The sin of Discontentment

The sin of Discontentment

Text: Philippians 2:14–15 (KJV 1900)

14 Do all things without murmurings and disputings: 15 That ye may be blameless and harmless, the sons of God, without rebuke, in the midst of a crooked and perverse nation, among whom ye shine as lights in the world.

Introduction:

* Let me translate the verse I have chosen for our text into the kind of language that we understand this morning… the apostle Paul says the people of the church at Philippi “Stop Complaining … Stop Complaining.”

* Let me take a minute to take you back into the Old Testament in chapter 13 of the book of Numbers.

* And I want you to follow me and we’ll at least get through this little introduction and I think set the stage for this sermon on “The Sin of Discontentment.”

* We go back to the number one illustration of grumbling, murmuring belly-aching griping people the world has ever known, namely whom?

*The Israelites, God’s chosen people of the Bible.

* Numbers 13 just gives us a little insight in to the potential power of this sinful attitude of discontent to spread.

* Verse 30 says, “Caleb quieted the people before Moses and said, We should by all means go up and take possession of it for we shall surely overcome it.”

* Joshua, you remember, and Caleb came back from spying out the Promised Land and they said we can do it, God is on our side, we can take it.

* “But the men who had gone up with Joshua and Caleb said, We are not able to go up against the people for they are too strong for us.”

* Which is nothing but doubting God. God had plainly told them to go up and possess the land that He had given them to bless them with.

* Now I read on …“So they gave out to the sons of Israel a bad report of the land which they had spied out saying, The land through which we have gone in spying it out is a land that devours its inhabitants and all the people whom we saw in it are men of great size.”

* And then those who doubted God said this, “There … also we saw the Nephilim, (the sons of Anak are part of the Nephilim), and we became like grasshoppers in our own sight and so were we in their sight.”

* So the greater part of those who went to look at the land that God had given them, came back with this complaining attitude because this situation was not the way the liked it. They said “… we’ll never do it, we can’t make it, we can’t defeat them. It’s a bad report. It will fail, we will never make it! They became Prophets of doom to the people that were gathered to hear what they had seen on the Promised Land.

* Now what they were really complaining about is the fact that God has told them to go in and conquer the Promised Land.

* They thought that God should just hand them everything on a silver platter. After all, everything revolved around them didn’t it?

* Now go over to chapter 14, and watch what happens in verse 36, now I am paraphrasing the passage:

“As for the men whom Moses sent to spy out the land and who returned and made all the congregation … what?… grumble against him by bringing out a bad report concerning the land, even those men who brought out the very bad report of the land…

* Now take note of this … died by a plague before the Lord.”

* Now you know what the Lord thinks of grumblers! He killed them because they spread a brooding discontent against God, that’s the issue here between God and His people in these passages.

* The terrible sin of discontentment.

* These people complained against God, they complained against God calling them to go into the land, they complained because the odds were against them humanly speaking.

* And in their disbelief and complaining against God, they caused the whole nation to grumble, and as a result God killed them with a plague.

* Grumbling really spreads, and your discontent, and your critical spirit, and your grumbling attitude, and your murmuring complaining, will infect other people.

* Here were the children of God. They had been led out of Egypt. God had parted the Red Sea for them. They had seen ten plagues, miraculous plagues, and they were delivered out of all of them.

* And as soon as they got out of the land of Egypt they started to complain, and it never really ended.

* Can I take you through a little Bible journey?

* Let’s go back to the book of Exodus, to where it started in Exodus, chapter 14.

* Look at Verse 11 of chapter 14,

“Then they said to Moses,” and they’re out in the wilderness now. “Is it because there were no graves in Egypt that you have taken us away to die in the wilderness?” They said, “What do you bring us out here for, because there weren’t any graves in Egypt?”

* Now this is a mocking statement!

* I mean, wasn’t there a place to bury us there down in Egypt? You mean to tell us that you’re going to have to take us to the desert to bury us? “Why have you dealt with us like this, we were better off before you tried to help us.”

* Oh don’t you thing that stirred up the anger of God toward His people!

* It’s not like they really wanted to go back to Egypt. They’ve left Egypt; Egypt was not what they wanted, they just wanted God to do things “their way.”

* Pharaoh is now moving after them and they begin to complain.

