Dependence on God Builds a Firm Financial Foundation

Christian author Lynn Cowell reminds us that when we build our lives upon Jesus, even when the most severe trials come our way, we will stand.

Hi, I'm Rob West. Jesus is the firm foundation for the Christian life, including finances. Today we'll talk about how dependence on God helps us stand firm through any financial storms. Then we'll take your calls at 800-525-7000.

That's 800-525-7000. This is Faith and Finance Live, biblical wisdom for your financial journey. Well, in Matthew Chapter 7, Jesus tells the parable of two builders, a foolish one and a wise one.

You probably remember this. The wise builder builds his house on a rock, and the storm can't destroy it, but the foolish builder builds his house on the sand. And when a storm comes, it all gets blown away. Jesus tells his disciples that everyone who hears these words of mine and puts them into practice is like the wise builder.

As with all of Jesus' parables, there's an underlying message for us here about God's kingdom and how we should live. This parable about the wise and foolish builders can also apply to our financial choices. Here are three things we can learn.

The first lesson is pretty obvious. It's better to be wise than foolish. Depending on God is the wise thing to do. If we follow God's principles and our finances, listening to the words of our Savior and doing what He says, we will be like that wise builder and our efforts will have eternal value. The foolish man who ignores and disobeys God's word will end up with nothing to show for all his hard work. The second lesson we learn from the parable of the wise and foolish builders is that a firm foundation can protect you from the storms of life. The key is to choose a firm foundation instead of a weak one. Worldly promises and desires are made from human weakness and have no power to protect or save us. Jesus, the Son of God himself, is a solid rock. Place your trust and obedience in Him and the storms of life won't destroy you.

The third lesson might also seem pretty obvious, but it's worth repeating. Storms happen to everyone. Both the wise and the foolish builder had to live through the bad weather, but in the end, the wise man was the only one left standing. So let's inspect your financial foundation for a moment. Are you really depending on God for everything? It's tempting to think you can go it alone financially, but the do-it-yourself philosophy of life is a blueprint for financial and spiritual disaster. Only the Lord is strong enough to provide, protect, and rescue you. In Christ, He provides salvation and the forgiveness of our sins.

We desperately need Jesus, for all have sinned and fallen short of the glory of God, according to Romans 3.23. Ephesians 5.15 admonishes us, as believers, to be very careful then how you live, not as unwise but wise, making the most of every opportunity, because the days are evil. Wisdom like this isn't something we can muster by ourselves, because it comes from God. No matter how smart or successful or hardworking you are, you still need God. Depending on God for everything takes practice. It's also a matter of daily discipline, so here are a few actions you can take to stand firm in Christ in your finances. First, study God's Word and follow Biblical principles.

God cares about the details of your life because He loves you. That's why there's so much in the Bible about how to be wise with money and possessions. Next, stick to your faith when temptation and opposition come, and they will come.

Satan does not want you to depend on God. That's why Paul warns his readers in 1 Corinthians 16, 13 to be on your guard, stand firm in the faith, be courageous, be strong, do everything in love. Another action you can take to stand firm is to practice discernment. I love the truth in Romans 12, too. Do not conform to the pattern of this world, but be transformed by the renewing of your mind. Then you will be able to test and approve what God's will is, His good, pleasing, and perfect will.

The wise person chooses a foundation of truth instead of the shifting sands of worldliness. Finally, keep praying. Test every financial opportunity with prayer. Seek Godly advice and ask the Lord for the wisdom you need. If we can help you address some of your financial concerns, visit us at faithfi.com and click on the Community tab. You're not alone, and we have many wise financial contributors available to answer your questions. I hope you'll build your spiritual house on the rock of Christ today. Continue to depend on the Lord for everything you need, and make your financial choices with the wisdom found in God's Word. All right, it's time to take your calls and questions today at 800-525-7000.

Those lines are open 24-7, 800-525-7000. I'm Rob West, and this is Faith and Finance Live. We'll be right back. Well, thanks for joining us today on Faith and Finance Live.

I'm Rob West. It's time to take your calls and questions today. The number to call is 800-525-7000.

Again, that's 800-525-7000. We've got some lines open today, and we'd love to tackle your financial questions. Let me also remind you, Faith and Finance Live is listener supported, and here as we round out the month this week, we could certainly use your financial assistance for us to stay on goal. We rely on listener support to bring you this broadcast every day and all of our other ministry resources. So if you'd consider a gift to the ministry, we'd certainly be grateful. You can just head to our website, faithfi.com, and click Give.

