Then what?

In the beginning, a new business startup is, essentially, a survival game. Keep it alive, keep cash flowing, keep customers coming, see what happens. But after a while, the hope is that we move from crawling to walking, walking to running, and, hopefully, running to flying. But it doesn’t always go that way. And even when it does, sometimes that growth curve is wretchedly long; brutally flat, sometimes for years.If your friend started a business and, five years in, he still could not afford to pay his wife, would you call him a failure? Would you tell him to quit and get “real job”? Perhaps, if you’re kind, you’d at least chalk this up to a hobby — maybe a charity? 😂 — but not a job. Not a business.That’s where our story begins.And I’m already giving it away because, if it’s a story worth telling, then you’re now waiting with baited breath to hear the glory story.But pause with me for a second… because crawling for five years - 260 weeks - is a brutal, grueling, soul-crushing experience.This guy had borrowed $600 to start making miniature picture frames in his garage. His two young sons glued the frames together for seven cents apiece and his wife handled the shipping.She did so, quite dutifully, for five long years—without pay. That’s not something I’d typically recommend. And quite honestly, that’s part of why I’m telling the story.They were super tight on money, obviously, so every dollar they could spare went back into the business. Only many years later, did he describe those early days as crawling: “You crawl and crawl. Eventually you get on your feet. Then, if the Lord is with you, you can fly.”I gotta confess … the flying sounds great. Most of us like the flying part. We all wanna fly. And who can blame us? We live in a world with “success stories” like Anthropic starting literally 5 years ago (Jan 2021) and today, 5.75 years later it’s value is estimated not in the billions but in the trillions of dollars.The crawling is so much more common. It’s real. And it’s very hard to romanticize when you are the one on your hands and knees.But they crawled. And, notably, they kept crawling.The little frame business became a small store. The small store became several stores. Several stores became a national company worth — you guessed it — billions of dollars.At that point, the problem changed. Early on, the question was how to keep the business alive. Now the question was what to do with everything it had become.Smart people called “advisors” came in to help the founder protect the wealth and pass the company to his children, then to his grandchildren.That’s pretty sensible advice. Time-tested. Understandable. “That’s what everyone would suggest” kinda stuff.Yet it made him miserable.He actually wept under the weight of it. Something was wrong. He could not live with the idea that generations of his family would inherit wealth they had not earned, especially when that wealth might hurt their character more than help it.One day while enjoying a prayer walk through his back yard, God brought a question to him: “What would you do with the company if another family owned it?”It landed so squarely that he points to that mid-day walk as a pivotal moment in his life.The answers came very quickly. If another family owned the company, he would manage it faithfully. He would work hard. He would take care of the people in it. But he would not confuse the company’s money with his own.Bingo.The company did not, in fact, belong to his family. It belonged, as all things do, to God.Christians say “God owns it all” so often that the words can lose their power. They’re true. We acknowledge them. We nod our heads. Sometimes we write checks. But our core beliefs usually lie out of reach. Beliefs like,“it’s really all up to me.”“I’m the provider for my family.”“I know God led me to start this business so I’m sure it will succeed.”That last one can really sound like faith. But God leading me to start a business doesn’t mean He has promised it will thrive. When I confuse the two, every slow month becomes a test of His trustworthiness. Now I’m trying to keep the business alive and prove that I was right about God. The role of a steward answers both because, as a steward, I’m responsible for working faithfully and leaving the outcomes up to God.If another family owned your business, you would not casually use its money to build your personal kingdom. If another family owned your investment account, you would not treat every gain as permission to raise your lifestyle. If another family owned your house, your time, and your abilities, you would probably ask more often what the owners wanted done with them.Ownership says, “Because this is mine, what do I want to do with it?”Stewardship asks, “Since all I have is the Lord’s, what would the Owner do with it?”That is the dichotomy of ownership and stewardship.The entrepreneur was David Green, founder of Hobby Lobby.The irony is that a man who spent years building what looked like a family empire eventually concluded that it was never his empire at all. He and his family could be paid for the work they did. They could enjoy the fruit they earned. But they would not treat the tree as theirs to sell and consume.While building a billion-dollar company may not be God’s path for you, don’t discount all that has been entrusted to your care:An income.A business.A home.A calendar.A unique set of abilities & skills.Maybe more wealth than you once imagined having.So try the question that changed David Green’s thinking: What would you do differently if all of it belonged to another family?And may the utter relief of stewardship bring joy and gladness to your heart this week!P.S. This newsletter started as another way to serve my clients, sharing my thoughts on integrating faith and finances. If we’re not working together yet, here are three ways I can help whenever you’re ready:‣ Prepare for a Gospel-centered retirement‣ Align your investments with your faith‣ Figure out how much is actually enough This is a public episode. If you would like to discuss this with other subscribers or get access to bonus episodes, visit faithandfinance.substack.com