* Now God does a marvelous thing, He opened the Red Sea, drowned Pharaoh’s entire army and by a miracle saved His people.

* Now, go to chapter 15- the people of Israel come through the Red Sea, they’ve been delivered and in that great fifteenth chapter of Exodus, they sing the song of Moses about God’s great deliverance.

* And it’s no sooner than they’ve done that, now look in verse 22, then Moses led Israel from the Red Sea and they went out into the wilderness of Shur.

* and they went three days and they didn’t have any water, just three days later- And they came to Marah, and they couldn’t drink the waters of Marah, they were bitter therefore it was named Marah, so the people … what?… grumbled at Moses saying, “What shall we drink?” Again the same sinful attitude of ungrateful discontentment!

* How can it be? How can people forget what God has done for them and turn on God like a dog turns on his owner and bites him?

* How can we forget the goodness of God, and then then turn around and have an evil attitude of discontent and complaining against God?

* How can God’s children be walking through the Red Sea on dry land one day, and three days later be complaining against God?

* How can they receive water out of a rock and a few days later be complaining to God?

* How can God’s people be given manna from heaven to eat, and at the same time be complaining that God’s provision is not good enough, while the manna is still in their mouth!

* How could God’s people be headed for the Promised Land, a land of milk and honey and the entire time be griping to God about their circumstances?

* How can we today, right here in Blue Springs Baptist Church have a sinful attitude of discontent, and complain about life because it doesn’t fit our particular preferences?

* IN our text, the apostle Paul says, “Do all things without grumbling or disputing,” which are really two ways of saying stop complaining.

* We live in a very complaining society. And I really believe we are breeding a generation of complainers and they seem to be getting worse with each passing generation.

* It seems that the most indulged society, the richest societies, are the most discontent societies. It seems that the more conveniences, and material things people have, the more they seem to be discontent with what they have, and the more complaining they seem to be.

* A sociologist on the radio made a very interesting point recently, he was talking about the young people in our culture, talking about their discontent, talking about their complaining attitude, their resistance to responsibility and how that nothing is ever the way they would like it.

* He said they go through life with a kind of sullen discontent attitude, a kind of rejection of things the way they are.

* And he had an interesting argument. What he basically said was this, that in many ways, this discontented generation of young people is a product of small families.

* His argument was that the average family now in America is 1.7 children.

* He pointed out that families are getting smaller and smaller and moving toward one child families in America. Most families in America have either none, one or two children.

* This sociologist argues that, those kinds of small families in a materialistic society breed selfish, self-indulgent children.

* And he gave a very simple illustration. He said, for example, when you only have one child or two, they get up in the morning and mother says to them … What would you like for lunch?

* The child responds “Oh, I’d like peanut butter … I’d like tuna,” or whatever. And so she goes in the kitchen and she makes that.

* And then when they go off to school she says, “Well what would you like for dinner when you come home?”

* The child answers “Oh, well I’d like this … well, I’d like this.” “Okay, well I’ll have that for you and this for you.”

* Then the mother says “By the way, what time will you be home? What time should I plan dinner?” And the kids say, “Well, about … we’ve got to do or that … we’ll be home around four, five, five-thirty will be fine.” And the mother says Okay.

* If you are raised in a family of four, five or six children, you get up in the morning and you get handed a bag. And when you leave the house your mother says to you, “Dinner is at 5:30, you’re here, you eat.”

* And when you go to a table in a small family and your mother has broken her back to prepare some kind of cuisine that she has taken out of an exotic cookbook and you take one bite of it, the typical one or two child family, the kids say, “I don’t like it. I don’t want this.”

* In a family or five or six children, somebody says “I don’t like it,” the kid next to him says, “Good,” and takes it.

* And the difference is where you have a small family the system bends to the child.

* Where you have a large family, the child bends to the system.

* And so what you have is young people growing up in an environment where the system bends to them. You have a society of child-centered parenting.

* When we were children, one of the reasons we wanted to grow up was because we wanted freedom.

* We lived in a totally conformed society. We ate what they gave us.

* Most of us don’t ever remember going shopping with our mother ever. We wore whatever she brought home.

* We rarely ever picked out any clothes for ourselves.

* Our parents brought to us what we needed and we put it on. And we conformed to the system.

* And I looked forward to adulthood so that I could be free to make my own choices.

