Parsley Sage Rosemary and Calm

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Rosemary is a savory herb with a heavenly scent. Not surprisingly, this herb is also great for relaxation and stress relief. One website even said that it promotes hair growth! This adaptable herb also takes oven roasted sweet potatoes to a whole new level.

All I know is this: when I clip a sprig of rosemary, the fragrance inspires serenity.

Herbs are to food what contentment is to life; a healthy addition that improves everything it touches. Rosemary has a soothing scent. Contentment has a calming effect on our souls.

Rosemary is easy to grow. Contentment is not. Rosemary is low maintenance. People are not. Rosemary will continue to grow with just a little attention. Contentment requires attention to our attitudes. We have to work on our minds to grow contentment within our hearts. Often the greatest obstacle to contentment is the illusion that things have to be the way we want them to be in order for life to be good.

The apostle Paul had experienced beatings, shipwrecks, and prison when he made this statement: “Not that I speak in respect of want: for I have learned, in whatsoever state I am, therewith to be content” (Philippians 4:11). Paul was a role model for godliness with contentment. He rarely had a really fantastic day. If someone wasn’t trying to beat him up, they were rejecting him or tossing him into prison. And yet he somehow learned how to see all of these events through the lens of contentment.

The contentment that Paul spoke of was not an attitude of “toughing it out.” He was modeling a spirit of accepting God’s plan for his life. Contentment doesn’t require perfect circumstances in order to exist. Contentment is saying, “Lord, whatever you do with my life and whatever you give me is enough.” It’s a beautiful admission of sufficiency in Christ.

Sometimes we simply need to reframe the way we’re seeing our lives and the events that affect us. When we abandon the notion that our circumstances have to line up with our vision of wonderful, episodes in our life stories settle into a rotation of hard mingled with pleasant, and sorrow followed by joy. Contentment teaches us to accept the rotation as from the Lord without always wishing things were different. When we master the life art of contentment, our noisy souls become quiet and we calm down.

Grow a pot of rosemary. Cut a sprig and tuck it into the back of your Bible. Let the fragrant herb remind you to be content with whatever God does in your life.

“But godliness with contentment is great gain. For we brought nothing into this world, and it is certain we can carry nothing out. And having food and raiment let us be therewith content.” (1 Timothy 6:6-8)