“The Gift That Leads to Death.” I know, such a cheery start to your day. Probably not the day-one giving campaign sermon title of choice, and that’s fine.I want to put two stories from Scripture next to each other, starting with the widow in Zarephath in 1 Kings 17. Elijah comes to her and asks for bread, and she tells him she has a handful of flour and a little oil left. She’s going to make something for herself and her son, and then they’re going to die.That’s how little she has. She’s already thinking in terms of their last meal.So when she makes something for Elijah, I wonder how much hopelessness was wrapped up in that moment. Humanly speaking, you could almost read it as, “Well, what does it matter? Fine, you can have it.” We aren’t told everything going through her mind, but Elijah has also brought her a promise from God: the flour and oil will last until He sends rain.And she acts on it. This woman, who isn’t even part of Israel, trusts the God of this prophet enough to give from the bottom of her barrel. Somehow the flour doesn’t run out, and neither does the oil. There is food for her household through the famine.Then we get to Ananias and Sapphira in Acts 5.It’s the early church, and people are bringing gifts to the apostles to care for the other believers. Ananias and Sapphira sell a piece of property and bring part of the proceeds, but they present the gift as though they’re giving the whole amount.And Peter sees straight through it.By the way, they were allowed to keep some of the money. Peter specifically says the property belonged to them, and after they sold it, the money was theirs to do with as they wished. They could have brought a portion and been honest about it.Instead, they lied. They wanted people to think they had surrendered everything while they were secretly holding something back. They wanted to be seen as these wonderfully generous people giving their lives to the service of the church.And both of them died.That is a sobering story to read, especially next to the widow’s. Both gave, and yet apparently not every gift is generous.Where is the giving coming from?The widow is responding to God’s word with almost nothing left. Ananias and Sapphira have property to sell, and they’re trying to manage what people think of them. From the outside, you could look at either gift and see someone being generous. But what’s happening in their hearts is very different.And I think it’s pretty easy for us to put spiritual language around mixed motives.I can give because I want to be faithful, but I can also give because I want to be impressive. Money might be losing its grip on me while approval still has a pretty firm hold. The outward act could look almost identical, even to me if I’m not paying attention.So “Am I giving?” doesn’t get far enough. Where is that giving coming from, and what is it doing in my soul? Who am I becoming as I give?I’ve talked before about the gravitational pull of wealth. We have to respect its ability to draw our lives into orbit around it. Giving can help loosen that grip, but I can also give an amount I’m perfectly comfortable with, get the satisfaction of feeling generous, and never have to trust God with anything that feels costly.Or I can give a lot and become even more attached to being known as someone who gives a lot.That possibility ought to make us pause before assuming the gift tells us everything we need to know.I can hide behind a good strategyIn my line of work, I talk about generosity in terms of tools quite often. Donor-advised funds, appreciated securities, estate planning, deductions. All of that matters, and it can be really helpful.Take a donor-advised fund. You can contribute eligible appreciated assets to a charitable account, then recommend grants to ministries and other charities from that account. Depending on the asset and your circumstances, that can allow more to go toward giving than selling the asset yourself, paying capital gains tax, and giving what’s left.That’s a really cool tool. I love helping people think through things like that.But you could set up the fund, contribute loads of appreciated stock, and still have the same heart problem you had before you started. A clever strategy can’t settle the question of why you’re giving.And sometimes the planning itself gives us a way to delay obedience.I have five kids, and then I have a sixth kid called Charity in my estate plan. The ministries we care about, our church, people getting the gospel to unreached places, will receive an equal portion of our estate.I’m glad we have that in place. But I also have to ask whether knowing they’ll receive something someday could become an excuse to ignore God’s prompting to give now.Because when I say, “I’m going to give a lot to them someday,” I should probably be more precise. My executor will give it. I’ll be gone.Oh, dang.There’s a different kind of trust involved in giving while I’m still here and could still use that money. Planning a future gift doesn’t answer whether I’m obeying God with what He’s asking of me today.And the same question applies when a ministry invites us to give. If nobody ever knew I made the gift, would that change how I felt about making it? Am I responding to God’s prompting, or do I want the person asking to think something of me?Those are questions I need to sit with even when the financial strategy makes perfect sense.The death I actually wantBut our faith also revolves around a gift that led to death.“For God so loved the world, that he gave his only Son.” The Father gives the Son, and the Son gives His life. That gift leads to death before it leads to resurrection.So as I think about this title, there’s a kind of death I actually want to happen in my giving. I want my desire to impress people to die. I want the hypocrisy in me, the parts of my heart that don’t match what I’m saying, to be brought into the light and dealt with.Sometimes an act of generosity can be part of that. I give, and there’s no credit coming back to me. Nobody respects me more because of it, and I don’t get to build a story about what a generous person I am. God prompted me to do something, and I did it.I’d like that to put another nail in the coffin of my pride.Even there, I don’t want to turn around and try to impress God with how little I’m trying to impress everybody else. First John says we love because He first loved us. That’s where I want my giving to come from too. Christ has made me His, and I’m responding to what He’s already given.People ask me good, practical questions about giving. Do I tithe on net or gross? What about Social Security in retirement? What happens when I’m selling appreciated assets?I’m glad to talk through those questions, and I love a good giving strategy. But we’d miss an awful lot if we worked out all the calculations and never considered what kind of people we’re becoming as we give.When I give because God prompted me, without needing anybody to know, I want my pride to lose a little more of its hold. That would be a gift that leads to a death I’d welcome.P.S. This newsletter started as another way to serve my clients, sharing my thoughts on integrating faith and finances. If we’re not working together yet, here are three ways I can help whenever you’re ready:‣ Prepare for a Gospel-centered retirement‣ Align your investments with your faith‣ Figure out how much is actually enough This is a public episode. If you would like to discuss this with other subscribers or get access to bonus episodes, visit faithandfinance.substack.com

