Philippians 2:14

The first word in this verse in the Greek text is "all things" (NASB) or "everything" (NIV), which by its position indicates the writer’s emphasis. Most of us can learn to grumble and argue less than we do now, but such activities should be totally absent from our lives.

The first of these words looks at the initial activity and the second what results from the first (cf. 1 Corinthians 10:10; Philippians 2:2; Philippians 4:2). The great warning of what complaining and disputing can lead to is Israel’s 10 instances of complaining in the wilderness. That behavior culminated in the Israelites’ refusal to enter and occupy the Promised Land from Kadesh-barnea (Numbers 13-14). We frustrate God’s work of producing unity, which He does by reproducing the mind of Christ in us (i.e., humility), when we complain and argue (cf. Philippians 1:19; Philippians 1:28).

"The new nature is ours by gift of God, but the activation of that new nature in terms of new character and new conduct is through the responsive work of obedience, the hard graft of the daily warfare." [Note: Motyer, pp. 130-31.]