I’ve never been a big fan of t-shirts with cheesy, tough-man slogans splashed across the front. You know the kind I’m talking about. The words are written in jagged lettering and say something like, “Pain is just weakness leaving the body”, or, “No pain, no gain”, or “I like being jabbed in the eye with a blunt stick”. Maybe I’m just a Dorito-loving pansy, but I never was a huge pain lover.
But as I’ve spent time pondering Philippians 4:11-12, I’ve come to realize that the t-shirts might be on to something. This is how Paul puts it:
Not that I am speaking of being in need, for I have learned in whatever situation I am to be content. I know how to be brought low, and I know how to abound. In any and every circumstance, I have learned the secret of facing plenty and hunger, abundance and need.
Paul makes a staggering claim about himself in these verses: he can be content in any circumstance. Starving? He’s got that figured out. Festering in prison? He can be content there as well. Beaten to a messy pulp by a frenzied mob? Contentment is possible even there.
How did Paul acquire such supreme contentment? He learned it. God led Paul through fire to teach him contentment. As Paul lay on the ground with blood dripping from his head, God was teaching him contentment. As Paul shivered in a dingy prison cell, he was learning the divine secret of contentment.
God could have simply given Paul an intravenous shot of contentment. But he didn’t. God wanted Paul to learn.
I find that very encouraging. God is teaching me to be content in busyness. He’s teaching me to be content with working long hours. Some days seem like one, long, brutal grind. But God is using these days to produce the sweet fruit of contentment. Like Paul, I need (and want) to learn the secret of contentment.
So maybe there’s something to those “I Love Pain” shirts after all.
{ 4 comments… read them below or add one }
Thank you for the post! This truth is very encouraging and so true. What amazes me is the each person’s lesson is different. My friend could be learning contentment and trust by having her body fall apart and her life turned up-side down. But, I on the other hand, have been learning contentment by hearing wait, sit, trust (and having my body flip a little, too). God has produced so much in my life in the past couple of years. It’s all been the result of the refiner’s fire of contentment. I’m grateful the Lord doesn’t leave us alone, but loves us enough to put us through “tough” things (yet, always giving us the grace and power to do them.). He is so good!!!
Very timely post!
It’s so true God wants us to be content in all circumstances, that always sounds so spiritual and then the application comes! I’m in the midst of learning to trust God more than ever, trusting that as His word says, He’ll never leave me or forsake me. It’s difficult because His ways are definitely not our ways and you’re right His ways are to teach us not to inject us with the right combination of responses to Him, if that were the case, we’d all be a bunch of godly robots!
Anyway, great post. I really needed this today!
Blessings
Ron Reffett
Nice post, as I have been saying for quite a while, ‘if you start to take yourself too seriously it’s time for you to catch the flu.’ I know of nobody who still has his own plans when the flu sets in, we all become very humble. Oh Lord, please let me learn the lesson of contentment from your word rather than my own experience.
YellerDaisies – Isn’t it amazing how God custom designs our situations to sanctify us? I’m glad these words were encouraging for you.
Ron – Thanks for your consistent encouragement. You’re absolutely right, the application is the hardest part. I’m glad you found this post helpful!
Jim – Yeah, the flu will knock anybody out!