Count Your Blessings

Psalm 94-19 is a great source of peace in troubled times. It reads, When the cares of my heart are many, your consolations cheer my soul.

I am Rob Lest. Whenever you face uncertainties, financial or otherwise, God's Word is filled with reminders that He is always with you. A great way to overcome your fears is to count your blessings. We'll talk about that first today, then we'll have some great calls that we've lined up.

But since this program is not live today, please hold your calls until we're back in the studio. This is Faith and Finance Live, biblical wisdom for your financial journey. Okay, so if your 401k is looking more like a 201k, you're not alone. Or maybe you just pulled away from the gas pump after spending a pretty penny filling your tank.

Or you recently gasped at the total in the grocery store checkout line. Stocks fall and inflation happens. So in times like these, it's good to stop a moment and focus on finding some peace in the middle of all the uncertainty. When financial circumstances are knocking you down, what you need is something to hang on to, something that's permanent, reliable, and true. The best place to start is always God's Word. In James 1-17 we read, Every good and perfect gift is from above, coming down from the Father of the heavenly lights, who does not change like shifting shadows. Understanding this truth can help us navigate the stormy times. Let's unpack it, and that starts with understanding that God is the source of every blessing, and He's given you many. You have the ability to openly worship and follow God. Our religious freedom in America is a rarity, not just in the world, but in all of history. It's a blessing we take for granted, because we've always had it in our lives.

But we should include it in our prayers of praise and thank God for it. Your freedom also extends to many areas of your life. You can choose where you live and how you earn a living.

You can vote for who represents you in local, state, and national elections. In many parts of the world, those blessings are unheard of. You have family and friends to share your joy and hardships with—shelter, transportation, food on the table, and clothes to wear. When was the last time you thanked God for those things? Every true blessing flows from Him, even your health, and every breath you take is a blessing from God.

Here's another blessing you might take for granted. While almost everything in the world is subject to change, God is not. He's fully worthy of your trust. You can count on Him whenever the world lets you down.

Economic forecasts, your bank account, and even your emotions can change like shifting shadows. But God isn't like that. He is good all the time. His character is fixed. In Christ, we see God's love for us in action. For God so loved the world that He gave His only begotten Son that whoever believes in Him shall not perish but have everlasting life. By the power of the Holy Spirit, you can face every day with peace and confidence in God's unchanging love, provision, and peace.

Hebrews 13 confirms the character of God in verse 8, Jesus Christ is the same yesterday and today and forever. The scripture I read earlier from James 1-17 follows with a description of all the trials we might face as we run the race of life. Whether you're just starting out or finishing the race, you can trust God's goodness now and in the future. Your circumstances don't change God's character.

So if the current economic climate scares you, try thinking about it with an eternal perspective. All the financial resources are God's anyway. He owns everything, including you, and He remains in control.

Not a single atom in the universe moves without His command. So God has His part and you have yours. You do your best with what you have, preparing the best you can, and trust the Lord to handle the rest. Even when you feel powerless to change your circumstances, rest assured that God provides His Holy Spirit to protect and support you each day as you walk with Christ.

Whenever you feel yourself wavering when fear begins to take hold in your thoughts, remember Philippians 4-7, and the peace of God, which transcends all understanding, will guard your hearts and your minds in Christ Jesus. You may not know what lies ahead, but God certainly does, and He doesn't want you to waste time worrying about it. Instead, He wants you to always look to Him for your provision.

How do you know that? Well, Jeremiah 29, 11 and 12 reads, For I know the plans I have for you, declares the Lord, plans for welfare and not for evil, to give you a future and a hope. Then you will call upon Me and come and pray to Me, and I will hear you. You will seek Me and find Me when you seek Me with all your heart. Well, I hope that's given you some comfort in these uncertain times.

Watch more to come just around the corner. Stay with us. Thanks so much for joining us today on Faith and Finance Live. I'm Rob West, your host.

