holy discontent
January 21, 2010 | Dear Friend,Knowing Christ,Living Free,Ministry Life
Have you ever felt it? You want something, but you don’t know what it is. It’s right under the surface and it won’t go away, so you do other things to cover it, or you push it aside.
It’s holy discontent. You might feel stuck spiritually. It may have been a very long since you felt God.
Oh, Suzie, don’t give me that emotional stuff. You don’t have to feel God to follow Him.
I do. I have learned to trust Him in the times that I don’t feel Him. I have learned to dig deep into the experiences of the past that remind me of God’s faithfulness. I have learned to lean on Scripture and the promises within.
But I need to feel God, His presence, His strength.
I want to feel Him, and there have been times (many) that I’ve had to stop and find the source of that holy discontent.
That’s exactly what happened the day I stood in the ballroom of the hotel at the She Speaks conference as my friend and Proverbs 31 Ministries founder, Lysa TerKeurst spoke.
(To see the original devo that started this crossroads discussion, click here.)
I was discontented. I had been for a while. Like King David in Psalms 51:12 I was praying, “Restore to me the joy of your salvation, and grant me a willing spirit, to sustain me”. I needed Him. I had allowed some really meaningless things to take the place of intimacy with God. I still talked to Him. I still loved Him. But I knew there was more because I had experienced more. I had misplaced something very valuable and I needed it back.
I remember standing there in a room of 700 and it was as if I was alone with God. I held back, waiting for the final amen so I could escape to the prayer room. I didn’t care who was in there. I didn’t care if people saw that I was part of the team. All I knew is that I needed to get alone with God.
It was a course correction of sorts.
Holy discontent is a beautiful gift. It’s the Holy Spirit, the One who knows you and the heart of the Father drawing you closer, stopping you in your tracks and reminding you that there’s more to being a child of God than church, more than committees, more than writing books, more than teaching, more than being just being moral or good.
Maybe you are connected. Maybe you are right in the heart of His plan, and you still feel holy discontent. This is a prayer today for you and for me.
I pray that from his glorious, unlimited resources he will give you mighty inner strength through his Holy Spirit. And I pray that Christ will be more and more at home in your hearts as you trust in him.
May your roots go down deep into the soil of God’s marvelous love. And may you have the power to understand, as all God’s people should, how wide, how long, how high, and how deep his love really is. May you experience the love of Christ, though it is so great you will never fully understand it. Then you will be filled with the fullness of life and power that comes from God.
Now glory be to God! By his mighty power at work within us, he is able to accomplish infinitely more than we would ever dare to ask or hope. May he be given glory in the church and in Christ Jesus forever and ever through endless ages. Amen.
Ephesians 3:16-21 (New Living Translation)
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Powerful! Staying connected to GOD is so powerful and important for our everyday lives.
January 21st, 2010 at 10:40 amSuzie… this is such a heartfelt post. I pray that I will allow the Holy Spirit to work in my life so there is not any holy discontent. Amen.
January 21st, 2010 at 12:00 pmI know HD. I am thankful God gives me HD to stir me to seek Him in deeper places. HD won’t allow me to just go through the motions. I have to be where He wants me, not where I would choose to be. I am thankful for the measure of HD now. It is moving me where He is calling me. Crossing the road. B
January 22nd, 2010 at 9:46 amWOW!I love praying this passage from Eph!
January 23rd, 2010 at 11:58 pm