Teaching Grandkids Generosity with Ron Blue

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That's faithfi.com and click give. A good man leaves an inheritance to his children's children, but the sinner's wealth is laid up for the righteous. Proverbs 13 22.

Hi, I'm Rob West. God's word is clear that faithful stewards should leave an inheritance for future generations. That inheritance doesn't have to be money. Passing along biblical principles and values such as generosity to grandkids, well, that's priceless. Ron Blue talks to us about that today, and then it's on to your questions at 800-525-7000.

That's 800-525-7000. This is faith and finance, biblical wisdom for your financial journey. Ron Blue is our guest today.

He's co-founder of Kingdom Advisors, the author of many books on biblical finance, a friend and a mentor of mine. Ron, great to have you back. Oh, as always, Rob, good to be a part of it. So looking forward to it.

Well, I am as well. Ron, that verse is so key. Proverbs 13 22. But as you've taught us, we leave a financial inheritance, but what's more important to that, far more important, is the spiritual inheritance that we leave to our kids and grandkids, right?

Oh, no question about it. And it's amazing to me how much influence a grandparent can have over their grandchildren. I share story after story after story about my grandfather or my grandmother.

Talk me this. You're in a different position as a grandparent than you are as a parent for sure. I know generosity has been a hallmark of your teaching, Ron, throughout your life, and that's certainly appropriate here.

And I know you've taught us more as caught than taught. So how do you model generosity in a way that's effective to pass on that value of giving generously to your grandkids? Well, you can of course talk about it and demonstrate it, but one of the things that we found that was probably the most effective in terms of communicating generosity, and I got this from Bruce Wilkinson, told me about it. And every year at Thanksgiving, when we're all together as a family, Judy and I would give each of our grandchildren $100.

Now we have 13 grandchildren and four great-grandchildren now, and they're adults, so we don't do it now because they're all growing. But when they were younger, as young as three, four, five, we would give them $100 and we would say, we know you're going to give us a Christmas gift, and here's what we'd like to do is we'd like for you to give away that $100 someplace and then write us a note and tell us where you gave it. And Rob, I've got to tell you, we got such incredible stories back about how it just blessed them, but it taught them so much about generosity. So that was the best thing we ever did. I love that idea. Ron, I know you've also talked a lot about how you can use a donor-advised fund and get the kids and even the grandkids involved in the giving.

That's a really powerful tool, isn't it? Oh, it sure is, and I think using the donor-advised fund as they get older, and we did that, too, more for our children than grandchildren, but it works with grandchildren of having that donor-advised fund and letting them participate in the giving out of it. We also did the Operation Shoebox from Samaritan's Purse, and we had our grandkids help us pack those boxes, and they loved it. They looked forward to that time when they could pack the boxes. Can we be generous on the go, if you will, as the opportunity provides itself? Yeah, and you've got to be intentional with it, Ron.

We've got just 45 seconds left. Challenge the grandparents listening right now as to why this is so important to model and teach generosity. Well, I think the only way that you can experience financial freedom is to experience generosity, and so if you can help teach your grandchildren generosity, what you're doing is you're potentially freeing them up to live a life free from the bondage of money, and money can be a bondage many times. So teaching them to give in any way that you can is significant to their future well-being, no question about it.

That is well said. As you've taught, Ron, the only way to free or loosen the grip of money over our lives is to give and give generously. Ron, thanks for your time today. You bet, Ron. Good to be with you. That's financial teacher and author Ron Blue.

You can find his books wherever you buy books, and you can't go wrong with any of them. Your calls are next. 800-525-7000. That's 800-525-7000. And if you prefer not to call, keep in mind, you can always send us an email at askrobatfaithfi.com. That's askrobatfaith, the letters F-I dot com. I'm Rob West, and this is Faith and Finance, biblical wisdom for your financial decisions.

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That's chministries.org slash faithfi. Great to have you with us today on Faith in Finance. I'm Rob West. Well, it's time to take your calls and questions here in just a moment. That number to call, 800-525-7000. Again, that's 800-525-7000.

You can call right now. We'd love to tackle whatever's on your mind in your financial life. I'm sure there's things you're wrestling with today. We'd love to wrestle through them with you, help you apply God's wisdom to your financial decisions and choices. Maybe it's your spending plan.

