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Hospitality as Generosity With Sharon Epps

Faith And Finance / Rob West
The Truth Network Radio
March 20, 2024 3:00 am

Hospitality as Generosity With Sharon Epps

Faith And Finance / Rob West

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March 20, 2024 3:00 am

WHAT DOES BIBLICAL HOSPITALITY LOOK LIKE IN TODAY'S CULTURE?

Sharon reflects on the biblical instruction to show hospitality, emphasizing its relevance beyond traditional notions of entertaining. Hospitality is an act of generosity and kindness, extending warmth and generosity to both guests and strangers alike. This understanding encourages us to reconsider hospitality as acting as God's ambassadors.

  • Hospitality transcends formal dining and embraces the simple, generous reception of others.
  • It's an expression of generosity, serving as a means to fulfill our role as ambassadors for Christ.
  • Personal experiences underscore the profound impact hospitality can have during challenging times, illustrating its power to provide support and comfort.

 

HOW DOES 'UNREASONABLE HOSPITALITY' TRANSFORM EXPERIENCES?

Drawing inspiration from Will Guidara's book "Unreasonable Hospitality," Sharon highlights how exceeding expectations in hospitality can create memorable and personalized experiences. Guidara's approach to making every guest feel like a VIP through tailored service and attention to detail serves as a model for extending hospitality that goes beyond what seems sensible, focusing on celebrating others and recognizing their uniqueness.

  • "Unreasonable Hospitality" involves stretching the limits to provide a remarkable experience.
  • It's about making guests feel celebrated and special, not through extravagant means but through thoughtful, personalized attention.
  • This approach fosters a mindset of celebrating the smallest details that contribute to making someone feel valued and cared for.

 

WHAT ARE THE OUTCOMES OF EXTENDING 'UNREASONABLE HOSPITALITY'?

Embracing unreasonable hospitality leads to several positive outcomes, including demonstrating love in recognizable ways, fostering selflessness, creating a safe and calm environment, deepening fellowship, and filling us with joy. Sharon underscores how such hospitality aligns with our inherent design to give and receive joy through acts of kindness and generosity.

  • Shows love in a manner that is palpable and meaningful to each individual.
  • Encourages selflessness and generosity, moving beyond self-interest to cater to the needs of others.
  • Provides a rare safe space in today's culture, allowing for genuine expression and comfort.

 

CHALLENGE FOR EMBRACING UNREASONABLE HOSPITALITY

Sharon challenges listeners to consider how they can use their unique gifts to meet the specific needs of others. This challenge prompts us to think creatively about how we can share our talents, interests, and resources in ways that uniquely benefit those around us, further extending the reach and impact of hospitality in our communities.

  • Encourages reflection on how personal gifts can be utilized to serve others in meaningful ways.
  • Suggests identifying common interests or needs that can serve as a basis for extending hospitality.
  • Motivates individuals to act on opportunities to share and serve, reinforcing the connection between hospitality and generosity.

 

ON TODAY’S PROGRAM, ROB ANSWERS LISTENER QUESTIONS:

  • As a 57-year-old nearing retirement with a portfolio heavily invested in stocks, I'm contemplating how much to shift into safer investments like government bonds or T-bills to rebalance my 401(k).
  • I need dental work totaling $5,500 and am considering different payment methods since the dentist requires upfront payment, but I want to avoid high-interest healthcare credit cards.
  • At 99 years old, my mother is still paying for life insurance, and I'm wondering whether it's necessary to continue those payments or if there are more practical options regarding her burial expenses and potential cash value of the policy.
  • As a 64-year-old "solo ager" or "elder orphan" without dependents, I'm setting up my estate plan but struggle to find a Power of Attorney for property management, considering a lawyer or a corporate trustee as potential solutions.

 

Remember, you can call in to ask your questions most days at (800) 525-7000. Faith & Finance is also available on the Moody Radio Network as well as American Family Radio. Visit our website at FaithFi.comwhere you can join the FaithFi Community, and give as we expand our outreach.

 

Remember, you can call in to ask your questions most days at (800) 525-7000. Faith & Finance is also available on the Moody Radio Network and American Family Radio. Visit our website at FaithFi.com where you can join the FaithFi Community and give as we expand our outreach.

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Rob West and Steve Moore

What's most important to you when it comes to choosing your financial advisor? Someone who's aligned with your biblical values. How about someone who will take the time to explain your options? Certified Kingdom Advisors are professionals who meet high standards in competence and integrity and have been trained to offer biblical financial advice.

