This is the Chip Ingram Sermon Podcast, brought
to you by Living on the Edge. In this podcast,
you'll hear Chip's teaching unedited and from
beginning to end. Here's Chip Ingram with today's
teaching, Managing Your Finances Together. If
you'll pull out your notes, skill number four
is how to biblically manage your finances together.
The number one source of conflict and divorce
in America is issues and problems around money.
And really, it's the symptom as we learned. It's
different values, different priorities, different
styles. Almost every marriage has a spender and
a saver. Different family backgrounds, your whole
view of money, wealth, spending, saving, investing,
risk. You grew up in a family and it's in your
thinking, it's in your nerves, and you just have
preconceived ideas about those things. And then
some of you, because of circumstance or situations,
entered your marriage with debt or challenges
or have had huge hardships that have created
financial problems. All I'm saying is all that
does is this. It creates incredible pressure.
Just incredible pressure. And incredible pressure,
brings things to the surface where, because we're
human, we figure out primarily how to blame the
other person. Okay, you still have your passage?
We're still in Colossians 3, 12 through 17. So
in context here, it says, as those who have been
chosen of God, holy and beloved, put on a heart
of compassion, kindness, humility, patience,
bearing with one another and forgiving each other,
whoever has a complaint against anyone. Just
as the Lord forgave you, so also should you.
Beyond all these things, put on love, which is
the perfect bond of unity, and let the peace
of Christ rule in your hearts, to which indeed
you were called into one body, and be thankful.
The very first line says, this is how God sees
you. This is who you are. What I just read after
that is this is what we're to do in our relationships.
And then notice verse 16 is a resource. Let the
word of Christ. richly dwell within you. How?
With all wisdom. That means at the right time,
at the right way, sharing it for the right purposes,
teaching and admonishing one another. Well, how?
With truth, psalms, hymns, spiritual songs, and
then this idea of regardless of our circumstance,
singing with thankfulness in your hearts to God.
And then in verse 17, he's going to say, this
is how I want you to behave. Whatever you do
in word or deed. Now just pause for a moment.
Can you think of anything that's outside of word
or deed? Thought. That's good. Whatever you do
in word or deed, do all in the name of the Lord
Jesus, giving thanks through him to God the Father.
The command here is that all of our words and
all of our actions are be done in Jesus' name.
And in Jesus' name simply means two things. It
means you do it as a representative of him. So
I'm speaking or I'm behaving or I'm acting as
his representative. And it also has the idea
of being empowered by him to speak whatever he
wants you to speak or to do whatever he wants
you to do. The two most accurate mirrors of our
heart and our lives are our words and our money.
The good man out of the good treasure of his
heart, Jesus said in Luke 6, verse 45, brings
forth what is good. And the evil man or the evil
woman out of the evil treasure brings forth what
is evil. For the mouth speaks from that which
fills the heart. If you ever want to know where
you're at, the MRI of your soul. I mean, I can
intend, I can think, I can lift my hands, I can
sing, I can say I love God, but my words, my
words reveal what's really in my heart. And that's
why our speech is so important. And so anytime
that's true, the other thing is your words, you
can go into training so that You deal with issues
so that what comes out of your mouth reveals
what you want to be in your heart. The second
greatest revealer is our money. Jesus said, do
not store up for yourself, underline in your
notes if you would, for yourself, treasures on
earth where moth and rust destroy and where thieves
break in and steal. Why? Why would he say that?
He doesn't want you to have nice things. He wants
to keep something from you. What's true about
moth, rust, and thieves? They can take it away.
In other words, it's vulnerable. But store up,
now underline again, will you? For yourself.
This is for your benefit. Treasures in heaven
where neither moth nor rust can destroy and where
thieves do not break in. And then here's the
purpose clause. Why? For where your treasure
is, there your heart will be also. Wherever,
if you want to know, I mean, if you really wanted
to know, Lord, how am I really doing? From heaven,
all pretense, what anyone else thinks, in my
own denial, in the deceitfulness of my own heart,
if I really wanted to know, where am I really
at? If I took a tape recorder and listened to
my words for a week and then sat down and listened
to it. the tone of voice, the anger, the sarcasm,
the hurt, the swearing, the thanks, the praise,
I would get a really good idea of what's in my
heart. That would be a pretty challenging thing
to do. A little bit easier way, if you would
take all your financial statements, all your
credit cards, and see where all your money was
spent in the last year or two years or three
years or four years. What you saved and why you
saved it and where you gave money, both formally
and informally, it would tell you more about
your life than almost anything you can imagine.
