Decluttering

 My youngest grandson was sent to give himself his nightly bath.  He’s just turned 5 and is very proud of this responsibility, but with all the excitement of older brother having a birthday and the cake being readied for the festivities, I guess he just gave himself that extra measure of autonomy and filled the bathtub right up to the top.

Mother swung by in her rounds and ‘noticed’ the flagrant abuse of conservatism in a house where money spent on water is one of the things they govern quite carefully.

She said to me, “Mae, would you go in there, I’m just too busy and since I’m a bit perturbed, I might be a bit too hard on him”. So I did.

“Well well", I said casually, as I looked thru the bubbles and saw a very happy child. “I guess you’re just having a luxurious bath, aren’t you?” I continued.

Then, seeing his puzzlement, I asked him if he knew what “luxurious" meant, and he clearly didn’t. So off the top of my head, I began to explain...

“It’s like rich people, who have such a nice time in life, treating themselves to so many extras,” I continued, faltering a bit thinking about how I had chosen to describe “rich people”.

“Oh NO!” He sat up and with a serious look on his face, and, wiping a stray bubble from his brow, continued with great conviction. “I never want to be rich.  Rich People have WAAY too much stuff to put away!”

In Tony’s words, “That’ll preach”.

The Bible has some things to say about this ‘problem’. 

For example, Hebrews 13:5, “Keep your life free from the love of money, and be content with what you have, for he has said, “I will never leave you nor forsake you.”

In the next few weeks, I want to highlight a few ‘saintly’ people, some known to you and some only known to history, who have not held their blessings back. Instead they have invested in others, leaving very little to ‘put away’ except in the lives of others.  

Stay tuned!!  I’ll be talking about some people you may know who have gone to glory recently in our mission, but next week we’ll probably start with that wonderful woman named Mary with her bottle of perfume and what my Japanese pastor had to say about her so many years ago.

 

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