Hey, our team is away from the studio today. We're not here, so we won't be taking any live calls, but we do have lots of great information coming your way in our broadcast. Folks, have you checked out recently our website at faithfi.com?

If not, I'd encourage you to do that. You'll find our community there where you can post questions and comments, hear from others that are on the stewardship journey as well. You can also access our content and check out the Faithfi app.

It's at faithfi.com. So let's go ahead and dive right in. Let's head to Texas. Hi, Kerry, you're next on the program.

Well, thank you for having me. Yeah, I have a second home that I'm selling and six months ago I had some foundation repair that needed to be done and they gave me an interest-free loan on that and that's going to be due here in March. I'm not real sure if I'll be able to sell my house before then, maybe, maybe not. So I'm needing a short term, maybe a month or two loan just to cover that interest-free loan so I don't have to pay the 17% interest on that. So I was thinking about maybe a home equity loan or some other type of loan, short term loan that would be able to cover that if I don't sell my house here real quick.

What's the, what do you think is the best way to just cover that for a short, short time? Yeah. What is your interest rate?

You said it will be 17%? Yes. Okay. And what is the balance on that?

It's 36,000. Okay. All right. And when are you planning to list the home? It's listed last week.

I listed it last week. Okay. All right.

Very good. So ideally you'd get that sold but it may not happen. You may have a kind of a short period of time here. Well, you're going to need to kind of look at some options here. Obviously, do you have quite a bit of equity in the house? Yes.

Okay. So I think it's really going to come down to less about the interest rate because the home equity loan in the line of credit will be fairly close. Normally, I would say let's stay away from a line of credit just because it's a variable interest rate and the tendency is to open this line for more than you need and, you know, use that as kind of a fallback. And I hate to, you know, encumber the house for things, any number of things. I remember at one point seeing a billboard for a bank that had what they call the put it on the house credit card. Imagine that you go out to dinner, you swipe it and you're securing that to your home.

I mean, we want to stay far away from those kinds of things. But your situation is a little different in that we're just trying to get out from paying, you know, one 12th of 17% every month on this 36 grand until you can get the house sold. The question is between the fees and the closing costs of establishing that line of credit or that home equity loan, how do those compare to the interest, the increase in interest that you'll be paying? So let's say you're paying, you know, seven or 8% on that line of credit to start with. How much is that in interest per month versus the 17% you would be paying?

And then when we factor in the cost to establish that line of credit, you know, how many months does that give you where just by paying the 17% you'd still come out ahead perhaps, let's say, you know, for 90 days and you may decide, well, just given the costs of securing this loan and putting it in place and, you know, all the fees that they associate with that, I'm actually better off if I sell the house by June 1st staying with the 17%. Does that make sense? Oh, sure. Sure. Yeah.

Yeah. I knew home equity loans or some other loan would probably be less than 17%, but I didn't think about the fees involved. So that that's a good point about the fees. So yeah, particularly if it's short, like, like, you know, only one month and I, you know, one 12th of 17% it's not that bad for one month.

So yeah, I think I'll be able to sell the house here within a month or two. So yeah, the fees involved in getting another loan from another bank or credit union or whatever. Yeah, that's a good point. I didn't think of that.

Yeah. So I think you're going to need to look at that. I mean, it could be as much as two all the way up to 5% of the loan value, depending upon the lender. Now, often some lenders, because they have more money to give away or to win and they're, you know, they're trying to be aggressive. They might, you know, say no closing costs associated with HELOCs.

And so you could look around for those. But I think just the hassle of putting that in place and all the paperwork, not to mention the fees, I'm just not sure given the timeline here that it's going to make sense as much as I don't like you paying 17% on anything. So I think the key is just get that house listed as quick as you can, or maybe you said it was already listed. So, you know, just try to move that.

And, you know, if you have the time and are willing to do the research, you know, you could go to bankrate.com and find out, you know, if anybody out there is offering a HELOC with no closing costs, and then that might give you an option to do that. But I think you've got to factor all of these pieces in just to make sure that it's worth your while to take the time and effort to put it in place. All right. Yeah, that's great. Excellent. Well, thanks. You're very welcome. We appreciate your call today, sir.

