Money touches nearly every part of life. But for many, it still feels stressful or overwhelming. Faith Phi exists to change that. The FaithPhi app is the leading Christian budgeting app, integrating biblical wisdom with practical financial tools to help you build habits rooted in scripture and guided reflection. With just a few minutes a day, we'll review your spending, anchor your heart in God's Word and take simple steps forward.
Weekly and monthly reviews help you stay on track, gain clarity and celebrate how God is shaping your financial story over time. The new Faith Phi Pro adds powerful automation, smart categorization, personalized insights and budgets tailored to your real life spending, so you can spend less time managing money and more time living with clarity, contentment and purpose. Over seventy thousand believers already use Faith Phi to steward God's resources wisely. Start your free thirty day trial and get twenty five percent off at faithphy.com slash app. What if the greatest shift you could make in your financial life didn't start with budgeting, investing, or earning more, but with surrender?
Hi, I'm Rob West. We don't usually think of surrender as a financial word, but Jesus does. Today we're talking about the life-changing truth that God owns everything and how that single conviction can transform the way we live, give, and steward our resources. Then it's on to your calls at 800-525-7000. This is Faith in Finance, biblical wisdom for your financial decisions.
When we talk about money, we tend to ask familiar questions. How much do I have? How much do I need? Am I doing well? These are common questions, but they're not the first question Scripture asks.
From the very beginning, Scripture establishes God as the owner. Before humanity ever managed a garden or named a creature, God formed, filled, and ruled creation. Psalm 24, 1 later declares it plainly: The earth is the Lord's and the fullness thereof. Simply put, God is the owner, and we are the stewards. For many of us, that's a familiar idea, but familiarity doesn't always mean surrender.
We may believe God owns the universe, but we instinctively act as if we built our lives with our own hands. We say things like, I worked for this, or I earned this, but scripture adds a crucial line: it is He who gives you the power to get wealth. That's in Deuteronomy 8:18. Even our ability to work is a gift from God. Jesus picks up this idea in the parable of the talents in Matthew 25.
The master entrusts resources to three servants. Two invests courageously. One buries what he's been given out of fear. When the master returns, he doesn't praise the servants for increasing his net worth. He praises their faithfulness.
That's a key detail. God doesn't measure stewardship the way the world measures results. The world defines success by outcomes, God defines success by trust and faithfulness. If God owns everything, then we are not owners, we are managers. The Greek word Scripture uses for steward, oikonomos, means household manager.
A steward manages resources they didn't generate for purposes they didn't define under a master they serve. That may sound restrictive at first, but in reality, it's freeing. Because if I'm not the owner, then I'm not the ultimate provider and I'm not the ultimate protector. Like Ron Blue always says: if God owns it all, you can't lose anything. Ownership carries weight.
Stewardship carries trust. And when we truly embrace stewardship, everyday choices become opportunities for worship. Budgeting becomes an act of aligning our desires with God's priorities. Giving becomes a reflection of the generosity we've received. Planning becomes obedience instead of anxiety.
Even investing becomes a way of multiplying what belongs to the Lord, not to secure independence from Him. There's a famous line from the Puritan preacher Thomas Watson. What we keep, we may lose. What we give to God is kept forever. It's a reminder that ownership is temporary, but stewardship is eternal.
We brought nothing into the world, Paul says, and we can take nothing out of it. that reality isn't meant to discourage us, it's meant to liberate us. When we stop clutching what we cannot keep, we're free to invest in what we never can lose. Of course, this raises the practical question, if God owns everything, what does He expect of us?
Well, Jesus answers it simply One who is faithful in very little is also faithful in much. Faithfulness is not about size, it's about surrender, and surrender always begins in the heart. When we embrace the conviction that God owns it all, we gain two things the world can't offer. humility and hope. Humility because we stop boasting in our own accomplishments.
Hope because we realize we're not carrying the burden alone. God equips, God guides, and God provides.
So let me ask you: where is God inviting you to shift from being an owner to a steward? Is it in your giving, your planning, is it your savings, your lifestyle, or maybe in the quiet belief that your security depends more on markets than on the God who owns the cattle on a thousand hills? Stewardship isn't about God getting something from you. It's about God doing something in you. It reorders the heart so that money serves its proper place, not as a master, but as a tool.
If this idea resonates with you that God owns it all and stewardship begins with surrender, I'd love for you to explore it further in my brand new devotional Our Ultimate Treasure: a 21-day journey to faithful stewardship. It's available now at faithfy.com/slash shop. You can order a copy for yourself or place a bulk order for your church or small group. That's faithfy.com/slash shop. All right, your calls are next.
