Financial Unity | Young Families

Scripture has a whole lot to say about dealing with money. So one third of Jesus parables had to do with money or stewardship. There's over 2,000 verses in the Bible that reference money or wealth. Jesus talked more about money and possessions than he did about heaven and hell combined. Why, why, why, why?

Matthew 6:21 gives us the answer very. Let me give you right away. Your treasure is there. The desires of your heart are going to be also. Pastor Trent this morning actually referenced this as he spoke.

He and I had not spoken about this, but it was amazing. He referenced this verse in Matthew. I think it's incredible that we talk about the guarding of the heart. If your heart is wrong in your approach about money, it doesn't matter about how much you have. It makes no difference because you will blow through it or have poor stewardship of it.

So God knew that the only thing that would try to vie for our affections the way that money does it would have this kind of power over us. So this is the why the loyalty of his kingdom is so vital. It's right here. It requires us to have only one master. Matthew 6:24.

No one can serve two masters. You will hate one and love the other. You'll be devoted to one and despise the other. You cannot serve God and be enslaved to man. Money.

So what's the moral of the story? Money is nothing more than a test of the heart. Let's get down to the root of it. It's a fantastic servant and a terrible master. That's the truth.

How we spend our money is deeply personal to us. It's a very personal aspect of our marriage because it speaks to what we place value on and who we are. So that one click Amazon when you're in bed at night. That's a big deal for most people. I'm saying, every morning I wake up and your order, your order's on the way.

So that has happened to me too. I'm guilty of as well, because, you know, I gotta have that thing and apparently I only search for it at nighttime. I guess. Proverbs 4:23 says, Guard your heart above all else, for it determines the course of your life. So what's our objectives for tonight?

Okay, primary objectives for tonight are the principle of first fruits, the challenge of ourselves, finding spousal unity and spending, the importance of a written budget, tools for tackling debt, and planning for the future. Just a curiosity, how many in here had a financial literacy class in high school? Did anybody have one of those? Two people? Three people.

Okay. So maybe four. It's just not taught. It just isn't. I'll be honest with you guys, and that's a serious problem.

This is why we have an issue today that we have. So I'm not going to tell you that you need to go buy every Dave Ramsey book and do every single thing that he does. Although he's done pretty well for himself, apparently. So maybe you should. I am going to tell you what I believe the Lord's laid on our heart as far as what principles matter.

We're also going to get not really deep in the weeds, but I'm going to take you through what my. Excuse me. Our budget looks like. Thank you for correcting me. So, our budget looks like I'm going to show you screenshots of what I actually use.

So we. We. Yeah, Sorry. Sorry. I'm gonna get there, guys.

It's the principle of first fruits, first up. So something a refuge does not shy away from is a discussion about scriptural obedience in the areas of tithing and giving. It has nothing to do with arm twisting. This is just what Scripture teaches, and the refuge has never shied away from that. So as far as Scripture giving us clear instruction, it does.

In fact, we're told by God that unless we honor the Lord with our income, our finances will actually rest underneath a curse. That's bad. Okay. However, we're also told that if we choose to honor the Lord with our resources, he will open the floodgates over us and provide for us. That's good.

Okay, we're tracking. So, Micah, I'm sorry. Malachi 3, 8. Should people cheat God? Yet you've cheated me.

But you ask. What do you mean? How do we ever cheat you? You have cheated me. When the.

The tithes and offerings due to me, you are under a curse, for your whole nation has been cheating me. Bring all the tithes into the storehouse so there will be enough food in the temple. If you do, says the Lord of heaven's armies, I will open the windows of heaven for you. I will pour out blessings so great you won't have enough room to take it in. Try it.

Put me to the test. This is the only place in scripture where God himself has given you permission to test him. I want you to know that this very. If you've never been told that if you were raised in a different denomination or whatever else, this is the one place in the Bible that God says, see if I won't do it. He asks you to test him in this so we could do an entire night's teaching just on the aspect of finances concerning first fruits.

But because we don't have that kind of time, I want to consider that. Proverbs chapter 3, verse 9 and 10 tells us to honor the Lord with the best part of what we produce. He wants us to honor us, honor him with his, with our wealth, and then he will fill our barns with grain and our vats will overflow with good wine. It may seem like splitting hairs when I say this, but the reason I feel it's so important of a detail that we honor him is that I don't want to rob God of anything that he is claimed as His. It's very important.

This whole topic of gross pay versus net pay. I think it's very important. If God has given you a blessing and His Word says the best, the first fruits. That doesn't mean after everyone else has had their take on it. It means, what's the very first thing you get?

So I want to make mention of that. And it may seem like splitting hair, like I said, but here's why. Two things considered. I don't want to rob God of any portion of what he's called as His. And number two, Scripture places an emphasis on the manner in which the seed is sown.

Let me show you. Galatians, chapter 6. Do not be misled. You cannot mock God. You cannot mock the justice of God.

You will always harvest what you plant. 2nd Corinthians 9. Remember this. A farmer who plants only a few seeds will get a small crop. But the one who plants generously will get a generous crop.

It's an important side note to make mention here. The Bible is really clear about first fruits, that we're to bring the first fruits or the tithe into the storehouse. The storehouse is not a televangelist. It's not a parachurch ministry. It's not your missionary friend.

