Buy Less

Luke 12:¹⁵ “…Take care! Protect yourself against the least bit of greed. Life is not defined by what you have, even when you have a lot.” (MSG, emphasis added)

To live what is known as the One Handful Living, the first thing you need to do is Throw Out and the second thing you do is Buy Less. I get that with Black Friday and Cyber Monday, we get good deals. I get it. Some of us are prudent,

we have had this list for a while, and we plan our shopping.Fantastic! But the truth is a lot of people, sixty-two percent of people admit that they shop to buy things they do not need on Black Friday or Cyber Monday. They shop just to cheer themselves up. They use shopping as a form of entertainment. Listen, if you are going to live a significant life, you have to throw out and buy less.

I saw a video interview of Jeff Bezos; he was already a billionaire at the time. But in the video, the interviewer could not understand why Jeff was still driving an old Honda car despite all the money he had. Some people that have only a few hundred thousand dollars will feel insulted driving the car Jeff Bezos was driving. They feel that until they have a certain kind of car, house, or device they have not arrived. You need to buy less and set yourself free. Psalms 119:^36-37 “Cause my heart to bow before your words of wisdom and not to the wealth of this world. Help me turn my eyes away from illusions so that I pursue only that which is true; drench my soul with life as I walk in your paths.” (TPT, emphasis added). This is huge! In fact, this should be your prayer.

What I am saying is you need to live a One Handful Life. And what that does is it frees up your life. The One Handful Life frees up the other hand and declutters your life. You travel light! And when it comes to buying things because God has blessed you, right? So, you have financial resources. But when it comes to spending it, what I probably will recommend is to choose experiences over things. Use your resources to create experiences and memories with the people that you love, not to buy things that will burn up. Create experiences with your family.

Use your money to create experiences with your children. Use your money to create experiences with the people that matter to you. Even if you are buying things, the difference is you are buying things that will create experiences. And that is so powerful. For instance, my dad bought me a bicycle on my ninth birthday, and he taught me how to ride it. I can never forget it, the streets I was riding on are still vivid in my mind. While the bicycle is gone, the experience of my dad buying the bicycle, assembling it, putting me on it, and teaching me to ride is priceless.

Prayer: Father, I am grateful for the things You are teaching me. Please cause my heart to bow before Your Words of wisdom and not to the wealth of this world, in Jesus Name. Amen!