The Christian's Call to Contentment, Part 2

Turn me in your Bible to 1 Timothy chapter 6. 1 Timothy chapter 6, as you look at the Christians' call to contentment.

If you weren't with us last week, if you can go back and listen to that, it would probably do you some good to help you understand where we are even this evening as we begin to look at what the Bible says surrounding learning contentment. Paul learned contentment, and if the great Apostle Paul had to learn something about everyday living, of course, so do you and I. But this word contentment is a high, high virtue, and yet it seems to be so elusive to us. For some reason, we just can't seem to grasp it. We just can't seem to take hold of that which the Apostle Paul learned.

Being able to think rightly about the Christ and to walk intimately with the Christ so that He governs everything about our lives seems to be, on so many occasions, further away from us than we could ever imagine. And all of a sudden, we begin to substitute contentment for things of the world, so we pursue them. As we talked about last week, we end up in that little village called Mooreville, where we want more cars and more homes. We want more money and we want more opportunities. We want more vacations. We want more of this and more of that. And all of a sudden, we realize that the things we want is just so unattainable, absolutely impossible to get there simply because that's not what contentment is.

The great Puritan writer Jeremiah Burroughs, who wrote a little pamphlet, I guess it's not a pamphlet, it is a book, it's not a very big book. It's called The Rare Jewel of Christian Contentment. In that book, he says these words: "Christian contentment is that sweet, inward, quiet, gracious frame of spirit which freely submits to and delights in God's wise and fatherly disposal in every condition." In other words, the providence of God and the plan of God and all the promises of God are able to be rested in by the person who trusts that God, and it becomes the sweetest place in which to live.

Now, the Bible speaks a lot concerning contentment. Some soldiers came to John about what it means to enter the kingdom, and John said to them these words: "Be content with your wages." Luke chapter 3, verse number 14. Timothy said these words, or Paul wrote to Timothy: "If we have food and covering with these, we shall be content." 1 Timothy 6, verse number 8. In Hebrews 13, verse number 5, "make sure that your character is free from the love of money, being content with what you have." 2 Corinthians 12, verse number 10, Paul said he was well content with weaknesses, insults, distresses, and persecutions, difficulties for Christ's sake. And then over, of course, in 1 Timothy 6, verse number 6, that godliness actually is a means of great gain when accompanied by contentment.

We don't realize how often the Bible addresses contentment, and so what we're going to do is go through this with you and help you understand how it is you can actually learn something that the Apostle Paul learned. One author says this: "Many people are truly like thermometers. They merely register whatever the climate is around them. If the pressure is high and things are tense, they're tight and irritable. If life is stormy, they become worried and afraid. If things are calm and relaxed, they read peaceful and quiet. Others, though, resemble the Apostle Paul. They're more regulated and consistent, like thermostats, maintaining a mature attitude in spite of life's highs and lows." Are you a thermometer or a thermostat? Are you up and down all the time, or are you even keeled?

Now, some would say, "Well, the Apostle Paul, he just didn't care that much." Well, let me tell you something. We read all the things he went through last week concerning shipwrecks and snakebitten and being involved in prison, being dragged out of a city and stoned and being beaten three times with 39 lashes. It wasn't the most pleasant of all lives. So we know that his life wasn't one where, "you know what, I'll just take a beating today for Jesus. It's fine. Let's just take a boat ride. Let's have another shipwreck. Who cares?" That wasn't the Apostle Paul's attitude at all. But he learned within each of those storms, within each of those situations, in each of those circumstances, that there was something there to learn about resting in what it is God would have for him.

Contentment, as we talked to you last week, is a word that means self-sufficient, and to understand the ramifications of that is absolutely huge because it deals with every single one of us in a very practical kind of way. Contentment certainly is being at peace with Christ's sufficiency. On Sunday morning, we talk about the book of Hebrews, about how the book of Hebrews emphasizes the sufficiency of Christ, His superiority, His supremacy, but it deals with the sufficiency that comes only through Jesus Christ our Lord. Well, contentment is being at peace with Christ's sufficiency.