God bless you. Let's head to beautiful Maine. Hey, John, thanks for calling. Go ahead, sir. Hi, Rob. Thanks for taking my call. It's quite a contrast between Texas and northern Maine.

That's true. I love it. Well, I'm semi-retired, 82. I'm living on Social Security and taking a small amount for my mutual funds, which last year I lost about 25%. I checked with my financial person as to what to do. He mentioned a fixed annuity, which I don't think I should do. My thought is to take the hit, withdraw everything and put it into my local bank's CD, put a CD on it, and that percentage would be four point one eight five. So I think maybe that's the way it should go. But your advice would help. Yeah, well, I appreciate that.

Let me just ask you. You said you're down 25 percent, John, and I can understand the concern there, given your age and the fact that you're on a fixed income. Were you in an all stock portfolio or was there a bond allocation to that? No, no bond allocation.

Just just straight stock funds, mutual fund. Yeah. So that does make sense as to why you'd be down. Have you seen a bit of a recovery in the month of January? A little bit, especially in the rough IRA. A little bit of recovery. Yeah.

And so I'm you know, I'm on pins and needles, which which way to go. What roughly are we talking about in investable assets, if you don't mind me asking? It would be about seventy six thousand as of the end of the year, maybe less now. Yeah. And you're not pulling any amount out on a regular basis, apart from a required minimum, if you have that. I'm pulling out monthly 700 to go with my Social Security.

It's a frugal income. Yeah. Yeah.

Yeah. So I could see why you'd want to be pretty conservative with that, because, you know, normally I'd say on seventy six thousand, I'd rather you pull only about three thousand a year, even at one hundred thousand. I'd rather you pull only about four thousand a year. You're pulling about eight.

Sounds like so. You know, we're going to deplete this over time. I think, you know, the question is, do we wait this out and let it recover?

I would have told you if you'd called me a year ago before the downturn that, you know, we needed to be much more conservative, just given what you know, how you're relying on this. The question now is just, you know, your anxiety level and peace of mind. I want you to sleep at night.

And, you know, I don't want you to lay awake worrying about this at the same time. I hate to lock in these losses. Let's do this. I've got to take a quick break.

If you don't mind holding, John, I'd love to finish up on the other side. You stay there and we'll be right back on faith and finance. Stay with us. Great to have you with us on faith and finance live. I'm Rob West. Let me remind you that we're not live today, so don't call in.

But we have great information lined up ahead in the program coming your way. Also, if you'd like to have a one on one conversation with a financial professional who's been trained to bring biblically wise financial advice, counsel that aligns with your Christian values, well, we recommend the Certified Kingdom Advisor designation and you can connect with a local CKA in your city when you head to our website, faithfi.com. That's faithfi.com.

Just click find a CKA. Before the break, we were talking to John in beautiful Maine and John was sharing with us as a gentleman, 83 years old. He's an artist living on a fixed income. He's got some investment accounts that are down about 25 percent, all stocks.

And he's pulling out about 700 a month to supplement his income. And obviously, very concerned about the fact that this $100,000 portfolio is down to 76 or so thousand, even though it's recovered slightly this month. And John, as I was saying before the break, I think the key is there's no doubt you're too aggressive in that portfolio with an all stock portfolio at 83. And given the withdrawal rate that you have going on there, the question is, what is the best path from where we are today sitting at 76,000 to where you have a much more conservative portfolio that is not going to have the volatility that's going to allow you to stretch it out as long as you can, you know, before you deplete it and, you know, not have to wake up and open a statement one quarter and, you know, see it down another 20 percent. And the options are, of course, to leave it where it is, knowing that, OK, even though we may be six or even 12 months away from a recovery, maybe even a bit longer, we don't want to lock in those unrealized losses.

