David writes and asks this, Dear Pastor John, I'm a 22-year-old single Christian in Singapore.

How does a Christian single see and savor Christ as his all and ultimate satisfaction, yet

have desires to be married?

How do I reconcile my desires for marriage with my satisfaction in Christ?

The first thing I want to say to David is that the desire to be married, a good desire,

is one of hundreds of desires that might compete with satisfaction in Christ.

Desire to have a job, you don't have one, desire to be free from cancer, when you're sick,

desire no longer to be blind or disabled, if you're disabled, desire to have enough money to

go to college when you don't desire to be tall instead of short. In other words, the desire

for marriage is not unique. It's not a unique challenge. I just don't want David to feel isolated,

like he's got a battle to fight that I don't have. We all have desires that put us in the

same battle for how does contentment or satisfaction in Christ relate to the intensity of those desires

from time to time. The second thing I'd say is that we should probably remind ourselves that

there are good desires and bad desires. The desire to be married is a good desire. The desire for

adultery is a bad desire. The desire for food is a good desire. Gluttony is a bad desire.

David is not dealing with the conflict between evil desire and good contentment in Jesus. He knows

that, but I'm just making it clear for all the rest of us. The question is how does contentment,

satisfaction in Jesus relate to good desires that tug at us and make us feel some measure of

discontent? Are we contradicting our desire for and our delight in Jesus? It might be good to put a

text on this issue of contentment or satisfaction because he's just kind of assuming it and maybe

not everybody even thinks in those categories. So here's Philippians 3.8. I count everything as

loss because of the surpassing worth of knowing Christ Jesus, my Lord. So Paul seems to have such

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