Reflection - Hebrews 13:5

Hebrews is a long sermon and near the end of that sermon are some imperatives for God's people. The Bible is anything but Basic Instructions Before Leaving Earth, but Hebrews 13 has some pretty basic instructions that are wise to remember. There are 2 in this verse to encourage me this morning:

1. Your lifestyle must be free from the love of money
2. For he himself has said

Reflect

The lifestyle comment just such a particularly relevant thing to me right now as God has brought changes to my work/career. In many ways my lifestyle is very free from the love of money - we live below our means, give money away, etc. But I know my heart is fickle, and if there's not as much money as I think there should be in our account I feel something in me that is most certainly sinful. I know what having more than we need is like, and to be honest with anyone - I do love that... I don't love money but I really enjoy the simplicity that having too much money affords you in daily life. What will the next several years look like? I do not know exactly, I have no reason to have any actual concerns, and so my hope for myself is that God fills me with contentment as I processed some the other day in reflection-contentment-and-work.

The work changes are welcome but it doesn't feel natural to me to welcome them. I think I can only call them welcome because of the second part of the verse that jumped out at me - "For he himself has said".

The Word of the Lord ought to be a heavy thing to the Christian - to me. God's Word is objectively more valuable than gold, and "he himself has said, 'I will never desert you, and I will never abandon you'". My heavenly father has given me assurance through his own word, which he is bound by his own nature to be true to, that I am cared for. My life is evidence of this - so many examples of God's faithfulness to me and my family. He's been so materially faithful that I'm not sure I can ever say I've learned any secret to contentment - God has simply been so good to me has blessed me greatly. Between his word that he'll never forsake me and the record of faithfulness to me in my own life I'd have to make a choice that flys in the face of data to not be content... What is there for me to not be content over? Absolutely nothing!

Contentment has been on my mind a lot this week, there's no reason for me to lack contentment, and no secret to lean into. I am, simply put, still a sinner and the love of money is the sin crouching at the door, waiting for me. By God's grace he continues to protect me, and I can calmly, with contentment and satisfaction, walk through the next season of my life knowing that he himself has said, he will never abandon me.