All those are honorable things. The storehouse is your local church. Because when you have hard financial times, you're not going to call the televangelist and say, I need money from you. You're going to call the local church and say, I need help. That's why the principle is to bring the tithe into the storehouse.

Offerings over and above that, you give it to whoever you want to. Man, that's awesome. But the tithe belongs to the Lord, so there'll be food in his house for his people. That's the whole point behind it. So I wanted to make mention of that.

So I'm not going to harp on the whole tithing and the first fruits piece, I wanted to just talk about that briefly because at this church we've had many times to listen to Pastors Jay and others teach on this topic, but I wanted to refresh it. So the challenge of ourselves, this is a big deal. We live in a hyperconnected society. We can fall prey to the perfectly timed ad on social media or YouTube because algorithms follow everything that you do. This can lead to the justification of non essential spending, which can easily create piles of debt if we're not careful.

And if nothing else, even if it doesn't create piles of debt, it can dilute the biggest weapon to build your wealth, which is your income. If your income is sent in a whole bunch of different ways, you aren't going to be able to build wealth because you're constantly behind the eight ball. That's a big deal. I know I sound a lot like Dave Ramsey harping on all the things I do like Dave Ramsey. But I'm also saying this is a basic fact of if you have a ton of money coming in and it could split 15 different ways, there's not a whole lot left over.

So the idea is, how do we bring that back in? This is the side of the coin where money can be a terrible taskmaster. So we all have the ability to regain the upper hand when it concerns winning with money, but it requires the use of a very big word. And that word is no.

No. My kids love that word. No, our kids. Excuse me. Our kids love that word.

Excuse me. I'm sorry. If. If you're not home. They only want me.

That's right. But if she's there, they wouldn't let me. They don't know who he is. So first Corinthians 6. You say I'm allowed to do anything, but not everything is good for you.

And even though I am allowed to do anything, I must not become a slave to anything. If we are not operating in self control, and this is, this applies to me and Sam and everybody in this room. If we don't operate in self control, which is a fruit of the spirit, every outside influence will easily persuade us to cave to our temporary desires. Proverbs 25:28. A person without self control is like a city with broken down walls.

Everything will get at you. Everything. Because there's no self control. Being willing to retrain our thought process is a crucial process or part in order to break poor habits. So Romans 12:2, very common verse.

Don't copy the behavior and customs of this world, but Let God transform you into a new person by changing the way that you think. Then you will know God's will for you, which is good, pleasing, and perfect. Amen. Great job, Andrew. Okay, so one of the biggest aspects of tonight that we want to cover is talking about finding spousal unity and spending.

And there's a bajillion reasons why spouses don't. Aren't unified in their finances, just to name a few. One's a spender, one's a saver. Cultural upbringings concerning money, we're totally opposite. Convictions about carrying debt are vastly different.

Spouses choose to handle their finances differently instead of jointly. Like secret spending and hid of hidden motives. Differing levels of what an emergency actually means. Parents still funding a large portion of the spouse's daily life, and they just haven't learned to leave and cleave. That was one of the first things.

Things that when we got married, Andrew was like, turn your credit card in. I was like, why? No, no. Turn your mom's credit card in. Yes, yes, that credit card.

I was like, what? What am I going to get gas with? And he's like, our money. And I'm like, oh, at the time, yes, he made me turn my credit card in. Lack of boundaries when adult family members ask for money or bailouts.

Different views about money as it relates to representing and status in society. An opposite approach to the importance of teaching children about money and stewardship. It's true. It's very true. So we wanted to give you guys three different practical ideas on how spouses can work together to be unified in their finances.

Three things. Three. Three things. Three points. Here it comes.

All right, so the first one is to pray together and ask the Lord to give you both a renewed vision for your finances and building a budget together. Have to? Yes. So if you're not on the same page and you're not bringing it underneath the Lord honoring him first, then you're never gonna be able to strike a, you know, balance with the two of each other because you're both going to have different motives. So, Proverbs.

Oh, no, not Proverbs. Psalms 127:1 and 2. Unless the Lord builds a house, the work of the builder is wasted. Unless the Lord protects a city, girding it with its centuries, centuries will not do good. It is useless for you to do work so hard from early in the morning until late at night, anxiously waiting for food to eat.

For God gives rest to his loved ones. He does. Amen. Yes. Okay, can I add to that real quick?

Well, it's green, so that's yours. Oh, it's my time. Yeah. Okay. I think that this morning we talked about the idea of summer Selah.

It's a great time if you are not on the same page with your spouse. And I know this sounds like. Well, yeah, we should pray together. I understand that, but do you actually do it? Do we actually do it to where we sit down and we ask the Lord to breathe fresh life into our financial picture?

Do we ask him for his vision? How do we move the ball forward here? This is a big deal. Unless the Lord builds the house, the work of the builders is wasted. Guys, it doesn't matter because you won't be on the same page in good times and in bad.

Like, it's easy to go to the Lord and be like, we're struggling. Like, how are we going to make ends meet? But then when there's excess coming in, still going to the Lord and being like, all right, Lord, what am I supposed to do? How are we going to honor you? Amen.

Amen. So always being intentional and doing it together in unity underneath the Lord. Being intentional with communication. Hallelujah. Like, getting down to the nitty gritty, boring details.