It’s a Monday. I’m driving into my office and listening to a voice memo from my good buddy out in Colorado. We banter about faith & finance topics all the time — in fact a few of my newsletter ideas have come from chats with him. And this one’s no different.He proposed to me the question on the other side of most every financial goal. And let me pause there — financial goals like…Build a businessGet rid of the mortgagePay for your kids’ collegeSave $1 million in your retirement accountsGet the promotion to secure your income for the foreseeable future.So you get the point. But I wanna share this question with you. On the other side of those goals … now what?The economic warning light that used to flash in the corner of your life has finally turned off.So what’s next?It’s a fair question because more money really can make life better, especially when there isn’t enough of it. Money can put groceries in the refrigerator, fix the transmission, cover the electric bill, and give a family room to breathe. The longing to provide well isn’t greed. For many people, earning more would relieve real pressure.But my friend’s question assumed that pressure had already lifted. The income is there, the family is healthy, the house is comfortable and the boxes are checked.What do you pursue when you no longer need to pursue the things that got you here?The little Eden we buildI think many of us spend years trying to architect our own little Eden.We want a beautiful life with everything we need, arranged carefully enough that very little faith is required. We don’t mind God being present, of course. We would simply prefer that he not disrupt the plans.So we work, save, insure, diversify, and optimize until we’ve protected ourselves from every problem we can imagine. Then, once the structure is secure, we plan to give God the overflow.One problem here is that we never defined how much was enough, so the overflow never quite arrives.There is always another expense, another upgrade, another milestone, or another risk to guard against. The imaginary line moves every time we get close to it. We keep assuming that one day we will look around, discover we have far more than we need, and become radically generous without having practiced generosity along the way.Proverbs says, “The wealth of the rich is their fortified city; they imagine it a wall too high to scale.”Read that last phrase again: “…they imagine…“Money can protect us from many things. It can absorb a bad month, replace a roof, and pay for excellent medical care. But the wall is never as high as we imagine it is. Eventually, life reminds us that we are finite.The finish line keeps movingEven if life goes wonderfully, there is no natural point at which desire declares itself satisfied.I once heard a kind Englishman named Richard share his life story. He described what happened when his career changed and his income took off. He began earning in a month what he once earned in a year. Then he earned it in a few weeks. His lifestyle rose just as quickly.Wool became cashmere. Nylon became leather. The house got larger, and the schools became more exclusive. None of the upgrades stood out as outrageous on their own, after all … he could afford it. Couldn’t he?Then he realized that his consumption had become insatiable.Around that time, his church began raising money for a new building. As he studied the plans, he started researching what the same money could accomplish through ministries serving people in much poorer parts of the world. He had spent years asking what more money could add to his life. He began asking what it could accomplish through his life.That question changed the way he gave.For years, he increased his generosity beyond what felt comfortable. Each time, he feared he had finally gone too far and would discover that God would not provide. Each year gave him another chance to learn that God’s provision was sturdier than his fear.Then he was diagnosed with terminal cancer.Near the end of his life, he said he was grateful God had gotten hold of his heart before the fear of death forced the issue. His generosity had been freely offered, not extracted by a diagnosis.I heard his story 2 years after he died, and shared it with my friend on an ordinary Monday morning voice memo.Richard had no way to know where his obedience would travel or whom it would reach.A larger storyThe question “then what?“ assumes there is a finish line where the important work is complete and the rest of life has to be filled.But you may already have much of what you once thought would make you feel secure. You may have savings, a home, healthy children, meaningful work, and enough margin to absorb a surprise. In a real sense, you may have already arrived at someone else’s dream.And yet the worries remain. The goals multiply. The finish line moves.Life may still feel quite hard.Money cannot give us the kind of security that lets us stop depending on God. It cannot relieve us of our finitude or guarantee that life will follow the plan. No portfolio can do that much work, though we often ask it to.This does not make planning pointless. Saving is wise. Providing for a family is good. Work, ambition, and preparation all have a place in a faithful life.But ambition has to be yielded to Christ or it will shrink our lives around ourselves. We can spend decades building a private kingdom, then wonder why the view from the top feels smaller than expected.God’s story is incalculably larger than the life we can secure for ourselves. There is always someone to serve, something to build, a burden to carry, a gift to offer, or an act of obedience that will far outreach our vision.This hard season may be teaching us dependence that affluence will tempt us to forget. The prosperous season may give us resources that were never meant to terminate on us. Either way, God is present before the warning light turns off, and he is still there after it does.So when the income rises, the house is paid off, the children are launched, and the boxes are checked, the answer is not a blank page.The story was never that small. This is a public episode. If you would like to discuss this with other subscribers or get access to bonus episodes, visit faithandfinance.substack.com

