Category: Life

Sooo…college is it?

Silva

The Bible says many things about many things.  It seems reasonable to believe that all the eternally important things ARE in the Bible.  The rest, though meaningful, is not in the same category of importance.  I have interacted with many confessing Christians who regularly elevate things not in the Bible to apocalyptic importance.  Like kids and careers.

What about goals for our children?  Into what should we be aiming our children?  Back in the day of my youth and exuberance, college was it.  I-T.  It was the goal, it was the done deal, it was what was expected, it was the topic of conversation, it was the object of ridicule etc., etc.  Few were the ones who did not go to college.  Fewer were the ones who admitted that they really didn’t want to go.

That was then.  This is now.  Now, I have children.  The conversations I have about college these days are far different than they used to be.  I remember talking to a friend who didn’t ever go to college but seemed to be fitting into God’s plan just fine and thinking, “whoa, she didn’t go to college.”  That was the beginning of a conversation that endures regarding my kids and college.  Now, I’m not quite there yet so even these musings are theoretical.

Here’s an interesting article: Is College the Only Option?

I guess the question is should we just assume that university is a done deal for our children?  “Of course he’s going to college!”  “Why, as soon as she graduates she’s off to college!”  That brings me back to how I started: the Bible and college.  Hmmm.  Strangely silent.  In fact, the silence is eerie.  The Bible does not tell me I must train my children to go to college.  It does not tell me that the key to my child’s future is college.

Instead, the world tells me that college is the place where 2/3 of churched children reject the faith they know.  If that is true, that’s a big deal.  There are surely many reasons for that tragic statistic but it isn’t necessarily reason not to send our kids to college.  God’s path for His children is often a valley that feels like death (see Psalm 23).

Parents are to prepare our children for the tasks that God has set before them.  That may mean sending them to college.  It may not.  We must certainly should ask  God if college is His plan for our children.  Of course, there are practical reasons to ask the question as the linked article tells us.  But, the greater question regards just to what is God calling our children?  We must pray and ask!

Survival is not living

Silva

This weekend, I will start teaching a book at our church.  It’s about parenting.  I’ve been thinking about parenting a good bit more lately than normal (if that’s possible with a pile of kids in my house).

Recently my son and I were doing an evening devotion.  We have this book called “Created for Work” by Bob Schulz that is focused on helping young boys understand the creation mandate (Genesis 2:15).  In the first chapter, “Art in your Heart” the author talks about how we don’t usually act like God as we approach life.  Take moths, for example.  What’s their life span?  Purpose?  Neither is very glorious compared to other things in life.  Yet, God created them with artistic fervor and in great detail.  He didn’t have to do that for a bug.  Or house flies?  Their eyes are among the most complex in the animal world.  This is for an insect whose life span is about a month (less in my house!).

God is an artist and a maximalist.  He is not a minimalist like we often live.  He is not interested in simply survival but “thrival.”  He takes great pleasure and satisfaction in the details of life.  He works and works and works until the product is perfect and glorious – like a sunset or a conch shell or a smile.  Creation is the easiest place to see that our Creator is not interested in anything other than the maximums.

In Christ, He gives us the same opportunity and the same charge.  In fact, He tells us “Whatever your hand finds to do, do it with your might” (Ecclesiastes 9:10) and “Whatever you do whether in word or deed, do everything in the name of the Lord Jesus…as for the Lord and not for men” (Colossians 3:17, 23).

Brothers and sisters, don’t parent as minimalists.  Don’t let your parenting be only about survival.  It can so easily become about laundry, yard work, dishes, cooking, sleeping, changing clothes and paying bills.  Those things we must do, of course.  But not as minimalists.  Can you receive the tasks of each day from the Lord and work them creatively, differently or thoughtfully?  In the book, he tells boys not just to mow the lawn in boring straight lines and put the lawnmower in the garage and plop down on the couch!  Cut angles, trim hedges, plant flowers, create a mower station in the garage with fuel, and oil and tools!  Surely, if God calls us to find Him in the details of our lives, He will be found if we look!

Look again.

