This Lent: I Threw It Away

The day before Lent started, I skimmed my Facebook news feed and saw a link that piqued my interest. Later, I Googled “40 Bags in 40 Days”, clicked on one result (which I confess I did not read all the way through), and then spontaneously made my own plan of action, which started a day “late.”

I’m not particularly good at planning ahead for holidays (see also: digging out my homemade Advent calendar a week late, then completely foregoing it a week later). But I appreciate the rhythms that certain spiritual seasons can bring, and I always spend some time reflecting throughout those days.

Last year, I meditated on my selfishness. That’s an ongoing process. In light of our upcoming move, it seemed fitting that this year’s focus would be on clearing out my house, not just my heart. I challenged myself to remove 40 bags worth of stuff from our 1400 square foot space during the 40 days of Lent.

I was excited to scour, room by room, space by space, hidden cupboards by forgotten drawers. I thought I’d finally feel motivated to tackle this - 

the Room Which Shall Not Be Named. Or Room of Avoidance. Also used as Room to Hide Gifts for Kids. I looked forward, at the end of the 40 days, to a less cluttered, more appealing home.

I started in the kitchen, which is my go-to location for clearing and cleaning. I had organized a garage sale last spring and the kitchen was the first place I had emptied, but I decided, for this project, I would literally remove every item from every cupboard in order to keep only what was necessary. It took me 2 days and I filled 4 bags of stuff that made its way to the trash/recycling. Our counter space is severely limited, but reducing the clutter in our cabinets allowed me to hide items we don’t use on a daily basis and to find new homes for random objects we keep on-hand. Success! [almost immediately, though, I realized I had forgotten to take before and after pictures! where would my evidence be???]

I kept up a good pace for the first 20 days, as I identified specific areas of the house - not just a room, but a corner of a room! - to clean out. I rejoiced as the bags filled up. I even inspired my husband in his own project, as he suddenly went on an ebay selling spree and made us over $4,000 in these 40 days.

Well, the best laid plans...

I could tell you how many days passed at a time without my hands busy at the plow (of bag-filling). And despite entering the Room of Avoidance - and clearing out 2 bags of stuff - it remains essentially unchanged.

But something else happened to me while I emptied my hutch and organized my sock drawer. I examined this mass of items that had accumulated and quickly, almost without thinking, tossed most of them aside. Why had I kept so many unused, broken, dirty, unnecessary things? Had I just been lazy or was it simple carelessness? Isn’t it disgusting how easy it is to find 40 BAGS worth of possessions that I just didn’t need?

Of course I immediately began to picture the impoverished children of the world who don’t even receive one solid meal a day. I remembered the tiny house with no roof where a Costa Rican family hosted me for a week. But more than that, I saw the state of my heart in all the junk of my house. I recognized how quickly the cares of the world enter into my life and choke the word of truth. I admitted that I had grown lazy in tending the soil of my heart, which was meant to receive the Word, grow up into it, and bear fruit. I realized that those 40 bags represented an entire mess of distraction from the beauty of Jesus.

As C.S. Lewis said, I am a half-hearted creature, fooling about with drink and sex and ambition when infinite joy is offered to me, like an ignorant child who wants to go on making mud pies in a slum because she cannot imagine what is meant by the offer of a vacation at the sea. I am far too easily pleased with STUFF and far too careless about cleaning it up in order to remain focused on CHRIST.

It’s been three years since I was first inspired to begin managing my home with a more godly mindset. Filling those bags this Lent - making my home a more welcoming and hospitable place - challenged me to wonder what needed to be changed so that my heart would also have more room for others. In the end, it wasn’t about the 40 bags at all, though I’m thankful for the (minor) headway I made in the house. Instead, the Holy Spirit showed me how much more work needs to be done in the really hidden places!

What about you? How did you spend your Lent? Maybe you can inspire me for next year!

In My Dreams

In the fall of 2010, I had this sudden, irresistible urge to downsize from our house to an apartment. All I could think about was having less space, less stuff to put in that space, living on less...less, less, and more less! I am now convinced that this was the prompting of the Holy Spirit, preparing me for our call to move from Minneapolis to New York City, and I have been itching ever since then to rid myself of this burden called home ownership.

Anyway, part of my obsession with downsizing has involved watching incredible videos about small spaces being transformed into multiple rooms. And the coveting has begun!