About a year ago, I needed someone to give me permission to save for retirement. I know that sounds really strange coming from a financial planner. I got into finance because compound interest absolutely bedazzled me. It felt like black magic. You look at a graph showing what happens when money compounds over 10, 20, 30, or 40 years, and it is hard to believe.Then I tried to reconcile the financial wizardry of modern investing with my Bible—especially Jesus’ teachings in Luke 12 and similar. I read about a Jesus, who had nowhere to lay his head and gave haunting warnings about wealth. Who called the rich foolish for building bigger barns and telling himself he could finally relax, eat, drink, and be merry.Suddenly, my excitement about investing and building wealth felt harder to reconcile with following Christ.Was saving for retirement wise stewardship? Or was I slowly buying into an affluent, self-indulgent, godless vision of the good life? Could it be both? I do not think I am the only Christian who has felt that tension.I talk with people who say, “I want to save, but I don’t ever plan to stop working.” That sounds bold & faithful when you are 35. Then you turn 50 and your knees hurt. Your back hurts. Your eyes are not what they used to be. Work takes more out of you than it did 20 years ago. Then grandchildren arrive. Your parents need help. You want more time to serve your church, care for your family, or do work that matters without worrying about what it pays. Eventually, the question changes. It is no longer, “Why would I ever stop working?” It becomes, “What might become possible if I no longer had to trade so much of my time for money?”I needed to know that it is okay to save for retirement.Saving does not mean you are abandoning God. It does not mean your faith is weak. It does not automatically mean you are storing up treasure on earth or pursuing a secular fantasy where enough money finally makes you safe. It may simply mean you are being a wise steward, carefully managing your household and preparing for responsibilities you can reasonably expect.Consider the antProverbs tells the sluggard to consider the ant. She prepares food in summer and gathers provision at harvest. She does not wait until winter and call that “trusting in God’s provision”. She recognizes that seasons change, and so she works while work can be done.Human life has seasons too.Most of us will not have the same strength, earning capacity, or opportunities at 75 that we had at 45. Preparing for that change is …wise. Pretending it will never happen is …foolish. And Scripture repeatedly commends wise provision.“Precious treasure and oil are in a wise man’s dwelling, but a foolish man devours it” (Proverbs 21:20)Wisdom does not consume everything today. It preserves some resources for tomorrow — that is what retirement savings can be. A careful, consistent setting aside of some of today’s income because you know tomorrow may require something different from you. You are preparing to care for your household. You are reducing the chance that your future needs will fall entirely on your children or community. You are creating room to respond generously when God places an opportunity in front of you.None of that guarantees security. Money cannot do that. It does not replace daily dependence on God.It is still wise to consider the ant.The problem with the bigger barnsBut what about the rich fool in Luke 12? His land produced abundantly. He tore down his barns and built larger ones so he could store the crop. Then he told his soul, “You have ample goods laid up for many years; relax, eat, drink, be merry.” God called him a fool. YIKES. Take that in for a second. God doesn’t often call people fools. The warning needs to be heeded. Wealth can tempt us to treat God as unnecessary and comfort as our reward. A retirement plan can become an attempt to build a private utopia where no one needs anything from us and we need nothing from God.But notice where Jesus takes the parable. The man “lays up treasure for himself and is not rich toward God.” His abundance stopped. With him. In his hands. Or, more accurately, in his barns.Proverbs 11:26 says, “The people curse him who holds back grain, but a blessing is on the head of him who sells it.” It’s never occurred to me that the rich fool could have sold grain. He could have paid workers, met needs, given generously, strengthened his community, and turned abundance into blessing.Instead, he hoarded everything for himself …and called it the good life. That is the spiritual danger. The size of the barn matters less than what the barn is for and whose kingdom it serves. We have no clue how large his barns were before. That’s really not the point. The mindset and heart-posture around money and it’s perilous implications for our souls is the point here.Financial freedom for faithful workThe usual retirement story says you work for several decades, save enough, and then earn the right to stop contributing. I do not think that is a Christian vision of aging. An 82-year-old may not need to get out of bed and go to a job every morning. But an 82-year-old still needs a reason to get out of bed.Paid employment can end while meaningful work continues, and retirement savings can make that possible. They can give you freedom to care for grandchildren, volunteer at church, mentor someone younger, support a missionary, help an aging friend, study Scripture, learn something new, tend a garden, make a meal, or take on work that will never produce a paycheck.That kind of retirement still needs ambition. Paul spoke positively about ambition when it was pointed toward God. He was ambitious to please God (2 Corinthians 5:9). He was ambitious to preach the gospel (Romans 15:20). He told the Thessalonians to make it their ambition to lead a quiet life and work with their hands (1 Thessalonians 4:11).Financial freedom should create room for that kind of godly ambition.Ambition of the heart: I still want to please God, love people, and see others come to faith.Ambition of the mind: I am still learning, reading, listening, and growing. I have not had my final new experience.Ambition of strength: I will steward the body God has given me and use whatever capacity remains to work, serve, build, tend, and help.Jesus calls us to love God with our heart, mind, and strength. None of those receives permission to become complacent when the paychecks stop.Save without worshiping the savingsProverbs 1:32 says, “The complacency of fools destroys them.” That is a needed warning for retirement. Financial freedom can open beautiful possibilities, but it can also make a comfortable, self-focused life easier to build. So save diligently. Hold the money with an open hand. Prepare for future needs without pretending you can control the future. Build financial freedom without making personal comfort the goal. You do not need to feel guilty for preparing for a season when your body changes, your family needs you differently, or paid work is no longer the best use of your time.You have permission to consider the ant.You have permission to manage your household carefully.You have permission to save enough that someday you can choose work because it is faithful, useful, and good, even when nobody pays you to do it.Save for retirement.Just do not retire from loving God with all your heart, mind, and strength. This is a public episode. If you would like to discuss this with other subscribers or get access to bonus episodes, visit faithandfinance.substack.com