That thing is so hard to wrangle. Maybe it's paying down debt. It just seems like you can never get on top of because the interest is running away from you. Maybe it's that emergency fund you're struggling to put together. Or perhaps God has blessed you with a bit more than you need, and you're wondering, how do I steward that wisely? What does it look like to manage it wisely, invest it, and save it appropriately, and give it generously? How do I reconcile those tensions?

Or perhaps it's money and marriage, that conflict that's present so often. You're just struggling with how to navigate that. We'd love to tackle any of those topics with you today. The number to call, 800-525-7000. We've got several lines open. They won't be open for long, so go ahead and call right now.

Our team is standing by. Again, 800-525-7000. In the news today, economists tell us the rate of inflation has fallen a long way from its high during the COVID crisis, but that sky-high inflation is unfortunately baked into the cost of everything. It's causing many Americans to continue living paycheck to paycheck. That's according to a new customer survey by Bank of America. Respondents had annual incomes ranging from $50,000 all the way up to $150,000. The survey showed that overall, one in four said they were living paycheck to paycheck.

Those tended to be at the lower end of the income scale, but not always. 35% of respondents earning less than $50,000 a year said they were living paycheck to paycheck. That's up from 32% in 2019. But listen to this, 20% of those with incomes of $150,000 or more are also living paycheck to paycheck.

That's up from only 17% in 2019. Bottom line, if you're living paycheck to paycheck, you've got to find a way to lower your expenses or increase your income or both. So there's margin in your budget.

That margin is so key. By the way, I mentioned the conflict that we can have around money and marriage. One of the keys to overcoming that conflict, according to Harvard researcher, Shanti Feldhahn, is cushion or margin. For her study, those couples that were able to overcome conflict in marriage around money, among other things, it wasn't a matter of what their income was.

It was that whatever their income was, they were living below it. And that cushion was one of the key factors that was present for those couples that in the survey said, Yeah, we have a healthy relationship with money, we're able to communicate about it without having conflict. Well, in order to get that cushion, you've got to have a plan to do that.

Because without it, you won't be able to save and you'll unfortunately gradually slide into debt. We can help with that through the faith by app, you could download that in your app store, just search for faith by that's faith fi, you can also check it out on our website, faith fi.com. All right, we're ready to take your questions today. The calls are coming in, but we still have several lines open. The number to call 800-525-7000. You can call right now.

Let's go to Texas. Hi, Keith, go ahead. Hello, I have a 403b. And right now I just let the money sit and it pays me 3% interest, no matter what the market value is. It's what I got locked in on the thing. At age 72 and a half, I understand I'm gonna have to start withdrawing some of that money.

I don't know what the denomination is. I'm 72 now. And so I'm looking at just a few months before I have to start withdrawing. When I withdraw that money, or when I'm forced to, since I have not paid taxes on it, I know I'm going to have to pay taxes on it.

But what can I do? Is it better to just put the money in a savings account where I can continue to draw a little interest on it? Or would it be better to put it into an IRA or something of that sort where I can get more for it? I don't know, like I said, I don't know, I don't know what the value, you know, how much the amount of money that I have in there that I'll have to withdraw. But how can I minimize further taxation?

Yeah, got it. Well, I think the first question is, when do you need to take it right now, if you reach age 72, after December 31 2022, then your required minimum is 73. And the RMD for the first year is due on April 1 of the year after you turn 73. So you may want to check with your CPA just to make sure you're square on when you actually need to take that. Because again, if you're turning 72 after December 31 2022, it's going to be 73. And you don't have to take it until April 1 of the year after you turn 73.

Does that make sense? Okay, okay. So I have another year pretty much.

Yeah. And I would check with your CPA just to give him your data or her your date of birth and just in the specifics, just to clarify that never a bad idea to get professional counsel. But that's generally speaking the way this should work. Now, in terms of when you do take that out, your custodian should tell you how much you need to take. But essentially, you can divide the balance of the account at the end of the previous year by what's called your life expectancy factor, which is a table that the IRS provides on their website.

And that will tell you what that RMD is. A couple of things you could do there. Number one is, if you're doing any charitable giving right now, let's say you're tied to your church or other giving, and you're doing that out of cash. So you're writing it out of your checking account or your savings account with after tax dollars. One option is you could stop giving it out of cash, and you could give it instead from your IRA directly to your church or charity. That's called a, as long as you're 70 and a half or older, you can do what's called a qualified charitable distribution.

