Christian Hoarding....

Hoarding is the sickness where you accumulate certain things in great abundance to the point where it disrupts your function to live.  There is a show called hoarding that depicts these sad stories of people who have been hoarding everything from newspapers, to books, to animals, trash; just about anything.  Their houses are so cluttered to the point that it makes it impossible to live.

As Christians we do this very same thing.  We hoard in all this mess because we are either attached to it by memory, lust, or dependency.  It can be we hoard relationships, attention, bitterness, jealousy, fears,or even ourselves.  This hoarding does the same thing to our souls and spirit internally that the physical hoarding of all that stuff is the same result.....clutter.

We clutter up our souls with this garbage to the point to where this stuff can dictate our personality and out faith in Christ.  You can't believe God will do it; if you got a bunch of failures in your life cluttering up your perception.  You can't see past the pain or anguish of your past sins or the sins of other that were done to you.  Scripture says...

Matthew 16:26 For what will it profit a man if he gains the whole world and forfeits his soul? Or what shall a man give in return for his soul?

This scripture is preceded in the same passage with Jesus telling his disciples "If anyone would come after me, let him deny himself and take up his cross and follow me (Matt 16:24-26).  Hoarding is the exact opposite of denying self.  To deny self as Jesus prescribes is to forsake all for Christ.  Hoarding is selfish and self-centered.  Hoarding also is also an idol to the hoarder.  it has become their god to the point they are blinded by it and their soul is cluttered with it.  Brothers to be the man of God we need to be; heck to be the Christian we need to be, we have got to deny self.  We have got to remove the clutter that is in our hearts.  We have got to empty ourselves of the mess and make room for Christ and let him fill us up with all that we need.

You so busy with filling up your soul with empty relationships that the Lord has no room inside of you.  There is no space for a God as big as Christ.  Christ knows how big he is and he needs all of you or none of you.  He is not a God of partiality.  He gives us all of Him and he wants the same in return.  He will not be second fiddle to any idol.  Just like in the scripture Matt 10:37-39; God is saying I need to be above your parents, your children, your dog, your cat, your car, your home and yourselves.  God is saying "I don't want your clutter I want you".

Commissioned men of God....We as leaders and fathers, brothers, and sons have got to heed this message the Lord is trying to drill into us.  You can't love your woman with true agape love if you are not willing to show that same love to Christ first.  You can't walk in confidence that God has got your life in his hands if you are not willing to make room for God in your heart and soul.  Remove the clutter in your heart; remove the anger that lies withing; remove the selfishness that chokes the life out of you.  Then and only then can God take residence inside you and truly change you from the inside out.

So what do you think? please feel free to comment