Contentment

Introduction

We are conditioned not to be content

Adds surround us and constantly appeal to us or our children

Our children are targeted and taught to constantly desire new things

Ex of after Christmas, a child wanting more new toys

New smart phones every year

Our houses that we live in

Google and Facebook creating an add profile

Once we see something that we want or that is an upgrade from what we have, we are more likely to become discontent with what we have.

Even social media and apps affect it

You get a hit of dopamine with positive encounters

You get a hit of dopamine

TEDed- Social media is designed to give you immediate rewards in the form of likes, shares, re-tweets, etc. Each time you receive some form of positive interaction from your network, your brain releases dopamine. Over time, the brain of a person who spends large amounts of time on social media rewires itself to crave these interactions. In fact, brain scans of these people show decreased white matter in areas that control their emotion, attention, and decision making, the same areas as people with addictions to drugs. This dopamine release is much greater when talking about ourselves, leading to around 80% of the conversations we have on devices centering on ourselves.

Once rewired, we instinctual start pursuing it, and it is like fighting an addiction to quit

However, we do not like to be discontent

The new things we seek are so that we will be content

How many times have you gotten something new only to find it did not make you content

You get a fancy new car, but the new car smell goes away

You get a new phone, and find that it functions just like your old one, but now you have a higher bill

You

The Heart of Contentment

Contentment is that inward condition of a Christian where they are at peace with and delight in their Father’s will for their life, no matter the situation.

Proverbs 30:7–9 CSB

7 Two things I ask of you; don’t deny them to me before I die: 8 Keep falsehood and deceitful words far from me. Give me neither poverty nor wealth; feed me with the food I need. 9 Otherwise, I might have too much and deny you, saying, “Who is the Lord?” or I might have nothing and steal, profaning the name of my God.

Recognizing that the problem is in our heart, not the circumstances we are in.

Proverbs 30:7–9 CSB

7 Two things I ask of you; don’t deny them to me before I die: 8 Keep falsehood and deceitful words far from me. Give me neither poverty nor wealth; feed me with the food I need. 9 Otherwise, I might have too much and deny you, saying, “Who is the Lord?” or I might have nothing and steal, profaning the name of my God.

Notice how Agur does not trust himself, in either extreme

Notice how Agur does not trust himself to know how much or how little he could handle,

He ask God to keep him from experiencing a set of circumstances that he could not handle

He knows that he is still a sinner and struggles

We can excuse our discontentment and convince ourselves that it is okay to be angry at God. However, why are we angry at him unless we think that he has done something wrong? that he is acting in some mischievous and evil way? It is a sign of immaturity in a child when he gets angry at his parents for not letting him have Ice-cream instead of the meal his parents cooked. Why do we think it is okay for us to treat God that way and not see it as a sign that we need growth. Let me ask you a question. If it is okay to be angry with God, will we be angry with him in heaven? Being angry with God is not a sign of maturity. Now, does that mean that we should pretend that we are not angry when we are with him? No! In fact, he is the one who makes us capable of growing and maturing in such a way that we will be able to put our anger towards him to death.

Recognize that we are sustained by God, not the circumstances of our lives

Agur wants to avoid extremes because they lead to self-centered living

In wealth, he focuses on his ability to sustain himself, and forgets that it was given by God

In poverty, he believes he must provide for himself, even sinfully, because God will not do so

When he has just what he needs and is satisfied with what God has given him, he will be:

Reminded of God’s provision

Grateful for God’s provision

Reminded of God’s provision

Moved from his thankfulness to serving God

Not be overwhelmed by the desire for more that leads to sinful pursuit of things

May be good things, like food or family

Comfort

May be evil things, like an affair

Recognize that discontentment is a rejection of God, saying that his ways are wrong and he can not keep his promises

Discontentment is a inward condition of a person where they feel as if God is withholding from them what they have a right to, and the fault is with God.

It starts with a view of the world that centers on our desires and plans for our lives

Ask yourself, why do you want that thing or person so much?

You may could list a number of good, biblical, financial, occupational reasons for wanting it, but are they the actual reasons you want it?

Why is it that not getting that thing causes you to be restless?

Why do you think that you deserve it or treat God as if you have a right to it?

Do you know that you have no rights that are not given to you by God?

Our country is very entitled, and we can believe that if we want something then we should get it.

We think that if we desire something, we should get it

If you do not think this is the case, that we as a nation are so entitled, look at how we respond when we want something and someone tells us no

Look at who we respond towards God when we want something and he refuses to give it to us

He becomes deviant, rude, not loving, not a good father,

We become angry, bitter, resentful

When we lose a loved one, when our dreams fall apart and we are riddled with shame and a sense of failure, when the nightmares of things from trauma in our past haunt our sleep

We believe that God has allowed us to experience poverty, and we start trying to get what we deserve apart from God

How many people have had affairs because they said they deserved to be happy? How many people stole money from their work because they deserved to be paid a little more? How many people erupted in anger at a spouse for not respecting them or doing something they wanted to because they deserved it?

