Live Simple

A few weeks before Christmas I was shopping at a fair trade store in downtown Ann Arbor with a good friend.  We were looking for Christmas presents for friends and family and as we were headed to the check out there was a box of rings.  I was instantly drawn to one that was a simple twisted piece of metal and says "live simple."  This past year I felt as though God was teaching me to trust him not only for my needs, but also to allow him to delight in me.  I have often denied myself wants or things I know I don't need, and even denied others the opportunity to serve me.  I realized that by doing so it actually doesn't allow others to live as God has called them because we are all called to serve others.  So back to the ring.  I felt God delighting in me in that moment and bought it as a Christmas present from Jesus to me.  It is a great reminder of how God calls me to live, and the life that is truly filling.

It is funny how God prepares things ahead of time to teach us something and we can't see what he was doing until we have already learned.  Let me clarify.  Sense I've been in El Salvador I have had so many opportunities to live simply.  I only packed one suitcase so I don't have a ton of clothes.  I am living with a family and sometimes we have water and other times we don't.  Last night we had water flowing in one spigot outside for only an hour or so and that was the first time we had had running water sense I arrived.  Now I could sound like I am complaining, but I see it as a blessing.  I do not have the luxury of wasting water like I did in the US, and I am reminded of how entirely dependent I am on God for every single thing that I have each day.  Another example is that I don't have a mirror.  I may get one soon, but there is something so humbling and God centering about not looking at yourself every day.  It reminds me of what my focus should be and I think a lot less about myself and my appearance.

If you remember the story of the rich young man who desires to follow Jesus and so he asks Jesus what he must do to follow him.  Jesus responds by saying, "Sell all your possessions."  The young man hangs his head and walks away.  He was more in love with his "stuff" than he was with Jesus.  Sense I have arrived I have found myself more deeply connected to God in prayer, and more fully dependent on him each day.  We can not count on anything except God's faithfulness in all circumstances.  So weather I wake up and am able to take a shower, or if I have food to eat, or clean clothes to wear, I have no idea, but I do know that God's promises are true and because of that I have hope.

"No one who hopes in you will ever be put to shame, but shame will come on those who are treacherous without cause." -Psalm 25:3

Shame is so powerful.  I love how this verse puts shame to shame.  God promises that we will not be put to shame is we hope in him.  So what do you think?  It is scarier to hope for fear of being let down, or is being treacherous scarier?  This may seem like an obvious answer, but seriously ask yourself if you're willing to hope.  I found a definition of hope that says this: a person or thing in which expectations are centered.  Where are your expectations centered?  On yourself, on your family, your school work, your future?  I want to challenge you to seriously consider what you are hoping in and if whatever it is can give you true satisfaction or if it can really be trusted to be faithful all the time.  God can.

Standing in awe of hope,

Sigourney