contentment, part 1

I had the privilege this morning of presenting a devotion to the moms group at our church. This is a lovely group of young moms who are meeting twice a month to encourage one another in the ways of the Lord. I thought I'd post the devotion in three parts, so come back again if you want to read the rest!

I thought I’d start by asking you a question. Do your kids ever get hungry? Is anyone saying no, because if so, I want to learn your secret. It could save me bundles on groceries! If our children are hungry, we serve them nourishing (most of the time!) food that will sustain life, grant energy, and promote growth. Once our children have eaten, they are content, hop down from the table, and off to their next adventure.

What about you? Are you hungry, spiritually speaking? Is there something lacking in your life that you want so badly you can almost taste it? Perhaps there is a material need that has demanded all your attention and resources…perhaps there are not even resources enough to cover it. Perhaps there is a longing for a deepened relationship, for peace in the midst of strife, or for resolution of a difficult situation. We all have hungers, desires in life that require satisfaction. Our trouble is so often we have an appetite for steak and potatoes and we are trying to satisfy it with cotton candy. Then we wonder why we feel so lifeless, empty, and discontent.

I’ve been searching the scriptures these past weeks trying to discover what God has to say about the satisfaction of our souls and true contentment. As I share those discoveries with you, I’d like to talk about three things: the problem of possessiveness, the Source of true satisfaction, and finally the challenge of contentment. I want us to learn what the Bible teaches: true contentment is experienced in the soul that is wholly satisfied in Jesus.

I. The Problem of Possessiveness

We all live in America so...tell me, where do Americans look for satisfaction? “Let’s go shopping!!” The truth is we live in a consumer culture. We are constantly bombarded by advertisers who make it their business to create in us a sense of need and dissatisfaction. The solution to this sense of emptiness and need is to fill it: with their product! Research has determined the average American has seen 1 million commercials by the age of 20. That averages to 137 a day if you begin at birth! Add in advertisements we see in newspapers, magazines, on the internet...can you picture what this constant bombardment of advertisements is doing to our minds in creating a sense of discontentment and a need to obtain stuff to maintain or boost our sense of well-being? We constantly live with a heightened awareness of our hunger.

If more stuff is really the answer to our desire for contentment, America should be the happiest place on earth to live. Shouldn’t we be living with great joy, with families that are wholly satisfied and intact, and lives that have meaning? Yet that is not what we see. A study done in the 1980’s found that starting with the baby boom generation, when our country began to experience its greatest days of economic growth, Americans experienced a ten-fold increase in depression compared to earlier generations. Since that survey was done in the ‘80’s, I can’t help but look around and feel we are facing a depression epidemic, with every person in this room touched by it in some way. When we look around we see men and women, perhaps even ourselves, who are struggling to find meaning in their lives, families that are increasingly torn apart, and an increasing sense of not only discontentment, but utter despair.

What does the Bible say about possessiveness, this quest we have launched to satisfy our desire for happiness with things? Last summer I studied the book of Ecclesiastes, and wow, if you want a glimpse of what the hearts of people are experiencing in our culture today, read that book! Let’s start there in Ecc. 4:8 “There was no end to his toil, yet his eyes were not content with his wealth. “For whom am I toiling,” he asked, “and why am I depriving myself of enjoyment?” This too is meaningless—a miserable business.” Ecc. 5:10 which says, “Whoever loves money never has money enough; whoever loves wealth is never satisfied with his income. This too is meaningless.” The more we get, the more we want. We are not satisfied! And again in 6:7, “All man’s efforts are for his mouth, yet his appetite is never satisfied.” Working hard to obtain wealth, income, and enjoyment in material things is going to lead to misery. Jesus puts this even more bluntly in the gospels when he warns in Mark 8:36, “What good is it for a man to gain the whole world, yet forfeit his soul?” Luke actually uses the words, “forfeit his very self.” The attempt to fill our emptiness with material goods actually destroys our soul.

As I have studied the subject of contentment, one thing has become crystal clear: God has created man with an earnest, voracious appetite for satisfaction. Man seeks to quench this appetite in all manner of ways. He seeks to satisfy himself through wealth, but also through things like good reputation, relationships with others, good health and wellness, excellent medical care…we pursue satisfaction in any and every way except the one way it was truly meant to be satisfied: in God Himself.

As we consider the problem of possessiveness, let’s do some self-assessment. Is there an object or person you are grasping too tightly as your source of satisfaction? When you find yourself growing discontent, what do you do to cope? Do you grab another cookie? Call a friend? Turn on the computer? Do you look for the boost that material things may supply to fill your need for satisfaction? After my youngest son was born we went through a trying time in our family, and I often found myself discontented. We lived in a small house and I was able to talk myself into deciding the solution to all our problems would just be a bigger place to live so we wouldn’t constantly be tripping over each other and our stuff. Yet I have to admit that although God was gracious to supply us with a lovely and needed new home, it didn’t solve my problems of discontentment. I was the same irritable and worn out mom (perhaps even more so!) in my new home as I was in the old. What I needed to do was bring my weary soul before God and seek His power and strength to meet my trying circumstances. The change that needed to take place was inward, not outward. That is where true contentment is found: in the inner man, not in outward circumstances or material things.