Because wherever your treasure is, that's where
your heart really is. That's why Jesus talked
more about money than heaven and hell combined.
He doesn't need or want our money. In fact, I
bet I was a pastor for 10 years. And I thought
life was like this. There's Jesus, right? There's
the Godhead, and then there's the enemy, Satan.
That's not what the Bible teaches. Jesus says
there's two gods. There's God, and there's mammon.
Wealth, greed. Money promises to do everything.
Money promises to protect, provide, make you
a someone. Jesus said, This is one God. This
is the other God. Satan is just the enemy to
get you to believe that that will deliver. And
the world system is created to tell you your
possessions, your power, your fame, what you
can buy, what people think. That makes you a
somebody. So Jesus says money isn't neutral.
He says it's powerful. It's deceptive. It's not
bad in and of itself, but it's the other God.
And so if you want to know what's going on in
your life or if you want to direct your life,
money is a revealer. And my experience is, you
know, I'll own it. The first few years I was
a pastor, I didn't talk much about money. A lot
of pastors don't talk much about money. Or if
they do, it's about giving, right? Or about a
capital campaign or about a building or a bus
that we need. And what you need to do is you
need to study the whole counsel of God on money.
I read through all of Proverbs a number of times,
and I took a green pen, and any time money in
any way came up in Proverbs, I highlighted it
in green. You'll go, are you kidding? Because
what you're going to find out, it's so fundamental.
Let me give you a very brief overview of biblical
finances. And I mean, I'm going to go really
quick and I'm only going to give this because
this is the context in which I'm speaking and
it's the context in my experience most Christians
don't have. Money is sort of like a side thing
over here. It's a problem to deal with. It's
like, you know, we know we need some money or
the matter of giving is sort of like, well, maybe
there's some law and, you know, I'm supposed
to give 10 % and either begrudgingly or semi
-begrudgingly, it's like paying a bill and I
should do that because I was taught to. And the
whole teaching of generosity in your heart and
the purpose and how money fits into the development
of your spiritual life in my experience is often
missed. So what the Bible teaches, and I mean
quick overview, is that God owns it all. The
earth is mine, Psalm 50. And the fullness thereof,
every good and perfect gift, James, comes from
God. Second, we're stewards, managers, and trustees,
Luke 16. You don't own anything. You don't have
a car. You don't have a home. You don't have
any investments. You don't own anything. It's
100 % him. What do you have, the apostle said,
except what you have received? And so my money,
my house, my investments, my wife, my children,
I'm a steward. And a steward or a manager is
someone who is entrusted with certain things
to make good use of them for their master. That
changes your whole world. That means... Okay,
the market goes up or the market goes down. Lord,
you're losing a lot of your money right now.
We laugh. People have been jumping off of buildings
and off of bridges. Anxiety, depression, fear,
overwhelmed. The American view of money, we are
living the last 50 years, 70 years. We're living
in America with a level of affluence that only
the greatest kings in all the world ever experienced
historically. And yet, in this affluent world,
we have more anxiety, more suicides, and more
problems than I could take you to multiple third
world countries where they have very little and
the people are very happy and no one's taking
drugs. The most recent research, but now by the
way, when you're in abject poverty or you're
really poor, there's financial issues, does money
solve all your problems? No, but it sure helps.
And what the secular researchers say is that
basically, right up to about $75 ,000 to $85
,000, if you're below that in the current economy,
if you get in about that area, And without debt,
money really helps. And all the dollars after
that is sort of diminishing returns in terms
of quality of life. The saddest, most miserable,
most problems in families in all my life have
been the wealthiest people that I know. And what's
so ironic, I sit with them and I talk with them
and they talk about their second or their third
marriage or their daughter's suicide or their
anxiety and their enablement of their kids. Because
when you're really wealthy, it's hard to say
no to your kids. It's hard to set boundaries.
