How Do I Think About What Is Commendable?
What happens when your private thoughts clash with the reality around you? Here are a few ideas.
Would you ever be embarrassed if others knew what you were thinking? As someone who sees the humor in just about everything, I’ve certainly had to battle maintaining face and suppressing my internal juvenile mind.
For example, ten years ago, I was sitting with my buddy at a pastors’ meetup in Toronto. There were about fifteen of us sitting in a circle. No one knew each other very well, and so the setting erred on the side of awkward—which, as it turns out, is my favorite kind of humor. As we turned to prayer, each pastor went around the room, sharing various prayer requests.
Mid-circle, that’s when everything went off the rails. There was a Korean pastor who shared a tough story about how his treasurer had been embezzling money from the church. This was all sad, and I nodded my head along with others that I would pray for this situation. But when asked the name of this culprit, the pastor calmly replied, “Young Bum.”
No one flinched. No one smiled, no one smirked, and certainly no one laughed. This placed me in a horrible situation as I instantly grasped for every self-control mechanism at my disposal. I started pinching myself, trying to focus on the pain and not the absurdity of allowing a man named “Young Bum” to be treasurer.
My buddy was having the same challenges, and the next ten minutes proved to be among the longest of our lives. What made matters worse was that the pastor was working through a translator, meaning the only phrase I understood before the translation was Young Bum. And each time I heard it, my fingernails dug into my flesh all the tighter.
Some days, I still wonder what happened to Young Bum and I still question the decision to make him treasurer.
What Is Commendable?
Controlling our thoughts is difficult. And this brings me to Philippians 4:8, where Paul says, “Finally brothers and sisters, whatever is true, whatever is honorable, whatever is just, whatever is pure, whatever is lovely, whatever is commendable — if there is any moral excellence and if there is anything praiseworthy — dwell on these things.”
The Greek word euphēma, translated as “commendable” by the CSB above, is translated differently across various Bible translations. The ESV and NASB use the word “commendable,” the KJV as “good report,” and the NIV as “admirable.” Euphēma is a compound of eu (good) and phēmē (speech or fame). It pictures something that sounds good in the deepest sense. Something that would be spoken of favorably before both God and others. Something that, if announced aloud, would bring about admiration, not shame.
Euphēma “means not ‘well spoken of’ but ‘speaking well of.’”[1] Ralph Martin notes that, “Although not quite a synonym of the preceding word [lovely], it belongs to the same general category of ‘virtues.’”[2] F.F. Bruce adds, “The mind that dwells on such things rather than on those that are disreputable has much in common with the love that takes more pleasure in what is to other people’s credit than in what is to their discredit (1 Cor. 13:6).”[3]
Dwelling on what is commendable is a conscious, Spirit-driven habit of setting our minds on things that carry a beautiful reputation before the throne of heaven. It means aligning our mental focus with deeds, qualities, and truths that, if they were brought to light, would cause even angels to rejoice rather than recoil.