That's faithfi.com, and click Give, and a gift of any amount would go a long way toward helping us stay on plan this month. All right, let's dive in today. Again, 800-525-7000 is the number to call. We've got some lines open. Let's go to Dothan, Alabama. Hi, Ann. Go right ahead.

Yes, I had a question. I'm 72 years old. I'm on a fixed income with Social Security, and I draw a little bit more from my husband who's passed away. And I have to start receiving some income from annuities.

I have three. I was wondering if that is going to cause a tax problem. I don't file taxes right now. And is the IRS going to be looking at anything over a $600 deposit to my bank account? I see.

No, that got pushed back, and that actually has to do with what you do through some of the payment, not processors, but the payment platforms like Venmo and others. But essentially, you have an IRA and you're rolling it to an annuity, or what's the status of your account? Well, I've had an annuity for years, and now I have to start withdrawing from it. One of them is an IRA.

I have a Roth and I have a non-qualified or something, and I don't know if the income from that would cause me to have to pay taxes. Okay. Did you say it's a non-qualified annuity? I do have one that is a non-qualified annuity, and then I have a Roth and then I have an IRA. I have three of them. Okay.

All right. Yeah, so if you have a, you know, a withdrawal from an annuity is typically going to be taxed as ordinary income. And so in just about every case, that would be the way that you would treat that. And so the interest or the earnings are taxed as ordinary income. You won't pay taxes on the premium or the principal you initially deposited, and there'd be a calculation to determine what was a return of premium or principal versus what was, you know, interest paid out. And again, coming out of an annuity, it would be added to your ordinary income and then taxed at your marginal tax rate. Withdrawals from a Roth IRA, as long as it's been in there for at least five years, you're not going to pay any tax on that. Both the original contributions, which were after-tax contributions, but then also the gains are going to be tax-free.

So you would likely pay, you know, ordinary income tax on all or a portion of the withdrawals from the annuity, just depending on whether that was non-qualified or qualified money going in. Okay. All right. Well, will they send me, will the company send me like a tax form? Yes. Yeah, they will.

So they'll, based on your withdrawals, they will send you a tax document at the end of every year showing exactly what was distributed, and then you would pass that on to your CPA. Okay. Okay. All right. Sounds great. Okay.

And by the way, you're welcome. And I will just mention the, you know, the IRS postponed the implementation of that $600 rule where, you know, any $600 in aggregate payments through a third party, you know, payment system would have to be reported to the IRS. And depending on what type of transaction it was, it may or may not be taxable and you'd have to be able to justify that. That was delayed. So that's not in place now for this tax year, but we'll see kind of where that goes in the future. The Biden administration has kind of backed down on that just because it's been, there's been a lot of folks that have been just concerned over how that would be implemented and the amount of documentation that would be provided. And, you know, what that would do to, you know, taxpayers who were, you know, selling goods, you know, maybe selling a used couch or something through one of these platforms and, you know, having to now pay taxes on that.

So anyway, we'll see how that progresses, but that is not something that's in place currently. And we appreciate your calling today and thanks for being on the program. Let's head to Noblesville, Indiana. Hi, Charles. Go ahead.

Yes, Ron, thank you for taking my calls. I have an annuity. I'm in my 70s and retired. I have an annuity for around 50,000 and I was wondering about, because some company asked me about changing this to a precious metal IRA. And could I change it to a metal IRA since I'm already retired and in my 70s?

Yes. Yeah, you have the option to, you know, roll an IRA. You could essentially transfer an existing IRA into what they call a gold IRA. And, you know, you would retain that tax deferral on that account.

