There are devoted parents, outstanding teachers, and excellent schools. But no one can say that, overall, our system of education is flourishing. This is one of the many things that leads a majority of Americans to feel that their country is going off, or is in danger of going off, the rails. We didn’t get here because we wanted to get here. We got here, at least in part, because we wanted eudaimonia—we wanted to flourish—but without putting in the work. Paul wrote, “I have learned to be content whatever the circumstances.”  I have learned. It took time and practice, paying attention and perseverance.

People want to flourish. Aristotle surmised that the most basic longing people have is for eudaimonia, usually translated as happiness but perhaps better understood as contentedness of mind and soul. It’s a sense that one’s life is worthwhile and on track, that is one is living the way he or she should—and it’s a good, beneficial life. When St. Paul wrote that he had “learned to be content whatever the circumstances” (Phil. 4:11), it seems that he was expressing something like eudaimonia.
People want to feel that their lives are going well. What’s often forgotten is something classical philosophers like Plato, Aristotle, Epictetus, and also Jesus and St. Paul agreed on, namely, that the path to contentedness of soul isn’t the chasing of contentment itself but hard work over a long period within the context of a virtuous life.
Aristotle writes of the toil involved in becoming a person of integrity—the kind of person who has arrived at a place where he or she can enjoy a life of honesty and know that he or she is trusted. Paul speaks of a contentment and peace that “transcends all understanding” (Phil. 4:7), but he also uses the metaphors of running, fighting, and boxing. Jesus speaks of peace but also of crosses.
When Thomas Jefferson wrote that God had given all people a right to “pursue happiness,” he was drawing on this ancient thought. Happiness—eudaimonia—human flourishing—is something that’s pursued. It takes time, work, persistence, perseverance; it involves a longstanding pursuit of some kind of excellence, the possession of which, along with a virtuous moral life, can bring a sense of contentment and thriving.
A persistent problem lies in the desire to arrive at contentment without putting in the effort. Aristotle noticed a tendency to confuse eudaimonia with amusement.
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For believers, over time, our belief systems and thought patterns are conformed more and more to God’s Word. Triggers will lose their power to tempt us towards sin and self as God’s Word becomes more real to us.

“What are you thinking?” We ask this of each other often, don’t we? When our minds are troubled, and our thoughts seem filled with unholy and disturbing ideas or images, we need outside help. Christ does not leave us to fend for ourselves but rescues us out of our distress to produce peace in our thought lives.
God’s Word makes a startling statement about a believer’s thought life. 1 Corinthians 2:16 tells us that, through our union with Jesus, we now have the mind of Christ. This gives us the ability to distinguish good from evil and truth from lies. Believers can think as Christ thinks. Throughout this lifetime, we will battle to keep our thoughts set on him and the truths of Scripture, but, no matter what you have been through, it is possible to have your mind renewed so that you experience thought patterns that line up with the gospel and an increasingly Christ-centered emotional life.
Women who have pursued pornography, sexual fantasy, sinful sexual experiences, and other expressions of sexual sin increase their likelihood of experiencing troubled thought lives. Sadly, women who have been sinned against with sexual trauma can have troubled thought lives, through no fault of their own. Some say that an image or memory can pop into their minds in an instant, even though they have not looked at porn or been involved sexually with someone for years. Others’ patterns of thought are entangled with troubling emotions that seem deeply engrained in their responses; prayer, Bible reading, and listening to Christian music push away these thoughts for a time, but they still return. Distressing, scary, shame-provoking memories about themselves, their bodies, men, women, relationships, and more flood their minds like an incoming wave or an unexpected hurricane that threatens to undo them.
The Bible teaches that all things are the servants of God (Psalm 119:91) and that all things are in subjection to and under the authority of Jesus (Ephesians 1:22–23). Yet many of us struggle to come anywhere close to clean and holy thought lives that serve Jesus. Present and past experiences have formed pathways in our minds that produce dark thoughts—and usually result in sinful behaviors too. Maybe we have absorbed sexual images through pornography, movies that normalize and celebrate sin, or books that feed sensual ideas and fantasies. Maybe the memories that currently trouble you aren’t primarily sexual in focus, but they are connected to messy relational dynamics in which you were ensnared, like codependency and emotional enmeshment. Perhaps fear triggers a moving sidewalk in your thoughts that carries you from distraction to distress to destructive patterns of thinking.
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Last year, after completing the ministry’s new mandatory sexuality training, the Mundells, who are both 42, said they raised concerns with their supervisors, the human resources department, and other Cru leaders, including the director of theological development, Keith Johnson. Each time, they said, their concerns were dismissed. The Mundells questioned whether it is Scriptural for Cru to allow staff to adopt LGBT identity labels—including identifying as “gay Christian” or using a person’s preferred pronouns—and to refer to same-sex attraction as a “disordering of sexual desire,” not sin.

One of the nation’s largest campus ministries has dismissed two longtime employees who publicly questioned the way it addresses theological issues surrounding sexuality and gender. Uriah and Marissa Mundell, who live and work in Austin, voiced their concern over Cru’s policies in a WORLD story published Feb. 22. Two weeks later, the organization formerly known as Campus Crusade for Christ terminated their employment.
“Our primary concern is that the level of dissonance you have with Cru’s position on biblical sexuality that led you to go to public spaces to communicate your disagreement with the ministry,” the human resources department said in a March 13 email.
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