Godly Contentment
This is an audio recording of a teaching given at our 2023 Women’s Retreat by our Women’s Discipleship Coordinator, Andrea Hoglund.
Once upon a time, there were two gardeners named Content and Discontent. They each were given fertile plots of ground. Discontent was always looking at other garden plots and thinking her own wasn’t good enough. But Content was always busy working on the plot of ground she has been given, turning it into a thriving garden.
Discontent reminds me of another gardener in another garden. Eve lived in unspoiled paradise – the garden of Eden. The Sabbath rest of God was literally her home. But Satan whispered lies that turned her restful heart to restlessness. She craved more than the garden she had been given and her paradise was turned into a wasteland.
Contentment is no longer natural to us as daughters of Eve. Now it’s natural for us to say, like Discontent, “The grass is greener on the other side.” It’s not as easy to say, “Look how green my grass is!”
So often we want godliness to be natural, to come easy, but it doesn’t, and so we “give up.”
Like when my kids open the refrigerator and immediately close the door and say, “Mom, I can’t find the ketchup! It’s not there!” And I’m like, “You didn’t even try! It’s right in front of your eyes! Costco size!” We can do that same thing. “God, I can’t find contentment! It’s not there!” But it is! Costco size and full to the brim if we have eyes to see it.
We are like gardeners, and the circumstances we have been given and the things we have been given, the good, the bad and the ugly – that is our garden plot. Discontentment takes that ground and sees only a wasteland. But we want to be gardeners marked by contentment, who can look at a wasteland and turn it into a fruitful garden – for God’s glory and for the life of the world.
And that is possible, not because we are amazing gardeners, but because God, the Master-gardener, is with us and will never leave us or forsake us (Hebrews 13:5-6).
What is Godly Contentment?
In order for us to pursue godly contentment, we need to have a vision of what godly contentment actually is.
Think a minute about contentment and discontentment. What are some words or short phrases that describe discontentment? What are some words or short phrases that describe contentment?
Some words related to discontentment might be: comparison, restlessness, never satisfied, empty, ungrateful, anxiety, “more,” grumbling, fear.
For contentment, we might think of: joyful, peaceful, rest, gratitude, open-handed, happy, and satisfied.
The Old Testament and the New Testament describe contentment as sufficient, enough, satisfied, and well-pleased. Discontentment is described as insufficient, dissatisfied, or displeased.
So what is it that we are either satisfied with or dissatisfied with?
Take some time to meditate on the following Scripture passages and see if you can answer the 3 questions below – 1 Timothy 6:3-12; Philippians 4:10-13; Hebrews 13:5-6; 2 Corinthians 2:7-10; Psalm 73; Psalm 131; Psalm 116.
What is the situation to which contentment is applied?
What is the basis for contentment?
Are there any warnings about discontentment? [Hint: not every passage has a direct warning.] If so, what are they?
All of these passages show us that contentment doesn’t come from wealth, or possessions, or easy circumstances. Godly contentment rests in God and knows his will for us is good. Psalm 116:7 “Return, O my soul, to your rest; for the Lord has dealt bountifully with you.”
Godly Contentment is a deep satisfaction with the will of God for me.
When we are satisfied with God’s will, our lives will bear fruit for God’s kingdom and glory, no matter what our circumstances. But if we reject God’s will in discontentment, we only make things worse.
Discontentment Turns a Garden into a Wasteland
Discontentment takes root when we say to God, “It’s not enough,” or “It’s not good enough” or “It’s not fair” or “It’s too hard for me.” Why do we do this? What happens is that lies start to creep into our hearts, and we start to see everything through a false lens and we think we’re seeing reality. Like wearing sunglasses in the house – everything looks darker than it really is.
Learning from Eve, one of our main jobs to cultivate contentment is to keep the deceiving snakes out of the garden of our hearts.
Three “snakes” that deceive us and destroy our contentment are: wrong thoughts, wrong expectations and wrong desires.
Wrong Thoughts
One author says that indulging in wrong thoughts is like dumpster diving, filling our mind with a lot of rotten produce and garbage from the dump – bottom feeding. When it comes to contentment, we tend to feed on wrong thoughts about our circumstances and wrong thoughts about God.
Just like he did with Eve, the first thing that Satan wants us to think wrongly about is God himself. Satan wants us discontent with God. And if we become discontent with God, we will soon become discontent with our circumstances. We’ll believe more and more that God is against us and that his will isn’t good. And as my mom used to say, that is a lie from the pit of hell.
Psalm 145:14 says,
“The Lord is righteous in all his ways and kind in all his works.”
There is no moment when his care for us falters.
Do we believe that? To know godly contentment, we need to get out of the dumpster of lies and get into God’s word.
Wrong Expectations
Just like we need to control our thoughts, we also need to control our expectations. Our culture is always trying to teach us what to expect from life, and it isn’t what God teaches us to expect. If we expect wrong things, our expectations can’t be met. We inevitably end up discontented when we never had a reason to be. But godly contentment has true expectations rooted in the gospel.
1 Peter 4:12 says,
“Beloved, do not be surprised at the fiery trial when it comes upon you to test you, as though something strange were happening to you. But rejoice insofar as you share Christ’s sufferings, that you may also rejoice and be glad when his glory is revealed.”
When trials come, we shouldn’t think, “That’s weird!” In fact, Peter tells that this is normal. The world is broken so we should expect brokenness. And the Redeemer has come, so we should expect His redemption to get the final word. We shouldn’t expect life to be comfortable and easy, but we should expect God to be at work, especially when things are most difficult.
Jeremiah Burroughs says that this kind of contentment is something the world has no skill in. This kind of contentment only belongs to disciples of Jesus, because He is the one who has defeated death and he is our living hope.
