Real contentment
June 21, 2006
By Greg Ebie
French author Guy de Maupassant was one of the greatest writers of short stories and novels the world has ever known. Within ten years he rose from relative obscurity to fame. This is just what he thought he’d always wanted.
Maupassant enjoyed a life of affluence — a yacht in the Mediterranean, a large house on the Norman coast, a luxurious apartment in Paris. It was said of him that “critics praised him, men admired him and women worshipped him.” He had all the trappings of what the world would call the “fulfilled dream life.”
Yet at the height of his fame he suffered insanity, brought on by what those close to him called a “promiscuous lifestyle.” On January 2, 1892, he tried to cut his own throat with a letter opener. He lived out the last months of his life in a private asylum on the French Riviera. He died at the age of 42.
Before he went insane he prophetically wrote what was to be his epitaph: “I have coveted everything and taken pleasure in nothing.”
“God won’t starve an honest soul, but he frustrates the appetites of the wicked.” (Proverbs 10:3, The Message)
I don’t know about you, but I’m glad God won’t let me starve to death. Instead of chasing after rainbows, the righteous find satisfaction and contentment only God can give. God will satisfy the hearts of His children. God will meet our every need.
Now don’t misunderstand; God is not a “sugar-daddy in the sky.” The Lord does not promise us everything we want. But God will provide for the righteous; genuine contentment and peace fills the honest heart with the knowledge Father God cares and provides enough.
The wicked are not so blessed. God will frustrate their appetite. The unrighteous get what they crave for only to want more; they are never satisfied.
All I want to hunger and thirst for is God’s righteousness; this too is a yearning He has promised to always satisfy. (See Matthew 5:6.)
D. Greg Ebie is senior pastor of Praise Assembly of God in Garrettsville, Ohio, and an author of Daily Bread devotionals.