Just think about how many rights we believe we are entitled to, but when we come before God, they are nothing. We are a creature. He is our creator. We have no more of a right to things that God has not given us than a toaster has to tell it’s maker it wanted to be a blender.

Also, look around and you will see that we are also wealthy. No one in here is going without clothes, food, housing, or transportation. Even the most impoverished in here have plenty for their needs. You can see it when we say, “i’m starving” while our clothes are beginning to fit us too tight.

We are so confused, we are wealthy and forget that God is our creator, but lash out like we are impoverished when we do not get something we want.

This is wicked self-love, love that treats God as a genie in a bottle, meant bound to our wishes and desires.

God made us to find our delight, our joy in him and his ways.

Power

Cars

Phones

When [the saints] perform actions to God, then the soul says: 'Oh! that I could do what pleases God!' When they come to suffer any cross: 'Oh, that what God does might please me!' I labour to do what pleases God, and I labour that what God does shall please me: here is a Christian indeed, who shall endeavour both these. It is but one side of a Christian to endeavour to do what pleases God; you must as well endeavour to be pleased with what God does, and so you will come to be a complete Christian when you can do both, and that is the first thing in the excellence of this grace of contentment.

My brethren, the reason why you do not have contentment in the things of the world is not that you do not have enough of them. The reason is that they are not things proportional to that immortal soul of yours that is capable of God Himself

Thus, a godly man wonders at his cross that it is not more, a wicked man wonders his cross is so much:

Introduction

Christmas

The Heart of Contentment

Proverbs

Proverbs 30:7–9 CSB

7 Two things I ask of you; don’t deny them to me before I die: 8 Keep falsehood and deceitful words far from me. Give me neither poverty nor wealth; feed me with the food I need. 9 Otherwise, I might have too much and deny you, saying, “Who is the Lord?” or I might have nothing and steal, profaning the name of my God.

Contentment is a Christian’s inward condition that produces delight in God’s actions, no matter the circumstances that they have to endure

This is not a sermon about how bad it is to want more

This is a sermon about how bad it is to lose delight in God and his plans

Agur has a relationship with God

Speaking to God

Pr

In times of distress, we doubt and suspect those who we are not close to

Ask for things that are pleasing to God, not selfish

He entrust himself to God

He ask in accordance with God, not for sinful or selfish things

He holds God in high regard

Crucial to contentment when in trials

Easy to start believing someone is far worse than they actually are when you stop talking to them

Easy to start becoming angry with God when you do not talk to and spend time with him during suffering

Agur recognizes his humanness

He knows that if he had too much or too little he would either forget God or sin against him

a healthy distrust of himself

He does not set strict parameters for God, but leaves his life in God’s hand

He does not know how much would be enough

Agur knows what his real goal is

It is not that he will have enough

We can thing that if we get something we will be content

as much income or the job that someone else has

a spouse like someone else

kids like someone else

friends like someone else

His real goal is to remember God in whatever he has

To remember that all he has or does not have is from God

To trust that God will give him what he needs

Not Forgetting God

We are wealthy

1 Timothy 6:6–12 CSB

6 But godliness with contentment is great gain. 7 For we brought nothing into the world, and we can take nothing out. 8 If we have food and clothing, we will be content with these. 9 But those who want to be rich fall into temptation, a trap, and many foolish and harmful desires, which plunge people into ruin and destruction. 10 For the love of money is a root of all kinds of evil, and by craving it, some have wandered away from the faith and pierced themselves with many griefs. 11 But you, man of God, flee from these things, and pursue righteousness, godliness, faith, love, endurance, and gentleness. 12 Fight the good fight of the faith. Take hold of eternal life to which you were called and about which you have made a good confession in the presence of many witnesses.

If you have food and clothing, Paul says that you have enough to be content

However, we are not in poverty

adds

children and toys

new ipads and iphones

Social Media

We, in a consumer culture, are trained to not be content

However, we are not in poverty

Say we are starving while our shirt buttons are about to pop

However, this passage does not condemn wealth

It elevates remembering God

So I want to ask you, when it comes to your wealth, your house, your children, your parenting, all that you have, are you remembering God or are you seeking to serve yourself

For example, when you get a paycheck, are you thinking about what all you can go buy with it or are you praying, and recognizing that it is a gift from God meant to be used in serving him

When you look what God has given others, are you rejoicing that God has given them something to bless him in return, or are you wanting their blessing for your own selfish desires

When you discipline your children, do you do so because you wan to teach them about God and how to serve him, or just how not to inconvenience you?

At the center, the heart of contentment is the question are you remembering God and his role in it all.

WE are to remember who God is, and to conform our desires to what he is doing