To find a Certified Kingdom Advisor in your area, visit faithfi.com and click Find a CKA. Christians know the Bible tells them to be generous. What some may not realize is that God's Word also tells us to be hospitable. Hi, I'm Rob West.

Still others might not realize that there's a connection between the two, hospitality and generosity. Fortunately, Sharon Epps is here today to explain this to us. Then it's on to your calls and questions at 800-525-7000.

That's 800-525-7000. This is Faith and Finance, biblical wisdom for your financial decisions. Well, it's always great to have Sharon Epps with us on the program. Sharon is President of Kingdom Advisors and Sharon, it's great to have you back.

Wonderful to be back. Hospitality may be on your mind these days, Sharon, I'm guessing, because as you know, we just hosted and you led the team in hosting 2200 financial professionals at the Kingdom Advisors Conference redeeming money in Orlando. This is obviously right there at the top of your mind, isn't it?

It absolutely is. I think there's a perception that hospitality involves entertaining with big formal invitations or maybe complicated events like the Kingdom Advisors Conference. It might mean crystal in China and a spotlessly clean home.

And I just want to ask who does that these days? I haven't been invited to a China dinner in quite a while. But I've been challenged recently to study hospitality from a biblical perspective. We're given the instruction in Romans 12-13 that we're to share with the Lord's people who are in need. In fact, it reads, contribute to the needs of the saints and seek to show hospitality. We're actually commanded to show hospitality. So I've given a lot of thought to what that might mean in today's culture. And one of the things I always do is go to the dictionary and see what it says about hospitality. And it says that hospitality is the friendly reception and treatment of guests or strangers, the quality or disposition of receiving and treating guests and strangers in a warm, friendly, generous way.

I love that. And I also believe that hospitality is that act of generosity. And that's when we should care about it. It's a pathway to fulfill God's role for us as his ambassadors. And it also allows us to be generous to make others lives easier. I have a quick story about that myself.

I actually had a season in my life where I was just having a lot of challenges. And I had some friends that literally invited me to their home open door any night for dinner so that I didn't have to worry about going home to make dinner myself. Talk about hospitality. Incredible. It was amazing.

Yeah, it sure is. And it really helps us to understand how to put feet to that idea. Now, you and I have been impacted by Will Gadara's book recently, Unreasonable Hospitality.

You challenged me to read it as we were thinking about our leadership at Kingdom Advisors, which I did, and I loved it. And he, of course, tells this story of transformation of an average New York cafe into literally the world's best restaurant in 2017. So talk about how that concept of unreasonable hospitality fits here. Well, he actually received that award, best restaurant, and it was because of his unreasonable hospitality. He believed that he needed to provide his guests with a fantastic experience. In fact, he calls it stretching the limits of what seems sensible. And he wanted to give them unique and tailor made service that made each and every one feel like a VIP and exceed expectations.

Now, are we back to that concept of finding it in China? I don't really think so. It's more a mindset of celebrating others, and it's celebrating those smallest details that can make someone feel really special.

Oh, that's exactly right. And I'd love to dig into that a bit more. So what do you see as some of the outcomes of unreasonable hospitality, if you will? Well, I think, first of all, it just shows love in ways that each guest can recognize and feel. It also, in us, fosters selflessness and helps us to be more generous. It also provides a safe place in this culture. It's rare that we have a place where we could just feel calm and safe and be ourselves.

It deepens fellowship, and it helps fill us with joy because God's wired us that way. Yeah, he sure has. Well, we've got just about 30 seconds left. Hi, Ebola on this, Sharon. What would you leave us with here? Well, I'd really like to give us a challenge. As we think about this idea of unreasonable hospitality, what gift has God given you that you might be able to share with others that might uniquely fit their needs?

Is it a child that might need to learn to cook? Is it a friend that's got an interest you share? Let's look at how we can share today. Yeah, it's such a great word, and I love that we connect this back to generosity because our hospitality is really an extension of our generosity, right? It is. Sharon, thanks for stopping by. It's been great to be here. Thank you.

That's Sharon Epps, president of Kingdom Advisors. What a great word for us today as we think about being more hospitable. All right, we're back with your questions after this. 800-525-7000.

