Nineteenth Sunday
after Pentecost – Proper 21 – Year C
September 29, 2013
1
Timothy 6:6-19
Of course, there is great gain in godliness combined with contentment; for we brought nothing into the world, so that we can take nothing out of it; but if we have food and clothing, we will be content with these. But those who want to be rich fall into temptation and are trapped by many senseless and harmful desires that plunge people into ruin and destruction. For the love of money is a root of all kinds of evil, and in their eagerness to be rich some have wandered away from the faith and pierced themselves with many pains.
But as for you, man of God, shun all this; pursue righteousness, godliness, faith, love, endurance, gentleness. Fight the good fight of the faith; take hold of the eternal life, to which you were called and for which you made the good confession in the presence of many witnesses. In the presence of God, who gives life to all things, and of Christ Jesus, who in his testimony before Pontius Pilate made the good confession, I charge you to keep the commandment without spot or blame until the manifestation of our Lord Jesus Christ, which he will bring about at the right time—he who is the blessed and only Sovereign, the King of kings and Lord of lords. It is he alone who has immortality and dwells in unapproachable light, whom no one has ever seen or can see; to him be honor and eternal dominion. Amen.
As for those who in the present age are rich, command them not to be haughty, or to set their hopes on the uncertainty of riches, but rather on God who richly provides us with everything for our enjoyment. They are to do good, to be rich in good works, generous, and ready to share, thus storing up for themselves the treasure of a good foundation for the future, so that they may take hold of the life that really is life.
Of course, there is great gain in godliness combined with contentment; for we brought nothing into the world, so that we can take nothing out of it; but if we have food and clothing, we will be content with these. But those who want to be rich fall into temptation and are trapped by many senseless and harmful desires that plunge people into ruin and destruction. For the love of money is a root of all kinds of evil, and in their eagerness to be rich some have wandered away from the faith and pierced themselves with many pains.
But as for you, man of God, shun all this; pursue righteousness, godliness, faith, love, endurance, gentleness. Fight the good fight of the faith; take hold of the eternal life, to which you were called and for which you made the good confession in the presence of many witnesses. In the presence of God, who gives life to all things, and of Christ Jesus, who in his testimony before Pontius Pilate made the good confession, I charge you to keep the commandment without spot or blame until the manifestation of our Lord Jesus Christ, which he will bring about at the right time—he who is the blessed and only Sovereign, the King of kings and Lord of lords. It is he alone who has immortality and dwells in unapproachable light, whom no one has ever seen or can see; to him be honor and eternal dominion. Amen.
As for those who in the present age are rich, command them not to be haughty, or to set their hopes on the uncertainty of riches, but rather on God who richly provides us with everything for our enjoyment. They are to do good, to be rich in good works, generous, and ready to share, thus storing up for themselves the treasure of a good foundation for the future, so that they may take hold of the life that really is life.
It’s
the end of the month, when for many people and businesses budgets tend to get a
little tight. We begin to watch our
buying habits much more closely. At the
beginning of the month we tend to be a little more loose; when we want to spend
a little bit more at a restaurant, or spend the extra few dollars for a splurge
we think a little less about it. Yet,
when it comes to the end of the month, suddenly a dollar here and there seems to
add up a lot faster. We end up watching
our bank accounts carefully, hoping and praying that nothing unexpected pops up
that we can’t afford.
A
few weeks ago, we once again saw the Powerball lottery reach crazy amounts of
money. In some places, lines to purchase
tickets went around the block. It seemed
many people had a good idea of what they would do if they were to win the 400
million dollar prize. Even though the
chances of winning were smaller than being hit by lightning more than once in
your life, people still shelled out their dollars for their dream.
It’s
interesting to note though, how many people who win the lottery end up
penniless and miserable just a few years later.
They looked at winning the lottery as a blessing from God that was going
to transform their lives, yet it ended up being far from a blessing. They saw their families torn apart, their
marriages shatter, their friends walk away.
There are former lottery winners who now depend on soup kitchens and
homeless shelters to survive. We have
all heard the stories, we have all heard the warnings about how life is much
harder if you win the lottery, yet we often joke about being willing to give it
a try.
For
some reason, when it comes to life and happiness, many people have this idea
that money will somehow make life better.
The reality is that for many of the things we worry about, a little bit
more money could very well reduce our worries.
If we worry about being able to afford our children’s college education
– a little more money will definitely help.
When we worry about being able to afford to retire – a little more money
will make things far more comfortable.
When we worry about paying our bills – a little more money would
help. When we worry about fixing our car
– a little more money will lessen the sting of the repair bill. In a lot of cases, a little more money will
make us worry less – or at least we think it will make us worry less. With a little bit more money, we think we can
finally have ‘the good life.’
The
good life. Living the life. Living the dream. Phrases that bring all sorts of things to
mind. When you hear someone say that,
“Joe is living the dream!” what do you
think of? What makes it the stuff of
fulfilled dreams?
