I am in the process of decluttering my house. Maybe even more so, I am deeply in process of decluttering my heart.
There is so much clutter.
Over the years, a house filled. Overflowing really. We had worked hard to get these things. Married at 19 , with only a few boxes between us, we had started out with so little.
Quite a few years ago, I had scoured the papers for Black Friday sales and plotted my shopping tactics with near military precision. It was the first Christmas we ever had money. We had always scraped by in the winters but this year would be different. We had an abundance.
- Justification #1 We had never had money to buy for all our loved ones. This year I wanted to really bless them.
- Justification #2 These were really good deals. I may never get a chance to get these things later. I was being thrifty shopping the sales.
- Justification #3 Isn’t giving one of the most godly principles?
- Justification #4 It wasn’t like I was being greedy, I was giving abundantly to a lot of people
- Justification # 5 I’m not like one of those crazed Wal-Mart shoppers trampling down old ladies to get the new game console, I know what Christmas is really about and just because I am out buying a ton of things doesn’t mean I don’t love Jesus.
And so I set out in the cold, black morning.. I came back hours later with more than what was on my list. So much more. My eyes found things and my heart cried out that these were necessary, deserved, satisfying.
Can I tell you that I do not remember one single thing I bought that year? Not one. I spent a lot of time wrapping up things just so. I spent a lot of time looking for more sales. I spent a lot of time in crowded stores, finding parking spaces, wrapping, storing, transporting my idols about.
Before you think I am an overly guilt ridden person ( I am), I am not saying that all shopping is idolatry, that having nice things is a sin, or that we shouldn’t get nice things for our loved ones. I am simply saying that for me, my heart was being filled with things not of God. It was a distraction from my relationship with Him.
After Christmas was over I felt a huge let down. That’s it? Everyone opens their gifts, the kids play with them for a bit, the relatives say thanks, and then it’s over. What??? Emptiness again. Luckily for me, the after Christmas sales were just around the corner and I could go get the things I really wanted. The things that would satisfy me.
God is so faithful to bring us back to Him.
When the economy started to nosedive and the housing market began to dry up, our painting business was hurting badly. I sunk. Depression black and cold took over. I had nothing to fill me now. Shopping had been my entertainment, my activity, my comfort and distraction in the midst of my life. Desperation and despair has a way of making God’s voice penetrate in a way that nothing else can.
In our pain, he calls us and perhaps because we have nothing to numb us, we can hear him.
I went on a spending fast.
It forced me to search my heart.
My issues with shopping are no longer a major battle.
After tearing down idols, there will be ruins and there will be rubble. It has to be cleared away, and that takes time and grace.
Some of the rubble in my life left to be cleared after all these years is my accumulation of stuff. Too much stuff everywhere. More than we need. More than I want.
The drain on me to care for it all is too high a price to pay, but I was overwhelmed by where to start.
God works all things. Enter Tsh of Simplemom.net author of Organized Simplicity and blogger extraordinaire of all things simplifying. What a lovely happenstance that she is a fellow tutor at a home school group and we happened to meet this year. She is just as down to earth and simple (in a good way) as she is on her blog. She also has an e-book called 52 bites you can download to your kindle or nook. I bought it as an e-book and had it bound into a spiral ring because I love to write all over things when I am organizing and planning which I can’t do on my Kindle. It gives 52 bite size projects to help make your life simpler. Her book really helps to break it down into doable steps of which I am still working. It put hands to the process that my heart had moved toward.
Seven Goodwill trips, one garage sale, and a few Craigslist posts later and we are well on the way to clearing out the rubble left from those years and to having much less to clean. Now on Black Friday, I stay in my pj’s, eat turkey sandwiches, and spend some time with my family. I think we’re all better off.
