‘I know how to be abased, and I know also how to abound. In everything and in all things I have learned the secret both to be filled and to be hungry, both to abound and to be in want. I can do all things in him who strengthens me.'
And he takes the opportunity to strengthen the resolve of the Philippians in terms of his own example. Let them learn from his own behaviour, for who could know when they might be called on to face something of what he had faced? So he points out that he knows how to be abased (how to be humbled - compare Philippians 2:8) without it affecting him unduly or upsetting him too much, and in contrast how to abound without it being a hindrance to his work. The latter indeed could have been more spiritually dangerous, for he would often have been feted and adulated by the churches that he visited. But he had learned to cope with it. Indeed he had learned to cope with whatever situation he had to face. He had ‘learned the secret' (the word regularly means being initiated into something as a novitiate) of both being filled (well feasted by those who had provided him with hospitality) and being hungry (when no hospitality was available), without it making any difference to him. It was something that God had initiated him into. And thereby he had learned to cope with ‘abounding' at times when there was no shortage of money, (money which he could have called on for himself, but would not), and with being in want, when money was lacking and he had to fend for himself. Neither situation affected him, because he was able to do ‘anything' through Christ Who strengthened and provisioned him whatever the circumstances. (And the indication was that the same was true for them). In that indeed lay his secret. It was that he had the mind of Christ. And all that he did, he did as one who walked continually with the all-sufficient Christ, so that he could boldly say, ‘I can do all things through Christ Who strengthens me'.
‘I have learned the secret.' The word was used of the initiation of a novitiate into the mysteries. Others boasted of divine mysteries learned. His boast was that God had taught him not to be concerned about whatever situation he was in, because God was active in the world.