Last month I wrote about the study we are working through at church, in our women’s ministry.  It’s called “Stuck”.  Written by Jennie Allen, it’s about “the places we get stuck and the God that sets us free.” This week’s topic (after missing the last two sessions because of sick me and sick kids) is appropriately, about a topic I know all too well – discontent.  I wish I could say discontent and I weren’t old friends, that at some point I’d grown tired of her bullying and general shiesty behavior and let her go, but alas – she remains a bitter pill that I swallow on a daily basis.  It really would be nice if at almost 35 years old (hold it – I still have 6 months people) I’d learned a thing or two about combating her tired old talking points. The truth is, I haven’t.  Not a day goes by that I don’t feel annoyed or frustrated at something I don’t have/feel like I should/feel like I deserve/etc.  So when part of the study asks us to make a list of all the things it would take for you to never struggle with these feelings again – “name everything you could ever want or change about yourself or your life.” Oh, well since you asked – just a couple things: – I would have a successful theatre/commercial/voice-over career – even as a Mom I would juggle all these things effortlessly and with total mastery. – I would live in a brand new, no update needed, eat off the floor it’s so clean gourmet kitchen home.  – My brand new, no update needed home would be fully and completely furnished just like an HGTV Dream Home straight out of Park City or better yet, Vermont.  Luxe, lodgey, rustic – um, did I say luxe?? – I would be my pre-Chicago move weight (circa 2000) – the weight that my 22 year old self lived at, 10 pounds lighter than I am now.  Before two babies (whom I love) left me with stretch marks and the promise of a Mommy Makeover for my 40th birthday present. – I would feel comfortable having my picture taken in a bikini.  And I would rock that bikini, with abs you could bounce a penny off of and no arm flappage (or flappage of any kind, for that matter). – I would have a money tree in the backyard.  Its sole purpose would be to provide green for my growing Louboutin collection (in my mind, only in my mind – I do not in fact own a pair of the red-soled beauties).  I would have all the shoes I could ever want or need in my whole lifetime. – I would be the best cook, the best housekeeper, the best Mother, the best wife, the best friend, the most accomplished writer, be penning my stunning autobiography, and have 20,000,000 Twitter followers. – And finally, I would never have to color my hair, wax my eyebrows, maintain my figure, get my nails done – because I would be perfect, at all times, forever and ever. Just a couple things, right? Something tells me, and I know this to be true, that even if I had all of these things, I would still be letting my friend Discontent write my story. Because I know, at 10 pounds lighter, I was just as manipulated by whatever I felt was lacking in my life.  I know, as a young girl in my 20’s, that although I was auditioning and working my fingers to the bone to make my rent so I could do shows at night – when I thought I was “living the dream”, all I could think about was being a mother and having babies. I know, that it doesn’t matter how much money you have, how many pairs of shoes you buy, how many rooms you have furnished in your home and how many “Vogue” magazines you flip through – you will always and forever be seeking to fill the void in your heart that God created…for Him. How can so many small objects fill a space that is so unbelievably infinite?  A space that is truly, God-sized? Hebrews 13:5 says: Keep your lives free from the love of money and be content with what you have, because God has said, “Never will I leave you;
never will I forsake you.” …Because God has said, “Never will I leave you; never will I forsake you.” Never.  All of the other things, fall away.  Houses get older, newness wears off, skin ages, trends come and go.  But the constant, the all-consuming, all-knowing, gigantic love of Christ will never, ever fail you.  He is the only thing that can fill us, because He is who we were created by and for.  And it could be, that if we learn how to be content in the here and now, that His plan for our lives and for that space inside us…just might be…better than we ever imagined it could be.