And how does that actually come to be for you and me? Paul was convinced that Christ was with him in every situation, no matter what it was, in every place, no matter where he was, and he was convinced that because the Lord was with him, the Lord would take him through. He would learn that from the Old Testament writings of Scripture. For the Lord would say to those in the book of Isaiah, the 43rd chapter, these words in verse number 1: "But now, thus says the Lord, your Creator, O Jacob, and he who formed you, O Israel." So the Lord is reminding Israel through the pen of Isaiah that they are created by him. In other words, He is the master architect of everything in their lives, and He created them. He made them the way they were. He put them in the place they were in. And not only is he their creator, but he is the one who formed them. That is, that God was intricately involved in every aspect of their lives.

And so the Lord is reminding Israel: "this is what I've done for you. This is who I am. I've made sure that I've taken care of you, I've worked it out for you, you are where I want you to be, you're doing exactly what I want you to do. So understand that I'm involved in your life." Then he says, "This, do not fear, for I have redeemed you. I have called you by name, and you are mine." God says to Israel, "you're mine. You're nobody else's. You can be taken into captivity, but you're mine. Somebody can buy you, but you're mine because I've redeemed you for myself. I've called you by name, and you are my very own."

And then he says these great words: "When you pass through the waters, I will be with you, and through the rivers, they will not overflow you. When you walk through the fire, you will not be scorched, nor will the flame burn you. For I am the Lord your God, the Holy One of Israel, your Savior." Those are the words in the mind of the Apostle Paul as he talks about contentment.

When you go through the waters, when you pass through those waters, God never said, "I'm going to build you a bridge so you can go over the waters." No, he says, "when you pass through the waters." He wanted to make sure they understood the turmoil and the turbulence that would come with rough waters. So much so, back in Psalm 124, the psalmist says this: Psalm 124, verse number 1. "Had it not been the Lord who was on our side, that Israel now say, Had it not been the Lord who was on our side, when men rose up against us, then they would have swallowed us alive. When their anger was kindled against us, then the waters would have engulfed us, the streams would have swept over our soul, then the raging waters would have swept over our soul. Blessed be the Lord, who has not given us to be torn by their teeth." Why? Because the Lord was with us and protected us.

And so the Lord is saying to Israel in the book of Isaiah: "you need to understand that no matter what it is you go through, I'm with you." He never said, "if you happen to go through the waters and if you happen to go through the fire." He said, "when you go through the waters and when you go through the fire." It will be hot, but you will not be scorched. The waters will be deep, but you will not be swallowed up because God was with them. So important.

So the Apostle Paul is talking about contentment, realizing that no matter what turmoil he went through, and we told you last week that all the things that he did cannot even begin, we can't even begin to compare our life with his, and we're not supposed to. Because the problem is that we get into this whole comparison mode that somehow somebody's trials and difficulties are worse than mine are. That's just not true, because everyone faces their own difficulty. But when you read about the Apostle Paul and see all the things that he happened to encounter, You ask yourself, "how did this man ever learn to rest in Christ? How did he ever learn to come to a place where he could say, 'you know what, I've learned to be content that whatever state I'm in, I've rested in my Lord, realizing that amidst all of my weaknesses, God's grace is sufficient for me.'" How did Paul come to that place? And that's the uniqueness of Scripture, because what it does is outline for us exactly how you and I can learn to come to the same place the Apostle Paul came to when he began to learn what it means to be content.

I told you last week, contentment is not a gift, nor is it an ability. You don't pray about contentment. It's something that is learned over time. And we told you last week, you're not going to learn it in a week, or two, a month, or three, or even a year or four. It's going to take a lifetime to learn contentment. We have a problem with that because we live in a day and age where we want everything at our fingertips. We don't want to wait for anything. If you're in Amazon Prime, you know you can order it today and get it tomorrow. We don't want to wait two days or three days. We want everything right now. Nobody likes to wait. And so in this modern age of technology, we don't have to wait for anything, and so we're accustomed to that. But contentment doesn't come that fast. You can't wake up tomorrow and say, "hey, guess what? I'm content today. What a great day to be content." Doesn't work that way. It's something that's learned over time by going through the waters, by going through the fires, by learning to trust and depend upon God.

