This I’d rather ignore: Do I own my possessions, or do they own me?

By Mark A. Taylor

I first heard the phrase decades ago, when I was still a young adult,

… before I bought a second car,

… before I spent untold hours through the years getting cars cleaned and gassed and oiled and running well, and uncounted dollars on tires and dents and parts and insurance that never covered the cost of it all,

… before my wife left her stay-at-home life for a part-time job, and before it morphed to full time,

… before we paid for preschool and childcare while my wife was working,

… before I took a second job to “expand my ministry”—and my income,

… before I filled my closet with clothes and later packed unnumbered garbage bags with clothes I grew tired of and gave away,

… before I bought a wall of bookshelves and before I filled them,

… before I carted box after box of books to donate at Goodwill and to a Christian college library,

… before I accumulated more Christmas ornaments than we can squeeze onto two trees,

… before we furnished a TV room in addition to the living room,

… before I purchased a large-screen TV and then a larger one because the first set went bad,

… before we replaced kitchen and dining room furniture ,  

… before we moved to a newer home in a nicer suburb,

… before I spent thousands and thousands of dollars on paint and wallpaper and plumbers and electricians and exterminators and roofers,

… before I made yearly investments in chemicals to fertilize some plants and kill others and discourage pestilence that threatened a garden that could never have fed us anyhow,

… before I paid money managers and tax preparers and trust creators to protect and grow my investments and provide for distributing them when I’m dead,

… before the weight of my wealth became a burden I ignored like the person who’s 100 pounds overweight and doesn’t remember how light it felt to be slim,

…before all that happened, I first heard a speaker say. . .

You don’t own your possessions. They own you.

I knew he was right, but I didn’t know how to live by what he was teaching. And now, after all these years of spending and acquiring and maintaining or storing what I’ve bought, I still don’t.

Give it all away?

A minister mentor during those young adult years once told me, “If you donate everything you own to help the poor, then you’ll  need someone who kept their money to support you.” Jesus told the rich young ruler to give everything away, but his command was not for all of us. We know the Bible indicates God’s compassion for those living in poverty and warns against evils that follow a love of money. But at the same time, some who followed him faithfully were people of means. So what’s wrong with me?

The quick and convenient response to this is, “It’s not how much money you have, but what you do with it and how you see it.” And in all my years of accumulating, I’ve encountered some affecting role models in people who viewed their wealth soberly.

• A well-paid employee in a large, local firm lived simply (but not in poverty) and spent more than we know financing and participating in mission work around the world.

• A retired missionary couple living on a just adequate retirement income decided to give away their total government stimulus check. “We don’t need it,” they asserted.

• A minister’s wife made a public vow not to buy anything for herself for a whole year. No new clothes. No new kitchen gadgets. No new decorations. Nothing, except food and necessary toiletries. It was a struggle in our consumer-driven economy, but she learned the true value (both positive and negative) of possessions.

• A retired preacher and his wife gave away all their possessions except for what they could carry in a couple of suitcases and backpacks on an airplane. And I do mean all: every stick of furniture, every dish and placemat and table setting, most of their clothing, their car, their books, their linens, their souvenirs. “I don’t own a key,” he told me. And then they spent two or three years traveling the world, with many stops to encourage missionary families on several continents.

When they drove out of town after giving it all away (on their way to deposit their car with the relative who would get it), he asked his wife, “How do you feel?”

“Free,” she said.

They had virtually no possessions owning them.

Free indeed?

I think about these examples, about the “who’s the owner?” question, and about the Bible’s warnings on wealth, and I intend to take some action. But I don’t have much time this morning to decide what that will be.

I must make an appointment to get my taxes done.

I must plan how to eat all the food in our refrigerator before the trunk full of groceries I brought home yesterday from two different markets goes bad.

It’s going to be warm today, and there’s a spot in my front flower bed that needs tending.

We paid big bucks to a guy who dug a trench through our front yard last fall to accommodate a new sump drain pipe because the old was too small and had caused a flooded basement family room followed by months of hassle and unanticipated expense. I need to repair my lawn where the ugly trench path has created a mound of clay-colored mud.

None of this is wrong or sinful. Some of it could be called good stewardship of the abundance God has lavished on me. But as I spend time and capital on what I own, I can’t forget another proverb repeated by some who have probably come to terms with all of this in ways I haven’t:

Live simply so that others can simply live.

I’m going to get another cup of coffee (we have a new coffee maker I really like) and ask God to help me understand how to do that.

_____________________________

Money photo by Karolina Grabowska from Pexels. Closet photo by Andreea Pop on Unsplash. “All you need sign” photo by Edward Howell on Unsplash. Paint tray photo by KJ Styles on Unsplash. “Simplify” photo by Mark A. Taylor.

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