When we moved into our little house, we had two children with another one on the way. I never measured the house for size, but it had two rooms — a kitchen and a bedroom. In the bedroom the head, the foot, and one side of the double bed touched three walls. If you barricaded the remaining side, it made a nifty playpen. Underneath the bed we could store all our out-of-season clothing. The bedroom also held a chest of drawers, a full-size crib, and a smaller portable crib that squeezed in between the bed and the big crib. Its door was made of primary-colored bath towels, sewn together.
In the kitchen were cot-width bunks that could be curtained off in case we wanted to stay up after the two older children were in bed. The cook stove provided our heat. A dirt-floored attached shed held our firewood, and the unheated rear entryway with shelves doubled for a refrigerator during the long winter.
We never had leaky faucets or frozen pipes. Instead we had a bucket and dipper for drinking water, a galvanized tub and scrub board for laundry, and a large wooden barrel to catch rain for washing. I used to pray that it would rain every night (to fill the barrel) and be sunny every day so the children could play outdoors and the clothes would dry. Our gracious Lord frequently answered that prayer.
I must have had a bit of pioneer spirit in me because I loved that house. “Small house, small work” one of my neighbors had told me, and that is true! Often the kids and I all curled up together on the top of the wood box (it had a lid) and sang and read to our hearts’ content as cozy as bugs in a rug there beside the stove.
One day a brother in the Lord who was accustomed to a more affluent lifestyle visited us. “Oh,” he said, looking around, “you should make an addition. You could add this here, and that there. Your home would be so much better!” Suddenly all my contentment flew out the window. All my thoughts were about adding this and that. How foolish! The Lord had given us this delightful little house and these precious children (four by now). He had also given us His true and wise word, “Let your conversation be without covetousness; and be content with such things as ye have: for He hath said, I will never leave thee nor forsake thee” (Heb. 13:55Let your conversation be without covetousness; and be content with such things as ye have: for he hath said, I will never leave thee, nor forsake thee. (Hebrews 13:5)). It took about a month to get that covetousness out of my system, but when it was gone I was happy again. “Mortify [or put to death] ... covetousness, which is idolatry” (Col. 3:55Mortify therefore your members which are upon the earth; fornication, uncleanness, inordinate affection, evil concupiscence, and covetousness, which is idolatry: (Colossians 3:5)).