We want to let it recover. But as soon as it does or gets close to it, we're going to quickly kind of reposition this either into a much more conservative, largely fixed income portfolio comprised of, you know, typically we would say at 83 years old, you might have 20 to 30 percent in stocks, not 100 percent. That provides a little bit of the growth engine and, you know, helps to boost the returns. But then the bulk of it, you know, 70 to 80 percent is in bonds, fixed income, high quality governments and corporates throwing off a good income. And then all of that together should allow you to sustain a four percent withdrawal rate.

In your case, you know, we're talking more like, you know, an eight percent withdrawal rate if it was one hundred thousand. But at least we allow this to last as long as it can. The question is, though, if you as the steward are saying, I just can't do it anymore, Rob, I realize that the market has always recovered and, you know, I still need to take a long term view on this because I need this money in the last, you know, at least another decade. But I'm you know, it's causing me anxiety or losing sleep and I just need to go ahead and move it. Then I think certainly that may be the decision you need to make, even though I think in hindsight, 12 or 18 months from now, you know, you might say, man, I wish I would have waited that out. So give me your thoughts on kind of that path forward and what you're sensing now, even if, you know, perhaps waiting for it to recover might be the more prudent option. We also have to figure into this kind of the non-financial aspect of this, which is, you know, I just can't stomach it anymore. Well, thanks, Rob. I can withdraw on a monthly basis less than the 700 and still work out. I have about $60,000 to $70,000 in a savings account, which I'm using as a buffer. Yeah.

So I probably I probably could get go with $500 taking out $500 a month. Okay. Okay. Yeah, I'd certainly feel better about that.

I can do that. What is a revelation is, I just thought, you know, mutual funds was it, but you're saying 20% in in mutual fund stocks, 80% in bonds, which I have never researched. So that that gives me something to look at. In other words, bonds would give me a fixed percentage. Well, that's right. However, last year was challenging for bonds, too. So you would have still experienced some loss, although maybe not quite as much. It was just an unusual period where the stock market was falling, you know, pretty significantly. And when interest rates go up, even though the yields on the bonds increase, the prices of the bonds fall in concert with those rising interest rates. But given that we're going to be you know, we're talking about you moving into this portfolio that I described, perhaps, you know, later this year, we would be at the end of that Fed rate increasing cycle, which would mean that, you know, you would the bond prices would no longer be falling, and you'd be able to lock in some pretty good yields. And as long as we're using high quality corporates and governments, you really don't have to worry about, you know, much risk of default. So you would just kind of enjoy that better rate of return, then you might get longer term in a CD.

So that's, that's why bonds, you know, can be very attractive in this season of life. I see. What I was thinking of with the CDs, they would be short term, you know, 15 months, two years.

And so I'm thinking with my age, and I would have one of my daughter's name on it also so that they can control it and withdraw if necessary. So that was basically what I thought would be effective. Yeah.

And I can understand why. I think the only thing is we just have to recognize that, you know, if you were to pull it out of the investments right now, you're locking in those losses. So you're taking unrealized losses and you're realizing them. And then you don't have the potential to participate in the recovery of this market, which will happen. Could it go lower before it goes higher?

Sure. I mean, depends on how deep this recession is that most economists are expecting this year. But I think if you could wait it out and you feel good about that, I'd probably let this portfolio recover a bit more before you make that transition to your new strategy, which could either be a more of a guaranteed approach with an income or excuse me, a CD ladder, where you maybe do a 12 month, 18 month and two years.

And then every six months, you roll a third of it forward. Or you could do more like this stock and largely bond portfolio, perhaps get a second opinion on this, John, you could also look for a certified kingdom advisor there somewhere near you. If you go to our website, faithfi.com and click find a CCA. I hope that's at least giving you some things to think about all the best to you, my friend. And we appreciate you checking with us. If we can help further along the way, let us know. Hey folks, we're going to pause now for a brief break, but we'll be back with much more on today's faith and finance live.

Stick around. Great to have you with us today on faith and finance live. By the way, we're not live today.

