4 Keys to Replace Striving with Thriving

Consider the lilies of the field, how they grow.

They neither toil nor spin. Yet I tell you, even Solomon and all his glory was not arrayed like one of these. Matthew 6, 28 and 29. Hi, I'm Rob West. Do you worry a lot about your finances, fretting over things you can't control? Wouldn't it be nice to just relax and trust God? Well, John Putnam joins us today to talk about trusting in God's provision. Then it's on to your calls at 800-525-7000.

That's 800-525-7000. This is Faith and Finance Live, biblical wisdom for your financial journey. Well, it's always a pleasure to have my friend John Putnam back with us. John's a certified financial planner, a certified kingdom advisor, and founder of Smarter Stewardship, a marketplace ministry. John, great to have you back with us. Rob, always good to hang with the cool people at Faith Phi. Well, we love having you, my friend. Hey, as you well know, John, it's all too easy to worry about money, especially when the so-called experts talk about a looming recession.

So how do you counsel folks who've fallen into that trap? Well, Rob, you know, I grew up on a black Angus cattle farm and a lot of fields and we had hay every year and we had these tall flowers that would grow. Now, if you looked at them from the highway, they're beautiful, but my dad called them a weed, but they would just grow and grow. They needed nothing to be that beautiful. And, you know, when I coach and I lead church workshops, I always want to remind believers about God's provision to us and the way these flowers grow to minimize worry.

And you know how the heavenly father feeds them. And, you know, I love the scripture you shared and, you know, you can't be anxious and add a single hour to your life and just think about the flowers and how they grow. And I meant that what I love about this picture in this scripture is that these flowers and these birds that scripture is talking about, they are not striving. You know, I think of striving as being distracted by the moment that you are trying to create. And I think about flowers and birds that are thriving. I think about thriving as being present in the moment that God created.

Oh, I love that. So if that's our heart's desire that we want to replace the struggle of striving, John, what does that look like? Well, look, especially as we come into this season, we've got some particular opportunities. First off, think it's just about the testimony of being present, just being in that financial moment that God gives you. I mean, so often a theme that is counter to this is getting into debt.

The debt accelerates our provision for ourselves. Yet at the same time, it delays God's provision that he has planned for us. So just be present and then be patient. That testimony of being patient, you know, guys, in the hustle and bustle of life. I love the idea of this picture that Jesus, he wasn't ever in a hurry, but he was always intentional to minister to those around him.

So this idea of being patient. And then finally, just this testimony of being generous. There is no better way to combat the struggle of striving and worldly worrying with the thriving by centering your attention on the needs of others. It's exactly what Jesus did. That's so good, John. You know, as we think about this, it's really critical that we understand our role as stewards, isn't it? No question about it. I mean, as stewards, you know, we get to enjoy the peacefulness that everything we have is provided by God. His money, his time, his opportunities, not ours. Now, look, we've got a part to play, Rob, you know that, but we've got to leave room for God to show up in only the ways that he can and do his part in our money and in our life. And you may just be amazed.

I love that, John. We're about out of time. Sum this up for us. I would just say replacing worry and striving with thriving. Focus on this holistic overall provision of where God has you and what God has given you.

Because God is too good and life is too special to let money hold you back. Wow, that is powerful and something we all need to do. I'm talking to myself. It's great advice, John, and really appreciate you stopping by today, buddy.

Always a blessing. That certified kingdom advisor and certified financial planner, John Putnam, he's also founder of Smarter Stewardship. Now, folks, I want you to check it out today. You'll be blessed and encouraged and find a lot of practical help. smarterstewardship.com.

That's smarterstewardship.com. All right, your calls are next. The number, 800-525-7000.

That's 800-525-7000. I'm Rob West and a quick break and then back with much more just around the corner. Stick around. The opinions offered during this program represent the personal or professional opinions of the participants given for informational purposes only.

