The Secret to Financial Freedom

He was biblical wisdom for your for the decisions together. We want to try to hold God's money, loosely, generously, and find contentment and joy pursue God's purposes using money as a tool.

Let's do that together as we chat today.

All the lines are full some great questions folks going in from literally all over the country working at the Chicago, Illinois. Next, in fact, we got several folks in Chicago ready to go. Doug Europe first docket helps her third hey Rob, thanks for getting my call if want you know I appreciate your wisdom and financial matters.

It's really a blessing. Anton even mentioned I get a call within the past couple weeks so I had some cash. I think he to $10,000 and was wondering the best place to put it just for saving sorts of very liquid and you given him an online tool. I believe for I didn't write it down and I'm wondering if you could remind me of that, I'd be happy to Doug so couple of thoughts.

One would be if you're looking for a high-yield savings account. I like the online banks, primarily because there are no fees so they don't have monthly maintenance fees are no transaction fees so they try to eliminate all the fees because they want to pay the cost of the brick-and-mortar banks and they pass that savings on in the form of higher interest rates for their savings accounts.

So I like to use the online banks for my FDIC insured savings and because there are no fees. You could even have multiple savings account for various savings goals. The three that I like right now are Marcus switches the retail operation of Goldman Sachs Marcus.com Ally Bank and capital one 360. All three of them pay the best rates going right now with FDIC insurance. No fees there. Great customer service. If you're wanting just know to look for the best rates for any kind of loan be at the mortgage credit cards, personal loans, car loans, there's two websites I would recommend for that one is bank rate.com bank rate.com there.

One of the leaders in the space tracking the best rates for all those various types of loans and the other is nerd wallet.com.

They do a great job with that as well so you're looking for savings account. I use one of those three. If it were me, I can wanting to find the best rates for any kind alone, use either by greater nerd well set some good pictures.

Thank you so much appreciate your help.

I appreciate your call. Marilyn not ask a couple questions related to advisors that Marilyn has one related to a certified kingdom advisor. How can I help yesterday in the course of the conversation is concerned about not getting a good return. The best returns come from investments casinos gun from tobacco but I told him I was interested in that it all is looking for a more conservative, socially comfortable and responsible.

He almost want to abort the conversation. It may make like ESG environment something else and governance kind of account and he said that he would send my account to somebody else if he was that if he can't wait to how are those related and what recommendations do we have there, but not being in a vice investment but trying to get some return on something responsible now.

I love this cluster there's a lot of pieces to that.

Let's unpack that Marilyn's number one of the good news is that there is now an opportunity through what I call faith driven or faith-based investments for you to have your values reflected in the investments in your portfolio so as an owner of the company whether that's through direct stock ownership work through mutual funds or exchange traded funds urine odor very small owner very small percentage but you're an owner and the companies you invest in. The question is one of those companies doing and are they companies you want to be aligned with with God's capital that's been entrusted to you. Well, as believers, we have the opportunity to form our own convictions about how we want to invest God's money. I don't think there's a necessarily a right, wrong, or wrong, you are right way or wrong way. I think it's ultimately between you and the Lord.

But if you want to avoid companies that are you involved in activities that you believe are misaligned with your Christian values like some of the industries you just referenced then you can avoid those altogether. If you have the right advisor who can do that for you.

So the avoid pieces one part of this, the engage or embrace people piece would be another where, instead of just avoiding companies doing things that don't align with your values you're actually where the advisor is actually selecting companies for you to invest in that are actually having either a kingdom your social outcome creating human flourishing and making the world rejoice those kinds of things. All of this rolls up under something called faith-based or faith driven investing. Now what he's describing is ESG which is and your faith-based investor would be a subset of that the environmental, social and governance investments are growing rapidly, but they're not always aligned with kingdom values, they really are prone promoting again, environmental issues, social issues are governance issues that may or may not line up with your ideology. So I think what you need to find and what you will be most happy with. Given what I'm hearing is an advisor who can deploy not necessarily an ESG portfolio but a faith-based investment strategy and in order to do that I would find a certified kingdom advisor in your area and when you interview them. I would say listen, I'm looking for faith-based investments. Can you offer that and many of them do, and I think that will give you exactly what you said makes sense during yes, go to our website moneywise.org and click find a seat KA were actually going to be enhancing that search in the couple coming months were you can say specifically, I want to see Kay does faith-based investing, but in the meantime, just find a CK asked that question many of them do some bill you'll find out very quickly. Marilyn, this is moneywise thanks for tuning in the moneywise live with us today. Take your calls and questions on anything financial to trifecta the phones just before the break we were talking about advisors and Ron wants to continue the conversation run I can help you. Looks like we just lost all of our phones that happens periodically not very often, but it does happen and so while we try to get to those folks back on the line who will take some emails today. Just backup for second we pull up some emails here and remind you why we do this program you you might be asking the question periodically when you hear us come on the air every afternoon to talk about money. Why talk about money from a biblical perspective that every day is that really something we should focus on is this really just about to building bigger barns is about making a little bit more money, or is there another reason why we do this in the bottom line is the reason we do this every day is because it's important to God and when we look through the Council of Scripture we see very clearly that this is on God's heart yelled the money conversation.