The number 800-525-7000. This is Faith in Finance. We'll be right back. If budgeting feels like a second job, the new Faith5 Pro was built just for you. It learns your spending patterns, categorizes your transactions, and helps you build a budget based on your real life.
Plus, scripture readings and biblical devotionals help you manage God's money God's way. Try FaithPhi Pro free for 30 days and lock in 25% off a pro subscription. Download the FaithPhy app from your app store or at faith5.com/slash app. That's faithfi.com/slash app. Faith in Finance is thankful for support from The Good Investor, a book by Robin John.
In his book, Robin shares his journey from an immigrant child struggling in school to co-founder and CEO of Eventide Asset Management, a faith-based investment firm. This Faith and Work memoir seeks to inspire readers to view their work and investments as opportunities to honor God and bring blessing to the world. More information is available at goodinvestor.com. That's goodinvestor.com. Hey, thanks for joining us today on Faith and Finance.
I'm Rob West. We've got lines open. We're ready for your questions: 800-525-7000. Call right now. All right, let's head to the phones here.
Indiana is where we're going to begin today, Anthony. Hey, it's so cool to talk to you. I've been listening to you almost 10 years. Oh, awesome.
Well, thanks for calling in. Oh, absolutely. And my question was. My wife and I, over the last few years, have accrued some debt and kind of just let our finances get away from us. We're both in our late 30s, and we've really felt convicted that we're not being great stewards of God's money.
And it's not that we're living some extravagant lifestyle or anything like that, it's just that we're not budgeting properly. Every time I've ever made a budget, we don't get past a month or two of sticking with it. And, you know, we tried the first Faith Fi app, and I remember loving it. I was using the envelope system, and then I just, for whatever reason, I don't remember why, but it got away from me. And then now we're trying to use the Dave Ramsey Every Dollar app, but it's pretty expensive.
And I did, you know, it doesn't have all the stuff I remember from the original Faith Fi app.
So we're just kind of looking for what you would think for basic budgeting guidance and like money management tips to be good stewards. Yeah, I love that.
Well, listen, what you're calling out is really the key because your ability to live faithfully as a steward means, first of all, we have to decide, even before we start budgeting, what is that lifestyle God has called us to? What's our number? And that's not an answer I can give. You. It's something you and your wife have to come together around prayerfully.
But I think you need to have a number because remember, if God were to bless you with a whole lot more, even unexpectedly, what would that mean for your lifestyle? Would you just automatically, you know, spend up to the limit? Or is there some number where you say, no, you know, this is really enough for us. And then once you pick your finish line from a lifestyle standpoint, that does a couple of things. Number one is it really helps to inform how much you need as a finish line for your balance sheet.
The other thing it does is it really requires that you begin to track your spending. Because once you define enough, then you need to say, okay, let's put a plan together that allows us to stay within that and give every dollar a job and make sure that's ultimately where those dollars are going. But if you can, you know, do that successfully and then God blesses you with more, well, it just gives you a lot of freedom for additional giving and all kinds of other things. But you're right, it can get away from. You, even if you're not, you know, living lavishly, you know, money just has a way of kind of finding its way into places that maybe we don't even intend.
And just getting that clarity and visibility that can be, that can come with a budget, I think, is really key. But to your other point, you know, it can't get away from you in the sense that you've got to find a system of tracking that fits your temperament and personality and kind of the way you and your wife want to handle things. Do you want to be directional or do you want to be detailed? And, you know, do you want to go with the full-blown envelope system where kind of you can see every dollar in each category and it rolls over from month to month? Or do you just want to track against the budget and have a barometer of how we're doing?
And then we kind of start over in the next month. You know, one is a little more hands-on. One is a little less hands-on, more directional. We actually literally just came out with the brand new update. Update to Faithfy, Faithfy 5.0.
It's the biggest update we've ever had, and it's completely overhauled from the ground up. The user experience, the user interface, the onboarding, you know, just all the features and functionality, plus all of the FaithFi content comes in as well. We are going to be adding in the next couple of weeks some opt-in AI solutions.
So imagine you going into the app, connecting your account securely using Plaid, the biggest third-party aggregator out there. That's who we use. And let's say the last three or six months of transactions flow in. And let's say you didn't have to go through and assign the category, but the local secure, not out over the internet, but on our secure servers, the local AI model goes through and analyzes everything, assigns the category, and then essentially presents you back with a budget that you either accept or modify. I mean, in just a couple of minutes, all of a sudden you've got your spending plan based on On real data of you and your wife and how you've been spending.
And then, once you kind of work into, okay, this is what we're going to lock it down at, then it's just a matter of tracking it moving forward and having a simple system where, in the palm of your hand, you can see at any point during the month, how are we doing and where do we need to dial it back? You know, if we've already used more than half of our eating out money and we're only a week into the month, well, we need to slow it down and start eating at home a little bit more. But having that visibility is key. The other thing that we introduced in this new version is what we call daily, weekly, and monthly rhythms.
