Buddhist Catholic Contemplative Evangelical General Christian Hindu Jewish Latter-day Saint Muslim New Visions Progressive Christian

Beliefs

Topics

Columnists

Resource Library

Research Tools

Video

Podcasts

Thought Readers

Faith In Media Tracker

Newsletters

Ad-Free & Subscriber Log-In Subscription Support

Follow Patheos

Preventing Grace

Home
Evangelical
You Can’t Have Everything, Where Will You Put It?

You Can’t Have Everything, Where Will You Put It?

Last updated on: April 1, 2016 at 8:44 am by Anne Kennedy

You Can’t Have Everything, Where Will You Put It? 2016-04-01T08:44:49-04:00 Anne Kennedy

LOGO Patheos Explore the world's faith through different perspectives on religion and spirituality! Patheos has the views of the prevalent religions and spiritualities of the world.

Ah, the sweet sound of children bitterly recriminating each other over April Fool pranks gone awry. A charming way to begin the day.

What is the history of April Fool? Never mind, I don’t really want to know.

And no, I have no announcements to make. I’m not pregnant. I haven’t accepted God’s dubious call to run a marathon. I’m not about to take a new and exciting job in Mozambique. I have no funny prank whatsoever to offer up to whatever god is being appeased on the first of April.

In fact, no joke, I’ll be back in the laundry today, systematically dealing with boxes of clothes and trying to throw away so so so so many things.

Two days ago I most passionately defended the owning of stuff, if that’s what you want and like to do. But really, balanced against the right to own stuff should be the right to throw it all away.

Yesterday I drove my three well children to NJ to say goodbye, one last time, to my Great Aunt’s house and…stuff…by bringing some of it home with me. I really miss my Aunt Kathryn. As I’ve said before, her being there, in Annandale, made me being here, in Binghamton, make sense. I’m not from here. I’m from the West, and other worlds entirely, and this Eastern life with the low rolling hills, and the close set towns and villages still feels foreign. But Aunt Kathryn was a stopping point, in the journeying from one part of the world to another, from my earliest childhood moments, and so I put a frame around living in Binghamton that I was living “near family”.

Aunt Kathryn grew up in the Depression era, the child of missionaries, a tough tough lady. She earned an MD long ago when there were no other women around her doing that kind of work at all. She owned her own medical practice. She eventually worked for AT&T in the glory days when companies hired their own doctors. Her generosity for the gospel kept missionaries alive and eating across the whole world. And very often she would come up here to Binghamton and buy us the whole contents of Wegmans, which richness we always thoroughly enjoyed.

But like so many of her generation, who suddenly had the power to buy, she never was possessed of the power to throw anything away, anything at all. And so, when she died, her house was full to overflowing of stuff, and she was confined to her chair, a space on her own bed, and a pathway to the kitchen. A life so broad and generous and far reaching narrowed itself to the point of not being able to see out of the windows to the vista of the bright New Jersey woods outside.

I came away from her house, and a lovely visit with her daughter, my…which kind of cousin (my mother will have to align the generations for me), bearing a car full of stuff that Aunt Kathryn had carefully collected, and that my own children thought we definitely should have. A small China cat figurine for each child, lots of nice tea cups, a really glorious green milk pitcher, boxes and boxes of pictures and papers, a whole bin of knitted items which will be lovingly distributed by me around the country and world to all my relations who I know will be most happy to receive them (I have orange, green, Everything, ya’ll), and also a really fine bookshelf.

My children wanted to take it all. They have no idea of the peril that lurks behind the accumulation of interesting “Stuff”. I kept saying “No” and “where will we put it”, “what is it for”, “what will you do with it”, and myriad other questions intended to narrow the scope of what we would walk away with.

I came home, remembering my own comfortable moments in that house, moments that never included seeing all of the rooms, moments that were guaranteed to leave me with a stubbed toe and a feeling of sadness, prepared to throw away absolutely everything I own. A great urge to hire myself a dumpster and fill it with all my own things is still sitting in my throat. We don’t Need Anything. We can’t take it with us. We should just rid ourselves of its burden now, before it’s too late.

This is our cultural heritage, we Americans who have endured both deprivation and prosperity. It makes sense that we would look to someone outside of the confines of our culture to tell us what to do with our stuff. What is it for? Where should we put it? And, importantly for me with my own children, how should I help them deal with the tidal way of consumables that fill up their Easter baskets, Christmas stockings, and other unplanned moments like going to Shepherd’s Bowl to eat food and coming home with bags of weird looking China dolls from a garage sale that some nice person “thought all the kids would love”.