What did we tell you last week? Contentment is all about independence and dependence. It's about being independent from the things of the world and completely dependent upon the things of God. That's what it means. To be content, you are independent from all circumstances, all situations, all worldly desires, and materialistic kinds of things, and totally dependent upon everything that God has for you. And when you're dependent upon him, then you learn contentment. So important. It's about walking in the spirit so you don't fulfill the lusts of the flesh. You want to walk hand in hand with the living God every single day, and the Apostle Paul learned to do that as well.

So in 1 Timothy 6, verse 6, down to verse number 19, we're going to give you 10 principles. 10 principles that Paul outlines for young Timothy. Paul already said, we looked at Philippians chapter 4 last week. Paul already said that he learned to be content in whatever state he was in. So now he wants to be able to teach Timothy how he can adopt that lifestyle. He wants Timothy to be able to see that he too can be content in whatever state he is in. But Paul has to be able to outline those things for him. And so, from the verses before us in 1 Timothy 6, 6 to 19, we're going to give you 10 practical principles that will help you respond to the call to be content, because Paul outlines them for us.

And so it says in 1 Timothy chapter 6, verse number 6, these words: "But godliness actually is a means of great gain when accompanied by contentment." That's how he begins. But those but-ologies of Scripture, right? The biggest aspect of theology is understanding but-ologies because they show you the huge contrast. False teachers, as he's talking about earlier, are into false pretenses, a false kind of godliness, that they might receive some kind of material gain from that. But the true teachers of the Lord, they're different. They have a true godliness about their lives. There's something unique about them. So, "But godliness, when it's accompanied by contentment, is absolutely the greatest gain."

You can be a false teacher and you can gain worldly wisdom and you can receive worldly benefits, and that's gain, but it's not great gain. But godliness, when accompanied by contentment, is absolutely great gain. Now, the word godliness is a great word. It's a word that means reverence. It's a word that means godlike. Used 15 times in the New Testament, 10 times in the pastoral epistles, 1, 2 Timothy, and Titus, 8 times in 1 Timothy alone. Because the key to any leadership in the church is godlikeness, being a reverent kind of person. That's what godliness is. You can't expect to be a leader in the church of Christ without having a godly characteristic, and so Paul spends all kinds of time talking to us about godliness.

In fact, earlier in 1 Timothy 6, he says these words in verse number 3: "If anyone advocates a different doctrine and does not agree with sound words, those of the Lord Jesus Christ, and with the doctrine conforming to godliness," there's something about the doctrine of godliness. And the doctrine of the Lord Jesus Christ molds you and shapes you into a godly person. People say, "you know what, I don't want to go to church because all they do is talk about doctrine." Well, listen, without doctrine, which really is a word that means healthy, without the health, the hygiene of truth, we can never be godly people. And so Paul is talking about the sound doctrine that produces a godly characteristic.

And then in verse 11 of 1 Timothy 6, "but Timothy," another one of those but-ologies, "flee from these things, you man of God, and pursue righteousness, godliness." So, godliness is something to pursue. You want to pursue godliness. So that's why over in 1 Timothy 4, verses 6, 7, and 8, he says, "Timothy, you train yourself to be godly." Why? Because bodily exercise profits just a little bit. It does profit, but only a little bit, because there are only profits for this life, not the life to come. But godliness is profitable for all things, not just in this life, but in the life to come. So, therefore, train yourself to be godly. So, Paul says you need to pursue godliness, need to chase after it, need to hunt it down, need to track it down, Timothy.

And how do you do that? Discipline yourself to godliness. The discipline that's there. You know, discipline is a nasty word for most people, right? Nobody, it's the word "gunadzo." "Good nadzo" is how you say it. It's like you're grunting when you say it. Why? Because it's the word we get our modern day word gymnasium. And nobody likes to go to the gym and sweat. I mean, who likes to do that? I don't like to do that. That's why I never work out. I don't like to sweat. I just don't like to work out. This is too much extra work. But my son, Cade, boy, he loves to work out. He gets up at 3 a.m. every morning, works out for an hour and a half. I'm like, "dude, really, seriously? You just like to sweat that much and work out that much," but that's what he just loves to do at that kind of thing.