Any information provided is not intended to replace advice from a financial, medical, legal, or other professional who understands your specific situation. Great to have you with us today on Faith and Finance Live. I'm Rob West and we're looking forward to taking your calls today. 800-525-7000. Again, that number is 800-525-7000.

Our team is standing by. They're ready for you. So give us a call with your financial questions today.

Let's see what you're thinking about and see if we can help you move forward and make a good decision in light of biblical truth. You know, big news coming out of the markets today. Well, the S&P 500, that is the 500 largest companies here in the US, closed at 4840.

Now, why is that significant? Well, that's a record high. Narrowly beating January 2022's prior all-time high of 4830.

So we are at an all-time high. We're officially in a bull market, which might surprise you despite everything else going on around us, both domestically and abroad. Big tech stocks, not surprisingly, led the way with shares of Meta and Nvidia, which is the popular computer tech hardware on graphics and so forth. Each gaining more than 2% today.

Jerry Boyer will be by later in the broadcast will get Jerry's take on this. The S&P's rally today. Why all of the strength in the market? Is it going to keep going higher for here? Why is big tech leading it? And why is this happening now in the midst of high inflation? It's not to mention what's going on overseas in the Red Sea and obviously in the situation with Israel and so much more.

Jerry can weigh in on all of that. You know, folks, as we get started here today, let me remind you why we do this. Why do we talk about money every day? Is it so we can enrich ourselves?

No, that's not it. Is it so we can squeak a little bit more out of our returns on our 401k? Well, that's not a bad thing. But no, that's not the reason that is at the core of this. The reason we talk about money every day is it's really a key responsibility that the Lord has entrusted to us. Everything belongs to him.

The Bible is very clear about that. And therefore, we're his money managers. So once we surrender our lives to Jesus as our Lord and our Savior, it's really about stewardship from that point forward. What have you done with what you've been given? And you've been given a lot. You've been given, first of all, eternal life.

I mean, that's the biggest one. But then we're stewards of our time and our relationships. We're stewards of God's Word. We're stewards of so much, including God's money. You see, we are the money managers for the King of Kings.

And so it's one of God's good gifts. You remember, it's not that money is the root of all evil. No, it's the love of money. It's when it competes with our affection and our devotion to God. It's when money becomes our treasure as opposed to God.

Well, we want to counteract the messages of this world and really make God our true treasure. With God on the throne of our lives and then money a tool to accomplish God's purposes, that's a game changer. It really does change our perspective. It reorients us from the temporal, the here and now, which, by the way, is fleeting.

The Bible calls it but a vapor. And resets our sights on the eternal, that which will last. And ultimately, when we live with that perspective, when we put money in its proper place and God in His rightful place, and we use this good gift called money as a tool to accomplish God's purposes, and we're enjoying it, and we're providing with it, and we're giving it generously to meet the needs of those on our path down the street and around the world, well, then, you know, money is accomplishing the purpose for which it was intended. And it changes our perspective.

It reorients our thinking from our own little mini kingdoms to the ultimate kingdom, God's kingdom, which is where our sights should be set in the first place. Well, that's why we do this program every day. That's why we talk about money every day. And we're delighted that you're along with us as we do that, because this is a program about what you're facing in your financial life. So, what do you have that you're dealing with today?

What would you like to talk about as you live, give, owe, and grow? We'd love to know about it. The number to call today is 800-525-7000.

That's 800-525-7000. And if you'd like to send us an email, you can do that as well on our website at moodyradio.org slash finance. There's a form there that you can use to submit your questions, and we'll look forward to taking those. All right, let's dive in today, and we're going to begin in Lowell, Indiana.

Ann, how can I help? Hi, thank you for taking my call. Yes, ma'am.

Yes, I just have one question. I'm considering taking a personal caregiver's position. I'm not with a company. I'm just an individual, and a woman I know has asked me if I could care for her 94-year-old husband while she takes, you know, trips to the grocery store, doctor visits, and things like that. So it's not a full-time position. Neither is it a part-time position. And I'm concerned about the liability issues, such as if he falls, could I be sued, or if there's an accident, so things like that.

