Contentment

Well, good morning. Let's stand and pray. Heavenly Father, we come before you this morning.

Lord, thank you for blessing us with another day. Lord, I pray that you would bless our service here this morning. Lord, again I pray that you would touch each of our hearts.

Lord, call us this morning. Work in our hearts and draw us. Lord, help us to worship you.

Thank you for your word. I pray that you bless it to us. In Jesus' name we pray.

Amen. Okay, you may be seated. Okay, thank you Ben for the children's lesson and Dave for the opening.

I was kind of pondering the combination of what I'm wanting to share and what you shared and they go together. One thought I had about surrender, just as an example, I don't know if any of you have ever been on a boat and be stranded. Have you ever been on a boat and you're stranded on the water? I've done that.

That has a different level of panic feeling that comes with that. You can't just get out and push or swim. Now you wait until somebody comes and picks you up.

Actually, I had bought an old boat and I was all eager, I'm going to fix this thing up. And I will say that my soul struggled with surrender. I was at a place, even with my parents, I struggled to surrender as a youth boy.

My dad said I could buy me a boat and somehow it seemed to want to run on land but not in water. So if I would run it on land at the house, it would run and I don't know what changed. But as we put it in the water, we got it started and then it flooded with fuel and then we were stranded.

Not too far from water or from the shore. But anyway, the coast guards got called and the helicopters were on their way and the police boats were on their way. And let's just say that didn't end very well.

So somewhere we got to learn to surrender. With all that, the police officer comes up to me and I didn't even have my whatever license that is. And he was very, very upset.

And he taught me really quickly what he thought of my eagerness and foolishness. So anyway, that helped me to learn to surrender. I was like okay, got to be more careful in what I choose to do.

If we don't surrender, somewhere, sometime, again and again in life, something comes up and it teaches us. Either the hardship of not surrendering or the blessing of surrendering. It reminds me of, if I were to try to give an example, it's like a baby being born into a ship.

We know the stories of ships that have sank, thinking even of like Titanic. They thought it would never sink, but it did sink. It hit an iceberg.

And so it's like a child being born. And it has some years in this world until it comes to the age of accountability. It's happy to submit.

It's happy to surrender. It goes through its struggles. You know, dad and mom, they're training the child.

Yeah, it goes through its child life stage and it's good. But then when it comes to the age of accountability, they start to learn the power of choice. The power of the will.

And that's the time where it becomes crucial to learn to surrender. And I was reminded of a thought this way. It's like this ship.

This ship is programmed to crash. We know that Satan has, there's only two people, there's only two choices in this world. Sometimes in our mind we think it's other things as well, but there's only two choices in this world.

One is that the Lord would be in charge of our ship. He's the captain. Or that the devil is.

And I'm reminded of that thinking how even at 12 years old in my life the devil was in charge. And something that struck me strongly as I was pondering later in years is the mockery and laughter of the wicked one. So I could be that teenage boy, teenage girl that's on this ship.

And somehow I've allowed myself to come to this place in my mind. I am in control. And as I sit at the captain's wheel thinking I can do as I please, I'm in charge.

Satan is laughing in the background knowing your destination is to crash and sink. And only the Lord is able to help us as we acknowledge that all my doings, all they do is they harmonize with evil which will cause me to crash and die. As we acknowledge that, that I'm not in a place where I can guide this ship or be the captain of this ship.

As we give that over to the Lord is the only way we can have life. So you and I aren't in charge of whether we have death or life. Other than we make a choice.

And it's God who gives life. And if we live this selfish, unsurrendered life, even as a Christian, where we turn back to wanting to be in charge, you start charting that course again where you're going to crash. So yeah, I thought that was a blessing that we would be surrendered.

Well, what I'd like to share about this morning, my title here, I call it contentment in the home. Contentment in the home. And I think maybe the opposite of contentment would be being covetous.

But as we'll see a little bit later, it seems like covetous is one of the surrounding sins of all sins. It's covetousness. And Satan was covetous of God.

And it caused him to sin and be cast out of heaven. And it goes well with this topic of surrender. If we are surrendered, then we are content.

If we're not surrendered, there's a very strong chance that we're covetous. Our heart has this feeling and desire of covetous. So it is good to desire contentment for our families.

And we often think about this in relation to money. When we think of contentment, we think of the things that we buy or we don't need to buy. And when we think of telling someone, you know what, you should be content.

We probably are referring to them wanting something. And we're saying, you know what, you have enough. You don't need more.

You should be content. Maybe children, as they ask for something, as children would go to mom and dad and say, I want this. I want this.

And dad would say, well, you know what, it's a no. You can't have it. And then maybe the question is, why? Why can't I have it? Why can't I do this? And then mom or dad says, well, you need to be content.

Now, sometimes in our minds, definitely as children, hopefully children, you can follow me this morning in these thoughts as well. Sometimes in our mind, and maybe you can think about it for me, is it not, children, sometimes we feel like, well, if there's nothing wrong with it, why not? You ever felt that way? I have, many times. Raise your hand.

Children, did you ever feel that way? If a parent says no and you feel like, why not? I think so. I think we've all felt that way. Well, I was blessed to learn a little secret here, and that is, sometimes the struggle or the trouble is not the item.

