But God, it's MY stuff!!!

We all have these times, I guess. The convicting times where you realize that you're not as good as you fancy yourself to be - or the uncomfortable times when you realize that you are a lot worse off than you righteously believe yourself to be. Those times when you realize the glaring thing you're doing that's separating you from God as effectively as a ten-foot-high brick wall with razor wire on the top separates you from the prisoners in the local jail.

As much as I hate these times, I know that they're when I grow the closest to my Savior. When I get off my high, righteous horse and realize what a failure I am. It's uncomfortable, often difficult, and usually involves a lot of sacrifice and growing pains.

Lovely.

So here I find myself in the midst of conviction with a path carefully set out before me. All I have to do is walk it in complete obedience with my Savior.

Yeah...

As Anne Shirley would say: "Therein lies the rub."

My problem is simply stuff. Anything and everything that I own becomes to me a prized possession, to be guarded even with my life. I treasure it, take care of it, store it, and -- this is where the biggest problem comes in -- find my joy and contentment in it.

It seems that no matter what I have, no matter what I get, I always want more. There's always that elusive "one more thing" that'll make my happiness complete. When I feel down, my stuff is what I think of -- it's what makes me smile.

It should be what makes me cry.    

It should make me cry buckets because I've put it higher in my estimation of value than my relationship with God. Where God should be the one I find my joy and contentment in, it's something silly like a book or music or a knick-knack or electronic gadget of some sort that makes me glad to be alive. How pathetic and shallow is that?

And since God is a jealous God, who wants my heart and soul to belong completely to Him, He sends along the Holy Spirit to whisper in my ear that I'm putting to much store in my treasures-on-earth.

Many, many times He has done this, I'm ashamed to say, but I've only half-heartedly listened and given perfunctory and -- ultimately -- ineffective efforts to right the problem. Truth be told, I wasn't too concerned about it. I figured that there were bigger problems in my life that God should be tackling, like my temper or my self-righteousness. (Just a hint, ye reader: If God brings something to your attention over and over again, don't tell Him that He should be focusing on something else or try to focus on something else in your own all-knowing power. God's not stupid. He knows your biggest struggles better than you do. If He brings it up a lot, it's important!) Recently, I realized that telling God stuff like that isn't very smart. I also realized that my protectiveness of my possessions was a big problem - and that it was creating a huge rift between me and Him. Then I decided that I didn't want that rift to be there anymore and that my prayers to know Him better were basically ineffectual when I refused to face my obsession with things squarely in the face and admit that it was bigger than I wanted to own up to.

So, I prayed and gave God my stuff - every last thing - and resolved to place less store in the things I owned. By the way, if you give something to God, expect Him to test your sincerity. He doesn't want a mamby-pamby giver. You've got to mean it or you'll be right back at square one when the first test comes.

My first test came in the form of my older sister.

She has a habit of storing the books that she's reading in her lunchbag when she's at work. Normally, I don't care whether or not she does it (except for the time when she accidentally refrigerated one), but when she's reading my books, I, as the meticulous and obsessive owner, request that she keep book and lunchbag separate.

As my older sister, she doesn't place much store in what I say.

So, she borrowed one of my brand-new books and stored it in her lunchbag. I nervously asked her to keep it out of the bag, in which was stored a Tupperware container of very juicy watermelon. Despite my pleas, she put the book in her lunchbag (don't judge her; I'm sure it was God who arranged this) and, by some twist of mischief, the container leaked the juice, which my book happily sopped up.

I had a moment of paralyzing (I'm joking a little) shock when I discovered it (after all, it was a new book...) and when my sister offered to buy me another one, I stumbled over the Holy Spirit, who was whispering in my ear that I had decided to give God my stuff; and that the book didn't really belong to me; and...I shut him up after that and accepted her offer.

It didn't take God long to send the Holy Spirit back to work on my conscience and eventually I -- rather unwillingly -- went back to my sister and told her that it wouldn't be necessary to buy me a new book. When that was out of my mouth, my only regret was that I hadn't said it when she asked the first time. Especially when the book dried so well that you could hardly tell it had been soaked for three-and-a-half hours in watermelon juice.

I'm still waiting for the second test, and I have an uncomfortable feeling that it's going to be a little bigger than watermelon juice. I constantly have to remind myself that it's God's stuff, not mine, and He can do what He wants with it. It's a strange feeling to know what He could do with it, but the relief of not having to be so protective of it and the thrill of being more generous with it (it's amazing how easy it is to give people something that doesn't belong to you!) so far have outweighed the "inconveniences" of giving it to Him.

I want to encourage anyone who reads this that if there is something that God is bringing to your attention and you are ignoring Him because it seems too hard to change or because you just don't want to do it, think about this: Is it really worth holding on to if it's going to separate you from the God who gave everything -- including His life -- for you? When I realize that, my collection of stuff that I've gathered over the years (that will someday all be broken and gone) doesn't seem as important anymore. I mean, just think about it. God gave you everything anyway, so what's the harm in giving it back? Would it be a big deal if He took it all away? (The horror, I know...) It's not likely that He will, but there's always the possibility. All I'm saying is that if my house starts on fire and all my stuff goes up in smoke, I'd rather it belongs to God than me. Then it's His loss - not mine.

As Otto Koning says: God can take better care of your things than you can.  
   
So, what's the harm?

'Till next time,