All the things that you have to talk about. Being intentional with communication. This happens, you know, in our house quite frequently. We try to budget and plan ahead and think about all the random things, and then all of a sudden, last minute, I'd sign up a kid for a sport, and his jersey is $125. That happened this week, y'.

All. So you're. And, like, we'll teach you to, like, have, like, a line item of, like, the oops, we forgot. But being intentional and, like, bringing everything to the table, you know, especially as, you know, we're all married and, you know, been married for a little bit. But, you know, as people enter into marriage, so many people are entering in with secret debt.

And so, like, being super intentional with all the communication, laying it all out on the line and, you know, really talking about boundaries and how we're going to pay off debt and where we're going to invest and where we're going to give over and above our tithe. And it's big. When we got married, Sam had this really cute little Honda Civic car. It was so cute. It was really cute.

It was such a cute car, but it had a really big, fat price tag on it. It was still cute. It was cute. So we got married. And I was.

At the time, I didn't. I think I had one car and I had a motorcycle, which I love that, if y' all didn't know that. I used to ride this awesome candy plasma blue Kawasaki Ninja. Sorry, Josh. So I'd love to see.

You want one of those? That'd be fantastic. We got married and I was like, I hate debt. So I sold my motorcycle and I took that money and I paid off her car. It was probably the best thing I could have done because I probably wouldn't be here today had I not done that.

So. Didn't love that motorcycle. 20 year old me was a little different than 36 year old me. Especially when he opened it up on the back roads and how fast. I'm not gonna talk about.

We're not gonna talk about that. We're not gonna talk about it. Okay. I'm talking about privately. I need deliverance for that, so we're not gonna talk about it.

What happens though, babe, if we come across the topic we're talking about and we hit a chord like you guys hit a cord with that? 150 is all you got, big dude. It's all you got. What do we do? Being willing to show grace and humility when you come across those hot button topics.

Andrew.

Pastor Andrew. Ephesians 4, 2 and 3 says, Always be humble and gentle. Be patient and kind with each other, making allowances for each other's fault because of your love. Make every effort to keep yourselves united in the spirit, binding yourself together with peace. Unspoken frustrations will resent, will create resentment in your heart.

And it's better to be honest and to resolve a disagreement than sweep it underneath the rug. Even if it's hard and it sucks in the end. A joy filled marriage with fewer bells and whistles is far better than being in denial and stewing in animosity. That was a big word for me. Did it?

You guys ever been on a date with your husband or wife and it's terrible because you're not on the same page and you're just out to dinner? We have dates like that. I'm just. No, okay. Some.

Maybe earlier, but I'm saying you had a date planned possibly. And then you just fight like cats and dogs the day of or the day before and then you want to get. You're like, yeah, I'm so happy to be here when like you want to die and crawl under a rug. There's a Bible verse about that. Oh, I think that's where I'm supposed to say the Bible verse, so.

Proverbs 15, 17. That was a really good tia. A bowl of vegetables with someone you love is better than steak with someone you hate. It's true. You could be sitting across with your spouse and you're just stewing because you hate that purchase that they made.

The F150 is all you got, buddy. It don't matter how big that steak is, man. It doesn't matter because there isn't. You're not at peace with each other. I would rather have a bowl of vegetables knowing that I got this woman next to me and we've talked about some junk and dealt with some stuff and brought it in the open than have the nicest whatever dinner and not be on the same page.

I'll eat a salad with you any day. Come on, girl. Hallelujah. All right. The next thing is creating a written budget together.

It needs to be factual. It needs to be. The only way to improve the situation is to be 100% transparent with the facts. It's okay if one person does the budget, the spreadsheets, or the data entry. I'm going to get better.

About that I do promise. Not everyone is gifted in administration. I just forget. I'm usually at the store with three kids, and I always forget to plug it in. So I just know he's got my back.

And you're eventually going to do it. So thank you. Thank you. Stick to the plan. Stick to the plan.

Proverbs 21:5. Good planning and hard work leads to prosperity, but hasty shortcuts leads to poverty. It does. Dave, you are so great, always plugging in all my purchases. I did.

I just did that yesterday. I went back to, like, August 6th or something like that, and I plugged in, like, two weeks for the stuff I do really good for, like, three minutes, and then I just fall off. You guys ever heard of the Whole30 diet? Well, we do budget, like, every, like, for a whole 30 minutes, and then we fall off the wagon again. I'm kidding.

We're. But we stay in a budget. I just don't put my numbers into the app. And I forget. So a budget is important for everybody.

It doesn't matter even if you have no debt. Let me explain why. Imagine how much you could be setting aside right now every single month for future expenses or oops or ohs with that brand new F150. Even if you had no debt, imagine what you could do if you knew how your money was being spent. It isn't wise to always assume you'll be flush with income or that hard times won't come to your doorstep, because they will.

You need to be prudent. So Proverbs 27:12 says, A prudent person foresees danger and takes precautions. The simpleton, or the one who believes that there will never be hard times, goes on blindly and suffers the consequences. So how does the budget look? How detailed should you be?

It could be as simple as an Excel spreadsheet. We got a. There you go. This is, this is actually something I use. This is a shout out to Prabhu Gupta back here in the back.