A few weeks back, we talked about the fear of doing the wrong thing leading us to inaction—where this shows up in life, career, and money. We often feel embarrassed for not knowing things we feel we should’ve figured out by now and that embarrassment leads us to hide instead of “asking the dumb question” that might lead to the change we’re longing for. I ended our time around Jesus’ parable of the talents, pointing out that both the 2- and 5-talent servants received identical praise. Jesus did not discriminate based on quantity.But you might’ve noticed I didn’t address the 600lb gorilla in the parable—the guy who did nothing. He’s, arguably, the more poignant member of the illustration, given my context.what fear really costs meThat guy. The servant who, filled with fear, did nothing with his money sobers us because he demonstrates what fear—what embarrassment—can actually do. It doesn’t just make me put on my helmet, oftentimes it keeps me off the bike altogether. And staying off the bike keeps me from exploring the mountain trails, seeing the owls and deer, and sitting by the quiet of the lake at sunset (ask me how I know!). In short, fear makes me bury, freeze, and hide. Because as painful as it may be to sit by and do nothing, it’s better than doing the wrong thing and losing it all, right?what our scorecard isn’t telling usSo I bury my treasure — hiding my gifts, shying away from my callings, backing down from iron-sharpening-iron style conflict. For some reason I’m often afraid to be the pioneer who does the thing first. I’d rather sit back and watch to see how it goes for the other guy. But what would be true about me if I was the first to do with my gifting what God intended for me to do with it?I freeze because analysis is the endless cycle of doing tomorrow what I should have done yesterday. It’s the death by committee — and the committee is all in my own head. It’s easier to wait it out, see what happens, do some more research, have another conversation, and then I’ll act, right? Except by that point the sands have shifted and the new evidence demands I return to square one, endlessly prolonging action through the veil of planning.But eventually the rubber meets the road. The master returns home. The financial day of reckoning has come. The credit card bill arrived. Or the retirement party has been scheduled. The reality we’ve been running away from with eyes turned behind us has become the brick wall we didn’t see coming — and just ran into. And we weren’t ready for it.How then shall we live?I want to revisit my post from July 27 — *the prize we’re all longing for.* The dream of every faithful Christian is to hear, “Well done, good and faithful servant.”Not, “Well done, impressive investor.”Not, “Well done, successful entrepreneur.”Not even, “Well done, because you produced more than everyone else.”The servants who received two talents and five talents heard the same praise. Different starting points. Different outcomes. Same scorecard: faithfulness with what they had.That is the scorecard we need. One that measures whether I faithfully used what God entrusted to me, not whether my results looked impressive next to yours.So perhaps the better question is: What does faithfulness require of me today? and what faithfulness to Christ free me from today?Cheering you on. This is a public episode. If you would like to discuss this with other subscribers or get access to bonus episodes, visit faithandfinance.substack.com

If Dave Ramsey helped you get out of debt, start investing, or simply think differently about money, there may come a point where you ask a different question: “Okay, now what?”The debt is gone, or at least moving in the right direction. You have margin again. You are investing. Retirement is getting closer. The 401(k) feels more complicated than it used to. The business is doing well. The kids are getting older. The decisions feel bigger. At some point, a lot of people move from “How do I stop the bleeding?” to “How do I steward this well?”SmartVestorThat is the idea behind Ramsey’s SmartVestor program. Ramsey has spent decades helping people take control of their money through budgeting, debt payoff, emergency funds, investing, generosity, and common sense repeated until it finally starts to get into your bones. When someone reaches the point where they need professional investing help, SmartVestor connects them with financial professionals who share that same commitment to teaching and serving.I’m grateful to share that Openhanded Wealth has officially been accepted as a Ramsey SmartVestor Pro here in North Georgia. That means a lot to me. One reason is Ramsey’s emphasis on finding advisors with the “heart of a teacher.” I have never wanted financial planning to feel mysterious enough that people need me forever. I want people to understand what they own, why they own it, what decisions are in front of them, and how those decisions fit into the life they are actually trying to build.early rootsThe other reason is more personal. I started listening to Dave Ramsey on AM radio while lying on my bedroom floor when I was about eight years old. His show was one of the first things that made me interested in personal finance.Almost 25 years later, someone can now go to Ramsey looking for financial help, raise their hand and say, “I’d like to talk to somebody,” and I may get to be the person on the other end of that phone call. That is really cool.The goal is not just more money. The goal is to use money more faithfully.But the longer I do this work, the more convinced I become that the goal is not merely to help people accumulate more money. The goal is to help people use money more faithfully.margin funds ministryIn one of the SmartVestor trainings, Dave shared a story from