Yeah. Well, there's no doubt, and you can become a paid caregiver in Indiana. You know, I think the key is, you know, as your question alludes to, what is your liability?

I would not be the person to weigh in on that. That would really be a question for an attorney. I'm not an attorney. And so what I would recommend is that you reach out to somebody who can give you legal counsel to determine what is your liability, what insurance could you buy that could cover you or offset that liability, and then just get some counsel so you'd know what your exposure is. You then could price out a policy that could protect you from that liability given the work that you're doing. And you'd obviously have to factor that into the, you know, the real cost of doing business, which is what you're doing here, and just make sure that, you know, the compensation that you'd be receiving is still worthwhile given some of those extra costs, including, you know, a policy that would, you know, offset your liability.

It wouldn't eliminate it, but it certainly could offset it. But getting that legal counsel and ultimately a quote on a professional liability policy of this kind to make sure that you have some coverage I think is really the next step for you. If you don't have somebody or you can't find somebody through your church, what I would do is reach out to a certified kingdom advisor there in your area and ask for a referral.

And typically they'll have a godly attorney that they work with that perhaps works in this area. So thanks for your call, Ann. I love that you want to do this and be compensated for it.

It would be a wonderful ministry in addition to a job, but I'm delighted to hear that you're also thinking through the potential risks associated with it. God bless you. Thank you for your call today. The number to call is 800-525-7000. It looks like we have a few lines open today.

Let's go to Grayslake, Illinois. Hi, Barbara. How can I help? Yes, thank you very much. I'm like 80 years old and I'm not good on budgeting. And what I would like to know is I've heard you talk about the envelope system and I think I could manage that. How do I go about being able to get that? Barbara, were you thinking the digital version that would be on your phone or would you rather a tactile actual envelope system?

I'm not good on electronic things. Okay, yeah, no problem. So let's do this. I'm going to connect you with a certified Christian financial counselor who can help you think through how to get that set up using physical envelopes. So it'll be our gift to you. You stay on the line and we'll get someone in contact with you.

More to come right after this. Stay with us. Delighted to have you with us today on Faith and Finance live here on Moody Radio. I'm Rob West. We're taking your calls and questions today at 800-525-7000. We've got lines open.

We know you have questions. So call right now 800-525-7000. Let's head back to the phones.

To North Carolina we go. Michael, how can I help you, sir? Hi. Yeah, about maybe four or five months ago, I don't know what the caveat for the question was, but you had mentioned for budgeting for food, grocery store food, and you said 12%. And I had kept track for a couple of months and I was on the money like maybe a dollar off every month.

I thought, this is great. You know, I felt like it was a good guide, but I wondered with the other categories, if you had any kind of, you know, what percentage of your income should go to, I don't know, everything else, you know, your budget, you know, entertainment, car expenses, insurance, mortgage, blah, blah, blah. Do you have some kind of synopsis of a brief listing of that? Yeah, you know, it's a good question. I'm not sure on our website if we have an actual kind of detailed listing.

I mean, there's a number of them out there. If you just search for budget guidelines on the web, you'll find a number of kind of rules of thumb. I'm hesitant to give you any other categories because I hit that one on the head, Michael, I might not get as close. You know, typically what we say is for housing, you know, you want to try to keep that under 25% as a helpful percentage. That would be principal interest taxes and insurance, and then another 5% taking you up to 30% when you add, you know, the utilities. Another helpful guideline would be, you know, food, as you said, 12, which is right in the middle of our guideline of 10 to 15%.

