CONTENTMENT.

Main Entry:  contentment
Part of Speech:  noun
Definition:  comfort, happiness
Synonyms:  fulfillment, peace, pleasure, satisfaction, serenity
Synonyms to "content":  can't complain, comfortable, willing
                   -- www.thesaurus.com

Please note:  fulfillment and willing.

It's here.  The feeling I have been yearning to feel while at home.  The feeling that I haven't felt in this house since... elementary school?  Jesus has been working on me for so long and I can finally say that I am happy right where I am (for the time being).  Yes, I still can't wait to go back to school.  But it's more of a feeling of anticipation for the school year and excitement about InterVarsity and less of a feeling of just wanting to get out of here.  I feel peace and pleasure and serenity and comfort about being here this summer.  I can't complain.  The Lord is satisfying me even apart from the fellowship that I felt so glued to at school.  I feel challenged and I have people to challenge.  I have people that I feel comfortable confiding in for spiritual advice.  I have a bible study that I actually look forward to going to (a bible study apart from IV that I enjoy!?! GASP!).  I'm making Christian friends.  I have a job as a nanny that's challenging, but extremely rewarding and I feel myself growing as a person from it.  In the past three weeks I've watched as God answered my prayers immediately (sometimes in a frame of 12 hours) and it has been amazing to encounter.  I've also watched Him answer prayers that I have been praying for for years in the past few weeks.  Things are looking hopeful between my dad and the Lord, just gotta keep on praying.  I feel really good and at ease about my post-college plans.  Everything just feels like it's falling into place.  It took almost 2 years of struggling as a lone Christian in New Jersey and I finally feel like God has provided me with fellowship.

Yeah work is hard and long and I'm allergic to the dogs and feel physically drained.  But I don't care.  Yeah I'm bored 5/7 nights a week because I'm so used to having structured daily events and in the summer there are few.  But I don't care.  Yeah I still am really struggling with a few things and my family/home life is FAR from being "good."  But it doesn't matter.  I am learning how to be completely fulfilled by Jesus, no matter the place I'm at or how bad things may seem.  So what made the difference for me this summer?  I had all of the same resources and opportunities last summer, but I still felt so empty.  This time, I've chosen to be in the Word everyday, regardless of my crazy schedule.  I've chosen to go to church every Sunday, regardless of the little sleep I'm running on or events I have going on that day.  Being in the Word on my own daily this summer has seriously made my life at home do a 180.  I didn't invest my time in the resources that were there for me last summer because I wasn't first investing my time in the Lord.  But seek first his kingdom and his righteousness, and all these things will be given to you as well. (Matthew 6:33)


It is only when you are first fulfilled in Christ that you can be willing to do His work (note the synonyms above).  In his book Future Grace, John Piper wrote "Spiritual beauty is the beauty of God diffused in all his works and words.  Embracing this, or delighting in it, or being satisfied with it, is the heart of saving--and sanctifying--faith."  While Piper goes into intricate detail of this throughout a chapter, he is arguing that the same faith that saves is the faith that sanctifies (for even demons believe in Jesus, the difference is they are not being sanctified).  And this sanctifying faith is shown through the good fruit produced (James 2:19; Matthew 7:18).  But how can you be willing to do the work of God, aka producing the good fruit (Matthew 7:18-21 emphasis on v.21), if you are not FIRST finding your fulfillment in Him?  So you see it's when we embrace, delight in, and are satisfied with the spiritual beauty (to use Piper's AND the thesaurus' words) that our lives become a living sacrifice.  Because as soon as you find your fulfillment in Christ you will be willing to lay down your life for Him.  Being content means being fulfilled and willing.

So you can see how I found the synonyms to the word contentment so intriguing.  Life is good.  God is good.  I can't wait to see how the Lord will have me grow tomorrow.  And the next day.  And the next...

All My Fountains

The water in my house started having a sort of problem today.  Apparently they were working on something in the township and it made our water have a yellowish, cloudy tint-- very rusty.  It effected everything:  the water that comes out of the showers and the sinks, even the water in the toilet.  I have to use a bottle of spring water to brush my teeth and I will probably bum a shower from someone else's house tomorrow.  And cooking pasta?  Forget it.  It shall be sandwiches from here on out until the water runs clear again.  And I dare not even try to wash my clothes.  Hello another few days of wearing the same dirty lifeguard suit and jean shorts.  Ew.

That's the thing about water, it all comes from the same source.  It doesn't matter what activity you're trying to do or which faucet you turn on--it's the same water in the showers as it is in the sink, etc.


Jesus answered, “Everyone who drinks this water will be thirsty again, but whoever drinks the water I give them will never thirst. Indeed, the water I give them will become in them a spring of water welling up to eternal life.”  --John 4:13-14


Yeah we've heard it time and time before, the old "only Jesus can quench your thirst, son."  And while this is indeed true, have you ever took the time to think about it?  What Jesus is saying here is choose Him.  There is one choice.  You can't play both sides of the field.  A spring of water means all of the water will come from Christ and Christ alone.  You can't go to a river and get a sample of water, run 100 yards down the same river and come up with a different sample.  All of the water is the same.  It's flowing and changing, adapting to the environment that it's moving into-- around and over rocks, bending around corners.  But it stays in its boundaries, coloring inside the lines.  You can either play on Christ's team or on the world's team.  Doing both just isn't even a possibility.  You can't turn on the shower in one room of my house and expect clear water when the sink in the other room has rusty water.  It doesn't work that way because it comes from the same source.

