They suck for those directly affected – those who have lost a child, or friend, and are experiencing grief – but they also suck for those of us who are trying to figure out how to process it. How to talk about it… with others, with our kids.

It’s almost impossible to know where the line is between being overly morbid and depressed vs. looking callous by not letting it affect you.

I want to be sensitive. I do. But I’m often not. I don’t think we get anywhere constructive by being “sensitive”. We’d just be wallowing in feelings.

Someone has to have the presence of mind to say, “STOP IT!!”

So I’ve turned the news off the last few days because there is nowhere constructive that they’re going to go with this situation. There is nowhere in our news media, or social media like Twitter for that matter, where there is any focus on what God’s intentions are for what happened in Connecticut – or what happens every day of the year all over the globe where tragedies occur that don’t move the emotional needle one iota for us.

There is nothing in our human power that we can control to avert every tragedy. We try, but clearly we fail. And will always fail. Because other people’s decisions are not yours or mine to control.

There are no laws that have ever stopped an accident, or a criminal or an unstable mind.

So, I’m all for sharing the message of hope that God has for us all – that He loves you and me and our kids, and despite the horribleness of this world (which, by the way, He knows full well and was born into it in days worse than the ones we’re in now) I’m thankful that in the middle of those terrible things we experience we can join the heavenly angels singing, as they did then…

“Glory to God in the Highest, and on earth peace, goodwill toward men”.

So we turn to the story of the babe in a manger. The little innocent baby, full of promise and wonder, who lived to die to save a world that has always been His all along.

Not ours.

It’s in Him that our hope lies. The more people who are talking about what THAT means (every single person on his or her face repenting before God) instead of how many new laws we can pass or what people we can place under government control is where we can be constructive.

What took so long?

Winning tickets for that big Powerball lottery were purchased in Missouri and Arizona. The jackpot had gotten up to almost $600 million.

Until yesterday, there were 6 states that did not allow sales of Powerball tickets – with California being one of them.

No more.

The state apparently is devastated that potential tax revenue is crossing over to Arizona so they voted to approve bringing Powerball here beginning in April 2013.

My only question is “what took so long for the craziness to come to the land of the crazies?”

You can read more here.

Boots in the cold

You never know when a random act of kindness will inspire more than just the people involved in the act. A police officer in New York City did a kind deed recently. A tourist took a photo of it and it’s become a hit on the internet.

Lawrence DePrimo, on duty on a freezing cold night near Times Square, says he was wearing two pairs of socks and his feet was still cold – when he saw a homeless man sitting on the sidewalk with no shoes or socks – and Lawrence could see the blisters on the man’s feet.

Lawrence was moved to walk down to a nearby shoe store where he bought socks and a pair of boots for the homeless man, brought them back and helped the man put them on.

And we know about this because Jennifer, a tourist who happened to see what was happening, took a picture of the officer kneeling beside the man as he helped him with the boots.

That photo has had over 300,000 likes on Facebook and tens of thousands of people have shared it.

It’s true that most acts of kindness do go unnoticed. But every once in a while – we need one that gets noticed – and talked about – if for nothing else than to inspire us to do more acts of kindness that go unnoticed.

It’s the spirit of Christmas.

You can read the full story here.

I’ve heard of grocery giveaways, especially this time of year, but I don’t think I’ve ever heard of someone giving away a grocery STORE. But that’s what Joe Lueken did. He decided to retire from his grocery store business (he owned 2), but instead of selling it off to another company or investors – or even passing it down to family – he decided to give it… to his 400-some employees.

Nice little Christmas present. Joe says the reason he’s doing it is because it’s his employees who are “responsible for the success of the business and they deserve to get some of the benefits”.

The new employee-owned company will have a new president and CEO. Brent Sicard started working for Lueken in 1998 as an overnight janitor.

Reminds of something I heard once – that’s it not about where you begin in life, but where you finish.

Joe Lueken is finishing well. His wife Janice says they hope to leave a lasting legacy – of doing the right thing for people, empowering them to help themselves and help others, too.

You can read the full story here...

Best vehicle for resale

If you knew you were going to lose 62% of the money you invested in something, I wonder if you’d make that investment?

That’s what happens when you buy a new car. Kelley Blue Book has come out with their list of the best vehicles for resale value after 5 years – and it seems the cars to buy to lose the least are Toyotas. They make up the majority of the list – with the FJ Cruiser having the best resale value at 63%.

Only 3 others are over 50%.

Any other vehicle you buy new you will lose more than half what you pay for it within 5 years – and when you’re talkin’ $20-40k for most cars, that’s a loss of at least $10-20k!! Or in other words, only losing 200 to 400 hundred bucks a month.

I guess that’s why the financial guy Dave Ramsey is always talking about buying used cars that someone else has taken the loss on.

You can read the full story here.