"7" An Experimental Mutiny Against Excess

Just as we conclude our course this summer a friend recommended a new read for me!  These last 6 weeks have been filled with lots of eye-opening about the web and applications and resources that are at our finger tips.  I have been amazed and overwhelmed to learn how businesses and educators are putting technology to work.  Usually during heavier work loads with work and grad school I tend to find time to read for fun hard to incorporate but I still try to get a few good reads in throughout each year.  Ironically, the book I'm about to purchase puts a new perspective on how I've been using the internet over our last few weeks.  The book is called "7 - An Experimental Mutiny Against Excess".  The author of the book writes about ministry and is a wife and mother to 3 along with being a regular blogger and a public speaker.  She has a witty and quirky personality that captured my attention within the first two minutes of reading her blog post about this particular publication. 

                                                                   

Her book chronicles the lives of Christians who are living with "the world at their finger tips"!  People who have access to anything and everything they could need and are fulfilled with God but still yearning for that something more.  From her own personal experiences she and her family decided to enter what she calls "7", a seven-month experimental mutiny against excess.  7 areas of consumption are bundled up over the course of 7 months and each month you limit or reduce that particular excess down to 7. 

Food.

Clothes.

Possessions.

Media.

Waste.

Spending.

Stress.

Excert from Jen's blog:

Only seven foods for a month. Only seven pieces of clothes for a month. Give away seven things we own a day for a month. Eliminate seven forms of media for a month. Adopt seven substantial habits for a greener life. Spend money in only seven places. Practice "seven sacred pauses" a day and observe the Sabbath...a deeply reduced life to find a greatly increased God.

I don't know how else to talk about 7 other than to say it changed our lives. The discipline of fasting from such cherished, abused luxuries was transformative in the most difficult, painful, beautiful way. It shined a spotlight on dark corners, corners I wanted hidden and kept from scrutiny. 7 held my life up to God's Word and said, "One of these things is not like the other." It pried our eyes open to needs and abuses and the far reaching effects of unchecked consumerism, and it would not let them close again in ignorance or obstinance, I tell you. It hurt. We bled out in parts. We celebrated in others. We pushed through the chaos of repentence and found liberation waiting on the other side.
So ironically as we conclude a semester of exploring all sorts of technology forums I'm actually considering taking this leap and giving up 7 forms of media for a month!  While I don't find anything wrong with our exploration of the media and putting to use what we've found to benefit our education and careers I do think we all have to be brought back down to reality and in my faith simply doing this is a reminder of why I'm really here and what I have to give thanks for.  I'm still contemplating what my 7 forms will be but I'd love to hear your ideas and suggestions on any of the 7 areas, particularly Media!