Now, I think the question would just be, does that make sense from an investment standpoint, even though it's not a taxable event? And what I would say to you, Charles, there is just be careful, you know, in the sense that I don't recommend overweighting in the precious metals. You know, typical allocation would be to precious metals 5%, maybe 10% at the most. I understand in the midst of the economic uncertainty, a looming recession, not to mention, you know, sky high inflation and just some of the headwinds we have around the US dollar and our debt levels in this country have a lot of folks concerned. And therefore, the immediate response is, and you see a lot of marketing around this in times like this, that we run to gold. The problem is, when you look back historically, although, you know, gold is a store of value, it just doesn't have the performance and it has more volatility than a properly diversified stock and bond portfolio. And so I think from that standpoint, overweighting in gold, although it kind of may make you feel better temporarily, especially while there's heightened uncertainty and concern, you know, it just long term doesn't pay. And so I would much rather you, you know, be positioned in a in a heavily bond focused portfolio, because as interest rates fall, and they will begin to fall next year, because we're going to need to stimulate this economy, whether we hit a mild recession or a deep recession, or we skate by, we're going to need to stimulate the economy. That means the Fed's going to have to bring interest rates down, that means bond prices are going to go up, we've got good yields right now. And so I think if you're looking long term, and even in your 70s, if the Lord Terry's and you're in good health, you know, the data says life expectancy is 83. I mean, clearly you could live into your 90s or beyond. And so you still have the ability to take a long term perspective with your investments.

And I would just make sure you don't get too heavily concentrated in gold, despite all these TV ads that you're seeing all the time. Does that make sense? Yes, it makes sense. And thank you. All right, Charles, we appreciate it. Thanks for being on the program today. Well, folks, so we're just getting started today.

We've got room for more questions. We'd love to hear from you. The number to call is 800-525-7000.

Again, that's 800-525-7000. Feel free to touch base with us and let's see if we can get you on the program today and tackle whatever you're thinking about financially. This is Faith and Finance Live, where we apply God's wisdom to your financial decisions and choices. I'm Rob West and we'll be right back. Stay with us. Well, it's great to have you with us today on Faith and Finance Live.

Every line is full. Some great questions coming up. So let's dive back in. We're going to head to Noblesville, Indiana.

Oh, excuse me, Alliance, Ohio. Hi, Mike. Go right ahead. Hi, Rob.

Thanks for taking my call. I've got some money and some IRA CDs and I need to move it to some other banks. And I was wondering if you had any information on how to evaluate the financial stability with all the things that are going on with banks these days?

Yeah, yeah. Well, it's a good question. I mean, you know, we usually recommend you go to bankrate.com and, you know, they have a five star rating system. You know, a lot of that, though, is around just their customer service and, you know, how friendly is their app and website and, you know, those kinds of things. You know, in terms of, you know, if you're concerned about a bank stability, I mean, I think the key is having the FDIC or the NCUA insurance, which means that, you know, the U.S. government's essentially going to be the backstop to ensure that depositors have not only safety of their funds, but liquidity access to their funds in the event of the bank failure. You know, the Federal Reserve is constantly doing stress tests, at least on the big banks, and obviously these smaller regional banks, you know, especially those that are highly concentrated in certain sectors of the economy are more vulnerable. And that's what we've seen play out, you know, not only several months ago, but even more recently. But, you know, it's not kind of a systemic problem that's going to have a ripple effect.

Some thought it might. It was really localized and, you know, the government stepped in and did what they have said they would do in terms of protecting depositors and keeping the liquidity flowing. The investors to those banks were left kind of holding the bag, if you will, on their investments, but not those that, you know, had deposits. So I would say if you're concerned about that, you'd probably want to stay with the larger banks as opposed to, you know, maybe some of the more regional type banks. I would certainly check Bankrate.com, look at their rating system.

But I would certainly make sure you have the FDIC or in the case of a credit union, the NCUA insurance, because I believe, you know, that really is effective and it's proven to be whether it was 2008 and 2009 or even just in our more recent isolated bank failures. Is that helpful? That is. Thank you.

Okay. I appreciate it, Mike. Thanks for being on the program today.

Let's head to St. Louis. Hi, Carlos. Go ahead, sir.

Yes, how are you doing? Thanks for taking my call, Ron. So my question is, so I'm trying to pay off my house.

I'm only 45 and I've been talking to my wife and we want to stay in the house for forever. Okay, so God take us home. So my question was, is it okay to take out a loan from my 401k to pay it off and just deal with it and then just continue adding more percentage to my 401k to continue growing my money there?

Yeah, I wouldn't do that. But and I'll tell you why in a second. But let me ask a couple of questions. What is the interest rate on that mortgage?

3.2, I think. Okay. All right. And how long before you have it paid off? Just based on, you know, the current payment schedule you're on? I have like maybe 10 to 15 years left. Okay. And how far off is retirement just based on what you know today? Oh, I'm 45 right now. Okay, so good.

20 years. Yeah. Okay.