You know, another one would be transportation, another 10 to 15%. So those are good guidelines. But you know, I think while these are helpful percentages, I think the big idea is that, of course, they always need to, you know, be tweaked to fit your unique needs and situations. And, you know, depending on the part of the country you live in, depending on, you know, what your actual budget looks like, the bottom line is we need to balance it. And by balancing it, I mean, let's make sure we have that cushion or surplus, because that's ultimately what's going to drive your ability to accomplish your God given goals, whether that's increasing your giving, saving for the future, being able to, you know, reduce debt, whatever it is that you've decided you'd like to do. But yeah, I think those guidelines can be helpful in particular, just to say, how am I doing, right? It's kind of a barometer to say, wait a minute, if I'm spending a whole lot more than the budget guideline in this category, maybe I'm missing something or overpaying or, you know, I need to go out and shop my insurance, something like that. So, you know, hopefully those, you know, will just serve in that way as a guideline, and then you can use them to kind of gauge where you're at. But at the end of the day, I think making sure you get that spending plan that works for you, that allows you to, you know, cover those things that you not only get a bill for, but the discretionary items, the non-recurring items, and then do all of that by living with enough cushion or margin, you know, to cover your long term goals. Does that make sense?

Oh, sure. So you just say, look up budget guidelines, and that might give me some kind of a, you know. Yeah, or budget percentages. I mean, for instance, you know, Dave Ramsey, our friend, he has a whole, you know, budget guideline template that has a range for every category.

You could look his up. There's a number of them out there, you know, that will give you some rules of thumb. But I would say, you know, the 10 to 15 for food savings, transportation, those are all good estimates, 25 to 30 percent on housing, depending upon whether or not you cover utilities and other expenses. One percent a year of the value of your home for home maintenance is another good guideline. Those would be some some general rules of thumb.

But if you want to dig a little deeper, I think that's where an Internet search will help. Hey, Michael, thanks for being on the program today, sir. We appreciate it. 800-525-7000. We've got some lines open today, and we'd love to tackle your financial questions. Let's go to Idaho. Hi, John. How can we help, sir? Hey, Rob, thanks for taking my call. Sure.

Question for you. I'm 40 years old, married, no kids, have about a million dollars in household assets. I have no debt and want to start investing towards retirement. I wonder is, is the is an IRA the best place to start at my age? And the follow up question would be, considering someone in my position with what we have, is life insurance still something we should consider purchasing?

Yeah, those are great questions, John. So first of all, where is the million dollars? Is that in a in a taxable account, a taxable environment?

That's basically tied up between cash and property that we own free and clear. Okay. All right. So how much of that is liquid? About 300.

Okay. And that's just in a savings account or savings and checking something like that? That's in a high yield savings account right now, because I do use cash to play with real estate. I'm a contractor by trade. And basically, I've got to the point where I have by buying and selling properties and fixing and flipping and that kind of stuff. So I do like to keep some money laying around that we can play with.

Okay, so let's try to bucket this out for a moment. If we were to say your emergency fund is three to six months of expenses, how much are you guys spending on your lifestyle on a monthly basis, roughly? Yeah, so right now I have 30k set aside as emergency fund based on 5k a month. Okay, perfect. And then beyond that, how much do you need in your kind of real estate fund to do your projects? 250. Okay. So I mean, so that, you know, eats up most of it.

I mean, that would leave in this case about 20,000 left. Do you have a small business that you own? Are you self employed?

Yeah, self employed. So I've looked into the SEP and I've looked into the self employed 401k. I could probably throw based upon my income, I could probably throw like 20 to 30k a year in this in a new investment. And okay, wondering, obviously that exceeds IRA limits, but just wondering what the best way to do it is.

Yeah, I like that. I mean, I'd probably fully fund the Roth for you and your wife, the Roth IRA, your age, you can put 7000 a piece or 14. And then I'd spill over to the SEP. And then I love the fact that you're diversified between, in this case, stocks in the Roth and the SEP with some high quality mutual funds. And then the real estate, which diversifies you among asset classes. Obviously, you're really skilled and you've done well love that you're debt free.

I think the key right now is to get some money in stocks and bonds for retirement. Hang on the line. We'll talk a bit more off the air.