If Kai says, I want a new bike. And I said to him, no, no, we're not going to buy a new bike. And he'll say, why not? Well, there is actually, contentment is a unique word, as we'll see, that sometimes if dad says, I want you to be content.

We, or to any of us, but anyway, then we children, we will say, why not? And we look at the item as the problem. So, for example, if we want to buy a good item and we ask dad, dad, could I have this? And dad says, no, we might look a little confused. What's a good thing? Why not? So, contentment isn't whether you want more or less.

Contentment is not, you should have nothing and be happy, or you should have lots and be happy. Contentment is an issue of the heart. You can have a very rich man, be very discontent.

You can have a very poor man, be very content. And so, we'll separate those things today. Contentment is not saying, you shouldn't have anything.

Contentment is an issue of the heart. The heart that is built on, I want, I want, I want. And if the heart says, I want one, and then you get one, and then it says, I want two, and then you get two, and then I want three.

The heart is not content. It's a problem in our own being that, yeah, that's the problem. So, money cannot buy.

Things cannot make us content, whether few things or many things. I'm sure we've had the feeling where we thought to ourselves maybe, if I just had that, I would be happy. And the truth is, if you're not happy now, you won't be happy then.

How many times has a young man decided to be unwise and maybe buy a vehicle at 17, 18 years old, and he was so full of, it's my turn, I need a vehicle. And then he's so full of, I got to buy a vehicle that everyone likes, and all these things come together. And he owns that vehicle for three months.

He struggles to pay the insurance and payments on it. And you know what? Then he hates the truck or the car. It doesn't take long to buy something, and it actually causes you trouble.

And then you come to a point where you're like, I do not like this. Now, I know many of a young man who has then went and who first bought this expensive vehicle to impress maybe his friends, and it didn't take long until he just as quickly got rid of that vehicle and bought a different vehicle because he wanted to save money, have cheaper payments. But contentment can go back and forth, back and forth.

Even with him, after he bought the expensive vehicle, he still was not content. Okay, contentment cannot be bought, and it cannot be received by getting things. So, another phrase here that I have is, a content person does not look to circumstances to find peace.

Do you have peace? Contentment is an inner sufficiency that keeps us at peace despite outward circumstances. Well, I'd like for you to consider that this morning. It's for all of us, but also for you younger ones.

I know that we are well familiar with the feeling of disappointment when something does not go right. Something is not the way we would like it to be. What shall we say? I want to use an example.

Maybe you have planned a fishing trip, and it's windy and raining all day. It's a disappointment, yes. Maybe whoever you're going with cancels.

They don't want to go. And how does it – what happens in our hearts? So, the idea of an event being canceled, and how do we handle that idea? Being able to go through circumstances and be at peace and not go through all the hard feelings of disappointment and wanting more. The idea of wanting more.

I wish, in a way, I could give us a warning. And I thought of giving a little story. And I'll share this.

It's not a written story, but just as a little example to us. It doesn't come around all the way. It's not a perfect story, but it could help.

The idea of wanting. Do you know what it feels like to want? Anyone have something you really want? Is it wrong to want something? No. When does wanting become wrong? When does wanting become wrong? It's actually the definition of covetousness.

When does wanting become wrong? When what I want is at such a high priority that that's all I can focus on. And I'm willing to do a selfish and a disobedient method of getting it. So, for example, you need money to buy something.

And you decide, I'm just going to work and work and work and work until I have the money to get it. And so you work from sunup to sundown every single day, six, seven days a week. Your focus is, I got to do this.

I want to get it. That want, the want itself isn't wrong. Your heart is wrong.

You're wrong. When the priority becomes so high that it's our first priority outside of a healthy God-ordained lifestyle, then it becomes wrong. It's covetousness.

So we know the feeling of want. And so the story I was going to give a little bit is, want is like a lion. Here we can go to different places.

You rent a cabin. And I remember being in Tennessee. We rented a cabin there years ago.

And there was bears wandering around on the outside. Now, the bear is not exactly a good example of want because want has a hunger it devours. So want actually devours your mind.

And that's if you're on the extreme side. You think of where people would intoxicate themselves and they can no longer think clearly. They'll take substance abuse of other kind and they can no longer process their thoughts clearly.

Want does that. Want is like a drug. It warps our mind and heart and emotions and all we can think is, I want this, I want this, I want this.

Whether it's, you know, for adults, for adults it's probably jobs or houses or some sort of, you know, we as dads, we want to prosper. We want to bless our family. We want our family to prosper.

But maybe that could be too high on our list. I feel like I'm guilty of that where that's too high on my list. And so maybe for moms, I'm not sure what I would use as an example.

What would be something there where the moms are, they would be in want. Maybe for moms it's having the house that's too nice, too much focus on, on all the niceness of life. But then there's also children.

And so for all of you children, you are very much, very much part of, in God's will, regarding contentment and the endangerment of want. Sometimes we might say, oh, well, I'm not born again yet. I'm seven years old.

I'm not born again. And so therefore, what God's word teaches is not really for me. God's word is for those that are born again.