We're away from the studio, so don't call in, but we have some great questions that we lined up in advance. By the way, this ministry is entirely listener supported. That means we rely on your financial gifts and support to do what we do on the air every day. If you consider a gift, we'd certainly be grateful. Just head to our website, faithfi.com. That's faith f i.com and click the give button.

Thanks in advance. All right, let's head back to the phones. Let's head to North Carolina. Hey, Bob, thanks for calling, sir. Go ahead. Bob, are you with us?

All right. It looks like we lost Bob. Unfortunately, Bob, feel free to give us a call back. We'll try to get you on to Texas. We go.

Hi, Virginia. Go next on the program. Go ahead. Hello. Thank you for taking my call. Yes, ma'am.

Okay. I have monies in the bank for an autistic grandchild. And I have a trust that puts it to him. Although the bank said that it would be best just to put the father's name on and he could draw it out and blah, blah, blah. But I want to make sure that it's tax deferred for him.

Yeah. And so I want to put it into a Christian credit union. I know I could make more money if I put it in stocks and bonds. But also also know there's risk. And I don't think there would be any risk in a credit union.

Yeah, I would agree with you there, Virginia. And I think if that's really the direction the Lord's leading you, there's no problem with that. You mentioned that you'd like it to be a Christian credit union. We happen to have a wonderful partner, the Christian Community Credit Union. You can find them on the web at joinchristiancommunity.com.

That's joinchristiancommunity.com. And they not only will allow you to take advantage of CDs and other banking instruments, they provide mortgages and loans of all kinds for individuals, churches, ministries and businesses. But they're, of course, faith-based and purpose-driven, which means their mission is to serve Christ followers to help them live and give more abundantly.

They've been around for 65 years. And a portion of the money that you put with them will go to support the work of the kingdom as well. And so through their partnerships with some wonderful ministries around the globe, a lot of that money will be working for the sake of the gospel. So you can become a member just by way of your affiliation with a Christian church, ministry or school. And so you would just sign that statement of faith and be a part of what they're doing there. So again, you can look at that online, Virginia, at joinchristiancommunity.com.

And I think you'll like what you see. Okay, I appreciate you. Thank you. All right. Thank you, Virginia. Thanks for being such a great grandmother, thinking about how to be a good steward of God's resources. Let's see, back to North Carolina. Bob, I think we have you with us now. How can I help you, sir? I'm back on. Sorry, I double-fingered the call there.

No problem. My wife and I have just recently found that we've got some double-E bonds that have fully matured to the tune we bring in about $41,000 on those if we cash them in. Now, we're retired. So we've got an income from a military retirement and Social Security. I don't need the money.

We don't need the money to live day to day. But we do have a $31,000 home mortgage. That's all that we've got in terms of mortgage debt at this point. So my question is, is it best to go ahead and pay that off? It's at a fairly low rate.

It's actually only about, I think, just below 4% at this point. And anyway, whether we should pay that off or whether we should put this money into investment. Yeah, very good, Bob. Well, you've got some great options there.

And I love that you're trying to think through the priority use of this. Couple of questions for you. Number one, do you have what I call an emergency fund, a reserve account of at least three to six months expenses? Yes, we do have.

We have that available to us at this point. Okay, great. And then secondly, would you and or your wife really have a lot more peace of mind just knowing that you had this home paid off? Is that a priority for you all? Would that give you more peace of mind? Or would you say, you know what, although we'd love to pay it off at some point, we're fine hanging on to it and putting this money to work and trying to grow it. Where would you all come down on that? People know that I thought through it to, you know, to that depth yet to know which we would want.

Yeah, I would start there, Bob, because I think you could go either direction. I mean, could you take this money and put it to work and continue to pay on this mortgage at a low interest rate? And, you know, could it grow beyond the interest rate?