Stay tuned. It's great to have you with us today on faith and finance live. Hey, coming up in the next segment, Jerry Boyer will stop by we'll get Jerry to weigh in on the S&P 500, hitting an all time high today.

Fascinating, despite some of the headwinds we have out there, economically, that's to come just around the corner. Before the break, we were talking to John in Idaho. He's 40 years old. He and his wife have a million dollars in assets, about 250,000. It's earmarked for buying and selling real estate.

He's a contractor, so he does that as a business. Got a fully funded emergency fund, about 20,000 overfunded in that. And then about 700,000 in real estate. Just quickly, John, that 700,000, how much of that is in your personal residence versus investment properties that you're either renting or flipping? Currently, that's all in our personal residence. Okay.

All right. So, as I was saying, I think the key is I love that you've got real estate, you can build that portfolio, you're buying and flipping. That's great, but let's start to take some surplus as it comes and fund the Roth and the SEP IRA.

So now we've got both asset classes working for us, stocks and real estate. I think at some point you'll need to answer the question, how much is enough, both with lifestyle spending and accumulation, because you guys are debt-free and obviously doing well. And you've still got, let's say, 25 years before God were to redirect you in retirement to whatever your next calling is that could be perhaps without pay. Now, the second part of your question was, okay, in my situation, do I need life insurance on me payable to my wife? I've got this million dollars in assets. And I would say yes, because you haven't reached yet your enough point.

And here's what I mean by that. Let's say you were to pass away and your wife continues to live in your home. Well, that's now her residence, that's not an investment property.

So what's left? Well, she'd basically have $300,000 left. And if she were to just invest that with an advisor and pull 4% a year, that's going to give her $12,000 a year. That's not going to cover her bills, not to mention continuing to save for the future. So even though you guys are doing great, you're debt-free, what we're insuring your life for payable to her is the loss of income that you're generating for her to pay the bills and maintain her lifestyle and whatever God has called her to do in this next season. So I think for that reason, you still need 10 to 12 times your income, what you're providing to the family on an annual basis, 10 to 12 times that in the form of a death benefit.

I recommend for somebody in your situation, term life, it's the least expensive, allows you to get proper coverage so that if you pass away, she doesn't have to sell the house unless she wants to and she can essentially take the death benefit, turn that into income that would allow her to maintain her lifestyle, continue to save for the future so that when she reaches 65, you know, she's not only been able to keep her lifestyle consistent, but she's got enough built up that will sustain her. You know, until the Lord calls her home, which she could be 90 or older. Does that make sense though? Yeah, Rob, that makes perfect sense. I appreciate the different perspective because I always just thought, hey, we're in great shape, like you would own the house free and clear, you'd have some money, you know, but the way you spelled it out seems to make more sense to go down that avenue.

We're still very young yet and we should do that. Yeah. I mean, even if she downsized and instead of a $700,000 home, she bought a $400,000 home, which is the average home in this country. Now she's got 600,000, the 300,000 in cash plus the 300,000 she pulled out of this house.

I mean, even that at 4% a year only gives her 2000 a month and I suspect, you know, she's going to need more than that. So, you know, we're looking at income replacement when we look at the need for life insurance to offset that risk. Hey, John, thanks for your call today, bud. We appreciate it.

Let's go to Spokane. Hi, Sue. How can we help you? Hi, thank you very much for taking my call. I just wanted to give a brief testimony after Mr. Putnam's comments.

Yeah. I was so impressed with that. So I'm 71 and in my early fifties, I went through a financially devastating divorce and then at 57 due to downsizing in colleges, I was college administrator. I lost my career job. I went through some really severe financial difficulties as I had paid off a debt consolidation from my divorce. And so my savings was gone and I literally was right next to being homeless, could barely keep the power turned on. And that's when God said, you are mine and I want you back.