Ten or 12 years ago, a guy named Joe Sangle came to the refuge. Was anybody here for this? 10 years plus, okay. He came to the refuge and did a few financial literacy course. And this Excel spreadsheet, which I literally took a screenshot of, was where this came from.

These numbers are a little skewed up, so don't worry about those. But I literally still use that spreadsheet because somebody taught me. Somebody taught me. I've never used a budget in my life. I'm 21 years old or whatever the case may be.

Never seen a budget before. So it can look as simple as this. It could be a modified version of things. You can get all fancy. You can.

Could talk to Taylor Brown. He's got algorithms all day long. You can plug a number in it, cut your grass. It's incredible, man. I don't know how he does it.

It's amazing. So is fifteen hundred dollars for groceries for the entire month. Yes. You know, that's just. Well, you know what?

This is an example, baby. Thank you so much. Listen, in the America we have right now, right, that may not get you the whole month. So. But this is an example.

You see that line item at the bottom? We forgot. You're going to forget stuff, guys. You're going to forget the jersey we had to buy this week for the kid that just started soccer or whatever the case may be, because that was not thought about, you might as well go ahead and bank on yourself for getting things and plan that in. You'll be glad that you did that.

So I like how you planned the date night. Yes. Went ahead and budgeted date night. $100, maybe for dinner. And then we still have to budget in for the child care.

Okay, but look at that. Credit card, debt, vehicle payment. Imagine if those things didn't exist and you can throw that somewhere else. Oh, shoot. Now we're talking.

Okay, I want to talk about how to get there. Okay, so our personal budget, there's a mixture of things that involve this. But I also use an app called the every Dollar app. It's a Dave Ramsey. I may have that in this room.

Anybody ever heard of that before? Okay. Okay. One guy in the back. All right.

He's amped about. He's on it right now. It's awesome. She's like, yep. Are you good with plugging in your numbers?

Yes. Absolutely not. It's not me. If. When you've got kids, you're just not like, oh, I spent.

He's holding a baby. This is awesome. Just saying he's excited and he's holding a baby. So that's awesome. So every dollar looks like this.

This is a screenshot of what it looks like again. You could see how it's really nice and fancy. All this stuff. I like that. Clean lines.

If you go to the next slide, you can see the other part of. You can plug in all your stuff. And you see how it says at the top there. It's an every dollar budget. It's green.

If there's an excess or an overage, it changes colors. It gets mad at you if it's red. If you're over budget or it's like you have extra money to spend, you need to spend. Spend it. I'm like, thank you, budget machine.

I want to plug that money in somewhere. So we use a date night, a day night, credit cards. Ends up being some kid's soccer jersey or whatever. So. So enter the anticipated income.

Track all your spending, which is what we're working on. Sync a bank account if you want to. You can see on the next slide, you can sync a bank account. There's a fee to do that, but you can do so. So it plugs in all your charges automatically.

We were doing that, but I was, like, paying for this. I'm gonna do it myself, and then I never do it. Well, sync your credit card. Then you just have to allocate where it goes, right? That's true.

It'll dump it all in there. Then you have to tell it where you spend that based on the budget. So you can put it in the line. Items with the budget, Both spouses can have the app on their phone to record the purchases. It does require access to the Internet.

Just as a heads up, this is what we use. If you don't use this, that's awesome. If you use some other app or some other thing, that's great. People often ask me, man, this is the Pastor Andrew. Say, Pastor Andrew, what's the best translation of the Bible to read?

The one that you'll open. That's the best one because that's the one you should be. What's the best budget software? Whatever you're using, just do it. Just get in there and get your hands dirty.

So if you want to win with money, you must be willing to operate inside of parameters on a budget. It will prevent you from getting into getting to the end of your paycheck and having way too much month left. Some of us have been there, been there. It put checks and balances into your spending habits and helps to instill wisdom and preparation into your finances. Proverbs 21:20.

The wise have wealth and luxury, but fools spend whatever they get. No plan. Tell every dollar where to go. Tell everything what to do. Because if you do, then money is your servant, not your master.

So if you're on a fixed income, when do you think is the appropriate time to do your budget? Right now. Well, like do you do it? Not those classes. You do it at the end of the month or the beginning of the month.

So good question. If you guys start the month and you have a lot of cash on hand, that's great. If you're on a fixed income, what I would suggest you do is this is what I personally think we should do. Start the month and you can break it up into two segments where you have bi weekly paychecks. If you have all the money at the front of the month, it makes things a lot easier.

So what I say is start saving in some column called next month's budget. And then basically over a few months, maybe even a year, you save what it takes for a whole month. And then eventually you can switch to where you have all the money you need at the start of the month, everything's there. And then you just start plugging and playing because you saved a little bit at a time and now you're finally ready. If you're in this room and you have you're a little bit more flush with cash and you have the options of doing things, I would say it depends.

But this is where go pick up Dave Ramsey's total money makeover. You can find out all his thoughts on that. But as far as what you do, what we do, I would suggest starting if you can have all your money at the beginning of the month before you spend any of it. If you can't do that, break it up into two segments where basically it's every cycle you get paid. That's like a brand new month for you, essentially speaking.

