Be anxious for nothing; but in everything by prayer and supplication with thanksgiving let your requests be made known unto God.
Read Chapter 4
Gaius Marius Victorinus
AD 400
“Do not be anxious about anything.” This means: Do not be concerned for yourselves. Do not give unnecessary thought to or be anxious about the world or worldly things. For all that is needful for you in this life God provides. And it will be even better in that life which is eternal.
But in every thing by prayer By the Greek, the sense and construction cannot be in every prayer; but in every thing, in all circumstances, have recourse to prayer. (Witham)
It is comforting to know that the Lord is at hand…. Here is a medicine to relieve grief and every bad circumstance and every pain. What is it? To pray and to give thanks in everything. He does not wish that a prayer be merely a petition but a thanksgiving for what we have received…. How can one make petitions for the future without a thankful acknowledgment of past things? … So one ought to give thanks for everything, even what seems grievous. That is the mark of one who is truly thankful. Grief comes out of the circumstances with their demands. Thanksgiving comes from a soul that has true insight and a strong affection for God. .
