Contentment … it’s one of the things that each one of us wants. But today, today we’re going to look at three of the things that can rob us of that contentment – girls, gold and glory.

 

GIRLS AND GUYS

In the days when I was studying at Bible-college, a good many years ago now, the principal of the college was a man by the name of Barry Chant, and I remember quite distinctly he came down to the common area where we all gathered before lectures, and he announced that today was exactly fifty years since he’d started following Jesus. Fifty years! And the more I came to know him, as a teacher, as a colleague ultimately, and as a trusted counsellor and friend, I realised how much his life had been impacted by fifty years of walking with Jesus. The man has a maturity and a wisdom that are quite remarkable.

I say that as a preface because I’m about to share with you something today that he shared with me all those years ago. We were studying in our various dreams of academia to become ministers of the gospel of Jesus Christ, and I recall one lecture where he talked about the three things that generally bring ministers unstuck. They’re really easy to remember because they all start with the letter G. Would you like to know what they are? ‘Girls, Gold and glory’. Pretty simple. Pretty powerful, and the more I think about it, those are the very same things that bring us unstuck in our search for contentment: Girls or (in the case of women) guys, gold, and glory.

I want to kick off with the first one of those today because unless we get this girls/guys thing under control, then we’re not going to be content. And the whole subject of the boy/girl, man/woman relationship and intimacy thing isn’t an easy one to talk about in this day and age without sounding a bit anachronistic, because attitudes and lifestyles have changed a lot.

See, these days, intimacy before marriage and indeed outside marriage is pretty much accepted in most societies as a fact of life. I think the current term is ‘Friends with benefits’, where people engage in casual sex to meet their physical needs without the emotional entanglement of an exclusive boy/girl relationship, and most couples who get married today have slept together before they get married.

I heard a statistic the other day that fully thirty percent of married Australian men have visited a prostitute, not to mention the office affairs, unfaithfulness and marriage breakdowns arising out of those extramarital affairs.

And as the world around us becomes more and more accepting of promiscuity as purely a lifestyle-choice, I start to find myself wondering: ‘Hang on a minute. Is it me that’s going crazy here? Am I the one who’s out-of-touch by believing that physical and sexual intimacy belongs inside a marriage, in this completely exclusive lifelong relationship between one man and one woman? Is the Biblical position on this still tenable in this day and age?’

Then I pinch myself, and I realise that what Jesus has to say is as applicable today as it was two thousand years ago because truth, His truth, is timeless, and this is what Jesus said when the religious leaders of the day came to ask Him about divorce. He said (Matthew 5:27-32):

You have heard it said, ‘You shall not commit adultery’, but I say to you that everyone who looks at a woman with lust has already committed adultery with her in his heart. If your right eye causes you to sin, tear it out and throw it away. It is better for you to lose one of your members than for your whole body to be thrown into hell. And if your right hand causes you to sin, cut it off and throw it away. It is better for you to lose one of your members than your whole body to go into hell. It was also said, ‘Whoever divorces his wife, let him give her a certificate of divorce’, but I say to you that anyone who divorces his wife except for grounds of un-chastity causes her to commit adultery, and whoever marries a divorced woman commits adultery.

That seems pretty harsh, doesn’t it? Pretty tough and rigid. If Jesus were alive today, they’d probably call Him an extreme conservative: A fundamentalist, but there’s a reason that Jesus takes this apparently hard-line, and that reason is that God created us male and female, in order that those of us who so choose can live in a lifelong intimate marriage as husband and wife. Plain and simple. Again, here’s what He said, quoting this time the first book in the Bible – the book of Genesis (Matthew 19:3-9):

Some Pharisees came to Him to test Him and they asked Him, ‘Is it lawful for a man to divorce his wife for any cause?’

And Jesus answered, ‘Have you not read that the One who made them at the beginning made them male and female, and said ‘For this reason a man shall leave his father and mother and be joined to his wife, and the two shall become one flesh’, so they are no longer two, but one flesh. Therefore what God has joined together, let no one separate’. 