But see, godliness is that kind of pursuit. It's not easy. It takes discipline. And so Paul says to Timothy, "you're going to have to discipline your life." You just can't wake up one day and say, "you know what, I'm going to be godly today." You don't wake up one day and say, "you know what, I need to lose 30 pounds." Wake up tomorrow and say, "I'm good. I've lost 30 pounds." It doesn't work like that. If you're going to lose weight, it takes time, right? You can't do it in a week. You can't do it in a month. It takes discipline day after day after day. And then you begin to see just a little bit here, a little bit more, and then finally, three, six, eight months down the road, you say, "Hey, I've lost a pound or two." And you say, "I've put all this work in, I've lost three pounds. Are you kidding me? I'm done. I'm done." It takes time.

Same thing is true with godliness. You don't wake up one day and say, "I'm mature, I'm godly, I'm walking with Jesus." No, we all want to walk with the Lord, that's why we're here. But the fact of the matter is, it takes time. It takes energy. It takes discipline. That's why Solomon would say that man's most precious possession is his diligence, is his discipline. The very fact that a man can be diligent, go after a task, stick with it, and continue on is his most prized possession because most people just can't do that. So, Paul says to Timothy, "you need to discipline yourself toward godliness. You need to pursue godliness. You do that because of the sound doctrine that conforms you to the doctrine of godliness."

And then Peter would say it this way: over in 2 Peter chapter 1, he says, "Simon Peter, a bondservant and an apostle of Jesus Christ, to those who have received the faith of the same kind of ours, by the righteousness of our God and Savior Jesus Christ. Grace and peace be multiplied to you in the knowledge of God and of Jesus our Lord, seeing that His divine power has granted to us everything pertaining to life and godliness." So, everything about the divine power of God is given to us, promotes godliness. And this says, "through the true knowledge of Him who called us by His own glory and by His own excellence."

So now Paul says, "but Timothy, understand this: that godliness, godliness, when accompanied with contentment, is the highest of all virtues." There's nothing worth pursuing, nothing more important to discipline your life after than this avenue. Nothing is more important than this. So because godliness with contentment is the greatest of all gains. I'm going to outline for you exactly how it is you get there.

So he says, "Godliness accompanied with contentment." Now remember I told you last week, contentment comes from two words, one meaning self and the other meaning sufficient. It speaks of self-sufficiency. And so the Stoics would say that it's a life of self-mastery, to be able to master the inner man, so much so that what's on the inside is never disrupted by that which is on the outside, no matter how negative the circumstances. And even though you cannot control them, you could always control the way you respond to them. So the Stoic philosophers would emphasize the self-sufficiency, the self-mastery of one who is content.

So, Paul would use the exact same word, and everybody who is reading his epistle would understand what that word meant. And so, he uses the exact same word, but he does it from a different angle, because he does it from a Christian perspective. He does it from a biblical perspective. So it is true that the word content means self-mastery. But if the Lord God Himself indwells your life, then the only way you can master the inner man is because of the Christ who dwells within you. So, it's not self-mastery, it's yourself being mastered by the indwelling God who rules within you, which allows you to live a life of contentment. And that's how Paul uses it when he talks about biblical contentment.

Yes, it's about the sufficiency of God. Remember, our Lord is sufficient in and of himself. Our Lord doesn't need anything to make him better or more than he already is. He doesn't need us in heaven. He wants us there. He doesn't need us in heaven. If our Lord needs anything, He's not sufficient in and of himself. And if he is not sufficient in and of himself, that means there's something insufficient about him that would make him less than perfect. So, because God is totally sufficient in and of Himself, He needs nothing. He wants our praise. He's created us for the praise of His glory. But he doesn't need it because he's totally sufficient.

So now you have the totally sufficient one who indwells us, "Christ in you, the hope of glory," and Christ dwelling in us is the sufficient one. That makes us sufficient in and of ourselves, not because of our human nature, but because of the divine nature that we become now a partaker of, as Peter has said. That makes sense? So we are partakers of the divine nature, a nature that's completely sufficient, so that now our self on the inside is mastered by the God who lives within us. And therefore, because of that, we are at peace with the Christ who is all-sufficient. And because we're at peace with the Christ who is all-sufficient, we then are content in situations we find ourselves. And all of life is learning how that manifests itself every day in your life and in mine.

