Nuggets
The difference between the right word and the almost right word is the difference between lightning and a lightning bug.
Personal Finance
The Risk in Using Financial Metaphors
We pour metaphors into everyday conversations, often without awareness that we do so. A grandmother laughs as her “little monkey” climbs the play castle at the park. Of course, she does not believe her progeny […]
Cognitive Aging and Money Mangement
I had arrived in Portland on the last flight of the day. The next morning I went to see my father in the care facility in which he was living. I found him asleep in […]
Incremental Steps
Someone has said that when it comes to health, the first 50 years are a gift. After that you have to earn it. According to my last doctor’s visit, I’m late in showing up for […]
Savings Rate and Retirement
About 20 years ago, my wife and I decided to spend our two-week vacation remodeling the kitchen and dining room. We started the first thing Monday morning by hauling out the appliances and removing the […]
Ready for the Surprise — an Emergency Fund
The man gave me two options: I could give him a plane ticket to San Francisco, or I could buy him a car. Pick one, he said. He had a job with a roofing company […]
Livelihood and Ministry
I did not know him well, but after being a peer in seminary classes I knew enough of his story to be intrigued. He came to the city from a rural area. He was a […]
Today’s Decisions, Tomorrow’s Needs
My father died six years ago at age 92. For 31 of those years, he served as a pastor in the Church of the Nazarene. He went to his first congregation in Broken Bow, Nebraska, […]