In 1 Timothy 6:6 Paul writes and tells his readers that ‘Godliness with contentment is great gain’ AV
And yet here we have another challenge to our peace and wellbeing in 2021. The spirit of the age, the ‘atmosphere’ in which we live is designed to make us discontent in every area of our lives. How we look what kind of home, kitchen, lifestyle we have, what kind of job we have etc. etc.
I would say that one of the enemy’s current insidious, and often unrecognized, attacks on us, is through the propagation of dissatisfaction and discontentment with every aspect of our lives. The sense of needing ‘more’ and ‘better’ courtesy of the advertising that bombards us through every medium it can. It keeps us busy fighting off a sense of dissatisfaction and discontent.
It can also seep into the very fibre of our being and make us discontent with ourselves, and ultimately with who God has made us to be, and how He has made us. This kind of discontentment must so grieve the heart of God. It clearly matters to God how wonderfully He created us. Look at His reaction after He had created the world and finally man. Genesis 1:31 ‘God saw all that He had made and it was very good’.
The Psalmist in Psalm 139:13,14 ‘gets it’! He says ‘I will give thanks to you for I am fearfully and wonderfully made: wonderful are your works, and my soul knows it very well’ NAS. How powerful is that? He is agreeing with God that He did a good job. That agreement through thanksgiving, must so bless the heart of God. It can also, I believe, bring about a great deal of acceptance and contentment into our hearts as we rejoice with God over His creation of us.
The psalm goes onto talk about God knitting us together in the womb, and in these days when we have so much information and living pictures about what is happening in those nine months in the womb, let us never stop being amazed at the incredible and intricate design of our bodies.
If in any doubt look up the amazing facts about your blood, and what it does every day, as it courses through you veins. Or think about your skin and its ability to protect, repair and renew. We could go on; so given that there is so much staggering information available to us, let us thank Him for our amazing bodies every day we live.
If we can do this we will take our eyes off of the kind of ‘perfection’ sold to us by the airbrushed pictures of the ideal man and woman, delivered into our homes daily and hourly. Our thankfulness to God will rob the enemy of his ploy to make us unhappy with ourselves and ungrateful for the life He has given us.
This also applies to our personality and circumstances too. Later in the same psalm David says God ‘knows the days ordained for us’ and ‘precious to me are your thoughts ’ I like the foot note in the NIV which indicates this could read ‘precious concerning me are your thoughts’. God thinks about me He knows my personality, my upbringing, the education and the path of my life. It’s a path unique to me. No one else has the opportunities I have today and every day of my life to love and serve Him, as only I can, in my life situation.
In thanking Him for our bodies, our personality, our life, and our circumstances, we are expressing our agreement with Him, and releasing ourselves from discontentment, into the joy of walking with Him as the unique person He has made us to be.
