I knew I couldn’t live without it.

Once I had this I would not need anything else, this was the thing I had been waiting for. To own one would make me complete.

What was the thing I hear you ask?

Mmmm, I can’t remember.

Because once I had this thing I realised that it was not actually the thing, that it was the next thing that my soul really craved and that would make me…

• Important.
• Significant.
• Attractive.
• Rich.
• Desirable.
• Spiritual.
• Creative.
• Disciplined.
• Intelligent.
• Successful.
• Etc etc
• Yada yada yada

Ad infinitum. With emphasis on the ad.

The skies are already darkening

Get ready for the storm that’s brewing to blow through your pockets.

I can already smell the early offers on the gathering breeze.

It’s coming with gusts of forceful persuasion, ready to whip your credit card into a frenzied dance of delusion.

Dusky skies are swirling overhead in preparation. It’s gonna be dark, black even.

The “whirlwind of want” is about to break on the shores of your soul. 

Is Jesus against this frenzy of consumption?

Is our life meant to languish in want and need, enjoying little more than necessities.

Not so. 

God “gives us all things richly to enjoy” (1 Timothy 6:17)

You are told to pray for, “Whatsoever thing ye desire” (Mark 11:24)

Great verses for the consumer.

But the richest man on earth is not the one with most stuff.

Our lives do not consist in the abundance of objects we own.

And he said unto them, Take heed, and beware of covetousness: for a man’s life consisteth not in the abundance of the things which he possesseth.”

Luke 12:15 KJV

The Recipe of Rich Contentment

Here is the best prosperity verse you will ever confess:

Actually, I don’t have a sense of needing anything personally. I’ve learned by now to be quite content whatever my circumstances. I’m just as happy with little as with much, with much as with little. I’ve found the recipe for being happy whether full or hungry, hands full or hands empty.”

Philippians 4:11–12 MESSAGE

Paul discovered the recipe of rich contentment.

Oh, how I long to sit at that table!

So long as our measure of success is rooted in the world we will always come up wanting.

Another recipe feeds the emaciated needs of the desperate.

Welcome to the Cauldron of inadequacy

The cauldron of inadequacy bubbles away every day, spewing its aroma on every billboard, infusing every online interaction.

• Two pounds of envy.
• A pinch of doubt.
• Three slices of keeping-up-with-the-Jones’s.
• A quart of wannabe, spiced with the promise of tomorrow. 
• All topped off with a cherry of wilful ignorance.

Are you really measured by the breadth of your 95-inch television? 

The length of your credit rating?

Is your worth determined by the depth of your pocket?

Let me remind you of the only measure that counts your worth.

Paul prayed it well:

For this reason I bow my knees to the Father of our Lord Jesus Christ, from whom the whole family in heaven and earth is named, that He would grant you, according to the riches of His glory, to be strengthened with might through His Spirit in the inner man, that Christ may dwell in your hearts through faith; that you, being rooted and grounded in love, may be able to comprehend with all the saints what is the width and length and depth and height—to know the love of Christ which passes knowledge; that you may be filled with all the fullness of God.”

Ephesians 3:14–19 NKJV

Maybe this is the secret recipe?

To know God’s love.

To be filled with a knowledge of his affections.

To live with a perspective painted by eternal values not passing trends?

Even in the blackness of the darkest Friday God’s light shines through brightly. He holds in His hand the greatest offer of all – eternal life for all those who believe.

Friends, it does not get better than that!