Contented Discontent

There are many paradoxes in the Christian life. Paul speaks of being "unknown, and yet well known; as dying, and, behold, we live; as chastened, and not killed; as sorrowful, yet always rejoicing; as poor, yet making many rich; as having nothing, and yet possessing all things" (2 Cor. 6:9, 10).

In the same way there is such a thing as contented discontent. We are happy in our work, though we may wish that it were more fruitful; we are happy in our living, though we desire that our lives were more holy. We may be both dissatisfied and satisfied with our lot, our task, our circumstances.

In a conversation when a missionary friend was asked about his field of labor, he said that the Lord had given him a holy discontent in which he was properly contented. "But," he said, "when we were first looking toward the field, we asked the Lord most definitely to give us a very hard field. God both heard and abundantly answered that prayer, for He has given us one of the hardest fields in the world."

There are many lessons that can grow out of this line of thought. Like Paul, we can learn that in whatsoever state we are, therewith to be content. We can know how to be abased and how to abound (Phil. 4:11, 12). These things we can learn by the various places and circumstances in which the Lord is pleased to place us. For Paul says, "In all things I am instructed both to be full and to be hungry, both to abound and to suffer need." It would appear that the instructor, in this case, was none other than what we might call the vicissitudes of life - the ups and downs that go with living - the richer and poorer, the better and the worse, the sickness and the health, as long as we shall live. It is God that makes the circumstances in the life of the believer; nothing can ever touch us unless it has passed through His will. In the last analysis, it is the Lord Himself who is our instructor in these things, teaching us in fullness and in hunger, in bounty and in need.

While I was in the midst of writing this last paragraph, the typewriter remained still for more than an hour as I talked and prayed with a brother whose job was suddenly nonexistent because of the death of his employer and the liquidation of the jewelry business of which he had been a part for many years. Now, just past forty, he came, saying, "Pastor, I am in a fix." How happy I was to tell him that he was not in a "fix," but that he was in a path which had been ordered by the Heavenly Father, and that it was a part of the all things which work together for his good, since he truly loves the Lord and is one of the Lord's own. He had a right to be discontented that he was unemployed, for God requires us to be diligent and industrious, but he had the right to be perfectly serene in the contentment of his heart as he went about diligently and industriously seeking a new connection in life.

May we all learn to walk very close to the Father, and to seek every possible lesson that He would have us learn from Himself as an instructor using the object lessons of living.

1. How has the Lord prepared you to be content in discontent?
2. What would it take for an individual to rely totally on the sovereignty of God in tough situations?
3. What are some lessons God has been teaching you this week?