I have been reading the personal finance blog Money Help For Christians for a while now and decided to contribute something to it. Craig had opened it up a while back for guest post opportunities. I came up with an idea that I’ve been implementing successfully for two months, thanks to a savings account my bank gave me.

The article I wrote explains my idea about being your own rewards card. Essentially, I’ve found most rewards credit cards to be more dangerous than helpful for people who can’t control their spending, so I use a method that lets me get “rewarded” for making purchases without going into debt.

The article might get me some hotly negative reviews. I said “Earning miles is a joke.” Craig actually has a course he teaches on earning miles, so I directly contradicted him. He said he really liked my article, though, and is going to use it as a springboard for some articles in the future. I’m counting on the “love of the brethren” I’ve seen displayed there before to keep people from ripping my head off.

Anyway, go check out my article if you’d like. I’m pretty happy with it!

DIY Rewards Cards: Pay Yourself Back Without Going Into Debt

-j

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But I also want to write. I want to write well. I would love to sell a book, but I also think I could potentially make some side money from blogs. I have two ideas for informative blogs, but to make them worthwhile, they would require a lot of extra research for articles and such. One is sort of a gardening blog. I want to have a garden next year to grow my own veggies and such, but I know nothing, and I’m sure there’s more of me. So I could blog it. The other is a book blog, but that also requires that I read several books in short periods of time. I think that one would be exceptionally fun.

I also want to get really good at photography, but I don’t have the time or money for that.

But before any of that, I need to make more time for prayer and Bible reading/study.

The point is there’s so much I want to do and not enough time to do it. Nor do I have enough brain cycles to keep track of it all.

At least in November I will write. I’ll be posting here as I do, if I like what comes out.

I wish we had more hours in a day…

-j

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Let me pose a second question. As a pacifist, believing that killing of any kind is wrong, shouldn’t I take the stand that *no one* should be allowed in the military? Obviously that’s absurd; only in a world where Jesus really reigns would a military be unnecessary. So then am I saying that the military is a necessary evil?

I never hear anyone in the church talking about banning the military. We holler all the time about sexual immorality, but what about the sanctity of life? Including (especially?) the lives of our enemies (Matthew 5:44). I never hear any talk in the church against the military even though to join it is to forfeit your membership in the ACC. It’s like it’s a topic we just ignore unless it pertains directly to one of us.

So I ask again – does that mean we as a church consider it to be a necessary evil? Answering that question to the positive opens up a whole host of other theological and moral issues. But answering “no” might mean we’re choosing not to do the good we know to do. I don’t have an answer, and I don’t mean this post as a criticism. It definitely has been a thought exercise I’ve been working on in my own head.

-j

*Many people like to use the wars that God encouraged or even started in the Old Testament as a justification for wars now. So called “just wars”. Everyone says war is an evil, but when they’re “just”, it’s somehow better. If there is a place where Jesus authorizes wars (aside from the Final one that He will lead), please show me.

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Everyone likes to take the easy road. Well, maybe not everyone, but for the majority of people, wouldn’t you think folks would prefer to just sort of glide along? Not that we don’t have ambitions, just that the ambitions wouldn’t take a lot to accomplish. I would love to be fluent in Portuguese, but I’d prefer it not take years to happen. Let’s switch gears to more morbid things. If you could live your life without experiencing the deaths of others, wouldn’t you prefer that? Death is a part of life that we all have to deal with, and people deal with it every day, but I’m sure most of us would rather not have to.

That kind of sets the background for a thought I had the other day. it’s a recurring thought that pops up from time to time. I suppose I could change my original statement to be something like “I hate meeting new people, getting close to them, and then leaving them.”

I was driving home from work one day last week and started thinking about some friends I made in college. When I first started, it didn’t take long to find a group I gelled with. There were only about 6 or 7 of us, but I would say we were pretty tight all the way through OCC, and even stayed connected for a little while after that. I am still to this day indebted to one of them for allowing me to live with him in Buffalo while I worked at an internship he got me for three months. When I moved back to Richmond, I managed to get in touch with another one, but we have since lost touch again.

I’m a very social person, and I love having a few close friends. I don’t like leaving those friends. I am finding myself in a similar situation at work. There are a few of us that, were we in college or without families, would probably hang out constantly. A few have already left the company. I really would prefer to spend the rest of my professional life working with these people. But I know that probably won’t happen, and it makes me a little sad to think about.

My friends mean a lot to me. I don’t want to keep having to make new friends and then one day having to leave those friends. Fortunately the internet is an amazing way to keep in touch, but even then you can lose it. In case any of you has happened across this, Mike, Greg, Marie, Jon, Shelly, or Jeremy, I still think about y’all from time to time, and I miss you.

-j

More great posts:

• DIY Rewards Cards: I Have A Personal Finance Post at MH4C
• Not Enough Time
• Should anyone be allowed in the military?