Pastor Andrew, please tell us your qualifications on speaking such sound doctrine concerning finances. I'm waiting on you to tell me so, well, I want them to know you have a finance background, so you're not just shooting. I spent a decade. I was gonna get there, but I spent a decade in corporate America in financial services. I was licensed, I was appointed and I didn't.

I worked in wealth management. Taylor Brown actually was on my team. We were glorified receptionist this for a lot of time, but I'm just saying. But there was a whole lot of conversation with people who had a whole lot more money with me than me. And.

And they were calling in, having lots of conversations about what am I supposed to do? Accounts with millions of dollars in it. And these people are about to retire or had just retired, and they're like, do I have enough? I'm like, dear Jesus, I don't know what you got. I have no idea.

If you have enough, how much do you spend? And they got the wheels turning a whole lot for me. But it's been a decade in that. Did a lot of stuff in stocks and bonds and brokerage as well, in trading. I'm going to get to that in a few minutes, but let's talk for a second about this big word, this big D word, debt.

Tackling debt. Another big pillar of financial success is tackling debt. So imagine how much room you'd have in your budget if you could create or if there was a way to create. No payments to anything. So no medical debt, no vehicles, no credit cards, no student loan debt.

Imagine how far plush with cash you might be. Okay, that's a. For some of us, that feels like that'll never happen. But for some of us, it may be very, very close. So debt feels terrible.

You feel like you're a servant to all to it at all times, and it looms over your head. Well, Proverbs 22:7 says, just as the rich rule the poor, so the borrower's servant. To the lender, you are the servant until you flip the script. That's what we want to do, is to get everyone to a healthier spot, us included. So think back.

What's the most powerful tool that you have in your whole repertoire? It's your income. It is your most powerful tool. It's much harder to build wealth if you're constantly putting your money in a bunch of different places, paying down debts, while also maybe still digging the trains that you've been standing. And you're still digging.

Rule number one, if you're in a pit, stop digging. That's a good idea. So there's several ways to eliminate debt. I feel like Phil Corneo. So come up here and just talk about this for like hours.

He could probably just wow us, which is true. So. But the one way that I like, which I have read a lot about, is called the debt snowball. When she started Debt Snowball, babe in the winter, I'm being funny. She was begging to tell this joke.

No, I wasn't. No, I wasn't. We were talking about it over coffee and he was like, I'm going to, I'm going to give you the debt snowball portion of the night. And I was like, okay, great. So I'm going to tell people in the wintertime is the perfect time to start the debt snowball.

Yes. So lots of ways to do it. How it works. List out all your debts. Make only the minimum payment on all your debts.

Pay extra on the smallest debt first. Why? Because you need psychological wins knowing that you're doing, you're chunking away at things. Don't start with the biggest debt. You'll never get there.

Smallest debt first. Move on to the next smallest debt. Take all the firepower you're putting towards that first debt. Now put it towards the next debt. And then wash, rinse, repeat until all your debts eliminated.

Sounds super easy. Until the dishwasher breaks, until the car breaks down, until the F150 gets repoed or whatever the case may be. You know what I'm saying? So those things happen. I know, I'm sorry.

I'm just. I'm sorry. I'm sorry. I know. I. I love y' all so much.

It's at F250 now, so I'll leave it alone. So. But this process is something that has word structure tried and true. There's lots of other ways you could do it. But if you're like, I don't know where to start at.

Create a snowball. Start at small and keep moving. So we're getting close to time here, but I want to make sure that I do want to respect all of you guys time because I know school has started. So I'm committed to getting you all out of here by like 8, 10. Okay.

So just hang tight with me. So once all your debts eliminated, your money can begin to work a lot harder for you. So you'll have a good bit more room in your budget to begin thinking about both your future self, not just the. I'm trying to survive right now. So.

So like she said, I did work in financial services for almost a decade. That's, that's literally. I don't really care about that. My point that was that I saw a whole lot of damage that money does to people. That's really what I came away with.

So there were. I saw firsthand what the love of money looks like and what it can do to people. There were days when I thought to myself what a terrible existence some of these clients have. Spending every waking moment chasing after the dollar, trading stock after stock after stock, then dump it and dump it and dump it, endlessly chasing some feeling. And it made me think about how I preach this scripture.

Proverbs 1:19. Such is the fate of all who are greedy for money. It robs them of life. It steals your joy. Guys, it can't be about that.

It cannot be. So one of the best ways to plan for the future is to consider how taxes are going to beat the daylights out of you. You two things are true, death and taxes. It's very true. So consider how taxes are going to eat away at your wealth in the future.

One of the ways. And there's lots of accounts that you can get that are tax protected. I'm going to simplify this really quickly for us. The word is Roth ira. A Roth ira.

And again, there's lots of different types of accounts. I'm going to talk about this because it's very easy and most people in this room would easily qualify. So just about anybody with a job or earned income can open one within certain limitations. You can open a custodial Roth if it's a minor, you can dump money there for your kids until they turn 18. Contributions can be invested into a bunch of different ways contributions can grow tax free for your whole working career.

And then one day, when you are ready to pull the money out, what's called a qualified distribution means you hit a certain age or a certain factor, you can take all that money you put in, plus all the money earned while it was working for you out fully tax free, 100% tax free. So let's say I'm 36 years old, because I am, praise God. And now I'm debt free because I debt snow by myself. And we're good. We're on the same page.

