Coveters Anonymous

I'm coming through a season of fixating on owning other people's houses.
It began last summer, when our neighbors put their 2 story home of 40 years on the market. They'd always let the kids and I play in their backyard (we have our own, but it felt like more of an outing to play in theirs, and they had a trampoline), so we already loved the place. On a whim, I threw out, "Maybe the church could buy it. They have money in investments!" The owners got as excited about the prospect as we did. I had already begun to muse about all the gatherings we could host in the spacious outside kitchen and backyard, all the space we'd have to host our visiting family, and how much fun it would be to spread out in the historic, sprawling home. We came back to earth two weeks later, when we realized it was too great of an expense to ask the church to make on our behalf, that energy costs would be high, and that it would require extensive rennovation.
I thought I had let it go, until recently when I got a tour of the home by it's new owners, a young family of photographers. As we walked through freshly painted rooms, and I heard of their elaborate plans, I felt myself inwardly twisting/wishing/ bemoaning a "loss" of something which was never intended for us. Pangs of missed opportunity and wanting what they had, hit me.
Why was it hard to let go of something which was never ours? Because of whatowning that house represented to me. Then I realized that the abilty to host gatherings, have bbqs, be the hang out place for the kids' friends was not contingent on us getting that or any other house. It could happen just as well here. We can live into and live out our call now - as is.
Test #2 came when I realized my friend was moving out of the country, and selling their spacious home with pool, patio, large yard and guest house. After feeling sadness at the reality of having my close friend move away, I shifted to ruminating on how to get the church to buy the place for us. And then my thoughts moved to their lovely furniture, and what they might need to leave behind, and where we would be able to use it. Thankfully, I acted on none of this, and just talked and prayed it through with Bill and close friends, knowing it was something I needed to relinquish. God is freeing me from fascinating over all that should've/could've been mine, and to focus on the relationships and being a faithful witness.
This 3 br home felt palacial when we moved in 8 years ago. Since then, the kitchen and bath have been renovated and a security system put in. We have all that we need and more. As long as we keep tabs on the amount of stuff mounting within our walls, we can live, love and serve from here, beyond comfortably. Simplicity in itself is a blessed relief. More stuff brings greater complexity and obligation.
When I was wrestling through all of this with God, he pointed me to I Timothy 6:6
"But godliness with contentment is great gain. For we brought nothing into this world, and we can take nothing out of it. But if we have food and clothing, we will be content with that."
We already have abundantly beyond what we could ask or think.
Forgive me Father, for being so quick to look for more and "better".