Onward and Upwards

 Complacency has been on my mind lately... I see it everywhere I go and quite frankly, it bothers me.

The questions in my mind is this: As an Apostolic Christian, should I feel complacency in any aspect of my life? Should complacency exist in the personal, social, or spiritual areas of my life? Is it okay to feel contentment or self-satisfaction with the who,what, when, and where's of my life? 

Yes, the Word says in Hebrews 13:5 "Let your conduct be without covetousness; be content with such things as you have. For He Himself has said, “I will never leave you nor forsake you.”  And in Philippians 4:11 "Not that I speak in regard to need, for I have learned in whatever state I am, to be content:"

Yes, we should be thankfully content with the things divinely given or the state in which we've been divinely placed. Contentment is different from complacency.  Contentment centers around being happy and according to freedictionary.com, complacency is "a feeling of contentment or self-satisfaction, especially when coupled with an unawareness of danger, trouble, or controversy." 

We should be wary of feeling self-satisfied within our life. Self-satisfaction leads to laziness. Read Proverbs, the book is full of what happens to those who are lazy. Proverbs 1:32 "For the turning away of the simple will slay them, and the complacency of fools will destroy them."

If we allow it, complacency will destroy us and our walk with God . We need to take on the attitude of Paul in Philippians 3:12-14

12 Not that I have already attained, or am already perfected; but I press on, that I may lay hold of that for which Christ Jesus has also laid hold of me. 13 Brethren, I do not count myself to have apprehended; but one thing I do, forgetting those things which are behind and reaching forward to those things which are ahead, 14 I press toward the goal for the prize of the upward call of God in Christ Jesus.

If we are still living and breathing, then we have not achieved our divine purpose. We must keep pressing forward towards the "upward call of God."  We must not become complacent in what we possess or where we are. Our life motto must be like the cry in 'The Last Battle', the last of the Chronicles of Narnia by C. S. Lewis, "Onward and Upwards,..."