Nobody likes to admit that they are greedy and materialistic, yet that is one of our biggest problems in our society today.  We buy stuff that we don’t need with money we don’t have. And then we expect someone to bail us out when we get into financial trouble. We are in the middle of a series called In God We Trust at Cornerstone. We’re taking a hard look at how we can really honor God with our possessions and our finances. To help show how easy it is to manage money in a way that honors God, I recruited some high powered help. Check out this video from my little man.

As a father, I’m incredibly proud of all my children, but seeing them learn from an early age about honoring God and saving money is awesome! I even want to share a little story about Drew, the six year old star of the above video.  About six months ago, while he was eating a snack in the cafe before the service started, he asked me about one of the offering boxes. I told him what it was and he went on to talk about something else. About 5 minutes later, I glanced over and saw him sneaking over to the box. He made sure no one was looking and he slipped some money out of his pocket and put it into the box.  I asked him about it later that day and he just said he felt he needed to give some of his “extra” money back to God. He had already tithed out of his allowance, but he wanted to give more!

If you want to teach your younger kids about handling money, one excellent resource is Dave Ramsey’s Financial Peace Jr. For your high school and college kids, I highly recommend Joe Sangl’s book What Everyone Should Know About Money Before They Enter THE REAL WORLD. Let’s teach our families the true meaning of Proverbs 3:9 and let them learn the joy of giving.

Over the past few years, I have gotten to know Joe Sangl as a friend in ministry. We have a lot in common since we are the same age and we both have degrees in Mechanical Engineering. Joe is really “fired up” about his ministry and he does a great job teaching people how to get out of debt and live sold out for Christ. Joe’s passion is equipping others “to accomplish far more than they ever thought possible with their personal finances”. He has been to our church a couple of times now to share his Financial Learning Experience and I have seen first hand how he is making a difference.

He recently sent me a copy of his latest book, What Everyone Should Know About Money Before They Enter THE REAL WORLD. It is a great book for youth and college age students. Joe shares about giving, saving, and avoiding debt. He explains in easy to understand terms about student loans, credit scores, and the power of compound interest. And he shares all of it from a Biblical background. This book is short and powerful, and it’s a great gift for young adults. I definitely plan on using it with my own children and I’ll be recommending it for all the youth at church.

We also use Joe’s first book, I Was Broke. Now I’m Not, in our financial counseling at church. It’s a good book about how to budget and get out of debt. Joe also has a great website with tons of free financial tools at iwasbrokenowimnot.com.

Disclosure Policy

Here’s a little humor for your Friday afternoon from the Skit Guys. At Cornerstone, we’re currently in a sermon series about fear. It seems like in our society, one of the greatest fears is the fear of not having enough. Everyone wants to spend money they don’t have on things they don’t need. And then when they end up broke, they want a bailout. Watch and enjoy

Proverbs 22:7 The rich rules over the poor, and the borrower is the slave of the lender.

Debt is bondage …
It enslaves you …
It holds you back …
And it keeps you from following God

If you haven’t noticed, our national economy is in a downward spiral.  The media and our government want us to believe that the solution is simply spending more money.  If we spend more, more jobs will be created and the economy will recover.  But it doesn’t make sense to spend money that you don’t have!!

At Cornerstone we want to help you get your finances under control.  We don’t want you to be enslaved to personal debt.  We want you to be able to follow God when He calls you to do something. Worry and anxiety about your finances will only keep you from doing what God created you to do.  So we want to do something practical about it. We have two huge events this week.

Dave Ramsey’s Town Hall For Hope

First, on Thursday night, April 23rd, we are joining thousands of churches around the country to join Dave Ramsey’s Town Hall for Hope.  Come join us at 8pm at Cornerstone to watch Dave share a message of hope.  Here’s a video with more info

Joe Sangl’s Financial Learning Experience

On Saturday night, April 25th, we are excited and FIRED UP about having Joe Sangl join us live here at Cornerstone again.   Joe is on a mission to help people do far more with their money than they thought possible.  He believes that when you live in financial freedom you can actually do what God put you on this earth to do!   Starting at 6pm, join us at Cornerstone for Joe’s Financial Learning Experience.  I want to stress how much this experience can help you in the area of your personal finances.  We will not be having our normal Saturday Night Worship Experience, but this is an experience that you don’t want to miss.  We are asking for a suggested donation of $10 to help cover the cost of the materials.  You can sign up if you want at Cornerstone’s website.

Last year at Cornerstone we had Joseph Sangl, the Pastor of Financial Planning at NewSpring Church in Anderson, SC, come and lead a weekend about getting our finances in order.  Joe is on a crusade to help people get out of debt so that they can do what God has called them to do. Joe and I instantly hit it off because we both we’re mechanical engineers who left the engineering world to go into ministry.  Joe is FIRED UP, and I’m FIRED UP that he is coming back to Cornerstone on Saturday night, April 25th, to lead his Financial Learning Experience. I’ll be sharing more details in the next week about how to sign up.  You definitely want to check out Joe’s website for more information and tons of free tools to help you get out of debt.

You can check out all my previous posts about Joe and his ministry here.  In the meantime, Newspring is hosting the Financial Learning Experience on the web tomorrow night.   This is the same class he will be leading at Cornerstone, so if you can’t make it to Galax, you will definitley want to check it out online.  Here is the info straight from Joe’s website, the wildly popular JosephSangl.com.

NewSpring Church is making the Financial Learning Experience available FREE for one night only TOMORROW (Tuesday, March 24 @ 6:30PM).

It is going to be available at the Web Campus.  We are going to have members of my team in the chat room to answer questions throughout the event.

If you are looking for help with your finances, the Financial Learning Experience is the place to start!

The event will actually be the Financial Learning Experience DVD which was released this month.  This is a great opportunity for you to check out this resource.

Participants of the FLE will learn:

• Develop a plan for one’s life
• Create a budget that works
• Eliminate debt
• Calculate debt freedom date
• Calculate amount needed for retirement
• Hear about the power of compound interest

Go invite your friends and neighbors, and we will see you online at the Newspring Web Campus at 6:30PM, Tuesday, March 24!

If you are confused by the current lending and credit crisis, then watch this 10 minute video. It does a great job of describing what has happened. In a nutshell, the banks let people borrow more than they could afford, and when too many people defaulted, the banks got into big trouble.

Psalm 37:21 (NLT) – The wicked borrow and never repay,but the godly are generous givers.
Romans 13:8 (NLT) Owe nothing to anyone—except for your obligation to love one another.

As Christians, we should put ourselves into position to financially help those in need. And we should model and teach financial responsibility. If you are struggling with debt, then please start taking the steps to get out of debt as soon as possible. Check out Joe Sangl’s website where he has some excellent info about what to do next.

The Crisis of Credit Visualized from Jonathan Jarvis on Vimeo.