Not Comfortable but Learning to Be Content

Comfort.  We are on a never-ending quest for it.  We eat comfort foods, look for comfortable furniture to sit and sleep in, and dive into our comfy clothes after work.  We even sing about it at Christmas: “Tidings of comfort and joy”.  We hate being uncomfortable in any way: physically, financially, emotionally, or spiritually.  We really do equate comfort with joy.  But I am not so sure that God does.  In fact, as I look through the Bible, God tends to shake things up when people get too comfortable.  He shook my life up recently and moved me away from everything that was comfortable and familiar.  So I have to ask myself if comfort is the ultimate goal God wants for His children.  What if comfort is not always part of God’s plan?  What if it actually draws us away from Him?

By most anyone’s standards, I was comfortable. 

I was pretty comfortable.  I had my home that I had lived in for most of my life.  I knew where every light switch, drawer handle, and crack in the wall was.  I could navigate that place in the dark and never run into anything or struggle to turn on a light.  I had my favorite places to vacation, my favorite spot to go camping, my favorite stores and restaurants.  I had my routines with church and activities and friends.  I sat every morning in the same recliner, drinking the same coffee.  Complete familiarity.  By most anyone’s standards, I was comfortable.  Oh sure, there were things that I wanted and problems that popped up.  But I had most days under control.

Spiritually speaking, that is one of the most dangerous places to be. 

Spiritually speaking, that is one of the most dangerous places to be.  When things are good and we feel like we have everything handled, we start to believe we are the one in control.  We start to take credit for the good things.  We feel like we somehow have earned them and are being blessed because of our own effort and value.  We even start to forget how comfortable we really are, and we want more.  We move from prayers of gratitude to prayers of entitlement. We start to take God out of the equation or turn Him into some weak, divine gift-giver. 

Don’t be surprised if God steps in to shake things up.

At those times, don’t be surprised if God steps in to shake things up.  He did it so many times throughout the Bible.  I think about Joseph, the favored son of Jacob, with his beautiful coat and his leadership role over his brothers.  Comfortable and blessed and sure of his future as the right-hand man to his dad.  He had a good heart – nothing indicates he was wicked or cruel or anything like that.  He was just comfortable.  But he had a bigger destiny than to just be comfortable.  He had a bigger role in the plans of God than to order his brothers around.  He would never have pursued his bigger role on his own.  Why should he?  He was already so comfortable.  So God shook it up.  God moved him to a foreign country, as a slave.  God allowed him to sit in prison for a while.  God removed the comfort to strengthen the man.  And then God introduced Joseph to his higher destiny:  second in command of Egypt, provider of food to God’s chosen people, and mover of the nation of Israel so that the amazing story of Moses and the Exodus could one day happen.

God had bigger plans but Abraham would never have done them on his own.

Even earlier, Abraham was comfortable.  He lived in Ur of the Chaldeans.  It was a big city with all the modern comforts and advantages of the day.  Everything we know of Abraham and Sarah indicates that they came from wealthy families.  He could have spent his live accumulating more wealth, living in a comfortable home, and enjoying all the entertainments of his city.  And if he had, he would have died unknown to us today.  God had bigger plans but Abraham would never have done them on his own.  God had to call him to move and to leave his comfortable life.  Abraham spent the rest of his days being a nomad, tending flocks in the middle of nowhere.  He slept in tents.  He moved when God told him to.  He struggled to deal with the foreign people and nations around him.  And he fulfilled his destiny of being a father of nations, a representation of obedient faith, and the first in the line that would bring forth the Messiah that saved all mankind. 

Find your strength in Jesus, not your comfort in your circumstances.

I also think of Saul in the New Testament who would later become Paul.  Talk about a life of comfort!  He was a Pharisee.  He obviously had money and position and power.  He had a job persecuting Christians and he was good at it.  I can imagine that the chairs he sat in and the bed he slept in felt comfortable at night.  He could have died a wealthy and successful man in the eyes of his fellow Pharisees.  He would have been forgotten in time, just like so many others that were like him.  But God had another plan for Saul.  He struck him blind, changed his heart, and put him right in the middle of the very people he had been persecuting.  Talk about uncomfortable!  He was on the wrong side of everyone – a traitor to the Pharisees and a monster to the Christians.  He went on to live a life of constant hard travel, persecution, and sometimes loneliness.  But he also had a life that brought many to the knowledge of their Savior, encouraged struggling new Christians, and left us with beautiful letters of faith, instruction, and encouragement.  He was seldom ever comfortable – especially not with all the time he spent in jail.  But he himself said he learned to be content. (Philippians 4:11-13) He had the right perspective.  Comfort is temporary but true contentment is a lasting, deep peace of the heart.  And he learned it was found by finding your strength in Jesus, not your comfort in your circumstances,

We all have a role in God’s plan.

