As our four year old’s birthday rolls around I am even more aware of this. I know that over half the toys he receives will never reach their first birthday. How can we teach our children to not be consumed with the need for stuff?

I first clicked on your post thinking, ’Does somebody really have Tuberculosis?!?’ I am pleased to find that’s not the case, although our lines of thinking were related.

Both of you have valid points, but I think there is a danger in viewing the desire for material things as inherently bad. I hope you’ll not take offense to my opinion below, as none is intended.

In my opinion, rabid consumerism is one of the whipping boys of popular culture, and often undeservedly. What does it mean to be “consumed with the need for stuff?” One immediately constructs a definition based on his own situation, which is not really definitive at all.

Everyone bases his “need” on his surroundings and familiar environment. Do you need shoes? A roof? A house? A climate controlled house? A climate controlled house with a TV? A very large TV? A bicycle? A car? A luxury car?

Poll people from different cultures at different times in our history and you’ll get wildly varied results. At one time humans survived as hunter/gatherers and wandered the wilderness without home. They survived. Is anything above survival a luxury?

I feel as if I desperately need shoes in order to thrive in my world. Many people survive every day without shoes. Am I consumed by the need for shoes? You’re probably thinking, “No, silly, I’m talking about luxury items: electronics, designer clothes, cars.” Well, what is a luxury item? Luxury to you? Shoes are a luxury to many that live today. It all depends on your perspective.

My point is that we all desire stuff–every one of us. It’s tempting to think of desiring anything above our own lifestyle as consumerism, but that doesn’t look at things from a global and historical perspective.

More practically, I think the answer lies in trusting God and relying on him for all your decisions. This would lead any Christian to live within his means and keep Jehovah God as his god, and not consumerism. I don’t have kids, but if I ever do I plan to teach them to trust God and live within their means. In short, if their spiritual life is in order then I don’t think they have to worry about putting possessions above God. If Ferraris are within their means, then I hope they’ll give dad a ride, but I don’t think there’s anything necessarily wrong with them owning a Ferrai. A Ferrari would be a great luxury to me, but maybe it’s just shoes to them.

Good dialog. Hmmm…

So one of the basic questions we seem to be discussing is “is desiring material things bad?”

Isn’t it all about your motivation? Are you desiring something because you want to share it with others or because you want to fill some sort of void in your life?

As far as rabid connsumption being a whipping boy - so what? Does that mean we shouldn’t discuss it? In many cases whipping boys become whipping boys for a reason.

I vaguely remember in high school learning about Maslow’s Pyramid of Survival (I may have the name wrong) - anyway he theorized that people had needs that could be categorized in a pyramid shape. The bottom layer was called “Physical Needs” and it was stuff like food and water and the top was “Self Actualization” - (I know that is the right word because it was the first time I had ever heard that crazy term) So to me, shoes (depending on your climate) could be considered low on the rung. If you live in Norway you better have some sort of covering for your feet. I’m not sure where a ferrari would fall on that pyramid (I suppose for some people a ferrari might help them ’self actualize’ better?)

Bottom line for me is that Jesus told us to “store our treasures in heaven” Right? I’m not taking that out of context? I feel like personally I would have a hard time explaing a ferrari to the Lord when people are literally starving to death and I am doing so little to help them.

Here is the problem with that statement: Bill Gates is not scared to give away some money. He has given away millions and millions of dollars. So if I saw him driving in a Ferrari I would thing “Way to go Bill - you earned it!” Whereas if I drove around in one I would be thinking “I am so going to hell” So maybe I am just being judegemental Woo Woo! Go me! Get judgemental!)

Plus I’m a girl - ferraris just arent my thing…

The more I think about it the more I want to know the answer to the question “is it inherently wrong to own certain things because of their cost.”

Right now on the poshtots.com website there is a bed for a little girl that costs $47,000. Forty seven thousand dollars for a little girls bed!!! Don’t we have to draw a line somewhere - and I don’t even mean “as Christians we shouldn’t spend $47 grand on a bed” I mean “as humans we shouldn’t spend $47 gs on a bed. Or the Victorias Secret million dollar bra. A few years ago (I think its even more now) there was a bra that was sold at Christmas that cost 1.5 million. Can we agree its wrong to own a bra that costs that much? Where is our line?

I agree that whipping boys often get their reputations for a reason, but they also get reputations because sometimes people won’t take gut reactions to the logical end.

