The Elusive Business of Contentment
Socrates once said, “He who is not contented with what he has, would not be contented with what he would like to have.”
Martha Washington, our country's first “first lady” said, “The greater part of our happiness or misery depends upon our dispositions, and not upon our circumstances.”
Pastor Steven Furtick gives great insight and truth when he shares, “One of the Enemy’s most effective strategies is to get you to focus on what you don’t have, what you used to have, or what someone else has that you wish you had. He does this to keep you from looking around and asking, “God, what can You do through what I have?”
Our culture influences us to be discontent by teaching us to play by the wrong rules…and it starts early.
When I was young, my sisters and I played a game called “The Game of Life.”
“The Game of Life”, subtly or not so subtly, taught me at an early age, what success was and where happiness came from.
These were the rules:
He who ends up with the most money WINS!
You get money for having children.
You get a free car.
This got ingrained in my head as I went to business school in the 80’s and it was reinforced by my professors and by the award winning movie “Wall Street” with Michael Douglas and Charlie Sheen, where happiness and contentment came by getting what you wanted at all costs…IT LOOKED SO GLAMOROUS AND REAL.
Then I got out in the real world and learned there were different rules and realities in the real game of life which were the exact opposite of the board game I played as a child.
These are the REAL rules:
Money has little to do with whether you win the game! (They say that if you are not happy when you are poor, you will not be happy when you are rich, and if you are happy when you are poor, you will be happy when you are rich.)
Kid’s suck you dry of every dollar you will ever make. TRUTH!
You only get a free car if you make the half time shot at an NBA game or you win one on “The Price is Right”. And you still have to pay taxes on it.
The truth is, people are really confused these days about what the rules of life are.
Even during these difficult and uncertain times, we in the west, have never had more. And at the same time, never in the history of our world has depression, sadness, loneliness and discontentment been higher.
CONFESSION: I am not very good at contentment. I wrestle with this everyday. Maybe it’s my generation, maybe it’s my insecurity, maybe it’s the way I’m wired up, maybe it’s my experiences, and for sure it’s my fallen nature.
The wisdom of scripture and the example of the content people I know and have studied shows me, “Real contentment does not come from right circumstances, but from a rich relationship with God, deep friendships and a purpose greater than ourselves.”
You fill in the blank of what circumstances would make you happier…a better job, more money, a spouse, a better spouse, a house, a better house, children, better children, if your children would just move out.
Our culture's contentment is like cotton candy. It might taste good for a short time, but it doesn’t fill you up. You can’t build your life on it. If you eat too much it will make you sick.
You get a new car and it smells good for a while, then you get the first door ding and the first spill and the first payment and you no longer have the rush of happiness when you see it. (Cotton Candy)
You meet an amazing person, and for a while you can’t sleep, work or do anything without thinking about this perfect human being God has given you. Then it’s not long before you realize this spectacular person has some quirks and they do some things that irritate you and they have bad breath and the feeling of euphoria you felt for the 1st week leaves and reality sets in and the real work of love begins. (Cotton Candy)
You join a church and the music grabs hold of your soul and you’re amazed how brilliant and relevant the person who is giving the message is, and then you keep coming and the music loses some of it’s emotional edge and there is a song the worship team does too often and it’s getting on your nerves, and the guy who is giving the messages tells the same joke too often and is a little long winded at times and you realize he is not as brilliant and relevant as you thought and you have to decide your belief in God is deeper than a feeling and the real work of faith begins. (Cotton Candy)
We can spend our entire lives hoping to spin the right number and land on the right spaces OR we can stop, begin a relationship with the One who made us, discover our real purpose and find contentment isn’t as elusive as we think.
Imagine getting to the place the Apostle Paul got when he wrote these words in prison, “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(Jesus) who makes me who I am.”
3 QUESTIONS:
1) On a scale from 1 to 10, 10 being very content and 1 being not content at all, how are you doing when it comes to living a contented life?
2) What have been those things in your life you have pursued which ended up being “cotton candy”?
3) Think about the times you are most content? What are you doing? What are you thinking? Who are you with? Where are you at?