“Stop envying others and accept the life you have” is not the worst advice in the world. In the context of money and possessions, it’s quite a vital piece.

But there is also a sense in which it’s terrible guidance.

Hear me out. I submit that discontentment has two separate components: a groaning and a proposed solution (the part where we usually go wrong). My proof is this: is it possible to desire no unholy solutions, to be completely given over to God for our daily life, and still find oneself groaning on this earth?

Scripture seems to think so. It speaks of a longing, one depicted not as a product of sin but simply of standing on this side of the mirror dimly. “…we groan within ourselves, eagerly waiting for adoption, the redemption of our bodies” (Romans 8:23). “Now we know that if the earthly tent we live in is dismantled, we have a building from God, an eternal house in heaven, not built by human hands. For in this tent we groan, longing to be clothed with our heavenly dwelling” (2 Corinthians 5:1-2).

These verses speak not as if we’re home, but as if we’re still very much journeying. We understand from a Scriptural framework that there is a part of our forming that will not be complete in this life, even if we are surrendered to God. That’s just not where we are in the story yet.

What is the source of your groaning this morning? Is it that you don’t have enough things? Or is it that our constant toil, the fragility of our bodies, the screams of nature and human nature are all shouting a soul sense that we’re living in a tent? If it’s the latter, you are discontent in the most wonderful way. Of course you aren’t happy. You’re not home yet.

Truth be told, I’m more worried about those who don’t groan. They think this life is all there is, and they’re given over to making it work for themselves. It is the spirit of the age: “we can make life work now”. Perhaps it’s been the spirit of every age.

In that sense, God never tells us to accept the life we have. That would be awful. He tells us to yearn for the next one, to “set your minds on what is above, not on what is on the earth” (Colossians 3:2), to “store up treasures in heaven” (Matthew 6:20). He implores us to treat our possessions with an earthly disdain as if we will someday grow beyond them, in one fell swoop, with a trumpet sound and an atmospheric leap.

Some of our longings are actually cries for that life. We long for the ending of tears. We long for reward. We long for the restoration of our loved ones. Those of us who long for marriage are really, at the soul level, seeking the relationship of the Trinity, which will be completed there. And those promises will be realized.

Christianity has nothing to say to those who have accepted this life. Instead, it teaches a holy dissatisfaction with it, a groaning for the next. There will be no role for money and possessions there; thus, we shed those desires now. But many other longings are wonderful, for they reveal our awareness of a coming paradise and all that God has wrought for us there. Perhaps longing is not always a bad thing after all?

I’m glad you tuned in today. If you found this post to be of value, please feel free to share it on social media. Thanks a bunch!