In
our text from Timothy, we hear a bit about money; specifically the love of
money and how that love can lead to many problems. I think we all know that love of money, love
of anything to the exclusion of others can lead to problems. Money by itself is neutral, it’s what you do
with it. I bet you think I’m going to
talk about money for the rest of this don’t you? I could, but there is another word that is
part of this passage, a word that we might easily skip over because it’s right
at the beginning. The word is
contentment.
We
read that, “there is great gain in
godliness combined with contentment”. It
sounds to me that godliness (something I‘m sure we are all striving for in our
own way) is improved by being lived out together with contentment. I think we’ve got a decent idea of what
godliness is – I mean, we’ve got a great model to follow in Jesus. So what is contentment? Merriam-Webster defines it as being, “the
state of being happy and satisfied.”[1] That’s great.
Now if we could just figure out how to be happy and satisfied.
I’ve
done some reading and thinking over the last week about contentment, about
things you can do to be happier and more satisfied with life. Numerous books have been written on the
subject, so obviously I can’t share more than a few points with you. But, I think I’ve found five basic things
that can be used as a guide when we seek contentment in our lives.
First:
love people, use possessions. This seems
obvious, yet so often we have it reversed.
We love our possessions, and we use people. We look at the things we have, we take pride
in them. But, then we spend time outside
cleaning our car when the kids want to play at the park. We spend that extra hour or two at work for
the overtime instead of spending those hours with a friend we haven’t seen in
weeks. We’ll spend hours and hours
researching our next big purchase, yet find ourselves looking at our watch
after just a few minutes of visiting someone in the hospital or nursing home. What it comes down to is that we all too
often place a greater value on possessions, and things we do to get those
possessions than on the relationships around us. When we put the emphasis on the people, we find
that they are the reward. They are the
things that are priceless and can never be replaced. Love people, not possessions.
Second:
Don’t compare yourself with others. This
is another thing that way too many of us do, I know I do it. We look at another person, and think about
how awesome they are, or the many things they can do or have that we can’t or
don’t. It’s important that we are each
the best we can be – no matter what it might be. Me, I was a music major who could barely play
piano. I beat myself up for my entire
time in college, looking at my other classmates who could seemingly play at
will. No matter how many hours I spent
in the practice room, I never got beyond the easiest of pieces. It was only when I accepted the fact that I
was never going to be playing Chopin Etudes, that I could only be as good as I
was going to be – not as good as my classmates, that I found peace in my
inability to master the piano.
Third:
This goes along with what I just talked about: Appreciate what you have. Okay, maybe you aren’t friends with the most
popular person, but I bet you have some really awesome people as friends. Maybe you aren’t driving the newest car, but
you have something to drive. Maybe you
aren’t living in the house of your dreams, but you do have a place to call
home. We all tend to focus on the things
we don’t have rather than the things we do have. And that goes not only for possessions, but
also for traits and abilities we have.
Don’t let the fact you’ll never win American Idol for your singing
ability stop you from raising a joyful noise to God.
Fourth:
Choose friends wisely. When it comes to
friends the saying of quality over quantity really rings true. Surround yourself with people who are
positive, people who inspire you, people who bring out the best in you, people
that are positive additions to your life.
People whose lives are full of people that bring a smile to their face
tend to be happier. While, if we
surround ourselves with negative people, with people that cause us to be
unhappy, with people that don’t laugh or smile often; then we will feel unfulfilled,
we will feel our life is missing something.
Fifth:
Feed your spiritual life. For many of us
this might be among the hardest things to do.
Taking care of and nurturing your spiritual life is not just about
coming to church, reading the bible and praying; although all those are
important. Feeding your spiritual life
means taking the time to engage in the things and ways in which you feel most
strongly connected with God and others.
Perhaps that’s going for a walk, maybe that’s visiting with friends,
maybe that’s serving as a volunteer at a hospital, maybe that’s serving food in
a shelter. If you feel closer to God in
those moments, it’s an aspect of your spiritual life. However, it’s also important to spend time
together in worship, it’s important to spend time reading and meditating on God’s
Word, and it’s terribly important to spend time in conversation with God in
prayer – and when we do pray, to spend more time listening than talking.
Mother
Theresa was once asked about her prayer life.
The interviewer asked, “When you pray, what do you say to God?” Mother Teresa replied, “I don’t talk, I
simply listen.” Believing he understood
what she had just said, the interviewer next asked, “Ah, then what is it that
God says to you when you pray?” Mother
Teresa replied, “He also doesn’t talk. He also simply listens.”
Listening
to God is another central thing to contentment.
Not listening to the world, not listening to the hundreds and thousands
of clamoring voices each trying to convince us of something. Not listening to the voice within us that
questions if we are good enough, if we have done enough. Listen to God, turn your eyes toward our Lord
and Savior. Make that your focus and
your guide. If you work toward doing
that, and it is work; it’s something that we need to practice doing each and
every day. It’s something that if we don’t
think about it, we can easily be distracted from. Yet, if we do so, we will find contentment, we
will seek godliness, we will discover what it is our letter to Timothy is
talking about when it says we will take hold of the life that really is
life. May God strengthen us as we seek
to walk in those ways. Amen.
No comments:
Post a Comment