Sure, that's possible. I think, you know, a lot of folks would say, you know what, I'd just like to own my home. And given the fact that we're probably going to be in a sideways market here and, you know, given our age and the fact that we would be in a fairly conservative portfolio, meaning maybe we'd have, you know, a 60-40 portfolio in this season of life, 60 percent in bonds, 40 percent in stocks, you know, given what the market's expected to do, could we outpace, you know, the interest rate on this mortgage by a couple of percent a year after tax?

Sure, you could if you took a long term view. But is that worth it versus having just the peace of mind to know that, yeah, we own our home and we don't, we're not encumbered to anyone and we've got complete flexibility here and, you know, we've taken this largest expense that we have in our budget and we've eliminated that, so now we're not making a mortgage payment, which means we have more margin on a monthly basis to give away or to, you know, put back into savings or, you know, whatever we want to do with it. So I kind of like you paying off the mortgage for those reasons. But at the end of the day, if you said, you know what, we'd rather put this to work, we could talk about an investment strategy that, you know, might help to offset and grow the money beyond the interest you're paying. Although I just think you've got to factor in those non-financial elements of having that mortgage, you know, completely eradicated.

But give me your thoughts. Yeah, that certainly sounds reasonable there to do that. Now I realize our tax payment rate last year was I think about 12% or so in taxes, income taxes. So of that money we'll get, I realize on roughly 31,000 of it, we'll have to pay, let's say on the order of 12 to 15% bond tax this year.

Yeah. Is there any advantage in just not taking, say, half of those bonds, putting moving those into next year, even though they don't earn interest, but moving those taxes to next year? It's possible, but probably not. You're probably in a low enough bracket where it's not going to make a whole lot of difference. I would check with your CPA just to see if that strategy of spreading this out over two tax years would benefit you. But I think what you'll find is that you're in a low enough bracket that it's really not going to make a whole lot of difference. And so if you had the option, for instance, if you decided we're going to pay off the mortgage, I'd probably go ahead and knock it out this year. And again, eliminate that expense from your budget.

So you guys have even more margin on a monthly basis. Right. Okay.

Well, that makes that makes a whole lot of sense too. Okay. Very good. Well, listen, Bob, thanks for checking with us. And thank you for your service, sir. We're incredibly grateful. Well, I was, you know, pleased to do it at the time. And the Lord has blessed us through all of that. Very good. We can help you further along the way.

Let us know. God bless you. Before we head to our break, you know, as I read scripture, I see this big idea jumping off the page around contentment. You know, I think as we consider our role as stewards of God's money, we need to foster this attitude that the apostle Paul talked about. And that is contentment. Remember, he said that it's learned. I've learned to be content. He was in a time of plenty and in a time of need.

And he learned to be content in either of those contentments of choice. And when we increase our contentment, well, then we can focus on what God has given us and not on what he's given others. I hope that's an encouragement to you today. Again, we're not here today. We're away from the studio. So don't call in, but just around the corner, we have some more questions to tackle. I know you're going to enjoy the calls we have coming up. Stay with us. We'll be right back. Thanks for joining us today on Faith and Finance Live here in our final segment of the broadcast today.

Let me remind you, our team is not here, so don't call in. But we lined up some great questions in advance. We'll get to those in just a moment. Before we do, let me remind you, if you haven't downloaded the FaithFi app, we'd love for you to check it out. It's got three sections in it. The first is the money management system based on Larry Burkett's digital envelope system.

It helps you manage God's money in a way where you know exactly what's left in each envelope at any point during the month. There's also our Learn tab where you can access the best content and biblical finance to grow in your understanding of God's way of handling money, and our community where you can post questions, get comments and ideas from other stewards on the journey. So download it today on our website, faithfi.com.

Just click app. All right, let's head to Louisiana. Steve, thanks for calling. Go right ahead. Steve in Louisiana, are you there, sir?

All right, I'm not hearing you, Steve. So we're going to let you see if we can get you back on the line and come back to you here in a moment. Folks, we receive emails all the time from you and we love to get them. You can send them along to askrob.faithfi.com.

