One of the more common reflections I hear after short-term mission trips is surprise: “The people had so little, yet they were so happy.” After returning from Chimbote for the second time, and having traveled over the years to the Yucatán peninsula, the Dominican Republic, Haiti, and Honduras, I want to push deeper into what people are actually observing. I don’t think it’s happiness they’re witnessing—it’s contentment. And that contentment is grounded not in material comfort, but in faith.

Years ago, a friend of mine hosted a young Haitian boy who came to the U.S. for major reconstructive knee surgery. The procedure not only saved his leg from amputation but also brought him into a life very different from his own—he stayed in a beautiful home, in a safe neighborhood, in one of the most affluent areas of the world.

The day before the boy was to return home to his Haitian village, my friend found him weeping in the piano room. Concerned, he sat down, assuming the young man didn’t want to leave behind the comforts and opportunities of American life. But to his surprise, the boy explained through tears of joy that he was grateful—grateful to be returning home to his family. Then he added, matter-of-factly, “The Lord brought me here this time. If He wants me to come back again, He’ll do it again.”

Six months later, I had the joy of walking with my friend up to that young man’s home in Haiti, carrying three jars of Jif peanut butter—the one American thing he admitted he missed. His grandmother welcomed us warmly, then jokingly scolded my friend: “He came home with an insatiable appetite!”

That lighthearted comment has stuck with me because it names something profoundly true about our culture. We live in a land of abundance, and yet we’re constantly chasing more. We have plenty, but its never enough. Our appetites are rarely satisfied.

That’s why what I’ve seen on these trips is so striking. Not fleeting happiness—but enduring contentment.

Happiness is tied to circumstance. It comes and goes.
Contentment, on the other hand, is anchored in something deeper—a settled trust in the goodness of God, even when life lacks what the world calls “enough.”

That’s what the Apostle Paul meant in Philippians 4:11–12:

“I am not saying this because I am in need, for I have learned to be content whatever the circumstances.
I know what it is to be in need, and I know what it is to have plenty.
I have learned the secret of being content in any and every situation,
whether well fed or hungry, whether living in plenty or in want.”