4 Lessons I Learned From Battling Discontentment

My name is Jeremy Toro: husband to my amazing wife Ashley for 2 ½ years, father to a baby boy due in November. By the grace and mercy of God, I’m a follower of Christ. My desire is to honor Christ in everything I do and seek to live a life that glorifies him. In 2022, I was ordained as one of the pastors of Restoration Church of Sanford. I had the great privilege of partaking in Restoration’s church planting process in the historic district of Sanford, Florida.This has been one of the many joys of my life and I’m grateful to be apart of what God is doing in Sanford. My wife and I were married in December of 2021 and we struggled with infertility for over 2 years. At the same time I’ve been working full time and involved in full time ministry. These are the four lessons I learned from battling with contentment.

Lesson 1: Identify and Repent of Discontentment

I recall being at dinner with my friend and Pastor Arthur Goncalves. I began to recount for him all the things currently going on in my life. I explained to him how I really wanted to get to the next season of my life. We began to unpack the reasons why I want to move on to those next seasons. Arthur posed some questions to me that really helped me to examine my heart and my motives. It was in this conversation that I first acknowledged discontentment in my life. This reality hit me like a ton of bricks. I started to identify how it has affected different areas of my life. I saw how my desire to move to a different season of life was just a mask for my discontentment. I learned that discontentment is not being satisfied with where God has you. It’s acting as if God has somehow shortchanged you and there is a wiser/better way for your life. This discontentment is like a cancer that spreads to every area of your life. So, until you identify and repent of it, you are unable to be content even when you have everything you could ever want.

Lesson 2: Contentment is Found in the Lord

As a young man with a young family, there are so many things to be worried about. The list of things to be worried about can sometimes be overwhelming and consuming. At times our to-do list can seem to cause us to be discontent with where we’re at. In our case, the very thing that you are praying for and asking God to give you can breed discontentment when you don’t receive it. We can feel as if we are waiting for that next great opportunity or answered prayer to come our way so we can finally be established. Yet God reminds us that our contentment is not found in our circumstances or receiving the things we want but in God himself. Paul when writing to the church in Philippians 4:11-13 says:

Not that I am speaking of being in need, for I have learned in whatever situation I am to be content. I know how to be brought low, and I know how to abound. In any and every circumstance, I have learned the secret of facing plenty and hunger, abundance and need. I can do all things through him who strengthens me.

Scripture makes it clear that I can endure any number of difficulties, hardships, unmet expectations, and whatever might come my way because my contentment comes from the Lord. This is the same reason why Jesus was able to endure the hardships and sufferings set before him. His eyes were fixed on accomplishing the plans and purposes of God. Jesus’ joy and contentment wasn’t tied to the people or their actions but on his relationship with the Father!

If our eyes are fixed on Christ and our relationship with him then by the grace of God you can endure whatever this life may bring. Even if you never receive anything you desire in this life, your joy and contentment will always be full because it’s based on the immovable God!

Lesson 3: Contentment Breeds Joy in all Circumstances

I remember when my dad was going through his battle with aggressive prostate cancer. The cancer spread to the point where not only were his bones affected but so was his mind. To move around was a struggle and it got to the point where he was bound to the hospital bed. He no longer had the strength to get up and use the restroom so he needed to be helped and tended to from the bed. Why do I share this with you? In the midst of his body deteriorating in front of us, my father continued to rejoice in the Lord. When people came to visit him and expected the worst, they found a dying man that was more joyful than they were. He would be smiling, laughing and speaking of his great hope in Christ. He rejoiced in the fact that he knew that the Lord would take care of him and his family.

My father was content in the Lord and that contentment brought a joy from the Lord that’s beyond all understanding. This joy continued all the way to the Lord calling him home. It’s important to note that contentment that breeds joy doesn’t always mean that life will turn out the way we want it. Everyone doesn’t receive an ending like Job did. Not everyone who prays through infertility receives children. There are so many things saints pray for that they will never get. As much as I desired my father to be healed of his cancer, the Lord chose in his infinite wisdom to take my father. Yet because God is good and my contentment is based on him, I can rejoice in my father’s death. Why can I do this?

God’s plans and his glory are for my good. God’s infinite wisdom is better than man’s wisdom. God wants what's best for us and he wants what's going on to draw us closer to him. God doesn’t want us to look at our circumstances, struggles, frustrations or disappointments, but he wants us to look to him. Contentment in the Almighty God brings joy everlasting in this life and the life to come

Lesson 4: Contentment is Cultivated in Thankfulness

This past week I was able to listen to a sermon from Hebrews 12 where the pastor called us to be thankful and serve God. One thing that stuck with me is the importance of thankfulness. The pastor encouraged us to put together a list of all the things we are thankful for and then begin to pray through that list. As we do this, we can also join our brothers and sisters in Christ to be thankful with them.

Contentment is the understanding that everything I have has given to be from God. For the believer, whatever he decides to give me (even if it's just breath in my lungs) I will rejoice and be thankful for it. If we are not focusing on what God has done and is currently doing, we begin to lose our way. Satan wants you to focus on the things you don’t have. He wants you to covet and desire the things God has given to your neighbor.

I recall a time during our infertility struggle that close friends of my wife and I (who were living with us at that time) became pregnant. Our sin nature wanted to cry and lament to God as to why he didn’t want to bless us with a child. Satan wanted us to see God as being unfair and ultimately as if God didn’t care about us. Yet by the grace of God, the Lord overwhelmed us with joy and love for our friends so that we could genuinely rejoice with them. God helped us to be content with where he had us and allowed us to be thankful for what he did in their lives.

By the grace of God, they were able to rejoice with us when the Lord brought our beautiful baby boy to my wife’s womb. All this to say that our contentment is cultivated by a heart and an attitude of thankfulness. Once we are able to see all that the Lord has done for us and how he takes care of us. There is absolutely no room for us to be discontent. We are not entitled to discontentment or dissatisfaction with almighty God. We need to remember that we were enemies of God and we only deserve his wrath. “But God” (my favorite words from Ephesians 2:4). God steps in and saves us by his grace. He takes enemies and makes them dear family members. He takes sadness and turns it into joy! He takes those dead in their sin and makes them alive in Christ! Read and pray through these words from Psalm 95:1-3:

Oh come, let us sing to the Lord; let us make a joyful noise to the rock of our salvation! Let us come into his presence with thanksgiving; let us make a joyful noise to him with songs of praise! For the Lord is a great God, and a great King above all gods.

Conclusion

Contentment in the Lord isn’t about you getting what you want when you want it— it's about finding your joy in Almighty God! I’ve learned that I need to identify and repent of discontentment in my life. I need to root my contentment in my relationship to the Lord. My contentment in the Lord will produce joy in whatever life may throw at me. This contentment is saturated and grown in thankfulness to God! I pray if you are anything like me that God would help you to do these things so that you can rest content in the Lord until he calls you to be with him forevermore.