Top 7 Money Mistakes I’ve Made – Part Two March 10, 2010

Continuing yesterday’s post…

#4 – Seeking to live the “minimum payment” lifestyle.

I remember my first credit card…after getting it I stopped at a sporting goods store and bought a gun.  (Just like all pastors should!)  It was $300…and when I got the bill in the mail the next month the payment was ONLY $15!!!  (I didn’t know what 19% interest meant!)  It was the beginning of a PAINFUL lesson for me–making the minimum payment is NOT a great financial plan!

Within four years I was carrying maxed out balances on around seven credit cards and “successfully” making the minimum payments every month…which was KILLING ME financially.  I reasoned that if I continued to make the minimum payments that I would one day be out of debt…which WAS true…but “that day” would have been in the year 2900 at the rate I was going!

#5 – Transferring credit card balances

Don’t roll your eyes…some of you do this!  I would get a “convenient” credit card offer in the mail and it would say, “transfer your balances today and get no interest for six months.”  What the offer didn’t tell you is that the interest rate was an arm and a leg after that six months.

I always told myself that I could pay off the balance within six months–WHICH NEVER HAPPENED!  I realized then that Proverbs 22:7 was/is true…in just four years of having a credit card (which was only going to be used in case of an “emergency”) I had DISCOVERED that my VISA to financial freedom wasn’t in obtaining more AMERICAN OBSESS but rather in turning over MASTER CARD to Jesus instead of the banks!

#6 – STUPID car decisions.

I used to be the guy who said, “I will always have a car payment.”

I used to be the guy that when a car needed a repair I would say, “Go get another one, you don’t want to sink money into that old thing.”  (Which, by the way, is STUPID financial advice!  Seriously!  Spending $300 to fix a leak…or $45,000 on a new car–DUH!!!)

So…because of my desire to have a new car every year and a half (no, I am not making that up) I kept trading them in…and discovered what the term “upside down” means.  (It means, “I am a stupid, materialistic person”–at least that’s what it meant to me!)

I once financed a car that was two years old for 84 months at a 12% interest rate…DUMB!!!

Today I own my cars…they do not own me…and that is a very freeing feeling.  Most people I have talked to who are strapped financially could free themselves up so much if they would just sell their car…but their desire for status rather than financial freedom will prevent them from it most of the time.

#7 – Not having an emergency fund.

One of the things that Joe and Dave teach is that emergencies are going to happen, the car is going to break down, the kids are going to get sick, the tire is going to go flat…and that if money is set aside for these emergencies then they are less worrisome when they take place.

You CAN set aside an emergency fund…and you CAN live in financial freedom…it just takes WORK!!!

Top 7 Money Mistakes I’ve Made! March 9, 2010

Quite a while back I shared a two part post in regards to the top seven financial mistakes I’ve made…in light of yesterday’s message I thought I would share those posts again!

#1 – I Did Not Place Jesus First In My Finances

OR…in other words…I did not tithe.

I used the excuse that I could not afford to tithe…and it was through some painful financial lessons that God actually showed me that I could not afford NOT to tithe. God kept bringing me back to Matthew 6:21 and Matthew 6:24 over and over again…and in the fall of 1999 I completely surrendered the 10%. (And I’ve never missed it!)

#2 – I treated tithing as the finish line.

When I began tithing I sort of expected God to strike up the heavenly marching band…and for about a year I was quite proud of my newly formed spiritual discipline…until…

In the summer of 2000 Jason Wilson, our Executive Pastor, was speaking at NewSpring Church and said, “We all know that Scripture says to tithe…what I want to ask tonight is what are you doing with the other 90% to advance His Kingdom; after all, He does own it all!”

That statement hit me in the face like a ton of bricks…Psalm 24:1 became more real to me than ever before…and that night I surrendered the other 90% to Jesus!

Tithing isn’t the finish line…it’s the starting point…God has called us to be generous givers–HE IS!!! (II Corinthians 9:15)

#3 – I thought I could NEVER get out of debt.

When Lucretia and I got married on April 8, 2000 we had over $100,000 worth of debt and DIDN’T EVEN OWN A HOME. It was all credit cards, student loans and ridiculous purchases (all made by me!)

I felt trapped–heck, I was trapped…and I had just about given up hope until I heard about this guy named Dave Ramsey. It was in one of his all day sessions that I began to understand that I could get out of debt…but it was going to take sacrifice, a lifestyle adjustment…but it COULD be done!

In November of 2007 Lucretia and I became debt free…we owe on nothing except for the house. Trust me–if we can do it–YOU CAN TOO!!!

(By the way…if you are making one of these mistakes…OR any of the next four that I will talk about later on this week…and you do not MAKE it a priority to get to JOES CLASS THIS WEEK then you’re passing on an incredible opportunity!  Seriously, there is NO REASON for you to be in debt…when Jesus sets us free…WE ARE FREE, and yet so many Christians go and enslave themselves to debt! BREAK FREE THIS WEEKEND!!!

Stay tuned for the other four…