The past couple months I've been in an awesome bible study at church based off of the book "Lord, Change My Attitude" by James McDonald and Barb Peil. It's ah-mazing!! We go through the workbook, but there's also a "real" book you can get. I totally recommend picking it up. So the entire study is about changing our society-accepted sinful attitudes - like complaining, grumbling, coveting (more than just money/stuff! relationships, body types...everything), criticism, doubting...etc -- into God-honoring attitudes - like Thanksgiving, Contentment, Love...etc. It's pretty awesome and kind of heavy at times. Very eye-opening. God's doing awesome works within me, revealing areas I need to be refined in.
Fast Forward to this week, Thanksgiving week. We actually went over the "Thanksgiving" section several weeks ago but everything kind of builds on itself and we just ended on Contentment. This is an area that I've struggled with a lot, for awhile now. And actually, when I first saw this study being offered, my interest was piqued solely because of the whole covetousness/contentment portion. When I started the study, I figured I would have at least a good couple weeks until we got into this but instead, God hit me HARD with just how big of a problem covetousness/contentment had been in my life. I always knew I had an issue with it but on the other side, I tried to be thankful for what He has blessed us with and kind of figured that not being totally content wasn't that big of a deal. I mean, doesn't everyone struggle with this? Doesn't everyone want something different in their house, or a different body type, or think they've worked really hard in one area so they deserve a certain outcome? And if I thank God the majority of the times for the majority of stuff, isn't that enough? Um....God's answer to me: NO! He totally revealed this truth to me in the "complaining" portion of the study. Yea...in the FIRST section. Talk about not wasting any time. Thanks God. But the great thing is that I needed this truth to be revealed to me early on so I could recognize it, confess it and then submit it to God so He could start a work on changing it. And boy, has He been working on me!
Which brings me to today and this Thanksgiving post. It's not the typical "I'm thankful for _____" post that normally I would do. Instead, it's what God has taught me in the last couple weeks about Thanksgiving and Contentment. So here we go: I always thought in order to be content, I needed to be more thankful. And when I wasn't content with something, I was just be blinded to all the blessings in my life. So I needed (and vowed) to try harder to "count my blessings" and to see that what I have is actually enough....and so forth. But I always failed. And it was a vicious cycle of feeling discontent, then trying to be more thankful and then falling back into old habits and feeling discontent again and then guilty because WHY couldn't I just be happy and grateful for what I already have???!!!! And here's what God showed me: I've been totally focused on on the wrong thing. I seriously missed the boat here. I meant to get on the right boat, my intentions were there but the boat I was on, I was also trying to steer. And that's never a good sign. Being more thankful for things DOES NOT equal contentment. It just causes an endless cycle of spinning my wheels and getting no where. Because it's all about me. I didn't include God in any of it other than trying to thank Him more in my own strength. And that's where I went wrong. I can't do anything without Christ but WITH HIM, "all things are possible." See, Christ is what equals contentment. When I am drawn into Him, when I'm connected to the vine, when I'm sitting quietly and spending time with my Savior, then suddenly, I'm content. Because I'm focused on what matters. I'm able to be thankful for things because I know how blessed I truly am. One girl in my study said something like this and it really stuck with me: It's like if we walked around with absolutely nothing but a cup. And in our cup, God poured in salvation. If ALL we had in that cup was the salvation God poured into it - our cup would overflow.When you look at things with that perspective, then you're able to see that everything else becomes just extra stuff He blesses us with. We were DEAD....like we should be living in utter torture for eternity, and He saved us. For no reason other than He loves us . He died so we can live. And now, we get to live in the light of His grace and crazy blessings. Oh my goodness, anything that we have, every single thing that He's given us is just this amazing overflow of what He's already done for us. And you know what - when my relationship with Christ is growing and strong and I'm focusing on what really matters - everything else seems to be pretty great. It's easy to be thankful then, because gratitude is a natural response when you're plugged into the Savior who has given you life. It makes my messy house with stained carpets, a small kitchen and crayon-colored walls, wonderful. It makes my growing body just perfect, because He's creating life in me. It makes my face beautiful, because that's how He created me. It makes trials joyful because I know that He is good and that He is doing a good work through it. It makes my finances enough because I'm constantly putting my security and faith in HIM, instead of money. It makes the thrift-store and hand me down clothes for my kids perfect because my precious little ones are clothed and warm. I just become .....content. With everything. I don't need anything else - no new clothes for my kids, not a new house, not a skinnier waistline.....nothing. Christ is all I need. Now, don't get me wrong. It's not a one-time thing that you do and then you never struggle with discontentment ever again. Philippians 4:12 says "I know what it is to be in need, and I know what it is to have plenty. I have learned the secret of being content in any and every situation, whether well fed or hungry, whether living in plenty or in want." That's the key word there - LEARNED. It's something you have to practice daily. It's something that must be learned over time, through repetition and God is the only one who teaches it to you. It's a continuous choice to spend time with Him and keep staying connected to Him. I'm still struggling with it too, I have a feeling it'll be something that takes me a long time to learn. But at least now I'm on the right boat with the right Captain steering the way. :)
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