It's hard to teach them responsibility. And so
really, really, the only people that have more
messed up kids in all the world, by the way,
this was a study done by an insurance company,
is the poorest of the poor of the poor, like
living in the ghetto, and the ultimate rich.
And what they measured is treatment centers.
and all the rest. Why? Because money can't solve
the problems. In fact, it creates incredible
entitlement, lack of responsibility. We'll give
an account for our stewardship. God, according
to how he's made you and purposes, has given
us all different talents, different resources,
and I'll give an account of what I do with his
money, what I do with his time. I had a card
for years that I wrote down. You know, I do this
thing a lot with my thinking. I mean, I really
believe as a man thinks in his heart, so he becomes.
The mindset on the flesh, death. The mindset
on the spirit, life and peace. Set your mind
on the things above. I'm absolutely, I mean,
I'm like over the top on, boy, what comes into
my mind. There's a huge filter. And what I put
into my mind. Because life change happens not
by behavior or emotions or trying hard. Life
change happens. First and foremost, you renew
your mind. And as you think differently, all
of a sudden that's not a temptation because it
doesn't look very good. You think differently
and emotionally things change because the news
is like poison. And the more and more I watch
of news and people being blown up and these people
hate these people and those people, then what
it does is it creates all kinds of things inside.
You know, ask a teenage girl, the more you're
on social media, the higher the anxiety, the
higher the social suicide rate. And so I keep
aware of what's going on, but I'm real careful
about what I let in my mind. And then what I
know is that when I struggle with areas, I've
got to change my thinking. So coming from my
background, giving away money and being generous
did not come naturally. My dad grew up out of
the Depression. His parents' farm was sold out
from under him. That's a picture that he remembers.
He took me as a little boy to the bank every
single week. And I did yards and did things and
you put it in savings. And so that was embedded
in me. And so I had a card that I wrote, Lord,
I desire to be more generous with my time and
my money this year. And I would just read it
over and just read it over, read it over, read
it over, read it over. And I just found there
were opportunities. They were probably always
there, but I noticed them and I would be a little
bit more generous. then a little bit more generous.
And then I reviewed that card for like five years.
And then I was studying and I just realized,
that's not accurate. That's wrong, Chip. So I
put an X through the card in certain places.
God, I desire to be more generous with your money
and your time this year. And that's what I just
realized. Whatever I've got in my pocket, whatever
I've got in the bank account, whatever kind of
car, whatever I have, it's yours and I'm going
to give an account for it. Money is powerful
and deceptive. Mark 4, you know, the parables
of the seed and the sower, right? The seed is
God's word. It goes into the earth. You know,
the hard soil, Satan takes it away. The shallow
soil, it grows up, but persecution and difficulty
fades away. The thorny soil, It grows up. And
then the desires of this word and the deceitfulness
of riches choke out God's word. By the way, the
deceitfulness of riches. You do understand the
word deceit means this. When you are deceived,
you don't know it. And we now live in a Christian
worldview where we all have certain issues that
we all sin, that we've decided, let's have a
few acceptable sins. And we'll give all each
other a pass on them. I've been in a number of
men's groups where, you know, we all struggle
with porn. But, you know, let's try and be more
porn light. That's really not one of the options.
Or, you know, I know it's not very wise, but
everyone has a lot of debt. And everyone gossips
a little bit about people when you meet in those
groups. And, you know, we all struggle with that.
