A Promise to Myself

I promised myself last month when I was at the Stewardship Kaleidoscope conference that was going to begin to blog regularly on the topic of stewardship. I have to admit that I am a terrible steward. One only has to look at my car, my house, and my desk and they can see what a state of chaos my life is in at this time.

I have always been a somewhat undisciplined per son. I’m not a huge fan of authority, rules, and other such things. I have spent most of life and career knowing the rules. I often times am the one that knows the rules – inside out and upside down. I have also spent the majority of my working life in situations where the work I do not always fit the clean and idealized situations that formed the policies and procedures and rules. I have often found that the rules – which often times are pretty ridged – have to be bent, massaged, adjusted or made exception to in order to get the job done.

So when I think about stewardship – taking care of things – I get a little overwhelmed at time. I start out fine then the rules get in the way. I don’t like the constricting nature of programs and systems. At this point in my life, my life is a bit out of control. It is chaotic and the chaos in my life can be seen as I look around my home. Nothing is getting taken care of. I’m a terrible steward of what I have.

And I have stopped running. I know that his is an area of my life that has needed work for quite a while. I have gone kicking and screaming in the other direction for too long.

So tonight I begin.

So tonight I begin the apply to ME the reading I have done over the years on the topic of Stewardship and Simple Living. I believe that part of being a good steward is utilizing ones life, and that means everything folks, time, skills and abilities, and STUFF to a greater purpose and good. It is easy to talk about Stewardship in terms of giving tithes (10% of income) to the church. It gets harder when we encroach on how one spends their time, disposable income (even budgeted income) and how they acquire and dispose of stuff.

It are these finer points where I struggle.

I struggle because I see this as a big picture thing. I see this as making significant changes in my life to more fully reflect the gratitude and joy of a beloved child of God. I don’t get joy out of being the care taker of everyone else's stuff. Stuff is just that stuff – crap – garbage – and we in this nation are obsessed with material good. Since I see this as a BIG PICTURE issue, One that overlaps with other concerns, my thoughts on this matter are not well organized and articulated. I hope that by making the commitment to MYSELF to blog about this I can bring some organization and order to this chaos that is my life.