For example, this Hong Kong architect has 344 square feet of space that morphs into 24 different rooms!

This teacher has a 450 square foot apartment in Manhattan that is beautiful and works as 4 different spaces.

And this 420 square foot apartment in SoHo should be credited for awakening all my deepest design and space-saving dreams, as well as introducing me to my fantasy store, Resource Furniture.

I visit the Resource Furniture site about once a week and lust after all the innovative pieces. It is now my goal in life to figure out how I can possibly purchase The Goliath.

I am also in love with their sofas that conceal a queen-size bed (don't you plan to come visit me? wouldn't you love to sleep on this thing?).

And seriously, what kid wouldn't want to show off their Lollipop bunk bed?!?

If any of my readers are independently wealthy or exceedingly generous or have some connections at Resource Furniture, I am shamelessly asking you to make my dreams come true.

Or you can add to my unrealistic hopes by posting some more video links to awesome small space-saving designs that I will never afford.

Meet My Monster!

The longer I live, the more I conclude that I must be the most selfish person alive. To be safe, I’ll say that at least one other person on the planet is more selfish than I am, but that’s just to avoid a sweeping generalization. You can go ahead and assume that I’m the most selfish person you know.

My Selfish Monster has done a great job of disguising herself for most of my life, though. You see, I’m not selfish with my stuff. If I’ve loaned you something, I don’t mind if you forgot to bring it back. If you want something I have, I’ll gladly give it to you.

And I’m not selfish with my money. I once gave $100 to a guy I knew was swindling me. I’m a sucker for sob stories and good causes.

I’m certainly not selfish with my words (he he). What I mean to say, is that I’m generally not selfish with my talents. I know what I’m good at and I love finding opportunities to share my gifts with others.

You can see how easily I have convinced myself that I don’t have a Selfish Monster?


The problem is, you can’t be tempted to be selfish about things that don’t matter to you. Just like you can’t call yourself brave to fight a battle that you know you’ll win. If there’s no sacrifice in your giving, then there’s no selflessness in it, either.
I’ve come to recognize my selfishness in the areas that I look out for myself instead of someone else, when I seek my own good above the need of another. And that trait is evident in just about everything I do.

I plan my day according to what I want to get done.
I cook meals according to what I want to eat.
I drive to stores that I want to visit.
I spend time with people that I prefer to be with.
I pursue activities that I enjoy doing.
I fill my calendar with people, events, to-do’s, and pursuits that suit my interests and serve my needs. I avoid interruptions, projects, and people that conflict with my goals for me.

I don’t care about holding on to material possessions or money and I believe that talents are meant for the good of others. So it doesn’t really cost me anything to give those things away. The real challenge is believing that I’m not here to please myself.

Put another way, do I believe that my life is not about me?

I claim to follow a God named Jesus. A God who willingly put aside all the power of his omnipresent being in order to walk in human flesh, with human limitations (like hunger, sleep, and even the temptation to be selfish). Instead of showing off his greatness and expecting people to worship him, Jesus humbly, quietly, sometimes even secretly, served people. He served them to death.

Jesus had equal status with God but didn’t think so much of himself that he had to cling to the advantages of that status no matter what. Instead, he set aside the privileges of deity and took on the status of a slave, became human! It was an incredibly humbling process. He didn’t claim special privileges. Instead, he lived a selfless, obedient life and then died a selfless, obedient death—a criminal’s death —a crucifixion.

If this Christ now truly lives in me, then I can only regard myself in the same way that Jesus thought of himself. Rather than run my life in selfishness and conceit, I must take on the humility of Christ and consider others as more important than myself. I am compelled to care about others as much as I care about myself.

And I care about myself A LOT. But Jesus cares about me - Jesus cares for me - a whole lot more than that. Which is why I am able to not focus on serving myself - because Jesus has got that part covered (and WAY better than I could do!). Instead, I am FREE to live my life in service to others.

The apostle Paul put it this way: Now I have been set free from sin (selfishness!) and I have become a slave to God. This will make me holy and lead me to eternal life. Sin pays off with death. But the FREE gift of God is eternal life in Christ Jesus my Lord.

Take that, Selfish Monster!  

What about you? What kind of monsters do you keep hidden? How do you fight them?

What's In My...?

I need a fun theme song for this completely random and soon-to-be ongoing series called What's In My....?

in which I choose some sort of contained space in my house and tell you what's in it.

