"What does satiate mean?" Abby asked me yesterday as we began a new unit of vocabulary words. She pronounced it like sat-i-tate and I could tell she did not like the word already. Too hard to pronounce. Too archaic, she thought. I immediately told her that it was one of my favorite words. And then that beautiful verse rushed into my mind and I shared it with her:
"And I will satiate the soul of the priests with fatness, and my people shall be satisfied with my goodness, saith the LORD." Jer.31:14
Nobody's satisfied anymore, it seems. I know I rarely feel satisfied with my life, with my house- flat and boxy as it is. I don't walk around, normally, thinking-Oh, how satisfied I am with life! How rich I feel! No, I usually walk around thinking about the next issue I should deal with, the next bill I need to pay, the next problem on my list.
And of course, right now in our nation's dire economic straits, I would be as silly as a slow turtle crossing a busy highway if I felt satisfied and happy and at ease. But that's not what this verse is talking about. It isn't a horizontal look around us that we are to take, and then an upward look of gratitude. It's the opposite.
I am supposed to take an upward look first and see the Provider whose grace is sufficient for me, and then take a look around me and see how God will affect my life with with His goodness. Then maybe I'll notice the shiny quarter on the ground- like my daughter always does ( I swear she'll be able to fund her way through college with all the money she "finds" in front of her). Then maybe I'll see the love offered to me by those who care about me. Then maybe I'll realize how rich and full my life is in spite of the fact the the headlines tell me I am diminishing and joining in the national depression that's supposedly right around the corner.
There may be bad things right around the corner, but there's God's goodness raining down on me as well. I will be satisfied with His goodness. That's not only my statement of faith. It's also my intention to obey. It's my intention to see it- to perceive what He says is there. Abundance. It's not a word most people will be talking about right now. And that's why it's going to become one of my favorite words.
4 comments:
Great post. Sometimes we get so caught up with our wants that we forget about our needs, including our spiritual needs. If we could concentrate more on what God wants for us in our lives, perhaps we would feel more satisfied with what we have.
Amen!
Much love,
Angela
God uses what we have and we worry about what we don't have.
So true. I've been looking up...lifting up actually.
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