Well, it is not. It is not just for those that are born again. God's word is for those that are not born again.

And as you follow God's word, even though you're not born again, as you get to the age of accountability, God will call you. And then you have that choice to make. But understand this.

If your want is too high and you're not really following God's word and your want list is very high, there's a very good chance that you're going to not listen to God when he calls. You're not, you don't want to. You're starting to learn what's happening in this ship.

You're very much a part of the waves and the crashing and things aren't working well and there's anger and there's frustration. That's called guilt. That's the conscience.

And as you're in this life, struggling through that, but you struggle to surrender. And so your want is high. Your want.

Sometimes we want to protect ourselves. So I would say from all the children, I don't know who the youngest is here today. Is it Theodore? Anyway, from all the little children, they won't understand you as well.

But then we go to Nolan, Rosie, Dawson, Ashton, all you boys, all of you. I want to talk to you that you are able to look at this area of want and see yourself in this little story. You've rented a cabin and around this cabin, maybe we're in Africa.

And we've rented a cabin there, but for whatever reason, the lions are stalking around the house. Now, would you or how would you feel as these lions are very hungry, haven't had anything to eat and they want to get in the house. And if you are there as a family, this is how it works.

Contentment is as a family. It's not just one person. It's not just dad.

It's not just mom. It's also the children. So as you're in this home and the lion is walking around the outside, scratching at the windows and roaring away.

The idea of discontentment is if I am discontent, then I open that door to that lion to come into that house. But it's actually not an outside thing coming in. It's in here coming out.

Discontentment is like a lion. And so which one of us would be willing to open the door for that lion to come in and to really hurt anyone and everyone in that setting? I was listening to a message on contentment, reading different passages on contentment. And so as I was looking at contentment, the opposite of it is covetous.

And as I was looking at this word covetous, the word is a word that is often not really understood. And actually there's a man, there's a Catholic priest who said he had listened to thousands upon thousands of confessions. So people would confess that I stole something or I did something wrong, I hurt somebody, I lied, I gossiped.

All these sins, they would come to the priest and confess. But there's one sin he said they did not confess. They didn't understand it.

And it's covetousness. And yet if we look through the Bible what covetousness is and does and how it affects us, covetousness kills. It kills.

And so we don't want to be part of that. We want to be part of a setting where we are content. Our hearts, our feelings are in a place of, you know, we put them in check, we would say.

We make sure our feelings are in the right place. We are content. Let's give another example.

For dads it might be you're starting a new job and it goes wrong. Am I content? Or do I get angry? Well, I've experienced both. For moms, maybe it is a school day teaching children and there's circumstances that come up there.

And it makes the day very difficult. Lots of circumstances. Maybe it was a full day of school but maybe someone came over to visit and had a need.

And because of the need, all of the school day got mixed up and we couldn't finish school. That could be for a mom. Is the mom frustrated, angry? Or can the mom be content? And then for us boys and girls, maybe we have something we would really like.

And maybe mom and dad have said, you know what, it would be good for you to wait. What kind of feelings come up inside? What kind of feelings come up where you can say, you know what dad, I really would like it. But if you want me to wait, I can wait.

Now we are surrendered. Now we are content. What happens though if we get mad? No, I want it.

It's not fair. Someone else has it, I should be able to have it too. Or somebody else does it, I should be able to do it too.

What happens? See, we have that choice in this ship. Would you like a captain that can take you to the nicest scenery of the globe? All over the oceans, seeing all kinds of beauty. Or do you want this captain that is out, laughing and mocking you, hoping you're going to die.

See, life without Christ is for you to be in this ship where your captain, he doesn't care that you get hurt. He says to you, be selfish, be selfish. Yeah, oh yeah, take it, take it.

He's not looking, doesn't matter. Oh, it's unfair. He lied to you, you can lie to him.

All kinds of things can come together. He says, fight for yourself, fight for yourself. And if you're on that ship, and you're willing to fight for yourself, when you don't see, I don't see.

As I battle this war in this ship, when Satan is away, he laughs and sneers. And he says, he stands before God and says, look, he cursed you to your face. He doesn't love you, he doesn't want to serve you.

There's only two choices. Will you serve God? And will you let him be the captain of your life? Or will you serve yourself and let Satan be the captain of your life? Satan will destroy you. And he knows he will be destroyed.

And he wants everyone that he can get to join him. Well, you know what? A little bit of a struggle with contentment is also this. Have you ever been at a place where having peace is just too peaceful? Have you ever felt that? It's a nice, beautiful day.

There's just, nothing's pressing. You know, how many children in different countries, India, China, in how many countries are children working six, seven days a week? Slave labor. It happens a lot.

And we in Canada, we don't experience that. In the U.S., there's other countries that don't experience that. But the idea of peace, how often is peace born? Is peace born? You know, I as an adult struggle with that.

When you're tired, it's easy to say. You know, you're out, it's a nice day, and you had a hard day yesterday. I go out, if I had a hammock, I would go and sit on the hammock and say, oh, how nice just to relax.

