Contentment!

My youngest daughter can play with an empty gallon jug of water for hours. She’ll push it across the floor pretending it’s a train, she’ll bang it on the floor pretending it’s a drum, she’ll take the top off and try to peek in to see if there’s any water left, she’ll try to throw it up in the air to see what sound it makes when it comes crashing back to earth, and every time she gets her hands on an empty jug, she’s in her own little world.

Yesterday, while her mother was running some errands, I brought her into my office and let her play on the floor. I watched her out of the corner of my eye as she played with such complete contentment plastered on her face, that I understood what true contentment really was.

True contentment is not simply saying that we are content when in point of fact we are wrestling with issues in our hearts. It is not plastering a smile and nodding along to positive affirmations while we are racking our brains endlessly trying to figure out the pieces to a puzzle so complex its very scope escapes our understanding.

The Word tells us that godliness with contentment is great gain. The two must be coupled, intertwined, and matured as one in order for optimal gain to occur. While many of us strive for godliness, the number of those who strive for contentment is frightfully small.

No matter how much we pursue godliness, many of us are still ill at ease, trying to figure out the mysteries that will not be revealed until seals are broken, and that which was kept in the shadows will be brought to the light.

Contentment is a priceless virtue, especially in times such as these wherein it’s easy to let one’s mind wander, and attempt to make connections that are tenuous at best.

Be content in godliness. Be singularly focused on godliness, and allow it to nourish your spiritual man to the point that you will not inquire as to what will be tomorrow, but rejoice in the fulfillment of contentment for all that God is to you today.

It’s easy to get caught in the trap of the next thing, the next message, the next warning, the next prophecy, and we become so addicted to what’s next that we lose our peace in the present. God is as in control over tomorrow as He was over yesterday and as He is over today. We pursue godliness because we want to deepen the bond of fellowship with Him, not because we may get some insider information on what will occur in the future.

Yes, I believe in the prophetic, I believe in dreams, in visions, in revelation and in God speaking through certain vessels regarding what is to come, but what I do not believe in is chasing after revelation rather than after Christ.

It is not prophecy with contentment that is great gain, nor is it visions with contentment, or dreams with contentment for that matter. It is godliness with contentment that is great gain, and it is the principle thing we must focus on.

Build up contentment in your heart to the point that it is not a forced mimicking of it for the sake of those watching, but something pure, and true and honest, something sincere that is as evident in you, as is my daughter’s contentment each time she gets her hand son an empty gallon jug.

With love in Christ,

Michael Boldea Jr.