Rather than loving Jesus so much that we hear his call and gladly do it, finding our contentment in Christ and pressing on for his glory because it is what we most want to do, we focus on ourselves, our felt needs and end up shying away from what Jesus asks because it doesn’t “meet my needs”. It is, when all is said and done, a failure to trust in Jesus. 

It is not uncommon to find people dissatisfied as believers. They may be dissatisfied with their lot in life. They may be dissatisfied with their church. They may even have become dissatisfied with the Lord himself.

There is often a common theme with such dissatisfaction. There is a belief that either they deserve better or that the Lord had committed to giving them something that they don’t currently have or enjoy. When the Lord isn’t giving them what they think he should, they become dissatisfied. This may lead them to try and ‘make good’ what is currently lacking and chasing after things they hope will fill up their lack. In worse cases, it may lead to people backsliding altogether and rejecting Jesus because he hasn’t given them what they want.

The problem is obviously not with Jesus (you knew that!) The problem does not even lie in the dissatisfaction itself. We may all be prone to dissatisfaction sometimes. The issue in these kind of cases is in the belief that things are not how God promised they would be. Although more accurately, the real issue is that God often hasn’t promised these things at all.

Most of us can clock on to the more obvious stuff – the things of the unabashed health and wealth gospel – and recognise God simply hasn’t promised to make us all healthy, wealthy and happy if we just trust in Jesus. At least, not this side of glory. We recognise ‘Lord, fill up my bank account’ is just not something Jesus ever promised to answer with a ‘yes’. But there is a soft prosperity thinking that creeps in which says that God has effectively promised I won’t be dissatisfied, and if I am I must do something to find the contentment he promises.

Only, Jesus doesn’t promise us contentment; he commands us to be content. That is subtly different. Along with the command to be content, he also commands us to do a whole host of other things too. Some of which are quite difficult and may not seem like the obvious road to health, wealth and blessèd happiness.

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