Contentment is satisfaction with one's lot or condition. The word conveys the idea of fulness and sufficiency. It is opposed to envy, which is displeased with the prosperity of others. It is opposed to ambition, which is not satisfied with equality, but aspires to superiority. It is opposed to avarice, which grasps all it can reach, keeps all it obtains, and "sayeth not it is enough." It is opposed to anxiety, which is always taking needless thought for the morrow, saying, "What shall we eat? what shall we drink? and wherewithal shall we be clothed?" It is opposed to murmuring and repining, which is an ungrateful distrust of God, an unjust arraignment of his providence, an impious impeachment of his wisdom and goodness, a presumptuous spirit of rebellion against his righteous government. St. Paul's statement seems to express complete and perfect satisfaction. In the highest sense this is applicable only to Jehovah, who is El Shaddai, God All-sufficient. But in a lower sense it is true, to a greater or less degree, of all good men. They have no sufficiency in themselves, but their sufficiency is of God. Of his fulness they have all received--the unsearchable riches of Christ. With the fatness of his house they are abundantly satisfied, and he makes them drink from the river of his pleasures. This is the only satisfying portion of the soul. Without this, men may be indifferent--may be jovial and reckless; but these are not contentment--are perhaps the very opposites of contentment; indifference, the sullen obstinacy of a perverse and rebellious will, as far from contentment as it is from submission; jovial recklessness, the effort of a restless heart to throw off its burden of care and trouble--the revolt of the whole man against Providence and against conscience. But when Divine Love brings us to its banqueting-house, and God becomes our shield and exceeding great reward, then the fluctuating soul returns to its native rest, like Naphthali satisfied with favor and full with the blessing of the Lord. When the apostle says--"I have learned, in whatsoever state I am, therewith to be content," no one can imagine that he refers to his former state of sin; for of that he constantly speaks in terms of strong regret, and as long as he lived he never ceased to sorrow for the evil he had done. Nor are we to suppose that he means to express his full satisfaction with his present state of grace; for he is always hungering and thirsting after the fulness of God; and no Christian can be fully satisfied with his spiritual attainments till he awakes in the likeness of his Lord.