Amazing. Wonderful that God called me back. But when I said, OK, he said, will you trust me? And I said, OK. And he said, I want you to trust me with your finances. And I want you to tithe from that three hundred dollar unemployment check that you're going to get.

And I said, but Lord, the power's turned off. How could I possibly give to this church that doesn't need my thirty dollars? And kicking and screaming, I put that thirty dollars in the plate at church and it turned my life completely around. And since that point, I just, you know, if anyone is doubting, you know, this that the Lord can can provide, I, you know, at 20 years later, almost 20 years, 15 years later, I don't have a lot, but I have some money in savings. I've got a good income. I have a home that's mine again. And, you know, we just don't trust God with our money.

A lot a lot of people are really hesitant to. And I know I was. So I just wanted to say that that, you know, if anyone is saying, well, but I don't believe it. I just want to say. God is amazing.

Wow, Sue, thank you for that testimony. You know, it it just strikes me. I mean, of course, God doesn't need our money. He owns the cattle on a thousand hills, but he wants our hearts. He wants us to trust him. His promises are true. He can be trusted.

He is our provider. And you, in a very difficult time, demonstrated that in a very real way. And that was difficult. And yet God was faithful.

And now here you are on the other side of it. You know, still making your way, not in a situation of abundance by any stretch. And yet you continue to see God's faithfulness, his provision to you. I'm confident, Sue, somebody needed to hear that word of encouragement that you shared today and is perhaps in that dark, desperate situation that you were in in your 50s and early 60s, not knowing where to turn, not knowing where to you were going to be provided for. And yet in the midst of it continued to trust God even in your giving, which is that ultimate act that says, you know what, if I believe it's dependent on me, then I'm going to take every last dollar and I'm going to hold it with a tight, clenched fist. But if I truly believe God is my provider, then even in that difficult spot where I don't know where the next meal is going to come from, I can still hold it loosely because I'm trusting that God is going to continue to provide. And that's not easy.

And yet you did it. And here you are telling that story of God's faithfulness to everyone here today. Sue, I appreciate you calling in and sharing that. That's a blessing to me. And I know it has been to so many others. Thank you for being on the program today.

May the Lord bless you, Sue, and call back any time. You know, folks, that's why we do what we do. I'm so glad that Jon Putnam was able to join us today and share that word of encouragement.

If you happen to miss that, you can check out this broadcast after the fact at moodyradio.org. What Jon shared today was a great reminder that God can be trusted. And just like the birds of the air, we can know that he'll provide for us.

A break and then back with more after this. Stay with us. I'm so thankful to have you with us today on Faith and Finance Live. I'm Rob West. Joining us today in this segment of the broadcast, our good friend Jerry Boyer. He's president of Boyer Research. He serves as our resident economist here on this broadcast and joins us each Friday with his insightful analysis. Jerry, we're going to get to the World Economic Forum, which is just wrapping up its annual meeting. And if you're going to have a meeting, you might as well go to Davos, Switzerland to do it.

That's my philosophy. Right, right. We'll get to that in a moment, but let's first talk about the markets, Jerry. A new all-time high on the S&P 500, so everything must be fine again, which is good news, right? Yeah, but of course we're near all-time highs on gold and on cryptocurrencies, too. So there's this sort of sense like, all right, markets are up and that's usually good, right? But then what's going on over there in the corner where disaster hedges and tax hedges and some of these other kind of risk assets, you know, assets that are bets against the system are also up. And I think it kind of tells the story, which is that markets are up because it is believed that the Fed is going to start cutting rates in May. Markets believe that they're going to start cutting in the spring.

There has been a real significant shift in probability that they're going to cut rates. That means pumping money into the system. Pumping money into the system pushes markets up.

Why? Because the central bank pumps money into the system through markets. I mean, technically they could have set up a system where when they inject money into the system, it just goes into your bank account and my bank account. Like they expand the money supply and we get like an extra $5 per hundred, you know, just directly deposited into our account. But that's not what happens. They do it through financial markets, so that's where the money goes and that's what pushes it up. So how do we know that? Well, there's a couple of reasons. One, all the markets are up, including the bond market.

