Years and years ago (has it been 28 years ago already?!) when we first arrived in Venezuela for the beginning of a temporary transfer with My Beloved's job, I wrote a letter to a friend back home and poured out my heart about how much I missed my family and friends back home, especially friends for my two little girls, and that I couldn't speak the language (should have taken Spanish in high school and college instead of French), and that I couldn't count the money and, therefore, often got cheated, and how difficult it was to make friends, and on and on I lamented. She wrote back to say that it seemed like I was discontent. The nerve of her! I wanted sympathy, not admonition. So, I didn't ever write her again.
But she was right. I was discontent, but I believed with good reason. Whenever we're asked how long we lived there, My Beloved says two years; I say too long. I would not want to do those years over, but they were some of the most defining of my life. I began to see myself as I was, and I didn't like what I was seeing--self-focused and put out about disagreeable people and situations. But God, in His graciousness and faithfulness, used the pressures I faced during those years to change my heart in many ways. I still struggle with contentment, still am happier when having things go my way, but I've learned to wait things out a little longer without so much inner churning.
I think I'll probably be struggling with contentment until I reach heaven's shores. A book that recently has been helpful is Jeremiah Burroughs book, The Rare Jewel of Christian Contentment. Sharing a little nugget from from it today.
Contentment is not merely one act, a flash in a good mood. You find many men and women, who, if they are in a good mood, are very quiet. But this will not hold. It is not a constant course. It is not the constant tenor of their spirits to be holy and gracious under affliction.Now I say that contentment is a quiet frame of spirit and by that I mean that you should find men and women in a good mood, not only in this or that time, but as the constant tenor and temper of their hearts. A Christian who, in the constant tenor and temper of his heart, can carry himself quietly with constancy, has learned this lesson of contentment.~ Jeremiah Burroughs in The Rare Jewel of Christian Contentment