Life is all about learning how it is the indwelling God who is all-sufficient wants us to lean upon Him and walk upon Him. That's why we told you: sufficiency, contentment is all about independence and dependence. It's all about independent from everything that the world offers and totally dependent upon everything God offers because we are dependent beings. We are dependent upon the sufficiency of Christ because we are so insufficient in and of ourselves. We are dependent upon what God Himself does. And that's how Paul says it.

When Paul says this in 2 Corinthians 9, verse number 8: "And God is able to make all grace abound to you, so that always having all sufficiency in everything you may have an abundance for every good deed." Paul talks about the sufficiency, having all sufficiency, because of the God who dwells in you. Over earlier in 2 Corinthians chapter 3, 2 Corinthians 3, verse number 5. "Such confidence we have," this is verse 4, "through Christ toward God, not that we are sufficient or adequate in ourselves to consider anything as coming from ourselves, but our adequacy, our sufficiency is from God."

So Paul says, "you know, there's nothing about us that makes us adequate. There's nothing about us that makes us sufficient because it's not about us. Our adequacy, our sufficiency comes from God." Why? Because God indwells us. Our inner man is mastered by the king of the universe, the one who is all-sufficient. The one who said, "My grace, Paul, is sufficient for you." And Paul learned that in his weaknesses, he was at his strongest, because he could lean dependently upon the sufficiency of an all-sufficient God whose grace would sustain him every single day. That's the direction Paul wants us to understand.

So, Paul very simply says that godliness, when accompanied with contentment, is the greatest of all gains. The Christian has the one thing, the one person who dwells inside of him that allows him to learn life's greatest lesson. That is learning to rest in the One who dwells within. So Paul is talking about godliness being true gain when accompanied by contentment. In other words, it really truly means that our Lord is enough.

For most of us, that's not true. We want to verbalize the Lord's enough, but we don't live as if the Lord's enough. Like the psalmist in Psalm 63, when he said it this way: "O God, you are my God, I shall seek you earnestly. My soul thirsts for you, my flesh yearns for you, in a dry and weary land where there is no water, thus I have seen you in the sanctuary, to see your power and your glory, because your loving kindness is better than life. My lips will praise you. So I will bless you as long as I live, I will lift up my hands in your name. My soul is satisfied as with marrow and fatness and my mouth offers praises with joyful lips."

We wish that our inner man was satisfied. We wish that we could offer up praise to God. But it's accompanied with what? A longing and a yearning to be with the Lord. Why? Because godliness with contentment is great gain. You can't be content and ungodly. You can only be content if you're godly, because the two go hand in hand. It's a pursuit of God, it's only to be like God, it is God's likeness. And when it's, that's why he says that godliness with contentment is great gain because it's godlikeness.

Listen, when you are acting like God, it's only because the sufficient God has made you a partaker of his divine nature, therefore your sufficiency is in him alone. And that's the lesson that takes a lifetime to learn. And you learn it more and more each and every day. And then, over in, I love this, in Psalm 73, verse 25. "Whom have I in heaven but you? And besides you, I desire nothing on earth." Don't you wish you could say that? Don't you wish you could say, "you know what, Lord? I don't want anything else but you. That's all I want." But we don't say that, because as soon as we say that, our friend drives by in a newer car. "Oh man, I wish I had that car." But we just want what the Lord has.

So, "my flesh and my heart may fail, but God is the strength of my heart and my portion forever. For behold, those who are far from you will perish. You have destroyed all those who are unfaithful to you. But as for me, the nearness of God is my good. I have made the Lord God my refuge, that I may tell of all your works." The Apostle Paul could actually say that the nearness of God was truly his good. He could say, "for to me, to live is Christ and to die is gain." Why? Because he had been crucified with Christ. He realized there was nothing in and of himself that was adequate. But everything about God was more than adequate. It was more than competent. It was more than sufficient because the all-sufficient God lived within him.

