What is our contentment as Christians? How does it differ from other religions or worldviews? I would like to invite you to define your own contentment.

⁷ For we brought nothing into the world, and we can take nothing out of it. 

This verse echoes Job 1:21, “Naked I came from my mother’s womb, and naked shall I return. The Lord gave, and the Lord has taken away; blessed be the name of the Lord“—Job’s noble confession at the start of his series of sufferings.

⁸ But if we have food and clothing, we will be content with that. 

But is this an idea that is more or less similar to ‘Empty-handed we came, and empty-handed we will depart’ in Buddhist poetry? Even in the Buddhist context, the poem’s ultimate focus is not on the emptiness or vanity itself but rather on the surpassing being and power that will give meaning to this apparent circle of emptiness. So contrary to what is widely perceived, the poem was written out of joy at knowing that supreme being rather than emptiness.

Then what is Paul talking about here that is different than Buddhism and that will fortify his argument and exhortation so far? What is our contentment?

⁹ Those who want to get rich fall into temptation and a trap and into many foolish and harmful desires that plunge people into ruin and destruction. 

‘Many foolish and harmful desires’ is the temptation and the trap that only every word that comes from the mouth of God can resist and loosen, as Jesus declared in Matt 4:4 in the face of the devil. Jesus was quoting Deut 8:3, where Moses explained to Israel the essence of God’s teaching, the background for why God ‘humbled Israel, causing them to hunger and then feeding them with manna’ (Deut 8:3), taking them out of the ‘richness’ of Egypt where they ‘ate fish at no cost—also the cucumbers, melons, leeks, onions, and garlic’ (Num 11:5). It was to teach them that man does not live on bread alone but on every word that comes from the mouth of the Lord.

Therefore, if we have bread, that does not mean we are off training, but it should be a sign that prompts us to remember and trust this historic teaching of God: it is our manna. Later, Jesus claimed that He was the bread that came down from heaven (John 6:41, 51). The piece of food or anything material in our hands is more than itself from now on; it is a piece of Christ that points to the truth that we live by his words and not by this thing in our hands that goes into our stomach.

¹⁰ For the love of money is a root of all kinds of evil. Some people, eager for money, have wandered from the faith and pierced themselves with many griefs.

As we looked at yesterday, Jesus defined the love for money as the desire to justify oneself and to look right, just as it is displayed in the Pharisees (Luke 16:14–15). They sneered at Jesus after the parable of the dishonest manager, who, despite having the title of being dishonest, now with his means of living at stake, tries to copy his master by cancelling the clients’ debts (Luke 16:1–9). How the Pharisees disapproved and sneered at it is the representative enemy attitude against ‘living by God’s word’, which corresponds with the letter’s call to submit to the desire of God. If you have followed through the reflection on the letter so far, you know by now that it is for all people to come to know the truth and be saved (2:4) through his believers and their prayerful lifestyle, looking to God’s godliness, never their own, applying it to everyone without discrimination.

Knowing this and taking part in this is our contentment. The joy of the Lord is our strength (Nehemiah 8:10).

Dear Lord, we say and pray that we desire our will to be the same as yours. But many times we do not know, and even if we do, we forget what your will is. You teach us again from this letter of Paul that you desire for us believers to take part in your grand project—for all people to come to know you and be saved! It is the work Christ and the Spirit have already perfectly accomplished. Yet you invite us to stand with you, come to know who we are, and let others also know who they are. What our true contentment and satisfaction are. Lord, let us please you and therefore find our best happiness. Let us be glad and content with you. As an infant child is satisfied in the nursing mother’s arm. Let us be who we are, just as you intend.