Spirituality and its Discontents

A close friend of mine, Michele, once told me I had the "spiritual gift of discontent". I recognized that her feedback accurately portrayed my sometimes "glass half empty" mindset and my uncanny ability to look at 10 things, 9 of which are perfect, and notice the 10th. After all, I come from a long line of "discontent" in my family. And I have, over the decade since I first heard this, intentionally tried to not only notice but also to verbalize what is right. And, working on my tendency toward "discontent" has been good.

Still, recently I have begun to return to the recognize the "spiritual gift" element too....that it, there is some positive in Michele's statement. N.T. Wright suggests in his book, Simply Christian, that the hunger for justice evident in human experience is an "echo of a voice" that beckons us to faith. The hunger is evident in our desire to "put things to right" and this requires noticing what is wrong. So, perhaps my "spiritual gift of discontent" is indeed a gift as evidence, perhaps, of God's purpose for my life to participate in putting some little part of the world "to right".