We'll try to get them on the air quickly. In fact, we heard just in the last day or so from Emily. Here's what she writes. It's a great question.

A lot of folks ask about this. She says, I'm employed and currently receiving Social Security income. I tithe on my salary. Should I also tithe on my Social Security income? I love your program and I listen at work.

Thanks. Emily, I appreciate your generous heart and wanting to honor the Lord with your giving. I think the tithe is a great starting point for our giving.

My friend Randy Alcorn calls it the training wheels of giving. We're no longer under the Mosaic law and we're under the law of Christ. I don't think we're obligated in the same way to give a tithe. And yet, I think clearly even in the New Testament, we see that we should do proportionate, systematic giving, that the idea of being a generous sower just jumps off the page in both the Old and the New Testament. Those of us who have seen what Jesus did for us on the cross certainly should be giving. And we should do that according to how God has provided to us.

So it's a way to be connected back into His activity and demonstrate our trust in the fact that His provision is complete and He is trustworthy to provide. So I love the idea and the principle of the tithe as long as we're doing that cheerfully, not under compulsion. Now, if we're going to apply the principle of the tithe, that is a tenth on the increase, how do we approach Social Security taxes? Because clearly a portion of what you're receiving, if you've been tithing on a gross amount of your income throughout the whole of your life, a portion of that is a return of what you paid into it. The challenge is it would be very difficult, perhaps it would take an army of CPAs to figure out what is a return of what you've paid into the system versus how much actually came from your employer. Because remember, you, if you were a W-2 employee, only paid half of the FICA taxes, your employer paid the other half.

And then you've got the growth that occurred as the Social Security system took it and invested it. So it would be very difficult to determine kind of what is the portion that you put in versus that you did not. And so I think for that reason, you know, the Bible doesn't make special provisions that exempt those who are on fixed income or government subsidies. It just simply says, Proverbs 3, 9, honor the Lord with your possessions and with the first produce of your entire harvest. So perhaps one approach is to say, whatever funds come into my possession from whatever source, the first produce of my harvest, welfare, Social Security, SSI, unemployment, disability, alimony, inheritance, regular income, I'm going to consider that the first produce. And then from the heart of a joyful giver, I'm going to just give it and accept it as a gracious gift from the Lord. That would be the approach I would take. But at the end of the day, here's what I would say. You know, Emily, this is between you and the Lord. So I'd be on your knees saying, Lord, what would you have me to do?

But hopefully that gives you at least something else to think about as you consider this. All right. Let's try to get to Steve again in Louisiana. Steve, do we have you this time? Yes. Are you there? Yes, sir.

Go right ahead. Okay. I'm retired back in October. I'm 65. I'm on Social Security. But at the end of the day, I've got $800 that I need to do something with.

Okay. And I listened to your show for almost a year, and I didn't realize it until we kind of calculated. I've probably got a year set aside as far as unexpected funds to draw back on. But what I'd like to do is take that $800 each month.

What should I invest it in? And I'm thinking about something that's really aggressive. You know, I just don't know what to do. Yeah, yeah.

Boy, there's so many options here. I mean, I think the key here is, I mean, you're talking about money that you could afford to lose. And so that's why I hear you saying I'm willing to be a little more speculative with this money.

And I can understand that. I think there's still something to be said about not being highly concentrated. You know, the Bible talks about put your portion into seven or even eight because we don't know what misfortune may occur on the earth. So we should be diversified, not having all of our eggs in one basket. So I wouldn't pick one high-flying company and just kind of say I'm going to stick it all in that because you have the potential to do really well, but you also have the potential to lose a whole lot. So I think there's some wisdom in being diversified. So if I had $800 a month and I wanted to be on the more aggressive end, I would probably drop it into a high-growth mutual fund, something that's actively managed in a particular sector of the economy and maybe in biotech or it may be in technology or something that has some potential to really accelerate into the future.