We're clicking, we're tracking. So on paper I can afford to add let's say 400 bucks a month into a Roth IRA. You're like 400 bucks a month. Forget it, Jack. 10.

Just stick with me, okay? I want to try to hold off taking withdrawals from this IRA until I'm, let's say 65. So for me, that's 29 years from right now, if I invest in funds for 29 years that are able to give me a return of about 12%, which is not that hard to do. Come talk to me later. I can reach age 65 and that Roth IRA will have approximately $1,029,997.

All of it will come back to me 100% tax free. That's a. That's a. That's a good place to say amen. All right.

Hallelujah. 400 bucks a month consistently. That's the trick here. Consistency. So it hammers home this scripture about diligence.

Proverbs 13:11. Wealth from get rich quick schemes quickly disappears. But wealth from hard work grows over time. It's really important we plan for the future as well, not just about what we're doing today. So next, I think the goal here is we just personally don't want to spend our entire marriages chasing a false perception that having enough money will insulate us from other problems.

It won't. God's the only one who can. That's why Proverbs 11:28 says, Trust in your or trust trust in your money, and down you go. But godly flourish like leaves in the spring. So we want our marriages to flourish.

We want to have a biblical definition of honoring the Lord with our stewardship and living a life unto him and sewing into his economy. So we are covered no matter what is happening. Amen. In this world. Amen.

So closing with this scripture, and then we're going to bring up Taylor and Stephanie. Hebrews 13:4 and 5. Give honor to marriage and remain faithful to one another in marriage. God will surely judge people who are immoral and those who commit adultery. Don't love money.

Be satisfied with what you have. For God has said, I will never fail you. And I will never abandon you. I will never fail you. What are we singing tonight?

That song. I trust in God. He will never fail. His word never fails. It never returns void.

It always accomplishes the things that we want. I may switch chairs with you because that one's kind of rickety. So go ahead. Go ahead and do that. Okay, so we're gonna invite up Taylor and Stephanie Brown.

You guys give it up to Taylor and Stephanie Brown. Really great testimonies. These are some of our core leaders on our young families leadership team. I've asked them to come up. Taylor and I actually worked.

I'm sorry. Yeah. Taylor and I worked on the same team in financial services in corporate America. So we. We were some.

One of the couple people that actually were believers and so we would have each other's back spiritually and also in accountability with other stuff as well. So I was very thankful for the way that Taylor. Taylor has this perfect mixture of he's super good with people, he loves people. He's really good with data, and he knows how to problem solve. And I'm like, where's the party?

So I just. I want to be with people. I love hanging out with people. I'm energized with people. But you give me, like, a bunch of spreadsheets like, I just threw you guys.

I'm like, this might take me a while to figure this out, but I will figure it out. But Taylor has a gift. Stephanie is incredible. She's just here to laugh now. Stephanie's awesome.

Because you guys have figured out a few things concerning a couple of the topics we talked about. I don't know if you guys want to start with the personal or the professional stuff or whatever, but why don't we start with the idea of how did you guys get on the same page with marriage, with money? Hey, everybody. So one thing I'll say, front off before I answer that question, is I definitely feel totally unqualified to talk to you guys just about money or finances. But because we're still learning, we're still growing in this.

We are, too. One thing I will say is that we. We're in a much better place now than we were even a few years ago. And it really starts kind of like, as you mentioned earlier about, with submitting our finances to the Lord and wanting to honor him in all of this. But to answer your question, as far as unity as a couple, my dad, A really good piece of advice that he gave us was, when we were engaged, was that, in short of saying.

He didn't really say this, but he was implying it. It's like, okay, in order for me really, to bless your marriage, y' all gotta do Dave Ramsey while y' all are engaged. We weren't allowed to get engaged until we did Dave Ramsey. Oh, were we dating a bit? Yeah.

So it was like a. Like, he's like, no, you have to do this. But. And one thing I'll say, though, is that, yeah, there were some good principles with it. We did not implement all of the Dave Ramsey stuff at all.

But what it did for us is it broke down those barriers of what it looks like to talk about finances together, where I can honestly say, like, I don't know if we've ever fought over finances. And that's not like a, hey, look, at us, like, type thing. But it was because from the get go, we just understood, no, this is our goal is really to honor the Lord with this, and we want to be on the same page. And so with those two goals in mind, we were willing to have those difficult conversations, but it never turned into anything beyond that because we were just committed from the get go. Amen.

Amen. I know there's a. Did you want to add. There's several things you wanted to talk about, so I want to make sure we get to those things. Something that I'm very curious to know about is who handles the budget in your.

In your family? He makes the money, I spend it. Oh, okay. Okay. No, I mean, we both do.

And like, to be honest, like, we both handle the budget. It's. When we sit down, we talk about it. We talk about, okay, how. What are we going to prioritize?

And, like, one of the things I want to talk about, practically speaking speaking, was y', all, like, the grocery budget right now is insane. Like, it is insane. And so for us, every single month, we're going over on our grocery budget until we heard some advice that they were, like, create a separate checking account for your grocery budget. There you go. And transfer over that money into this separate checking account.

Have a separate debit card, everything separate just for your grocery budget. It. And so it's been a game changer. It's been huge for us. But as far as setting the amount that we put in there, like, that's where the discussion happens between both of us of, like, all right, how much are things costing nowadays?