Yeah. I mean, you know, here's what I would say, Carlos, I love the idea of you paying off your house. I'd love for you to be debt free as soon as possible. But unless you have just a real conviction from the Lord to be debt free, you know, as soon as possible, I would balance the desire to be debt free with the competing priorities of maintaining proper liquidity, meaning you have access to capital reserves, or what I would call an emergency fund, and the ability to have compounded growth working for you in your retirement accounts between now and retirement.

And we've got to balance all of these things. Because although it's a good thing to pay off the mortgage, if we have to deplete all of our liquid savings, well, that's not good. Because now when the unexpected comes in it, and it will now I've got to put it on the credit card, or if we do it at the expense of our 401k. So the mortgage is paid off, and we got rid of that 3.2% in interest, but we miss out on, you know, 20 years of compounded growth that, you know, let's just take the S&P 500 over the last hundred years, 9% a year on average, you know, so I think we've just got to balance all these things. So my goal for you would be to make sure that that mortgage is paid off, at the very least by the time you retire. The good news is, if you just stay on your current track, and maybe add an extra payment a year or something out of current cash flow, or even if you don't, you just continue like you are, you're going to have this paid off five to 10 years before you retire, which is great. And that means that you're going to enter retirement with that major expense of your mortgage gone. And that's, that's the way it should be. And by doing that, and not pulling from the 401k, you're leaving all that money in the 401k, which does two things.

One, it means it's still available to grow. And I realize we've been in a challenging market. So you might say, Well, why would I want to leave it in the market and just watch it decline?

Well, only if you're looking at the last couple of years, is that true? If you would have looked at the last 10 years before that, in the last 10 years before that, and if I were to keep going, you'd see that, you know, the market has done well, and we would expect it to do that again, once we get past this recession. But if you borrow that money out, you're going to miss it.

You're not going to be there and have the ability for it to grow. So you've got a nest egg down the road. And if you were to separate from the company for any reason, all that becomes taxable.

And if you're under 59 and a half, now you got to pay a 10% penalty on top of it. So where would I go from here? I love your idea of being debt free, but I wouldn't do it at the expense of savings or your retirement assets. So I would stay on your current track. If you get extra money along the way, a bonus or gift or an inheritance, by all means, accelerate your debt payoff.

But let's not try to do it through either depleting your savings or borrowing from your 401k. Does that make sense? Yeah, that makes a lot of sense. I appreciate it. Okay, very good. Listen, Carlos, I love the way you're thinking.

So I don't mean to squelch that in any way. I want you to be debt free. I just want you to balance that against these other competing priorities.

So it seems like you're on the right track, my friend. All the best to you and your wife as you live out your desire to be a faithful steward of God's resources. Well, folks, we're going to take another quick break. When we come back, we'll talk to Kathy in Lakeland. She wants to know some tips for young people on how to help them stay out of debt and manage God's money wisely. And Barry wants to talk about generosity and how he can help others. Let's do that, plus your questions just around the corner. Stay with us. Well, I'm delighted you're joining us today on faith and finance live.

My name is Rob West. And on behalf of this entire team that brings you this broadcast every day, it's our privilege to encourage you and provide Godly wisdom and principles around being a wise and faithful steward of God's money. That's why we're here each afternoon, not so we can enrich ourselves or try to grow our 401ks, although that's not a bad thing if it's done with the right hard posture. The key is to make sure that we're faithful stewards, obedience in the same direction over a long period of time with our hope fixed in the eternal, not the temporal and trying to use money as a tool to accomplish God's purposes, never allowing it to compete with our affection for God. And that's why we gather here on this program.

I hope it's an encouragement to you. And we'd love to tackle your specific financial questions in the context of a biblical worldview today. So if you have a question, give us a call 800-525-7000. It looks like I've got 1234 lines open 800-525-7000. Let's go to Lakeland and talk to Kathy. Go right ahead.

Hi, thank you for letting me on your show. I'm 18 and I have some things like a car and insurance now, and I'm the one paying for them. And I'm also going to school as well. And I've heard of some things that for students will students to do while they're young, which is, of course, invest their money and, of course, get a credit card, but stay out of debt. And I was just wondering, okay, what type of investments? Because I've heard of things like 401k. I've heard of Ross IRA. I've heard of like the IUL through like life insurance. Things like that.