So we could say, "I desire nothing on earth but you alone." That's why you can say, "I forget the things that are in the past and I press on toward the upward call that I have in Christ Jesus, my Lord." Because he knew that everything in life centered around the Christ in all that he had for him. If you move on to Psalm 107, verse number 8, it says, "For he has satisfied the thirsty soul and the hungry soul, he is filled with what is good. He has satisfied the thirsty soul. He has filled the hungry soul with that which is good."

Remember, we told you last week in Matthew 5, verse number 6: "Blessed are those who hunger and thirst for righteousness, for they and they only are the ones who are satisfied." If you're not hungry and thirsting for righteousness, you will never be satisfied with anything else. You'll always be empty. There'll always be a hole. Your life will be a donut with a big hole right in the middle of it. You just will not be able to fill that void. You can't, because you must hunger and thirst for the righteousness of Christ. And so Paul and the Apostle come together, or the Apostle Paul with the psalmist come together and talk about the longing and the yearning to be what Christ wants them to be.

Remember the writer of Hebrews in Hebrews 13. Hebrews 13, verse number 5 says this. And you know these words. It says: "make sure that your character is free from the love of money, being content, being satisfied with what you have." How? "For he himself has said, I will never desert you, nor will I ever forsake you. So that we confidently say, The Lord is my helper, I will not be afraid. What will man do to me?" So the Lord says, "listen, you can be content if you realize that I'm never going to leave you, nor I'm never going to forsake you. That's what you need to understand."

If you understand that truth, if you believe that with all your heart, when you go through the waters, you won't drown. They will not overflow you. When you go through the fire, you're not going to be burned. Why? Because I'm right there with you. I am enough. Let me be enough for you in life so that you can be totally satisfied with me. Because if you are, you will be sufficient to live each and every day based on the fact that godliness with contentment is life's greatest gain.

I love what one author said about those who are content. He says, "Contentment allows current enjoyment rather than constant striving." If you're content, you live a life of enjoyment instead of a life of always striving for this or for that. Someday I'll have this. Someday I can retire. Someday I'll have a house in Laguna. Someday I'll drive the sports car I want to drive. Someday I'll be able to do the things I want to do. Always living in the some days, but never living in today, hoping that someday all that will come to be. But the contented person knows that Jesus is enough in the exact moment he's in. He doesn't live in a someday that might not ever come. He lives in the present because there's one who will never leave him nor ever forsake him.

And then he says this. He says, "contentment gives us freedom to recognize and applaud another's achievements without being eaten up with envy." You know what a contented person does? They are really happy for you. They're really glad when you get a new house and they live in a shack. They're really glad when your kids get married and they're single forever. They're really glad when you, as a woman, are pregnant with your fifth child and she's barren. They're really glad for you. They're not eaten up with envy, jealousy. They really truly are glad because at the heart of the believer's life is a truly grateful spirit, a kind spirit. They are so at rest and so at ease with what Jesus has done. They can actually rest in that and be happy for you. How many people do you know that are really happy for you?

You know, we live in this day of social media, right? And so every day we wake up, go on our social media, and we're already discouraged. Why? Because somebody always has something I don't have. Somebody always has something better than I do. Somebody always looks better than I look. Somebody always has more of this than I have. And social media has just so enveloped our lives that we can never be satisfied because everybody out there has it better than I do. But we don't realize that all those pictures are not real. They're all fake. You don't know what's happening behind closed doors. They just put out there what they want you to see. They don't put out there what really is truly happening.

But yet, we get lost in the minutiae of all social media, and all of a sudden we're just so discontent with our lives, and we can't be thankful for what we have because everybody's got something better than I do. Everybody's happier than I am. And it just makes me more and more sad, more and more discontent. And then I go to church, and the pastor says, "You got to learn to be content because contentment with godliness is great gain." I'm like, "I'm not getting any gain here. Everybody around me is happier than I am, everybody around me is more joyous than I am." But the contented person is so grateful that God has allowed this or that to happen with you. And we say, "you know what? We are so happy for you. I hope, I hope, that God blesses you with even more this or more that and really mean it when we say it." So important.

