Abide in me, and I in you. As the branch cannot bear fruit by itself, unless it abides in the vine, neither can you, unless you abide in me. I am the vine; you are the branches. Whoever abides in me and I in him, he it is that bears much fruit, for apart from me you can do nothing.
John 15:4-5
Whom or what are you abiding in today? Where is your source of strength coming from? Think about this for a moment, where does your contentment rest? Another way of addressing the issue is, when someone of something doesn’t fulfill your desires, do you lose your contentment? This may give you a better understanding of where your contentment rest. Many of us say it is in God, but is it really true. It is very easy for our true contentment to rest in our relationships, our profession, our family, or in what we enjoy doing. But what happens when these things disappoint us? Does your contentment run up and down like a rollercoaster based on what others are doing around you? Does it rise up and down like the waves in the ocean, because of your circumstances? It’s a hard question to answer, especially if things are going good for you. And when we are on the other side we may look at what we aren’t getting and lose our focus when it comes to being content in all things. Can we say what Thomas Watson said, “If we have not what we desire, we have more than we deserve.”[i]
Going back to the verse, Abide in Me, is that who you are abiding in today? I think abiding and contentment go hand in hand. When I am abiding in Christ, I am more content, but when I abide in someone or something, I can be tossed back and forth in being contented. Dave Harvey says, “When God acts contrary to our will, disappointment is understandable. But when our desires go unfulfilled and disappointment begins to define us, something else is afoot. It’s called discontentment.”[ii] How about you, where are you at today? When your desires are not fulfilled, who do you turn to? Who or what do you lean on when someone close to you disappoints you and your desires are not fulfilled? Discontentment erodes our trust and faith in God. It erode it when we are abiding in anyone besides God, and when things don’t turn out for what we think is our good, we can blame God. We may not say it out loud but deep down we wonder why God didn’t act in our behalf. The danger in abiding in something else is that we lose our nourishment from the True Vine. We begin to rely on another sinful, fallible, human being that has shortcoming, just like we ourselves possess. The opposite is true when it comes to Christ, He is someone who can provide for us, and rely on, who does have our best interest in mind. Even when we don’t think He does, or when he acts contrary to what we think we need.
Dave Harvey has some good questions to ask on this subject, he says, “How should we respond when blocked ambitions open the door to discontentment? Where do we go when we’re haunted and taunted with “By now, I should have been…”? What do we do when we don’t have what we desire?”[iii] When discontentment creeps into our soul, it is hard to see past what disappoints us. Self-pity, hurt, longings, and bitterness can keep us stuck there. It can be difficult to grasp what we have when we are disappointed, but doing so we see how much God has given us, we can say like Thomas Watson said, I have more than I deserve. Contentment is based on our abiding in Christ, when we begin to live connected to the True Vine, we can rest. Paul says contentment is something we learn, it is something we must pursue. While we can be grateful for what we have when we see others suffering, contentment is not based on comparisons, it is based on connects. The connection to the Vine feeds our contentment; our ambitions are based on His ambitions. Comparisons help for a while, but we can begin to judge others harshly. Or we spend our time looking at what fruit we are producing or not producing. We lend our eyes with too much attention on what others are doing, judging the fruit and production of others in the Kingdom. Instead we need to place our focus on the True Vine which gives us the nourishment to grow and produce godly fruit; fruit of contentment which brings peace no matter what situation we are in, whether in need or plenty. Once again I’ll ask you, where are you connected to today? Where does your contentment rest? Is it in the True Vine, if so continuing resting in Him, if not, what do you need to abide in Him?
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