Tim Ellsworth

Thanks to Cameron Cloud for his gracious words about my book, “God in the Whirlwind.”

A friend of mine asked me this week about my experience regarding allowances — both from when I was a child, and now that I’m a parent. I thought maybe what I told him might be helpful to others as well.

To start with, I received an allowance as a boy. I’m not sure how old I was when my parents started giving me a weekly allowance (maybe 7 or 8?), but I do remember them explaining it to me. If I were to receive such an allowance, I was required to give 10 percent of it to the church every week.

This was a valuable lesson for me on the benefits of tithing, and one that has stuck with me ever since.

A few months ago my wife and I started giving an allowance to our son Daniel, who’s 5. Some may question whether that’s too early or not, but it seems to be working well for us. We give him $1 every week (although we haven’t been 100 percent faithful in sticking to it). My wife created small containers labeled “Tithe” and “Savings.” Of the $1 he receives, he must give 10 cents to the church, and put another 10 cents into savings. We expect the savings to accumulate over the years. Money he earns from work outside the home will also be distributed in this way.

Some of the reasons why we decided to start this practice:

1. We wanted to establish him early in the practice of tithing. It’s biblical, and I want him to learn about being faithful to God with the resources he has.

2. We wanted him to get in the habit of saving money.

3. We wanted him to appreciate the value of delayed gratification. If Daniel has $7, and there’s a toy at the store that he wants to buy costing $10, we’re not going to make up the difference for him. We’ll tell him that he’s welcome to purchase the toy when he has saved enough money. Assuming he can’t persuade his grandparents to give him the extra money (which is a large assumption), Daniel will pinch his pennies until he has enough money to make the purchase. Sometimes it might take a few weeks. That’s good for him.

4. We wanted him to learn about making wise use of his money. If he impulsively spends $2 today on some trinket, that means he’s another $2 away from buying something else that he might want more. It will make him think more seriously about how he spends his money.

5. We wanted him to learn the value of work. Yes, Daniel has tasks around the house that he has to do without getting paid. But we tried to come up with some additional chores he could do in order to “earn” his allowance. We want him to recognize as he grows older that time is a commodity he needs to think about, in addition to money. When he has the opportunity, will he spend an hour mowing a lawn in order to earn some money, or will he spend it idly in a way that doesn’t benefit him? We want him to grow up to be a hard worker. (And just to be clear, he’s not mowing lawns right now. I’m thinking a few years down the road here.)

6. We wanted him to learn the value of service to others. While it could be a danger that children will want payment for every little task they do for anyone, I think that’s where wise parenting comes in. In addition to teaching our children the value of work, we’ll also teach them the value of responsibility and serving others without expecting to get paid. When you know that you can work for an hour mowing a lawn and make $10 from someone who’s willing and able to pay it, I think it makes you appreciate even more the hour you spend mowing the yard of someone who doesn’t have the ability to pay you.

These thoughts are by no means exhaustive, and we’ll continue to think through these matters as our children grow up. But this is where we are right now.

Reynolds follows father’s example in baseball and faith
ESPN story highlights Cotchery’s faith
Price signs with Patriots
Shi leads CBU past Westmont
Union soccer edges Freed-Hardeman

Some funny stuff here. See lots of others.

If you’d like to read a book that will help you think biblically about sports, check out “Game Day for the Glory of God,” by Stephen Altrogge.

I write about the new book in more detail in a column on BP Sports.

In an article for USA Today, David Gushee criticized conservative evangelicals for their support of Sarah Palin, suggesting that by supporting her for vice president, complementarians were somehow being inconsistent.

Two articles I’ve come across adequately refute Gushee’s arguments. See what Denny Burk and the Council for Biblical Manhood and Womanhood have to say.

UPDATE: Andreas Köstenberger also has written a response to Gushee’s article, in which he addresses this question: “Is it appropriate for Gushee to seek to ridicule, or at least embarrass, his brothers and sisters in Christ on the pages of a national newspaper for their ‘archaic’ beliefs?”

UPDATE #2: And now Richard Land has responded to Gushee and others who are similarly wrong.

Alex Forrest has a good column on BP Sports about Matt Cassel.

Cassel’s story challenges me to persevere in quiet discipline regardless of what role I’m called to play (or not). Discipline bears fruit and there is a reward for perseverance. That’s true in football, and Scripture makes clear that it is true in God’s kingdom as well.

Also, in recent days, Gordon Cloud and Paul Shirley have written columns for BP Sports as well.

I have five free copies of my book, “God in the Whirlwind,” available for the first five people who comment and ask for one, under the following conditions:

1. If you have a blog, post at least a brief review of it, as well as a review on Amazon.

2. If you don’t have a blog, post a review of it on Amazon.

3. If you like it, recommend it to some friends.

Comment moderation is on for those who are commenting for the first-time, so just because your comment may appear to be one of the first five, that doesn’t necessarily mean it’s so. Someone else’s comment may be awaiting moderation.

Make sure you post a valid address in the e-mail field when you leave a comment. I’ll e-mail the winners to get a mailing address.

I’ll post a comment after all five books are gone.

An unusual obituary ran in a California newspaper last month.

It was an obit for 79-year-old Dolores Aguilar in the Times-Herald of Vallejo, Calif. Her daughter Virginia Brown was the writer.

“Dolores had no hobbies, made no contribution to society and rarely shared a kind word or deed in her life,” Brown wrote about her mother. “I speak for the majority of her family when I say her presence will not be missed by many, very few tears will be shed and there will be no lamenting over her passing.”

What a way to be remembered, huh?

Read the rest of my most recent column in the Jackson Sun.

“So man’s will is like a beast standing between two riders. If God rides, it wills and goes where God wills: as the Psalm says, ‘I am become as a beast before thee, and I am ever with thee’ (Ps. 73:22-23). If Satan rides, it wills and goes where Satan wills. Nor may it choose to which rider it will run, or which it will seek; but the riders themselves fight to decide who shall have and hold it.”

– Martin Luther, “The Bondage of the Will”

Just saw this sign this morning:

“God don’t call the equipped. He equips the called.”

Talk about displaying your ignorance for the world to see.

For years now I’ve been using Sitemeter to monitor traffic and incoming links to my blog. But they’ve updated the service, and have ruined it in the process. It really is good for nothing now. So I’m looking for something else.

If you can recommend a free service providing traffic reports for a website, please let me know. Thanks.

Christian recording artist Ray Boltz has come out of the closet.

Good words from Father Thomas D. Williams in his article, “The Gospel According to Joe Biden”:

It is fascinating to read over texts circulated in the middle of the 19th century in defense of the practice of slavery. When we look back at how revered politicians, intellectuals, and churchmen could seriously defend a practice that now seems so patently barbaric, we cannot help feeling a twinge of moral superiority. Yet their arguments bear an uncanny resemblance to those now used to defend abortion, almost as if pro-choicers had been using these tracts as fodder for their own rhetoric. From Nancy Pelosi’s “historical argument” (“Slavery was practiced in the greatest civilizations”) to Joe Biden’s “personally opposed” argument (“No one is forcing you to own slaves, just to respect those who do”), all the way to the feminists’ “woman has a right to her own body” argument (“Slaves have been bought and paid for and no one has the right to touch another’s property”) to Obama’s “We don’t know when life begins” argument (“We’re not sure whether black people have souls”), it is truly déjà vu all over again.

I was going through some old files and came across this headline I saw in a Baptist newspaper a few years ago:

“Billy Graham keeps it simple for Harvard’s intelectuals”

Note the spelling.