Acts 2:45 - Too much stuff

Last night I was preparing for a cluster meeting and was looking at Acts 2:42 which is a verse I think we should all heed. As I was looking at this verse I read around it to see what else was said co that I could put it into some sort of context and gain a little more understanding. While doing this I noticed what it said about the early Church in verse 45;

Acts 2:45
     And all the believers lived in a wonderful harmony, holding everything in common. They sold whatever they owned and pooled their resources so that each person's need was met.


Now we have just had Christmas, and I am sure that like me many of you will have received a lot of gifts. I don't want to sound ungrateful here but for me personally many of the things I received I didn't really need or particularly want. It is not that I don't appreciate the time effort thought and money that my family have spent on me, but I pretty much have everything I need or want already. And as a result I have far too much stuff, most of which I never use or need.

Now this has been a thought in my mind for a little while but I feel that with the direction my life is heading and the signals I feel I am receiving that something needs to be done about this in my life. I need to think about what is important in my life and trim down the excesses, streamline and become less wasteful. Get rid of all of the useless paraphernalia in my life and do something useful with the proceeds.

I know that holding things in common is not going to be easy or necessarily practical, but it is possible to collect together everything I can do without, sell it and use the proceeds for expanding God's work somehow. There is the old adage that one man's rubbish is another man's treasure, and amongst the things I own there is considerably more gold than rubbish. I guess that what I am saying is that I am planning on selling a lot of things, getting rid of the years of accumulated material wealth. And yes initially I will be hopefully turning this in to financial wealth, but with that I can follow God's plans and hopefully build up a small store of spiritual wealth that will be worth so much more.