Job Growth! Oh no!

Silva

Here’s an excerpt from January 2, 2010 World Magazine:

…at least one sector of the job market has been thriving during the past 18 months-the one your tax dollars pay for.

The paper analyzed the 2 million federal workers tracked by the database of the Office of Personnel Management, which exclude the White House, Congress, the postal service, intelligence agencies and uniformed military personnel.  Its finding: 19 percent of federal workers make more than $100,000 per year (before overtime and bonuses), compared to 14 percent when the recession began.  The average federal worker’s pay is now $71,206 must higher than the average private sector worker’s pay of $40,331.

Don’t miss the salient points:

1. 380,000 federal workers make more than $100,000 per year.  That’s a lot of money for a lot of people.  If the average American worker across the country makes 45% less, then the cost of living nationwide mustn’t require 100 G’s a year.  Maybe the nature of the job requires it?  That ‘s a tough sell.

2. That number of six-figure people is a 5% increase since our economy tanked – since it tanked.  It’s not so much the amount that’s egregious but the timing.  Think about that: when many folks in many sectors of our economy were getting laid off, many federal workers were getting pay raises.

[PAUSE]

If there are fewer workers to pay taxes since they’ve gotten laid off, where did the pay raise money for the federal employees come from?  The tax payers of tomorrow: deficit spending.  At a time when things should be getting leaner and more efficient, Congress authorized more debt.  How irresponsible is that?

[UN-PAUSE]

Do you remember all the screaming and hollering about corporate pay?  No one seemed to squeak about public employee pay.  There’s no automatic pay-raise machine that’s in some basement somewhere in D.C.  No, people in Congress authorized this: a Congress dominated by a party that has always claimed to be for the little people.  Must be the little government employee people…

3. Federal employees make 44% more on average than private sector employees.  44% more.  These aren’t the ones in war-torn Iraq or Afghanistan, on the Hill or delivering our mail day-in and day-out, remember.

4.  Where’s this money coming from?  Taxpayers of today and taxpayer of tomorrow (deficit-spending).  What if this number of six-figure people continues to rise, where is that money going to come from?  Will Uncle Sam increase taxes on federal employees in order to pay them more?  Hardly.  Everyone will be taxed at higher levels to benefit just a few.  Sounds like how health care legislation in the Senate was passed (just ask states how excited they are to subsidize health care costs in Nebraska and Louisiana and Connecticut).

It is really attractive to work for the federal government – that’s a big problem.  If people want to work for the government more than for a private company, then eventually it will be harder to hire qualified employees for companies.  (Technically trained workers might still work for private companies at lower pay – maybe.)  But that wouldn’t be necessary if the government got into more private sector jobs like banking or automotive (oops, they already have).  With fewer private employees, our ability to compete in the world will gradually diminish because skilled people will work for Uncle Sam since it pays so well.  But what does Uncle Sam make?  Nothing.  Not yet anyway (banks and GM notwithstanding).

If more people work for Uncle Sam, then health care costs will go up because the pool of employees for plans will decrease.  Isn’t that a premise behind “affordable health insurance” that there would be more people in more pools?  So, if I continue to stay off the public dole, then my health care costs will go nowhere but up since there will eventually be fewer folks in my pool.  Unless of course that every single American is in the pool, right?  Sound familiar?

Make a quick comparison between heavily unionized companies and our federal government.  Those unionized companies gradually became far less competitive in every industry (worldwide and here at home vs. non-unionized companies in the same markets).  Their employee benefits (pay, pensions and insurance) often amounted to more than companies made in selling their products.  (How many unionized companies have filed for bankruptcy?)  Was the basis of their bankruptcy more to do with employees’ fat benefits or the lack of need for their product?  Companies that made less money had to borrow more (sound familiar: Senate, House?) to pay their obligations.  Eventually they didn’t make enough money to pay their operating expenses or their debt.  So, they defaulted.  What if our government (that has no income stream from any product but from us) increased in size or employee pay went through the roof and there weren’t enough tax payers to support it and no one will lend money to cover it?

  • Can you imagine what would happen to our country?