And that satisfies your required minimum. And it's the only way to get money out of an IRA, which means you'd have to transfer the 403b to an IRA before you did it. But you can as long as you separate from your employer, separate from service. It's the only way to get money out of an IRA without paying tax on it. So essentially, you could instead of pulling it out of one pocket, which is after tax dollars in your checking account, you could pull it from your IRA and satisfy that RMD, give the same amount to your church or charity, and not pay any tax. Does that make sense?

Yeah, yeah. So that's around it. Yeah, that's one way. The other is, yeah, if you do need to take it out, you pay the tax on it. And then what you do with it's up to you, you could only put it into an IRA if you have earned income. So not under unearned income, like Social Security or interest income, but if you have earned income from wages, or self employment income, then you could contribute to an IRA up to the amount of earned income you have, and only to the maximum contribution for the year, which for 2024 is $8,000 if you're over the age of 50.

And that's going to think be 8500 next year. So that would be an option. Or you could just, you know, put it into another account, like to build up your emergency savings. Or you could just invest it in a taxable account if you don't have earned income.

And then you'd pay capital gains along the way. Does that make sense? Yes, sir. Okay, sir. Gotcha. Good.

Thank you very much for your information. And that's, it's a great show. Thank you, Keith.

God bless you, my friend. We appreciate you being on the program. Well, folks, so we're gonna head into our first break here in just a moment.

But we do have some lines open today. So if you have a financial question, you'd love to wrestle with it. We'd love to talk to you about it.

You can call 800-525-7000. We want to help you see God as your ultimate treasure, and money a tool to accomplish God's purposes. Let's do that together as we talk about a biblical worldview of money right after this break.

We'll be right back. We're grateful for support from Guidestone whose diversified suite of investment solutions align with Christian values to create positive change in the world. More information is available at guidestonefunds.com slash faith. Investing involves risk, including potential loss of principal. Carefully consider the investment objectives, risks, charges, and expenses of Guidestone funds before investing.

They're distributed by Foresight Funds Distributors, LLC, which is not an advisory affiliate, a registered investment advisor, nor do they provide investment advice. Do you feel like your hands are tied with debt, preventing you from serving God? If you have credit card debt, Christian Credit Counselors can help. Through our debt management program, we can get you out of credit card debt about 80% faster while honoring your debt in full. For more information on how Christian Credit Counselors can help, visit christiancreditcounselors.org. That's christiancreditcounselors.org, or call 800-557-1985, 800-557-1985. Great to have you with us today on Faith and Finance for taking your calls and questions with several lines open, 800-525-7000. You can call right now. We'll see if we can help you think through what's going on in your financial life through the lens of biblical wisdom. All right, let's head back to the phones as we round out the broadcast today. We'll go to Texas, and welcome Martin.

Go ahead, sir. So, I'm not typically what you can deal with, but here's my situation. I'm married.

We're 50 years old. I work full-time. My wife works on the side. We have three and a half acres. We have a double-wide manufactured home. I pay a 9.4 interest rate on that. One of my main concerns is, could I make changes to make it where it's not a mobile home?

Where do I get the funds to do that, to make upgrades on my house, to raise the value on it, get possibly a lower interest rate, different mortgage? We don't have savings. Our vehicles are paid for.

We live week by week. Gotcha. Yes, sir.

Well, a couple of thoughts here. I think the first one is, I'd love for you to start working toward, before you do anything, an emergency fund, just because we know the unexpected is guaranteed. It will happen, and we want you not to have to fall back on credit cards when that happens or some other means. And so, I realize it's easier said than done, but I think at the end of the day, it's going to require finding ways to dial back lifestyle spending, even where you could take $25 or $50 a month and just get an automatic transfer going to a separate savings account so you can start building something up. Start with a small goal of saving $500 to $1,000 in an easily accessible account. This is going to give you the cushion for those unexpected expenses. I think second, track your spending. See where your money is going each month, whether it's our app or a paper and pen process. I think it's really important just to have a good understanding of everywhere your money is finding its way to and just looking for any opportunity to cut back. Since you have that $1,300 monthly payment right now, what is that covering?

What is that for? Is there a mortgage on the double-wide? Yes, there's a mortgage insurance escrow. That's the total payment. Yeah, got it. And I know you said you're living kind of right up to the edge. I mean, the only way really for you to enhance that, and by the way, what is your current interest rate?