So Paul says, "godliness with contentment is the means of greatest gain." So, how do I receive the greatest gain? How do I get to the place where I learn contentment? So, I spent a week and 45 minutes getting to point number one. I have 10 points I want to give you. 10. And so I'm going to give them to you over the next five weeks. I think I have five weeks left. Yeah five weeks left. So I can do two a week to take you down through verse number 19. So, we're going to walk our way through the text. Each verse is going to unfold for you another point to show you exactly what Paul wants to teach us so we can learn contentment. And just because you have one point doesn't mean the other nine will come easier. No, they all flow one from another. That's why they're all in one section, so you can begin to understand them and digest them.

Here's the first one. You might think it's a little weird. But it is the word of God, so don't think it's weird. Listen to what Paul says. He says this: "But godliness actually means a great gain when accompanied by contentment." Here is verse number 7: "For we have bought nothing into the world, so we cannot take anything out of it either." That's the first point. Here it is. Recognize the ultimate reality of your coming and going. This is where it begins. Realize the ultimate reality of your coming and your going.

Now, you know as well as I do that when you were born, nobody came out of the womb with a backpack. Nobody came out of the womb with a suitcase. When you came out of the womb, you came out with absolutely zero. Nothing. You got your eyes, your arms, your legs. Maybe you had hair, maybe you didn't have hair, but you came out of the womb with nothing. And Paul wants Timothy to realize that when you were born, there was nothing. And when you die, you leave with nothing. When you die, you leave with absolutely nothing.

I don't think there's ever been a person who on their deathbed said these words, "I really, really should have spent a lot more time at work than with my family." I don't think anybody ever said that. I would venture to say that no one has ever said, "Boy, at the end of life, I wish I would have spent more time at work than with my family." But you hear all the time, all these coaches and all these athletes and all these big CEO guys saying, "you know what, I've lived my life. You know what? It's now time for me to spend time with my family when they're 65 and 70 years of age, they've done everything they wanted to do. Maybe I better go back and spend some time with my family now," realizing that everything about that is so crucial in the in-between years. Because when it's all said and done, you leave with nothing. You came with nothing, you leave with nothing. But we spend everything in between those two days gathering everything we possibly can, but then leaving it to who?

And so now you understand Ecclesiastes 7:1, that one's death day is better than their birthday. If you have a good name, right? A good name is better than a good ointment. The day of one's death is better than the day of one's birth. Why is that? Because a good name is dealing with one's character, and what's the greatest character one can have? God likeness, a godly life. And that godly life now is the life that you leave behind. And so, what it is you're doing is realizing that the ultimate reality in life is that when you come, you come with nothing. When you leave, you leave with nothing. But yet, we want to spend all of our days accumulating more and more of this and that, never being satisfied with the things that we accumulate. Why? You're going to leave with nothing.

But what you do leave behind is a legacy that will be translated on for the coming generations. And that's why Solomon says that a good name is better than a good ointment, because the character of a person will live in and through the succeeding generations. So important.

We talked with Larry Cassler at his memorial service when the family got together last Friday, and we talked about his name, his name being crowned with a laurel. And crowned with laurel means the laurel wreath that someone wears that symbolizes the fact that they have won victories in the past. And so, everything about the laurel wreath around the soldier or the captain or whoever it was who wore the wreath was always a reminder of past victories. And so Larry's name means crowned with laurel. Why? Because Revelation 14:13, "blessed are those who die in the Lord. Yes, says a spirit, because they rest from their labors and their rewards follow after them."

What are the rewards? The rewards are the laurels, the past successes. What are those? Treasures that have been laid up in heaven, not upon earth. That come about because of a godly character that has impacted other people's lives. And so Paul wants Timothy to realize, "Timothy, look, you know what? Godliness with contentment's great gain. And you've got to realize that when you came here into this world, you came with nothing. When you leave, you're leaving with nothing. So make sure that in between that, you are building a life of quality character. Because you see, that's going to pass down from generation to generation."

