---
title: True Contentment
subblog: yhwh
tags: the good life
---

Contentment is fairly universally agreed to be a virtue. We aspire to the ideal that regardless of our circumstances we are happy, and we understand that without a measure of this virtue there is no set of circumstances that will satisfy us.

But what does contentment look like? I find if I'm not careful, what seems like contentment is dangerously near to disillusionment and existential despair.

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I had a brush with death about a year ago. I woke up in the hospital one day with a frightening litany of injuries. As it happened I was fine within a couple of weeks, but it's easy to imagine rolling those dice again and being maimed or killed.

This experience drove home to me a few beliefs about life I already held in theory, but perhaps not to my core. First, sure as Saturday, death is coming, and we are powerless to ferry our souls across that mortal gap. Second, the Resurrection is coming, and in Jesus we look forward to eternal life that will dwarf our lives on Earth just as they dwarf the time we spent in the womb.

<pre class="prose">
Who shall separate us from the love of Christ? Shall tribulation, or distress, or persecution, or famine, or nakedness, or danger, or sword? As it is written,

“For your sake we are being killed all the day long;
    we are regarded as sheep to be slaughtered.”

No, in all these things we are more than conquerors through him who loved us. For I am sure that neither death nor life, nor angels nor rulers, nor things present nor things to come, nor powers, nor height nor depth, nor anything else in all creation, will be able to separate us from the love of God in Christ Jesus our Lord.

Romans 8:35-39
</pre>

There's the source of contentment for you. Nothing can keep us from so great a salvation, so no lack ought bring us fear. Moreover, what could add to these riches? Naked we came into this world and naked we shall depart, but even if we could bring all with us it would amount to nothing in comparison to what we have already been guaranteed. 

But this raises a question: Now what? How then shall we live? Well, our lives are to be a living sacrifice offered in thanksgiving to our adopted Father. But for the recipients of so great a salvation, this is way harder than you might think!

Where I have recently fallen short in this regard actually approximates a Buddhist idea more than a Christian one. This is the elimination of desire. Nothing can happen to me, so nothing matters, right? If I lost my life, ultimately it wouldn't matter, so certainly if I lost my job, it wouldn't matter. Whatever happens, I am secure. I lack nothing, so I desire nothing, so I care about nothing. Really, I might as well die and do away with this wearisome waiting.

This outlook lends itself to a life of poverty and withdrawal. We'll get by on what the Lord provides and make music to him, patiently awaiting his day. Some outsiders will come and see our peace and want it for themselves. We'll invite them, too, to renounce all that ensnares and to join us in our contentment. Most people just won't notice, but we won't mind.

Maybe some Christians are called to live that way, but here's the thing: it's not up to us how we live. Our lives are not our own. They've been bought at great price. If we are content to take the guarantee of our eternal security and to sit on it until it comes, we ought to seriously question whether indeed we have received it.

Salvation comes through faith. Faith leads to repentance and the surrender of our whole selves. These are returned to us animated by the Holy Spirit of God, for good works to the praise of his glory, until he returns or calls us home. There's a reason Paul mentions "tribulation, or distress, or persecution, or famine, or nakedness, or danger, or sword." These are what we ought to expect the Spirit will lead us into! Knowing this, we are content to follow him, though we know not what will come.

Lord, may I internalize this, too. Fill me with your Spirit, that in my days I will be more than the drifting dude!