We'll be right back. As a faithful listener of this program, you know that there's life-changing financial wisdom in God's Word, and FaithFi is here to help you and millions of others learn to be good and faithful stewards. As a nonprofit organization, we rely on help from monthly FaithFi patrons, supporters of this mission, to help us continue and expand our outreach. Has God provided financial answers for you through this ministry? If so, consider becoming a monthly FaithFi patron.

Visit faithfi.com and click Give. What's most important to you when it comes to choosing your financial advisor? Someone who's aligned with your biblical values? How about someone who will take the time to explain your options? Certified Kingdom Advisors are professionals who meet high standards in competence and integrity, and have been trained to offer biblical financial advice.

To find a Certified Kingdom Advisor in your area, visit faithfi.com and click Find a CKA. Welcome back. This is Faith in Finance. I'm Ralph West. You're taking your calls today, 800-525-7000, that's 800-525-7000. By the way, you don't have to call, just send an email, askrobb.faithfi.com. That's askrobb.faith, the letters F-I dot com. All right, we're going to head to the phones.

Hart, you've been waiting very patiently there in Indiana. Go ahead, sir. So today, I'm 42 months away from retirement, and I've been investing in my company 401K for a long, long time. I'm about 70% to moderate to aggressive growth, about 35% in the S&P 500 and about another 35% in the large caps, and only have about 10% in T-bill bonds and that. So my question is, I have plenty of money put in the bank for three months of emergency and I have six months' worth or so ready to liquidate out of the company stock if I needed to.

My question is, I'm looking to rebalance my 401K and I'm wondering how much should I take out of what I've earned in the stock market and put it into safer government-type bonds or T-bills. It's a great question, Hart. What are you? Like 62? Actually, I'm 57.

We get out, with 30 years of service, we can retire at 60. Oh, wow. Okay. And what are you planning to do at that point? Well, I have a summer house that I own outright and I'm planning on building a barn out there and woodworking is kind of a hobby of mine, so I was looking to maybe start a side business doing that and doing a lot of fishing and traveling, things of that nature. Okay.

Great. Yeah, I would say you are probably a little aggressive at this point, just given your proximity to retirement. This has worked in your favor because bonds have just been so lousy over the last couple of years, unusually bad, just given how fast interest rates went up and how many consecutive rate increases we had.

But we're in a period where all that's going to turn around and so this is a good time, I think, for you to rebalance. You know, I would say as a guy who's approaching 60, 57, probably somewhere around 50-50 makes sense. 50% stock, 50% bonds and obviously within that, you'd either have to make a decision yourself or hire an advisor to figure out kind of what is the right mix of investments. I'd stay in the bond side probably on the shorter end of the durations, but you'll get great yield and you'll have appreciation as those interest rates come down and the stock side, you'll build that out. If you wanted to be a little more aggressive, I mean, at this point, just given everything you're saying and what you've got, if you wanted to be up as high as 60% in stocks, you could, but I'd say probably 50 is probably the right number. And then as you get older, every decade, you'd probably want to put another 10% toward the bonds and 10% less toward stocks. And then if you want an allocation of precious metals, maybe take 5% out of each one. But I think this is a good time for you to rebalance and that way, if we get into a recession later this year, if we skirt by this one but we hit one later a few years down the road, you're not at the risk of the market so much where you've got the volatility that you're not looking for in this season of life as you're approaching your non-working years.

So I think if it were me, I'd begin to move in that direction. Awesome. Thank you for the confirmation. I've been praying about this for a while. Cool.

That sounds great. Well, I'm sorry. Go ahead. No, I was just going to say thank you so much.

I'm very much into analysis and research and sometimes I get stuck in that mode. Yes, I get it. No doubt about it.

And you can second guess yourself all day long in stock market and investing decisions. So no problem. Well, hopefully that's given you some clarity, Hart. Thanks for calling and all the best to you. I love the idea of what you're talking about. Let's go to Wildwood, Florida, Lynn. Go ahead. Hi, Rob. Thank you for taking my call.

I appreciate it. Yes, ma'am. Yeah. I have some dental work that needs to be done.

The total amount is $5,500, but I'm only going to do $3,500 this year and then hopefully can wait till next year to do the rest. Yeah. My question is the dentist said they need payment upfront and so they gave me this healthcare credit card information so I can take out a loan, but I don't want to do that. Their interest rate is so high, it says 17.90, and so I thought, well, what if I take $2,500 out of my savings and I have a 401k, but I don't want to touch that and then still pay $1,000 to this credit card until the insurance pays their portion. Okay. So how much are you going to get some back or how does that work?

