Hawaii and happiness

A handful of things happened in sequence leading to some insight that is valuable and important to me.  First, I read Jonathan Fisk’s book “Echo”.  Second, I went to Hawaii.  Third, while in Hawaii snorkeling for the first time in Hanauma Bay, I lost ring which I’ve worn on my right hand for about 5 years; the ring was a plan iron band engraved with the words “wisdom, contentment, peace.”  I selected those words because I felt they were the 3 things I needed the most in my life (beyond, of course, saving faith in Christ)—these were the things, and really continue to be the things, that are a central struggle and therefore of central benefit to me as a wife, mother, leader, follower etc.  I’m not done seeking these things, but in a weird way losing the ring made me realize how important it is that I live out and continue to study, pray for and seek them, not just wear them on my hand.

I realized that I’d lost the ring while snorkeling and was briefly very upset. Then I started to think about particularly this past year.  I’ve made a strong habit of reading my bible almost daily at work and on Saturdays and have prayed diligently for the wisdom I know can only be found in God’s word and though His Spirit.  I’ve been seeing a psychologist for just over a year and through discussions with him—and some meds—feel a greater degree of peace and control over anxiety, irrational anger and outbursts than I have felt maybe ever, certainly in a long time.  As far as contentment goes, being in Hawaii and knowing that I would need to leave the white sandy beaches, the beautiful plants and flowers, the topaz blue waters, and the vacation life of site seeing and restaurants, that realization was really the opposite of contentment.  I’m retirement eligible in the military, hypothetically I could go be on a perpetual vacation and, with some penny-pinching, even live on the beach.  Who wants to leave a vacation in Hawaii?  It makes the real world, real life, day-to-day stressors that much more humdrum and burdensome.  

That’s when I started reflecting on “Echo,” while floating face-down admiring coral reefs and bright fishes, thinking about my lost ring and the notion of contentment.  In “Echo”, Rev Fisk talks about the major elements of the Christian catechism, starting with the 10 Commandments.  But the angle he approaches the discussion is not the well-worn paths of confirmation class.  I was able to follow his discussion well through the first 8 commandments, as his paraphrasing and perspective was unique but made sense to me.  I struggled with his discussion of the 9^th and 10^th commandments, which for Lutherans (and Catholics) are about not coveting anything—neighbor’s spouse, house, stuff etc.  These final 2 commandments always felt a little anticlimactic to me, a little redundant and somehow too similar to the command not to steal.  But Fisk frames them differently; his discussion of the 9^th commandment is titled “God gave you happiness” and the first subtitle in bold is “You’re not happy.”  He proceeds to talk about discontent driven by commercialism, the desire for more things—buy, buy, buy; shop, shop, shop; more, more, more.  We may briefly “feel” happy but that is always spoiled by a sense that we don’t have enough; we need “just this one more….”

I’ve felt that.  Every time I crack open a catalogue of roses or craft supplies, peruse eBay for some vintage jewelry, sniff a perfume sample that inspires bottle-envy, visit a neighbor’s immaculately kept and curated home.  Or visit an island paradise for a week of vacation.  “Just one more X and I’ll really be happy.”  It’s a never-ending itch that no amount of spend-scratching can stop.  

The way I was taught the “do not covet” commandments was to simply focus on being grateful and happy for what you have:  focus on good health, the material blessings I have, and believe that that is enough.  This is my daily bread and more blessings beside, I should stop coveting and just be content.

1 Timothy 6: 6, 7 was where I meditated and prayed, “But godliness with contentment is great gain.  For we brought nothing into this world, and we can take nothing out of it. But if we have food and clothing, we will be content with that.” This was a burden for me.  I am not content and I know it deeply; I covet, I feel that pressure to buy, to purchase, to acquire, to own, to accumulate.  There’s a rush that comes with it, I know, the immediate feedback, the shot of elation that comes with a new bauble, a new scarf, new shoes.  There’s also the pressure to look like others, have what others have, “keep up with the Joneses.”  What I never thought about until “Echo” was that my deep-seated discontent is driven by the underlying truth that God DID create me to BE HAPPY.  But I’m not.  And it isn’t because I don’t have enough stuff, it’s because this world is broken and will therefore never, ever be enough to satisfy me.  Yes, my covetousness is part and parcel to being a sinful human being; it does relate to my fear of not having enough or not being good enough.   But beyond that, my quest for happiness is simply a quest for the lost perfection of a world spoiled by sin.  

The world is a broken place.  That means starvation, sickness, disease, divorce, depression, frustration, stress, inefficiency, miscommunication and every other terrible thing.  It means beloved parents and favorite pets both die.  It means the best pair of blue jeans gets a hole in the knee or simply doesn’t fit anymore because of that middle-age spread.  It means houses are struck by lightning and burn to the ground.  It means that paint color is simply the wrong one.  It means children around the world starve to death or die of water-borne illnesses every day.  It means expensive electronics get dropped in the pool.  It means parents get divorced, it means adults abuse children, it means families become estranged.  It means the Polish pottery is knocked off the counter and shatters.  It means thousands of babies are aborted every day.  It means the grass dies and the roses are decimated by thrips.  The world is a broken place.

