#money

How To Be Rich

My family lives in the poorest section of one of Canada’s wealthiest towns. Work brought us here sixteen years ago, and we bought the only house we could afford—a forty-year-old thousand-square-foot townhouse surrounded by much newer homes that are five, six, and seven times more expensive than ours. With a brief, five-minute drive we cruise past gated neighborhoods where every home costs in the tens of millions. In a town like this we have many opportunities to see great wealth …

Living in the Light: Money, Sex & Power

Money, sex, and power: three great gifts of God that can be used to such noble ends or abused to such ignoble ends. They can be harnessed to the greatest of good purposes or exploited to the most terrible of harmful purposes. All three are considered ghastly to some while they are worshiped as gods by others. This holy/unholy trio is the subject of John Piper’s latest book Living in the Light. While the book began as a series of …

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I Wish I Was Rich

Surely you’ve had the filthy-rich daydream before, right? Maybe you heard about the latest tech billionaire who turned a little app into gold by selling it to Facebook or Google. Or maybe you heard of lotteries with their prizes stretching into the hundreds of millions or the guy who made the little investment in just the right company at just the right time. You heard about it and thought, “I wish I was rich. I know what I’d do with …

Letters to the Editor #15 (Alcohol, Affluence, and More)

There were not a lot of letters to the editor this week which probably indicates that I stuck mostly to non-controversial topics, or that I stuck to full-out boring topics! That said, I did receive some interesting ones; this is a selection. Comments on The Spiritual Disease Ravaging Our World Thanks for the good article regarding affluence. Thank you for emphasizing generosity over frugality. The call to generosity is a call we who are blessed with much need to hear. …

The Spiritual Disease Ravaging Our World

Even Solomon in all his glory was not arrayed like one of these,” Jesus said as He recalled the beauty of a common lily (Luke 12:27). And I suspect that even Solomon in all his splendor could not have imagined the sheer affluence that you and I enjoy today. The lily is here today and gone tomorrow, so fleeting and commonplace that we overlook its intricate beauty and fail to acknowledge the glory of the God who made and sustains …

The Cost of Radical Generosity

I was actually just starting to feel a little sorry for myself. I was on the sidelines at my daughter’s soccer game while a group of parents stood behind me laughing and chatting. As the game went on they talked and talked about all the great things they’ve done, the homes they’ve bought, the vacations they’ve enjoyed, the lessons their kids have taken. One even talked about his bright yellow Corvette that was parked conspicuously nearby. Their lives sounded pretty …

Do You Pay Your Taxes Joyfully?

It is tax season again. In just a couple of weeks a lot of us will be writing a check to the government, or, far better, hoping that the government will be writing a check to us. It is this time of year when, more than any other, we are forced to think about taxes, so once again I find myself pondering the first few verses of Romans 13. Paul is writing to the church at Rome and telling them …

13 Ways You Waste Your Money

About once a year I go through a phase—a deliberate phase—in which I evaluate our family finances to see where we’re doing well and where we aren’t doing so well. I especially look for places we are spending money we don’t need to spend—bills that are too high, subscriptions we no longer need, and all of those little money-wasters that eventually add up. And over the years, I’ve collected quite a list of ways that we, and perhaps you, waste …

The Legacy Journey

Let me tell you: It’s not easy being filthy rich. You would know, wouldn’t you? Most of us feel like we live in poverty, but that’s only because we restrict our comparisons to the people closest to us. When we elevate our gaze a little, we see that most of us qualify as being among the richest people in the world. Compared to the mass of humanity, we have fantastic wealth.  For many years Dave Ramsey has taught people how to …

When Was the Last Time You Just Enjoyed Your Money?

I overheard an interesting discussion the other day. I was out-and-about and caught just a fragment of a discussion about money and the sheer joy of having it. I couldn’t eavesdrop for more than a few words, but that was enough to get my mind working. I thought about the way I use my money, and the way we, as Christians, use our money. And I want to ask you the question: When was the last time you just enjoyed …