Looking for contentment

If we’re searching for something we can find justification or even validation for it most anywhere.  I did that searching for contentment this week.  It’s always been one of those things that’s been elusive.  I wasn’t raised with much materially, so I’ve always thought I was trying to compensate somehow. I still don’t have much.  Sometimes I secretly wish a close friend or relative would win a PowerBall or MegaMillion and throw me a bone or two.  After all, it’s illegal for a Bapticostal to gamble, right?

So I’m preparing a talk for this weekend and the topic I was given was “the family as the primary disciple-maker.”  No problem.  Deuteronomy 6 was a good starting point.  Plenty of material there.  After a little study, I just seemed like I needed to go to the Ten Commandments.

I became transfixed and distracted from my subject matter.

I read the Decalogue and reread it.  I had already read it like a thousand times.  I even had most of them memorized.  (You may be able to quote them all without a lot of mental gymnastics, but I’m not you, OK?)

For the first time I saw the Ten Commandments as a statement of how to be content as a human being.  Adam and Eve weren’t content.  We haven’t been content since then.  In God’s infinite wisdom he knew we needed something to show us how to live as the human beings we were created to be.  The radical minimum standard of human behavior included, even if inferred, our need to have a character that includes contentment.

Be content with a Creator God alone.
Be content that I can’t successfully craft Him in my image or any other image.
Be content with a God that is indescribable instead of throwing His name around loosely.
Be content with completely unplugging and spending time with the Creator one day each week.
Be content with my parents and I’ll actually live longer.
Be content and I won’t get angry enough or careless enough to kill someone.
Be content with my wife.  Discontentment here just causes a lot of pain and misery for a lot of people.
Be content with your BlackBerry Pearl and PowerBook G4.  Contentment keeps me from getting arrested.
Be content to keep my mouth shut.  Let other people make themselves look stupid with gossip, lies, and slander.
Be content with my house that doesn’t have a media room.  I’ve got HDTV and a PS3. A servant or two might be nice…sorry.

It was a good study for me.  It wouldn’t get an “A” from my hermenutics professor but he’s probably already content.

I’m still working on it.  I’m content with being a created being, but I’m getting an iPhone 3Gs when my contract rolls over in November.  Just sayin’…

We salute you, Mr. Semi-Permanent Food Baby Guy

Today, we salute you Mr. Semi-Permanent Food Baby Guy…keeper of the double standard.  You want your wife to look like Halle Berry but it’s okay if you look like Larry the Cable Guy.  You wonder why your wife lost her girlish figure but you can’t figure out why you just ate your fourth Krispy Kreme.  While your wife is at least thinking about losing weight, you’re at the “All You Can Eat Buffet” telling the cashier, “I’ll take two of those, please.” That’s right, Mr. Double Standard, go ahead and get your semi-permanent food baby on.

Let’s think about this real men of genius…

Guys, how about we take a long, side-view look in the mirror?  We complain to the each other that we’ve lost a step playing softball, but it’s hard to admit that we don’t exactly look like we can pull off the cover of Men’s Health.

Let’s be completely honest.  We put too much emphasis on the physical part of being married.  It’s what guys do.  It’s time for a reality check.  Very few of us look like we did in our honeymoon pictures.  It’s sad, but we want our wives to still look like they did back in the day…before three kids, two C-sections, and hardly any time to slow down and eat a balanced meal.  Sure, my wife doesn’t look like she did in our honeymoon pictures, but neither do I.  I weighed a buck twenty-nine when we got married.  Let’s just say I weigh more than that now….

So before we get all stupid, how about us guys doing something about the semi-permanent food baby we have strapped to our waist?  Start walking.  Join a gym.  Eat less and eat healthier.  Just say no when the “hot light” is on.  How about being a leader instead of a whiner.  Man up.  Who knows what will happen when you start losing those pounds?

So, how about it?  What are you willing to commit to do to look better right now, in writing, for the entire Internet to see?  Well….?

Marriage stats that will blow your mind

One of the most interesting sites on the Internet there is to survey the popular view of American culture is at SoulPancake.com.  I

follow the site on  Twitter as well as Rainn Wilson, one of the site’s editors and Dwight on “the Office.”  It’s not a mainstream Christian site, so if you visit it and start asking me why I frequent the site I won’t respond to you.  It’s designed for dialogue, not for Christian devotion.  Anyway…

SoulPancake.com asked the question, “WHEN DID MARRIAGE BECOME AN OUTDATED CONCEPT?”  I personally thought it was a great question to ask.  I’m pretty interested in the whole marriage thing anyway.  So I put my two cents in.  I did so with the help of a really great document that’s chuck full of great statistics.  One of the stats that absolutely blew me away was how cohabitation has become a norm in American culture.

Major props go out to The Association of Marriage & Family Ministries.  They twittered the doc so I’m guessing they wanted to make it public.  I have an email into them asking permission in order to be ethical and all.  I’m taking the liberty of posting it for your viewing pleasure/displeasure.  You can download it here.