CONTENTMENT

“Godliness with contentment is great gain.”

-1 Timothy 6:6

Psychologist Joseph Kreisler said, “If you wish to be miserable, think about yourself and what you want, what you like, what attention other people ought to pay you, and then you will find nothing will satisfy you. You will spoil everything you touch, and finally, you will make pain and misery out of everything God sent you.”

“Godliness with Contentment,” wrote the Apostle Paul, “is great gain” (1 Timothy 6:6). Such advice was given by a battle-hardened veteran to a young man called Timothy who was starting the spiritual battle that had engaged Paul for most of his life.

You can be content and happy or miserable and frustrated, as you please. You are the one who decides.

Paul is not alone when it comes to advising that contentment is great gain. Christ told soldiers that they were to be faithful to their government and to be content with their wages (Luke 3:14). Early Christians were instructed to “be content with such things as you have” (Hebrews 13:5). But Paul had the most to say about contentment. “We brought nothing into this world, and it is certain we can carry nothing out. And having food and raiment (or clothing) let us there with be content (1 Timothy 6:7). “I have learned in whatsoever state I am therewith to be content” (Philippians 4:11).

Paul had been shipwrecked three times. He had been given the forty-stripes-save-one treatment and suffered five times a brutal beating. He had walked across most of Asia Minor, travelling hundreds of miles to tell how Jesus Christ could transform lives. Paul had no income or pension, yet didn’t worry about security or position. He knew that God would take care of him. Contentment can be your portion, too, as you learn that God is big enough to take care of your life.

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