Live Free with Josh Howerton - Learning Contentment | Ep. 206 | Monday, November 20, 2023

Episode Date: November 20, 2023

What is a spark to all your sin? Ingratitude. What is the solution? It's learning to be content in all circumstances. Join us this week to learn the secret to having gratitude, no matter your situation. For more information, visit lakepointe.church/dailydrive

Thanks for tuning in to today's Daily Drive with Lake Point Church, a daily dose of God's Word for your morning drive. When the word, not the world, becomes the majority of your week, your life will start to change. For that reason, our prayer is that God will speak to you through today's devotional. For more digital content to feed your faith, visit lakepoint.comit. And now let's dive in to today's devotional. Hey, welcome to the Daily Drive podcast. My name is Mike Bro, and this is Thanksgiving week, and it's my favorite holiday. Now, I love Christmas and Easter because of the obvious hope that those two important events bring. But I love Thanksgiving because it is so hard to commercialize it.

When you walk into a store in the middle of August, and they got Halloween decorations up. You go back a month later, they got Christmas decorations everywhere, and Thanksgiving just kind of sits there quietly in the middle. It really does give us a chance to kind of chill, hang with family and friends, and count up our blessings. Our Thanksgiving dinner is kind of crazy. We have over 100 people at our family gathering. Debbie's grandma lived to be 104, and so all the cousins stayed really close,

and now they all have four or five kids, and now their kids have four or five kids, and some of them are not having kids. There are so many kids that we have to rent a gym in a local church. And most live in close proximity, and everybody brings food and turkey, stuffing, country ham, city ham, green beans, sweet potato casserole, mac and cheese, blueberry,

salad, jello jigglers, pumpkin pie with cool whip, pecan pie, homemade rolls, you name it. It's an amazing spread. And all the guys stand around and show pictures of the 12-point buck they just got, and all the old women sit around just giggle, and the 85 kids, they run around and have no idea. I have no idea who they belong to. But having a bunch of little kids running around my house has been one of the greatest gifts of my life. And man, we got a bunch. We got toys everywhere right now, clothes everywhere, diapers everywhere, you know, loose socks everywhere, children's books everywhere. And I love children's books because I can understand them, because I need pictures. I ran across this great line in the classic children's book, Winnie the Pooh, and I loved it.

It said this, Piglet noticed that even though he had a very small heart, it could hold a rather large amount of gratitude. And that's the kind of heart I want, don't you? So we're going to spend some time each day this week leading up Thanksgiving, just talking about developing a heart that can hold a rather large amount of gratitude. And we're just going to hang for a few minutes in the words written by this guy named Paul, who was in prison for his faith in Jesus. And these are not the words you would expect coming out of a dark and damp prison cell, but this is what he writes.

I have learned how to be content with whatever I have. I know how to live on almost nothing or with everything. I have learned the secret of living in every situation, whether it's with a full stomach or empty, with plenty or little, for I can do everything through Christ, who gives me strength. That is such a rich passage of Scripture. I have learned. I have learned how to be content.

And man, I want to learn that secret, don't you? Because let's face it, it's not easy to be content living in this culture, especially with social media these days. We scroll through our social media feed. We see everybody's highlight reel, you know. Their stunning vacation picture. Their amazing Pinterest-inspired preschool snacks. Their CrossFit workout of the day.

Their kids are all dressed in adorable Halloween outfits that they handcrafted. And the families eating vegetables from the garden they plant it. On the farmhouse table they built one afternoon from some pallets they found behind the local grocery store. And all of a sudden, we fall into the comparison trap. And we start believing that we're not good enough, that we're not beautiful. enough, we're not smart enough, we're not worthy enough, we're not blessed enough. And a lack of gratitude takes us to some very unhealthy places, and ingratitude starts to fuel a thing called envy. I think I might have given you this definition of envy on the podcast before,

but here it is again. Envy is resenting God's goodness in someone else's life while ignoring his goodness in mind. They call envy the green-eyed what? Yeah, a monster. Even though we label it a monster. We tend to think of it as one of those, you know, lesser sins. But do you know that envy is listed in the New Testament right besides some pretty ugly stuff? Deceit, orgies, hypocrisy, anger, malice, slander, stealing, murder? I mean, a few of us would place envy and murder in the same, you know, sin classification. We don't think as envy is part of a dark character. But it is. And if envy goes unchecked, it will have all kinds of murderous effects. For starters, envy ruins our health. I mean, all kinds of studies back this up. It's impossible to be an envious person and a

healthy person at the same time. Envy is insidious and progressive in nature. It kills our ability to celebrate. Envy just keeps chipping away at our insides. It eats away at our peace. And when your peace is gone, your contentment is gone. And when your contentment is gone, your gratitude is gone. And when your gratitude is gone, your joy is gone. And when your joy is gone, your strength is gone. worry and anxiety step into that void and rob your sleep, your nerves begin to tighten, your body begins to fail, you get headaches, backaches, knots in your stomach, hypertension escalates. It's why it says in Proverbs 1430, a heart at peace gives life to the body, but envy rots the bones. Again, fueled by ingratitude, envy not only ruins our health,

but erects our relationships. It blinds us to the good things in our own life and begins to point out our own shortcomings, which in turn fuels us out-of-control obsession to compete and win and start to view people as only a threat to us. The comparison trap is such an unhealthy place to be. Living there breeds enormous discontentment. It sucks the joy out of your life. It jacks up your anxiety levels, robs your peace, and fuels the life of ingratitude. And I'm not overstating this. This is a big deal. Think about this for a second. In gratitude was the reason for the fall. It was humanity's discontent with all God had freely given. They were living in absolute paradise and said, yeah, but what about that?

In fact, I believe that ingratitude is the catalyst for all my sin. It empowers my self-centered pride. It stokes my jealousy. It fans the flame of lust and envy. And if ingratitude is the culprit, then maybe, just maybe, gratitude is the cure. And I believe it is. And so we're going to start unpacking the power of gratitude tomorrow. But let me leave you again with these verses from Philippians chapter 4.

I have learned how to be content with whatever I have. I know how to live on almost nothing over everything. I have learned the secret of living in every situation, whether it's with a full stomach or empty, with plenty or little, for I can do everything through Christ who gives me strength. Man, I hope you have a great day. See you back tomorrow. Thanks for tuning in today. For more biblical teaching and worship, join us for our church online live weekend,

services on Saturdays at 6 p.m. and Sundays at 9.30 and 11 a.m. Central Standard Time. Also, if this podcast was helpful to you, would you be sure to rate, review, and share this podcast to help get the word out? For more information about all digital ministries of Lake Point, visit lakepoint.compt.combe.combe.