Is Christ enough?

But if we have food and clothing, with these we will be content.

1 Timothy 6:8

 

I wish there was a way to show the world the contentment that comes from Christ. I’ve been told my faith is hard, that it makes life hard. I’ve been told that others wouldn’t want to believe the way I do.

But the truth is there’s nothing easier. The Lord in His miraculous way, in His time, took from me the desires of this world and showed me the simplicity of living for Christ. He changed my heart.

I will sprinkle clean water on you, and you shall be clean from all your uncleannesses, and from all your idols I will cleanse you.  And I will give you a new heart, and a new spirit I will put within you. And I will remove the heart of stone from your flesh and give you a heart of flesh.  And I will put my Spirit within you, and cause you to walk in my statutes and be careful to obey my rules. Ezekiel 36:25-28 esv

This is the covenant I will establish with the people of Israel after that time, declares the Lord. I will put my laws in their minds and write them on their hearts. I will be their God, and they will be my people. Hebrews 8:10 esv

I never sought the things of the world the way a lot of people do but I wasn’t free from idolatry and covetousness either. I’ve had my collections of things over the years, wasted money on stuff I didn’t need, went places I didn’t need to go. And worse wasted time on things that simply fade away, things that had no purpose for me, my family or the Lord.

What I didn’t know back then was that the more I chased the world, the more I longed for the things of this life, the less happiness I had. That’s hard to explain to most people. They simply can’t understand that in Christ alone does true happiness come. 73% of the American population claim to be Christians. That’s 73 out of every 100 people that will profess Christ in some way. You’d think with statistics like that we’d have a lot more happiness in our country. But we don’t. An internet search on depression in America revealed that 9% of Americans suffer from it. The CDC says there were 41,149 deaths from suicide in 2013. That means someone in America took their own life every 12.8 minutes in 2013 making suicide the tenth leading cause of death in the country.

Those numbers are astonishing but not surprising. And yet they don’t begin to take into account those that seek happiness through drugs, alcohol, cigarettes, shopping, gambling and the multitude of other things that people chase after while trying to find happiness and contentment. They don’t count the number of people that live for their jobs or loose themselves in movies, video games, or books.

Being a true Christian doesn’t make us exempt from any of those human emotions. But it does give us happiness and contentment in the simplest things. If we keep our eyes on Christ life and all its struggles become easier to bear, even when we feel like we’re drowning in trials and tribulations.

Can you see the wonders in a tree? Is there contentment in walking through the woods and seeing the Lord’s creation? Are you happy just seeing a smile on your child’s face? Does time with your husband, no matter the activity, make you feel happy and secure? Is Christ enough?