Sermon Transcript
Well, I was thinking about today’s message in light of my 2 dining experiences at Black Bear Diner, have you ever been there, and Le Maire Michel. Black Bear Diner over in Sunnyvale, I guess the closest location, and Le Maire Michel’s in Saratoga. Black Bear Diner, Le Maire Michel, they’re similar in that they serve good food, but they’re different in that they serve different amounts of food, okay? So have you been to Black Bear Diner? How many of you have been to Black Bear Diner?
Oh my, you know exactly what I’m talking about right now. They bring it out on big plates and they fill up the plates, especially if you’re there at breakfast time. It’s like a feast at breakfast. I mean, it just makes you want to go there right now. But Le Maire Michel, the food is also fabulous, but they bring the food out kind of in the French custom of things, not a lot of food, just right proportions, I guess you could say.
Really good food in moderate proportions, not too much, not too little, just the right amount of food. So you have these different dining experiences at these 2 different places. Black Bear Diner, the plate is filled up, extra big plates. Le Maire Michel, smaller plates, it’s not filled up, it’s, you know, set there beautifully and you just want to look at it, not eat it. But anyway, you have that kind of experience.
Would you like to guess which one of these amounts of food is more representative of what we might call the American dream? All right. Yeah, it’s probably over here at Black Bear Diner, that kind of thing. Now, what are we talking about when we’re talking about the American dream? Interesting, James Adams, historian, in 1931, he wrote about the American dream in the book The Epic of America, and he said this: The American dream is the pursuit and hope for a better, richer, and fuller life.
Now let me ask you, do you think that that American dream is getting traction in Silicon Valley? Yes, of course. We are very interested in things being better, richer, and fuller. In fact, we give that a lot of our thoughts. What can we do to make things better, richer, and fuller?
We make effort in those areas. So we kind of understand the American dream, but what’s fascinating about this is that it’s really connected to the desire for more. We just want more. Now, if you ask a person how they feel about materialism, they’ll say, well, I’m against it. In fact, it’s fascinating if you take a study, they’ve done surveys on this, and they ask people about the whole matter of materialism, and basically 89% of Americans say that We’re too materialistic, okay?
89%. But also the surveys show that almost exactly the same percentage, about 89%, that almost exactly the same percentage of Americans say that they want more for themselves. So we are too materialistic on the one hand, but yet we want more. What is it that we want? Well, we want the American dream.
We want something that’s better, richer, and fuller. So better health, more meaning, more happiness, in this area, I would just like a home of my own. You know, we want that kind of thing. We want a dream vacation, a spouse, a couple of kids, a new job, more friends, more money. You get the idea.
So we understand a little bit of what, you know, is being presented around us and the challenge of living in an area where there’s a desire for more. And, you know, it’s just part of culture. You’ll find it among the churched. You’ll find it among the unchurched. You’ll find it in America.
You’ll find it abroad, outside of America. Anybody, everybody struggles, I believe, with this whole matter because it’s just something that’s part of who we are. Now, we’re going to go back today to the first church in Ephesus. And what we’re going to see in the book of Timothy is that the church there was challenged with this matter, just like the church today is challenged with this matter. Last week, we worked on the first part of this section, and we came to the end of verse 5, And verse 5 says that there were people that were in the church that found that godliness could be a means of great gain.
A great financial gain was what they had in their mind. In other words, they were loving life in the church because it gave them potential to make a financial killing, we might say. Have you ever found anybody connected to religion in any capacity that was interested in religion for the more factor? To get on the more bandwagon, you know, for what we can get out of it. It’s been known to happen in the church, and it was happening evidently in the first church at Ephesus.
So, Paul writes to Timothy, and he wants to do what he can to help him process this that’s potentially going to spread through the church. But what he does is fascinating because he brings into focus true great gain. Okay, so people that are interested in financial gain, he brings into focus great gain. What is great gain? That’s what we’re going to be looking at this morning from 1 Timothy chapter 6.
And if you brought your Bible, you might want to open there. 1 Timothy chapter 6 and verses 6 to 10. If you didn’t bring your Bible along, just pull out that message note sheet. You can find the passage there and follow along. But I think there should be a strong interest of this subject this morning from all of us.
