Last week during my Bible study (I’m currently doing Beth Moore’s “The Patriarchs”) Beth shared a little something that spoke right to my heart, “God’s going to keep giving you this test until you pass it…break the cycle.”
Sometimes I feel like I’m going to go to my grave battling this sin – the sin of desiring the things of this world too much, the sin of using the money God has blessed me with unwisely. I hate this about myself; I’m repulsed actually.
So, once again (I’ve lost count how many times God has tried to break me of this..) God is disciplining me in the area of how I spend money, as He strips away the desires I have for the things of this world that DO. NOT. MATTER.
“No discipline seems pleasant at the time, but painful. Later on, however, it produces a harvest of righteousness and peace for those who have been trained by it.” (Hebrews 12:11)
In college I racked up $15,000 in credit card debt. I had to reach a deep, dark, pit and humbly ask for help to dig my way out. God was faithful. I paid every penny of that debt off.
You would think I would have learned my lesson, yet I still desire stuff. I still swipe a credit card too often (I really shouldn’t AT ALL). When am I going to learn?
This world is broken. I get so frustrated at the stronghold money has on so many people. You can’t leave your house without being bombarded by advertising and people making you feel like you have to have stuff to be happy. (well, actually you’re bombarded in your own home – as soon as you turn on the television, or when you’re on Pinterest….)
“Do not love the world or anything in the world. If anyone loves the world, the love of the Father is not in him. For everything in the world – the cravings of sinful man, the lust of his eyes and the boasting of what he has and does – comes not from the Father but from the world. The world and its desires pass away, but the man who does the will of God lives forever.” (1 John 2:15-17)
Saturday I returned $160 worth of stuff that I had bought for Jackson for his b-day/Christmas. God convicted me of the insanity of buying $160 worth of stuff for a soon-to-be one-year-old. Something else also caused me to return the clothes and the movies – I don’t want Jackson to be like me.
I want him to find his contentment in Jesus – nothing else! I don’t want him to think he has to have the latest and greatest of everything to be happy. I want him to live a life that portrays 1 Timothy 6:6-10:
“But godliness with contentment is great gain. For we brought nothing into the world, and we can take nothing out of it. But if we have food and clothing, we will be content with that. People who want to get rich fall into temptation and a trap…For the love of money is the root of all kinds of evil.”
In order for Jackson to live differently, I have to live differently. I have to allow Jesus to break these strongholds that material things have on my life ONCE. AND. FOR. ALL.
Beth Moore said, “Let’s pursue becoming what we hope our descendants will be.”
Please Jesus, help me be the person you want me to be.
Jenn, I absolutely love this. In those moments when conviction strikes and you know what you ought to do but it’s outrageous (like returning all of that stuff!), it isn’t easy to make the right choice. And the most amazing part is that God doesn’t tug on your heart and ask you to do that just for his sake…but, like Beth Moore said, for the benefit of your descendants. I’ve been teaching Bella that her happiness comes from inside of her, and even over the weekend I was wanting to get out of the house, go to dinner, find something fun to do, etc., and it was right around that time she asked me where my happiness comes from. Oh, the lessons we learn as we parent these little ones….or as they parent us? 😉 This is a lovely reflection of your heart, friend!