Enough

Through divine intervention, I stumbled upon a book that would strengthen not only my choice of this simple living lifestyle, but also my faith. When I first started looking at minimalism, I wasn't viewing it as something faith-based, but more of a practical I-want-less-stress-and-stuff viewpoint. I now see why this was the book I found instead of the one I set out searching for.  Enough: Finding More by Living with Less by Will Davis Jr. is thought provoking and each new chapter and section moved me into a deeper understanding of what I had really gotten myself into.

Book break-down: Davis breaks the book down into the 5 views of living this sort of "enough" mentality. He starts out by discussing what this "enough" is and what it means to have enough. The second view is of  More Than Enough. This view is about living with more than what we really need and how this is or isn't biblical and how those who have more than enough can greatly impact others around them. The third view is on Less Than Enough. He goes in depth on what it looks like to have less than what is actually needed and how even those who have less than enough can greatly impact those around them. The fourth view is Moving Toward Enough. In this section, he writes about how we start moving towards this idea of enough and how we start looking at the value of things around us. The fifth view is Less is More. Davis discusses what it looks like once we've achieved the idea of "enough" and how it can radically change us.

"Our culture pushes us to strive for more - more money, more stuff, more clout. But how much is enough?"

This book so deeply impacted me in this lifestyle and I am now seeing it from a biblical standpoint. Back in January, I thought I was on a simple journey of decluttering and letting go of things I no longer needed, but this book has kicked it up a notch. It was sometime in June that I first posed the questions to Jason, "how do we know when we have enough? How will we know when we're done decluttering?"

I realize that the following won't fully make sense to you without having read the book, but I hope I've provided enough provoking thoughts to make you want to dive in, so, here it goes...

• A small section in the book of Proverbs talks about a man named Agur and how he prays that God will give him enough. "Give me just enough to satisfy my needs." Do we really need any more than enough?
• One of the greatest struggles we face in today's world is contentment. If we don't have the latest and greatest, we're not good enough. If we don't look a certain way, we're not good enough. Isn't it time we have enough of this thinking?!?
• We are manipulated by the world to think that everything we have is the most valuable thing, but if you were faced with a house fire and only had 30 seconds to get everything valuable, what would you grab? What is truly the most valuable?
• There are times when God gives us more than enough to help those around us who have less than enough, but we don't see the need because of the wool covering our eyes.
• When we have an excess coming in, we don't need bigger barns for storage, we need to use the excess to bless others around us.
• Scripture tells us that we are called to take care of those who don't have enough or those who have less than enough. Have you encountered any of these people or are you so caught up in your own enough that you are missing them right in front of you? I know I am.
• Most Americans have no clue what it's like to live with less than enough. Not everyone in the category of "less than enough" had a choice for where they are in life.
• Where does your value lie? If you really want to know, follow the trail of where your money goes daily.
• What are we really doing with what we have? Are we using what we have to meet a need?
• If we don't know what we really have in storage or surplus, do we really need it? What if we all developed a sort of "just keep it" mentality?
• God isn't necessarily asking us to use something we don't have - He just wants us to use what He's already given us. Just ask Moses.
• Are we too scared to leap for fear of not being able to see where we will land?

Back to my own questions - how do we know when we have enough? - I know we have enough, we still have more than enough and there are days when the thought of that beats me up and tries to break me down. We have more than we need, but maybe this is our time of being full so that we can be used to help those around us...maybe this is our time to be a blessing. How will we know when we're done decluttering? - I still don't know the answer to this one, but just today I woke up thinking about needing to let go of some things in my closet and then at church was presented with a way to use my purged items to meet the needs of someone else. I don't know if we'll ever be done (it can be a very draining, but humbling process), but in the mean time, while we are determining our idea of enough, we are being used to help others and have been given a voice to share what we're learning on this journey.