I really believe before we leave here today, all of us are going to have an opportunity to gain something from what this passage has to say. It’s an amazing, amazing passage. This is what it says, but godliness— 1 Timothy 6:6— but godliness with contentment is great gain. For we brought nothing into the world, and we can take nothing out of it. But if we have food and clothing, we will be content with that.
People who want to get rich fall into temptation and a trap and into many foolish and harmful desires that plunge men into ruin and destruction. For the love of money is a root of all kinds of evil. Some people eager for money have wandered from their faith and pierced themselves with many griefs. Now, this is a relevant passage, wouldn’t you say? I mean, if you’re not sure the Word of God is relevant, well, I’ll tell you what, this is as relevant today in the 21st century as it was when it was written in the 1st century because we still are big on big gain, on great gain, on something that’s better, richer, and fuller.
Frankly, that great gain movement, the desire for more, has been around since the beginning of mankind when the leader of the more movement himself, Satan, offered to Eve a better life. He offered to Eve great gain, greater than the gain they had already, you know, been experiencing. You’re in Genesis chapter 3 introduced to this, and I just want to read this out of The Message translation where it says, verses 5 and 6, God knows that the moment you eat from that tree, and he’s speaking to Eve here, about the forbidden fruit from this tree that God had said, don’t eat from it. But Satan says, God knows that the moment you eat from that tree, you’ll see what’s really going on. You’ll be just like God, knowing everything ranging all the way from good to evil.
And when the woman saw that the tree looked like good eating and realized what she would get out of it, She’d know everything. She took and ate the fruit and then gave some to her husband, and he ate. What’s incredible about this— think about this if you’re familiar with this context— is they had it all. They already had it all. They lacked nothing.
They were living in paradise. They were living in a sin-free world. And even still, the idea of greater gain appealed to them. It was like music to their ears, just like it’s music to our ears in our culture. Where we are still interested in greater gain than the gain that we’re already experiencing.
The fact is, is that the craving that we experience today in our world could actually be stronger now than it was back at the beginning of time. Stronger now because there’s more that we could crave. In fact, stronger now because we are more aware of what we don’t have. It’s always out there for us to, you know, peek into or whatever it might be. So we are living in a world where we have very strong desires for something more than it is that we already have.
And so in some ways, this account is even more applicable to us today than it was in the 1st century. Today, you know, in the 1st century, they didn’t have Tesla, okay? Well, we do. And they didn’t have tiramisu, and we do, you know. So it was probably a lot easier in former times to live with this mindset than it is for us to live with this mindset.
And what mindset are we talking about? Verse 8, a basic necessities mindset. What’s a basic necessities mindset? Hey, if I’ve got food and clothing, that’s enough. I’m good.
I’m good. Think about that. We want a lot more than just food and clothing, don’t we? We want a lot more than basic necessities. We want closets and pantries and houses full of more than just enough to get by.
We want more than just enough for today. And what Paul does here is he puts in opposition, if you want to say it that way, in contrast, 2 different mindsets. There’s the ideal mindset, which is a mindset that ultimately can lead to great gain, and then there’s another mindset. Quite frankly, this ideal mindset could be completely off of our lifestyle radar. I mean, like, not even a blip on the screen.
And so what I want to encourage you to do this morning as we just think about these 2 mindsets for a few minutes, I want you just to think about which mindset is representative of you right now and which do you hope to have representative of you. The first mindset we’re going to look at is found here in verses 5 and 6, okay? Excuse me, what am I saying? 9 and 10. In verses 9 and 10, it’s the I want more than I have mindset, okay?
I want more than I have. Anybody here want more than the more that you already have? Let me say it again. Anybody here want more than the more that you already have? Yeah, there’s at least one person back there, okay.
I’d put myself in this. I mean, who doesn’t want more than the more that we already have? I mean, from, you know, I’d like another shirt to I’d like a new set of golf clubs. And then everything in between. I want some new golf clubs because that’s— maybe that’ll fix my golfing woes, right?
At least that’s what— maybe. I mean, it could, right? You get the idea. As I was working on this, I was thinking about my first experience with skiing. Skiing and how my first experience with skiing was on some used skis, on old used skis.