They said to Him, ‘Why then did Moses command us to give a certificate of dismissal and to divorce her?’

And He said to them, ‘It was because you were so hard-hearted that Moses allowed you to divorce your wives, but from the beginning, it was not so. And I say to you whoever divorces his wife, except for un-chastity, and marries another commits adultery’.

The point is that we were created to be husband and wife and when we try to mess with that, when we try to break that, it doesn’t work. Our physiological drive to reproduce is a very strong one: Stronger in some than others, to be sure, but a strong one nevertheless. It’s a gift from God, and it’s a gift that is satisfied completely in the context of marriage, as God has always planned.

You can’t be content chasing girls (or guys, as the case may be) outside marriage. It might seem fun at the time, and exciting and alluring – fabulous, but in the end, it leads to emptiness and to loss because sex without love is always empty. For me there is no one, there can never be anyone, as beautiful as my wife. She’s mine, and I’m hers. Exclusively. No exceptions; and in that, my friend, there is such great contentment. So, if you find your eye or your heart wandering, remember this: If you wander, you will never, ever be content … ever.

GOLD

They say that love makes the world go round, but so far as I can see, it seems to be money these days that makes the world go round or at least, it certainly makes our economies tick over. In fact, it seems to me that economies, governments and people at large, ordinary punters like you and me, are addicted to conspicuous consumption to fuel our own personal growth and wealth and status and luxury and what other people think about us, not to mention fuelling the holy grail of a prosperous nation: Economic growth.

I really don’t think we even begin to realise how addicted many of us are to overconsumption: The next thing; the next dress; the next car; the next house, each one bigger and better and brighter and shinier than the last one.

Noam Chomsky, who I know some people consider to be a rabid left-wing critic, says something that really resonates with me, as I look dispassionately at the multi-trillion-dollar advertising industry that bombards me constantly with the exhortation to spend up big. He says this: ‘All over the place, from the popular culture to the propaganda system, there is a constant pressure to make people feel that they’re helpless – that the only role they can have is to ratify decisions, and to consume’.

Pretty much true, isn’t it? Advertising puts its finger on your feelings of inadequacy, in order to get you to purchase the thing that they say will make you feel adequate, even when that thing they’re selling us may not be all that good for us: Heart-healthy margarine when in fact, it’s more bad for us than it is good for us; wrinkle cream – come on, you women, which one of you can resist the advertising line: ‘Look ten years younger in just fourteen days’. Analyse any advertisement – television, radio, print, billboard, and at its heart, it points out our sense of inadequacy and promises to deal with that problem to make us content, if only we’ll part with our hard-earned cash. It’s true.

Now, am I saying that all consumption is bad? No. Am I saying that we should all be poor as church mice? No, but what I am saying is that in our yearning to feel satisfied, many people swallow this implicit lie that the advertising industry’s telling them, and they go looking for their satisfaction and their contentment in wealth and the things that it can buy, only to spend a fortune to discover that they’re living a shallow life and there’s simply no contentment in wealth.

Well, let me save you some trouble: God’s known that for rather a long time, and He’s gone to the trouble of telling us that over and over again. Here it is through the words of one of God’s servants King Solomon, who was one of the richest and wisest men who’s ever walked the planet. Ecclesiastes 5:10-11:

The lover of money will not be satisfied with money, nor the lover of wealth with gain; this is also vanity. When goods increase, those who eat them increase, and what gain has their owner but to see them with their eyes?

As an experienced practitioner in trying to satisfy myself with wealth, I can tell you that word from God’s Bible is absolutely true. Now I don’t know where you’re at, but I’m aware that many of the people listening today may not have a relationship with Jesus, so when I share something from the Bible, you’re thinking: ‘Well, yes, so what?’

Fair enough, so let me share with you something the great British journalist Bernard Levin wrote, and he’s a man who’s a professed atheist. ‘Countries like ours are full of people who have all they desire and yet lead lives of quiet desperation, understanding nothing but the fact that there’s a hole inside, and no matter how much food and drink we pour into it, however many motorcars and TVs we stuff it with, however many well-balanced children and loyal friends we parade around the edges of it, it aches’.

