How much is a billion dollars?

I remember being in a grade school class one day when our teacher was teaching us about large numbers. She said a 1 with 5 zeros was 100,000. I didn't have a problem with that number as I knew Mickey Mantle made $100,000. But then she started talking about how much a million was. That seemed like a number that I would not have use for except on her test. We were working people and I knew my dad didn't make that kind of money. The reason I knew that was because one day as I was walking through the kitchen as my folks were looking at their bills and they had this paper from the bank. I saw it had numbers on it and I asked my dad "why are some of those numbers red?" I thought it was a good question but he told me to go outside and play.
So we didn't have a lot of money. But today we hear about 30 second commercials during the Super Bowl that went for 3 million dollars! Can you believe that 3 million dollars! So for all of you math guys/gals out there figure up how many commercials it would take to total a billion dollars.
Recently the Alabama Baptist State Convention release a report that stated "on September 8, 2008, Alabama Baptists passed the $1 billion mark of gifts through the Cooperative Program since its inception in 1925."

Must be harder to get money from Baptists that it is from advertisers. But anyway, we are talking about a subject I know very little about, having huge sums of money. Our government has experience with big numbers though. We have a bail out coming, billions of dollars they say and we don't really have that kind of money because they say our kids and grandkids are going to have to pay for it. So that means we are bailing out credit problems with more credit, doesn't it? Something seems funny (not ha! ha!, funny strange) But what I do know is our government has a printing press, and boy can they shell out the money. I have been to the U.S. Mint in Washington, D.C. The day we were there they were printing $1 bills. There were pallets of $1 bills everywhere in the secured area.

I suppose if you had a billion dollars in $1 bills you would have several pallets of money. I don't know if the bail outs are going to work or not, and what is scary to me is that I don't believe the people who are working on the bail outs know either.

Maybe it is a really good time to pray for our country and our leaders. We need jobs and we need them quick. A working person doesn't have to make a billion or even a million dollars but they need to be able to make a living. I still don't understand how much a billion dollars is, but I do know people need jobs and they need them yesterday.

On another subject, we check this blog and find out who is reading. We don't have names but we have city, state and country. There have been several hits from people in Alabama and Oklahoma. Some people from Texas, Washington, Kentucky and Michigan have been on this blog. But I wanted to say a special thank you for those of you that have read my blog who live in other countries. It's amazing to know that people in the Philipines, South Korea, Ivory Coast and Israel have recently been on this blog. Thank you for checking us out and may God richly bless you.

New Stuff

Well, here we go 2009! Nine years after Y2K and my computer still works! It's amazing what we think is crisis sometimes when it isn't. A couple of years a go we had a movie come out that starred Tom Hanks and much time was spent in the Christian community telling us to boycott the movie and that the movie had the potential of shaking the foundation of our faith. Now here we are a couple of years after and I can't remember the name of the movie. On January 20 of this year we will have a new president. So much time has been spent by many worrying about the crisis the new president will bring. But folks we are already in crisis in this country, economically, morally and spiritually.
Maybe our crisis is that we are afraid of new stuff? I personally like new stuff. Last year I got a new chair, a new hdtv (see previous post for more detail on that experience), and a new grandson. I will have to admit the new grandson trumps the chair and the tv. Now this year promises some new things too. Sometime in this month of January, I will get another new grandson. In June I will get a new step mother, as my dad is getting married after being a widower for two years. Getting new stuff isn't a bad deal from the way I see it.
I will admit to you that I made no new years resolutions. Why? I mean why start the year off setting myself up for failure? It's January 5th as I write this and most of the folks who made resolutions have broken them or are trying to figure out how to get around them. But that doesn't mean that I don't want new stuff to happen to me in 2009. My hope is that if I live to see 2010 that the Larry of 2009 would have become something new. I hope I conquer some areas of which I stuggle. Maybe I will be a different person by this time next year because I grew in some areas of my life that need to grow. As well I plan on "expanding my horizons" as they say. I do intend to write more, alot more. That could be more blogs, more notes to people, more letters to the editor, more recordings of my life, present and past. And just maybe I might write a book like Sandy has been encouraging me to do over the last several years. Just maybe.
I've spent alot of time reflecting over some things during these quiet days of holiday. I'm looking forward to new things happening in my life. New experiences, new acquaintances/friends, new challenges etc. Why? Because God says I am a new creation and a new creation continues to grow. Above all I don't want to be afraid of the new things God wants to do in my life. May 2009 be known in my life as "The Year of the New Stuff!"
Oh, by the way, I wore a sport coat when I spoke Sunday and no one said a thing. Now that's two new things already!!!!!
"Dear God may we be open to the new things you have for us this year."