And I remember when I got up the mountain, I’m looking around at everybody else and they’re all, it seemed like to me, on new skis, brand new skis. By the way, for some of you, that have never heard of skiing because all you know is snowboarding, this is before the days of snowboarding, okay? So here I am out there, I’m looking around, everybody else, they got all these new skis and I’m on some old skis and all I know is, and I’m thinking, you know what, I could probably be a better skier if I had some new skis, some K2s or something like that. But if I had some nice K2s, oh man, this could be good. And I’m thinking that about half the day until this guy, this old guy, this old man, at least it was somebody who I thought was old, Just saying.
But anyway, anyway, this old guy, he skis by me and he’s wearing these skis that have ancient bear traps on them, you know? You know what I mean? Bear trap bindings on them. And they’re old. They’re just old decrepit skis.
And I watch him ski and all of a sudden he’s like, he’s out skiing everybody on the mountain. So I mean, literally, he looked to me like the best guy skiing on the mountain. And it got me thinking, do I really need new skis? Or is it something else that I need? You know, point is, is that we live in a world where we are constantly being brought— we come across stuff that can infect us with cravings for more.
And Paul wants to get into that with Timothy, and he says there’s a big difference here between what will give you great gain and what we’re going to call what will give you great pain. And this great pain picture he paints in verses 9 and 10, and he says it’s connected to 3 harmful desires. Desire number 1, wanting to get rich. Wanting to get rich. You see that in verse 9?
That this can lead a person, he says, into temptation, which is exact opposite of what Jesus had in mind when he told us to pray, lead us not into temptation. Remember that in the Lord’s Prayer? And Lord, lead us not into temptation. Well, when it comes to riches, our prayers need to be that. Lord, keep me from wanting to get rich.
Lord, keep me from chasing the almighty buck. Lord, keep me from dishonesty in the area of finances. Lord, keep me from cheating on my expense reports. Lord, keep me from scamming people and places in the name of good business. Lord, keep me from moral compromise.
Lord, keep me from lying on my taxes or selling a used product and not disclosing the true condition that the product is in, in order that I might be able to put more money into my pocket.
The desire for more, the wanting to get rich. The second harmful desire he brings up in verse 10 is the love of money. It’s the love of money. The love of money can trap you, verse 9. It can trap you into many foolish and harmful desires that plunge men and women into ruin and destruction.
Now, when I read that, What does that sound like? One of the things I thought of is that this is a description of the unprecedented opioid crisis. That’s what this is a description of, the epidemic in our nation where 175 people a day are dying from opioid-related drug overdoses. Opioid-related deaths are now leading cause of death in Americans, for Americans under 50 years of age, roughly killing 65,000 Americans a year. It is the leading cause of death for those under the age of 50.
Opioids are a trap that lead— now look at the words— that lead people into foolish and harmful desires that plunge men and women alike into ruin and destruction. Well, like we would want to pray for deliverance from opioid addiction, we should be praying for deliverance from the love of money.
From the love of money. And what’s the love of money doing to people? It’s plunging people into, verse 9, ruin and destruction and all kinds of evil, verse 10. The metaphor pictures somebody who’s sinking and they’re drowning in deep water. They’re trapped.
And if they aren’t freed, they’re going to die. They’re going to die. That’s the picture of somebody who potentially is headed for a terrible future because of the love of money. I was thinking about my cousin Randy, who is an experienced diver, who on one occasion went down for a dive. He didn’t have his proper gear with him, and he ended up getting trapped underwater.
And he died. He died due to a lack of breath. People can be trapped by the love of money. He’s just trying to help us understand that, and it can do them in. And then he also connects this great pain to people who have an eagerness for money, verse 10, the last part, which in turn can cause them to wander from the faith and toward things that pierce them with many griefs.
The word pierce there literally means to be spiked by thorns, so get the picture. In your mind of a rosebush, but rosebushes come with thorns. I prefer roses without thorns. And what he’s painting here is the picture of money without thorns. It would be better if we were to have money in our lives and it didn’t come with the thorns or it didn’t come with the many griefs.
He says at the end of verse 10, the many griefs. And the many griefs come to people who are eager for money, eager for more money. They just don’t have enough and they want more. And so Paul is saying, beware that your eagerness could be to your undoing. It could lead to great pain instead of great gain.
