...for I have learned to be content whatever the circumstances.
...I have learned the secret of being content in any and every situation....
-- Philippians 4:11-12
...so what is the 'secret'? And, does it have to be 'learned'? Why? How?
Does the secret involve the relationship between learning and contentment? I wonder if we have to learn to be content because, naturally, we aren't. We don't come into the world (more like kicking and screaming for disrupting our comfort zone). And, from then on, it's a striving to get something...which is almost the opposite of being content with what we have, with what we are. In our striving, we (desperately at times) seek to understand what is going on, why things are happening the way they are, what we need to do to overcome them...striving to understand (joy).
The language of the fall is discontentment.
-- Ann Voskamp
The reality is that it takes 'the peace of God' to transcend our desire to understand. And, it is this peace that will guard and protect us...or, teach us to be content.
But, we have to learn this...this secret. In other words, we have to learn by practice, to be accustomed to it, to even become intimately acquainted with, to develop a new habit in the way we think and operate. And, in order to do this, it would stand to reason, that this is not something we simply read about one evening in a book...it is something that we acquire (learn) over a lifetime. And, in case we are wondering, apparently even Paul had do learn it.
The fear of the LORD leads to life; then one rests content, untouched by trouble.
-- Proverbs 19:23