Well, I'm not really talking about that. It would be nice and comfortable to relax. But the idea of peace, where we're not in a storm, we are blessed, we have food to eat, nice place to sleep as far as in the home, air conditioning in the summer, heat in the winter, and we have clothes on more than enough.

Shouldn't we be at a place and say, how nice? How nice? And yet our hearts are often, well, I would do this, I want that, I want to do this, I want to go there. Contentment is not, there's a fancy word they use, it's called complacency. Contentment is not complacency.

So what I mean to say there is, contentment is not the idea that you should be happy doing nothing. Again, we want to draw this word, contentment, to our heart. Contentment isn't the idea that you do nothing and be happy.

Hey, if you get a day where you can do nothing, I hope that you are happy. But contentment, or with contentment, you can be busy. You could be, and you name it.

So we're going to read a verse here, and it talks to us about work. You can enjoy labor. Brother Dave, he does landscaping.

James and Joshua do siding. I do framing, and Ben does steel. Each one of us can be content in what we do and enjoy the work that we do.

A full day's labor is rewarding. And we make plans. We might make a plan to go on a vacation.

So you can live life in a healthy way and be content. So again, contentment is not the idea that we do nothing or have nothing. That should make us happy.

Contentment is, are you, in your heart, at peace? That you don't have to have things to make you happy. Contentment is an inner sufficiency that keeps us at peace despite outward circumstances. You have a lot of money.

You say, it doesn't matter. I'm content. I can give to the poor.

You have little money. You say, it doesn't matter. I'm trusting the Lord.

He will provide. I'm content. There's a beautiful psalm that talks about contentment in the home.

Psalm 128. Let's turn there. Psalm 128.

And you can follow me here as I read. Here we're going to use two words, kind of as synonyms. One is contentment, and the other one is peace.

In Psalm 128, it uses the word peace, which is good, but we could also say this is a psalm of contentment. And the context of this psalm is also in the context of a family. So, Psalm 128.

For thou shalt eat the labor of thine hands. Happy shalt thou be, and it shall be well with thee. Thy wife shall be as a fruitful vine by the sides of thine house, thy children like olive plants around about thy table.

Behold, that thus shall the man be blessed that feareth the Lord. The Lord shall bless thee out of Zion, and thou shalt see the good of Jerusalem all the days of thy life. Yea, thou shalt see thy children's children, and peace upon Israel.

We're going to break this apart here. Psalm 128 describes a family that cultivates contentment in the home. So, before we go further there, we must first remember what destroys family contentment, which is covetousness.

In Romans 7-7, the Apostle Paul confesses, I would not have known sin except through the law, for I would not have known covetousness unless the law had said, You shall not covet. Covetousness is a matter of the heart. It is a deceptive, debasing, and destructive sin.

One may not realize he has a wicked heart until it reveals itself through covetous desires. Discontent almost always leads to the sin of idolatry because a dissatisfied spirit desires riches and happiness more than it desires God. There's a unique thing about the Apostle Paul.

The Apostle Paul is, I'm going to paraphrase it, but as the Apostle Paul would have seen himself before he'd seen Jesus. Before he became a Christian, the Apostle Paul was a man that could look at the Ten Commandments and he could go through each one of them. The first one, second one, third one, he could go through the Ten Commandments and say, Yep, I did this, I did this, I did this, I did this.

And so there's Ten Commandments and nine of them he would have been able to check off and say, Yep, yep, yep, in the eyes of man. The tenth one, that struck him. That's Romans 7 verse 7. The tenth commandment is, Thou shalt not covet.

Thou shalt not lust. And here we have Romans 7. He says, I would not have known sin except through the law, for I would not have known covetousness unless the law had said, You shall not covet. The neat thing about the Ten Commandments is the first nine commandments are all our deeds.

It's what we do. The Tenth Commandment is what's our attitude, our desires. In other words, the Tenth Commandment basically wraps up all of the commandments.

So we would have the two commands that are given to us. Love the Lord our God with all the heart, soul and mind and love your neighbor as yourself. Jesus says these are the two commandments that we should follow.

And we would say that all the rest of the commandments will be kept if you keep those two. Love your God with all your heart, soul and mind. Love your neighbor as yourself.

But if you don't keep the commandments, there's the one which is number 10. That commandment is the result or maybe the explanation of our heart and why we do not keep the commandments. So if we deal with covetousness, then we will be able to, if we deal with covetousness properly, we will be able to keep the Ten Commandments because we will love the Lord our God with all our heart, soul and mind.

Again, Paul, looking at his deeds, could have said, oh yes, I'm doing all the right things. But he had to acknowledge in his heart there was covetousness. A desire, an unlawful desire for things that were not his.

Looking to your neighbor, he's got a big, big house. I want that house. Or that kind of house.

I will do whatever it takes to get me a house like that. Maybe it's his car and maybe it's his jet or whatever else it is. And I know you know this, but children, that's one of the reasons why you should stay away from what we call social media.

There's something of a massive attack on all of humanity. We were in Haiti. We were in Haiti 14 years ago, I think.

And what was interesting about being in Haiti, they are all very, very poor. Do you think they're all content? They're all happy sitting on their porches? No. We were in Haiti.