* The reverse is true now, children grow up controlling the family and they don’t want to become adults because that means conformity.

* Then they have to go to work and nobody at work says, “Now how would you like your office decorated? And what time would you like to take a break for lunch?”

* Nobody says that, they put you on an assembly line or they put you in a place where you are forced to conform, so what you have then is a generation of young people who don’t want to grow up.

* You ask the average high-school kid … what do you want to do when you get out of school? What’s his answer? “I don’t know.”

* You ask the average college student … what do you want to do when you’re out of college? “I don’t know.”

*And the reason he doesn’t know is because he is postponing responsibility because responsibility means conformity to a system whereas childhood for him has been absolute freedom.

* Eat what you want when you want, wear what you want when you want, and your mother will take you anywhere you want to go whenever you want.

* And that is how you breed a generation of young people who are irresponsible.

* And when they do get a job they get a job simply to finance themselves so they can enjoy their indulgences and then when they’re 28 years old their license plate says, “He wins who has the most toys.”

* And the whole idea of adulthood is to collect toys, boats, cars, vacation trips, on and on and on.

* Nowadays what we are doing in our society is breeding moody discontent children.

* We are building young people who cannot conform to a society of rules and cannot be satisfied.

* We are raising over-indulged kids who don’t want to be adults, so they continue to push off responsibility as long as they can.

* They have grown up in an environment that they control, and they don’t like being controlled. And they become discontent.

* They don’t want to take responsibility. They don’t want to work. And their adult years are sad. They become sullen, very often, they become complainers.

* And I really believe that one of the curses of our culture are over indulged childish adults who are complainers about everything.

* Nothing is ever enough. That’s why we have a whole society with a critical mentality, constantly attacking everything.

* If you have looked at the news recently you have seen this played out before your very eyes with the events of Ferguson Missouri and all the rioting and complaining.

* Social critic Christopher Lashe(?) wrote and I quote, “Every age develops its own peculiar forms of pathology which express in exaggerated form its underlying character structure,” end quote.

* The pathology of our age is narcissistic self-indulgence.

* We are a culture who conducts ourselves like that legendary Greek youth Narcissus, who was looking in a pond one day, and his own reflection, and fell furiously in love with himself!

* He fell so much in love with himself, that he kept staring into his reflection on the pond, pining over his reflection, because he was in love with himself.

* I am afraid that the world’s humanistic culture in which we live, has taught men to be in love with ourselves to our own destruction as well.

* And it seems as though we have found ourselves in the same hypnotic state that Narcissus was, as we continue to be in love ourselves, and pine away desiring to make ourselves the center of our own universe!

* As we continue to indulge ourselves, we continue to breed within ourselves a very great sin of discontentment!

* We have created a fantasy world around ourselves, a fantasy world that demonstrates to us that there should be out there some kind of perfect life where we can have and do anything we want.

* We see it on television, but never seem to to be able attain this perfect life for ourselves.

* And so our Narcissism only casts us into deeper shadows of despair and the grievous sin of discontent.

* We feed on self-indulgence. Having everything, we still brood over what we don’t have.

* We complain to the degree that we are rarely if ever satisfied.

* And I see it everyplace. You see it all over. You are part of it. Let me give you some things that people complain about.

* Now I want you to think about these things, that I am going to remind you of, and think about how frivolous they are, and see if you are guilty too, as I am.

* I find myself is If I were the prophet David telling someone of the evils of adultery and murder- I find myself guilty, along with you, of the things I am preaching about this morning.

* Here are some typical things that cause people to have increased blood pressure, things that make them angry, and even hostile in our society.

* Even in some times make them violent.

* Things like, for example, traffic jams bring incredible hostility, and anger, complaining.

* Slow drivers in front of you can be enough to cause you to lose your sanctification.

* Freeway cutters who cut in front of you, talkative people irritate you, long lines, short lines, any lines, having one person in line in front of you ,makes you complain!

* You want it your way and now!

* Crying babies, if you don’t think there is a terrible frightening brooding discontent over crying babies, then ask yourself why there is such an increase of frightening child abuse … precipitated by crying babies … once held to the breast of a mother, now hit with an iron or a frying pan, or who knows what.

* Phone calls at inappropriate times, misplaced keys, would you believe, the great trauma caused by that?

* Non-house broken puppies, I mean we really get distressed by the biggies, don’t we?

