The end of a chair-a.

We got rid of a chair this week.  And not just any chair.  My favorite chair.  I've actually gotten rid of it one time before this, but then I took it back.  It, along with a couch our dogs ate a hole in, was my first adult furniture purchase.  It was comfy and stylish and full of sentimental value.  It was also full of dog stink, so it had to go.  You wouldn't believe, though, how many times I walked by it until I finally worked up the courage to haul it to the curb.  Ask anyone in my family, I am not a pack rat.  So why is it so hard to let some stuff go?

When Joshua steps in to lead Israel, the walls of Jericho fall with great success.  But at Ai the Israelites are defeated.  Joshua falls to the ground in despair and cries out to God. 

"And the Lord said to Joshua, 'Stand up!  What are you doing down on your face?  Israel has sinned; they have violated my covenant, which I commanded them to keep.  They have taken some of the devoted things; they have stolen, they have lied, they have put them with their possessions.  That is why the Israelites cannot stand against their enemies; they turn their backs and run because they have been liable to destruction. I will not be with you anymore unless you destroy whatever among you is devoted to destruction."  Joshua 7:10-12

When Jericho fell the Lord commanded the Israelites to destroy all within the city and to keep away from the devoted things of its people.  A man named Achan, however, took in the plunder a beautiful robe, two hundred shekels of silver and a bar of gold and hid them.  These things he coveted were standing in the way of God's power in His nation.

Do you know how much better my house smells without that chair?  As soon as it was gone I knew I had done the right thing.  But we get caught up in the having, forgetting that the power is in the letting go. 

Now, the world will not be made perfect if we all get rid of our smelly chairs, let go of the pants that don't fit us any more or the gallon-sized bag of troll dolls you found in the back of your closet (true story....ask Christi Thomas!!).  I believe in God's power and I believe it's bigger than all of these things in spite of ourselves.  Still, there's something to being "liable to destruction" instead of accountable to Christ.  What within or around you is standing in the way of you seeing God's power?  Maybe it's time to haul it to the curb.

   
XOXO...Kelly