In fact, we’ve seen this. We’ve heard quotes over the years from people that had a lot of money and they ended up saying, it just took my life away. It didn’t add life to me. Remember the quote, the ancient quote from John D. Rockefeller who said, I made many millions, but they have brought me no happiness. Or millionaire John Jacob Astor, who said he was the most miserable man on earth.
Now, we look at that and we say, well, you know, that’s not really what I’m after. All I want is just enough to make sure my family and I, we have food and we have a nice, safe home to live in and a vacation, you know, every now and then, and clothes that are in style, and we have a secure future, and we have a college fund for our kids, and we have a good retirement plan, and all of that. Is there something wrong with that? Well, what verses 9 and 10 are saying, be careful. Be careful.
Verses 9 and 10 are like this flashing danger sign where it’s saying money could be to your undoing, and whatever you do, you don’t want money to overtake you. Don’t let a desire to be rich overtake you, or don’t let the love of money overtake you, or don’t live with an eagerness for acquiring more than you already have. Don’t trust in money. Don’t go there. That could lead to all kinds of grief and evil.
What kind of grief and evil are we talking about? We’re talking about emotional grief. We’re talking about relational grief, financial grief. We’re talking about spiritual grief so that you find yourself stressed out, so that you find yourself in debt, so that you find yourself constantly driven by the almighty dollar, feeling miserable, giving in to moral and ethical compromise, living in a state of worry. Because of money, dealing with relational conflict, overworking, sleeplessness, feeling pressured, driven to succeed in the eyes of the world, questioning your value and worth, and worst of all, creating a barrier, it says here, between you and God, distancing you from faith so that now you have no time for faith, no place for faith, because your love of money has replaced your love for God.
You can’t love money and love God at the same time. That’s what the Scripture teaches us. Your first love for God is going to become your past love. And what would be the worst grief of all would be that you never pick that up. You continue to live that way.
Simply said, in the words of a friend I was talking to this week, I asked him to, you know, his thoughts about this, and he said, you know, I kind of look at the craving money thing like craving a Twinkie. A Twinkie. A Twinkie that you just got to have. You know, you just got to have the Twinkie, and then you do. And then you feel terrible that you had it because it makes you sick.
You know, you’re sick to your stomach because of the 4 teaspoons of sugar plus the high fructose corn syrup and the shortening, which really is pig fat. And so you ate this, and you thought it was going to be so great, and after lunch, a little bit time later, give it some time, When you’re in your afternoon classes, you’re thinking, why did I eat that Twinkie? I mean, that— I feel terrible. And in your next business meeting, I, I hate Twinkies. I never want a Twinkie again.
Or when the kids come home from school and you’re, you know, you’re aggravated with them and you take it back and you say, it was the Twinkie. It was the Twinkie that did it to me. All of that, you know, all because you had a craving for a Twinkie. And so you had your Twinkie and you want to ask, was it worth it? And that’s what he’s saying here.
He’s saying, you know, in the end, is the gain worth it or is it a pain? And he’s connecting it to money. He’s connecting it to the love of money, the eagerness for money, the desire to get rich. I want more than I have. Now, there’s a second mindset here that he’s going after for all of us.
What’s the second mindset? Verses 6 to 8, but godliness with contentment is great gain. For we brought nothing into the world, and we can take nothing out of it. But if we have food and clothing, we will be content with that. What’s the second mindset?
The better mindset is this: I have more than I need. I have more than I need. Do you believe that?
Is that your mindset of choice? Your preferred mindset? I have more than I need. So that the I have more than I need mindset steers you away from I want more than I have. It steers you away from I need more than I have.
Now let’s think about that for a few minutes. Do you believe that you have enough? That’s kind of what’s underneath this one. Do you believe right now that you have enough? That if you have the basics, and that’s all you have, the basics, food and clothing, that’s all you need?
That’s all you need. And you might want to underline in your mind the word need. Can you be content? This is what he’s going after. Can you be content with the basics?
Let me ask it different. Do you want to be content with the basics? Now, what’s content? And content in our culture is like saying, I’m good. Okay?
