Holy Discontentment

Wrestling with faith often involves embracing doubt, not to pin it to the ground and suppress it. But rather, to take it by the hand and allow it to open a door that leads to a broader unfolding of what it means to have faith. Often we experience doubt as annoyance with an idea, belief, or perspective. Something that begins to unsettle our settled-ness. And we may respond to it with defenses to protect what was, and what we claim as our own faith tradition. We may dig in our heels and become more resolved and redouble our efforts with spiritual disciplines, yet the niggling doubt, or shift in thinking may persist.

Learning to trust the doubt, or as I like to think of it, the holy discontentment, may feel like the irritating sand in the oyster that will eventually produce within us a beauty like the pearl of great price — a pearl faith.

How can discontentment be holy? It’s a holy doubt when it leads us to deeper water. It’s sacred ground when we grow dissatisfied with easy answers that sound hollow when we’re thirsty for a hallowing of ordinary life. When we sense something more that invites us to explore, learn, take another step, simplify and cast off what encumbers the soul.

I wish I had a list of easy answers, a check list to help me know that this way is the way to walk with God. But each life is different. The cadence of faith and rhythm of life is unique to each one of us. Yet, we need not walk alone. We are given one another to walk alongside of as we keep our eyes fixed on the Giver of Life and Faith. We are simply called to trust our experiences with God on the faith journey which includes learning to trust that the annoyances, the discontentment, the defensive reactions are all keys to knowing a new facet of God-with-Us.

How have you experienced a “holy discontentment” in your own life? What does it feel like? What image would give it substance? Where does it lead? To a broadening and expanding of the heart, or to a narrowing of the mind?