From the credit card, it's no interest if it's paid within six months time. Oh, I see. Okay. And what about the insurance? How does that factor into this?

Well, the insurance will pay $1,000, but the dentist requires the full payment upfront. Okay. Got it. All right.

So you would be able to pay that $1,000 back before the interest kicks in once the insurance gives you their portion? Exactly. Okay. And what would that leave you when you pulled the $2,500 out? What would that leave you in savings? Well, I have almost $1,000. You'd have $1,000 left?

Yeah. Okay. And what do you spend on a monthly basis? Well, I'm 68 and on social security. I retired probably five, six years ago and on disability. So my social security now is, um, it's not very much.

Okay. And so do you have any margin? I mean, would you be able to start if you didn't have any debt because the insurance pays the $1,000, um, would you have something you could begin putting back into savings every month? Well, that was my thought instead of paying like a credit card payment and I can make a payment to my savings account. Yeah. And what would you think just on a typical month you'd have left to put back into savings?

Well, probably about $150. Okay. Yeah. I'm on board with this. I certainly don't want you to pay 17.9% and I don't like you pulling out of the 401k if you don't have to. So I would just say a few things. Number one, I like the plan. Number two, uh, I would really keep track of your expenses and do, and I know you're living modestly, so I'm not saying that's not happening, but just be really careful so you can really try to get that 150 a month going back into savings so we can get that built up.

Number three, let's do whatever preauthorization work you need to do. So there's no surprises with the insurance, you know, make sure that they've committed in advance to pay this and there's not any surprises. And then lastly, um, I would, would not be afraid to negotiate with the dentist. They may not be willing, but they may, if they know you're coming out of pocket $2,500, you know, they may be willing to give you a discount. And so I'd at least ask and just say, listen, I'm going to do $3,500 worth of, uh, you know, dental work. I'm paying 2,500 of this out of pocket.

Is there any way you can, you know, knock $500 off? They may be willing to do that. So I would at least ask the question, but even if they're not land, I'm on board with this plan. Okay. Okay. Well, very good. Thanks so much, Rob. All right. God bless you. Thanks for listening on the Moody radio app. We appreciate it.

All right folks, we're going to take a break and then we'll be back with our final segment and your questions right around the corner. As the leading advocate for the Christian financial industry, kingdom advisors serves the public by promoting the integration of a biblical worldview across every aspect of the financial services industry. And we serve a growing network of thousands of Christian financial professionals equipping and empowering them to carry biblical financial wisdom to their clients, peers, and community. For more information, visit kingdomadvisors.com.

That's kingdomadvisors.com. We are grateful for support from Praxis Mutual Funds. Praxis Mutual Funds has seven impact strategies that are designed to create positive real-world change. More information is available at praxismutualfunds.com. The funds investment objectives, risks, charges, and expenses are contained in the prospectus and summary prospectus. This and other information is available at praxismutualfunds.com. Investments involve risk.

Principal loss is possible. Foresight Fund Services LLC. You're listening to Faith and Finance, where we talk about how we handle God's resources.

How are you using God's resources? We're talking about it, and the lines are open to take your calls and questions. 800-525-7000 is the number to call. Let's go to Chicago. Hi, Linda.

How can I help? Hello. Thank you so very much for taking my call. I'd like to know from you very much, how long do you pay life insurance? My mother is 99. She'll be 100 in October, and she's still paying life insurance.

Yeah. You really only need life insurance, in my view, unless you have a small burial policy because there aren't assets there to cover funeral expenses. That might be an exception, but typically you'd only need life insurance as long as you have dependents that need your financial support. Think about somebody during their working years that's providing for a spouse and or kids. If their income goes away through an untimely death, it would create a hardship or a risk for those family members that were left behind that no longer have access to that income.

Your mom, in this case, probably doesn't need life insurance because there's likely nobody depending upon her for financial support. If she has assets that could cover her burial expenses, then this is just an unnecessary expense. Is the purpose of it, Linda, because she wants to give, quote, an inheritance to the children, or do you think there's some other reason?

