I find it difficult to keep my day, my lifestyle, my belongings tailored to just what I suspect God has in mind rather than my preferences, which so often outpace His will for me. I conclude this, because they all tend to get out of whack at least occasionally if not almost always. I have a theory if a person does according to God's will consistently, things will fall into place quite readily almost all the time. But we as a family, perhaps as a nation, have too many belongings, almost always too much food, too many things scheduled, too many library books...a plethora of feasting and a paucity of fasting.
It is not my mindset to rein it in properly. I haven't learned the art, which is probably what many would call minimalism. I see a home with minimal furnishings and to tell the truth, it makes me restless. I want for bookcases, and choices of activities and distractions (though mine at home tends by necessity to be housekeeping...sigh). This "abundant" life makes for an abundance of things to dust, stacks to move, things to reach over, look under, lose things in...and though contending with stuff is a high price to pay, I haven't found the clarity of mind that eliminates it and changes the ongoing nature.
Eventually we will move from this house, perhaps sooner rather than later. With that possibility comes the appealing but overwhelming idea of reducing our belongings by half or so. I think in the spring we will have a series of garage sales, getting rid of a record amount of our clutter and furnishings. I want to find out what it's like on the other side, where there are margins around each furnishing, and everything doesn't have to be shoulder-to-shoulder with the next thing. Maybe I will be restless and have to refill it a bit, but it will be refreshing none-the-less to seek it and try it out for a season.
With that in mind I have been, for example, passing more and more of the garage sale signs for which I otherwise might have stopped. I have been purposefully pushing things out to the garage and boxing them up--which I can probably do for another six months before I really feel the effects of it. I haven't been on the acquisitive side for a while (though Tim does need me to buy him some pants)...I hope and expect that this will be something of a permanent and increasing (increase of decrease, that is) tendency for our lives. As a result I would expect more freedom, more time, more clarity for parenting, family life, outings, fellowship, hospitality, witnessing--in varying order. Maybe, hopefully, more time to do what God would prefer for this life He has so graciously given to me. I strongly suspect He made me for something better than to primarily dust and rearrange stuff.
Luke 12:15 Then He said to them, "Beware, and be on your guard against every form of greed; for not even when one has an abundance does his life consist of his possessions."