So that's an indication. When people shift from bonds to stocks, it's like, well, bonds are risk averse. You know, they're not scary. Stocks are a little scarier. So if we shift to stocks, we're not so frightened anymore. But when everything goes up, you know, that means that the Fed is pumping money into the system or expected to pump money into the system. The other part of that story is that's inflationary.

And so what happens is inflation and debt crisis, hedges like gold are also up too, as are cryptocurrencies. So the whole thing basically says not healthy economy, more like the party's going to continue. Remember what I told you about the Fed chairman who was in a party and a woman said, what do you do for a living, sir? And he was there near the punch bowl and he says, when the party gets too exciting, it's my job to take away the punch bowl.

Well, they're putting the punch bowl back and they're pouring a lot of extra liquor into it. So the party's going to get more exciting, but maybe we just take away people's car keys. In other words, there's a little sense of, hey, wait a minute, this isn't real prosperity.

This is easy money. And so, yeah, the party's continuing. But smart people are kind of moving over to the edge and buying gold and cryptocurrencies and other hedges because we're not so sure this is going to go on for that much longer. Yeah, and it's ironic because all of that led to the inflation that we experienced 9% a couple of years ago. Well, and there it is, because that's the dilemma that they create.

Essentially, it's like addiction. They create the dilemma where you have to get off easy money, you have to go through a lot of pain. That pain is typically a recession. But we don't want pain, so we want easy money. But we don't want inflation that comes from easy money. So we go back and forth because we're not willing to kind of bite the bullet and take the pain that's involved with really dealing with the problem.

And so that's why you don't create bubbles in the first place, right? With any bad behavior, that's why you don't do the foolish thing in the first place. Because if you do really foolish things for a long period of time in finance, just as in every other area of life, there's no easy way out. Yeah, that's well said, Jerry. All right, let's talk about the World Economic Forum. You had an op-ed out in the World I think this week about Davos and that meeting. Tell us what their theme was and what's your analysis on what just took place. Well, Davos is the gathering of the global elite. When we talk about the global elite, that's their party.

I don't know what's in the punch bowl, but I think there's been a little too much of it. So they have a ski party every year on what Thomas Mann called the Magic Mountain in his famous novel. And there they come together and they plan our futures for us. Isn't that nice of them? I really appreciate that.

I really needed somebody to plan. Now Christians know who plans our future, but for the most part this is a secular elite. So they don't think there's anybody in charge, so they think they need to be in charge.

So Davos loves you and has a wonderful plan for your life and they're going to take care of us. By the way, all the crises we just talked about, the inflationary crisis, the bubble crisis, you know, that came from easy money, from a global shutdown. I mean, that's them, right? I'm not a conspiracy guy, by the way. I mean, this isn't a conspiracy. There is a ruling class.

Most societies have a ruling class. Well, this is when they go skiing together so we can see them all in one place. They've made a lot of mistakes. And I think what's happened is those mistakes have accumulated so much that we don't believe in them anymore. Now they believed in themselves long after we stopped believing in them, but it's now finally gotten through to them that we don't believe them anymore. So they're trying to rebuild trust.

That's their theme, rebuilding trust. Not that they're actually changing anything, not that they still think that, you know, they still think big government is the solution to everything. They still think there's too many people on planet Earth.

We just have too many folks and we have a population crisis and we need to be sustainable. They think all the things they've always thought, but they do know that we don't trust them anymore. One of the things that was really interesting is the new Argentine president, who I believe certainly talks like one, and a free market guy. They invited him to speak. Maybe they thought they could co-opt us.

It didn't work. He let loose about people who want to be part of a privileged class, about people who are greedy for power. He talked about abortion. He talked about all of the issues. He talked about inflation. He talked about all the issues right there in the lion's den.

