The garage sale syndrome. Suddenly, one day this urge hits you. "There's entirely too much stuff in this house. We're going to have a garage sale." Everybody is dispatched to their corner of the house to figure out their contribution. You set up shop, pray for a nice day, and then somebody comes along, likes the price, buys your stuff, and it becomes their stuff. Now might be a great time to look at the accumulation around you and do something about it!
In Luke 12:24 Jesus says, "Consider the ravens: They do not sow or reap, they have no storeroom or barn; yet God feeds them." What an interesting concept of security. He said there's no storeroom. In verse 30 Jesus continues, "For the pagan world runs after all such things, and your Father knows that you need them. But seek His kingdom, and these things will be given to you as well. Do not be afraid, little flock, for your Father has been pleased to give you the kingdom. Sell your possessions and give to the poor. Provide purses for yourselves that will not wear out, a treasure in heaven that will not be exhausted, where no thief comes near and no moth destroys. For where your treasure is, there your heart will be also."
Jesus says here that putting His agenda first means "unstuffing." Look at all you've accumulated, see what you could do without, and give it away to make a difference for Jesus. Hudson Taylor, the great pioneer missionary to China, wrote in his book To China With Love some really challenging words. He was meditating on the Lord's return and wrote, "The effect of this blessed hope was a thoroughly practical one. It led me to look carefully through my little library to see if there were any books there that were not needed or likely to be of further service, and to examine my small wardrobe, to be quite sure that it contained nothing that I should be sorry to give an account of should the Master come at once. The result was that the library was considerably diminished, to the benefit of some poor neighbors, and to the far greater benefit of my own soul, and that I found I had articles of clothing also which might be put to better advantage in other directions ... I have never gone through my house, from basement to attic, with this objective in mind, without receiving a great accession of spiritual joy and blessing."
Simplify your life so God can lead you any way and anywhere He wants. You don't want Him to come back someday and say, "What are you doing with all that stuff you're sitting on? It could have been put to use." Hudson Taylor wrote, "I believe we are all in danger of accumulating - it may be from thoughtlessness or from pressure of occupation - things which would be useful to others, while not needed by ourselves, and the retention of which entails loss of blessing. If the whole resources of the Church of God were well utilized, how much more might be accomplished! How many poor might be fed, and naked clothed, and to how many of those as yet unreached the Gospel might be carried!" He certainly caught the spirit of the verses stated earlier from Luke.
Maybe you're guilty of the sin of accumulating. Maybe it's time to sacrifice more so someone else can have just enough. In fact, it's quite a family adventure to do this together - to gather up your stuff and deliver it to people who need it or agencies that can get it to them. Look around you. It's all earth stuff, but when you give it to the Master and give it to people who really need it, you convert earth stuff into heaven treasure.