material things I want. After all, if His giving is according to the riches of His glory, then when I pray for a new car, which I desperately need, without it I can’t get to work or church, I can expect a Porsche or a Lamborghini, not a Mazda or a Ford. After all, it’s according to God’s riches, which are limitless.

No! That is not what He is saying. When you pray for a car, He might decide that your greatest need is exercise. The promise is that God, who is good and loving, will meet our needs. Of course, our perception of what we need might be very different from God’s knowledge of our need. God sees the big picture. He knows the future. He sees our need to be made holy. Perhaps He sees that I need to be humbled. Perhaps I need some struggle, some difficulty, some loss, to bring me to a place of repentance and dependence on Him. Perhaps my need is to pray more. Perhaps my need is to be confronted with my weakness, my mortality, or my sin. There are many things we don’t think of as needs, but God knows better because, whereas we tend to have a short-sighted, materialistic view of life, God has an eternal goal in mind.

While we might have our own ideas of what we need, we can trust that God, in His infinite wisdom and love, will supply all our true needs according to the riches of His glory in Christ Jesus.