Financial Peace University. A woman who had been an atheist her whole life was invited by a neighbor to a Ramsey event at a church. The neighbor did not want to go alone, so she went with her. They heard about Financial Peace University that weekend and decided to sign up.During one of the group discussions, people began sharing areas where they were struggling financially. This woman eventually shared that she was a single mom with two kids and had taken a part-time job at night just to make her car payment and insurance. The payment was not just an inconvenience. It was eating her life. After she shared, a man at the table reached into his pocket, took a key off his key ring, and threw it to her. He told her to sell her car, get rid of the payment, and he would bring her the title to his 2013 Nissan Altima the next week.finding different adviceThat is a very different kind of financial advice. No spreadsheet. No Monte Carlo simulation. No lecture on debt ratios. Just a man with enough margin to see a need and meet it.Dave ended the story by saying that the woman was baptized into Christ that weekend. I do not want to overstate the story or turn generosity into a formula. God saves. God draws people to Himself. God uses means we cannot control and usually do not see coming. But that act of generosity was part of the story, and I think that is worth paying attention to.planning makes it possibleThis is one of the reasons I care so much about financial planning. Yes, the Baby Steps matter. Getting out of debt matters. Building an emergency fund matters. Investing for the future matters. Paying attention to taxes, insurance, estate planning, and business structure matters. But none of those things are the finish line.They are tools that create margin. And margin gives you the ability to say yes when God puts something in front of you. Sometimes that yes looks like giving more consistently to your church. Sometimes it looks like helping your adult child without enabling foolishness. Sometimes it looks like taking less income from the business so you can hire help. Sometimes it looks like giving away a car because a single mom at your FPU table is drowning under a payment.open handsMoney is not the point. But money is one of the tools God often uses to reveal what we love, what we fear, and what we are willing to hold with an open hand.That is the kind of work I want to do with families and business owners. Not just helping people answer, “Can I retire?” Helping them ask better questions.asking better questionsWhat has God entrusted to me? What needs to be simplified? Where am I carrying risk I have not dealt with? What would generosity look like if I planned for it on purpose? What decisions would I make differently if I believed provision was God’s job and stewardship was mine?That is the heart behind Openhanded Wealth. And now, through Ramsey’s SmartVestor program, I get the opportunity to serve more people who have worked hard to win with money and are ready to figure out what comes next. I am grateful for that. And I hope I do it with the heart of a teacher. This is a public episode. If you would like to discuss this with other subscribers or get access to bonus episodes, visit faithandfinance.substack.com

I’ve been reading A Severe Mercy by Sheldon Vanauken, and I have been completely swept up in it.A friend recommended it, and I can see why. Vanauken is a beautiful writer. The kind of writer who makes you lose track of time.More than once, I’ve looked up from my morning reading and realized I was suddenly twenty minutes behind schedule. The coffee appointment was coming fast. The day had already started. But I had been pulled into a story that felt larger than my own.To me, that’s part of what makes a story worthwhile.For a little while, it lifts you into something grand and beautiful. It gives you language for things you already knew, but had not yet been able to say.A Severe Mercy tells the story of Sheldon and his wife, Davy, and their journey toward Christianity. Early in the book, they are at Oxford, reading C. S. Lewis, Augustine, Chesterton, and others. They are not yet Christians, but they are beginning to realize that Christianity is not a small thing to be lightly accepted or rejected.It is not a nice addition to an otherwise respectable life.It is either true, and therefore the most important truth in the world, or it is false.He writes:“It is not possible to be incidentally a Christian. The fact of Christianity must be overwhelmingly first or nothing. This suggests a reason for the dislike of Christians by nominal or non-Christians: their lives contain no overwhelming firsts but many balances.”…“No overwhelming firsts but many balances.”That is a piercing description of modern life.And if we’re honest, it may describe the way many a lot of us handle our finances.We believe in Jesus. We love the Lord. We want to be faithful. We want our lives to reflect the truth we confess.But then we look at our financial lives and find a long list of balances.* A balance between generosity and comfort.* A balance between stewardship and convenience.* A balance between conviction and performance.* A balance between wanting to honor God and not wanting to ask too many questions about what we own.* A balance between “all that I have belongs to the Lord” and “I hope my portfolio does well.”And I say all this as a fellow traveler. I feel the weight of it too.Most of us aren’t trying to be careless with money. We’re not trying to ignore the Lord. We’re certainly not trying to fund things that work against our convictions.But are good intentions really enough?At some point, love compels us to look.Love for the Lord.Love for our neighbor.Love for the people affected by the companies we own, the products we support, the systems we fund, and the businesses we profit from.If Christianity is overwhelmingly first, then it cannot remain sealed off from our investment accounts, our giving, our spending, our estate plans, our insurance decisions, or our cash flow.That does not mean every decision becomes more complicated.In fact, it may mean the opposite.Your next step may be very simple.Look.Look at what you own.Look at what your investments are funding.Look at whether your financial life is shaped more by habit, fear, convenience, or faith.You do not have to figure everything out this week. But you can take one honest step.Go to The Good Investor and use the portfolio screening tool. Or visit Inspire Insight and type in one ticker from your portfolio.Just look.Because once you see, you cannot unsee.And that is not a bad thing.It may be mercy.It may be the beginning of a more integrated life, where faith is not one category among many, but the first thing that rightly orders the rest.Personally, I think ol’ Sheldon was right.It is not possible to be incidentally a Christian.The question is whether we are willing to let that truth reach all the way down into our money. This is a public episode. If you would like to discuss this with other subscribers or get access to bonus episodes, visit faithandfinance.substack.com

