By Rick Warren, November 7 ‘Daily Hope’ devotional blog at: http://www.pastorrick.com
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God is more interested in your character than your comfort. He’s not going to give you things if you haven’t learned the principle of contentment first.
Contentment is not a lack of ambition. It’s not a lack of goals. Contentment means your happiness doesn’t depend on your circumstances.
How do you eliminate discontent? You eliminate the cause: comparing. We compare everything in this country—lawns, cars, husbands and wives, clothes, the education of our kids, etc. Whenever you compare, you’re going to become discontent. You’ve got to learn to stop comparing yourself to others.
Paul says in Philippians 4:12, “I know what it is to be in need, and I know what it is to have plenty. I have learned the secret of being content in any and every situation.” Contentment does not come naturally; it is something we have to learn. The Bible says, “There is great gain in godliness combined with contentment; for we brought nothing into the world, so that we can take nothing out of it” (1 Timothy 6:6-7).
One of the greatest secrets in learning to be content is to realize that you don’t really own anything. It’s all on loan to you for only a few decades. You didn’t bring a single thing into this world, and you’re not going to carry anything out of it, either. You just get to use it while you’re here on earth.
The Bible calls this stewardship. You are the manager or steward of what God allows you to have while you’re here, but it’s not really yours. When you understand that you’re just a manager of the blessings God allows in your life and you hold them with an open hand, you won’t be uptight about losing them.
So what if you lose things? God can turn off one faucet and turn on another just as easily. Learn to be content because things don’t last. God is more interested in your character than your comfort.
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Philippians 4:11b-12 — …I have learned to be content whatever the circumstances. I know what it is to be in need, and I know what it is to have plenty. I have learned the secret of being content in any and every situation, whether well fed or hungry, whether living in plenty or in want.
I Timothy 6:7-8 — 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.
Hebrews 13:5 — Keep your lives free from the love of money and be content with what you have, because God has said, “Never will I leave you; never will I forsake you.”
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A PRAYER FROM PROVERBS 30:7-9:
Two things I ask of you, Lord;
do not refuse me before I die:
Keep falsehood and lies far from me;
give me neither poverty nor riches,
but give me only my daily bread.
Otherwise, I may have too much and disown you
and say, ‘Who is the Lord?’
Or I may become poor and steal,
and so dishonor the name of my God.
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