Picture this…a closet stuffed from one end to the other with clothes. Clothes for this season of course, the ones for other seasons are packed in bags in the attic. It takes all the arm strength I can muster up to squeeze in another hanger. Some of the clothes don’t fit, they hang there anticipating the day I can squeeze back into them, they hang there as motivation. Look down. So many shoes that they are stacked on top of each other. Some are so uncomfortable I choose to never wear them, but they stay there on the off chance I pick them up one day. Tennis shoes, flats, heels, sandals, you name it. In reality I probably wear about 5 pair throughout the year, the other 20+ pair sit hoping to be picked like the toys in Toy Story, longing to be used. To the left of the stuffed closet is a chest of drawers with 5 very full drawers. One drawer houses pjs of which I maybe wear 2 out of the 6 pairs. One drawer is T-shirts, wait look again, no two drawers are T-shirts. There is an entire drawers of scarves. SCARVES! Behind you there is a dresser with 8 decent sized drawers. One for undies, one for pants/shorts, the rest for what…more T-shirts.
Take a 360 degree view of the room. What you will find are nick knacks sitting collecting dust, multiple bottles of perfume, makeup I don’t use, books collecting dust hoping to be opened instead of just moved around to create space for more,
STUFF.
STUFF.
STUFF.
That’s is all it is. STUFF. Being away from home. Living out of this 65 liter back pack, wanting so badly to buy more stuff to fill the space. Thinking about the amount of stuff I have at home really makes me reexamine what my priorities in life are. Am I like the man who built a bigger barn to house his treasures? Luke 12:13-21
Do I value STUFF too much? Do I care to much about having the nicer things to seem a certain way to other people? Do I find my identify in material things? What if I instead donated that stuff to people who do not have? What if I gave my clothes to those cold on the streets? What if I chose to live with less? I don’t want to look back at my life and think well, I had a lot of cool clothes, gadgets, and things to fill up my life and space. No, I want to look back and say I gave more than I bought for myself. I lived with less because my God tells me to give to the poor and hungry. I want to be able to give more than I receive. I want to have the extra money in my account to give when God tells me to give. If I continue to live like I have then I am hindering the work God has for me. There is something that happens in your heart when you see a family of 6 living in a one room cement house sleeping on the floor. There is something that happens when you see children naked and dirty longing for the piece of bread they are given each day. I have been convicted of how much I have. Yes God blessed my live with abundance and for that I am so grateful.
Does God bless us with good finances and wealth so that we can fill the space around us with earthly things or does he bless us with abundance so that we can give that back to grow His kingdom?
All this being said, I am making a change when I get home. All of the clothes hanging in my closet, folding the countless drawers in my room are being given away or sold. The shoes crowding the floor of my closet are being given away.
I am not going to buy a Starbucks coffee every other day. I want to have less, I want to live with less. I want to live by Faith that God will provide for me when I am in need.
I want to live a life lead by Luke 12: 22-34 “ Therefore, I say to you, do not worry about your life, what you will eat; no about the body, what you will put on. Life is more than food and the body is more than clothing. Consider the ravens, for they neither sow nor reap, which have neither storehouse or barn; and God feeds them. Of how much more value are you than the birds?” And which of you by worrying can add one cubit to his stature? If you then are not able to do the least why are you anxious to do the rest? Consider the lilies, how they grow: they neither toil nor spin, and yet I say to you, even Solomon in all his glory was not arrayed like one of these. If then God so clothes the grass, which today is in the field and tomorrow is thrown into the oven, How much more will he clothe you, O you of little faith? And do not seek what you should eat or drink, nor have an anxious mind. For all these things the nations of the world seek after, and your Father knows that you need these things. But seek the kingdom of God, and all these thing shall be added to you. Do not fear little flock, For it is your Father’s good pleasure to give you the kingdom. Sell what you have and give alms: provide yourself money bags which do not grow old, a treasure in the heavens that does not fail, where no thief approaches nor moth destroys.
For where your treasure is, there your heart will be also. “
