I remember growing up in Gilgandra, a small town in western NSW.  A simple life.  A life that I often reflect back to of how uncomplicated things were.  The people were common, salt of the earth people.  Farmers who had farmed the land for generations. 

I can remember on Saturday mornings going down to the main street and just talking with my mates without the pressure of having to rush home to do the next thing on my things to do list.  I look back now and appreciate that I didn’t need to impress anybody with what I was doing and definitely didn’t feel the need to perform - I could just be myself.  They were good days.

Money wasn’t an issue, I wasn’t married and didn’t have children and enjoyed my job.  Had a car, had enough money to buy what I needed and didn’t have the strain of financial pressure.  I also remember that I had the time to play sport as mush as I pretty much wanted too.  I didn’t have fight off people demanding my time - I was the boss of my time.  They were good days.

Now that I am married to a great lady and have four wonderful kids and am busy serving God and busy in life generally.  Having a mortgage, a dog and having to juggle my finances just to get through the month - man life has just got so complicated and busy!  Can you remember when you were younger and didn’t have the pressures and demands on you that you have now.  Remember the good old days where you didn’t have to be disciplined and you could be lazy if you wanted too!How can we make life simple again?  How can we build simplicity in our everyday living that has become so driven, complicated and so time consuming?  I know that it will take courage, honesty and discipline.  But in the end it will be worth the effort!

Ecclesiastes 4:6 (gnb) It is better to have only a little, with peace of mind, than be busy all the time.

I am reminded of the story of the sculptor who began to chisel out the form of Abraham Lincoln from a huge piece of granite.  Every evening after the sculptor chiselled the massive stone a cleaning lady would come and sweep up the dust and debris.  Day after day she would sweep up after him. Days turned into weeks and weeks turned into months.

Every day she saw the image emerge from the rock.  Finally, the sculptor put the last polishing touches on what had become a magnificent, larger-than-life monument of Abraham Lincoln.  The day of the unveiling arrived.  The sculptor was draped with a velvet cloth.  Distinguished guests from around the United States were invited to attend.  To show his appreciation to his cleaning lady, the sculptor invited her as his personal guest.

The lights came on, the cameras were ready and finally the veil was lifted.  ‘Oohs and Aahs’ broke out as the crowd marvelled at the polished masterpiece of Abraham Lincoln.  As the evening came to a close and the crowd had dwindled away, only two people were left - the sculptor and the cleaning lady.  They stood together gazing at the statue.  He asked her “well, what do you think?”

“I have only one question,” she replied.  “How did you know that Mr Lincoln was inside that rock?”  He paused for a moment and thought about how he would respond.  Then he replied, “I really didn’t sculpt Abraham Lincoln, I simply chipped away whatever wasn’t Mr Lincoln!”

Inside your life and mine is God’s image.  We are filled with God’s potential.  God wants to chip away at our thoughts, our habits, our attitudes and our lifestyles - the pieces of granite that we hold onto so tightly.

God says, “these things have to be chipped away” but we protest saying, “but I love this lifestyle, I need to be busy” and so on…  God motivated by His love for us would say to us, “Although I love you just like you are - I love you too much to let you stay that way!”

Isaiah 64:8 (nlt)  And yet, O Lord, you are our Father. We are the clay, and you are the potter.  We all are formed by your hand.

We all need to decide to become vulnerable and allow the greatest sculptor of all chisel away at our lives.   How do we restore simplicity into our lives that have become so complicated?

The Principle of living within the margins.

Isaiah 5:8  Woe to those who add house to house and join field to field, until there is no more room, so that you have to live alone in the midst of the land! 

One reason why life has lost its simplicity is because we are living a margin less life.  Crowdedness creeps in unnoticed and grows like aggressive ground cover till it takes over your life and demands your allegiance.  It usually begins with good aspirations like building a better life for you and your family.  It can come attached to the trophies of success or a promotion, causing you to feel obligated to spend more time to justify your increase.

Margins depict the space between your load and your limit.  If the load you are carrying is 80 kilograms and your absolute limit is 100 kilograms then you have a 20 percent margin.  If you are carrying 100 kilograms when your limit is 100 kilograms, then you are margin less or at capacity.  The same is true with money and budgeting.  If you make $100 and you spend $50, you have a margin of 50 percent.  If you make $100 and spend $150, you have debt. 

Margins help us maintain a balanced life. 

Every book has margins.  They are the white spaces around the edges of each page.  Now some can argue about how uneconomical and wasteful margins are: “Why, if we would run the words from one edge of the page to the other, we could cut the book by 20 pages, reduce the price and who knows how many trees we could save?”  Maybe so, but who really is all that bothered? 

One of the most important truths about margins is that friendships and acts of kindness are only built in the margins.  Without them, we live alone.  How can we build wider margins?  Simple.  Cut back.  But cut back wisely.

Monitor what fills and what drains your tank.