And what do we want to prioritize? Do we want to prioritize eating organic, or do we want to not prioritize eating organic? Like, just whatever that is for us or for any of y', all, like, having that conversation and then talking about. And getting on the same page of, okay, this is how much we think this is going to cost. Let's look at trending of what.

How much we've spent months past, but then being willing to figure out, all right, do we need to pull from somewhere else and adjust that? Like, our grocery budget now is, like, four times than what it was when we first got married. So, like, it's just. It's crazy. It's really fun.

It's really fun going to the grocery store and you get your total, and you're like, oh, cool, that's. That's fun. $500. So one of the things I wanted to ask you guys, so you have a grocery budget. If you guys go over.

Do you have like a separate line item budget that you would pull money from? Is that coming from somewhere else or are you like, okay, because we went over in our grocery budget, we're not eating out the rest of the month or I mean, you have to pay your electric bill. So practically speaking, help us figure out where to go. Last week when we went over our grocery budget. Last week when you went over your grocery budget, I told you we're not qualified to be up here.

You're doing a great job. I will say the spreadsheet that's. This chair is very wolf. I just keep. The spreadsheet is like, that's what he does.

Like, we have sat down and had so many long winded conversations and it's all about like putting all the dollars, having a name for every dollar. We don't really do that a whole lot anymore because we just. Everything is in its place and we know. But yeah, so like it's, it's realizing, you know, what, what are those extra purchases or whatever surplus we have that maybe it is that Amazon purchase that we're like, oh, yeah, that would be a nice kitchen gadget to have or that would be a nice thing for the yard or whatever it is, just being willing. Like your slide said to say no.

No. Like, no, we're not going to do that for at least these next two weeks. Because we refill that food budget every time. Because I get paid bi weekly. It's like every time we get paid, I just transfer over money into the food budget.

So we. We have multiple budgets. But not. We. When we first got married, we did the envelope system the day for you.

Absolutely. And I hated it. You hated it? Ever done that before? The envelope system?

It's the worst. It's the worst. It is. I'm sorry. If you still do that.

It is. You're amazing. And. But I just. Could I.

Having all that cash with me was just not. It's not something that I. That's very true. Did well with. So now we do have.

We opened up a lot of different accounts. So we have separate accounts for many things, but the one that we use all the time is the checking or the food budget. So like digital envelopes. Yeah, digital envelopes. Love it.

Can I add more thing? Oh, yeah, go ahead. It's really easy. If you came into marriage and you guys grew up in different perspectives, different backgrounds, it'd be very simple to say, well, we'll just keep our money habits separate. That's a bad idea.

I'm Going to tell you right now the reason why is because two cannot become one flesh. Unless you put everything in the pot together, it will not happen. Digital envelopes and extra bank accounts are awesome so long as everybody knows about them and everyone has access to them. I think it's a really important piece that we cannot hide things from our spouses nor should we find to have extra accounts they don't know about, have access to. It's a temptation.

Yep. One of the things that I wanted to ask you guys, we've done it as well and I know you guys have to talk to us about no spending months. What does that look like for you guys? And give definition to it. Yeah.

So like a spending fast. And that would be on those extra things. So that's something that for us has worked best in January, which is, I mean it's, it's great because here at the church we're doing Sala as well. So we can kind of like hop on that train of okay, going to fast all this other stuff. Why not fast our extra spending too?

Why not? And so. And it is no spending. Yeah. So like outside of like your budgeted items and going back to your comment about emergencies, like all right, the car broke, we gotta fix the car to be able to do X, Y and Z, like there are those things that we agree upon that all right, these are true emergencies.

But just the extra. And I mean y', all, if we do this in January, like Amazon already delivered a ton in December for Christmas. Like they don't need to keep coming to my house in January. It's going to be okay. Like they won't forget about us.

But like, yes, I will say this too. Talking about giving the Lord your tithe. It's like giving him the first month of the year. That's it. So that's just really how we view it.

That's giving him financially the first month. Yeah. And one thing I will say is we tried to do it again this month and it lasted like all of one week and we're like, oh, school, not a good month to fast. We're not doing this. You have to plan really far.

It just didn't work. And it's okay. It's like we've done it in January too, where it's like a no spend January and we get really dressed up to go to the grocery store. It's like a fun outing cuz that's like a budgeted item. So we're like kids.

We're going to the grocery store cuz it's like you're not doing anything other people. And I think, I think we've decided after this past season month or this past year doing it, we're going to budget in a date night. Cuz 31 days with your kids and no break is a really long time. It's like January 56 or something. Yeah.

You're like how many days are in January? So I think we are going to budget in a date night. But I think it's just interesting when we talk to other couples who have done like a no spend month. Like where are your parameters? What do you say yes to?

What do you say no to? It is hard to find fast that kind of stuff like knowing if it's not budgeted, you are not spending money on it and then realizing you're getting to the end of the month and you actually have a surplus and you're not in the deficit and you're not always trying to work to like pedal faster to make up speed. And one thing to add that isn't helpful is don't start filling up your Amazon cart throughout the whole month. Like you're not like going to make up for what you didn't spend in February. Shoot.