I think there's some other reason. It's just what, in her day and time, that's what you did. You had that life insurance, you just did, and if somebody, you bought it for them, and all, but she's 99, will be 100. She has no dependents, and I just think it's so unnecessary. I will check more into her burial expenses and things like that, but if she doesn't need money for burial, then we could let go of the life insurance.

You could, in my opinion. Yeah, you'd want to understand what kind of policy it is. Do you know, I assume it's a whole life policy, and if so, do you know if it's built up any cash value, Linda?

I do not know, but I tell you what, I'm going to check into that. Yeah, it could be that it's built up some cash value so she could collapse the policy or cancel it, and you'd get the cash value out. You could take that and stick it into an account for her that she could have access to, and then she wouldn't have to continue making those payments, which would just free up more money on a monthly basis for her care or whatever she wanted to use it for. But it sounds like it's unnecessary at this point, and I hear you just in terms of this being something that, as she was growing up, it was just what you did, right? But any insurance is to offset a risk. I mean, the reason we have car insurance is to make sure that in the event of an accident, we can repair a car and cover any liability or any medical expenses.

Well, the purpose for life insurance is to take care of loved ones in the event of our death, but that's not necessary in this season of life for her, and so we want to look for any unnecessary expenses that we can eliminate. This sure seems like that would be one of those. Thanks for your call today, Linda. Let's quickly go to Patrick in Wheaton. Patrick, I'm glad we got you on. Go ahead.

Thank you. So here's my situation. I'm 64 years old, divorced a long time ago, never had children. I guess I'm considered a solo-ager or an elder orphan. I have a friend, and I'm setting up, I'm finally getting around to setting all my trust and will stuff, and I'm working with a lawyer, and they're asking for a person to be the power of attorney for property and a power of attorney for healthcare. I do have a friend who's going to be the one for healthcare, but this power of attorney for property is the missing link. I also plan to use a bank and trust-like company to pay the bills, do the taxes, and of course when I pass away, distribute to beneficiaries, but there's this fiduciary power of attorney for property that I don't seem to know how I can land the person, and my attorney thought they had some people, but they're backing away, so I'd like to know what advice can you give to someone like me or point me into a direction or someone who's local in Chicago that if I become incapacitated, right now I'm healthy, knock on wood. What about the same person that's going to be the power of attorney for your financial and legal matters? My power of attorney for healthcare doesn't want to be the power of attorney for financial. The financial person is the one I'm looking for, and I apologize if I'm incapacitated.

No, I understand. You've got someone who's willing to serve as the power of attorney for healthcare directives but not for your property and legal and financial. Well, normally what you would do is you would choose someone to look after your best interests, somebody who has attention to detail and understanding of finances and perhaps business, the ability to collaborate with attorneys and accountants and other parties. They understand their duties.

They're willing to take it seriously. That would be the right person for the job. But if you don't have that person, then you could look at some other options. You could give it to an actual attorney, so you would find an attorney that would be willing to take that on and that person would be bound by law to look after your interests and there would be a cost to that. You could also choose a corporate trustee in some cases, depending on whether that would work. But typically, it would either be an individual, somebody who's trustworthy and nearby and willing to take this on, or an attorney that you would pay to serve in that role. Yeah, I think the attorney may be the way to go.

The bank and trusts are willing to perform tests, even when I'm incapacitated. I guess the fine line is they don't want to be in a position to make decisions. And I actually sent an email back to my lawyer today saying, tell me where the boundaries are of what this mysterious power of attorney for property needs to make a decision on. If my healthcare guy is saying, hey, Pat needs to be put in a home and can't make decisions anymore. So I appreciate your feedback and I'm actually thinking maybe a lawyer, which my current lawyer should be able to help on that too. I would think, yeah, that would be where I would go next. Just understanding your situation about not really having anybody that's obvious as a choice here and the one person who's willing to do it on the healthcare side is not wanting to take this on for other matters and I get that. And so that's where I think naming a lawyer as a power of attorney can absolutely be the way to go.

So I'd probably place that call and ask that individual that you already have a relationship with if he or she'd be willing to serve in that role and that could be a great answer to all of this. Patrick, thanks for being on the program today. We're out of time, but we appreciate your call.

Well, that does it for us today. I'm Rob West. Thanks to our amazing production team and to you for listening. I hope you'll join us again next time right here on Faith and Finance. Faith and Finance is provided by Faithfi and listeners like you.
Whisper: medium.en / 2024-06-29 06:58:01 / 2024-06-29 07:08:05 / 10

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