And I was like, okay, well, which one's the best? I know that the IUL is similar to Ross, but like you don't have a limit on it, I assume, I believe. And just things like that. If you could give me some helpful tips, that would be amazing. Well, I'd be delighted to Kathy, first of all, congratulations on starting to think about this at 18 years old. I mean, this is a great time for you to develop some really important disciplines with regard to how you handle money that will not only protect you from really the deceitfulness of riches that you can slip into when you get caught up in the world's way of handling money where, you know, our possessions become our goal and money is an end as opposed to a means to an end.

Meaning a tool, which is ultimately how it should be viewed. And you will also set yourself up really well by thinking about this now because you just have so much time ahead of you if the Lord tarries, you know, you could make some some small systematic investment starting in 18. And it would blow your mind what you could have, you know, in retirement, you know, 50 years down the road, which is just incredible to think about.

So with time on your side, you can really do some powerful things. The other thing I would just really encourage you to do is lean into the whole area of giving and generosity because ultimately, giving is what breaks the grip of money over our lives. And so being able to take God's money and enjoy it and save it appropriately, but also give it to help those in need and support the work of our local church is just one of the great privileges that God gives us as we steward or manage his money. Now, you're asking about investments. And I think that's a great thing for you to, you know, really think about of what you have today, both in savings and in what's coming in, assuming you're working, I would, first of all, carve out what I call an emergency fund. Typically, for somebody who's working, we would say, Okay, take the total of your expenses, and multiply that by three or even six, somewhere in that range is what you want to have an emergency savings. So that way, if you had a disruption in income, you lost a job, you have an unexpected expense, you've got three months or six months worth of expenses there in a liquid savings account ready to go. I would add to that any medium term savings goals. So if you knew, hey, and you know, two years, I want to buy a car, or, you know, four years from now, I need to get an apartment, and I'm going to have to furnish it. And, you know, so you set a goal for the amount that you need to have in savings. And I'd be, you know, I'd set up a separate savings account for that and start, you know, funding that maybe a little bit out of every paycheck as you're able.

But I think you're exactly right in starting to think about investing here as well. Now, you mentioned several types of accounts, Universal Life, you mentioned Roth IRA, you mentioned retirement accounts at work, those are all good things. For you, somebody who's young, with time on your side, I really love the Roth IRA, which that's the only one either a Roth IRA or Roth 401k where you're going to put in after tax dollars. So you work, you make wages or get tips or whatever it is, you pay taxes on it. And then you make the contribution to the Roth. So it goes in after tax, no tax deduction.

But here's the beautiful part, if you leave it in there, and you take it out after 59 and a half, you're not going to pay any tax on in your case, those 50 years of gains or 40 years plus, you know, and so all those gains in the investments are tax free. And then you can convert that to an income stream and start pulling it out a little bit every month in retirement to supplement Social Security and pay your bills. So that's where a Roth can be great. Now, that's just the type of account that has to do with the tax treatment, you can put essentially any investment you want inside of it. And that's where you're probably going to want to look at either what are called exchange traded funds, which are basically indexes that that mirror the stock market indexes, or mutual funds, which typically are more actively managed where you're hiring a money manager with a specific skill set and performance. That is, you know, trying to deploy a strategy that's defined in the objective of the fund and outperform the markets. And there's all kinds of mutual funds. And there's even faith based investing funds that as a believer will ensure that you're investing in things that aren't misaligned with your values, if that's a conviction of yours. I'm going to stop there, though, give me your thoughts on that.

And let me know if you have any questions. Um, okay. About the stock market part. That is something that kind of goes over my head. Yeah. Um, I don't. Well, I under I understand. In school, we did do like a fake stock market simulation. And I guess I failed at that.

So that is something like, um, is there. I understand that it's, I don't have a lot of money, and I'm probably not going to be a millionaire of some sort. But if I were to have someone else, I've heard of financial advisors. Is that something that should happen when I'm older? Because I don't have a handle on it. Are they someone who teaches you about these things?

Or do I have to go to like, finance class? Yeah, a couple of thoughts on that. Do you like to read? I like to listen. Okay, a couple of things. So here's what I want to do. That's funny.

At least you're honest. I want to send you a book that actually has a podcast that go with it, that I think will get you started in the right direction. It's called open hands finance.

And it's put together by just a wonderful couple graduates of Taylor University. And it's for college students. And it will help you understand the dangers of debt, how to set up a budget, but will also explain to you just the importance of investing and how investing works. And in addition to some simple reading, it won't be too much, I promise.

