Learning Contentment
After all, we brought nothing with us when we came into the world, and we can’t take anything with us when we leave it. So if we have enough food and clothing, let us be content.
(1 Timothy 6:7–8)
Contentment is something we must learn. It isn’t a trait we’re born with. But the question is how? In 1 Timothy 6, we find a couple of very practical answers to that question:
- A current perspective on eternity: “For we have brought nothing into the world, so we cannot take anything out of it either” (1 Timothy 6:7).
- A simple acceptance of essentials: “And if we have food and covering, with these we shall be content” (1 Timothy 6:8).
Both attitudes work beautifully.
First, it helps us to quit striving for more if we read the eternal dimension into today’s situation. We entered life empty-handed; we leave it the same way. I never saw a hearse pulling a U-Haul trailer!
The truth of all this was brought home forcefully to me when a minister friend of mine told of an experience he had several years ago. He needed a dark suit to wear at a funeral he had been asked to conduct. He had very little money, so he went to a local pawn shop in search of a good buy. To his surprise, they had just the right size, solid black, and very inexpensive. It was too good to be true. As he forked over the money, he inquired as to how they could afford to sell the suit so cheap. With a wry grin the pawnbroker admitted that all their suits had once been owned by a local mortuary, which they used on the deceased . . . then removed before burial.
He felt a little unusual wearing a suit that had once been on a dead man, but since no one else would know, why not? Everything was fine until he was in the middle of his sermon and casually started to stick his hand into the pocket of the pants . . . only to find there were no pockets! Talk about an unforgettable object lesson! There he stood preaching to all those people about the importance of living in light of eternity today, as he himself wore a pair of trousers without pockets that had been on a corpse.
Second, we can also model contentment if we’ll boil life down to its essentials and try to simplify our lifestyle. Verse 8 spells out those essentials: something to eat, something to wear, and a roof over our heads. Everything beyond that we’d do well to consider as extra.
