Day 8

“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.” — Hebrews 13:5

If we are not content with ourselves, it is unlikely we will be content with anything else. We envy success, status, abilities and appearances of others, often wishing we were like them. Consequently, we strive to get more of this or that, hoping it will meet our own basic discontent with ourselves.

God created everyone different, each with their own strengths and weaknesses. We need to appreciate exactly what God has given us, and also what He hasn’t. We are meant to live interdependent lives where we need each other. It is tremendously liberating to realize that God has placed us in a “team” where the responsibilities of life are shared by our mutual dependence. Paul likens the church to a body in this way. The eye can’t say to the ear, “I don’t need you” and the hand can’t say to the foot, “I don’t need you”. All the parts function together with the head of the body being Christ. God made us the way we are for a purpose unique to each of us, and we need to embrace that, celebrating our weaknesses that make us need others, as much as our strengths that enable us to serve others.

God loves us and has a purpose for us. Whatever our position in life, whatever our circumstances, we need to delight in the Lord in them. In Philippians 4:12-13, Paul says, “I have learned the secret of being content in any and every situation, whether well fed or hungry, whether living in plenty or want. I can do everything through him who gives me strength.” Paul didn’t write that from an ivory tower, but from a prison cell in Rome. Our circumstances should be totally irrelevant to our contentedness, because the secret to contentedness is not our good environment, what we have or who we are, but it is the sufficiency of Christ in us. Though we may have what Paul describes as a ‘thorn in our flesh’, it drives us to a fresh dependence on God.

To be completely content with what God has given us, with who He made us to be, and in every circumstance is a genuine mark of repentance, which leaves us content to let God be God of all our circumstances. As we walk humbly with Him, we find what we already have is all that we need, and it is ours in Christ Jesus.

Prayer: Dear Lord, I want to experience more and more the secret of Paul’s contentedness. thank you for coming to live in me. My joy, peace, contentment are all found in you, and your sufficiency equips me to face any circumstance. you are my strength and my life. thank you, Jesus.

To reflect upon: Do I embrace my weaknesses as well as my strengths? How does working with others in the body of Christ make a difference in what God calls me to do?