Week 5: Discontentment and Unthankfulness
I. What is Discontentment?
A. Legitimate Discontentment
1. …there is a place for legitimate discontentment. All of us should, to some degree, be discontent with our spiritual growth. If we are not, we will stop growing.
B. Sinful Discontentment
1. …often arises from ongoing and unchanging circumstances that we can do nothing about.
a. Psalm 139:13 – 16
2. The Life of Amy Carmichael
a. He said, “I will accept the breaking sorrow/Which God to-morrow/Will to HIs son explain.”/Then did the turmoil deep within him cease,/Not vain the word; not vain:/For in Acceptance lieth peace. (From In Acceptance Lieth Peace, Mountain Breezes by Amy Carmichael)
II. Discontentment and Acceptance
A. ….it is neither in resignation nor submission but only in acceptance that we find peace.
1. Acceptance means that you accept your circumstances from God, trusting that He unerringly knows what is best for you and that in His love, He purposes only that which is best.
a. Move from an attitude of a victim to an attitude of stewardship
i. Consider the life of Joseph
ii. Job 1:21
III. Unthankfulness
A. Spiritual Leprosy
1. Luke 17:11 – 19
2. Worse than Leprosy = Our sin
a. Eph. 2:1 – 5
b. Have you stopped today to give thanks to God for delivering you from the domain of darkness and transferring you to the kingdom of His Son?
B. Living a Life of Continual Thanksgiving
1. God gives us everything
a. Acts 17:25
b. Deut. 8:11 -14, 17 – 18
2. Giving Thanks Always
a. Eph. 5:20
b. Failure to give God thanks due Him is sin
i. Rom. 1:21
IV. In All Circumstances
A. Give Thanks!
1. 1 Thess. 5:18
2. Romans 8:28 – 29
Application Verses for this week: Ephesians 5:2 and 1 Thessalonians 5:18
*This Bible Study is a topical study based on Jerry Bridges’ book Respectable Sins, Confronting the Sins We Tolerate.
Leave a Reply