Lauren Sparks

The Sparks Notes

What is Prime in Your Life?

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prime – (adj) 1.  of first importance; main Dictionary

 

“For what I received I passed on to you as of first importance:� that Christ died for our sins according to the Scriptures,”  1 Corinthians 15:3

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Amazon Prime Day is almost here.  This annual event is bigger and longer than ever – lasting a full 48 hours.  July 15-16 the retail giant will have slashed prices on electronics, kitchen gadgets, clothing and toiletries.  They are broadcasting videos with shopping tips which, once watched, enter you to win giveaways. There is even a prime day concert this year.  Taylor Swift’s picture is on it.  I assume that means she’s singing.

 

I thought about doing a detailed post with pictures and links with all the crazy good deals you can find.  Lots of bloggers are, but I decided against it.  Full disclosure:  I am an Amazon affiliate.  This means that if you purchase anything from Amazon through the links I share, I receive a tiny commission at no additional cost to you.  I do this because running this website costs me some money, and as of now, no one is offering to pay me to write.  So every little bit helps.  And the link at the top of this post is my affiliate link.  If you click it you will see what Amazon is planning and if you purchase through it I will benefit.  But honestly, I’m not pushing you to purchase.

 

Why has Prime Day even become a thing?  My guess is because there is a lull in all major buying holidays in July and the retail geniuses at the Zon came up with a marketing strategy we couldn’t resist.  Sale prices from the comfort of our homes with free two day delivery on top.

 

I’ve been reading A Practical Guide to Culture:  Helping the Next Generation Navigate Today’s World by John Stonestreet and Brett Kunkle.  My daughter’s youth minister gave it to me and I’m getting so many great tips on how to have conversations with her about the world we have created for ourselves to live in.  And we ARE having good discussions.  I’m not done reading it yet, but it’s so good I might continue to reference it another 2 or 10 times.  What I did not expect from it, was to feel personal conviction for some things I have been a little (or a lot) too complicit in.  When I started thinking about a Prime Day post, chapter 12 on Affluence and Consumerism was all I could think about.  Not deep discounts on Fire TVs and designer clothes, but the $1.2 trillion dollars Americans spend annually on “nonessential goods like jewelry, alcohol, candy, recreational vehicles, gambling, and more.”

 

Now, while some struggle with debt, many can easily afford these luxuries, but at what cost?  Americans have “more money, disposable income material goods, technology, leisure time, vacations, square footage in our homes, quality health care, computers, cars, and conveniences than past Americans.  We have more wealth and more possessions than any civilization in the history of humanity.”  It sounds like we should be happier.  But that’s far from the case.  “Americans today report more symptoms of depression and anxiety than over the past 50 years”, and so much depression among young people that teens and pre-teens from affluent, well-educated families are the newest identified “at-risk” group!

 

Stonestreet and Kunkle believe that “beneath consumerism, idolatry lurks.  It sells an approach to life that says, ‘I’m the center of the universe.  Everything exists to meet my needs and satisfy my desires.'”  But when our stuff fails to make us happier, more important or personally better; we, like Solomon, discover that it is all meaningless.  Stuff may make us temporarily feel better, but the feeling never lasts, and often masks a need for true heart change.  We can’t live in order to consume when we are made to contribute.  I know I can do better with the resources God has so generously given me.

 

Now that I have been a huge internet downer, let me bring things around to say that I do believe – like the authors state – that God created us with the capacity for pleasure.  He is so kind in this.  And we can love the good things He gives us as long as our love for Him is not eclipsed.  Let’s keep first things first.  So if you have delayed gratification on that Instant Pot or want to get some discounted Christmas shopping done early, by all means thoughtfully hit up the Amazon sales.  And if you do, please use my link above.  I’ll be so grateful!  And thanks for reading.

Confessions of a Former Piano Student

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Photo by Geert Pieters on Unsplash

I took piano lessons for 5 years.  From the 2nd grade through the 6th, I went for once a week instruction and practiced on an old upright as faithfully as my Mama made me.  I started with a teacher who was young and fun.  She let me help pick out the music I wanted to work on and lovingly encouraged me.  Once she, sadly, became ill with cancer, my parents found another instructor for my sister and me.  By this point (around age 11-12) I was less interested in the piano and much into my friends and what they were doing.  Combine this fact with the poor opinion I had of my new instructor (she was old with long yellow nails that clicked on the keys as SHE played and she sang off-key as I played), and I had less than 0% interest in continuing my music education.  It is really a shame, too.  I come from a very musically talented family.

 

My parents made me stick with piano through the remainder of my 6th grade year and then mercifully let me quit.  I was spending half of my lesson time in my teacher’s bathroom anyway to avoid the torture.  I only wish I was kidding.  When I finally walked out of my last lesson, I felt the shackles fall off my ankles and the prison gates open up.  Ok, maybe now I’m kidding.

 

Five years is a long time to conscientiously (welll…) practice something – anything.  And yet today I cannot play a note.  Okay, that might not be entirely true.  I can show you where middle C is on a keyboard and play a chord from there.  But I couldn’t accurately name the other notes in that chord.  Anyway.  My point is that the skill and knowledge I acquired learning and studying and practicing for 5 years was lost without perseverance and repetition.

 

I’m being reminded of late how important perseverance and repetition are where Bible study is concerned.  Because it is “living and active” God constantly reveals different things about Himself to me – often from the same passage.  I heard someone say recently (I wish I could remember who – see how much I need repetition?) that we need to have an open Bible and an open life.  I love that.  But I would take it a step further to say that our lives need to be open to the Bible.  The more time I spend in God’s word, the more conviction and correction I experience.  If that sounds like a big, fat bummer to you, let me encourage you that great freedom comes from confession and repentance.

 

I listened to an audio book (I wish I could remember which one – yes, it’s a theme) that referred to a believer’s regular time with God as “the daily office”.  I got fired up about this.  Time in God’s word and prayer is the real work of a Christ-follower.  Calling it my “daily office” makes so much for sense to me than “quiet time” (Mine’s not always quiet) or “daily devotion” (what does that mean?).

 

In my personal study recently, I’ve been more and more enlightened to the story of God’s rescue plan for us.  Spoiler alert:  it’s the Bible.  The whole thing tells this story.  Not just the Christmas story.  Not just the parts we read at Easter.  All of it.  Every verse, every story points to our need of a Savior and how God sent His Son Jesus to be just that.  I want to know a God who would do that for me, and the best way to get to know Him is spending time with Him.  In prayer.  And especially in His word.  Every day.  As much as possible.  The Bible is His story.  It’s our story.  It’s my story of rescue.  If there is anything about this rescue story that you are unsure of, please send me a private message to lauren@laurensparks.net.  Or pick up a Bible and start reading in the book of John.  God longs to rescue you too.

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