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February 13, 2004
Contentment
Filed under: Hot Topic
The dictionary defines contentment as:
1. A source of satisfaction;
2. The act or process of contenting or satisfying;
3. Gratification; pleasure; satisfaction.
1 Timothy 6:6-10
"But godliness with contentment is great gain. For we brought nothing into the world, and we can take nothing out of it. But if we have food and clothing, we will be content with that. People who want to get rich fall into temptation and a trap and into many foolish and harmful desires that plunge men into ruin and destruction. For the love of money is a root of all kinds of evil. Some people, eager for money, have wandered from the faith and pierced themselves with many griefs."
"Godliness with contentment is great gain." Notice how it doesn't just say contentment is great gain, but godliness with contentment is great gain. My what a scare it would be if we were content without godliness. What a great lesson to learn. Don't be content with anything outside of the context of
godliness. The question of "how do you know when you will be content" can only truly be answered in light of Godliness.
Matthew 5:5
"You're blessed when you're content with just who you are - no more, no less. That's the moment you find yourselves proud owners of everything that can't be bought."
Notice how the verse does NOT read "you're blessed when you're content with just what you have." No, it says you're blessed when you're content with who you are. What a great way to measure contentment - by who we are, not what we have like I think the Western mindset often does.
John 14 details a moment when Jesus is explaining to the disciples who He is. He is the road and the truth and the life. "No one gets to the Father apart from me." "If you really knew me, you would know my Father as well. From now on, you do know him. You've even seen him!" Then Phillip says, "Master, show us the Father; then we'll be content." Jesus' response seems a little peeved. "You've been with me all this time, Philip, and you still don't understand? To see me is to see the Father. So how can you ask, 'Where is the Father?' Don't you believe that I am in the Father and the Father is in me? The words that I speak to you aren't mere words. I don't just make them up on my own. The Father who resides in me crafts each word into a divine act." This moment seems to reflect a longing for contentment on
behalf of Phillip (maybe even the disciples). A contentment that looks to rest in the comfort of knowing who the real person in charge is. It is as if Phillip learns that Jesus has a boss (father) and wants the word from the source. Wants to know that he (Phillip) really does have a future.
Philippians 4:11-13
"Actually, I don't have a sense of needing anything personally. I've learned by now to be quite content whatever my circumstances. I'm just as happy with little as with much, with much as with little. I've found the recipe for being happy whether full or hungry, hands full or hands empty. Whatever I have, wherever I am, I can make it through anything in the One who makes me who I am."
The Puritan preacher of the 1800s Thomas Watson points out in his book "The Art of Divine Contentment" that Paul's point of having "learned" contentment (Philippians 4:11) is key. Too many times we hear contentment, but have we actually learned it?
"He who is not contented with what he has, would not be contented with what he would like to have." -Socrates
"Contentment without external honor is humility." -Grew
"Being 'contented' ought to mean in English, as it does in French, being pleased. Being content with an attic ought not to mean being unable to move from it and resigned to living in it; it ought to mean appreciating all there is in such a position." -G.K. Chesterton
"Content makes poor men rich; discontentment makes rich men poor." -Benjamin
Franklin
"It is right to be contented with what we have, but never with what we are." -James Mackintosh
This last quote by James Makintosh at first struck me as right on, but the more I got to thinking about it the more I think it is off. I think we should be content with who we are, but never satisfied.
Content but never satisfied.
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