1) The Catalyst Conference is meeting this week. I have told myself every year for the past 6 years that I am going to go. But each year I have a conflict. Usually it is because I've led a group of college students to the Navigators fall conference called Main Event. This year I am officiating a wedding for two friends (which I truly am looking forward to). But I still REALLY wanted to go this year. In fact, this past Spring, I was making plans to attend Catalyst with a fellow young adult pastor, and when he had to cancel our plans, I decided it was not the best to attend alone, so I went with our staff to the Leadership Summit instead (which also opened my schedule up for the wedding this weekend). But when another good friend received a free ticket to Catalyst, and he has NO clue what Catalyst really is, I found myself fighting a bit of jealousy (it doesn't help that just about everyone I seem to be following on Twitter is at Catalyst as well...). "Be content, Erin, in every circumstance..."
2) This summer I was swimming laps almost 3 times per week. I was feeling great. I lost 10 lbs. I really enjoyed it. So I mentally made plans to buy a pass to an indoor pool to continue swimming through the cooler months. However, when LeAnn and I sat down to reexamine at our budget a few weeks ago, we saw there was zero room in our budget to make it work. "Be content, Erin, in every circumstance..."
3) There have been some other areas I haven't been content in, but the tip of the iceberg (which prompted this post) came when I stood in my closet trying to decide what to wear. You'd think with the cooler temps I'd be excited about the "new" clothes I would get to wear now that the warm temps are now but a memory, but instead I just looked the perfectly good clothes in front of me and thought "I'm tired of these." That's when the next thought came - "This is ridiculous! I have SO much. Be content, Erin, in every circumstance..."
Our family sponsors 3 kids through Compassion. I wonder if they struggle with contentment. I have SO much compared to them, and yet I'm unsatisfied from time to time. I complain about not having much margin in our budget. I long for new gadgets. I get frustrated we can't afford to actually paint the walls in our house or afford decent landscaping to finish the backyard after our deck project. And yet Lucia, Rosina, and Aleki are just grateful when they get new shoes for Christmas. They're grateful for the healthy meals they receive each day. They write us saying how thankful to God they are that they have us for a sponsor. While I have never met my Compassion kids in person, I sense they are quite content with what little they have - probably because they knew how much they didn't have before being sponsored.
Thinking of our Tanzanian kids helps me be content. I can give up swimming passes and new shirts so that they can have food and an education. Giving seems to be a path for me to learn contentment. Perhaps I need to consider finding something to give to this week just to help me be content.
(I know, I can give myself a new iPhone app that will... "Be content, Erin, in every circumstance...")
No comments:
Post a Comment