"I've always wanted to go to Switzerland to see what the army does with those wee red knives." - Bill Connolly

Henry David Thoreau was mostly a whacko. He got wrapped up in transcendental meditation, refused to pay his taxes because he didn't like how the government spent his money, and wrote stuff that is confusing to read. (His best friend was Ralph Waldo Emerson, another oddball.) But Thoreau did have some thought provoking things to say, including what he wrote in his book Walden.

Thoreau was bothered by the rampant development and materialism in his hometown of Concord, MA in the mid-1800's, so he decided to conduct a personal experiment. He decided to build a log cabin in the woods on a piece of land out by Walden Pond that he borrowed from Emerson, to see how simply he could live. His diary and reflections on that experience provide the content for Walden.

He concluded that the bottom line is maintaing body heat. (I don't think he knew it was 98.6, but that's beside the point.) To maintain body heat one needs a basic amount of food, clothing, and shelter. Deprived of any one of those in adequate measure means life itself - body heat - is threatened. But, he said, having any one of those in excess also threatens life - not physical, but (from Thoreau's perspective) metaphysical. And that's what so bothered him about the people of Concord. They were missing life because they were piling up excess in those three areas....and others.

Thoreau grew his own vegetables and caught his own fish. (He was a vegetarian otherwise, which means no BACON. Like I said, whacko.) He built the cabin and sewed his own clothes, albeit with fabric he bought in town. He wrote that this simple life of existing on just the basics gave him time and stimulation for thinking, reflecting, living. Working in his garden provided a connection with nature not available to the person who buys their groceries from the town merchant. Spending time at the pond fishing was time to meditate.
You get the picture.

OK, a lot of his argument is bogus. He borrowed the land he lived on, didn't buy it like the rest of us have to. He lived at Walden Pond for 2+ years and then moved back into Concord where he bought his groceries. And even while living in a small one-room house he was known to come into town for a carmel latte once a week.

But consider his basic premise: the amassing of stuff doesn't enhance life, it hinders life, constrains it, controls it. Too much time and energy is spent getting those things that then have to be maintained and protected against loss. When they wear out or expire more effort has to go into replacing them. Add to that the social stresses associated with the constant comparing of who has what and how much, and life becomes a kind of enslavement - to things.

No one can argue that we're not a pretty materialistic culture. The average American home is 2300 sq ft and growing, despite the shrinking size of the average American household. Bigger houses have to be furnished with more stuff, have a higher tax bill, higher utility costs.... All of this requires more money, and that means more income (cf. the now standard two-income household).
More. Always more.

I don't think Thoreau's extreme is necessary, or even commendable. There's nothing inherently wrong with possessions, and hovels aren't more righteous than 4,000 sq. ft. estates with stables, a pool, and tennis court. The problem is that too few Americans, especially evangelical Americans, stop to ask "how much?" They don't consider the possibility that more isn't automatically better, that it might actually be worse. The ability to have more doesn't necessarily mean the more should be had. Sometimes less really is more.

So I'm not advocating a Walden life for all of us, just that we all give some thought to the question, "How much is enough?" And when we do so it shouldn't be from a base point that represents our current situation. That is, the question is not, "Should I have more than what I have?" but "Do I have more than I should?"

And even that frames it poorly. There's probably no "should" limit. For the child of God this, as so many questions, is about stewardship. So maybe it's better put, "Do I have so much extra that the having of it represents poor stewardship of the resources God has bestowed up me? If I had less stuff what could I do with the time and money that stuff currently consumes?"

Thoreau was a self-righteous prig, and more than a little hypocritical. But his premise is worth considering, IMO.