Therefore, it must be okay. And we sort of gradually
give ourselves permission to have the sacred
cow of materialism. All the other Christians
I know, I mean, they always get the latest phone
and the latest TV and the latest that. What do
they have, the money? No, but they've got these
cards. And it's pretty cool. You just put them
on these cards and, you know, you only have to
pay like $11 or $22 or $33 each payment. and
pay $944 for that $300 TV over five years. But
you don't think about, wait a sec, it's God's
money. Am I saying it's wrong to use a credit
card? No, I have credit cards. I pay them off
every 30 days. But I'm just saying there's radical
thoughts about money and the subtlety and deception
of money is it. It takes you down a path. It's
like being in water where you go out, if you've
ever been at the beach, you know, and you're
having fun, and you've got the sand, and if you
have a family, you've got a couple kids here,
and you've got the blankets, and you're going
to have lunch and stuff, and they go out and
play, and you're playing, and then you're playing,
and you're playing, and nothing happened, but
the current's doing this, and you look up and
you realize, my lands, how did we get down? I
mean, hey, where's mom and dad? That's what happens
to us with regard to money. Money is the other
God according to Jesus. We can't serve both,
Matthew 6. Giving is God's antidote to greed
and the dangers of idol worship. We're commanded,
instruct those who are rich in this present world,
and biblically that's all of us, not to be conceited
or fix their hope on the uncertainty of money
or wealth. Notice that's the reason. Because
it's uncertain. He wants to protect us. But fix
their hope on God who richly supplies us with
all things to enjoy. In other words, when your
priorities are right, when it comes from God,
he's gracious and kind and loving. So you're
not overwhelmed in debt. You're not compensating
by buying things or going places you really can't
afford. Your priorities are right. And he says,
don't fix your hope here on the one hand. So
you want to be generous and be wise. And then.
When he blesses, you don't have to say, well,
the reason we have a swimming pool is we're doing
baptisms for the youth group. You know, that
mission trip that we're taking to New Zealand
and Hawaii. You know what? If you want to go
to Hawaii and the Lord has blessed your life
and your priorities in order, here's what you
ought to do. Enjoy it. If God gives you a swimming
pool and your pride or he's in order and he's
led you in that way and maybe it's especially
great for the season of your kids, why don't
you enjoy it? But what we do is we play lots
of games. God wants us to richly enjoy all that
he's given us and at the same time realize that
thing, that wealth, that idol wants to take over
your soul. Debt is dangerous and to be avoided.
I think the best counselors I know say it's,
you know, it's not wrong to have some debt, appreciable
items. It's way better not to have any. And we're
to be accurately aware of our financial condition.
Now, this would be interesting. I will not do
this because I would not want to embarrass anyone.
But if I could, if you all lined up and I could
meet with couples, couples, couples, couples,
and then I would just, okay, separate, you know,
earphones. She couldn't hear, he couldn't hear.
And I would ask the man, in general, how much
debt do you have? How much money do you have
in savings? How much is on your credit cards?
How much short -term, long -term, or any investments
that you have? I mean, just a ballpark. I don't
want the exact numbers, but you're aware of basically
your finances. What I would find in most couples,
one person would have a vague idea and the other
would be like, he takes care of all that or she
takes care of all that. Or they would both fumble
around a lot and not have a very accurate. The
Bible says, know well the condition of your flock.
You need to know this is our level of debt. Currently,
right now, this is how much we've set aside for
an emergency. This is a fund that we've developed
for. We're saving for the next car that we're
going to buy because we want to pay cash. This
is what we're doing in terms of long -term and
investment or retirement. And you kind of know
where you're at. And by the way, your body language
can... I'm talking really fast. I'm going to
pause for a minute. The reason you're feeling
the way you're feeling is because of the deceitfulness
of riches. Do you realize 50 % of all the people
that graduate from college, I read a statistic,
file bankruptcy? You know, you go to college,
they give you a t -shirt, here's a credit card.
But by the time they're out, there's literally,
we have a whole generation, some Christian, some
non -Christian, that they think this is money.
I remember one of my grandkids, we were taking
them out for something and we're having a pizza
or something like that. And you know, there's
six, seven, eight, nine, 10 at the time. And
we were here and, oh, do you want to get something
like that? I said, oh, I don't have my wallet.
And I said, I don't know what to do. And I forget,
one of my grandkids says, oh, just use one of
those cards. In other words, you don't need money.
There was no connection between money and a card.