* But you see, it’s a mood, and an attitude that pervades all of our thinking!

* Stuck zippers … especially if you’re already in the car half way to church to preach!

* Cold food, we not only want it when we want it, but we want it the temperature we want it!

* Somebody interrupting your conversation, noisy neighbors, being rushed by your husband, late airplanes, tight clothes, unsuccessful diets, peeling onions, squeaking doors, incompetent people around you, flat tires when you’re in a hurry!

* Some people complain constantly over the fact they have to balance a checkbook or doing the dishes, your mother-in-law, weeds, high prices, these are the things that … imagine it now… these are the things that generate hostility in people, cause tremendous conflict in marriage!

* We complain about all these things. How petty and utterly ridiculously narcissistic we are!

* Now, if you’re in Hiroshima and it’s 1945, then you have a problem worthy of considerable concern. But having to wait for something? Come on now!

* Just because you lost out on a promotion or a business deal, just because your child announced last week that she hates her room, just because the bank notified you this morning that you’re overdrawn, I’m sure you can find a way to survive, calm down, review the situation, think it through my friend…

* I hear all about mid-life crisis, do you know that there are nations in the world that don’t ever have mid-life crisis because they don’t live that long?

* Some people aren’t bothered by such things at all, there are parts of the world where the average life span is 37 years and men and women are spared the distressing reality of a fortieth birthday.

* Some people complain about grocery bills. More than ten thousand people die of starvation every day and you’re complaining about grocery bills?

* Millions more suffer from malnutrition. Some people say they complain about the high cost of rent … well maybe you’d rather be a pavement dweller in Calcutta, they don’t pay rent. They’re born, live and die on the pavement.

* They only thing they have to worry about is to find a rag they can put under their head when they go to sleep.

* You see, while these kind of horrors go on around the world in sort of normal accepted pace, we throw tantrums because we got seated at a poorly located table in a fancy restaurant.

* Or we’re frustrated because we can’t lose ten pounds. Or we gripe about our monthly debts.

* You’ve got problems relative to what?

* But you see, it’s the mood of the mob to complain.

* The world’s idealistic, fantasy oriented, consumptive, tv reality, culture feeds the sin of discontent.

* How can we as Christians be discontent when we remember what we really deserve from God?

* Lamentations 3:39 says “Why should any mortal being or anyone offer complaint in view of his sins?”

* Knowing what we deserve, what do we have to complain about this morning?

* In our Text the apostle Paul tells the people of the church of Philippi that they should not act like the complaining society of the world, but that they should be a people that act differently, a people that stand out against the complaining society like a shining beacon of light that draws men to the Gospel.

Philippians 2:14–16 (KJV 1900)

14 Do all things without murmurings and disputings: 15 That ye may be blameless and harmless, the sons of God, without rebuke, in the midst of a crooked and perverse nation, among whom ye shine as lights in the world; 16 Holding forth the word of life…

* Now I want you to know this attitude of discontent and complaining has found its way into the church.

* And the church is full of its own complainers, and what is really sad is that many families and even churches, are run by their children’s discontent.

* There are people who will leave the church because their children don’t like it.

* I can’t imagine how such a thing could happen, unless their children control the family.

* Our churches are filled with complainers. And here we are with so much, so much! We have moved from the little wooden one room churches to great expansions of concrete and glass, and the more churches have the more people complain!

* How in the world could we possibly complain just because every little thing in life isn’t exactly the way we want it?

* I would suggest to you this morning that few sins are uglier to God than the sin of complaining.

* I think that most churches today feed the sin of discontent, by continuing to propagate the world’s philosophy of self-esteem, self-fulfillment garbage.

* That kind of mindset just feeds the attitude of discontent in people causing them think that the world revolves around them, and that they are always to be the center of attention.

* The principles of living a Godly life are just the opposite of the humanistic world’s view of self-esteem.

* There’s little loyalty taught in the churches. There’s little thankfulness taught in our families. There’s little gratitude for the blessings that God has given to our generation.

* And there’s very little contentment in the lives of Christians.

1 Timothy 6:6–10 (KJV 1900)

6 But godliness with contentment is great gain. 7 For we brought nothing into this world, and it is certain we can carry nothing out.