So there's a daily rhythm that takes two minutes or less where you just review yesterday's transactions and the categories. You hit accept, you get a quick 60-second devotional thought, and you're done. And then a weekly recap with, you know, here's how you're doing. Here's, you know, what the software is identifying as some areas you need to pay attention to. And then monthly, kind of analyzing what happened the prior month and then.
And making suggestions for how you can proceed in the month following.
So, all of that kind of functionality is baked in, and all of the faith component as well. Because what we want to do with the FaithFi app, and it will continue to even improve every couple of weeks as new features come in. We want to take the mechanics of money management out.
So, you can focus on the why of the decision-making and how it intersects with your faith and your values.
So, I say all that to say, I think you should give it another look. I'd be happy to give you a six-month pro subscription to the Faith Vi app, just as our gift to you, that would give you a six months to kind of get it set up, get it working for you, make sure it is going to be the right solution for you. And, you know, hopefully, you guys will be back on track at that point. That sounds phenomenal. And yeah, I was really excited about you guys launching that.
I didn't know all the details about it. And no, I think, and thank you so much for the subscription. That is just incredible. And, you know, the Lord prompted me to call.
So there was something here, man.
So, no, thank you so much, Rob.
Well, Anthony, I appreciate you being a faithful listener, my friend. Thanks for being on the broadcast today. Yeah, if you just hang on the line, our team will pick up. They'll get your information. We'll get you a six-month complimentary pro subscription of the app.
And all the best. If you have any trouble, reach out to our team. They'd be delighted to walk alongside you and answer any questions you have.
So if we can help you any further along the way, don't hesitate to call. Let's go to Texas Orden. Thanks for calling. Go ahead. Hello.
Uh how are you doing there? Good. Thanks for your call. How can I serve you? I'm 24 and I was trying to look for a home, I think it would at least in my mind, I think it would be smarter to probably buy a home rather than a live in an apartment.
But right now I'm living at my parents' house, but I was just wondering like what would be some good steps to move toward a home rather than an apartment. Yeah, you know, I think the key is for you to save toward that down payment. And I think, you know, as you look at what might be your starter home, whether that's a condo or a single family home, you know, start to look at what you could support with your budget. And there's really two key numbers you want to focus on. The first is, you know, you want to make sure that whatever mortgage you have, that payment, including taxes and insurance, is no more than 25% at the most 30% of your take-home pay.
And you could use an online mortgage calculator to kind of back into okay, what mortgage could I afford where the payment is no more than 25 to 30 percent of my take-home pay? And then that would tell you how much mortgage you can afford. And then, secondly, would be to say, okay, now whatever that mortgage is, I can add 20% of that, and that's really what I can afford to buy. But I want to save that 20% as a down payment.
So, let's say that number is 200,000.
So, you'd want to make sure you have 40,000 saved up as your down payment. And then get the $160,000 mortgage, or maybe you can afford $240,000 and then grab a $200,000 mortgage. But I think the key is 20% down and a mortgage payment of no more than 30% as a starting point. What you may find is you gotta delay it and wait. We'll be right back.
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All right, let's head back to the phones. Deborah in Florida, how can I help? Hi, I have a question. I am actually, I've been praying about it. I actually am approaching 65.
And I have only a little shy of $70,000 in my 401k, which I'll be able to pull. And I just am looking for some advice on how to invest it in terms of creating wealth. Other than that, I have an annuity that I'll be able to get, but it only yields a couple hundred dollars a month.
So, I'm not even configuring that into this whole plan.
So, that's the question. I'm trying to see. What advice can you give on how I could create wealth with just that little, it's only a little shy of $70,000. Yeah, very good.
Well, you know, I think one of the great options you have here, if you don't need this money, and that's what I'm hearing, is that right, Deborah, that you're not going to need to rely on this for your income at this point? At this point, no.
Okay, great. Yeah, so I would think about rolling it to a traditional IRA that is not going to be a taxable event.
So there will be no taxes due. You're going to go from the pre-tax 401k to a pre-tax IRA. That just gives you a little bit more flexibility over how you manage it. And then at that point, you could hire an investment advisor to begin making the buy and sell decisions for you. Typically, and this is just a rule of thumb.
This doesn't replace you doing a little bit more in-depth planning and, you know, an advisor building a portfolio that's uniquely tailored to your needs and risk tolerance. But typically at 70 years old, we might say that you would put 30 to 40% in stocks and that would provide a growth component to this, but you wouldn't plan on touching it anytime soon. And so you could weather the ups and downs of the market. And then you would put somewhere between 60 and 70 percent. Bonds.