Because then you're just like still feeding it. You're like, save for later. I hope we got 24 more minutes and I can hit buy like no. Like that's not what we're doing. Yes.

I love it. I will say too something else that we budget for every single month because it comes every single year is Christmas. Yeah. Let us not be surprised when December rolls around. And so in January, I mean it's just automatically comes out of the paycheck and it goes right into a Christmas account.

I love it. It's true. And we stopped buying presents for all of the cousins. I'm telling you. Listen, we love y' all family, but like I love too much, too expensive.

I love you all. That's not my problem. And I don't have enough money. Well, we have birthday palooza in our house and it's like from the end of July to like the first week in August. And we way underestimated how much because hey, inflation, we weigh underestimated.

So we would not have done well with a surplus this month. So another key factor for those who are on a bi weekly paycheck, two, maybe three times a year, there is going to be three paychecks in a single month. Which means that you get a little built in bonus potentially. What you do with that, that's up to you. What Some people would do what I've done in the past.

Sometimes it's going to pay off all the overspending on the Amazon account. Sometimes it's, I'm going to sock it away. But if there's debt, it's another way to start chunking things away a little further, faster. This chair is squeaking. Terribly sorry.

So, but that those extra bi weekly paychecks that happen throughout the course of the year, when they fall in the same month, you can start to plan. All right, I'm going to use that. That's going to be next vacation. Next June, we go to the beach. That's going to pay for half that beach house or maybe a third nowadays, who knows?

So, but it will pay for some of that. So it's just about strategy and putting your money to work as best you can. We don't have too much time left, but I wanted you guys to hit on the testimony piece. Yeah. So what Andrew mentioned earlier about gross versus net and tithing off of it.

So I wanted to share a testimony about that and just one thing that really happened to us and how the Lord showed us and revealed that to us. So I was listening to a John Bevere podcast a few years ago and he talked in detail about this whole, whole premise of how the Holy Spirit had convicted him in that he should be tithing off of his gross income and that his health benefits or his retirement or his taxes should not reduce what he is giving to the Lord. And with that, like, we had always tithed off of our net income, but it wasn't out of like withholding, withholding this from the Lord. It was just ignorance. Like, I was just like, oh, like, yeah, this is my first fruits.

It's what's coming in. This is what I'm going to tied off, tithe off of. But when he said it like, the Holy Spirit just convicted me and was like, no, you have to do this. And it was one of those things where it was like, all right, if I don't do this, I'm disobeying God. So in talking about it with Stephanie, like I mentioned earlier, we were comfortable in talking about this type of stuff with finances and we were just like, okay, let's do it.

Now, I'm not sharing this as a formula in any shape, way or form. And it's not a way to manipulate God either. However, what our testimony is that week and I got called into my boss's office and I work in corporate America. So for all of y' all who work in a Corporate America job, y'. All.

Y' all will know that this is not normal. So I get pulled into the office and my boss is like, hey. So we were doing a salary evaluation and we realized that we could actually give you an off cycle pay raise. So we're going to give you like a 3 or 4% pay raise. Come on.

Like, just because we like you. And with that, like, it blew me. I was like, what? Like, I thought I was in trouble coming in, like. But it was just.

It blew me away at the Lord's faithfulness of. And again, this isn't a formula, but it was like the Lord was saying to us, like, I see that obedience. Yes, I. I see that sacrifice. And with that, I'm going to honor it. And it goes back to something that, like, I'm still growing in, is that he is my provider.

Amen. Like, in the midst of all this, in the midst of this economy, like, like, no, he is the one that's going to provide for me. That's exactly right. And as long as we're submitting to the Holy Spirit, as long as we are going after this together, working hard to be on the same page, because it's not easy. It takes intentionality.

As long as we're doing this and giving him our first fruits, like, he's got us. Amen. And so that's. That's our testimony, man. Praise God.

That's awesome. I will say that we're going to land this plane like we talked about. I want to tell that testimony.

Yeah. So I had to clear that with her. Last year. We. We sowed sacrificially into.

Into a. A ministry that, frankly, we didn't have. We weren't flush with casts, but we felt the Lord led us to give a certain amount that was going to be a sack of sacrificial gift. We gave that amount out of our savings, knowing that we're probably going to be a little bit tight, actually going to be really tight, trying to just pay the mortgage. But we felt the Holy Spirit tell us to do it.

We agreed on a number and we wrote the check. Four days later, someone showed up on our doorstep with a check for exactly double that amount. Exactly to the penny. It was God saying, I asked you to do this out of what you conceive as your lack. But I have no lack.

He has storehouses. Scripture has told us, if you do, I'll bless you so much you can't even contain it. Where is it going to be at? He'll release it when you need it because he's got it. But when you have opportunity to obey.

I'm telling you guys, it's not a formula like you're saying. It's not at all. It's. He cares about is your heart in the right posture about what this money is doing. He owns the cattle on a thousand hills.

It's all his to begin with. But if we have the wrong perspective about it, yeah, we'll hoard it. And we won't be able to use it or build the kingdom because we're keeping too much of it. So I wanted to mention that God does care, and he does watch. And he cares about obedience as well.

So we're going to pray, if that's okay with you guys. Can y' all give it up? Taylor and Stefan, just for sharing their hearts. Thank you, guys. Seriously.

Thank you, guys.