This is not a slam on Jeff Bezos, either explicitly or implicitly. This is not an attack on the rich. Or on liberals. Or on any other group of people.
All kinds of people have marital problems. Evangelical Christians commit adultery. Conservatives divorce and remarry. Poor people experience broken homes.
All this is self-evident and needs no documentation.
The sobering lesson is that, as the Beatles sang, money can’t buy us love. Or peace. Or contentment. Or a stable marriage. Or a sense of purpose. Or morality. Or freedom from inner demons.
In fact, it’s often true that the more we have, the less content we are.
To be clear, poverty is not the key to happiness. Or peace. Or contentment. Or marital stability. Far from it.
Poverty is draining and demeaning. Poverty is burdensome. Poverty, in and of itself, is anything but a blessing.
I don’t know anyone who thinks, “If only I were poor! Then I’d be happy and content.”
Hardly.
But I know many who think, “If only I had more money! If only I were rich! Then I’d be happy and content.”
Not so.
As Jesus warned, “Then He said to them, ‘Take heed and beware of covetousness. For a man’s life does not consist in the abundance of his possessions’ (Luke 12:15).
He also gave a warning to those who “[store] up treasure for [themselves], and [are] for themselves but [are] not rich toward God” (Luke 12:21).
The real question, then, is, are we rich toward God? Are we rich on the inside? That’s the key to contentment, joy, purpose—and a healthy marriage.
Some of the most content children I have ever met were kids aged 3-15 who lived in a children’s home in India. Some were orphans. Others came from families experiencing great hardship who were unable to care for their children.
These kids had a school uniform to wear and one additional set of clothing. They had no cell phones. No TVs. No computers.
They slept on the floor (more recently, they sleep on mattresses, several kids to each mattress), and they ate three simple meals a day.
But they were taught to love God. They were taught to pray and read the Bible. They were taught to love the poor and needy. To be compassionate. To respect their elders. To be wholesome.
They were not under pressure to dress a certain way or wear their hair a certain way or model themselves after the latest pop star.
Yet their smiles could light up the room, and along with getting the very best education offered in their entire community, they have gone on to productive careers, from pastors to medical doctors and from professors to homemakers.
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SOURCE: Charisma News, Michael Brown
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