Today's inaugural post is What's In My Freezer?

are you waiting with baited breath to know?

First, a word on this series. I was inspired to do this after hearing a pastor challenge his congregation to write down literally everything they own. Down to the number of forks, the number of pairs of socks, etc.

That's a little scary, isn't it? I imagine I will be completely grossed out by knowing the exact number of items I actually possess. So I decided to catalog my life on a smaller scale, and, in the process, hopefully clean some of it out! And probably be a little surprised along the way.

Also, you should know that we have a standard size freezer above our refrigerator - nothing fancy or unusual. I mention this because the list below seems awfully long to me; yet, I wouldn't consider our freezer "full". I'm already feeling completely humbled by how much I have in such a "small" space!

Are you ready to be awed?

What's In My Freezer? as of 03/13/2013

3 unlabeled large yogurt containers - I'm guessing various soups from at least a year ago
1 box of Stonyfield YoKids strawberry squeezers
A 16oz beef ring bologna {definitely not going to eat this - any takers?}
3 ice packs
Tuscan Valley Veggie Medley - no idea where this came from
1 loaf of homemade banana bread
1 loaf of store-bought whole wheat bread
1 bag of green beans from last year's garden
1 bag of all-purpose flour
1 bag of rye flour
1 bag of soy flour
Applegate uncured chicken hot dogs
2 lb pork steak from a friend's family farm
2 lb ground beef from the same friend's family farm
20 oz ground turkey
4 chicken breasts
A family-sized serving of homemade creamy chicken wild rice soup
A family-sized serving of homemade barley cabbage soup
A family-sized serving of homemade taco soup
A bag of tilapia filets
homemade cranberry-pistachio oatmeal-quinoa cookies
Our favorite homemade chicken enchiladas (12)
1 bag of tortilla strips
1 angel food cake
a half-used bag of Dunkin' Donuts original blend coffee grounds
a bag of homemade baby food (apple-apricot-pear blend)
Smek meat and sauce lasagna - I believe this was given to us when Esme was born 7 months ago? 
9 oz breast milk
Maren's placenta
Esme's placenta

I bet you were bored and completely uninterested in my freezer until you read those last 2 items.

So what about you? What's the most interesting item in your freezer?

Oh, and I will accept theme song submissions through the end of the month!

Who Does That?!?

A friend of mine once had a job naming new clothing lines. Bonus: she named a turtleneck sweater The Devereaux and mailed one to me! 

Another friend used to get paid to sit at intersections and count cars (I think this had something to do with the effectiveness of traffic lights). 

Did you know there is actually an industry for retrieving golf balls from the pools of water on courses? Yes, you, too, could be a golf ball diver. Start a career as a chicken sexer. If you’d like to get paid to play on your ipad all day, consider being a furniture tester. 


Or, you could join forces with my husband and me and start a church.

What?!? Who does that?!? And - why?

The 21st century has clearly demonstrated that we are now living in a post-Christian culture, where the church in general, and the Christian faith in particular, no longer influence the culture at large. Four years ago, Newsweek declared “The End of Christian America” and chronicled the decline of the importance of Christianity in modern society. More recently, the Huffington Post describes the death of traditional Christianity while a generic spirituality is on the rise. 

So why, in these conditions, would anyone want to start a church? Isn’t God dead and the church irrelevant? Aren’t we doomed to offend people, or, worse, to fail?

Quite possibly. But our job on this earth is not to try and impress people or even to win them over to our way of thinking. Instead, we follow the call of Jesus to abide in him and bear the fruit of his Spirit. Starting a church is about making and maturing disciples of Jesus - proclaiming the good news in word and deed, drawing people to this life-with-Christ, and instructing people in his ways. It’s actually not at all, in any way, about us. 

We start churches because we love God and we take his command to love people seriously. 

We start churches because we are ruled by Christ’s love for us.
We are certain that if one person died for everyone else, then all of us have died. 

And Christ did die for all of us. He died so we would no longer live for ourselves, but for the one who died and was raised to life for us.
We are careful not to judge people by what they seem to be, though we once judged Christ in that way.
Anyone who belongs to Christ is a new person. The past is forgotten and everything is new.
God has done it all! 

