Contented Discontentment

Contented Discontentment!  I know that sounds like an oxymoron, but that's where I am right now!  Let me explain!

For those of you who know me, you know that I have always been insecure!  Over the last few years, I have really struggled with not being content in who I am!  I have looked around me at others and have struggled with wishing I could have their spiritual gifts, or be used the way God is using them, or have the experiences that they are having!  I have felt not good enough or worthy of being used!  I have allowed these lies and feelings of discontentment to spiral until I end up feeling totally discouraged and all alone in my lowest times!

Well, this past winter I had one of those periods of time!  I looked at those around me and I felt like I was the only one not being used!  I felt like we were where we were supposed to be but yet I felt like God wasn't using me in any way!  I quite honestly felt left out!  Well, after sharing and praying with a dear friend, I was able to move past those feelings and allow God to begin to do a new work in me.  Over the past few months he's been bringing me to a place of being willing to wait on Him.  It's been a slow process since I tend to take a while to really let things penetrate!  I've gone through this in past years and I seem to get it for awhile, but apparently it hasn't been firmly rooted because then something else happens and I'm right back where I was.

Well, the work that God has been doing over the past few months was solidified at a conference I was at last week!  God cemented the things that He's been doing in my heart!  As I watched ladies around me who are at different places in their walk than I am who have different giftings than I do, there was no discontentment there was simply joy and peace!  Excitement for what God was doing in their life and anticipation and excitement for what He is doing in mine!  Just because God isn't using me the same way He's using them doesn't make them better than me, just different!  We each have a different calling!

He also showed me that even when we think we aren't being used we truly are!  We don't always know the impact of what we say and do!  I was given the gift of being able to get a glimpse of some of that!  God can take the smallest thing we say or do if done in obedience to Him and make it huge!  He's an amazing God!

I had another break through last night.  As I was getting ready for bed I was just praising God for all that He is doing and who He is!  Before I realized it the words "I praise you for who I am" came out of my mouth.  I was quite shocked that I said them!  My first response was I mean I praise you for who you are.  And then I felt like the Lord said, No you got it right the first time and I stopped and I thought, you know I do praise you for who I am!  This is honestly the first time in my life that I think I could truly say this!  I think I am actually beginning to like me!  I don't think I truly ever did before!  Yes, I know there are lots of things about me that need to change and that I need to allow God to transform, but for the first time I can actually say I like who God has created me to be and the purposes that He has for me!  For me that is a huge breakthrough!

I'll be honest I think I am at the best place I have ever been in my life!  No matter what is going on around me or what challenges I may come against, I am at the most secure and content place I have ever been!  I am finally moving who I know I am from my head to my heart!  I've been able for a long time to recite to you who I am in Christ and KNOW that it is true, but never completely felt it!  It's finally sinking down into my heart and taking root!  Is it sad that it has taken me this many years to get it?

So, I am contentedly discontent!  I am finally content in who I am in Christ!  However much or little He has for me at any given moment!  No matter how long I have to wait to see His promises unfold!  But, at the same time I don't ever want to be content in where I am in my relationship with Him!  I am hungry for more!  I want to always be hungry for more!  Desperate for more of Him!