Remember what it says over in Psalm 112? It says, "Praise the Lord, how blessed is the man who fears the Lord, who greatly delights in his commandments. His descendants will be mighty on earth. The generation of the upright will be blessed. Wealth and riches are in his house, and his righteousness endures forever." The man who fears the Lord and greatly delights in the commandments of God has wealth and riches in his house. And what are the wealth and riches that he has? It is the character that's been passed down to generation because his descendants are going to be mighty on the earth. Why are they going to be mighty? Because the godly character has been passed down to his children. That's what makes them mighty. That's what makes them wealthy. That's what makes them rich. And we all want to be rich with true biblical wealth, which is the godly character, the quality of a Christ-like life being passed down from generation to generation.

That'll never happen if you don't realize you came with nothing and you're leaving with nothing. Because you're going to spend your whole life in the pursuit of some other excellence, some other object, some other situation. Instead of realizing where you're at and passing that down to your children. So at Larry's memorial service, I addressed both of his sons because his sons each have four children. Larry had eight grandchildren. And so I addressed both of the sons because they need to recognize that the legacy that their father left behind. The legacy of a godly character now needs to be passed down to them and from them to their children. Because if they don't do that, they're going to miss everything about what it means to be a father.

See, fatherhood is wrapped up in the fact that how I pass down to my children a godly character. That's what's most important, see? And so the challenge was to his two boys to help them understand the value of their father's legacy being passed down to his children's children, his grandchildren. So they will then get on the ball and do those things that need to be done. And so when we look at Scripture, we begin to understand what the Bible says. Paul says, "look, Timothy, understand this. False teachers are going to do this for all kinds of improper motives and everything for the wrong kind of gain. But you, Timothy, you, you need to be godly. You need to pursue godliness, train yourself in godliness, because godliness, along with self-sufficiency or God's sufficiency, is the greatest of all gain."

Because if you're dependent upon God and independent from the things of the world, you're going to be focused on nothing but God. And if you're focused on nothing but God, then your character is going to be God-like. And that's what you need to pass down because you came with nothing, and you're going to leave with nothing.

You know, we have a hard time wrapping our mind around that. We really do. We look at this world as everything, but we're just passing through. We forget about eternity. Eternity is for eternity. It just goes on and on and on forever. Our life is just a blip on the screen. That's why at a funeral you talk about the brevity of life. Life's but a vapor, never lasts forever. And because of the brevity of life, you need to understand the sovereignty of God. Why? Because without God being sovereign, all your days are numbered. He knows exactly when you're going to die. Everybody dies on time. And then you talk about the reality of sin, how it permeates everybody, and how you need to understand that with that sin comes death. That's why you emphasize the necessity of salvation because you need to be saved from your sin. And then you emphasize the exclusivity of heaven because heaven isn't for everybody, contrary to popular opinion. Heaven's a very exclusive place. Read Revelation 22. Read Galatians chapter 5. Not everybody gets in there. Read 1 Corinthians chapter 6. It's only set aside for those whose lives have been washed in the blood of the Lamb, those whose lives have not been washed, they don't go. It's a very exclusive place. Not everybody goes to heaven.

And so, as you begin to preach that, you realize that when it's all said and done, you came with nothing, you leave with nothing. So, when you think about a memorial service, when you think about a graveyard, when you think about a cemetery, you realize that all those people left without one item with them. Because it doesn't make a difference. It's all irrelevant. That's why he goes on to say: "with food and clothing, they need to learn to be content." Once you have the necessities of life and God provides all those things for you, that's all you need. Because what you need to be pursuing, what you need to be disciplined in, is godlikeness. Because when you're like God, you understand the sufficiency of God. You depend upon God alone. And that means you live a contented life independent of things around you and completely dependent upon the God within you.

Thus, Timothy begins to understand how to learn contentment. We need to learn that when you arrived, you came with nothing. When you leave, you will leave with nothing, but you can leave behind the greatest, greatest character that translates into the lives of your children. A legacy of truth because truth is everlasting. It lasts forever. And we pray with you.

Father, thank you, Lord, for tonight. A chance to be in your word and the opportunity to examine our lives. And I pray, Lord, that you would really challenge all of us to realize, Lord, that we came with nothing, we're leaving with nothing. The only thing that matters is that we walk with God, talk with God, live for God. May we do that in a way that brings glory to your name. We ask that in Jesus' name, Amen.