Review: Satisfied

Satisfied: Discovering Contentment in a World of Consumption by Jeff Manion
My rating: 5 of 5 stars

Financial freedom begins with knowing your identity in Christ.

A great many books and seminars on Christian financial topics deal with the nuts and bolts: spending, budgeting, financial planning, investing. Jeff Manion, in Satisfied: Discovering Contentment in a World of Consumption, takes a different approach. He gives the readers an exposition on the theology of Christian contentment. His thesis is that true financial freedom is a function of learning contentment and satisfaction. However it isn't all theoretical and abstract: with each set of chapters (the book is divided into six parts) Jeff provides questions and activities to help the reader learn and develop the concepts discussed in the corresponding chapters. Activities include practical projects that reinforce learning.

The chapters are short and easy to read. Jeff includes numerous anecdotes from his life and from people he has interacted with to introduce and illustrate his points. He draws from six major scriptural passages (plus several more minor discussions) to develop his thesis. I appreciate his taking time to discuss the historical and cultural context of the scriptural passages used, to show that economic concerns and the problem of contentment are timeless concerns.

According to Jeff, one of the major reasons why we have such a difficult time with contentment is because we compare ourselves to those who appear to have more. And we compare because we have false ideas about where we derive our identity. We are culturally conditioned to look at externals, our possessions, and our spending to determine our worth. The key to financial freedom is to free ourselves from looking for our sense of worth in finances. To do this, Jeff writes, is to discover, learn, and internalize Christ as the true source of identity and worth. Jeff brings in the Epistle to the Ephesians as his theological basis. He writes how Paul wrote to the church at Ephesus about their new identity through the concepts of adoption, redemption, and sealing.

The second half of the book is about the challenges of affluence. This is a topic that I haven't heard or seen addressed very often. Jeff clearly writes for those who reside in well-to-do societies. He writes that even those who see themselves as "poor" in these societies are usually rich compared to most of the rest of the world. When one considers assets that people have access to outside of strict financial ones -- education, community and government support, families -- those of us who live in the developed societies are quite "rich." The challenge for those of us who are rich, who have found genuine financial freedom, is how to resist succumbing to the temptations to diminish our reliance upon God and to return to valuing ourselves according to what we've accomplished. Jeff writes that trust in God is an ongoing challenge. He provides a number of suggestions as to how Christians can keep focus on Christ when things are going well.

The gospel message is a message of freedom from fear. One of those fears is the fear of the future which includes issues around finances. Satisfied speaks to this segment of the gospel. This book is great by itself, and it will make an excellent companion material to more nuts-and-bolts financial instruction materials.

(This review is based on an advance review copy supplied by the publisher through NetGalley.)


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