Godliness with Contentment

1 Timothy 6:6: "Godliness with contentment is great gain."

Sermon over.  Now application...ouch.

Verses like these convince me that I can spend an entire lifetime walking through the Word, and never ever be able to fully put It into practice.  Godliness is one thing, contentment another.  Let me chew on the second piece today though.  Because isn't the grass always greener on the other side of the fence?  Don't we always want to be number one?  Don't we always want to win?  Don't we always want to get the highest scores, the best stuff, and work the hardest at work to be awarded or appreciated the most?  Don't we want to be the person at church who the pastor leans on and goes to whenever he needs something?  Don't we want to be the better spouse, the better child, the smartest guy in the room?

But The Lord says that contentment is key...that we should toss all those other yearnings and desires in the trash can because they do not satisfy.

Should we be excellent at what we do? Yes.  But that should not be our end.  We shouldn't do anything out of selfish ambition, but instead be truly humble (summary of Philippians 2:3).  But aren't we taught and trained to set a goal which usually has some great value to us (selfish goal) and then put everything we have behind it so that we can obtain it?  This happens all the time in sales and is pretty much the basis for most advertising...showing things we "have to have" to get us to buy.  But isn't that the exact opposite of the sort of life God calls us to?

Be content.  Stop chasing after anything but God.

What if nearly everything we think, we feel, we do, and we say is counter to the yearning of the Lord?  We need a heart transplant.  We need a brain transplant.  We need the Lord to transform our lives.