I shall not want. Are you Content, or do you want more?
Are you content with what the Lord has provided? Do you see what others have and wish you had as much or more? Is there envy in your heart when you hear about that person who won the lottery even though you promised the Lord you would give half if you had won? Are you happy with your lot in life? Do you have just enough or not nearly enough?
Those of us who live in well-developed countries have a difficult challenge with wanting more. If you have an opportunity to see how the rest of the world lives – do it. See what others don’t have, then come back home so you can complain about your poor WiFi connection.
Go to Mexico and help the poor. Then come back home and complain when the UPS guy doesn’t put your package in the corner of the porch where you like it.
Go to an orphanage in Russia and see blind and broken children who have no one to love them. They lie helpless and unseeing, alone on a bed. Then go home and complain when your sunglasses break or not enough people show up at your birthday party.
There are too many in this world who have nothing. We must learn to be content with what we have.
Below are some of the best verses in the Bible on the subject of contentment. We should all commit to studying and personal application.
1 Timothy 6:6
But godliness with contentment is great gain.
The godly man, woman, or child should be content. There is no need for more, even if you have very little. Instead of trying to get more, we should seek to be content because that is a far greater treasure than any gold or silver we could ever gain.
James 4:2
You desire but do not have, so you kill, You covet but you cannot get what you want, so you quarrel and fight, You do not have because you do not ask God.
James reveals the ugly character in all of us. We are seldom content with what we have. We desire more and are full of envy when we see others who have what we want. People are literally killing their neighbors for tennis shoes on the streets of America. I once traveled to Uganda. What an incredible lesson that was. In that country in which ‘things’ are few, a plastic bottle or a pencil are treasures. We throw them in the trash and think nothing of it.
Job 36:11
If they obey and serve him, they will spend the rest of their days in prosperity and their years in contentment.
The Book of Job is a treasure trove of wisdom. Here is one of the many nuggets we should learn. Obeying and serving God and others leads to prosperous living. The act of service is valuable and giving to others is riches. It doesn’t imply you will find your pot of gold. Instead, it directs us to serve the Lord and others, and that all by itself can be how we can become content.
Hebrews 13:5
Keep your lives free from the love of money and be content with what you have, because God has said, “Never will I leave you; never will I forsake you.”
Money isn’t bad. It’s the love of money that is bad. We can add to that the love of stuff. Anything that your eyes set upon and lust after is a problem. Be content with what you have. Keep a loose hold on the things of this world. Keep a tight grip on the things with eternal value. In eternal rewards be content.
Philippians 4:11 Be content whatever
I am not saying this because I am in need, for I have learned to be content whatever the circumstances.
Paul never boasted that the Lord would give him a Cadillac or even a fast donkey. He got by as best he could. Sometimes he had food for the day, other times he didn’t. Sometimes he was in good health. Other times he sat in prison cells with gaping tears in his flesh caused by whips, sticks, and stones. He often carried large amounts of money to give to others and never considered that money as his. Paul had need of nothing, nor did he want more than what God gave him. He was like the contented sheep in David’s Psalm.
Below I’ve written a few paragraphs from the second chapter of one of my favorite books. “A Shepherd Looks at the 23rd Psalm” by Phillip Keller.
This is a chapter every person should read, but especially Christians. We are to model the heroes that went before us, not the covetous masses of today.
I shall not want, but will be Content
“What a proud, positive, bold statement to make! Obviously, this is the sentiment of a sheep utterly satisfied with its owner, perfectly content with its lot in life.
Since the Lord is my Shepherd, then I shall not want. Actually the word “want” as used here, has a broader meaning than might at first be imagined. No doubt the main concept is that of not lacking–not deficient–in proper care, management or husbandry.
But a second emphasis is the idea of being utterly contented in the Good Shepherd’s care and consequently not craving or desiring anything more.
This may seem a strange statement for a man like David to have made if we think in terms only of physical or material needs. After all, he had been hounded and harried repeatedly by the forces of his enemy Saul as well as those of his own estranged son Absalom. He was obviously a man who had known intense privation: deep personal poverty, acute hardship, and anguish of spirit.
Therefore it is absurd to assert on the basis of this statement that the child of God, the sheep in the Shepherd’s care, will never experience lack or need.
It is imperative to keep a balanced view of the Christian life. To do this it is well to consider the careers of men like Elijah, John the Baptist, our Lord Himself–and even modern men of faith such as Livingstone–to realize that all of them experienced great personal privation and adversity.
When He was among us, the Great Shepherd Himself warned His disciples before His departure for glory, that–“In this world, ye shall have tribulation – but be of good cheer – I have overcome the world.”
One of the fallacies that are common among Christians today is the assertion that if a man or woman is prospering materially it is a significant mark of the blessing of God upon their lives. This simply is not so.
Rather, in bold contrast we read in Revelation 3:17, “Because you say, I am rich, and increased with goods, and have need of nothing; and know not that you are wretched and miserable, and poor, and blind, and naked…”
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