I rejoiced greatly in the Lord that at last you renewed your concern for me. Indeed, you were concerned, but you had no opportunity to show it. I am not saying this because I am in need, for I have learned to be content whatever the circumstances. Philippians 4:10-11
“Living simply has more to do with the “why” rather than the “what”. One of the most famous lines from the documentary Affluenza goes something like this: “We buy things we don’t need with money we don’t have to impress people we don’t know.”
Almost everything we buy says something, either to ourselves or to the world around us. And because we care about what people think about us, we are susceptible to this kind of marketing. So we clutter up our lives with stuff and activities that we are told will make us popular and admired.
The problem of course is that all of that stuff needs to be cared for and eventually, stored—which of course, is why the storage unit industry continues to grow. In a country that has the highest average square footage per house in the world, we still need more space to put stuff we don’t use. And that us the key to a simplified life: what we actually use and why? What activities do we engage in because we actually like doing them rather than because everyone else is doing them?
The way to measure simplicity in your life is not by counting your stuff or looking at your calendar but to ask what role these things and activities play in your life and, more important, if they add feelings of contentment or anxiety. Contentment in how you live is how the simple life is measured, not in the amount of stuff you have or how busy you are, but how you feel about how you are living.”
Lynn Miller in “Simple Living” in Giving: Growing Joyful Stewards in Your Congregation, volume 18 (Richmond: ESC, 2016) 10.
Miller hits the nail on the head. This summer I plan to help my students in various classes this summer (and readers of my daily meditations) to think about the “why” rather than the “what”. I want to do this so that our living models for others a different way to live, a Christian way to live: to consume without being overtaken by consumerism and to use things without being possessed by them, so that we are free to live, give, serve, and love as content conduits of God’s material and spiritual blessings.
Today at an International Missions Conference at Sarang Community Church (one of the largest churches in Korea), I will speak on “Sustainability and Missions” (reply to this email if you’d like a copy of my manuscript). The aim of my remarks is to deconstruct the false paradigm that “financial sustainability” is the driving force of missions, as the NT reveals that “faithful stewardship” is God’s design, His pattern, for sustaining and fueling mission.
What’s this have to do with simple living? The paradox is that God’s work goes forward not because wealthy people bankroll it. It moves forward when God’s people (whether rich, poor, or in between) live simply and participate richly with what they have: their gifts and goods to make known the gospel. The Korean Church, much like the early church in the days of the NT, has plenty of resources because millions or ordinary people are living openhanded lives and participating enthusiastically with the resources in their stewardship.