So many people relate to that paradox. The more we try to fill ourselves up, the emptier we feel. The more we consume, the less satisfied we are, so what are you consuming? What are you spending your money on, and how much does this desire to have, have its dark tentacles wrapped around your heart with a vide-like grip, that’s robbing you of the contentment that God wants you to have?

I was talking to a man, a farmer, just before Christmas last year and he was telling me how grieved he was at the consumerism that he was surrounded with at Christmas. He and his family had decided not to give one another Christmas presents anymore because they had all they needed. They decided to give to those in need instead.

If there’s one thing that’ll rob us of contentment faster than just about anything else, it’s greed. And if there’s one thing that’ll set us free from that terrible malady faster than anything else, it’s generosity; letting things go; giving to those who need more than we do.

I was quite shocked actually how prevalent is the exhortation in God’s Word to give generously. It’s something that God tells us to do all the time: Not because He’s in desperate need of our cash to fund His work (although that is how God funds His work on this earth – through His people), but because He wants our hearts, and He knows that our hearts are tethered firmly to our wallets, and the way He sets us free from the discontentment of putting our hope and our trust and our desire in wealth is by getting us to part with it sacrificially. Have a listen to this. 2 Corinthians 9:6-8:

The point is this (writes Paul). The one who sows sparingly will reap sparingly, and the one who sows bountifully will also reap bountifully. Each of you must give as you have made up your mind, not reluctantly or under compulsion, for God loves a cheerful giver. And God is able to provide you with every blessing in abundance, so that by always having enough for everything, you may share abundantly in every good work.

You see, God’s plan is to set us free from this addiction to wealth so that we can be content.

GLORY

Have you ever seen one of those old western movies, where the bad guy comes into the bar, and he starts to shoot at the feet of the good guy to make him jump and dance? And so the good guy’s jumping and dancing to avoid being shot in the foot. Depending on the scene, sometimes it’s funny, like in the final movie of the ‘Back to the Future’ trilogy, and at other times it can be really quite serious and scary, but anyhow, it’s a motif that’s repeated over and over again in many-a western movie.

Now, just think about the guy who’s being shot at – the one who’s doing the jumping and the dancing. What do you imagine is going through his mind? Shock? Terror? Fear? The adrenaline must be pumping to stop him from being hit by a bullet. The one thing that’s not going through his mind at that moment is peace and contentment. Obviously, it’s a bit difficult to be content when someone’s shooting at you, right?

And yet that in a sense is how many people are living their lives, because they’re so worried about what other people think of them. They’re so concerned about their reputation. They’re worried about what people are saying behind their backs, and all that comes from the fact that we want people to think well of us and to speak well of us and to like us. We worry about our reputations more often than we worry about whether or not we’re doing the right thing, and whether or not our lives are honouring God.

I can again speak with some authority on this, because I used to be really concerned with what other people thought about me. Well, I can tell you, if that still bothered me, I wouldn’t be able to do what I’m doing now. Some guy’s put a video clip up on YouTube claiming I’m a heretic. As well as lots of encouraging phone calls and letters and e-mails, I get the odd rude one or disparaging one too and … well the odd video on YouTube. If those things got to me, I simply wouldn’t be able to keep on going.

The miracle in my life is that God transformed me from someone who tried to be everything to everyone to someone who’s content with who I am and probably more importantly, who I’m not; what I can do, and what I can’t do. I (like you) have strengths and weaknesses, and I’ve come to grips with the fact that some things I’m just not good at, but it wasn’t always like that for me.

And so, when you try to be everything to everyone, when you’re running around keeping up appearances, man, that is seriously hard work! That’s exhausting, and it was only when I started feeling safe in Jesus that I started caring less and less what people thought of me and said of me. I’m me, and do you know what? I do my best; often times I say things as God tells it through the Bible, and that seems to be out-of-step with contemporary thinking. Well, that’s it. Can’t be any more or less than I am.

