intangibles

My husband and I love to watch "Love It, Or List It."  It is a program about people who have decided their houses no longer work for them.  One of them usually wants to move and the other wants to revamp.  A realtor and an interior designer compete to see who can sway them their way.  The realtor looks for a house meeting their standards within their price range and the designer is given a budget to bring their house up to what the owners feel the need.

Our reasons for watching are simply to see the finished product of the designer.  It always amazes us that one person can take a house and turn it into a show place.  It never looks like the same house when she is finished, even if she finds problems unknown before and cannot give them all they want.

Yet the more I watch the more I think about how spoiled we are as a people in general.  Owners will tell the realtor they want a house in a specific area at a specific price with a specific list of "must haves."  Of course there really are some necessary things like a place to sleep for the family members, a bathroom, and a place to cook, but a swimming pool, an eat in kitchen and dining room, a bathroom for each family member, a bedroom for each family member with plenty of windows in each but not street lights near them, and so on, and so on is simply astounding.

Last evening we watched a couple with two small children living in a 4000 square foot home with and indoor swimming pool that just wasn't working for them anymore.  They'd lived there a year.  I couldn't help thinking, "and in another year you would hate your new home as well."  It turned out a good thing they had renovations done, because a mouse  infestation was discovered.  They had to get an exterminator and replace wiring throughout the house.

I think this is what we all need at times, an exterminator and rewiring within ourselves.  We have all these so-called needs that are no more than wants, but we feel we cannot live without them.  An exterminator would cleanse our thought processes and rewiring would help us realize we can live without them and will probably be better off for it.

Most people know that when I was a child I grew up in an approximately 800-900 square foot home with a mom, dad, 5 children and a dog.

We had one bathroom for all of us to share and we were happy. 

I am not going to lie and say we weren't cramped.  Five kids in such a small bedroom was crowded, but we had fun!  We giggled together, tormented each other (my oldest sister was brilliant at this - she has a very vivid imagination and can be very convincing) and became very close and still are. 

When I was 15, we moved to a house twice (or more) the size of the one mentioned, but were no happier.  As a matter of fact, I don't think we were as happy. 

We tend to get it into our heads that things will make us happy, when it is actually love that does so.  Without love we are lost.  Living in that tiny, cramped house that was full of love and laughter is a treasure I will always have with me.  It was there that we had the family get-togethers, where our aunts and uncles and cousins would come over and we would have a fish-fry with fresh bluegill from the small lake we lived by.  We would all sit in the yard, eat, play games and sing!!  I remember the singing - love songs and gospel.  What a wonderful and uplifting time we had together!  There was still only one bathroom with about 30 people running around using it, but we made do with knocking on the door to remind people there were others in need.

As an adult I tend to find myself falling away from needs into wants way too many times.  A bigger house with more or bigger bathrooms, a finished basement, a flat yard, etc. etc, etc. tend to sometimes press on me.  If only we had.....swarms my thought processes.  I need to remember my roots.  It has never been things that brought me joy and laughter, but the wonderful love of family and friends and most of all, the love of my heavenly Father who pursued me until I finally turned and ran into His loving arms.  He has never let me go and I am thrilled!! 

I am tremendously blessed.  I have a lovely home, a wonderful family and extended family, many friends whom I love dearly, enough to eat and drink, work to do, and a more than wonderful husband who makes it his goal in life to bring joy to me and those around him.  

All this translates into this - I have a God who truly loves me.  He is all I will ever really need, though my flesh cries out for more.  That doesn't stop Him from pouring out the blessings anyway, and I am ever grateful for his generosity to me.
⁷ Beloved, let us love one another, for love is of God; and everyone who loves is born of God and knows God. ⁸ He who does not love does not know God, for God is love. I John chapter 4

I pray we all realize just how blessed we really are and begin to hang on to those intangibles that truly make life worth living and a joy.