I’m good. So somebody offers you something more to eat, but you’ve already eaten and you had enough, and so you say, I’m good. And you really mean it. You’re like filled up, you’re fine, you don’t need any more than you already have, and so you say to your friend, I’m good. Or if you’re our friend Kathy, you say, I never want to eat again.
That’s what she says after she finishes a meal. She’ll say, I never want to eat again. And what she’s saying is, I’m good. I’m content. I was thinking about this on Thursday.
Thursday was the day after the Wednesday rain and windstorm. I don’t know if you were around here that day, but things went through our neighborhood. A bunch of trees were knocked over, including a couple of trees in our yard and the tree across the street. A big branch broke out. And anyway, we’re on Cuesta Drive, and so they all got out into Cuesta.
I came— when I came home, pulled in some branches and, you know, did what I could along with the neighbor to kind of clear that and all the rest of that stuff. And the next day, the city of Mountain View came out to remove the larger fallen branch that had fallen off of our, our neighbor’s tree. So I happened to be looking out the front window and I saw them pulling up there and I decided, you know, that’s going to be good. They’re going to get rid of that branch. And since I’ve got 2 tree trunks that are broken and that are sitting in our yard right now.
Maybe if I walk over and I ask them nicely, they’ll say, yes, we’d be happy to take care of your branches too, or your trunks. So I went over and I asked them, this Mountain View tree removal crew that was over, I asked them if they might, you know, take away my trunk branches as well, and they said no. They just said no. They told me about the policy rule number, whatever it was. But anyway, so they told me about that, And at that moment, my contentment levels were tested, okay?
Could I at that moment say, hey, I’m good. I’m good. No problem. I’m good, and really mean it? Apostle Paul wrote about contentment while he was in prison.
I’m sure it wasn’t the condition that he wanted to be in. Yet, this is what he wrote in Philippians 4:11, the last part, verse 12. He says, I’ve learned to be content whatever the circumstances. I know what it is to be in need. 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. What’s he saying? He’s saying, I’m good. I really am. I’m good no matter what happens.
Hey, if I have a lot or have a little, it doesn’t matter. I’m good regardless if things are going my way or things aren’t going my way. I’m good. I’m content. In fact, he had learned, it says here, to be content.
In Philippians 4:11-12, you notice the word learned. The word learned is used twice there, which tells us that it wasn’t a natural for him. It was something that he had to learn. And quite frankly, I think for all of us, contentment is something you’ve got to learn. And what he’s going after here is learning to be content with just the basic necessities of life.
Which he has described as food and clothing. Content with the basic necessities of life, food and clothing? Are you kidding me? You say, well, what about shelter? Well, actually, shelter is included in verse 8.
The word that is used there for clothing is a word that could be translated covering. So it could also mean shelter. In fact, shelter is implied in this word, so we could as easily say clothing and shelter. So basically what Paul is saying is this, Hey, if I have food, if I have clothing, and if I have shelter, I’m good. I’m good.
Now that’s a heart condition. And we have to ask ourselves, when you read a passage like this, you have to ask yourself, is that what I feel? Do I feel the same way that the Apostle Paul was feeling? Would I say that? I’m good.
I got food. I got clothing. I got shelter. I’m good. Have you ever said that?
Do you ever want to say that? Maybe you prefer to, you know, go with the modern basic necessity list. What’s the modern basic necessity list? Well, it’s food, and food, by the way, implies water, so food and water, clothing, shelter, sanitation, education, healthcare, and the internet. The internet.
Yeah, that’s, that’s the modern list. And some people add, and transportation. And then others might add, and something else, and something else, and something else. And then the question becomes, so where does the I’m good list stop? Where does it stop?
And that’s really a good question, isn’t it, in our world that’s filled with stuffaholics? For the most part, we are just into the acquisition of stuff, more and more stuff. We can’t get enough stuff. We are like William Randolph Hearst. Are you familiar with William Randolph Hearst?
You familiar with that name? You familiar with Hearst Castle? You know why Hearst Castle was built? It was built because William Randolph Hearst was a stuffaholic. He really was.
