Session One: I'm supposed to be happy...what's the deal?

September 28th and 29th was our ladies retreat at Camp Joy.  
Our speaker - Lynn Gleiser.  
The theme:  Feathering your nest with the sweet song of contentment

These are my notes from the first session...

I Timothy 6:6 - "But godliness with contentment is great gain."

Contentment:  An inner sufficiency that keeps us at peace no matter the circumstances of life.  
II Corinthians 3:5 - "Not that we are sufficient of ourselves to think any thing as of ourselves; but our sufficiency is of God."

Discontentment:  Lack of contentment; dissatisfaction with one's circumstances.

A. The Quest for Rest
We all want contentment, but go after it in the wrong way.
1. Common pursuit. 
Ecclesiastes 1:3 - "What profit hath a man of all his labour which he taketh under the sun?"

2. Consuming pursuit.
Ecclesiastes 2:10-11 - "And whatsoever mine eye desired I kept not from them, I withheld not my heart from any joy; for my heart rejoiced in all my labour: and this was my portion of all my labour.  Then I looked on all the works that my hands had wrought, and on the labour that I had laboured to do: and, behold, all was vanity and vexation of spririt, and there was no profit under the sun."

B. The Quality of Peace
1. A Knowledge of God
Study and learn the attributes of God. 
Godliness is the pursuit of God and His ways.  Learn His heart.
- Only Jesus is the one true source of the knowledge of God.

2. An Abundance of Gain
Philippians 4:6-7 - "Be careful for nothing; but in every thing by prayer and supplication with thanksgiving let you requests be made known unto God.  And the peace of God which passeth all understanding shall keep your hearts and minds through Christ Jesus."

How can we be unflappable and unmoved by external circumstances?

1. Never allow yourself to complain about anything - not even the weather.
2. Never picture yourself in any other circumstance or someplace else.
3. Never compare your lot with another's.
4. Never allow yourself to wish this of that had been otherwise.
5. Never dwell on tomorrow that [tomorrow] is God's, not your's.

Taken from Calm My Anxious Heart by Linda Dallow