a strange new year's resolution

This article in Tuesday's Tribune fascinated me. Did anyone one else catch it?

S.F. group enjoys shopping sabbatical - Yahoo! News

It's about a group of friends in S.F. who, in order to challenge the consumerism of their own lives, make a "Compact" together to avoid buying anything new in 2006 except food, essential toiletries and health and safety products. I guess they pulled it off and some of them are going for it again in 2007.

I saved the article and read it to my kids this evening at the tail end of our family reading time. I said, "I'd like to try this for a week or a month." Susie said, "I think we should try it for 3 months!" We agreed to discuss it more this week and then make a decision and draw up some guidelines and start date next weekend. Anyone want to join us?

As we talked about it, I thought again about my idea of a "Grace Beg, Borrow & Buy Network" . . . a place within the church family to off load (give them away or sell them at a fair price) your unwanted items to others who might need them. You know. . . sort of an internal Craig's List. I'm serious about this and I'm looking for someone to make this happen. There's got to be a google app or some other social networking site that can help us pull this off. Maybe a simple forums app would work.

There would have to be a disclaimer. . . "Grace SLO is not responsible for deals gone awry. Please use responsibly and at your own risk, etc. etc.

There would have to be rules of use.

Acts 2:44-45 could be the theme verse . . .

And all those who had believed were together and had all things in common; and they began selling their property and possessions and were sharing them with all, as anyone might have need.

Here are some broad categories:

• Freebies: for good stuff you're looking to offload to a good home.
  
  
• Perfectly Good & Cheap: for good stuff you're willing to sell . . . cheap.
  
  
• Looking to Borrow: for those who need to borrow a power tool or something.
  
  
• Willing to Lend: I've got one of those luggage racks that fits in the back of your trailer hitch. You can't break it and I'd love to loan it. For stuff like that . . .
  

• Help Needed: for those home projects where you could use a few extra hands.
  
  
• Services for Sale: for business owners in the church to inform others of the services/products they sell.

We'd have to password protect or something, but there's got to be a way.

We need this. This is a great and creative way to practice and model "life together" . . . vibrant Christian community. I think it would be an awesome means to meet some needs of others outside the church community as well. . . friends, neighbors and folks we know.

Susie said I can spend 1 hour vision casting but I am forbidden from getting involved in the nuts & bolts. She's right. . . again! I figure I have about 45 minutes left on that clock after this post.

Until someone gets it going, I'm going to start listing all our unwanted stuff right here. Bloggers privilege . . .

We've got a double breast pump for $100 OBO (talk about offensive!) and a baby exersaucer for $50 OBO. Anybody looking for these things? Drop me an email. I'll try and post some pictures in the next week.