If you unhinged my head right now and peered in, I’m pretty sure you’d find a tangled, scramble-y mass of gray matter that used to be my brain. Ever since the kids have been home for the summer, I haven’t been able to unwind my schedule, my thoughts or my agenda from theirs. My brain feels agitated, disorganized and cluttered. I want to relax and hang out but I have work that needs to get done. I’m out of touch with my friends, both real and online, and feel disconnected and guilty about that.
I’m discovering that I’m not very good at balancing work and play when summer blurs the guardrails that keep them separate during the school year.
My soul wants rest. My body wants a day off. And my mind cries out, “No more!” But still work piles up on my to-do list and as much as I want to, there are just certain things I can’t blow off. Next week will be better, I promise myself.
Discontentment. It’s an easy place to settle in to. Before we know it, we get comfortable there and call it home. Unhappy with our circumstances, seeds of discontent take root. We think others have a better life than we do. Better kids. Better marriage. Better job. Better health. They have more friends, more money, more talent, more free time. We want what we don’t have. If only…
The Bible has a name for this condition and it’s called sin.
The apostle Paul, the poster child for a hard life, said “I have learned the secret of being content in any and every situation, whether well fed or hungry, whether living in plenty or in want. I can do everything through him who gives me strength.” (Phil. 4:12-13) The source of Paul’s contentment was found in one place alone: in Christ.
Content in every situation? I’ve got a looooong way to go before I can claim that. But in the past few days I’ve gleaned the truth of these verses. God’s word is alive and active. Reading scripture recently has settled my soul like a balm. Soothing, quieting, reassuring. Encountering the living God in the pages of this ancient text, showed me that even if I don’t figure out the craziness of my life right now, it’s not the point anyway.
Being one with Jesus is.
It is just as the hymnist wrote Horatio Spafford wrote in 1873:
When peace, like a river, attendeth my way,
When sorrows like sea billows roll;
Whatever my lot, Thou has taught me to say,
It is well, it is well, with my soul
It is well, indeed.







