Shiny Yellow Rocks at $1,000 each - What a Deal!

The price of gold has reached a record $1,000 an ounce, and I wonder what precisely is it that made a shiny yellow rock increase in value by that much? Did we suddenly discover it has some cancer-fighting agent within its compound? Are people somehow more compelled to ask you to the dance floor if you're wearing it? Has its heretofore unmarketed capacity to do the laundry and mop the floor while you lounge by the pool been finally realized?

Well, not really.

The only reason is because the value of the dollar is slipping and hordes of people (ah, no word is more apt here than "hoard") believe they can somehow protect the meaning of their value by getting and holding shiny yellow rocks.

Yeah.

Wow.

That'll do it.

I seem to vaguely recall a story about a king--name of Mitchell or Michael, not that but a bit more odd--for some reason I'm thinking of a muffler repair shop, but, what do I know...

But hey! What about the Constitution?! Ah yes, that treasured sacred document, the one that sacredly and, um, treasuredly I guess, really protects us and our value! Yes, that one! Yay for it! After all it does say right there in Article 1, Section 8 that the United States Government of America I quote now "shall have the power to coin money [and] regulate the value thereof" unquote. Thair-ya-go.

So then when the Congress says a dime is ten cents, then dammit it's ten cents.

Er, problem, though.

A dime is not ten cents anymore, and a dollar has never been a dollar. In fact shiny yellow rocks are only whatever value they are because of the work of miners and speculators, and perhaps image molders who find a way to make wearing them more fashionable. If a billion tons of easily extracted gold were found somewhere it won't be $1,000 an ounce for long.

Oh certainly there are gobs of people (I already did the hordes thing so I've got to use gobs) who believe that if you've got gold you're secure, but the question is brutally begged. What is it exactly that make you with your comstock load (or lode I guess) of gold any more valuable than you already are?

The reason there was ever any gold standard was very simple.

It is because all men are liars.

Not only are all men liars but most are dismayed they are. "Huh? You a liar? Me a liar? Nahhh..."

Do you realize how little regularly practiced deceit is considered as part of the cost of doing any business at all, when in reality it is entered into everyone's business accounting all the time? It is very expensive yet no one has the balls to admit why. That gold has reached $1,000 an ounce is testament to that truth.

In a very real sense, what is it that you're saying when you say, "Hey, I have gold. Trust me." Is it not the case that you are saying you need some extrinsically valued item--shiny yellow rocks--to establish that you are not a liar? Are you not saying you need a traditionally considered temporal form of value assessment to get people to consider you worth anything you are worth?

What about this. What about just being valuable in the things you can do to make others lives better in and of themselves? What about being so trustworthy that people know you are who you are? How about just allowing God to move you to do marvelous things He's already made you to do?

I know the reason why it doesn't happen. That too is simple.

It is because so many refuse to make Jesus Christ their very value assessment. The Bible is pretty clear about it. "You have the Son, you have life. You don't, you don't have life." That's pretty plainly laid out there.

Oh, and the dismay about the fact that all men are liars, that too is actually pretty much an exact verse from the Bible. Really. Look at Psalm 116:11. Look, right there. "In my dismay I said, 'All men are liars.'"

Hey, don't worry. I myself don't pretend to be a non-liar. I'm a liar too.

Unless I allow the counsel of the Holy Spirit to make me truthful.

He is the key. In fact He is the only thing. I'm the most brazen wretched pukifying liar without Him. And if I'm truthful I'm going to refuse to hide behind shiny yellow rocks or Congress and its constitutionally mandated value assignment powers, both of which are gutter sludge compared to the blood of Christ.

What do I have to lose to just let people see me as one who's abandoned himself to Christ. Oh, yeah, I may lose the World.

Wow. Seems like a lot.

The World.

But I'd rather have my soul back and the beautifully gracious (and quite truthful) interaction with my Lord.

(I've written a bit more about all this at my webzine. Here it is.)

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