We were helping rebuild there. And what was shocking in Haiti, they had nothing. They didn't have good food, no running water, all of those things.

No cars. But there's one thing they did have. Well, two things.

A television and a cell phone. Those two things they had. And guess what? What kind of people did they become? I'm going to use it carefully.

I want to respect them. But I'm going to say it like this. They became covetous people trying to be like the people they watch on TV and the social media they get on their cell phones.

And so TV and cell phones can be a massive advertisement. You'll be happy. You'll be happy if you have this.

Oh, you should treat yourself nice. You should have this and this and that. And so the rich people that get rich, they get rich because they come.

If a salesperson came in here, he would start, well, I think you would want this. And he would start showing off all the things he has to sell. Oh, your life would be so much better if you had this.

Oh, you would look so good if you would wear this. And they sell it to you. And that causes you to want.

I think it's better to go to the store when your shirt's ripped because I've got to get a new shirt. Instead of going around stores and going, oh, I really want that. Right.

So the idea of covetousness, waking up feelings of selfishness within us, we would be covetous. So in Haiti, they don't like to work. As one of the verses points out, they don't like to labor for their food.

They think, at least when we were there, the attitude seemed to be if we work and earn a living, then nobody's going to give us anything. They always had this idea. It was better to not work and to make all these news articles of how poor they were and hope for those rich countries.

They were going to send it to them. They're going to send them food. That was their way of trying to have what they wanted.

Covetousness, a terrible, terrible thing. Blessed is everyone who fears the Lord, who walks in his ways. It sounds simple, and it's such a blessing.

The ingredients of true happiness are not far away or hard to find. Someone says out on the street, I am so miserable. There's a very wealthy man who was asked what he would do different if he lived his life again.

And one thing he would not do is change the wealth. He said, I would take more time for my wife. I would take more time for my children.

I would take more family time. That was what his value was. That's what he wanted it to be.

Many a man has left the family because they would rather have money than family. And as you will grow older, for you young ones, you're going to see and hear that a lot. There is, I don't know how many a person.

How many fathers leave the home so they can drive nice cars and live like they're rich? How many moms leave the home so they can live rich because they're not content? What would God want us to do? Two things. Blessed is everyone who fears the Lord. What does it again mean to fear him? And we had this last Sunday, the idea of reverence.

To fear God is to be on that ship and to realize I'm in this ship that's going to crash. There's nothing I can do. That's not fearing God.

Here comes the fearing God. The fearing God is, I'm going to let God be my captain. I know he can take care of this ship.

And allowing him to be Lord of our life. We can look at the word of God, not that it says, oh, I can't have fun. I can't enjoy life.

Oh, the Bible wants me to be poor. No. Those are all fear tactics of the devil to try to make us run away from God's word.

But rather, looking to God's word and taking in what it teaches us. God's principles. The idea of, yes, work when it's work time.

Earn money if you can. Earn enough money to help the poor. Be a blessing.

Yes, God says in Deuteronomy to the children of Israel. God says, it's my will. This is to all of us.

God says, it's my will that you prosper. So that you can help others. And praise God.

Bring glory to God. God wants us to do well. And he wants us to do it righteously.

And in the right way for him. So we need to fear God. And like I already said, walk in his ways.

Here the idea is that we would reverence him. Have the right relationship with God. You know what a blessing is when we think about life? As soon as you can understand life.

Here's what you should think about. I think of the young men with a lot of energy. Did you know, so Caden, Elton, Kai, Trevin, all you boys.

You have a lot of energy. Did you know that's God's will? God wants that. Sometimes we mock dads and say, Ma, can you slow down? What's with all the energy? Now maybe if it's not used in the right place, we would want it to be used right.

But I find that neat. God delights in giving young men strength. And God knows that they don't have the full wisdom to know how to handle or what to do with their strength.

So God wants us to prosper. And he wants us to be content. God delights in your strength.

He wants you to be active. Just in a content way. So what we could say is, we could be 12, 13 years old, 10 years old.

And as we process, why are you here? Why are you in this world? That is that you would serve God. And so you can go day to day reading and learning of God and using your energy for God. It is good to have energy.

Use it for God. So verses 1 and 2 of Psalm, it talks about the man. A man before God.

This is to us men. To us fathers. He says to us, Blessed is everyone who fears the Lord, who walks in his ways.

And then you shall eat the fruit of the labor of your hands. You shall be blessed and it shall be well with you. Verses 3 and 4. Before we go to verses 3 and 4, there's a small little thing we want to clarify here.

We have the choice to participate in the joy of fearing the Lord and walking in his ways. You can be a mountain climber walking in his ways. You can be a fisherman walking in his ways.

You can be a pilot walking in his ways. You can be a missionary walking in his ways. You can be a minister walking in his ways.

You can be a framer walking in his ways. You can drive a truck walking in his ways. You can fly a jet.

There's all kinds of things. So all I want to point out here is let us not be blinded by the world's response to a surrendered life to God. The world has this idea, if I surrender to God, I lose.

And I think Dave already mentioned that. No, you don't lose. We do not lose.