These would be high-quality corporate or government bonds, things like that. With interest rates high right now, you'll get a great yield. As the rates come down, the bond prices will actually increase. They work inversely. And so you'll get some growth out of that.
And that would be a fairly conservative portfolio that would allow you to grow this over time.
So let's say, you know, in 10 years, this is worth $110,000 instead of $70,000 or something like that. And, you know, that would then allow you to convert it to an income stream if you needed to, which we would typically say you should be able to safely pull 4% a year.
So let's say this grew to $4,000 to $100,000. That would allow you to pull out $4,000 a year, you know, or about $350 a month that you could use to supplement your income. And ideally, if you kept it invested that way, getting a little bit more conservative over time, you would never impact the principal. And that would be the goal there. But you know, a lot of this I think comes down to you finding somebody that can take over responsibility for managing this for you, you know, so you know you have wise counsel and somebody looking over this.
But give me your thoughts on all that. Yeah, no, that sounds like a great idea. I did have a friend that actually kind of went that route and did, well, she went through a credit union, and they're advised that she lost a lot of money.
So my thing is really trying to see or seek. Financial advisors that will, I'm not saying that they didn't know what they were doing, but I really want to be able to know that the ones that I'm seeking out, I mean, I know the chances are still going to be up and down because everything's based on the market, but she lost a great deal of money. The market wasn't that bad, but she did lose a great deal.
So, really, I'm looking forward to the advice of the financial advisors that I may seek. You may have some on your list.
So, what I would do is head to our website at faithphy.com. That's faithfi.com. Right there at the top of the page, it'll say find a CKA. That stands for Certified Kingdom Advisor. And I would just find someone that can serve you there in your area.
You could interview two or three and find the one that seems like the best fit. Thanks for your call. Let's go to Tennessee. Bill, go ahead. Yes, hi Rob, thanks for taking my call.
And so I'm 65. I'll be 66 later this year. And we had a kind of a strategy. I left the corporate world a couple of years ago. We relocated to a different state to be close to the grandkids.
And um I'm struggling to find work to kind of, you know, keep things rolling. The financial projections I've gotten from our advisor though is that I don't really need to work with the different assets and things we have, so I'm blessed in that regard. My question is, I keep hearing two different stories about Social Security. One says take it as soon as you can because life expectancy is in the eighties and usually it's around eighty before your total cash flow at the lower amount by taking it earlier gets surpassed by waiting and taking a higher amount. and you're just betting on living long to make that pay out.
We do have IRAs, we do have non-qualified accounts as well, as well as short-term savings. And we're debt-free apart from a mortgage. We just have a little bit left on our house. And so the question is. what do I do first?
Do I buy down or pay down my nonqualified accounts first? Because that obviously, that income is taxable, so why not use it and delay Social Security? Should I start taking Social Security? My wife is sixty three, and she has a much lower Social Security benefit than I do.
So should we start taking hers now? Just want to kind of get a little bit of advice moving forward. Yeah, great. I think these are the right questions to ask. And you're right.
You're going to have to pick from these various buckets because you've got multiple buckets that you can draw from. And you want to think about the timing of each of these. I mean, the classic withdrawal order is taxable accounts first, because to your point, it's already taxed money. You know, capital gains are often taxed at lower rates, and it preserves your tax-deferred growth. And then you go with tax-deferred accounts next, so 401ks and traditional IRAs, but you withdraw them strategically because those are taxes ordinary income.
So the goal is to fill up the lower brackets without jumping into higher ones.
So you want to moderate those withdrawals. And if you're in a low-income year, you could even look at Roth conversions. And then the Roths last because those are incredibly valuable because you get the tax-free withdrawals. And we're probably in the lowest range of tax brackets that we'll ever see. We probably won't see any lower, and there's a good chance we could see higher.
Most planners, and I would agree with this, suggest delaying Social Security if possible. If you've got longevity in your family, you're healthy, and you've got your income covered. Just because that guaranteed 8% per year is really nice, and then you get the cost of living adjustments on the higher amount. And it's just hard to replicate that in the market. And people are living longer.
So, if you're healthy, you know, that you have a good chance of living beyond 82, which is where everything would have been paid back to you that you gave up between full retirement age and 70. And then you've got that higher check for the rest of your life, which can be really helpful.
So, those would be, you know, probably my best advice. Unfortunately, I'm out of time today, but I hope that was helpful, Bill. Thanks for your call. Big thanks to my team: Taylor, Tahira, Josh, Dan, everybody here at Faith Pot. We'll see you next time.
Bye-bye. Faith in Finance is provided by Faith By and listeners like you.
