Family and Finances: Episode 7, Part 4

How about that doctor that your brother John went to visit? Oh, that's a great story. You want to tell them? No, I can't remember all the details. I just remember how shocked he was. I always remember a story. This was an orthopedic surgeon that did surgeries on high-profile sports stars, athletes. And so he was very well-known. And surgeons make a lot of money, and my brother was a friend with him, and they invited my brother and his wife over for dinner. So they put the address in the GPS. They follow their GPS to their home for dinner, and when they get there, they're in a neighborhood of what would be considered manufactured homes or tract homes, a very simple, modest, middle-class neighborhood. And a small house, and my brother knew this guy had six kids. And so he thought, he's lost. And while he's sitting in the car, he says to his wife, I think we're lost. And she said, yeah, I think so too. And he said, but I guess I better go ask. So he sort of sheepishly creeps up to the door, knocks on the door, and one of the children answered the door and said to him, did you think you were lost? They were so used to it. It was a common. And so they said, yeah, and they said, well, come in. So they went in for dinner. The six kids gathered around the dinner table, the doctor and his wife. And my brother was sitting there, and they said, most people have a question about how we live. And he said, yeah, OK, I think I would be interested in knowing about that. And the father said to the oldest child, well, tell them why we live here.

And this child said, this oldest one said, we live here because our family gets so much joy in giving that we don't want to spend a lot of money on ourselves. And we really like this house a lot. We're closer. We're tight knit. We don't have a lot of room to hide from each other. You know, we're not all on our phones in separate rooms. And they just started talking about their joy and their satisfaction. This doctor could afford the biggest home in town. And he was living way, way, way below his means and content and happy. And I remember my brother calling me and saying, I'm putting my home on the market. Because he was sort of the opposite end of that scale. And it convicted him that he didn't have to have all that for his life. They didn't preach it. They lived it. And so when people think about their own finances, we have to escape the trap and the pressure and the cultural expectation that we will show wealth. And a lot of it is that we want others to sort of know what success we've had or know that we've got things that we can afford. And it drives us to, in some ways, to get into the comparison game. Well, and even just fitting in, just knowing you're accepted. I have felt that, you know, worried about what I'm going to wear to an event. You know, what's the bottom line? Why want people to accept me? Well, I push back against this mentality because I thought these super frugal people, these people that are fanatical, you know, they reuse a paper towel. I've seen people do that crazy stuff. They actually get wrapped up in a different form of materialism. And they get in bondage to how much they can save, how much they can sort of snobbishly say that they don't do what other people do.

And I think that's wrong as well. And I just push back against it. And I just sort of wanted to say, I don't want anything to do with that. What I wasn't accepting is that, in Christ, we do not have to have props. And I was into the props. I was into what's the brand of clothes I wear, what's the brand of watch that I have, what does my car look like, what does our home look like. All of those were just props that are going to go away. And why did I get so attached to them? And I think, ultimately, God tells us to be content because we're not going to be in pain if we lose something or we go backwards or we have a fire or we have a flood or we have a collapse of our currency. All of those things, we're now protected from that. them emotionally. Right. So ultimately I think the reason, the way that we guard our hearts is to be in the Word day after day after day. Renew our minds, get our focus on Christ. Well when I go into the Word, Ann, which you and I both do regularly, I adjust my perspective to an eternal perspective. I don't know what kind of watch the Apostle Paul wore. I don't know what kind of sandals or robe that he had. I don't know what kind of tent that he made or lived in. Because those aren't the things that are emphasized. The things that we get our emphasis on are the things that impress the world. It's what we see. Yeah, what comes into our eye. And ultimately we have to ask ourselves, what are we impressed by? And because what we're impressed by is usually going to take a hold in our heart. And if we're impressed by something, we want to be like that, or we want to acquire that, or we want to spend time in that culture or that group of people. And I remember in the scripture when the widow gave her two mites, Jesus was watching that. But not only did he see it, he called his disciples over and explained it to them that he was impressed. That she gave all she had. And so the Lord was impressed with this humble generosity. And I remember looking at that and thinking, oh my goodness, I'm impressed with wealth

accumulators. He's impressed with people who trust him with nothing. And I had the wrong thing that I was looking at, as you say. My focus was on the wrong thing to be impressed by. And it had gotten a hold of me. And I had to let go of it and say, Lord, I want to be impressed with what impresses you. And when I'm impressed with what impresses you, then we're in sync and I'm experiencing real contentment. Not something I have to make myself be content by, but being in the Word and seeing that there's a world to come. And that's what we're living for. Right. So when I think back, just to wrap up a few thoughts, Ann, and if you've got more that you want to add, jump in there, but that song of Mick Jagger that, I can't get no satisfaction in the world, is actually real theology. We can't. You can try and try and try. And I know people. God's put us in a position. I was counting the other day. I think I know four or five people who are billionaires. And it doesn't matter whether you have a billion or you have nothing. You can still be, you can still lose the joy of being content in Christ, because things aren't ever going to satisfy. Doesn't matter. I was on a plane one time, on a private jet, and the guy, we were flying to meet another businessman, and the guy said he was intimidated to meet this businessman. And I said, why? He said, well, he has a bigger jet than I do. That's the comparison that you fall into. Yeah. And so we find that God wants us to be satisfied today. Just today. That everything's okay. Just kind of let the stress drain off of you and say, I can be satisfied right now without anything changing. Isn't that an exciting thought? Well, for identities in Christ, then it doesn't matter what people think of us anyway. Yeah. And, you know, he owns everything, and he owns all the riches of the world, so we don't have to have them. They're his. And I remember thinking, and I know I'd have to wrap this up a little bit here soon, but I remember thinking that I was like a, I was like an ant, that every time I went out, I wanted to bring something back into my ant bed and have a better ant bed than all the other ants kind of mentality. And when I look at that, I would think, that, if I was observing some ant, you know, get into hyper decorating their ant bed, I would think, that's a weird ant. Well, that was

me. Well, I fell into it, too. So I think it's just, it's just part of humanity's. Part of our trial and temptation. Our flesh. But, you know, the end, sort of the end point of this journey of contentment for us has been, we are, we're experiencing the joy of the Lord without stuff to prop us up, and that has also benefited us financially in a great way. It's the little decisions that add up to the big gain. And those little decisions like water only, for years. Think about how much that's enabled us to save and give and to have be much better off financially. Well, I hope that this has encouraged those that are listening today and we hadn't made anybody feel guilty of their choices and that we've inspired them to look at this topic differently. And to just go to the Lord, just surrender everything to Him and thank Him for all He's given you and just who He is. Yeah, an attitude of gratefulness for today and for what we have. Well, look forward to talking next time. We're going to talk about investing but thank you for being content through this whole podcast. All right, it was fun. Yeah, thank you.