Handling money is something that's referenced thousands of times in the Bible and I believe the reason for that is because, well, at least in my experience it's one of the primary competitors for Lordship and we think about handling God's money. We are often looking at our spending decisions in light of how the world says we should use our money because it's ours when in fact a biblical worldview says it all belongs to him and we should be thoughtful, prayerful about how were going to use his money because in fact were stewards and when we think about it that way.

We realize that even how we handle money ultimately has a ripple effect into our own spiritual life feel of the late Larry Burket used to say that the way we handle money is the clearest indicator and what's going on in our lives spiritually let wasn't his idea that was originally Jesus I did what he said where your treasure is, there your heart will be also.

So far, heart follows our money then this is really a big deal, and money is ultimately a tool to accomplish God's purposes. The question is, are we happy with the way God's resources are being used and perhaps we made some mistakes in the past. We all have. The question is how do we move forward as a steward of God's resources, and I think that's were all trying to accomplish together. I think we got our phone lines back so we'd love to hear from you. The numbers 800-525-7000 will go to try to go to Ron again in Chicago and run appreciate your patience.

How can I help you sir. Yeah, my question is an Ellen, thanks for taking my call. Sure my question is what is the difference between a kingdom advisor that you talk about quite often and an advisor like right now I have an Edward Jones advisor because of work and I've heard a lot about fiduciaries, what are the less the difference between the great question. You know, here's the key. We do talk about certified kingdom advisor a lot and it's because I really think it's important that the advisor you're working with, related to your money for all the reasons I just mentioned about the role of money in our lives that your advisor understands God's heart as it relates to financial decision-making and the role of money and that's really why we recommend the designation. Now, does that mean that traditional non-kingdom advisor is bad in the kingdom advisor certified kingdom advisor is good. No, I'm not saying that I'm just saying they're different in the sense that a non-kingdom advisor noncertified kingdom advisor would be someone who typically unless they're a believer and really have pursued this kind of education on their own, they would be really ill offering investment or financial advice that's based on just the financial side alone without the understanding that God's word brings clear planning differentiators into the equation before looking at just the financial side we might miss the fact that when it comes to retirement view of the Bible takes a different approach than the culture in terms of how we think about being in service to the Lord throughout the whole of our life, we might approach debt differently if we don't understand a biblical worldview where there is clear warnings in Scripture around the use of debt.

It's not a sin, but we understand the borrower becomes the lender's life that we would approach, perhaps giving and generosity differently if we don't understand the Council of Scripture because that starts with the idea that we were created in the image of the ultimate giver God himself. It might mean we'd approach investing differently and wealth transfer differently. So really the key Ron for a certified kingdom advisor is not only have they met the experience requirements which most advisors have in the technical training and in the regulatory review but they've gone to a higher level to be educated at an extensive level to the biblical underpinnings for financial decision-making and in addition to that, are there held to higher character and integrity standards with pastor references and client references so I think that's really the key again doesn't mean you can get great advice from somebody who doesn't have the CK designation.

You absolutely can. But if you're wanting somebody who necessarily understands God's heart and can bring that biblical counsel.

That's where the CK designation comes in. You ask about a fiduciary and that's a word there were hearing a lot more about in financial services and it's an important term because it just simply means that a fiduciary is a person that acts on behalf of another person and has a legal requirement to do so.

So in the case of a financial advisor who's a fiduciary. They have to put the clients interests above their own. Why is that important. Well if your advisor is a fiduciary someone who's managing your money, he or she is not able to select an investment because it pays more to them because that would be violating their fiduciary responsibility to you.

They are only responsible for your interest, which means they have to select the of the investment that's can be best suited for you. So I think you know that's an important term.