There's some podcasts that go along with it that you'll listen to each week. And I think that will get you started in the right direction to your question. Yes, at some point you will want an advisor.

I think the Bible is very clear about the importance of wise counsel. But in the meantime, there's a lot you can do on your own. And this will get you help going in the right direction. So stay on the line, we're going to get your information. Open hands finance this course in the mail to you.

I think you'll really enjoy it. We'll talk to you soon. We'll be right back. Great to have you with us today on faith and finance live. I'm Rob West, your host for taking your calls and questions.

Every line is full. So let's try to move along as quickly as we can. We're going to go to peoria. Hi, Barry. Go ahead, sir. Good afternoon.

My I had to bet the lady I talked to said just asked the first one of have time to ask the second one. I'm a 63 year old man. I'm single, I do not have internet, smartphone, computer, any of that. I go I'm very generous in my finances, the Lord provides everything I need, and even more. I love giving to help others. I'm just concerned or thinking whether if it's like an idol, I don't do it all the time.

I don't do it to the detriment of myself. But I do love helping others. And I'd like some wisdom, counseled well wisdom on that, because I would literally do without and help others. And I know the Lord provides and takes care, meets all my needs.

Yeah, well, that's a great question, Barry. And I appreciate your transparency and even asking it, you know, first of all, I would say that, you know, we were created in the image of the ultimate giver, God himself, for God so loved the world, he gave his one and only son. So as image bearers of God, we have giving hardwired into our DNA.

And so you're doing what you were created to do. And I would go beyond that and say that some even have the gift of giving. You know, we all have gifts bestowed to us by God, and we have different gifts. And that's why as the body of Christ, we come together and, you know, we more accurately reflect the picture of Christ as we bring those gifts together. And some have the gift of giving.

And I would say it sounds like you in fact have that. Now, with anything, we always need to be checking our hearts. What is our heart motivation? Why am I doing this is because, you know, I want to give and make it a show like the Pharisees because it brings, you know, I like the way people respond to me and wow, look at his giving and look what he did and it's become about me. Or is it really just that I have great joy when I'm giving, which should be expected because again, God is a giver. And I get great joy from being able to help others.

And so I'm just living into that, you know, created order that God has put out there. And I just want to be able to give as the Lord leads. And I'm doing it in a way that makes sense in light of what God has entrusted to me.

And so I'm not, you know, robbing, you know, my family of needs that they have because I'm, you know, giving all of our money away. Although, you know, I would be careful there. And, you know, ultimately that's between you and the Lord. And there's plenty of people that have said over the years, I mean, you know, we're going to just trust the Lord for everything. And, you know, I remember when Bill Bright, the founder of Campus Crusade, you know, he and Vonette gave away one of their biggest retirement accounts to start a school in Russia that ultimately shared the gospel and they made that decision. That was between them and the Lord.

And so I would never get in the way of that. But I would just say, like, if you're violating biblical principles, like you're going into debt to give, I would caution you there. So I think it's ultimately, first, it's about a heart posture. And second, it's giving according to your ability freely and proportionately and not violating any biblical principles along the way. But if it's done, you know, as a cheerful giver and not about you, but ultimately about you being able to bless others and serve the Lord as an act of worship, then I would say, by all means, you continue.

Is that helpful? Yes, sir. I tell you, I get so much joy out of giving, not just financial, but otherwise it excites me as much as being a witness for Jesus Christ.

Yes, yes. Well, I think you're doing exactly what God's word said. I'm reminded of 2 Corinthians 8, 12 to 14, for if the willingness is present, it is acceptable according to what a person has, not according to what he does not have. For this is not the relief of others and for your hardship, but by way of equality at this present time, your abundance, here's the key, your abundance will serve as assistance for their need so that their abundance also may serve as assistance for your need. And, you know, I think if you're giving with that right heart posture and you're giving cheerfully, whether that's time or your talent or your treasure or relationship, whatever it is, that honors the Lord. And I believe that God is pleased by giving done in that way. So I would say just based on, you know, what you're describing, you know, this is entirely appropriate.

And, you know, I think the extent to which you feel like it perhaps could become an idol in your life. We'll pray about that and just ask the Lord to reveal that to you. But apart from that, I would say, you know, continue on. Thank you. All right.

God bless you. Would I be able to ask the other? Yeah, quickly. Go ahead.

