For Wilshire Baptist Church
Saturday while running errands I saw a car with a license plate reading, “PHIL 419.” I laughed and said, “Stick with the plan, Phil.”
You see, whenever I see or hear the name Phil I think about two summers ago when Ethan, our nephew, stayed with us while attending Wilshire’s MusiCamp. We took him to Legoland in Grapevine one afternoon and ended the day in their splash park where Ethan and other kids organized themselves and constructed a building out of giant foam Legos. I say they “organized themselves” because there were some kids building the walls, while others, including Ethan, gathered and delivered the blocks.When we told Ethan it was time to go he pulled one of his new friends over, posed for a picture, and then with his arm around the kid’s shoulders he said, “Remember what we talked about: stick with the plan Phil.”
When LeAnn saw the license plate with me on Saturday she suggested the word and numbers were a Bible verse – Philippians 4:19, to be exact. She looked it up on her phone and read this: “And my God will fully satisfy every need of yours according to his riches in glory in Christ Jesus.”
The scripture comes at the end of the Apostle Paul’s letter to the church at Philippi. He was writing from prison to one of his favorite congregations. They had supported his missionary work both materially and spiritually and the letter was a thank you for their generosity as well as another opportunity to remind them of what was important and how to live. In a very real way Paul was telling his friends in Philippi, “Stick with the plan.”
After Ethan said, “Stick with the plan, Phil,” the boy looked at him quizzically and said, “My name’s not Phil; my name’s Arturo.” To which Ethan replied, “I know, but I like calling you Phil.” We never got an explanation for why Ethan preferred that name, but whether Phil or Arturo, the message was the same: “stick with the plan.”
You and I are not Philippians, either, but we can still stick with Paul’s reminder that God has a plan that will satisfy all our needs. That takes a lot of faith because we don’t know the plan – certainly not the short-term plan – and often our immediate needs aren’t satisfied the way we expect or even really want. Sometimes I shake my head and say, “Really? Is this the way this is supposed to go? I’m not seeing how this is good for me or for anyone else. I’m not sure that prayer of mine got the proper hearing.”
That’s if I said a prayer at all, because often I operate under the belief that God through the Holy Spirit knows my heart even when I don’t spell it out. I pray the Unspoken Prayer memorized by those of us who are too busy or too selfish or too entitled: “You know what I want and need so just go ahead and give it to me now.”
I’d like to think that Paul, writing from prison, had some serious questions about God’s plan but yet he still was telling the folks in Philippi, “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.”
Or in other words, “Stick with the plan, Phil.”