Psalm 87:7 says, As they make music they will sing, “All my fountains are in you."  Chris Tomlin sings it oh so well (get the Passion 2011 soundtrack; number four rocks).

But what does it really mean to have all your fountains in Christ?  It means you are getting everything from Him.  To have all of your fountains in Jesus means nothing that comes out of you is of anything but the water that He gives you.  Everything is from Him and everything is glorifying to Him.  A fountain is big.  Artsy.  Catches the eye immediately.  If your fountains are in Christ then everything that comes out of you will bring glory to the Father.  And on the flip side, everything that you use as your source is from the Father.  It's a cycle.  Have you every watched a fountain?  It gives and receives from the same source of water.

Ruth, me, & Matt at the Princeton fountain

 My friends and I went and played in the fountain on Princeton's campus one day recently.  So many people were cooling off in the water because it was a really hot day.  It's a public site, open to anyone to cares to go for a shallow dip.  God's grace is the same.  It's for everyone to enjoy and experience.  It is everlasting.  But stopping by for an hour isn't enough.  You have to allow Jesus to transform you.  In the above verse He says [it] will become in them a spring of water.  Let it change your actions and opinions and thought processes.  Because if you make your fountains in the Lord, then He will receive the glory in whatever you do.

Moving Forward

The other night before I went to sleep I was going through my phone and deleting contacts that I no longer needed.  I hadn't cleared out my phone since probably sometime senior year of high school, and there were a good fifty names that needed to be removed.  I was moving along in alphabetical order, laughing at a few of the names that sparked goofy memories.  And then I got to it.  Mom.  I stared at the phone with the name highlighted for a long time.  I clicked on the contact and looked at the familiar number that my fingers will probably be able to dial by heart forever.  Should I delete it?  There isn't really an appropriate time to erase someone from your life.  Maybe I should keep it-- just one more year.  It's not like the contact information was taking up a huge amount of space on my memory card.  But why wouldn't I delete it?  What had I been holding onto for two years?  Keeping her name in my phone wasn't going to bring her back.

I let out a breath that I realized I'd been holding and continued staring at the phone.  I was trying to memorize the way the capitol "M" followed by the lowercase "om" looked-- something I used to write so frequently on the envelope of cards, but a combination of letters that had been removed from my life for two years.  Delete.  I put my phone down, rolled over so that I wouldn't have to look at the device that just removed a piece of history, and fell asleep.

When will my past stop haunting me?  God willing, I'm moving forward-- I know I am.  I feel myself constantly being refined, constantly hearing the call of where He wants me.  Home is slowly (but surely) getting better; this summer is worlds better than last.  But home still is not "where the heart is."  If my mom was here today would I feel so completed isolated from my family?  Would we be having financial problems?  Would my sister be in as much trouble as she gets herself into?  Would we have stopped going on family vacations at our beach house?  Would I have grown up so quickly over the course of college?  Would I be itching to move out of my parents' house?

Would I have accepted Christ?

These are questions that obviously cannot be answered.  When I think about where I am in my journey with Christ I am content, sometimes a little aggravated that I'm not moving faster, but content nonetheless.  I have learned to fully submit to God.  Even when the situation seems extremely bleak and I would not have picked the particular story-line, Romans 8:28 holds true.  I watched as my mother took her last breath.  I watched as my family fell apart in multiple directions.  And I watched as I simultaneously found joy.  Above all, I watched as God received the glory in the midst of everything.  I know my life is this way for a reason, but I can't help but long for the day that I'm not so bothered by my past.  So many things still pierce my heart to the point that I can still sometimes feel physical pain.  And sometimes I feel like a prisoner here in my home, in disbelief that the Lord has me trapped here for yet another summer.  I might not have open wounds anymore, but I still have distant scars that remind me of my past-- both literally and figuratively.

But, I deleted her number.  God is moving me forward.  At a very slow, glacier-like pace.  What I'm learning is that it's okay to have scars, as long as I say this is who I was and this is who I am because of God's grace on me.  My past, my problems, and my scars don't define me.

Galatians 2:20 says I have been crucified with Christ and I no longer live, but Christ lives in me. The life I now live in the body, I live by faith in the Son of God, who loved me and gave himself for me. 

It's a simple lesson to read and say, but a hard one to learn.  I'm hoping that one day soon the pain will be gone and I'll be able to forgive myself 100 percent.  But until that day all I can do is be grateful each morning because, thanks be to God, I can feel myself one step closer to letting go, one step closer to not caring about the answers to those questions.  When I think about the plans for my post-college life I am ecstatic to potentially have the opportunity to work in ministry and serve God.  Over the past month, I literally have been going to bed each night excited to wake up and read Scripture because I can't wait to see how the Lord is going to mold me over the next day, month, and year.  I know what I want--the only thing I want--and that is to be made as Christ-like as possible while here on this earth.  I pray that the Lord continues to refine me.  All I want is to keep moving forward.