He sent Christ to make peace between himself and us, and he has given us the work of making peace between himself and others.
What we mean is that God was in Christ, offering peace and forgiveness to the people of this world.
And he has given us the work of sharing his message of peace. We have been sent to speak for Christ, and God is begging the world to listen to our message. We speak for Christ and sincerely, passionately, ask everyone to make peace with God. [paraphrase of Paul’s words to the Corinthian church]

I really don’t know what will happen on this church-planting adventure. I only know that I carry about a message of hope that people so desperately need. I know that my life doesn’t belong to me and that giving it away is the best chance I have at demonstrating the generosity of God. I know what it was to live without Jesus and I can testify to the unbelievable journey of what life with him is like. My job is to represent and re-present Jesus to everyone I meet; it’s his job to prove himself to them.

So what do you think? 

Are we crazy to start a church? Tell me why we shouldn't do it!

Want to know more? Contact me - we love sharing this HUGE vision!

Want to help us? Make a tax-deductible donation to the Devereaux-NYC Fund here.

Smile For No Good Reason

In honor of bringing my blog back to life, and in an attempt to be a little more light-hearted, today's post  is a collection of my go-to video clips that make me smile. When I know I have 5 random minutes in a day and I want to feel happy about the world, these are the videos I'll return to. You'll need about 30 minutes if you want to enjoy all of them in one sitting, so depending on how bored you are at work (and if you get sound), you may need to save these for later.

Smile today!

1. Even though this video is 7 years old, you are surely one of the 210 million viewers who started dancing in your living room to comedian Judson Laippley's Evolution of Dance routine. As a dancer, I have to admit that I am personally impressed by his physical stamina.   (6 minutes)

2.  Flash mobs are all the rage now, but weren't you amazed 4 years ago when over 200 dancers surprised patrons in Belgium's Central Station with Do Re Mi? Everyone just looks so happy in this video! (4 minutes)

3. Remember Susan Boyle? (still brings tears to my eyes, but that's not the video I'm sharing today) I LOVE surprise moments, especially when they make Simon Cowell change his snooty face into a somewhat cheery chap. I've never actually seen any of these shows - I just catch the clips online - but when this little girl opened her mouth, I swear I heard the angels in heaven. Also, I love her dad. (7.5 minutes)

4. And, my all-time favorite opening monologue at the Oscars. Not only do I think this is brilliant, but I love how he laughs at himself so much throughout the act. Some day, I will perform this in a talent show. I will not be as good. (7.5 minutes)

Runner-up: Beyonce's Single Ladies. Because it's Beyonce.

What happiness videos am I missing that you must introduce me to?

How I Spent My Winter Break

So it’s been over 4 months since I last posted. I’ve been sleeping in, enjoying breakfast in bed, soaking up personal massages, attending high-class wine tastings, jet-setting to my private island...just the usual winter break kind of things.

Ok, in reality, life took off for our family. As I mentioned last year, we are preparing to move to Brooklyn, NY to start a church. Maybe you think this is an easy thing to do?

Well, in one sense, it definitely is. We’ve clearly been called to this mission and when God is the one driving the bus, there’s really no stopping it. For the last 17 months, our focus has been unwaveringly centered on Jesus’ work in Brooklyn and we’ve received only encouragement after encouragement to head in this direction. Our sense of purpose and genuine excitement for this next adventure has provided a certain peace in the midst of the hard work of “getting there.”

On that note, though, it takes ALOT to move a family of four to the most expensive city in the union! We spent a little over 40 days this fall researching - typical utility bills, insurance plans (yikes!), average rent costs (triple yikes!!!) - and praying over all these needs. We’ve made lists, instituted weekly family meetings, written newsletters, continued remodeling the house (in preparation for sale), traveled to family out of state, and just started telling our story to as many people as possible. This - all of this - is a joy and a privilege and an astounding challenge.

At the same time, God has been incredibly gracious to us, and that’s why I’m writing again. He gave me a word for this year - a word to meditate on, to ask of him, and to put into practice. Lent just began and I’ve got a little project I’ve committed to. And I want to share how our journey is going, how we are traveling this road from Minneapolis to Greenpoint. 

Will you join me over the next 6 months as I reflect and rejoice (and maybe freak out a bit)? I’d love to know what you want to know about our story, so please leave comments and ask questions along the way. And I can’t wait to let you into the crazy, beautiful, abounding JOY of what God is doing in us. 

My plan is to post a personal story or thought once per week. Then, a second time that week, I’ll post something that’s inspiring me or makes me laugh or is just for fun. I hope you’ll come along!