He built a 72,000-square-foot house to put his stuff in. That’s what he did. Like his 2,500-year-old Egyptian statues, his medieval Flemish tapestries, his century-old hand-carved ceilings. He built the house so he could put all of his stuff in there, and for 8 decades Hearst collected all this stuff and he stashed it in his home until the day he died. And then you know what he did?
You know what happened then? You know what happened to his stuff? He left it behind. And then the state got his stuff. So now people go through Hearst Castle, Hearst House, and they say, he sure had a lot of stuff.
We do that. We buy stuff and then we put the stuff into our shelters. I like what comedian George Carlin said. He said, a house is just a pile of stuff with a cover on it.
That kind of sums it up, doesn’t it? We see stuff, then we buy stuff, then we display stuff, and we insure stuff, and we compare stuff. And then when we run out of space, we run out and we rent storage units to store our stuff. Why? Because you never know when you’re going to need some extra stuff.
And so you go to your storage unit to get those tires that you’ve saved for some reason, that playpen that you’ve saved for some reason. Who knows? Do you know that now there are some 50,000 self-storage facilities in the United States? 50,000. You know how many were in the United States before 1960?
Zero. Zero. There are now storage facilities that cover something like 2.3 billion square feet of space to store our stuff. That’s a lot of Hearst Castles. It really, it really is.
Now we spend $38 billion a year just to pay somebody to store our stuff, which means, listen, which means the storage industry is about the same size as the music industry.
Check it out. And this industry did not even begin until the ’60s. You say, well, why not? Well, land was cheaper back then, homes were cheaper back then, so we could build these big houses and store more stuff. We didn’t need them.
Now we need them. But things are changing. They really are. Storage industry is actually praying that movements like tidying up and the minimalistic movement would fail. Last week, Bernice introduced me to tidying up.
By that, by the way, she didn’t give me a lecture about, you know, picking up my stuff. She did— that wasn’t what she introduced me to. She, she introduced me to this new show. A lot of you know about this new show, Tidying Up. It’s on Netflix.
It’s quickly become a growing movement. There would be, however, no interest in this show if Marie Kondo didn’t have people coming to her with all of their stuff and asking for, you know, some kind of exorcism of their stuff. And so what she does is that she comes in and she starts with their clothing, and then they move to the books, and then they move to the papers, and then they move to Kemono, which she calls the kitchen and the bathroom and the garage and the miscellaneous and all these sentimental items and all of that. All I want to say is I dare you to watch one episode and not be impacted by what you see, because what you’re going to see are people just like us. People who have a lot of stuff, like basic necessity kind of stuff, but too much basic necessity kind of stuff.
And so usually where she starts with these people is she starts with the clothes, and she has them take their clothes and pile them up on a bed. And this is a shocking experience to the Stuffaholics when they put them all on this bed and they just— they’re looking at it going, I can’t believe I have all these clothes. I can’t believe it. And that’s the whole point. That’s part of the reason she has them put them on the bed is because then they’re going to be shocked.
They’re going to be shocked with their stuff. And those of us who watch the show, we’re shocked too. And then we realize we’re closet Stuffaholics and we got to do something about that. The fact is that almost all of us need to tidy up, and all of us could probably use a good wake-up call when it comes to this area, because most of us have way more than we need. We truly do.
But do we really believe that? Do we really believe it, that I already have more than I need?
And that mindset needs to take in our present needs, but also this mindset needs to take in future reality. And what’s future reality? Well, that’s verse 7, for we brought nothing into the world and we can take nothing out of it. Think about that. Now, you might like to take some stuff with you when you die, but here’s the deal.
Taking stuff with you when you die, it’s not an option. It’s not going to happen. I mean, even that item you saved up 40 years to get, it’s not going with you. Nothing. That’s what he’s saying here.
Nothing is going with you. When you leave this world, it’s going to be just like when you came into this world. You brought nothing into the world. You’re going to take nothing with you when you go out of this world. Nothing.
No Vans shoes. No Van Gogh paintings. No Van Gogh leather recliners. None of that. None of that’s going with you, which means that your kids, your friends, or the state is going to have to come along after you die, and they’re going to have to deal with all the stuff that you left behind.
And really, we ought to be asking ourselves this question: Do I really want other people to have to deal with all my stuff after I die? Do I want to saddle others with the task of dealing with all my stuff? And you say, well, yeah, I do. They deserve it. You know, they deserve it.
