With the economy still appearing to be on life support and many families still struggling to pay the mortgage or even put food on the table, the art of shopping has taken on a whole new form.

I think I tried to eat an elephant this Summer; and, "no", I didn't finish it.

When making wholesale financial changes in your life, there needs to be progress and people that can be an encouragement and help you see that progress.

I thought I knew what a "joint budget" was going into engagement. Boy was I wrong!

The social gospel that over took many mainline denominations in the early part of the last century saw its mission as to be the hands of Christ to a broken world. I think there has been a lot of value in that message and many people have been helped by the church because of it. Yet, this view can be taken to an extreme, like everything. To the extreme where helping the poor becomes the sole reason for the church to exist. The think a lot of churches are there.

The poor economy over the past couple years has brought hardship to many undeserving people. Drastic changes are made in their lives, but it's just not enough, and what do they do when they are too battered to continue the fight?

You don't have to open very many of your retirement savings statements to realize that this past decade has been a little bit of a downer. For most people they are fortunate if they still have the funds that they put into savings, forget any growth they had hoped for on those funds.

I think the biggest reason it's called a "mid-life crisis" is because it's often too hard for us to correctly identify what exactly it is that has us so stressed out.

I recently came across an interesting study done by the Reputation Institute which has completed a survey of what a given country's citizens thought was the worldwide reputation of their country. Each also rated the actual reputation of the other the countries in the survey as well. The results were very illuminating.

"The earth is the Lord's, and everything in it, the world, and all who live in it." - Psalm 24:1