I mean, we talk about where everything's going with electric cars and energy and we've just got a whole number of AI. I mean, a lot of these industries are emerging and clearly you could be very well diversified and you can have a position in one of these sectors or multiple sectors that are high-growth with an active money manager who has a particular skill set in this area. That might be what I would look at. So an example would be, and we don't make stock recommendations here or fund recommendations, but Eventide, one of the faith-based investing mutual funds that are part of the faith-based investing space, they have a particular fund in the life sciences and healthcare space, looking at a lot of the emerging biotech companies and some really exciting companies in that space.

That would be an example. I'm not recommending that one, but an example of something you could do. So I might look at that or you could visit with our friends at soundmindinvesting.org and they could have some mutual funds that would be in this more aggressive growth category. But I think that's probably what you're looking for because then you could do a systematic investment, Steve, every month. I just open an account at maybe Fidelity or Schwab, set up that automatic transfer of seven or eight hundred dollars a month into the account, have it automatically buy more shares of that mutual fund.

So your dollar cost averaging in, whether it's up or down, you know, you're kind of systematically moving in and taking a larger position every month and then just take a long-term perspective on it, let it grow and see how it does over time. How does that sound? That sounds great.

Hey, I appreciate you. I'd like to find a King Kingdom advisor somewhere here that I can hook up with. I'm in Shreveport, Louisiana, so where do I go to find that? Yeah, you'd head to our website, faithfi.com, faithfi.com, and then click right there at the top of the page, find a CKA, and you can do a zip code search.

You'll get a list of them based on the how far away, you know, twenty five, fifty or a hundred miles and you could start interviewing to find out who would be the best fit. Hey, brother, thank you. I pray for you all every day. Well, thank you, Steve. God bless you, my friend. Let's stay with the name Steve and head to Iowa. Hi, Steve.

How can I help you? Yes, I wanted you to differentiate the following. When people put their son's or daughter's name on a CD, they do that at the risk. You should explain to people what a Totten, T-O-T-T-E-N, what a Totten trust is and how that keeps the money from being taken if the second name on the trust is involved in a lawsuit. Yeah. Well, here's what I would say.

I appreciate you raising that. And I am not an attorney, so I don't give legal advice, Steve. But what I would just say generally is a Totten trust is essentially what is today known as a POD, a payable on death. It received its name from a long time ago. But in modern times, we call it payable on death, where essentially it immediately passes outside of probate to the named individual. And so you're going to avoid probate.

It got its name from a decision at a court case back in the early 1900s. And there are certainly some protections from a legal standpoint. But I would always visit, especially whenever we're dealing with wealth transfer or any issues related to liability and your assets, always relate to a godly estate attorney who can help you navigate what is the best option for you in terms of naming beneficiaries, whether or not a trust makes sense. If you have your own business, obviously, you've got liability considerations that you want to make sure you're protected against.

And so always good to get some legal counsel when it comes to making sure you're passing your assets efficiently and effectively and you're not setting yourself or exposing yourself to unnecessary risk. And that's where a lot of these instruments, like the one that Steve's mentioning here today, can be very helpful. Thank you for your call, sir, and for asking that great question. Well, folks, that's going to do it for us. So we covered a lot of ground today.

You know, here's the bottom line. As we think about our role as stewards of managing God's money, we want to be found faithful. We want to be handling God's money obediently, obedient to his word and in the same direction for a long period of time. And when we do that and we live with contentment and avoid the comparison trap and hold God's money loosely, setting financial finish lines and giving generously, being a generous sower, I believe we'll experience God's best, not without hardship or difficulty. We're going to have those.

We live in a fallen world, but we ultimately place our trust in God and his promises. Hey, thanks for being along with us today. It's been an incredible opportunity to share these truths with you. I hope you come back and join us tomorrow. Thanks to my team today, Amy, Dan, Clara, and Jim. Thank you for being here as well. Faith and Finance Live is a partnership between Moody Radio and Faith I hope you have a great rest of your day and come back and join us next time. We'll see you there. Bye bye.