contentment in the present chapter
Looking forward and hoping for the future to be good is healthy I believe but a constant focus on certain things in life changing and a discontentment with the present season is not only frustrating but seems to steal a thankfulness for the good things in this season as well as keep us from actually engaging with the season in life we are in.
I find myself continually hearing God ask me to relax and enjoy the journey. Stop trying to figure out how a, b and c fit together but engage in the present with a,b, and c, relax, trust God and be free.
It seems that as humans we have this continual thirst for more, continual grasping for the next good thing that we are hoping for or expecting. But God is so insightful and so plainly says “Godliness with contentment is itself great wealth.” (1 Timothy 6:6) According to Webster, to be content means “satisfied with what one is or has.” In the amplified version of this scripture, it says to have “an inward sufficiency.” Being quiet and knowing that God is more than enough and He has way more insight into our lives and ability to grow our lives and us than we could ever muster up and to recognize how deeply satisfying just being with Him is. I recognize in myself that when I am most content in the season that God has me, whether it be extra challenging or filled with a bit more ease circumstantially, that contentment and satisfaction has thankfulness as a fruit as well as a general enjoyment of life. As I allow the supposed frustrations that I should feel at a given stage in life to begin to usurp the contentment in God’s goodness to me in this season, I not only begin to find myself less present in each moment but more frustrated and more dissatisfied. To be dissatisfied with the current season that I am in would mean that my life is not filled with love and hope but with greed and lust.
Sometimes we can get sucked into the pressures around us. The pressures to be on track with other people, or the pressure to be in the season that someone else is in, the pressure of thinking that the grass is greener on the other side when the reality is that both lawns need water and attention and can both grow and flourish and will both have weeds.
A few months back I was chatting with the mom of a family whose kids I regularly babysit for and she was asking me what I was doing the following day and I mentioned something about getting home so I could get to bed because I always wake up early even if I don’t have to. She so casually and quickly said “Girl, you better sleep in! There will be a time when you’ll have kids and you’ll have to be up early…” Since that conversation I have made a conscious decision to sleep in more often when I can. There are so many things in the season that we are in that are a gift from God to us and if we are over-occupied with getting to the next season we will miss them and this cycle will just continue for the rest of our lives to the point where we could miss our whole life waiting on the next thing.
Instead of looking at areas of my life that I hope continue growing and changing and focusing on the lack of growth and change, resetting my mind to say like David said “The lines have fallen for me in pleasant places; yes, I have a good heritage,” (Psalm 16) will yield more of a harvest of rightness and God’s will for me in my life than the focus on the lack of ____.
Whatever the chapter of our lives we are currently in, God has unique and beautiful gifts for us in them, deep truths for us to understand and grasp and ultimately a full experience of engaging with Him and with those around us in the moment.
In choosing contentment and thankfulness, I find a propensity in me to live free • enjoy the journey • relax and trust Him, which is exactly what the Lord is constantly asking me to do. I think life is better this way…
xoxo | katee grace | much love + peace to your heart
