Last year, my husband, John, and I were camping when his friend invited us to a new campground. We already had our seasonal camper set up at another campground only twenty minutes from our home, but John’s friend had spoken very highly of this one.

Once we arrived, I fell in love. This campground was WAY better than the one we were currently staying at. Let me paint a picture for you… It was on a lake, was a picturesque utopia of awesomeness, has fantastically serene and surrounded by nature, with trails and other various activities that would keep us busy all summer, the camper was nicer, there are trees, TONS of trees, and sits on a beautiful lake that is one of a chain of five lakes.  I am pretty sure I squealed like a whoop hog (you are welcome Star Wars fans) when I learned it was part of the new-to-us camper package. While our current campground only had a small swimming pond with questionable sanitation, the only entertainment was a mini-golf course (I don’t golf, big OR mini), and it was one step away from being a paved parking lot in Death Valley. The new campground was paradise in comparison to where we were currently staying.

We ended up selling our old camper and got a great deal on a camper that sits right next to the lake in this spectacular new campground. Everything about this place was better. I christened it “My Happy Place” or “My Place of Contentment”, and I blissfully took on the title of “Happy Camper”.

Fast forward one year. It is still “My Happy Place”, but I keep doing things to make it “My Happier Place”. A paddleboat here, a second kayak there. (I insisted we needed another kayak because our nine-year-old son kept taking the one we had, even though I had very clearly called dibs after the squealing subsided.) There is always something that could be improved upon. Don’t get me wrong, I thank God for blessing us with all that we have when we clearly don’t deserve it, but who am I kidding? Our campsite would look better with a glass-bottom kayak sitting on it.

After recently reading 1 Timothy 6:6, “Godliness with contentment is great gain,” I began reflecting over this past year. I realized that when we first arrived at the new campground, I was content with all that came with it. Now, I am always thinking about what I can do to make our camping experience the quintessential camping experience. And then I thought to myself, “When did I stop being content?” And THEN I thought, “Where did I make sure godliness was a part of it?” The truth is, I didn’t. I am ashamed to admit that my “Place of Contentment” was riddled with misplaced contentment. I had fooled myself into thinking that I was satisfied with the things I had and the godliness of my contentment was a given.

As I continued to delve into the subject of godliness WITH contentment, I came to recognize that God has crafted us so that we will never ever be able to be content until He is our greatest treasure (not a newer, bigger, prettier anything) and we prefer Him (not anyone, anybody, anywho) to anything and everything else (like a glass-bottom kayak) in this world and we base our contentment on the fact that we have Him. Godliness is the most important piece to the contentment puzzle. Without it, we will never be complete. Glass-bottom kayaks aside, I am truly grateful for everything that God has blessed my family with. I prefer Him, and to reflect Him, more than any treasure I might have on this earth. I am truly content where I stand, sit or camp.

Matthew 6:25-26, “Therefore I tell you, do not worry about your life, what you will eat or drink; or about your body, what you will wear. Is not life more than food, and the body more than clothes? Look at the birds of the air; they do not sow or reap or store away in barns, and yet your heavenly Father feeds them. Are you not much more valuable than they?”

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