But here's, okay, okay. Now I'm going to be really,
really gentle here. If you want to get hold of
your life, if you want to get hold of your values,
if you want to get hold of your future, you have
to get a hold of your money and your time and
your thought life. If you do not get a hold of
your money, it will get a hold of you, and despite
your best intentions, it will take you places
you do not want to go. If you don't get a hold
of your thought life, you can intend, you can
try, you can want to, you can plead, but you
are the product of your thoughts. It's how God
made us. Your emotions are a response to your
thoughts. Much of your behavior, instead of being
intellectually based, oh, this is logical. This
is what I ought to do. Is that what we do? Like,
I'm feeling kind of down. I'm feeling kind of
blue. Oh, it's really logical. Don't go to the
refrigerator. So I won't. What do we do? We eat.
We spend. We shop. We go. We vacation. There
are only five uses of money. I got this from
Ron Blue. You can give it away, you can pay taxes
with it, you can save it, you can pay off debt,
or you can live off of it. And when I say savings,
I mean savings as in short -term, emergency fund,
which I find most people don't have. But then
there's sort of a mid -range savings where we
set aside X amount so that when we get the tax
bill, we don't go, oh. So, you know, every paycheck,
a little bit goes in for the tax. We have a game
plan. At our age and our stage, we wanted to
help our grandkids. So we set aside some where
we started a little fund for their college. We
wanted to visit our grandkids and stay connected.
And when they all grow and go different places,
about 15 years ago, we called it a kid fund.
Because, you know. And by the way, it's not like
we had a lot of money to put in these things,
but the discipline of creating where you want
your money to go creates an intention. But the
point is, do you plan and do you segment your
dollars so that what I knew was at the end of
the day, what's going to be valuable? I want
to be connected to my grown kids. I want to have
at least every two years a window of time where
those little kids grow up and they remember being
on the boat with granddad and grandma and aunts
and uncles and cousins. Did it cost a lot of
money? Yeah. But I saved for it for two years.
I don't have a ton of money in retirement, but
I've got a plan that lines out that, well, at
65 I said, I don't have anything in the Bible
about retirement. I want to be used by God. I'm
not trying to figure out. I mean, I've met these
guys that their whole life was, boy, maybe by
56 I can retire and play golf. Now, personally,
I like to play golf. But I think pleasure is
a great vacation. It's a bad vocation. Pleasure
is a great tour guide. It's a great tour guide.
Ah, let's have some fun. It is a terrible destination.
It can't deliver. Financial freedom requires,
and please don't laugh, spending less than one's
income. If you add up all your expenses this
month or in the last year, are your expenses
more than the money that came in? And if so,
do you understand that's a fundamental problem?
The government can do that. You can't. I mean,
they can just say, hey, let's print some more
money. Unfortunately, we will all end up paying
for all that one way or another. And so the lie
is that what we need is we need more income.
And so often, well, it's a second job or we'll
do this, we'll do this. Well, then your priorities
get out of whack. Now, are there times for a
second job? Man, of course. But by and large,
your need is not more money. Your need is to
adjust your spending to your income. And your
income needs to flow out of not what are all
the things that we think we need. But see, you
got to go back to this is who we want to be.
This is God's call on our life. This is what's
important for our marriage. This is what's important
if you have children or grandchildren. These
are our goals. And then, okay, we're going to
give first and foremost because we're going to
declare that money will not be our God. Before
we do anything else, I'm going to make my offering
to God. Second is I'm going to obey the government,
so I'm going to set aside, I'm going to pay my
taxes. Then I'm going to say, what do we need,
you know, to live on? But before we do, even
if it's small, we're going to set aside some
money to save. And then you're saying, if I do
all that, I'm not going to have much left. You're
right. So do you need to lease a car that's $500
a month? Do you need cable and Netflix and this
and that? Do you need to eat out seven, eight,
nine times a month? That's just what happens.
Now you're thinking, gosh, you're talking about
a completely altered lifestyle. It's called freedom.
It's called joy. The borrower is always a slave
of the lender. And you just get into bondage.
And it starts small and then it mushrooms. And
so all I'm saying is that that's the principle.
You have to spend less than what comes in. Often
money is not the problem as we talked about.
It's often just the symptom. Money solves emotional
and relational problems short term by compensation.