I recently found a new favorite artist. He’s the bombastic, passionate, young, and fiery singer-songwriter who rocketed into spotify charts with his song Dusty Bibles. The song is a modern prophesy:We got dust on our Bibles, brand-new iPhones… No wonder why we feel this way.Good, right?Josiah Queen is his name. And he’s written a small collection of other songs too. Another favorite line came to my ears this week:What the world hasn’t given, it can’t take away.The song is about the treasure God alone can give and nothing and no one can take away: joy.But I’d like to pause and turn the crystal the other way and look at it from the reverse:“What the world has given, it can take away.”Naturally, I’m going to apply this to money. Because so much of our lives orbit around money. It can shape:* the education we pursue* the work we choose* the place we live* the people we know* the possessions we acquire* the lifestyle we maintain* the legacy we leave behindMoney is very powerful. And, as such, it’s a terrible place to put our security — so why do we so often do exactly that?I have to confess that my buddy Josiah (I’m sure we could be good buddies) hits the nail on the head - yes and amen - but those words were much easier to sing with passion at 23 than 33.Even though I know full well wealth is unstable. Markets fluctuate. Businesses rise and fall. Careers end. Health changes. Possessions deteriorate. Moth, rust, the whole nine. Even the wealth we carefully preserve will eventually pass into someone else’s hands. And we all must reckon with the fact that everything money buys us is temporary.All the trappings that the world offers to us, it can also take from us.And yet…What the world hasn’t given, it can’t take away.Christ, our treasure that does not fade, our pearl of great price, has given us in Luke 16:9 a rather staggering picture of the lasting treasure we can, in fact, acquire with worldly wealth.And I tell you [learn from this], make friends for yourselves [for eternity] by means of the wealth of unrighteousness [that is, use material resources as a way to further the work of God], so that when it runs out, they will welcome you into the eternal dwellings. Luke 16:9 (AMP)Let’s unpack this briefly:“…Make friends for yourselves by means of unrighteous wealth…”what a brilliant opener. Be friendly. Use money to make friends. It’s very easy to do. Prov. 19:6 reminds us of this: “everyone is a friend to a man who gives gifts”. Do you want lots of friends? Give gifts. Lots of them. Great use of wealth, right there.“…so that when it [fails/runs out/is all gone]…”the failure is inevitable here — it’s a given. The wealth will fail. In fact, many translations say “when you fail”. It’s almost implied that, at some point, your wealth-accumulating abilities will dry up and evaporate. Certainly few aged men and women find themselves in their peak earning years.“…they will welcome you into eternal dwellings…”The implication here is that these friends were not heading for heaven prior to encountering you and your clever (shrewd) use of worldly wealth. You leveraged your money to build Gospel-seasoned friendships thereby leading to the salvation of your friends.Someday when you and your wealth fail, and you finally lay down to your final rest, your eyes will open in the age to come and you’ll be met face-to-face, eye-to-eye, and embraced by your friends - for all eternity - who will join you in the fully-restored, fully-redeemed work of the kingdom. All because you dared to trust, not in riches, but in God. And you leveraged these failing riches to “win friends and influence people” unto glory.Wealth is not our refuge. It is a temporary tool entrusted to us for providing our needs, loving our families, serving our neighbors, and building relationships that will long-outlast the wealth itself. That’s kingdom work. And it’s yours for the taking. This is a public episode. If you would like to discuss this with other subscribers or get access to bonus episodes, visit faithandfinance.substack.com

Last week, we talked about embarrassment. The kind that shows up when you feel behind. When you feel like everyone else got a memo you missed. When you weren’t taught something, didn’t know what questions to ask, and now asking feels weirdly exposing.And the basic idea was that embarrassment makes us hide (ourselves, our talents, our contributions, etc.). But it doesn’t always say, “I’m scared.” Sometimes it says…“no no, I’m just waiting on the Lord”Now before I call out my own fear-based excuses, let me acknowledge that waiting on the Lord is never a bad decision.“Be still before the LORD and wait patiently for him; fret not yourself over the one who prospers in his way […] wait for the LORD and keep his way […]” Psalm 37:7, 34Yes. Amen.But this is not that. How often have I called it “waiting on the Lord” when really I’m worrying, impatiently fretting, neglecting prayer, and waiting for a written-in-the-sky-style sign from God? So am I really waiting? Or is it a nice-sounding excuse for inaction?I’ve found that when I seek the face of God, either He answers me, or He gives me peace to wait in silence.But anxious fretting ≠ patient waiting.It’s pre-embarrassment avoidance, isn’t it?It’s the fear of doing the wrong thing, so I’ll do nothing — no thing. Zero.The fear of looking foolish — or at least the chance of looking like …I don’t have it all figured out? I don’t even know. But even writing “foolish” feels too strong here.The fear of choosing a path and later wishing you chose the other one?The fear of realizing you don’t have control (actually wait, that’s a really good thing!)the prize we’re all longing forAt some point in the conversation, I found myself thinking about the parable of the talents.Different starting lines. Different dollar amounts. Same finish line, for the faithful.As far as I can tell, Jesus doesn’t hand out any extra praise because somebody started with more. The praise isn’t “Well done, brilliant investor.” It’s not “Well done, impressive strategist.”It’s: Well done, good and faithful servant.Let’s break that down piece-by-piece:Well done — you did well. You did. You did something. Which means you didn’t do