Son, you are always with me, and all that I have is yours. (Luke 15:31)
The older son grew up thinking that he was missing something. He had always felt incomplete, and he had always blamed his father for that sense of incompleteness.
The longer he served his father, the more that sense of injustice was reinforced in his heart. He was fixated upon the fact that his father had never given him a goat so that he could celebrate with his friends.
Need is the most powerful (or at least prominent) form of deception that the devil levels at us in this age. I’m not talking about “needs” in general. There are some very legitimate needs that we all experience every day. We need to eat, and to use the toilet, and to bathe and clothe ourselves, and to sleep, and to feel loved, etc. As a matter of fact, there are at least five levels of legitimate human needs, and I wrote about them in a previous post. The problem is that we tend to feel needy in places where no need exists. And in those places, we are often tempted to feel that somehow God left something out when he designed our lives.
All these years I’ve been slaving for you, said the older brother, and never have I disobeyed one of your commands. But yet you’ve never even given me a goat so that I might celebrate with my friends.
The goat can be translated into a thousand different unmet needs that we tend to lay at God’s doorstep. You never gave me a wife/husband . . . You never gave me a talent . . . You never gave me a child . . . You never gave me a good job . . . The list goes on and on.
Paul said that he had learned the secret of being content in all situations. You see, its a secret, and Paul said that he had to learn it. Contentment is the great secret that most people never learn of, and so they live unfulfilled lives, always clamoring for something more, feeling unfulfilled and dissatisfied. Now its your turn to learn that secret.
Yesterday, I caught myself in the midst of a pity party because I hadn’t eaten very much and it was 7pm. In my mind I was telling a sad story to myself. All I had to eat today was . . . But then I stopped and asked myself, “Do you feel hungry?” The answer was no. Whatever I had eaten was enough to curb my hunger. My need for food was purely emotional, not at all physical. I was lamenting as if I had starved myself, when in actuality I had eaten more than many people around the world get to eat on a good day!
Today as we meditate on this verse, let us be intentional about replacing the never-ending stream of requests with a rushing river of thankfulness and contentment. Father, I am always with you, and everything you have is mine. I am missing nothing; you have given me everything I need. I am content, satisfied, and thankful. Contentment is the missing piece, and in today’s meditation the Spirit of God is holding it out to us.
Share your thoughts:
What are you thankful for today?