I would recommend you have a fiduciary and you whether or not you choose to have a certified kingdom advisor would just really come down to the the things that I described moment ago. Does that make sense and I appreciate your time now absolutely wrong. Thank you for your calls to reap her grateful for your listening going today. Karen is in Spokane Washington.

Karen, thank you for your patience. I can help you. I had a question on currently taking Social Security I took in 865. I am now back and I have a feeling that this next year will be higher than possibly one of the state to figure my social security way to get that we figured if you go back into the workplace happens automatically, so it's automatically calculated each year. Karen based on what they call your high 35 so if you earn more this year than you did in any of the other 34 years, you may have worked your benefit will automatically increase so the year get to be in a situation where if that's the case that's automatically going to come through in your check as it's recalculated okay perfect.

I did not I needed to do something about that. So that's great thank you very much and what have you reached full retirement age on full retirement would have been 6655 hirings that had the codes and everything I wasn't able to find a job, but you are all have 66 now is that right because once you reach your full retirement age, then you're able to earn as much is one without your benefits being reduced if they were reduced because you're earning more than 18,900 you'll get that back, eventually.

But once you reach full retirement age are clear as much money as you not affect benefits.

Hope that helps. We appreciate you call the same as much regular money was not thanks for joining us today and moneywise lined up with the wisdom your financial decisions you haven't downloaded the moneywise app you can do so in your app store Sutra moneywise biblical finance you could take this program on the go.

Listen live or listen to any of our broadcast archives. You can read all of our great articles and podcasts. We aggregate from 15 different places. The leading voices in Christian finance today all in one place. It's all right there in the moneywise app.

We have our moneywise community work. Folks are posting questions. Getting answers from each other and our moneywise coaches and there's our money management system built-in where you can pick from one of three approaches to managing your spending plan.

There's one that's detailed one that's more directional one that's hands-off one that's more hands on whatever fits for you. You can set it up and manage your spending plan to stay on top of your budget throughout the month it's all in the moneywise app you can download it today again had to your app store and search for moneywise biblical finance puts it back to the phone. Scott was in Chicago, Illinois wanting to ask about bonds Ganga red hello there my call and call her love your show. Thank you. Question I have about I bonded. I know single person can purchase up to $10,000 per year, and I bond my question doesn't make sense to break to purchase up and say $2500 monitored to 5000 Darvon with the purpose of encasing my cash in, then you don't have to cash in the whole 10,009 bond yeah you know it. It I don't think you would really benefit you to do that because you could redeem a portion of it if if you wanted you to do that so you know if you person for any reason you knew that you were going to break it up down the road you wanted to redeem it in smaller increments. You could certainly do that but you know I think you can accomplish the same thing. By having the whole lot it once so I would necessarily opt for buying them know in smaller increments than 10,000 if you know you're ultimately gonna buy 10,000 worth okay. Is there any Like it or anything you cash command, like if there were $2500.01 well is a you you got a hold it for a year and that if you hold it for less than five years.

When you redeem it. You're gonna lose three months worth of interest prior to the five year mark. Okay okay sorry thank you very much Frank and I are very welcome Scott. Thanks for listening going today. We appreciated graces in Indiana great suck and I hope you don't, okay, so I wanted to get some kind of help. I'm a federal employee and I have participated in that translating program cent 2008 on here.

I turned 50, so I am contributing the 19,500 o'clock Drastic fountain and I when I was really young I went to bankruptcy, you could be a mortgage broker and everything to went bad so Whitney can't keep in the gecko.

I've always put everything into the G5 and now that I'm 50 I only have hundred 71,000 in the Jeep on so I'm wondering should I exploit the C fund on AA carried a little bit of more which I don't know if I'm comfortable with it or should I be investing money and time outside of my TSP gets gone.

I like to TSP plan, but the G5 is good be too conservative for you given your age and time horizon near the G fund is basically treasury securities.

And it's going to be no short-term treasuries and it's gonna provide the lowest rate of return.

Now you're going to have a lot of safety you won't have any volatility but it's it's not can it do what you need to do in terms of getting compounded returns over the next 15 years or more until you retire. So I would look at you know the appropriate way to invest one way to do that grace to ensure that you don't take too much risk would be to use the L funds, which stands for lifestyle RCC lifecycle funds and these are like what might be called target date funds where you would choose the maturity date of the L fund that actually aligns with the you know when you're going to retire and what happens is the mix of investments automatically gets more conservative as you get closer and closer to retirement so it will have some portion of stock, some portion of bonds in you as you get closer and closer to that retirement maturity date. It'll get more more conservative.