I mean, after all, we picked up after our kids. All those years, now they can pick up after us. Really?
Or maybe you’re just thinking, well, you know what, I really do need all this stuff. I mean, I just absolutely need this. Or, you know what, my kids are going to need this. Really? Is that the best thing that you could do for them?
Or could you perhaps, through your model, teach them to learn to be content?
Wow. Learning to be content with the basic necessities. Is it possible? The Apostle Paul said, yeah, it is. I’m good.
Food, clothing, I’m good. By the way, it tells us there that we’re going to need more than contentment. You see it in verse 6. It says, godliness with contentment is great gain. Great gain— there’s a little equation here— is found in godliness plus contentment.
That equals great gain. And what’s godliness? Well, godliness is a relationship with God. It’s to come into a relationship with God through Jesus Christ. It’s to be born into his family.
It’s not trying to do this without God. It’s doing this with God. It’s having God change our mindset and our purpose for life. Having God change our focus with regard to money, see money differently. And it’s having God continue to change us day by day by day.
And in that is found great gain. What kind of gain are we talking about? Are we talking about money?
No. This isn’t a passage that’s speaking about money, that if you do such and such, God’s going to give you financial gain. That’s not what this is talking about. This is talking about another kind of gain, the kind of gain that all of us would like, such as worry-free living.
How many of our worries are connected to our finances?
This is a gain connected to living an unpressured life. So much of the pressure that we face is oftentimes connected to the stuff. That we went out and purchased. This is gain that’s connected to simplicity.
This gain is connected to peace and balance, patience. This gain is connected to generosity. It’s that kind of gain. It’s not money gain. This isn’t the result of money-hungry life.
This isn’t the result of a money-driven life. This is a result of great gains in connecting with God through Jesus Christ so that we’re able to come to the point we’re able to say and mean it from our hearts, I’m good. I’m really good. I truly am. That just changes everything.
I’ve got food. I’m good. I’ve got clothing. I’m good. I’ve got shelter.
I’m good. I think there’s something here this morning for everybody. I really do. I was talking to a guy this week. We were talking about today.
I told him I was going to be speaking on this topic. He said, boy, it’s a good thing because we live in a materialistic country. I said, tell me a little bit about that. He told me how, you know, parents are blowing it in this area and other matters that he has an opinion about. And while he’s sharing this with me, I’m thinking in my mind about this 4-month relationship that we have.
4 months as friends. And I’ve probably over the last 4 months seen him wear 15 brand new pair of shoes. At least 15. Seriously, I might have seen him wear the same pair of shoes twice. And I’ve been with this guy a lot over the last 4 months.
And I thought to myself, you know, that could happen to any one of us here this morning, that we see it out there, ah, this world is so materialistic. But what about in here? What about right here? What about the condition of my heart? Right here.
There’s a lot to think about, isn’t there? Let’s don’t push it out there. Let’s, let’s ask God to show us what it is that we’ve talked about this morning could transform our lives and put us on a path to true great gain. Let’s pray. Lord, thank you for this amazing passage that speaks to us this morning.
Thank you that you don’t want us to try to sort this out alone, that you want us to sort this out in relationship with you. My prayer would be each one of us would have a genuine relationship with you through Christ.
And thank you that that’s a gift and it’s something that you want to give to everyone. I pray, Lord, if there’s anybody here that’s not received a gift, that they would receive that gift.
They would ask you to become their Lord and their Savior, their leader and their forgiver. And you begin to change them even as you’re changing so many of us that are here this morning. And we look at a passage like this and we’re reminded again how relevant this is to us as well, that we are people that just need so much help in this area. It’s hard to go a day without wanting something more that we don’t have.
So we ask for your forgiveness and pray that you continue to work in us and change us. Spare us of the great pain that is described in this passage. Give us your desires. Give us your heart. Change us into the people that you want us to be.
Lord, raise questions in our minds that need to be asked and answered. Surface conversations among us about this topic. Help us, Lord, not leave this topic in the building, but take it with us, that it might transform our lives in the near future and distant future. May it result in great gain. For we pray this in Jesus’ name.
Amen.
