There are disciplines that I have read about but never really explored until they stared me in the face last night while I was unpacking. One of those disciplines is simplicity. I am living among those who have little, and I was unpacking my shoes, or shoe collection as Jason likes to call it. And I have pared down my shoes b/c we were moving, but still have at least 30 pairs. It's interesting when thinking about ministry, when you're actually living it. The art of acquiring seems to stare down your neck every time you purchase a cd.

It's true, and I see it in my own life and the lives of my friends; a new car, the latest fashion, plasma screen tv, that cool watch, a new stereo...

"Every morning when I left for work, I would take something in my hand and walk off with it, for deposit in the big municipal wire trash basket at the corner of Third, on the theory that the physical act of disposal was the real key to the problem. My wife, a strategist, knew better and began quietly mobilizing forces that would eventually put our goods to rout. A man could walk away for a thousand mornings carrying something with him to the corner and there would still be a home full of stuff. It is not possible to keep abreast of the normal tides of acquisition. A home is like a reservoir equipped with a check valve; the valve permits influx but prevents outflow. Acquisition goes on day and night--smoothly, subtly, imperceptibly. I have no sharp taste for acquiring things, but it is not necessary to desire things in order to acquire them. Goods and chattels seek a man out; they find him even though his guard is up. Books and oddities arrive in the mail. Gifts arrive on anniversaries and fete days. Veterans send ballpoint pens. Banks send memo books. If you happen to be a writer, readers send whatever may be cluttering up their own lives; I once had a man send me a chip of wood that showed the marks of a beaver's teeth. Someone dies, and a little trickle of indestructible keepsakes appears, to swell the flood. The steady influx is not counterbalanced by any comparable outgo. Under normal circumstances, the only stuff that leaves a home is paper trash and garbage; everything else stays on and digs in."
--From Essays of E.B. White


Another thought is the slight nervousness that I feel at night. Lying in bed watching the ceiling fan spin, listening to the endless dogs barking... It's there in my subconcious, a twinge of fear. But fear exists and rightly so, but it cannot lead. Fear immobilizes, and I cannot make my decisions based on fear. God leads us down many various paths, some of which are dark and overgrown and turn out of the daylight. But he is here, with me. "Call us near, Lord, meet us here." Our roles have shifted in that Jason now takes Jake out at night, and I in the morning. But my reluctance to get out of bed in the morning is diminished once I am outside. Because the mornings in our neighborhood are so peaceful. The sun is just breaking and you can hear the birds chirping (even though those are the same birds our neighbor was throwing rocks at on Sunday). But I enjoy the mornings in our new abode, the fear dissipates and peace begins working anew.

Yet this I call to mind and therefore I have hope:
Because of the LORD's great love we are not consumed, for his compassions never fail.
They are new every morning; great is your faithfulness.
Lamentations 3:21-23

posted by Kelly @ 8:42:00 AM