What if You Don't Need A Simpler Life... You Just Need Wisdom?

Navigating the Pendulum of Faith: From Simplicity to Complexity and Back Again

A visual of what I looked like when I worked at the boutique I write about below. I was still into my emo Paramore phase. Bless.

A pattern I’ve noticed in my faith is how things start simple, get really complicated, then turn simple again.

There are beliefs and practices I share with my seventeen-year-old self, but I embody them differently. My teenage faith was a prequel to complexity. My adult faith is like an eye of simplicity in the storm of complexity.

Here’s what I mean:

In college, everyone was reading this book called Radical. It was about living radically for God and not spending money on clothes and houses and cars when people all across the world had never heard the name of Jesus. I, and many others, took this to heart. Instead of spending $200 on jeans we would go to Walmart and buy $12 jeans and give the rest to people in impoverished countries.

Everything was simple.

Then I started working for this boutique in East Nashville where all the clothes were ethically sourced: labor was fairly compensated and materials were not harmful to the environment. I learned about “fast fashion” and how thousands of people across the world were being paid cents a day to make me trendy clothes. I learned about how harmful the chemicals and working conditions were for those laborers. How most of the “fast fashion” clothes would be used for one season and donated to charity shops the next; and if they weren't thrifted, they would end up in massive landfills or shopped across the world for other countries to deal with.

This was not just true of clothes, but food and furniture and cars and Christmas decorations and hair products: the cheaper it is, the less laborers are being paid. For me to get something “cheap” increases the likelihood that ordinary workers- sometimes child workers- are being exploited.

Things got complicated.

On the surface, the most “radical” thing was to spend less money on stuff. But when I was challenged by the ramifications of spending my money on cheap stuff, I found myself gravitating towards local, more expensive purchases for everyday items: toothbrushes, food, clothes, soap, tea, art, birthday gifts, etc.

Things got simple.

I remember the day I saw the water company stop at our old neighbor’s house and turn off the water. I was on the porch and called Todd: “Is it normal for the city to do that for maintenance or is their water being cut off?

That evening, we went to their house and asked if they were okay. Our neighbor affirmed that his water had been shut off because they couldn’t pay the bill. His wife had just gotten out of the hospital after a traumatic labor and delivery. They were uninsured. He had to take off weeks to be with her, and they were drowning in bills. Besides their newborn, they had two young kids and two teenagers to feed.

For the next couple years, our neighbors welcomed us into their lives. For them, every day was sheer survival. They were underwater in bills and rarely had relief. One winter they needed jackets for the young kids and finding an ethically sourced option was, rightly so, the last thing on their minds.

Things got complicated… again.

To even have a choice of what to purchase is a financial privilege. Our neighbor worked twelve hours every day for his family to simply survive. To get his kids to school, fed and warm. To pay for formula. To chip away at the hospital bills.

To heap on top of that the burden of landfills and fast fashion child labor would be absurd. That is a systems issue that we all play a part in, sure, but cannot be solved by any individual. We need to collectively figure out how to create fairer systems with a more just supply based on just demands.

Do you see the pendulum? How it swings back and forth? How things start simple then get complicated again?

I regularly return to James’ words: “If any of you lacks wisdom, he should ask God, who gives generously to all without finding fault, and it will be given to him.” If life were truly simple, we would not need wisdom. We would just need black and white rules to follow.

But life is complicated, which means we need wisdom to live in a way that honors God and promotes the flourishing of others and the earth. We need the Spirit to help us discern how to live. How to spend our money. How to use our time. Where to give our attention.

Wisdom helps us navigate the pendulum swing. When big, messy things are happening in the world from the wildness of American politics to the devastation of war in the Middle East to the tangible happenings in your own life, I hope you resist the rigidness that can come from simplicity and the despair that can come from complexity. I hope you slow down and seek wisdom, knowing God is generous to give to all who seek.

-Savannah

Writing Prompt: Where do you need wisdom? Are there any areas of your life that seem complicated? Any that seem simple?

Recommended Shop: If you’re interested in buying more sustainably, my friend owns a shop in Nashville and it’s my favorite for cleaning supplies, soaps, shampoos, etc... It’s called The Good Fill.