Okay. My mom is elderly, she's losing her memory and only the Lord knows how long she has, but she had set aside some money for all of her children to be able to after her passing. I want to be wise.

Well, I don't know. I have no idea how much it will be, but I want to be wise because before about 10, 15 years ago, my dad had passed away. My older brother went and took care of his affairs and sold all his property and everything and his children and his ex-wife got all the money from it. I wasted that money by buying a new car. Unfortunately, I did. I want to be wise with this and to make sure I just need some wisdom. Okay.

Yeah. What I would do is connect with an advisor. I think this is a great opportunity for you, Barry, to have a financial advisor that could be a great accountability for you, could help you with a plan if we are talking about significant wealth, helping you to determine how much to spend freely and enjoy, how much to put away for the future and what an investment strategy looks like and how much to give and how to do that wisely.

So I would head to our website at faithfi.com, click find a CKA and perhaps start a relationship with a certified kingdom advisor there in Illinois that could be a great resource to you once this inheritance comes down. Thanks for being on the program, sir. To Woodstock. Hi, Carl. Go ahead. Hi, Rob.

Thank you so much for taking my call. My wife and I are looking, hopefully, Lord willing, to move out of state in about two years. When we sell our current home, we'll profit a little over a hundred thousand. Also, sometime next year, I'll be receiving a car accident settlement of also around a hundred thousand, a little over.

And when we move out of state, we're wondering whether or not we should use the money to pay cash for a home, or just the money from the sale of the home towards a home and take a small mortgage and invest the money from the settlement. Yeah, yeah. Would you consider yourself on track for retirement, Carl, apart from this two hundred thousand with regard to just your retirement accounts and other investment vehicles? Unfortunately, not at all.

I was disabled about six years ago, and so all of my savings is gone. Okay. All right. And how far out is retirement, just based on what you know today?

Well, for my wife, let's see, about thirteen, fourteen years. Okay. All right. And does she have a retirement plan available to her? She does. She's investing in a 401k with her current place of employment. Okay. How much is she putting into that percentage-wise, do you know?

Ten percent. Okay. All right.

That's great. Yeah, I mean, here's what I would do. You know, I think right now, you know, with interest rates where they are, it probably makes sense for you all to go ahead and, you know, buy this house for cash if you could and not pay, you know, seven percent interest. You know, if it was lower, I would say you could look at investing it or perhaps just maximize, you know, have her fully max out what she can put into the 401k. And then you guys each fund two Roth IRAs every year. And if that meant that that pulled your income down a little bit too low, then you could replace that out of the hundred thousand that you're going to receive from the settlement. So you'd essentially be shifting that money systematically into your 401k and your two Roths over time.

So I think, you know, that could be an option for you. But at these interest rates, I think, you know, if you were going to if we're still in the sevens or even the high sixes, I'd probably just go and pay off that house. Keep your expenses as low as possible. And then just, you know, out of current cash flow with what you would have been sending to the mortgage just over the next 15 years, just fund as much of those long term retirement savings as you can by maxing out her 401k and funding some Roths. And that will allow you to, you know, between your Social Security disability, you know, your tax, your debt free on that, including your house, the amount you're putting in over the next 15 years into her 401k and these two Roths. I think that will allow you to get to retirement in between Social Security, which will eventually switch to and her Social Security plus your nest egg and the fact that you're debt free. Hopefully, that'll, you know, work itself out.

I would also encourage you to connect with an advisor just to do some planning around this as well before you made that final decision. And you can connect with a CCA at our website at faithfi.com. God bless you, Carl.

Thanks for calling today. Lupe, real quick, you're wondering about adding your daughter to your credit card. Is that right? Yes, to my visa or just go to a bank and she would like a debit. She just started working. Are you trying to build credit or are you just trying to teach her how to manage money? Or both?

Actually, both. Yeah, okay. I like the idea of you helping her. I don't want her to get into debt, though. So I like the debit card and helping her get a spending plan together.

I think that makes sense. If you wanted to add her as an authorized user and not give her the card, that will pass your credit to her and help her build credit. But keep in mind, if you have a late payment or any negative credit history, that will go as well. So just be careful there.

But I like the debit card idea and helping her put a spending plan together. Thanks for your call today. Faith in Finance Live is a partnership between Moody Radio and FaithFi. Thank you to Dan, Amy, Robert and Ryan. We'll see you tomorrow. Bye-bye.