I don’t mix these things together casually—I know that the death of a child and the thrip infestation of my roses or my broken Polish pottery are not on par with each other.  But both are the result of this world being broken by sin.  We just don’t take the time to think about them both as having the same root cause.  Instead, I feel terrible for the tragedies and suffering in this broken world; and I fill up my Amazon shopping cart to knock back the pain for a moment.  I covet what I do not have materially, because there is a central part of me that knows I am incomplete, broken and unfulfilled.  And I feel badly about my coveting because I’m commanded to not covet and to instead be contented.  But the reality is, I cannot be truly contented here on earth nor should I even try to be truly, fully contented here on earth.  

Jesus says this in Matthew 6:  “Do not store up for yourselves treasures on earth…but store up for yourselves treasures in heaven…For where your treasure is, there your heart will be also.”  And “Therefore I tell you, do not worry about your life, what you what you will eat or drink; or about your body, what you will wear.  Is not life more important than food, and the body more important than clothing?  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?  Who of you by worrying can add a single hour to his life?  …So do not worry, saying ‘What shall we eat?’ or ‘What shall we drink?’ or ‘What shall we wear?’  For the pagans run after all these things, and your heavenly Father knows that you need them.  But seek first His kingdom and His righteousness, and all these things will be given to you as well.  Therefore do not worry about tomorrow, for tomorrow will worry about itself.  Each day has enough trouble of its own.” 

The command is to not worry about what is needed—God will take care of that—and to be content with what I have, knowing and trusting that it is enough to meet my earthly needs.  The command is not necessarily to be ‘happy’ with what this life, because this life is not the end nor is it going to meet all of our needs.  Ultimately there will be a new heaven and a new earth; ultimately, we will be given rooms in the Father’s eternal mansion (John 14: 1-4); ultimately, there will be no more sorrow or pain or tears (Revelation 21: 3, 4).  When I am discontented, I am looking for heaven here on earth; I am trying to make earthly things meet the need that only eternity in heaven with God can fulfill.  The command “do not covet” and the command to “be contented” is not a command to simply pretend to be happy with how the world is.  It is a command to recognize that this world is broken and will never meet my need for happiness, and it is a command to trust that my basic needs—for daily bread and for salvation—are met by God in Christ.  

I looked around Haunauma Bay, at the black volcanic rock contrasted with the pale sandy beaches and the crystalline turquoise waters and I said “If I could live here, I would be happy.” But that was a false thought.  And fortunately I realized the falseness as I thought it.  What I felt was a haunting, overwhelming desire for heaven—for true and eternal happiness in a perfect, new earth—and what I interpreted that desire to be was the need to live in an earthly paradise and shuffle off my earthly stressors.  The desire is true and good, that desire for heaven; it is a genuine longing for holiness, rightness and un-brokenness.  But I’m not going to fill that need with fridge magnets, Hawaiian shirts, fancy tropical drinks or bags of Kona coffee.  That need will not be filled until I leave this broken world and enter eternity with God.  In the meantime, that trip to Hawaii was an incredible blessing, a taste of something similar to yet so far removed from the eternal perfection of heaven.  It’s not wrong to want that kind of happiness; it is wrong to want it from anything here on earth.  When I covet things, when I imbue them with the false ability to “make me happy”, I am trying to make heaven on earth through my own efforts.  

There is nothing I can do to fix this broken world; praise God that was already done by Christ Jesus.  He has redeemed the world and ultimately there will be a new heaven and a new earth, completely free from sin and made perfect into eternity with no further risk of brokenness.  I have what I need to survive this world.  Indeed, I have more than enough and I am doing far more than just surviving—I just returned from a blissful trip to Hawaii.  My longing for paradise isn’t going to be fixed with a longer vacation.  My longing for paradise will be met when I enter paradise; until that time, “do not covet” means “do not try to obtain eternal happiness from earthly things” and “be content with the blessings you do have and don’t try to find perfect happiness in this broken world.”   I am made to be happy.  That is the truth and it is not a shameful, sinful truth; God made me to be happy.  But that desire for happiness is just a desire for Him, for His presence in heaven.  Looking anywhere else for that happiness will only lead to frustration and despair, debt and wasted time, and lost opportunities to appreciate the brief moments of joy which we are given here on earth.

Godliness with contentment is great gain:  faith for eternity with God through Christ, and contentment here on earth as I recognize where and through whom all of my needs—temporal and eternal—will be met.  It’s OK to not be happy here on this broken earth, because my faith is that I’ll be happy eternally with God, Who designed me to be happy and to find my happiness only in Him.

(Ok, that picture is not of Haunauma Bay, it's of the beach in front of our hotel at Waikiki.  The Haunama Bay pics are gorgeous but full of strangers, which I try to avoid on this blog for the sake of privacy and also because people distract from the scenery.)