We gain life. It's the pilot that's flying in the jet that can seek the Lord as things go wrong, and God helps him land that plane. Or it's the wicked man who is intoxicated trying to fly a plane and crashes it.

God's will is that he would take care of us, he would prosper. So God wants us to allow him to be Lord of our life. So the privilege of participating in fearing the Lord and walking in his ways, Or, as we could read in Genesis, it says this.

Here's the opposite. So they can be compared with their high-sounding, sorry, if these promises seem small, of little value, and the instructions of verse 1, which is to walk in the ways of the Lord, if they are unadventurous, here's the opposite. They can be compared with their high-sounding alternative.

Okay, here's the alternative. Instead of you shall be happy, which is what God's promise is, it says, ye shall be as gods. That's the other side.

There's no you can be happy not serving God. It doesn't work. And the ship will crash.

The alternative is, ye shall be as gods. Is that what we would desire? Satan's fall? Satan's outcome? And walking in his ways, in God's ways, with everyone to his own way. That's the alternative.

Would you walk in God's ways, or would you rather walk in your ways? And we know what we read of the Old Testament times, where every man did what was right in his own eyes. Very, very godless time of our history. When a man walks in his own ways, the wickedness expounds in the world, and it becomes a place of horror.

A few questions here. As fathers, are you and I content? Are we content in Christ, no matter how much or how little we have? Then we go to verses 3 and 4. And I find this beautiful. It's a structure set up with the verses.

I find this beautiful. Verse 3 says, your wife will be like a fruitful vine within your house. The idea of that I would be content in the Lord, that I would trust him in all my ways, and that my wife will be fruitful in my house.

So, yes, it brings me to a place of trying to ponder and meditate on, what does it look like when I am content in Christ? And what's my lifestyle? And so, for me, this is a new season, or it's going to be homework for me to think about and process, what does God want for me as a lifestyle? That I would be content in him, and then have the other priorities in the right place. That I would have my relationship with God in the right place. That I would have my relationship with church in the right place.

That I would have, actually even before church, would be, first it's God, then it's my family, and then it's church. Then it's work. All these areas to me.

I need to surrender all of these areas to God, and live for him in these areas, so that my wife, that she too, can be content in God's will. And then, for her, the steps go the same way. Her relationship with God.

Her relationship with me. For me, as in the spouse. Her relationship with the children.

Her relationship with church. And so on. So it's important that we have the right priorities, and God wants that.

God wants us to have the right priorities. Your wife will be like a fruitful vine within your house. The spirit that comes from our hearts is a spirit of peace.

A spirit of contentment. Whether we have little or much. Then it moves on to your children.

Your children will be like olive shoots around your table. Behold, thus shall the man be blessed who fears the Lord. How about for my children? Your children.

So as we were talking about, here's the fathers, the mothers, now the children. Children, are you content in Christ? Are you content in following your mom, or your dad, or your mom, as they walk with God? Are you content to obey your parents so that they can teach you the ways of life? So that you are prepared to live that life? I wish I had a quick enough mind to give you an example of what it would look like for a young man that gives his heart to God and serves God. And a young man that stays on course to say, I will rather live for myself.

The despair that the young man goes through, that lives for himself. The depth of darkness. The loneliness.

The sin. The bondage. The idea that peace can be boring.

Sometimes when everything is so peaceful, you're like, man, I wish we were doing something. It's just so boring. Again, I'm not trying to say that we're doing nothing.

But peace. We often, when things are peaceful, we are actually discontent. We would want, whether it's change or something.

And many a person has chosen to walk down a selfish road because peace was too peaceful. Wasn't adventurous enough. So rather than seeking the Lord and saying, Lord, things are peaceful.

If you want adventure, go be a missionary. You'll have adventure. Lots of it.

And many other things that can be done. Serving the Lord. Serve God.

You'll have adventure. Amazing adventures. But our flesh is geared towards carnal adventures.

Some sort of sinful or selfish adventures may be what we'd be attracted to more than adventures for God. But I wouldn't want to share the blessing of prosperity for a young man to entice us to be content. I would rather share it in a way to understand the prosperity that comes to those that are content.

And maybe the best example we have, it's actually the children of Israel. The promise that God gave to children of Israel, and I believe it's in Isaiah. God says to children of Israel, I will make sure that when you sow seeds, you will harvest those seeds and you will enjoy your harvest.

God says, I will not allow anyone to come and steal your harvest and that they would enjoy it. But this was only if they would have their hearts put to God. They would have their vision on Christ.

So if they would serve God and follow the principles of God, God said, I will make sure you will enjoy your harvest. And God also tells us that He blesses the seed. He blesses the harvest and we can enjoy that.

There is a powerful, beautiful picture of that in Hebrews chapter 13, I believe it is. Hebrews chapter 12, starting at verse 13. It's for the Christian.

It's the calling for the Christians to gather with the angels of the kingdom of heaven in a feast in the presence of God. And so there is a tremendous promise coming for those that will serve God and be faithful. There is again that promise of prosperity.

So we don't want to say, I want to be content because it's the better way to live so I can prosper more. No, we want to be content because it's what's good for us. It helps us to have a right relationship with God.

