I started praying this prayer that I would become less attached to my material things when I was in Swaziland. I knew the moment I started praying that prayer, it was dangerous and I probably wouldn't like the way it was going to be answered. Thy next day, I got paint all over everything I was wearing. Great…
I don't have that many things but I had started to notice an intense attachment forming to everything material that I owned. I didn't want to share my clothes. I didn't want to share my computer, my soap, my sunglasses… I just didn't want to share. We had talked at debrief about how we wanted to be a community that shared everything but I wanted all of my things to myself. Nothing I have is that special or important. Nothing is really irreplaceable… But I was clinging so hard.
Over the next month, more of my clothes got covered in paint. I lost a sock or two and some underwear. I lost a few other things that weren't too important and then we moved on to Ethiopia. In Ethiopia, I continued my prayer to be less attached to material things and what happened? Immediately my pack broke, my tent bag ripped, my spork broke in half (which was hard because I needed it for the first time)… Things started dissappearing and everytime I went to buy things, my money would dissappear as well. I was frustrated at first but then I started to think about the prayer I had been praying. God was answering that prayer. I started to notice that I was becoming much more attached to the people around me and to the love that God was pouring into me than to my things. God showed me that I don't need extra material things and what I do need, He will provide if I just trust Him
Matthew 6:25-30 says, "Therefore I tell you, do not worry about your life, what you will drink; or about your body, what you will wear. Is not life more than food and the body more than clothes? Look at the birds of the air; they do not sow or reap or store away in barns, and yet your heavenly Father feeds them. Are you not much more valuable than they?… And why do you worry about clothes? See how the flowers of the field grow. They do not labor or spin… If that is how god clothes the grass of the field, which is here today and tomorrow thrown into the fire, will he not much more clothe you- you of little faith?" Good call, Jesus. I read that passage 3 weeks into my stay in Ethiopia and God's lesson started becoming super clear.
So I gave up my hoodie and my speaker. I gave away some shirts and a skirt. I gave away a bunch of things that were in the free pile (shhhh…). I gave away a lot of food. I gave away money… But most of all, I gave away so much love. I did not find that love in material things as I had noticed I was doing before. That love was from God for people. And the more I focused on God's love and provision and not the things that I had, the more love I seemed to have to pour out on those around me. Pretty cool. 🙂