Wrong Desires
Discontent in our desires shows up in our hearts in two ways: not wanting what we do have and wanting what we don’t have. Like toddlers who say, “I don’t want the red cup, I want the blue cup.” Or like Eve – “I don’t want all that fruit, I want that fruit.”
The Bible tells us this can be related to both our circumstances and our “stuff.” Here are a few examples:
We don’t want what we have: trials, sickness, financial crisis, relational breakdowns, body, house, neighborhood, job, spouse, parents, car.
We want what we don’t have: health, higher income, friendships, body, house, car, husband, children, grandchildren, what someone else has, our story, past or upbringing, education.
These are often the areas where deep down, we might not want to be content! After all, if I seek contentment, doesn’t that mean I might not ever get that thing that I really want? We can be afraid to be content. Doesn’t that mean my circumstances might never change? It’s hard to be content in hard circumstances. We don’t want to be content, we just want things to change! But that is not what God’s word teaches us to want.
So what should we want? Jesus gives us a clear answer in the Lord’s prayer in Matthew 6:9-10:
“Our father in heaven,
hallowed be your name.
Your kingdom come,
your will be done,
on earth as it is in heaven”
We should want God’s name to be hallowed, his kingdom to come and his will to be done on earth as it is in heaven. When we struggle with contentment, we can tell ourselves whatever we want, but the truth is, we are struggling to accept God’s will for our daily lives and to do his will in our daily lives.
Contentment says, “God, you are king! You are King of the small stuff and the big stuff in my life! Let your kingdom come, right here, today. In this moment, in these circumstances, let me do your will on earth, as it is done in heaven.”
The work of contentment is picking up all our thoughts, expectations and desires in our hands and lifting them to God and saying, “You guide me, God. Teach me what is true. Teach me what I should expect. Teach me what I should desire. Get rid of my ungodly cravings. I want what you want, God.”
Are there any conditions, any circumstances that we could ever have that would prevent us from doing God’s will? No!
He has placed us where we are for a reason! – to give us more of himself as we extend his garden in a wasteland world.
Our circumstances – hard or easy – are the material we’re given for obedience. They’re our canvas to display God’s glory and goodness. They’re our plot of land to cultivate into a garden. That’s what it means for God’s will to be done on earth, as it is in heaven.
The skill and mystery and beauty of contentment is to want what we have, because we can do God’s will in the circumstances we have and with the things that we have. And that kind of contentment turns a wasteland into a garden.
Godly Contentment Turns a Wasteland into a Garden
A contented heart can turn the most difficult circumstances into a fruitful garden, because contentment doesn’t come from our circumstances. Jeremiah Burroughs (in The Rare Jewel of Christian Contentment) says contentment is a heart-business, a work of the Spirit “indoors.”
He defines contentment like this: Christian Contentment is that sweet, inward, quiet, gracious posture of heart, freely submitting to, and taking deep satisfaction in God’s wise and fatherly will in every condition.
This kind of contentment is like a green tree in the middle of the desert, bearing fruit in a wasteland.
We will never find contentment while we’re fiercely clinging to our own will. Submission follows Jesus’ example and says, “Not my will, but yours be done,” (Matt. 26:39,42; Mark 14:36, 39; Luke 22:42). Contentment lets God be God. Not just in the circumstances, but also in the timing.
Often we’re okay with going through something hard, as long as it’s not for too long. Or as long as the end is in sight. This is particularly relevant for Minnesotans – “I’m okay with a cold, dark winter, God, but Spring better come early!” But what if it was always winter and never Christmas?
Whether our trials are short or seemingly unending, a contented heart takes God’s hand and says, “I trust you. You are still with me.” Aslan is on the move.
Burroughs calls this “melting our will into God’s.” Like the Psalmist in Psalm 40:8, we say,
“I delight to do your will, O my God; your law is within my heart.”
This is how we turn the wasteland into a fruitful garden. Our circumstances are no longer obstacles to us, but opportunities to do God’s will. The plot of ground that God has given us is the material for our joyful obedience, and the whole tone of our lives is contentment. Right here, the grass is green! And this is something the world has no skill in.
A Tale of Two Women
If our discontentment makes us like Eve, this kind of godly contentment makes us like Mary, the mother of Jesus.
In Luke 1:28, the angel Gabriel says to Mary, “Greetings, O favored one, the Lord is with you!” In Jesus, these words are our words! We are favored beyond all expectation and all deserving, because Jesus is with us!
And like a second Eve, Mary teaches us how we were meant to respond to God. We learn from her beautiful words in verse 38:
“Behold, I am the handmaiden of the Lord; let it be to me according to your word.”
The word “handmaiden” is also translated “servant,” and is the word the apostle Paul uses often of himself (and others) as a bondservant of Jesus Christ (Rom. 1:1, 2 Cor. 4:5, Phil. 1:1, Titus 1:1).
Sisters, that is who we are. Remember who you are! You are God’s handmaiden! God’s word is your word! His will is your will! He is your good. He is your life.
Whatever conditions, whatever circumstances come our way. Whatever we have or don’t have, godly contentment makes us women with a sweet, inward, quiet, gracious posture of heart, freely submitting to, and taking deep satisfaction in God’s wise and fatherly will in every condition.
Let us say with Mary:
“Behold! I am the servant of the Lord! Let it be to me according to your word!”
Discussion Questions
What are some ways that discontentment can lead us to sin? In what ways does discontentment actually make our situation worse than before?
What are some Scripture passages that have helped you learn contentment?
What are some ways that you struggle with unmet expectations? Do you put unreasonable expectations on yourself? How can you grow to be more shaped by Biblical expectations?
How does social media affect your contentment? Are there any changes you might want to make to promote growth in contentment?
Are there any tasks in your life that you struggle to be content with? What are some promises from God that can help you surrender to God’s will in these areas?