nothing. And the thing you did was done well.Good and faithful — Profound. So much here.He didn’t say “desperately wicked” (see Jer 17:9 for more context—no, dear Christian, your heart is not still sick and wicked).He didn’t say “well-educated and wealthy”Or “efficient and profit-maximizing”Or “productive and busy”He said good and faithfulServant — What an honor and joy it is to serve at the pleasure of the King. We are not professionals. We are not machines. We are not accidents.the next right thingThe kingdom of God is here—now. Jesus has come and is coming again. So let us not shrink back to inaction out of fear of misstepping. Let allow our faith and trust to fuel our action.So the shift I want to make (and I think we all need to make) is this: you need a better scorecard, and I’ll write more about this next week. But for today, start with this simple question:“What would faithfulness look like with what I actually have, today?”What does “one faithful step” look like in money when I feel behind?Because a lot of the time, the path forward isn’t blocked by lack of information. It’s blocked by the fear of looking stupid. And the grace of God is not just forgiveness for sin. It’s also joy and strength to move, even when you feel behind.Is it a budget? Is it a net worth statement? Is it finally asking the “dumb” question? Is it setting up one automated transfer? Is it naming your finish line?You can do this. I’m cheering you on.P.S. I snuck two Frozen references into this newsletter — did you catch them?? This is a public episode. If you would like to discuss this with other subscribers or get access to bonus episodes, visit faithandfinance.substack.com

When it comes to how we handle money, it’s pretty safe to say we could all learn a thing or two from John Wesley. He’s the co-founder of the methodist church and the passionate advocate of radical, Gospel-saturated working, saving, and giving. He famously exhorted his churchmembers to “earn all you can, save all you can, give all you can.” (You may remember I mentioned this a few months back.)But what does it look like for us to pursue earning all we can, saving all we can, and giving all we can?Let’s start with earning. To earn all we can is to become shrewd as serpents in how we handle our finances and our investments, our purchase decisions, our real estate deals, our businesses. It means taking seriously our desire to turn a profit. That instinct is a good one. We need to be profiteering, and profiteering is not sinful in itself. The desire to make a profit, to earn a living, to work and create value — these are all deeply good things. In fact, the lack of these impulses is a real problem (1 Tim 5:8).On saving, I want to be clear: the Bible praises saving in almost every instance. Saving up money means margin. It means breathing room. It means options. It means the freedom to meet the needs of others, to invest in God-honoring businesses, to leave a nest egg for your grandkids, to store up now for the future needs you or your loved ones may face. It is prudent, responsible, and wise.The only time saving is not praised is when the use behind it violates God’s natural order of the work-money connection, or when the wealth itself becomes the god who is supposed to save us. The foolish man who built bigger barns let his wealth corrupt his natural inclination to work. His wiring shifted from “I need to eat this winter, so I’d better get up and work my field today” to “I’ve got ample goods laid up for many years; relax, eat, drink, be merry.” His gaze turned toward self-indulgence and away from productivity and contribution. He walked away from Paul’s ethic in Ephesians 4:28 — to labor, doing honest work with his own hands, so that he may have something to share with anyone in need.In many ways that cautionary tale exposes how badly we need to fight the modern notion of retirement. The idea goes like this: once you hit 55, 65, even 75, your contributions to society are essentially complete. Now you can enjoy your remaining years on the pickleball court, the beach, or the local library as you fade away into the company of your fellow septua- and octogenarians. The very notion is a disgrace.And it makes complete sense, given the world we’ve built. Our society runs on the self-defined, curated life. We worship at the altar of achievement and success. Our offerings are workaholism and the loss of personal connection. Our sacraments are a full calendar, where the honest answer to “how are you?” is a perpetual “busy.” We measure ourselves by job title and operational capacity, income level and wealth accumulation, business growth and the price tags on our status symbols. It is so pervasive that I’m not sure most of us even see how stark the contrast really is.So we fight — as if we were fighting the very powers of hell — against the current we’re swimming in. Be a salmon. Swim. For your very life.How? By giving. All we can. And then some. Every financial decision has to be weighed and measured carefully: the car, the house, the subscriptions, the bills, the gifts, the personal items. We have real power in our pocketbooks. But it is not our power, and it is not power within our control. It is a mighty magnetism. Its desire is for us, and it wants to consume us. That is why I wrote about “the snake in your bed” a few months back. We have to respect the power of the snake and its ability to overpower us. Satan uses money to ruin people all the time, and he is seldom in a hurry to do it.But that same magnetic power can pull others into the kingdom through courageous acts of generosity. How? Jesus said so in Luke 16:9. And why? Because we have first received. What do you have that you did not first receive (1 Cor 4:7)? Your giving should hinder your lifestyle creep. It should probably even outpace your income a little — enough to keep you dependent on the one from whom all provision comes.So give. Give as if your life depended on it. Perhaps it does, and perhaps that is the whole point. We love because he first loved us. We give because what do we have that we did not first receive? And when He loved, he gave — and we, too, can be like him in our giving. What we received from the Father we hand back with arms wide open, knowing that in our acts of generosity God has hidden gospel dynamite to destroy the strongholds of the enemy.So who has God put in your proximity, and how has he blessed you to be a blessing to them?Earn all you can. Save all you can. Give all you can. This is a public episode. If you would like to discuss this with other subscribers or get access to bonus episodes, visit faithandfinance.substack.com