As you contrasted the difference in Bill Gates and yourself you supported my point that any definition you create will only be valid for you. This is true both when examining the issue in terms of scripture and secularly. We are also in no position to know or judge how others in general give/spend their money, so knowing that Bill and Melinda Gates give to charity is largely moot.

In short, I cannot agree that any purchases such as the ones you have brought up are inherently wrong because of their prices. We all can make very simple choices about whether we would purchase those things, but I don’t know of any scriptural support that would give me reason to judge the morality of a purchase by a stranger. We can’t know how much others give to charity, so how (furthermore, why?) am I to make a judgment on whether their purchase was inherently wrong? Not only how am I to logically conclude right/wrong– on what authority am I judging their action? I say that I have no authority to judge it and that I could not judge it even if I did.

Your example of the $47k bed only holds water for someone in the middle of the economic distribution. Let’s go down the scale. “Should” someone in the middle of the economic distribution purchase a $10k bed? $1k bed? $100 bed? Where’s your line? Let’s settle on a $1k bed, just for argument. “Should” someone below the poverty line purchase the $1k bed? A homeless man? All of a sudden the $1k bed is no longer “OK” because you have shifted the example away from yourself. Take the example up the scale and get the same result (it becomes “OK” again and then even trivial for a millionaire). Any line you may draw is totally subjective.

My solution is to trust God to give me wisdom and discernment to make choices that are responsible and in line with his plan for my life. I can only make decisions for myself, so on a topic such as money that is different for everyone, I’ll only make judgment calls for myself. I don’t think we can draw a line for everyone on this topic. For Christians it would be legalism. For secularists the entire rationale is illogical.

That’s my $.02 I’ve been wrong before.

Jeff: Yes, I don’t think we can draw a line across the board, lest we be legalistic.

Paula: Correct me if I’m wrong, but I don’t think you are talking about legalism (i.e. good works) as a variable for salvation (like our Mormon friends). However, you perhaps are being somewhat legalistic regarding thinking about what glorifies God. But I don’t know if that’s wrong; since we can’t see into a man’s heart, we are left with our perceptions of someone’s actions and choices in order to extraplote to the condition of their heart.

Rich Sturmfels
Diesel Does It

Interesting research from NYTimes on American consumption at different socio-economic levels:

http://www.nytimes.com/imagepages/2008/02/10/opinion/10op.graphic.ready.html?ex=1360299600&en=9ef4be7cf82e4353&ei=5124&partner=digg&exprod=digg

David Thew
Sojourn Pastor
Thewblog

That’s an interesting graph. BTW, I think your link to the original article is broken. Perhaps this one will work:

http://www.nytimes.com/2008/02/10/opinion/10cox.html?scp=2&sq=spend&st=nyt

The first graph is pretty telling. I looked for areas where one of the groups (fifths) was drastically out of proportion to the others. It appears the richest fifth of society spends significantly more than the middle and lowest fifth on food, housing, and transportation. They also spend an order of magnitude more on taxes and charitable contributions. I’ve never seen the info presented this way. It speaks volumes (about several things, depending on which way you’re inclined to view them).

The second graph is not as useful as the first. It appears to track adoption of several technologies from 1900 to present (by percentage of households that adopted the technology). However, almost all of those technologies have been significantly cost-reduced, which is the chief cause of the increase in adoption over time (not a true increase in $ consumed). In 1965 less than 10% of households had a color TV. They were really expensive in 1965. In 2005 almost 100% of households have a color TV, because they’re $50 at Wal-Mart. I don’t know what a 19” color TV cost in 1960, but I’ll bet anyone a steak dinner that it cost a greater percentage of median per capita income in 1960 than it does in 2008. The graph would be more telling if the median price of all items purchased from that technology in a given year was indexed to it’s adoption rate, and then adjusted for inflation. Of course, that’s a lot of work to do for a simple graph. Unfortunately, I think the second graph is more informative about technology adoption and Moore’s Law than it is about true consumer spending.

Recently stumbled onto this graph on Digg that is a perfect example of what I referenced in my post above. It’s the price of common technology items over time, adjusted for inflation. Roughly combine it with the graph above labeled “Consumption Spreads Faster Today” and what do you get? A mostly flat line. (ie consumption is much more static than what you might first think when looking at the graph)