Saturday, February 21, 2009

A new lamp

So just a few hours after posting "Living with Eternity in mind", Fiona and I went out to buy a new living room lamp. Our old one had broken, so we found ourselves out and about looking at lamps. Now in view of what I wrote on Friday morning, I have no worries that I'm in grave danger of becoming too focused on a new lamp. I was simply a bit taken aback at the price of lamps and the thought that we were now spending more money on stuff that fills our house. In essence, more money on stuff for me. Don't get me wrong. I'm not racked with guilt for buying a lamp. I'm just distracted by how much money we continually spend on making our living environment functional and attractive, and how challenging that makes it to have resources left over to share with people in need, a priority we don't want to lose.

And then I was reminded of the video below. A very funny video that chastens me for becoming too attached to the stuff in my life, and then sneaks in a plug that new stuff is much better than old! And of course, the main attraction in the video is a lamp. Take a look!



© 2009 by Ken Peters

2 comments:

Anonymous said...

LOVE IT! It's too funny because just the other day you came up in conversation when Ken S. was expressing buyers remorse/guilt over spending his birthday cash on something seemingly superfluous. We fondly remembered the unopened purchases of the past that you would wrestle over whether or not you could justify. Ken can do a really good impression of you! ;)

Ken said...

So should we keep the lamp? Or is it too posh for us? Maybe we should just learn to live in dim lighting. That's a God thing, isn't it? See through a glass dimly, etc.?

Yes, I still have that buyer's remorse hang-up thing, though I think I'm more free than I used to be. I guess I'm still not sure how I view being a consumer - one who buys things for valid reasons or one who rapes the earth to support his lavish lifestyle.

And yes, in the midst of such challenges, I love that video. It makes me smile every time I watch it.