So you'll get the stock exposure, but you won't find yourself your two highly concentrated in stocks and therefore you're taking more risk than you'd like. So that would be one approach. The other approaches to come to do that yourself where you would use either the C fund which is this common stock index or combination of the the CDS in the eye, which are the common stocks the small-cap stocks in the international with some of the bond funds as well, which is their fixed income index and you can determine the allocation you want between stocks and bonds, but if you want that to be done automatically. That's where those L funds commit does it make sense thank you so much I appreciate you taking my call absolutely grace thank you for listening going that we appreciated. Andrew is also in Indiana and Andrew understand want to start a not-for-profit yeah I have five close Christian friend of mine and that I did that we pool our resources and make decisions together using a board structure and we file our 501(c)(3) status and if we have any appreciated stock or assets. We can donate those of the group and we can make larger donations together communally in to missionaries and Christian impaired Christian church impaired church groups is that a good idea. It could be. Yeah, I think the key is what you want to do with it and if it's just a vehicle for giving. I would just want to make sure that you going through the process of forming a corporation in filing for the arts tax exemption in the knee in the annual filings in the bylaws and the Board of Directors and you know all of that is necessary for what you're trying to accomplish.

It could be that you could do the same thing with something like a donor advised fund where everybody you know you all could open a donor advised fund you all could you know pool your resources there in that donor advised fund and then just granted out you know out of that and not have to have the Corporation in the nonprofit status and all of that so I think you just need to do a little homework on what is it were trying to accomplish and what's the least onerous way to do that in terms of the annual upkeep as well as the expense associated with it but give me your thoughts on what… Larger goal is to get an endowment that we made. I thought it 50% of the donation go to an endowment that we take the games from and get those out and then that endowment growth and eventually we replace our leadership with our children or somebody else's wise yeah I see. Okay, here's what I mean in terms of the nonprofit organization. Basically what you have to do is choose a name, file the articles of incorporation you'd apply for the IRS tax exemption and if you haven't done that before.

I'd probably have a somebody who has some expertise in doing that a CPA or attorney Yost do that for you would be worth the cost of that just for somebody that has the knowledge of how to fill that out and get that through in a way that's the most likely acceptance from the IRS. Then you'd apply for the estate tax exemption. The bylaws, the Board of Directors, you hold the meeting of the board obtain any licenses and permits means a pretty straightforward process. And again I think you benefit from having somebody walk you through that.

Then once you have it. You'd obviously open a bank account and then you all could each make contributions into the nonprofit, you know, for to fund it and then you know you're cut off to the races at that point so that would be one option. But before you do that I might visit with my friends at the National Christian foundation you'll find the bit in CF giving.com.

They have an office unaware in Indiana you are, but the others a great office of NCF in Indianapolis.

There are several of them there.

But regardless, if you talk through that with them. They may have some other ideas on creative ways to do this that would just lessen the annual burden both cost and and complexity so I would at least plays that phone call and talk it through.

Somebody in NCF, but apart from that, if you do form the nonprofit which is is not a bad thing. There's just some upkeep and ongoing work. You'll need to do is a part of that I would wait to make to pool those funds until you have the nonprofit in places that will make sense.

Thank you very much okay Andrew appreciate your call and appreciate your revision for generosity.

Especially as it relates to the next generation that's awesome OJ is in Miami, Florida, J just about a minute left, I can help user make it quick and the snowball effect. My wife and I have not cheated teachers so that the questioning of Megan as much should we mark on the fun.

And you know about your emergency fund and another couple hundred bucks like you 8000 emergency fund.

How much do you still have on credit cards will we been blessed by murder murder but I do have some that are coming up every teacher in America. Yes. So how much of that 8000 you know you'll have to use this summer to get through that okay alright see you got your 4000 left.

You know I would be okay with that, given how much credit card debt you have. I'd rather prioritize getting those paid off as quick as you can as long as you know that you only need 4000 other in the new bill to build up on the other side. Given the amount of credit card that you have Jay had also contact my friends at Christian credit counselors and Christian credit counselors.org they can get these interest rates down get you on a fixed monthly payment. This can help you pay this debt off 80% faster Christian credit counselors.org.

Thanks for your kind remarks listening to the show for us today.

Folks moneywise live is a partnership between moving radio and moneywise media was a thank you to Melody was answering the phones today.

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