You know, inspiration can come from the craziest places. Today I was reading through my Twitter feed while waiting on my little one to finish ballet. A friend of a friend posted that for Lent she was giving one useful item from her home each day. Sort of a purging of clutter. As I have been on the warpath to rid our home of the EXCESS, that sentiment struck a chord with me. As a Southern Baptist, we don’t celebrate Lent, but I have always been impressed with those who have the will-power to give up something they love for 40 days. I decided to see what the Word has to say about the idea of giving up material things.

I found what I was looking for in the very first book of the Bible. In Genesis 13:5-7 God says this about Abraham and his nephew Lot and their STUFF:

⁵ Now Lot, who was moving about with Abram, also had flocks and herds and tents. ⁶ But the land could not support them while they stayed together, for their possessions were so great that they were not able to stay together. ⁷ And quarreling arose between Abram’s herders and Lot’s.

At this point in the story, Abraham had heard God’s call to leave his home and travel to a land God would show him. Abraham, amazingly, had agreed because he believed Him to be the One True God. In a land that was polytheistic, it was possible that Abraham had never seen or met anyone who believed in One and Only One God. This would have been a foreign concept to him. From infancy he would have been taught to sacrifice to the sun god, the moon god, the fertility god, the harvest god, this-that-and-the-other god to gain their favor. The idea of believing in One God, and walking out that faith by leaving home and land and family to go to a land that God would show him? That’s just crazy talk. But believe Him he did, and now all of Christendom knows Jehovah as the God of Abraham, Isaac, and Jacob. Mercy! The difference one person can make in the lives of thousands and millions that come after him.

So Abraham and his nephew Lot are en route to this new home that God has promised. Everything rocks along just fine until THINGS get in the way. POSSESSIONS cause some major issues for the pair. They have attained so much wealth, much of it in the form of livestock, that the land cannot support them both. There simply isn’t enough food growing in the area to feed all of their animals and people. They had to separate. The end of the story is that Lot went one way and Abraham the other. But let’s look at what happens in the messy middle of the story.

Had Abraham and Lot had the grace to separate peacefully, all would not have been lost, but the last part of verse 7 lets us know that that’s not the case. Because of their possessions, quarreling arose between Abraham’s herders and Lot’s. This uncle and nephew, who obviously adored each other enough to begin a new life together, were eventually separated because of arguing and quarreling over THINGS. Their JUNK became a wedge driven between them. Oh, how I wish I could just shout back into history that PEOPLE ARE MORE IMPORTANT THAN POSSESSIONS!! The relationship between family is of far more worth than the junk we carry around.

Friends, are we naive enough (or blind enough) to think that this story doesn’t happen to each one of us today? I mean, I know that it’s the story of Abraham and Lot, but isn’t it all too often OUR STORY? I know we wouldn’t dare say it out loud, this confessions that we value our things more than relationships. We know that the Sunday school answer has it going the other way.

Except that sometimes our actions belie our beliefs.

And we lose our vision.

And we forget that it is people who go into eternity with us, not what we have stockpiled.

Oh, yes. I DO believe that the notion to give away things which we hold dear is a fantastic way to untie ourselves from our belongings. Unyoking ourselves from materialism? Yes, I think the Father would approve of that. Divorcing ourselves from the chaff to marry ourselves to the wheat? That’s a holy union. One that I willingly enter into.

I want less of STUFF and more of HIM. I want to rid my home, my schedule, my life of the clutter which causes nothing but distraction and busy-ness, so that I can have room for more of JESUS.

More GRACE.

More LOVE.

More of HIM.

Each year our church hosts a huge event to honor missionaries from across the US and around the world. We fly them all in to Birmingham, put them up i host homes, and dote on them all week. They provide us with a list of items they need for their ministry, and even some personal needs, and we do our best to blow them away with what we provide for them. We have a huge kick-off on Wednesday night of the celebration, and it is absolutely one of my favorite days of the year!

The missionaries set up booths so that our church members can go around and talk with them about the people they serve. Our children have the opportunity to meet missionaries from literally all over the world. The missionaries are treated like rock stars while they are here, and it is so good for our children to see that being a missionary is such an honorable vocation. My favorite tradition is how the kids take their GIC prayer books around and get autographs from the missionaries.

After a really fun time of NBA-style introductions of the missionaries, and a time of worship for what God is doing around the world, we always hear from a speaker who is heavily involved in global missions. The aim is to recharge the missionaries for what can be extremely lonely work, and to refuel our church’s commitment to supporting missionaries. This year’s speaker was Dr. David Platt. You might have heard of his book Radical: Taking Back Your Faith From the American Dream which came out last year. In it, he challenges us to take a BIBLICAL look at the issue of surrendering everything to make Christ known to the nations. If you haven’t read it, IT IS A MUST READ. I’m currently working my way through it, and he issues QUITE a call!

