I bet you thought that a paper twenty-dollar was money, right? Wrong! Paper has never been money. It is a note that used to promise the bearer to be paid in real money -- gold or silver. The question I want you to consider with me is: Why does it matter what we use as money?

In the beginning, our young nation had a solid biblical foundation of gold and silver backed money. The Coinage Act of 1792 provided the Congress with the authority to mint coinage of gold or silver as legal tender for the United States. Over time, however, the powerful banking establishment usurped that authority and several times in U.S. history we allowed the printing of unredeemable paper money notes to fund wars. Today, the Federal Reserve banking system today is a privately held corporation that has no backing of any sort behind it ... unless you consider debt as a tangible substance worth backing paper money. I sure don't! Our ignorance and apathy regarding coin, credit, and circulation has taken its toll.

Having an honest money system is critical issue since our money represents our life, our time, and for many retirees, their very survival in the future.

The main problems with debt-based (or fiat) money are threefold.

1. Every time that a new $1, $5, $10, $20, $100 or $500 bill is created its value begins a fast process of deterioration physically and financially. For example, in just the last 25 years our "dollar" has retained only 25 cents in buying power. Over time, fiat money becomes worth less because of the ever increasing money supply that is pumped into the economy. A major missing element in modern money is scarcity. The Fed can print as much as they want, whenever they want.

2. The result is that our modern fiat money is without a store of value. Over time, inflation also reduces the buying power of paper money -- a fact that any shopper will notice over a period of years. This inflationary problem robs buying power from both the children and the elderly, creating economic hardship in the future for both.

The solutions are not simple because the problems are not understood by most Americans. It is the job of Christians, as "watchmen on the wall," to sound an alarm before our whole nation falls into hyperinflation, depression ... or worse. Politicians will typically avoid the money issue because they are interested in elections, not fundamental change. That is why fundamental change usually comes from the bottom up. We the People, the Christians should be leading the fight for godly economics as fervently as we fight for the right to life or for morality in entertainment.