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There are lots of ways to judge people. Especially when you are feeling very confident of your Rightness and their Wrongness.
Facebook is a useful resource if you are looking for opportunities to Judge Your Neighbors. For example, after the immigration and health care decisions that made headlines recently, I finally availed myself of Facebook's nifty "hide" feature, so I can keep my big Friends list while conveniently avoiding any actual newsfeed from friends who prefer to post about how the Affordable Care Act is socialism or how our "demented" president obviously hates legitimate citizens or why else would he be so eager to let immigrants take all our jobs. And the like. And while I clicked some people into the "hide" column, I nestled down into the warm blankets of Judgeyness and shook my fists at them and their narrow-minded, obviously Un-Jesusy attitudes. Obviously. Obviously, Jesus would side with me and my liberal leaning stance on social debates, right? Right? Jesus told us to care for the immigrants, and to care for the sick and suffering (and poor, and old, and...) right?
I like to yank Jesus into most of my convictions.
ESPECIALLY when I am totally convinced that I'm right about something that Jesus would or wouldn't do.
Which is why I rolled my eyes in disgust and self-righteousness as I read the comments that sparked up when a friend of mine started a small but vocal Facebook debate over this post:
"In a world where so many lack basic necessities, recreational shopping cannot be considered a Christian practice." Agree?My friend was quoting a Tweet from a guy who is apparently a theology student and writer/tweeter about Christian topics. His simple post started an interesting conversation among his friends, to which I contributed a note that I do, in fact, agree with him, even though it is much harder to live than to agree with.
Most of the other posts riled my hackles. People thought that the notion was too extreme, and that the tweeter was just trying to make people feel bad for having things. Others said that that notion is not supported by the Bible. They wanted a better definition of what constituted "recreational" shopping. They made long notes about how the economy depends on us buying shit we don't need. That purchasing stuff made in other countries helps poor people. And some people gave really thoughtful responses to what is, admittedly, a really tough question - "What are we supposed to do with the money God has seen fit to bless us with at this time?" I'm really glad there were some of those comments too, because I really wanted to scream "CUT THE CRAP! WE ALL BUY TONS OF JUNK WE DON'T NEED WHILE PEOPLE SUFFER AND STARVE AND LACK WATER AND BASIC MEDICAL CARE RIGHT HERE IN OUR OWN COUNTRY. DON'T GET ME STARTED ON THE WORLD. DO YOU REALLY THINK JESUS IS COOL WITH THAT?"
But I thought better of it, seeing as how I had just spent $35 on Chinese food take-out and beer because I didn't want to cook dinner.
And even with No-Buy July in full swing and going pretty well (other than the Chinese food), I'm already pondering what things I still may want to buy next month, or save up for, or ask for for Christmas. Because while I can actually see small and slow changes towards Wanting Less Crap, I still have a list. That list of things that I would like to have in my possession.
Somehow my Judgeyness hasn't made it all the way back to my own lattes or cookbooks or paintings or new duvets yet.
Anyway, I'm getting off track a bit. The point is, I am convinced that "recreational shopping cannot be considered a Christian practice". And I'm equally convinced that I don't know where "the line" is. That book 7 that I raved about helped get my brain in gear for making different choices about how to spend money. Jackie and I have plans for at least 6 more months worth of intentional doing-without. But does that mean I can never, in good conscience, buy new clothes again? What about shoes? Or art supplies or books or.... Whatever. And what, exactly, would Jesus have to say about all this? Or about that cute anchor sweatshirt I want from JCrew? Would it be OK if I just bootleg DIYed it instead of buying it online? Anyone?
One idea that actually came up through the facebook litany on my friend's post is that I need to remember that it is not "my" money or "our" money, but straight up, no question, God's money. I'm just supposed to steward it around for the Kingdom while it is passing through my hands/bank account. Perhaps if I start actually saying out loud and in my head something like "Should I spend $4 of God's money on a latte?", or "Will buying $40 worth of art supplies with God's money build the Kingdom in any way?" I will... become totally paralyzed with guilt and have to drop out of the economic machine....? But maybe I'll conclude that God's money would be better spent on someone or something else.
Something that No-Buy July reminds me is that usually the longer I wait to buy something, the less I feel like I need it. I realize that I don't actually miss it from my life. The wait tamps down the desire. Sooooo many of my "recreational shopping" purchases are impulse buys made when I'm just wandering around in close proximity to pretty things for sale. Or I'm feeling stressed out, so I go to TJMaxx "just to look around". But for this whole 12 days of July so far, I've just deleted JCrew, Anthro, and other email ads before I even open them. And you know what? I'm pretty sure my life is none diminished by not finding new stuff to covet. And maybe it's just the looking and wanting that floats my boat: I can do that on Pinterest now! I can just look at pretty things - even "keep" them! - without owning them. It is great. I get a little buzz of pleasure just from adding a pretty outfit to my boards. I can visit it there any time I like, and it looks much better on that model than it would on me anyway. Pretty sure Jesus would have something to say about that, too, but one major character flaw at a time, please.
But anyway, the moral of this long rambling story is that I am a Judgey Jerk about other people's consumerism and politics, but I still spend God's money on earth-killing, multi-packaged take out and stand unreflective upon my soapbox with my gut reactions to conservative politics. To address just two of my top hypocrisies.
And I guess I've answered my own rhetorical question from way back at paragraph one. There is no way I'm going to pull my own head out of my butt and point my eyes towards Grace. Only God can do it, so thank the Lord, he is faithful, and He's not finished with me yet.
3 comments:
About a hundred years ago, before Mr. Peevie and I had kids, I was teaching a Sunday School class on Amos: "Hear this, you cows of Bashan who crush the poor and oppress the needy and say to your husbands, 'Bring us some drinks!'"
We had this very discussion about how to spend our money intentionally and not buy new stuff just because...
Mr. Peevie and I had been discussing whether or not to buy a new couch, because when you sat on our current couch, you were in danger of being impaled on a spring.
People in the room who had sat on that couch said, in no uncertain terms: "Buy a new couch!"
Heh. But we still deal with these issues every day.
Good post.
I was JUST praying this morning about my current tendency to get judgey in my head about those who are not feeling convicted the way I am about these things. In a discussion about environmental stewardship, a friend recently said to me, "I think it's great that you care so much about this, but everyone cannot be equally convicted about every single issue." She makes a good point, and so does one of the commenters on our mutual friend's FB post. She says, "I think it comes down to personal conviction. God moving on your heart to help others in lieu of purchasing something for yourself. If God moves on your heart and you choose to ignore - then that's another issue. That's disobedience." So that means that you and I are required to obey, since we are thusly convicted, yes?
the longer you wait, the less you need it- I like that point. If I'm in the throes of coveting something, I'll FIND a reason why it's necessary, rather than recreational.
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