8 And having food and raiment let us be therewith content.

9 But they that will be rich fall into temptation and a snare, and into many foolish and hurtful lusts, which drown men in destruction and perdition. 10 For the love of money is the root of all evil: which while some coveted after, they have erred from the faith, and pierced themselves through with many sorrows.

Hebrews 13:5 (KJV 1900)

5 Let your conversation be without covetousness; and be content with such things as ye have: for he hath said, I will never leave thee, nor forsake thee.

Philippians 4:11–13 (KJV 1900)

11 Not that I speak in respect of want:

for I have learned, in whatsoever state I am, therewith to be content.

12 I know both how to be abased, and I know how to abound: every where and in all things I am instructed both to be full and to be hungry, both to abound and to suffer need. 13 I can do all things through Christ which strengtheneth me.

* Sadly, instead of being a content people, a shining light to the world by our contentment, what has happened to the church is that churches are filled with griping, grumbling, murmuring, complaining and discontent people.

* If you have ever been in a church fight, or at the average church business meeting, the you know what I mean.

* The sin of discontentment is really a matter of blaming God, and being angry with Him, because after all, God is the one who put you where you are.

* So I want you just to know who you’re realty complaining against this morning.

* Who was the first complainer? The Devil. And who was He complaining about? God.

* And men are no different. Who was the first man to complain to God? Adam.

* The first complaining human being who ever walked, was the first human being whoever walked.

* And what was Adam’s first complaint? “God, the woman You gave me …” We are in this mess because of this woman.

* He didn’t blame Eve, he blamed God.

* Eve had nothing to do with it. God made Eve. Adam wasn’t married, he woke up one morning he was married.

* God could have picked anybody He wanted, He picked her. Why? It’s God’s fault.

* She led the whole human race in sin. The woman You gave me … Adam complained!

* Cain complained to God about God’s work in his life, Genesis 4:13 and 14.

* Moses complained to God for not doing what he wanted Him to do when he wanted Him to do it, Exodus 5:22 and 23.

* Aaron and Miriam complained to God against Moses, His chosen leader and their own brother in Numbers 12.

* Jonah complained to God because he was mad at God for saving the Ninevites, Jonah 4:9 and 10

* And it is still a popular pastime for Christians to complain at God.

* All of our complaints in one way or another are complaints against the providential purposes and will of God.

* Look back at out text verse in Philippians 2.14, but back up one verse to verse 13. It Reads…

Philippians 2:13–14 (KJV 1900)

13 For it is God which worketh in you both to will and to do of his good pleasure.

14 Do all things without murmurings and disputings:

* What is the will of God for your life? What is God’s good pleasure toward you this morning?

* It is an attitude of obedience to Him without complaint.

* You don’t have the right to complain about what God calls you to do.

* You don’t have the right to complain about what God asks you to do.

* You don’t have the right to complain about the circumstances in which He asks you to do it.

* Who are you to complain in view of your sins?

* It is only by God’s grace that you are not consumed!

* Complaining is in itself a wicked proud sin!

* In Jude 16 the Bible, speaking of those in the church with a discontent, complaining attitude, says they are grumblers, finding fault, and following after their own lusts.

* All they want is what they want when they want it, and when they don’t get it, they grumble and find fault with God, and with the Church, and with others.

* The sin of discontent is characteristic of pride in the heart.

* James even speaks about the sin of discontent in James, chapter 5- “Do not complain, brethren, do not complain against one another that you yourselves may not be judged, behold, the judge is standing right at the door.”

* You know what the picture is? It’s like a little kid in his room, a little brother talking to his sister, and he’s saying, “Boy, I hate the way Mom handles us, I hate the way Dad does …”

* And what he doesn’t know is Dad is standing at the door!

* And when you’re belly-aching and complaining about what God is doing in your life, and about how your life is, and how your kids are and how your circumstances are, and how this and how that, just know that the Lord who hates complaining, is standing at the door!

* The sin of discontentment is a Serious sin … a very serious sin.

* Not only the apostle Paul but obviously James felt compelled to remind us about the seriousness of the sin of discontentment as well.

*Even Peter did in 1 Peter 4:9, he says, “Be hospitable to one another without complaint.”

* James says “Don’t complain against other people either.”

* When you have the sin of discontent in your heart you will complain about other people.

* And if you complain against God, you’re going to be miserable to be around too, because you’re going to complain to everybody else, too.