Anyhoo, David Platt was our speaker and he was phenomenal! In a nutshell, his sermon was about how Christ, as our Master, Savior, Son of God, and Redeemer, is worthy of our praise. We should have such love for Him and devotion to Him that we worship with reckless abandon. And He is also worthy of the praise from the 4.6 billion people around the world who don’t know Him. If we love Him and agree that He is worthy of the worship of people from all nations, then we will be about the business of sharing Him with them. As I said, it was phenomenal!

Today MA and I attended a luncheon with all of the missionaries. We were privileged to sit with two sets of missionaries, one serving in Spain and one in Birmingham. It was incredible to hear their stories and hear about their daily lives in the areas God has called them to. The family from Birmingham has six children, whom they homeschool, and they are involved in ministry to people leaving jail and re-entering society. It was fun to learn ways we can plug into their ministry. We are always looking for ways we can serve with our girls.

After we ate, the missionary ladies held a panel-type discussion about life on the mission field. They discussed how they were called to missions, funny stories about things they have done, and ways God is moving in their ministry. I loved seeing my girl interact with the missionary children she met last night.

I am so thankful to be able to raise my girls in a church that cares so passionately about reaching the nations for Christ! It is the most important work we can do!

** I wish I could show more pictures of our celebration time last night. Unfortunately, being a missionary in a land that is hostile to Christianity is a harsh reality for many of these missionaries. For that reason, it could be dangerous to them to publish their photos and connect them with Christianity. All the more reason to keep them surrounded in prayer! (The above photo is not a missionary in a secure area. She is Sonya Bumpers with M-Power Ministries, located here in Birmingham. They serve the poor in area code 35222.)

“Do not be yoked together with unbelievers. For what do righteousness and wickedness have in common? Or what fellowship can light have with darkness? What harmony is there between Christ and Belial? What does a believer have in common with an unbeliever? What agreement is there between the temple of God and idols? For we are the temple of the living God. As God has said, ‘I will live with them and walk among them, and I will be their God, and they will be my people.’

“‘Therefore come out from them and be separate,’ says the Lord. ‘Touch no unclean thing, and I will receive you. I will be a father to you, and you will be my sons and daughters,’ says the Lord Almighty. Since we have these promises, dear friends, let us purify ourselves from everything that contaminates body and spirit, perfecting holiness out of reverence for God.” (2 Corinthians 6:14-7:1)

Friends, as I read this charge to examine ourselves today, I am struck with a sense of how holy our God is.

And what wretched sinners we are.

He is so pure, so without blemish, so perfectly right in actions and motives, so loving, so just, so unadulterated that we cannot compare. We, because of our sin, because of our impurity, because of our blemishes, because of our un-right-ness in actions and motives, because of our un-lovingness and unlovliness, because of our apathy toward justice, because of our adulterous ways in all things cannot even stand in His presence . We don’t even dare to lift our head to gaze upon Him because we will be consumed.

Hallelujah, we have a Savior who covers us with his sacrifice, becoming sin in our stead, that we might be spotless and without blemish and therefore righteous before the Father. Worthy, even, to be not only in His presence, but to be His child. His heir. Having His Name.

Can I get an amen for that kind of grace?

Now, if that kind of grace has been imparted to us, don’t we at least owe our reverence to the Giver? This passage tells us one way we show our reverence to God… by perfecting holiness. Knowing that we are imperfect, how do we perfect holiness in our own lives? By eliminating those things in our lives that make us unholy. You know the things I’m talking about*:

• Watching things on TV that we have no business watching.
• Being overly competitive or self-exalting. Serving God so we can look good.
• Getting our own way no matter what.
• Brooding about harsh things you would like to say to someone.
• Being prone to exaggeration or lying.
• Patterns of griping or complaining.
• Saying things that are divisive.
• Having a lack of respect or being critical of our spiritual leaders.
• Failure to forgive, even when the guilty party hasn’t asked for forgiveness or even admitted they’ve done anything wrong.
• Robbing God by failing to tithe.

This perfecting holiness does not save us. We know that. We are saved by faith alone in the atoning sacrifice of Jesus. We will never rid ourselves of enough sin to be righteous. That would be salvation by works, and salvation by works is no salvation at all. It certainly is not the Good News that Jesus offers. However, as James tells us, faith without works is dead. We must have works in order to show that our faith is genuine. This perfecting holiness, ridding ourselves of those things which don’t belong in our lives, is a way for our faith and works to line up. We separate ourselves from unholy things, not because it saves us, but because by doing so we show reverence to God (v.1).

I pray that we would all examine our hearts today and choose this day to separate ourselves from those things which we know to be unholy, and yoke ourselves to those things which are holy. Because in doing so, we show reverence to the One who is so worthy of our devotion.

*This list was taken from the Solemn Assembly prayer guide for Shades Mountain Baptist Church found here.