Disproportionate Care

I find myself returning often to John Piper’s thoughts on Enjoyment and Idolatry.  The one that’s haunted me lately is #2:

Enjoyment is becoming idolatrous when it is disproportionate to the worth of what is desired. Great desire for non-great things is a sign that we are beginning to make those things idols.

If we all came equipped with desire-o-meters or emotion-o-meters, this would be an interesting study.  Often I am challenged by the realization that I often desire/enjoy/care for things in a pretty ridiculous proportion to their relative worth.  Or, conversely, I’m challenged when I realize how often I can be deflated/discouraged/downcast over things of relatively small value. In fact, sometimes I have to stop myself in the middle of the day and do a little self-test: “Kari, why are you frustrated or discouraged?  Oh, you think your house might not sell and you will therefore be unable to move into the new house that’s being built.  Hm.  Ok. If that happens will God still be good? Yes.  Ok. If that happens will you still have a place to live (i.e. not be homeless)? Yes. Ok.  If that happens will you still be able to flourish and serve God and raise your children, even if you had to live in an apartment for the rest of your days (oh the horror!)? Yes. Ok, then I think this is a disproportionate amount of care.”  Maybe that sounds strange and mechanical, but for me, it helps to self-talk myself into reality.

The little scenario I was just referring to obviously is in regard to our house. Yes, we are building a house, but to our surprise, our little rental home in Corvallis (which is now empty–long story), has not sold. And because it’s empty, we are now paying rent and a mortgage (=not fun).  And even though we are qualified to buy our home even if that Corvallis house doesn’t sell, we both feel that it would be financially irresponsible to take on two mortgages, so if it doesn’t sell we’ve decided we will just have to walk away from the new house (and the money we’ve already put down).  I can say without a shadow of a doubt that God led us to go forward with the building of this house, that’s one thing I know for sure. I also feel certain that He’s led us to sell the Corvallis house and I can even say for sure that we’ve taken some steps of obedience with regard to how that all came about (another long story).  However, as anyone who’s walked with the Lord any amount of time can tell you, just because you obey God and follow His leading doesn’t mean He’ll make it all go exactly as we want.  (Shall we accept good from God, and not trouble? Job 2:10)

A few weeks ago I was feeling stressed and discouraged about the house situation.  I wanted to be excited about the house, but couldn’t because I didn’t know for sure if it would happen.  So I felt anxious.  And Jeff was so good, so matter-of-fact. He simply said, “What’s the worst that can happen?  If our house doesn’t sell, we don’t get to follow through with this new house, and we lose a pretty significant amount of money. Yes, that would be painful. But it would not be the end.  We’d still have an apartment. We’d still have a job.  We’d still have eachother.  It wouldn’t be the end.”  And he was so right.  I was giving a disproportionate amount of care to this concern.  While I was spending all my prayer time talking to God about real estate, there were prayer requests on our church’s prayer chain, truly dire situations, that received no more than a cursory flare prayer up to the Lord of Hosts. Forgive me, God.  Disproportionate care.

I know nothing I’m saying is new.  We all battle it.  I spend more time praying about non-eternal things than eternal things.  Ouch.  More time praying about unsold property than unsaved family members. Ouch. And please hear me, I’m not saying that we should’nt pray about our daily needs, that we shouldn’t rejoice over little kisses from God like toilet paper on sale at Safeway (that was tonight) or a perfectly timed coincidence today that made me able to visit my friend’s new baby right after her birth. Those “little” things are big because they are from God.  But when we have “great desire for non-great things” we’ve allowed disproportionate care to creep in and steal our joy.

On the continuum of victory in this area I’m somewhere in the middle (aren’t we all).  The praise is that I can honestly say I absolutely love our little apartment, I’m happy as a clam here, and if God decides to withhold our new home from us, He will still be good and I will still be happy.  And since it is His money, He can decide who keeps it anyway.  There are some God-things about the house that I would be sad not to see come to fruition (more on that later–amazing brand-new Christian I met at church is building the house across the street!), I think God certainly thinks up the coolest stories, so I’ll let Him write it as He pleases.

The prayer is that I still allow disproportionate care into my heart on a pretty regular basis.  A grand family-picnic I planned for tonight didn’t quite pan out, and instead of shaking it off I found myself frustrated and irritated.  Why? It’s such a small thing.  Disproportionate care.  Lord help us desire and care for things only in proportion to their true worth–the worth You assign to them.  Protect us from disproportionate care, and help our joy to be found in that which can never be taken away.