And the prospering that happens down here is but for a very small season. It's like the parable in the New Testament where Jesus says of this wealthy man who tastes in a harvest and it's so great. He says, oh, what am I going to do? I got way too much.

Oh, I know what I'll do. I'll tear down the old barns, build bigger ones. I can, you know, feast forever.

I've got everything I need. Then Jesus says, what does he say? Thou fool, your soul will be required of me. So that night, as he's made these plans, he's going to just really, you know, be this wealthy man, selfish, discontent.

Everything's for himself. And that night he dies. Then what? Where does the wealth go? There's a little saying I found in Humerus, but maybe this will help to stay with us.

Have you ever seen a hearse with a U-Haul following it? What will happen with your stuff? Nothing. It will rot, rust, perish. There's a promise that's given to us.

If we suffer and we are in covetousness, we will perish. Those that dwell in covetousness will perish. The children, what a wonderful blessing.

Children, the calling is to you. Children, learn to love following God's ways. You might not be at a place where you're born again.

But God's ways are for you. God's ways are for you, that he wants to teach you life. And when you come to the age of accountability, where you can say, Lord, I know that you're good.

I know that you take care of us. I've learned that. I've learned that in the Bible.

I know that you are God. You are creator. And I want you to be Lord of my life.

That's the calling to the children. And as the children learn to love their mother and love, I would say, love and obey their mother. Love and obey their father.

There is life. We as parents make mistakes. So there's a working together and a relationship that takes place.

It'd be easy to say, love your mother because she's perfect. Love your father because he's perfect. I'm sorry, I'm not perfect.

But the idea is, the invitation is, come, seek the Lord, serve the Lord, and labor together. And co-laboring a relationship with children and parents. And the blessing that we receive that is in the verses here.

If I think there's nothing that would give me more joy than walking with my sons and daughters as they serve God. And as they have learned this aspect of contentment, so that the devil cannot deceive and destroy them. And as my children teach their children to be content, love the Lord their God.

And it says there that I should take the word of God, the Ten Commandments. So, I don't know if you know this, but the Ten Commandments are written for fathers. Primarily for the home.

Do you know that? The Ten Commandments are for fathers. And that we fathers would take the Ten Commandments and teach it to my sons and my grandsons. And God wants to bless that.

So, God calls us to be content. Content with God's ways. Content with serving Him.

Will you heed that invitation? Will you come to the Lord and be content in allowing Him to be Lord of your life? I appreciate the way, just here it gives us a hint towards it. But there's also other verses that talk of it. The children around my table are the hope and promise of the future.

My children. My children, they are the hope and promise of the future. We look at the struggle that Abraham had when he did not have children.

No offspring. And he struggled. And it was a burden for him and he said, God, I have no seed.

Children, you are a tremendous gift. Yeah, you're a gift to your parents from God. And allow yourself to accept the factor that God gave you to your parents and you are a gift.

And again, you can do that and accept God's will for you. God's blessing for you. As a child, you can sit in God's presence and say, thank you for giving me.

Thank you for allowing me to be a gift to my parents. That's how we parents feel towards you, our children. You are a gift to us.

And God has this, this, call it this youthful energy towards you. Young people and all the way down to children. Jesus says he puts the children on his knee.

Jesus loves the children. We have other passages in John. We also have the idea, the comparisons that God makes about young people.

And God appreciates young boys and girls and so on. So the children are the hope and promise of the future. It's a wonderful, good thing.

And already there, the calling is out. Come serve the Lord. And then it goes on to verse five and six here.

The Lord bless you from Zion. May you see the prosperity of Jerusalem all the days of your life. May you see your children's children.

Peace be upon Israel. So here is actually a calling. It's a beautiful calling.

It's a calling to us. It starts at the fathers. Then it goes to the wife and mother.

Then it goes to the children. And you know what? The calling for us is that, and I'm going to use, instead of using the name Zion. I'm going to use the name church.

Do you know that? The Lord bless you from, maybe we would say the body. So in the Old Testament, everything referred to Jerusalem and Zion. You know, they would gather it at, if I have it right, they would gather at Zion.

They would gather in Zion. I looked up the description here, but it has to do with where God's people gather. Where God's people worship together.

And so it's like saying to me at my house, the Lord says, or if we read it the same way this verse says it here. The Lord bless you from Zion. The Lord bless me from the church.

And it has to do with the way of life as a church. When we live together in God's ways as a church. When I'm at home, it blesses me.

I get blessings and strength from the church. But it's not just for me. But then it also talks about, and let's keep this context together.

That I would be content. My wife is content. My children are content.

May you then, this is the promise that comes with it. As we are content, may you see the prosperity of the church. I think that's beautiful.

Here he says it's the prosperity of Jerusalem. It's all the children of God being in the right place. And Jerusalem will prosper.

For us today, it's not money and things per se. For us it is that we would have a home where we are content. I'm content.

Mom is content. Children are content. Then the church will prosper.

Again, to all of us, we know as adults, we labor day to day to serve the Lord. But do you know children? Again, I wish we had a hundred youth here that we could refer to. But it's just a few, which is good.

But all of you. So here, there is a blessing awaiting for you. You know, it's like you being in the desert and having made a trip.