A lot of parents buy stuff for their kids because
they feel guilty. They're not spending quality
time with them. We buy gifts for one another
or we say silly things like, you know, it's really
been a rocky time in our marriage, so let's just
go to Hawaii. I mean, we're only $60 ,000 in
debt. What's another 10? I mean, the logic goes
like that. There's a way that seems right to
a man. Proverbs 14, 12. There's a way that seems
right to a woman. But the end thereof is death.
And what is common for other people is death
for you. The fact that they do it is the fact
that you're going to see people whose marriages
don't work, whose kids are entitled, whose trajectory
of their life is the opposite of what you want,
and yet, If you did some real hard evaluation
at some level or maybe more than you would like
or maybe you're in the deep end of the pool and
you just realize this money thing is really the
thing that's causing the pressure. How do you
solve the money problem? It has to begin with
it's our problem that we will solve, right? We're
going to do this together because once the pressure
happens, what do we do? It's her or whoever is
the spender especially, right? It's him. You
know, I can't believe he bought new golf clubs.
I can't believe she went shopping and did this,
blah, blah, blah. I can't believe, blah, blah,
blah. And so you blame. Either win -win or lose
-lose. Second, then assessment instead of blaming.
You will need to get prayed up and then say,
let's sit down and see where we're at financially.
So we both know. This is how much actually comes
in. This is how much we pay in taxes. This is
how much total debt we have in every area, long
-term, short -term, credit card. This is how
much we give. This is, I've done this many times
in season of marriage. For 30 days. And it's
easier on your phone. There's probably apps that
do it now. For 30 days, Teresa and I would say,
we're going to track every dollar we spend for
30 days just to find out. And spend would just
be normal, but just track it. It's crazy. Just
by tracking it, you start spending less. And
then you track it and you find, okay, this is
how much on groceries. This is how much on going
out to eat. This much on recreation. This much
on clothes. This much. And all of a sudden, what
you see is. In your mind, it's we don't have
enough money to get by. And when you see where
it actually goes, you'll go, can you believe
we spend $142 on Starbucks? I'm just telling
you, we have patterns. And here, God's not mad.
But those patterns, right? Those paths, there's
a destination. And I just want you to know, the
destination that a great majority of Christians,
and maybe a lot of you are on, it's not where
you want to be. So you sit down, and you'll notice
the worksheet is I've just kind of taken what
other really smart people in finance, you know,
and an honest appraisal, and there's a confession.
Here's where you start. Lord, we are messed up
with our money. A correction, Lord, we are messed
up with your money. And since it's your money,
we're going to repent. And then second, we want
to have a clear conscience. We want not just
our words, not just our thoughts, not just our
actions. We want our money to be a reflection
that we're living in a way that's pleasing to
you. You do. You do understand. God longs to
bless you. Now, this is no prosperity stuff,
but he wants to bless you financially. Most Christians
are not in a position to be blessed financially.
You have high debt, and you don't give much,
and you're not very generous. God sees two kinds
of people, dams and streams. When he finds a
stream, that means it comes, you get it, you
know it's his, and it flows in you, you enjoy
it, and it flows through you, and you help lots
of people in lots of ways. God just keeps, he
just keeps filling streams. There's others that
are dams. It comes and hits you and you think
it's yours. And you know, the water goes down
because of debt and then you spend some stuff
you don't have and it produces a lot of pressure.
Oh God, help. He goes, well, I mean, you're going
to do the same thing with it. Actually, I need
you to hit bottom so you would like look at each
other and go, we can't keep living this way financially.
So it's always out of his love. And then there's
principles here, you know, about a budget and
how to do it and do it together and establishing.
These are all the basic principles of finances.
Resolving to get out of debt. Developing a plan
and a time frame. Many of you, just like in other
areas, you'll need someone from the outside.
You know, a financial counselor. Lots of churches
now are doing some really good things with this.
And then explore creative means to reduce spending
and living costs. And then just say, Lord, we
want to obey you. One of the things that we did
after we, you know, found out how much we were
spending and all, then we developed, you know,
a budget sounds so harsh, doesn't it? I mean,
it just sounds like, ugh, budgets. So what we
did is when we came up with, okay, this is where
we want to be, and this is what we can afford.