I am not Joseph or Abraham or Paul.  I don’t expect to have some monumental role in the history of God’s people.  I do expect to have a role in God’s plan, though.  We all have a role in God’s plan.  And even if the world would not judge our role to be as important as Abraham’s or Paul’s, to God it is every bit as big.  But I will not fulfill my role in God’s plan if I stop and get too comfortable.  I won’t step out in discomfort and uncertainty easily on my own.  God had to shake it up.  And He did.  He moved me away from everything and nearly everyone I know.  2,600 miles away.  And it hasn’t all been comfortable.

Modern-day travel has its own discomforts. 

As I headed out on the road in my motorhome, I had the advantage of taking a comfortable bed and plenty of food with me.  Joseph literally had the shirt on his back and walked in chains to Egypt.  Abraham walked away from Ur with whatever livestock he had and what he could carry.  Paul had whatever his pack animals were carrying on the road to Damascus.  But modern-day travel has its own discomforts.  I battled crazy traffic, strong crosswinds, broken up roads that threatened to shake my motorhome apart, and a particularly scary tire blowout.  Those men of the Bible didn’t know where they were going when they set out.  I did.  But I also had a GPS that sent me through winding, narrow roads climbing up and down through the Ozarks for 2 ½ hours in the dark.  Uncomfortable!

In some ways, it is a foreign country for me.

Abraham and Joseph ended up in foreign lands with all sorts of problems that arose as they learned to deal with the locals.  Abraham lied about Sarah being his wife just to save his own life.  Joseph escaped the clutches of Potiphar’s wife only to have it land him in prison.  I never had to fear for my life.  I speak the same language as the people here in my new home.  No one is threatening to throw me in prison.  But in some ways, it is a foreign country for me.  I don’t know any of the stores here.  It took me a while to figure out which ones sold food as compared to hardware or clothes or insurance.  I have no sense of direction here.  There are trees everywhere and the familiar landmarks from Idaho are nowhere to be found.  Every forest looks just like the next.  The traffic of a big city is its own kind of battlefield and I don’t know all of the rules of engagement.  Living in an apartment complex is another complicated dance I have never experienced, trying to live my life while not disturbing the neighbors that live next to, over, and under me.  Nothing is routine and comfortable yet.

It makes my old life in Idaho seem ever so much more comfortable and safe.

Like Joseph, I feel a little naïve and confused when it comes to dealing with people here.  It took me just a few days to earn a note of complaint from my upstairs neighbor for running my bathroom fan too early in the morning.  There have been things I have never encountered before as I have been working here.  Things that I have been promised that did not materialize.  Things that I expected to occur in certain ways are not occurring in those ways at all.  Disappointments and problems pop up, just like they do anywhere in life.  It is to be expected that there would be struggles involved in such a massive life change.  But it makes my old life in Idaho seem ever so much more comfortable and safe.  I have shed more than a few tears wanting to go back to the routine and comfortable life I had.  I know Joseph and Paul had to feel that way.  I expect there were even sometimes out in the wilderness that Abraham wanted nothing more than to turn around and return to the comforts of Ur.

I realize that if I had stayed there, I would not have fulfilled the destiny God has for me.

As much as I long for the comforts and familiarity of home, I realize that if I had stayed there, I would have rested too much in that comfort and not fulfilled the destiny God has for me.  I know this because I know it is Him who moved me.  It is Him who made all the details work out.  It is Him who convinced me that this mountain-loving, small-town girl from the West should move to the mass of humanity and humidity that is East Coast, big city living.  I would never have done THAT on my own.  So there is a plan and a reason and a goal that I would never have been able to be a part of if I had stayed in my recliner in my comfy home in Idaho. 

It isn’t about my comfort.  It is about God’s plan.

That’s the part I forget.  It isn’t about my comfort.  It is about God’s plan.  It isn’t about my being in control.  It is about submitting to the control and care of God.  It isn’t about how I feel about the circumstances around me.  It is about how I feel about God and my relationship with Him.  God never told me I would live a comfortable life if I followed Him.  He said that in this life I would have trouble, but not to worry because He had already conquered this life.  (John 16:33)  I can’t be sure of being comfortable.  But I can be content, knowing that God sees me and provides for me.  I can’t be sure of having everything work out.  But I can be sure in the moments of despair and frustration and fear and even massive homesickness, God is with me and will help me through it.  So Abraham, Joseph, and Paul – I am not experiencing the hardships you did.  Mine are different and not as life-threatening.  But I know what it is to have God shake up your comfortable world and tell you to move.  I am never going to have books of the Bible written about me, but I can take some comfort from knowing that in this leap of faith and this walking away from all that feels familiar and normal and safe, I am in very good company.

I hope today’s message touched your heart, increased your understanding, and encouraged you.  Praying the peace and comfort of Christ Jesus on your life.