The problem comes when our reputation is more important to us than our relationship with Jesus. Let me say that again because it’s important: The problem comes when our reputation is more important to us than our relationship with Jesus. The problem comes when we go looking for glory for us, and we forget that God doesn’t share His glory with any man, which is precisely the point that Jesus made in a powerful way. Have a listen to this (John 5:30-47):

I can do nothing on my own (said Jesus). As I hear, I judge, and my judgment is just because I seek to do not My own will, but the will of Him who sent Me.

You see, if I testified about Myself, My testimony wouldn’t be true. There is another who testifies on My behalf, and I know that His testimony to Me is true. You sent messengers to John, and he testified to the truth: Not that I accept such human testimony, but I say these things so that you may be saved. He was a burning and shining lamp, and you were willing to rejoice for a while in his light, but I have a testimony greater than John’s. The works that the Father has given Me to complete, the very works that I am now doing, testify on My behalf that the Father sent Me. And the Father who sent Me has Himself testified on My behalf. You have never heard His voice or seen His form, and you do not have His Word abiding in you because you do not believe in the One whom He sent. 

You go searching the Scriptures because you think that in them, you have eternal life, and yet it’s they that testify on My behalf, yet you refuse to come to Me to have life. I don’t accept glory from human beings, but I know that you do not have the love of God in you. I have come in My Father’s name and you do not accept Me. If another comes in his own name, you will accept him. How can you believe when you accept glory from one another and don’t seek the glory that comes from the One who alone is God?

The point that Jesus is making here is that He’s not here to build an empire. He’s not here to build Himself up into an empire to be weighted on hand and foot. He’s not here to get more disciples than the other Rabbis although, in the end, that’s exactly what’s happened. Jesus came to do His Father’s bidding, and when people (those people with whom He was speaking) didn’t accept Him as the Son of God, He knew precisely why it was: He put His finger right on the problem. Let me read it to you again – the last verse (verse 47). Jesus asked this question:

‘How can you believe when you accept glory from one another and you don’t seek the glory that comes from the One who alone is God?’

Good question! Right question! If people are seeking their own glory from one another – accolades and awards and pats on the backs and compliments, it’s a sure sign that they’re more interested in their own glory than God’s glory.

A little later, Jesus said to His disciples: ‘The time has come for the Son of Man to be glorified’. Do you know what He was talking about? He was predicting His crucifixion. To Jesus, being glorified means sacrificing everything for you and me, and now He sits at the right hand of the Father.

One of the reasons that so many people aren’t content is because they’re chasing the glory of men, the glory of their own reputations. And because people are fickle, you end up riding a rollercoaster of public opinion. That’s no way to find contentment, is it? So long as you worry about your reputation, and what other people think and what other people say, you can never be content … ever, and Jesus knew that. That’s why He said to them: ‘I don’t accept glory from human beings’. Elsewhere John records that Jesus, on His part (John 2:24-25):

Would not entrust Himself to men because He knew all people and needed no one to testify about Him, for He Himself knew what was in everyone.

So, who were the ‘Them’ that He didn’t entrust Himself to? The crowds that were following Him because they saw all the miracles He was doing. In other words, He didn’t get sucked in by all the people who were oohing and ahhing at His miracles because He knew that they were the very same people who would one day be shouting: ‘Crucify Him’.

Yes, we have relationships. Yes, we trust those whom we love, and our close friends. Yes, we listen to trusted advisors who come to us and tell us some hard things sometimes about ourselves … That’s how it should be, but the fickle opinions of people who are serving their own needs, the completely valueless taunts and words of flattery from people who themselves don’t have a strong and decent character, are not the yardsticks for our performance.

If we listen to them, then we’re no different to the cowboy dancing to the shots of the bad guy in the western movies. The only yardstick to measure who we are, and whether we’re living a good life or not, is God; and we find His yardstick, His measure, in His Word the Bible. The beauty of that is that His Word is true, and when we fail, and when we fall short, you and I (in Him) – we have forgiveness, through the grace of Jesus Christ. Mate, that’s where you find contentment. Nowhere else.