Okay, we gave. We paid our taxes. We saved at
least just, if mostly the principal, probably
won't do a whole lot of good. But we started
there and it kept growing. Now we have this much
money left. Then what we did is we said, okay,
groceries, literally. We went to the bank. We
got cash. Okay, family of six. Okay, $320. Put
that in an envelope that says groceries. Recreation.
We do want to go out a little bit. We want to
do this. We want to do that. Right now. $80 for
this month. That goes in another envelope. And
we had like five envelopes, and you'll see how
to do that. And when the envelopes were empty,
guess we're not going to Starbucks. Guess we're
not going out to eat. And so we lived on a cash
basis. And it can be different amounts, but you
would be shocked. how your debt will come down,
your freedom will go, and God will allow you
to get a hold of your finances. And then notice
what action step to begin the process. And this
is one where it's, in most couples, it's either
a default, we don't think about it a lot, or
it's really an issue where there's a lot of sparks.
This is one of those, let's agree, let's not
blame anybody. We've done that, right? Second,
let's not argue. That's no fun either. Let's
work through this worksheet together and let's
come up with just a plan that we both agree on.
And what I can tell you, I've watched this just
like spiritual intimacy. When couples get on
the same page in finances and then can I just
warning, warning. you know, caution light, you
know, yellow, now it's red. In about two or three
weeks, one of you won't stick to the budget.
And it's probably the spender. And one of you
is like really organized, follow through details,
and the other is a little bit more big picture.
That's the culprit. Watch that guy. And then
you're going to have an argument. And guess what
you'll do? You'll bear with one another. You'll
define the problem. You'll initiate a time to
talk. You have a way to solve the problem. You'll
forgive one another. You repent. Your Starbucks
is down to $4. No, I'm just kidding. So do you
get it? This is one that doesn't feel like, oh,
wow, what a wonderful difference it will make.
I will tell you, this... This will impact almost
every area. And your children, man, it will so
help them. What do you mean we can't have that?
What do you mean we can't buy that? Everyone,
you'll have so many teachable moments when you
begin to live in a way where you are wise stewards
of his money and his time, of the home that you
either own or rent as his steward. with the income
that you have. And as you do that, venture capitalists,
they look for who's the right person, the right
idea, the right concept, the right need, and
we want to fund it. And the ultimate venture
capitalist in the universe is God. He's looking
for someone that would be a good manager, that
has an open heart, that would use the resources
that would bring honor and glory to him, He would
really like as a byproduct to have you really
enjoy it and make you happy and probably provide
some things that you would never dream. But we
live in a world where I want the things now for
me. And I neglect my business partner, my venture
capitalist, the funder, the provider. Because,
you know, no matter how much you have, haven't
we learned? Man, your small business is thriving.
Guess what? You're out of business. I talk with
people. I spent 33 years building this company.
It's gone. It's gone. So what you want is you
want a financial partner that will never leave
you, never forsake you, and no matter what happens
or when you fail, you can always go back. Lord,
he's near to the brokenhearted. He wants to help
you. This is Living on the Edge with Chip Ingram,
and we're in our series called Choosing Love.
If you're ready to turn today's challenge into
lasting change, Chip's newest book, I Choose
Love, gives you the practical roadmap you need.
It doesn't just tell you what to do. It shows
you how to do it. You'll learn to recognize the
subtle ways pride and selfishness sabotage your
relationships. You'll discover practical exercises
to develop genuine humility. And you'll see how
choosing agape love, the sacrificial, others
-focused love of God, transforms even your most
difficult relationships. I Choose Love addresses
the real issues we all face. The tendency to
need the last word, the subtle belief that our
perspective is the truth, the grandiosity that
shows up in small ways like chronic lateness.
Chip gets brutally honest about his own struggles,
and he shows you the path forward. If you're
tired of broken relationships and ready to experience
love that actually works, get your copy of I
Choose Love today. Visit livingontheedge .org.
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that wraps up today's episode. Don't miss the
next Bible teaching message coming up here on
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