Well-Skilled in the Mystery

Ah, bliss.  A few moments to myself in a recent evening, watching the sun set on the sunflowers and zinnias, send pink cotton and then recede into dusk.  Half a dozen dragonflies bright blue and neon yellow tagged around the pond and zipped up together into the sky, then one would come and hover six feet in front of me wondering what alien invaded their space.  A frog yelped some unintelligible complaint and scattered into the pond.  Contentment!

Interesting conversation this morning about our upcoming ladies retreat on contentment:  If every lady has different definitions of happiness and yes, of what would make them content, how do we even discuss it meaningfully, as if one-size-fits- all? 

It matters  not who and what.  The soul-filling satisfaction is found in Christ the Person, our Redeemer, Friend, Intercessor...” I have a sufficient portion between Christ and my soul abundantly to satisfy me in every condition…”

“To be well-skilled in the mystery of Christian contentment is the duty, glory and excellence of a Christian.”

We don’t choose a course of virtue to pursue contentment and then craft the details of our heart.  It is beyond us.  It is a mystery.

Once when she was maybe 2, our youngest waxed artistic on the couch with a ballpoint pen.  When I walked into the room, I did not exhibit a gentle and quiet spirit.  She took one look at me and launched herself practically mid-air into her brother’s lap to escape certain doom.  Not that unlike our response to the looming condemnation of the law apart from resurrection grace.  We launch ourselves into the arms of a Christ who has turned the doom of our inability to beg, borrow or steal true contentment apart from Him into the gift of His transformation of our ugly places, our sin, into His glory.  How can we not exult in such a reality, royal sons and daughters that we now are!

*italicized quotes from Jeremiah Burroughs' Rare Jewel of Christian Contentment