“Those are so interesting!” I cry, and when the children wander a way I shove them in a bag and hurry desperately to Salvation Army, or even the dumpster, or anywhere where they will never be seen again by me. Life is too short. Soon I might die. I must not waste minutes worrying about twenty creepy China dolls cluttering up my life.

And so I swing wildly back and forth, just like everybody else, trying to deal with the stuff, and trying to be grateful for the people, and trying to keep my eyes fixed on Jesus, whose generosity for the gospel sent him into the world to feed us, clothe us, and keep us alive forever.

[Me in the room that I never before saw. It was so beautiful and plain and open and bright.]

Previous Post

March 31, 2016

Rescue No Longer: Trump Says Stuff About Abortion

Next Post

April 2, 2016 A Gray Saturday on the Contentious Links

Browse Our Archives

Select a Category books Catechesis of the Good Shepherd Children in Conversation culture watch Daily Devotions Demotivations with Anne faith alone for the grandparents GAFCON In conversation with children In the News Kitchen Notes Lambeth Learning Notes Life Going On Men are Human Notes from Home Pictures Reading the Bible Saturday Links Sermons Signs of the Apocalypse The Bad Word Association The Prayer of Jonah Travel Notes Uncategorized Witless Wednesdays Work and the Christian

Select a Month June 2024 May 2024 April 2024 March 2024 February 2024 January 2024 November 2023 October 2023 September 2023 August 2023 July 2023 June 2023 May 2023 April 2023 March 2023 February 2023 January 2023 December 2022 November 2022 October 2022 September 2022 July 2022 May 2022 April 2022 March 2022 February 2022 January 2022 December 2021 November 2021 October 2021 September 2021 August 2021 July 2021 June 2021 May 2021 April 2021 March 2021 February 2021 January 2021 December 2020 November 2020 October 2020 September 2020 August 2020 July 2020 June 2020 May 2020 April 2020 March 2020 February 2020 January 2020 December 2019 November 2019 October 2019 September 2019 August 2019 July 2019 June 2019 May 2019 April 2019 March 2019 February 2019 January 2019 December 2018 November 2018 October 2018 September 2018 August 2018 July 2018 June 2018 May 2018 April 2018 March 2018 February 2018 January 2018 December 2017 November 2017 October 2017 September 2017 August 2017 July 2017 June 2017 May 2017 April 2017 March 2017 February 2017 January 2017 December 2016 November 2016 October 2016 September 2016 August 2016 July 2016 June 2016 May 2016 April 2016 March 2016 February 2016 January 2016 December 2015 November 2015 October 2015 September 2015 August 2015 July 2015 June 2015 May 2015 April 2015 March 2015 February 2015 January 2015 December 2014 November 2014 October 2014 September 2014 August 2014 July 2014 June 2014 May 2014 April 2014 March 2014 February 2014 January 2014 December 2013 November 2013 October 2013 September 2013 August 2013 July 2013 June 2013 May 2013 April 2013 March 2013 February 2013 January 2013 December 2012 November 2012 October 2012 September 2012 August 2012 July 2012 June 2012 May 2012 April 2012 March 2012 February 2012 January 2012 December 2011 November 2011 October 2011 September 2011 August 2011 July 2011 June 2011 May 2011 April 2011 March 2011 February 2011 January 2011 December 2010 November 2010 October 2010 September 2010 August 2010 July 2010 June 2010 May 2010 April 2010 March 2010 February 2010 January 2010 December 2009 November 2009 October 2009 September 2009 August 2009 July 2009 June 2009 May 2009 April 2009 March 2009 February 2009 January 2009 December 2008 November 2008 October 2008 September 2008 August 2008 July 2008 June 2008 May 2008 April 2008 March 2008 February 2008 January 2008 December 2007 November 2007 October 2007 September 2007 August 2007 July 2007 June 2007 May 2007 April 2007 March 2007 February 2007 January 2007 December 2006 November 2006 October 2006

TAKE THE

Religious Wisdom Quiz

According to James, what does the prayer offered in faith do for the sick person?

Select your answer to see how you score.

Shorten their suffering Ease their pain Make them well, and the Lord will raise them up Comfort their spirit

Books by This Author Books by Anne Kennedy

See All Titles »