And you know, in a mile, I will be home. I will be in this nice, comfortable place. There will be a feast.

And there I can rest in peace. There's a wonderful place waiting for me. Do you know where that is? It's the church.

It's not just the body, one little place here. It's in God's kingdom. That's a place that's waiting for us.

And when we pass on from here, it will be at the feet of Christ. That's where that is. But here, God will prosper the church.

So when you come to the Lord, the Lord desires that you would continue to live for Him in the church. Or in the kingdom of God. And then it gives me that blessing.

Or you. And this is that blessing that continues. Today, it's to me.

Tomorrow, it's to Elton. And then the following day, as in days, it's to Elton's son. And then the same goes.

Today, it's to Dave. Tomorrow, it's to Caden. And the following day, it's to Caden's son.

This idea of blessing. See, when I serve the Lord, and I want my sons to serve the Lord. When my sons get to my age, Lord willing, they will have a burden.

They'll say they want their sons to serve the Lord. What's so typical today is some would serve the Lord. I would serve the Lord.

And the children will want to follow serving the Lord. And so there's such a normal procedure. And I think it has to do with the lack of understanding God.

The lack of fear of God. And it has to do with, like the children of Israel, when they left Egypt. And they looked back, and they were covetous.

God provided them everything. Their shoes lasted 40 years. They didn't have to buy new shoes.

Their sandals, maybe, I should say. And God supplied them with food and drink. And yet they would get together and complain.

Oh, if we could have the onions of Egypt, and the fish of Egypt, and on and on. What a sad thing it was for them. And notice what followed.

They complained. Then they disobeyed God. And then they died.

Those that disobeyed God did not see the land of Canaan. Today, it's so normal that so many, you do not see generation to generation serving the Lord. But there is this blessing that is waiting.

First, there is the church that awaits. For those that God has called, the church awaits for more to join the church. And the kingdom of God awaits.

You know what, I'll just paraphrase what I have here. I would like to paraphrase again. We did touch very little on covetousness or the definition of it.

I think that's okay. But I'll read the definition again. I hear of covetous is a matter of the heart.

It's a deceptive, debasing, and destructive sin. I want. One may not realize he has a wicked heart until it reveals itself through covetous desires.

Discontentment almost always leads to the sin of idolatry because a dissatisfied spirit desires riches and happiness more than it desires God. Covetousness destroys homes. Covetousness destroys lives.

But contentment is an inner sufficiency that keeps us at peace despite outward circumstances. You can be assured that Satan will cause you troubles to give you circumstances that are hardships. Like Job.

Satan goes before God and says, Job would curse you. If you would allow a few circumstances to happen to him, he would curse you. And that's what Satan does.

And God, though we go through circumstances that Satan causes, if we can call it that. God would see us through. God will give us to victory.

Sometimes we have the opposite view. We have the view that Christians, they struggle because they're Christians. No, Christians struggle because of the whole battle of sin.

But it is Satan that causes all of this struggle. So rather than a sinner saying, look at those Christians suffer. I don't want to be like them.

No, you're worse off than they are. Because you will be destroyed if you follow down your path. You see the Christian and they struggle.

They struggle to go through the trials of life. But he, if he is faithful, has life. The sinner who enjoys the sin.

Yeah, he might not feel the battle. But he will be destroyed. And so there's no gain.

There's no gain in being the sinner that can watch the saint struggle. It is better to be with the Lord. We could read more verses that talk about it's better to have a more soul.

I don't know the actual finishings. There's multiple comparisons the Bible, Proverbs gives us. It's better to have little and have it honestly than have lots.

But God is honestly. It is better to have little with God than have much without God. So let us find and desire a heart of contentment.

We could read 1 Timothy 6, verse 6 to 10. I'm just going to read a few verses here. Verse 7 says, okay, verse 6. But godliness with contentment is great gain.

For we brought nothing into this world, and it is certain we can carry nothing out. In having food and raiment, let us therewith be content. But they that will be rich desire, not riches, desire for riches.

They that want to be rich, they that will focus on being rich, they fall into temptation in a snare, and into many foolish and hurtful lusts, which drown men in destruction and perdition. For the love of money is the root of all evil, which while some coveted after, they have erred from the faith, and pierced themselves through with many sorrows. Righteousness is better to walk in righteousness with God than to have much and not be with God.

I hope that can be a blessing to you. In a way, I felt like it would be nice to have this conversation. It was kind of like, I always enjoyed the part in Pilgrim's Progress where the men, they sit by the fire and they tell themselves riddles.

You know what, I think it would be nice to sit and talk riddles, if you please, in light of just these different topics. You know, thinking of covetousness, the cause and the consequence of it, thinking of contentment. There's a healthy way of life.

We'll call it contentment with, what was the word? Complacency is the idea, I'm lazy, I'm not going to do anything, I got my feet up. But the idea of being a man of God, being a hard-working man of God, being proactive, being busy for God, living life with energy and will, and yet being content. That seems to be a bit of a mystery.

How do you bring those two together? You can live for the Lord, enjoy life, be busy, but content. May God add His blessing.