Finances are the third resource after time and energy. Some may consider money to be the most important or even the only resource, but they are mistaken. Money is actually the least valuable in the sense that it is the most easily renewed. When all your money is spent, a simple investment of time and…
Time is definitely the hardest thing to manage because no mater how many times I try to reorganize my time, it actually changes very little. There are always demands on our time that seem impossible to minimize no matter how little value we place on them. And in talking to retired people, they seem to…
An evaluation of resources: I plan to discuss, in the next 4 or 5 posts, the concept of what some might call ‘stewardship’ but really it is just using well what each of us have at our disposal. Stewardship concepts that deal only with finances are sorely missing out on the true richness of the…
Faithfulness is a playful interaction between the past, present and future. Let me explain: If I make a promise to you today then it is because I see the completion of that promise to be beneficial to both of us. But when I look back at that promise at some point in the future, I…
Now, what happens when government is given too much power? Generally speaking, there appear to be 3 main types of government in modern societies with some variations. The most oppressive may be the dictatorship. This type of government depends almost entirely on one man who has come into power either through inheritance, popularity, or force….
What are the responsibilities of government in a balanced model? Remember that we need a balance between the family, the church and the government. Each group is integral to the whole and serves a distinct function while supporting the other groups. The primary role of representational government is that of protecting the rights of the…
It is an interesting time to look at the role of government because of what is happening in the US under the Obama administration. I don’t really want to take political sides, just look at the tendencies of different perspectives and their effect on society as a whole. There are 2 pervading views in a…
Now for a quick comparison of the monotheistic religions. I want to do this to highlight differences in the belief systems and especially the differences in the societal outcomes of the Jewish, Muslim and Christian faiths. It is often falsely assumed that these religions are really essentially the same because they hold as a primary…
Let’s focus our attention now on the church. But there are actually 3 questions to discuss here: What is church? Is it a necessary part of a healthy society? If it is necessary, then what is its role and how do we distinguish it from the roles of family and government? Religion has been a…
As I consider the natural disaster in Haiti this month, several things come to mind. Most of the e-mails I have received focus on the desperation of the people without any means of helping or supporting themselves, the terrible loss of life (and miraculous rescues) and the huge response of the global community in sending…
So let’s think about this model a little more. Maybe the family circle is the best one to begin with. This is actually the foundational building block of any society because it is the first set of relationships that any individual has. Those relationships, for good or bad, influence the character and the values of…
I’ve been thinking a bit about society as a whole during the Christmas vacation – what makes it work and what leads to collapse. It is interesting that the 10 commandments actually lay out rules for a healthy society, one that honors God first, parents/family second, and then others.A Ven Diagram is a good visual…
