With the holidays rapidly approaching, I purposed to set aside some time to think and write. In all reality, because I’m normally an external processor, I will be thinking as I write. So, welcome to my cluttered mind! Hopefully the rest of this post serves to bring a bit of clarity and conviction to my heart (and yours!).
So, what’s on my mind these days? Deals! Deals! Deals! Tis the two-faced week of Thanksgiving where we seek to both be thankful for God’s many blessings – but also hungrily scroll sites and stores looking for that next purchase to give us a hit of momentary happiness before we trundle into December.
Now, in all transparency, I love Thanksgiving and Christmas. This is probably my favorite time of the year. Food, family, fun – and focused times of worshipping God for His generosity, faithfulness and incarnate grace. Some of the best worship songs ever written are played on the radio and sung at churches across the world at this time of year (though Thanksgiving has a severe shortage of good songs, save this one). At the bottom of my heart, I do love this time of year – and I want my kids to experience all the good of it.
Yet as the years have gone by – and I’ve gained more disposable income, my mind and heart are a bit more harried and foggy. Now, I’m not saying I was some idyllic innocent child. I’m sure as a kid my idol-factory heart found all kinds of things to worship instead of the Lord during the holidays. If I could just get that next piece of pie – or if I could get that awesome Lego set under the tree, all would be well. I was an idolater back then – and sadly, still am. Yet my waywardness and the context of my waywardness looks a bit different these days.
Nowadays, I have access to the Internet. I have a smartphone. I have YouTube. I have so many more options (and discounts!) vying for my attention than I did as a kid. As a kid, I remember looking at Lego catalogs and imagining all of the wondrously creative possibilities (frankly, I still enjoy some toy catalogs!). Yet there were only so many pages in those catalogs. Eventually, I got tired of the catalog – and just got back to the Legos I already had. But today feels vastly different.
My three big hobbies currently – videogames, boardgames and reading books – are all awash with multitudinous options. Thousands upon thousands of options (and discounts!). There are sites and forums dedicated to aggregating deals on these items. I should know because to my chagrin, I check the ones for games almost daily. Sometimes they’re really helpful and alert me to some great bargains or even free stuff. Yet if I’m being brutally honest with myself, they’re often just stoking discontentment. Is it necessarily wrong to visit these sites? No. But when you have as many games and books as I do – do I really need to know about another sale?
And don’t get me started on YouTube content creators, hobby sites, Reddit or old-school forums, podcasts, etc. While I enjoy some of it (for example, The Backlog Breakdown), so much content out there is just marketing by another name. It feels like it’s always about the latest and greatest thing to wishlist and pine for. But give it three months, and the ravenous zeitgeist will be on to something new, shiny and momentarily satisfying. All of this feels like riding a carousel that never stops and goes around and around. I’m starting to get a little nauseous.
Paul says in 1 Timothy 6:17: “As for the rich in the this present age, charge them not to be haughty, nor to set their hopes on the uncertainty of riches, but on God, who richly provides us with everything to enjoy.” There is so much in this one verse. For starters, it’s speaking to me – and likely to you, if you’re reading this. Given the reality of global poverty, we are “the rich” in this world. We have so much. Even if this year hit my family with more medical and car bills than I would have liked, I still have plenty of disposable income to spend on non-essential things like games and books. The problem with “the rich” like us is not necessarily that we have a lot of money and stuff, but that we get “haughty.” We get proud. We begin to set our hearts and hopes on our riches, on our reserves of hard-earned cash, on our backlogs, on our over-flowing shelves of stuff. We are tempted to look to these riches for solace, for comfort, for security in this “present age.” None of us can control the future or stave off the suffering of living in a fallen world – but riches are a fool’s gold. They give the appearance of something satisfying and secure – but the mirage doesn’t last. First, wearily, our sinful hearts always want more. As the author of Ecclesiastes puts it, “All things are full of weariness; a man cannot utter it; the eye is not satisfied with seeing, nor the ear filled with hearing” (Eccl. 1:8b). And second, none of it lasts. Unless Jesus comes back soon, each of us have an unavoidable appointment with death. All those deals we snagged. All that stuff we smashed into our closets, basements and garages. All of it gone. And then one day, this “present age” will be over – and Jesus will come back (1 Tim. 5:14b). Riches are very uncertain. And yet we spend so much of our time, effort and mental energy on how to spend and get more. There has to be a better way.
Thankfully, Paul shows us that better, more certain way in the same verse. He calls us to set our hope on God “who richly provides us with everything to enjoy” (v. 17). With that as the foundation, Paul then goes on in verse 18 to talk about doing good, being generous and being rich in good works. Paul’s vision of the good life is radically different than what I see in commercials, malls and many websites. Instead of telling us to “Buy now while supplies last!” or the opposite, “Everything is worthless,” Paul calls us to trace the goodness and joy we experience in this life back to its ultimate source. If there is anything good in games and books (and there is much!), it ultimately comes from the good hands of our lavishly generous Creator. We need to set our hope on Him. He will always come through. He will not disappoint. He doesn’t require an upgrade or expansion pack. He is not going to sell us a false bill of goods. He is enough. He is where true life is found.
But applying this truth and living it is harder than writing it. When I finish writing this post – and when you finish reading it, the current habits of our lives will carry us along. Without thinking and prayerfully and persistently implementing new patterns of behavior, we will likely find ourselves browsing the sites again, frequenting the stores and shelling out more cash for uncertainty. I’m not saying it’s wrong to shop or buy something for yourself this holiday season. I know I will. But I want to go about it differently. I want my heart to be in a different place. If “godliness with contentment is great gain” (1 Tim. 6:6), then I want that kind of gain in my life. Don’t you?
So, what do we do now? For me, it looks like moving toward less acquisition and more thoughtful consumption. Although not necessarily from a Christian perspective, videos like this have been helpful to me lately. Instead of scrambling around acquiring and shallowly experiencing vast quantities of games and books, I want off the commercial carousel. I want to slow the purchase train down. I want to go deeper. I want to think more. And I want to be more conversant with God through it all. I’m planning and hoping to continue using tools like Notion and this blog to help me organize and process my thoughts and habits this coming year. I encourage you to find something that helps you do the same.
Ultimately, all the riches and good things I have and will experience this holiday season are from the hand of my marvelous Maker. I want Him to be my chief and lasting joy. And that’s not something I’m ever going to find in a sale.
It’s already April? Where has the time gone! As I continue to quarantine with my family, I thought it would be good to step back and consider where I’m at with my 2020 goals. I also want to share about five things I’ve been enjoying lately. Maybe your interest will be piqued, and you can enjoy them, too!
With a new year kicking off, here are a few goals I’m focusing on this year:
Keep Thinking 