War Zone! =)

now that we've moved a lot of stuff up from sitiawan to our new house in seremban, our house is full of stuff. the chaos reminds me of when our house was like a refugee camp.

however, now there is too much furniture for it to be like a refugee camp (i'm assuming that refugees don't usually have much furniture). so, i think it looks more like a War Zone! (in a war, there has to be lots of enemy furniture for our soldiers to blow up, and lots of our furniture for enemy soldiers to blow up. thus, a War Zone should have lots of furniture in it... heheh)

it's nice to have familiar things around though. these are the things that i grew up with in sitiawan, through the years of my late childhood and adolescence. i'm glad that they now help to make our new house into a home. =)

there is a danger in all of this though. check out this paragraph from Jim Elliot's diary, dated 4 Jan 1951 (from Shadow of the Almighty by Elisabeth Elliot):

"i have been musing lately on the extremely dangerous cumulative effects of earthly things. one may have good reason, for example, to want a wife, and he may have one legitimately. but with a wife comes Peter the Pumpkin Eater's proverbial dilemma - he must find a place to keep her. and most wives will not stay on such terms as Peter proposed. so a wife demands a house; a house in turn requires curtains, rugs, washing machines, etc. A house with these things must soon become a home, and children are the intended outcome. the needs multiply as they are met - a car demands a garage; a garage, land; land, a garden; a garden, tools; and tools need sharpening. woe, woe, woe to the man who would live a disentangled life in my century. 2 Timothy 2:4 is impossible in the US, if one insists on a wife. i learn from this that the wisest life is the simplest one, lived in the fulfilment of only the basic requirements of life - shelter, food, covering, and a bed. and even these can become productive of other needs if one does not heed. be on guard, my soul, of complicating your environment so that you have neither time nor room for growth!"

now, i love The Wife very much, and i am privileged to be able to set up a home and a family with her. but there is wisdom in the words of this martyr, that resonates with my soul. i must be careful about this danger of material acquisition. as the hymn says, this earth is not my home; i'm just a-passing thru.