That kind of tells us if he's that bold in that situation, that crowd really has lost credibility. By the way, for this article, I did something interesting. I went back to 2007. Every year they come out, you know, kind of like the groundhog, you know, like Phil. Punxsutawney, yeah. I should know that because Punxsutawney is real near to where I live.

We're near Phil's home. So every year they come out and they say, these are the risks for next year. So I went back and looked at the turning points. They didn't see anything coming in 2007. They were not talking about a financial crisis before in 2019. They were not talking about a pandemic.

They didn't start talking. They weren't even talking about a pandemic in 2020 when it was already starting on their risk matrix. They didn't start to talk about inflation as a risk until 2023.

Any shopping mom knew about inflation two years before the Davos guys. So they have a pretty bad track record of predicting the future. The basic bargain they offer us is, give us power and we'll give you peace and safety. Kind of like Thessalonians 5.

First Thessalonians 5. But they didn't deliver safety. They delivered chaos. And so they are to some degree deposed from credibility. The only question for me is, what are we going to counter that with? Crazy populist angry conspiracy theories or credible Christian worldview witness as an alternative to their vision?

I think the future depends on whether we as Christians deliver a sane and credible alternative. Wow. That's well said, Jerry. And we know that's ultimately why this country performed like it has. It was God's favor and hand and provision in light of adherence to a biblical worldview and principles, right?

Yeah. What's interesting is Javier Malay, the president of Argentina, when he described his philosophy, you know what he did? He said that we are endowed by our creator with certain unalienable rights. I thought that was beautiful to see that man from Argentina, a country that was once great economy, but then sunk into poverty. Quoting in Spanish, the Declaration of Independence, giving credit to the creator for our rights.

That was just an unbelievable moment to me. Now, will the Davos people listen? I don't know. I mean, they think of themselves as kind of beyond humanity. They're nationless. They're post religion. They're kind of a new species of evolved humanity. So I don't know whether they're going to listen, but the truth was spoken to them.

And I thought that was just a beautiful thing. It is progress when we figure out that the people who are most ambitious with the most Ivy League degrees are not necessarily the wisest people. In fact, that has become almost a contrarian indicator of wisdom.

Yeah, that's exactly right. All right, Jerry, we've got about a minute left. Let's put a bow on this. What would you say to the average person listening today who's hearing you describe this and nodding their heads as you talk about the need to return to God's word and to place our trust in him? Where should they go from here?

Well, they should do it in their lives and I should do it in my life and you should do it in yours, especially you should do it in yours. So, look, God is the one who takes care of the Tower of Babel. I mean, we can't fight the Davos guys, really. I mean, we can resist, we can live in a resistant way to global power like that. But, you know, only God is big enough to beat.

Only Christ defeated Caesar. That's what it takes. But we can defeat that impulse in our own lives.

We can live with frugality. We can tithe it or give offerings to God to calibrate ourselves to say that we know who the real master of the universe is. We know who's really on the mountaintop.

It's not skiing billionaires. There's a higher mountain and there's someone at that mountaintop and he's thundering and we worship him. We know who's in charge so we can be obedient in our lives no matter what happens. He's got the continents, the nations, they're a drop in the bucket to him.

We don't have agency at that level, but we have the ability to obey in our lives and our families and in our churches. Wow, Jerry, it's a great place to finish. It's actually where we started today with our friend John Putnam talking about God's promises and his provision.

And if he feeds the birds of the air, he'll certainly feed us when our lives are surrendered to him. Jerry, God bless you, my friend. Thanks for stopping by today. God bless you.

All right. That's Jerry Boyer. You can read his articles at World News Group. You can also check him out on social media. He joins us each Friday on this broadcast. Folks, that's going to do it for us. Faith in Finance Live is a partnership between Moody Radio and FaithFi. Thank you to Jim and Taylor and Tahir and Amy. We'll see you tomorrow. Bye bye.