9.4. Okay, yeah. So you could do better than that now, depending on what your income situation looks like. It sounds like you don't have much debt, so that's good. Do you happen to know what your credit score is? Oh, it's way down again. I'll get it up and then make one mistake and it's false. Yeah, I'm probably around the $500.

Okay, yeah. So I think the thing for you to do at this point would be to start working on that emergency fund. Again, even if you can just make a little progress each month, make sure you're always on time to the best of your ability because the most recent information impacts you the most. So, you know, a late payment today is going to really pull that score down quite a bit.

But obviously, as you've seen this work, it will build it back up. And the timing may just work out that as you build that score up over the next year, you could take advantage of some much better interest rates, because with you being north of nine, I mean, I think we're probably going to be in the low sixes next year. Now that assumes you have a credit score, you know, over 700.

And you may or may not be able to get there. But, you know, as long as you can save a couple of points in interest, and you plan to stay for a while, then you should be able to refinance it and cut that down. And you could, you know, get a little bit more money out to do some renovations and repairs. But I think the key would be to do that as a part of a refinance that makes sense, where you can save enough on the interest to justify the expenses associated with that, that new mortgage, and make sure that if to the extent you're adding any debt to it, that you really count the cost because with you, you know, living paycheck to paycheck right now, it doesn't sound like there's a whole lot of room to have a larger monthly payment.

And even though the the lower interest rate will help some, it's not going to help a whole lot, you know, with an amortized mortgage. So I think your next step is let's start slowly working on that emergency fund. Let's really dial into the spending plan. Look for every opportunity to cut back.

And then thirdly, just work on being an on time payer every month, so that hopefully, as your credit score improves, you can take advantage of some lower interest rates to get that down, but also potentially assuming the budget can handle it, potentially adding a little bit on top of it that you could use for renovations at that time, which is probably at least a year from now. Does that make sense? Yes, sir, it does. Okay, very good.

Go ahead. One other question. I mentioned I don't have any investments. My company does offer a 401k.

I believe they pass dollar for dollar. Is that'd be something that I should look into? I would, but I'd get up to, you know, 1000 $1500 in your emergency fund before you did it. But yeah, once you have that emergency fund, that's free money.

And you're not going to get 100% return on your money anywhere else. So you'd you want to take full advantage of that if you have the opportunity. And so I love the idea of you participating in that plan, especially with that dollar for dollar match. That's going to be something that could really help you build something that you could then rely on down the road when you're not working or unable to, that could create an additional income stream because keep in mind social security, to the extent you're eligible for it is only intended to cover 40% of your pre retirement income and most people live on 70 to 80%.

So that's where getting that retirement savings through the 401k is going to be key. Martin bless you, bud. Thanks for calling today.

Hey, we're going to finish out today with Guy in Missouri. And Guy, I understand you have a testimony of God's faithfulness in your life. Tell us about it. Yes, this is probably the same story that a lot of your listeners have. But over the years, I've been a Christ follower for about 40 years. And we always make a point to give whenever we received income, sometimes it would have been only 10%. Sometimes it would have been more. Occasionally, it might have been less, but we always tried to give. And over the years, there were times when we didn't have money for other things.

And I wondered, how are we going to have money for retirement and all that. But in the last couple of years, God provided a way that we never thought possible, that has proved to be his faithfulness to us, that we now have an income stream that we never dreamed we would have. So just wanted to share God's faithfulness in that regard, upon his giving.

You know, it's amazing, Guy. And I have heard this story a lot. And it's because it's just the way God's economy works. It's not a cosmic vending machine. This is not about a prosperity gospel. But this is just about God's faithfulness, which can come in any form. But when we make God our ultimate treasure, and we hold his resources loosely, and we give it generously, it's amazing to see what happens. And I think that's just the way God has wired us. And that's also just the way his economy works.

Cranking through your calculator doesn't make sense. And yet, you can't outgive God and the joy that follows is incredible. So thanks, sir, for sharing your story today. I'm confident it's been encouragement to others. Lord bless you. Folks, thanks for being along with us. We'll look for you tomorrow. Big thanks to my team today, Jim, Taylor, Devin, Sandy, and everybody here at Faithfi. Couldn't do it without them. We'll see you next time. Bye-bye. Faith in Finance is provided by Faithfi and listeners like you.