My Inconvenient Prosperity
I’ve been raising a family for a long time now. The oldest of our seven children is 34 and my youngest is 10. That makes for a lot of nappy (diaper) changes.
It also makes for bigger than average purchases at the supermarket, and lots of exercise lugging bags of fruit, vegetables and other sundry items to our car at the local markets.
Anyone who regularly does the weekly shopping knows that the job isn’t finished once you’ve popped the last of the bags into the car. Once home, those bags need to be taken out of the car and their contents put on their allotted shelves.
That’s the part I used to complain about. I was usually all right going out to do the shopping. I was fresh and ready for the challenge. But coming home after 2 - 4 hours of being on my feet and running round from place to place would leave me somewhat wilted.
And it was in that condition that I had to face ‘the putting away’. It sounds simple enough, but the job could take 20 minutes, and on occasions takes nearly 30, especially if a few interruptions came along the way.
So ‘the putting away’ became the really distasteful part of the whole job, and every time I was faced with the task, I would do so, quietly bemoaning my hard lot.
I could have made things a little easier by putting my feet up and enjoying a hot drink before tackling the job, but that to my mind, was an unthinkable alternative. I just wanted to get this unpleasant task out of the way.
One day, as I was pulling items out of a shopping bag to place into our pantry my mind was filled with the same self-pitying thoughts that I usually got caught up with while doing that job.
Suddenly, a new thought cut right across my normal thoughts. It was different – and I knew it was God.
“How dare you complain about the inconveniences of your own prosperity!”
Ouch! That stung. I replayed the statement over in my mind several times.
It still stung.
It had hit the target like an arrow hitting the centre of the bullseye.
Here was I living in a comfortable home, with money to buy food, markets and supermarkets conveniently nearby, and shelves and refrigerators in which to store my purchases – and I’m whinging.
Now, don’t get me wrong. I’m not wealthy by the standards of my own country. I’m just pretty average. However, if you’re reading this on your own personal computer, chances are you, like me, are privileged to enjoy a quality of life that the bigger percentage of the people in this world will never come near.
Perhaps, as an alternative to my prosperous lifestyle, I’d like to join the ranks of those without a home. There’d be no shelves to stack, no toilets to clean, no beds to make, no messes to tidy. There’d be no carpet to vacuum, no garden to weed, no curtains to wash, and best of all – no oven to scrub. Wow! Just think. I could eliminate all those nasty jobs that I have inherited because of my prosperity!
There’d also be no washing machine, leaving me to wash everything by hand. There’d be no blender in which to make those oh so delicious fruit smoothies There’d be no oven in which to cook a roast for a cold winter’s dinner, or cakes for my children’s birthdays. There’d be no juicer to extract those wonderfully satisfying drinks. There’d no no food processor, or personal computer, or heater, or air conditioner……
I decided that this was a lesson I needed to learn very quickly.
I resolved never to complain about the inconveniences of my lifestyle again. Philippians 2:14 rang a loud and clear instruction: “Do everything without murmuring (grumbling/complaining) and disputing (arguing).”
I also resolved to be obedient to 1 Thessalonians 5:18: “In everything give thanks, for this is the will of God …”.
It hasn’t been easy, and it didn’t happen overnight. I asked God to catch me out when I begin complaining, or when I wasn’t thankful. I also called on Him to change my heart, so that my automatic response in any situation would be one of thankfulness – even when I’m wilting.