Enjoy what you have rather than desiring
what you don’t have. Just dreaming about nice things is meaningless—like
chasing the wind (Ecclesiastes 6:9 NLT)
It is much
better to dwell on what you have rather than on what you don’t have. Doing otherwise can launch us into a
life-long journey of trying to grasp something you can never obtain.
The famous
commentator Matthew Henry once said, “People who are always content even if
they have very little are much happier than people who are always craving more
even if they have much.” Dreams can be
powerful things. God often gives them to
people, and they are strong motivations, but we must make sure they are from
God and not just from our own imagination.
Dwelling on what we don’t have is a recipe for frustration and
discontentment. God often gives us more,
but it is usually never enough when fixated on what we lack. A very wealthy man once replied, “just a
little more,” when asked how much money is enough.
So what is the
solution? Should we all take a vow of
poverty? We have tried that in
Chrysostom, and it works for some but not for all. We usually exchange one craving for other,
giving up earthly pleasures but replacing them with striving after personal
piety. We are just substituting one
fleshly pursuit with another. The
solution, as the writer of Ecclesiastes, tells us is to seek satisfaction from
the reality of what we have, not the fantasy of what we don’t possess. Finding fulfillment in anything but God is
like pursuing a mirage. It looks good from a distance but when you get there
it’s gone, and you find yourself grasping after the wind.
Image used with
permission by Microsoft.
Ken
Barnes the author of “The Chicken Farm and Other Sacred Places” YWAM Publishing
Email: kenbarnes737@gmail.com
website: https://sites.google.com/site/kenbarnesbooksite/
Email: kenbarnes737@gmail.com
website: https://sites.google.com/site/kenbarnesbooksite/
Podcasts: http://kensblogpodcast.blogspot.com
No comments :
Post a Comment