MoneyWalk 196: Selling With Integrity

This program will help you undo financial bondage.

Most everyone must sell himself or herself in order to get a job. Some people select employment opportunities where they also sell products or services to others. Still others start entrepreneurial ventures and must sell themselves, their products, and their services to customers in order to receive income from their endeavors. Almost no one is immune from the requirement to be a salesman on some front. Therefore, it is incumbent upon you to sell yourself, products, and services in a way and for an end that pleases God and helps other people.

Some have chosen to deceive and oppress in order to sell themselves and/ or make the sale. Others have chosen to offer defective products and services to make the most money, hoping that people won’t notice or will feel it’s too hard to do anything to correct the problem and yet still buy from them. Still others have chosen to make guarantees they know they cannot live up to in order to make the bucks now, believing that everything will just work out if they can get their hands on more money and more luxuries right now.

You should not engage these wrongful attitudes and activities and no matter what your current situation you don’t have to operate in this manner in order to make a good living. If you do so, you will ultimately pay a heavy price that will result in broken relationships, loneliness from other people being unable to trust you, loss of employment and future career and business opportunities, and possibly prison sentencing resulting from criminal activity. Watch out! Most deceitful people start off small thinking they’ll never be caught but later on they are caught and must face the music and pay the piper.

You can and should operate in the utmost honesty and integrity regardless of whether you would make a bundle or live in the lap of luxury you envision. Yet opportunity to do well financially and even phenomenally beyond your wildest expectation is available to you in a way that will bless you and not curse you throughout your life when you sell yourself, products, and services in a manner that pleases God. All your needs and many of your desires will be filled and you’ll have peace, joy, and right standing with God as you operate with integrity in your dealings. If one opportunity passes you by, God will be sure to cause others to come your way which will provide all that you need and more and allow you to stay within His will and under His protective covering.

Please pray for this ministry and email any questions. May God bless you richly as you follow His plan!!!

Nehemiah 5:7-12, Proverbs 16:2-5, 22:16-19, 28:18-20, 1Corinthians 8:9, James 4:17, 5:1-6

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You can find books authored by Randy and Karen Parlor at www.Amazon.com

MoneyWalk 195: Purchasing A Car?

This program will help you undo financial bondage.

Many people have been duped into buying expensive vehicles long before they were really able to afford them. They’ve believed the lie that it’s their heritage to live the American dream no matter what the cost. So, they’ve allowed satan to destroy their lives by making the ownership of new cars every couple of years a need instead of a desire.

They’ve done such crazy things as purchased or leased a brand new car with $400+ monthly payments instead of paying $500 worth of repairs to a vehicle with low or no monthly payments that would run tens of thousands more miles without great amounts of additional cost for repairs. Their minds have been blinded to believe that they had to purchase the newer or more expensive vehicle because they could foresee the old vehicle costing them more in the long run.

All the while, their voracious appetite for new cars and SUVs along with that of many millions of other people have allowed manufacturers to jack up prices to ratios of income unseen in times past. Uneducated consumers will keep getting loans because they’ve bought the lie. However, pressure and stress mounts with each reckless purchase and disregard for your budgetary situation. Soon you have no peace and joy because you owe everybody a huge piece of your monthly income.

Well God’s plan is vastly different from the tricks and enticements of the world. He wants to give you the best, without debt and the grave consequences that result from it. Affordable, debt free purchases of cars that you really enjoy are made possible when you seek Him first and take care of your godly responsibility of being a good steward who properly sets priorities through budgeting that allows you to appropriately care for your family and your church.

His plan pays much greater dividends in the end without all of the headaches and troubles that accompany the loans you have been using to fulfill your desires. May God bless you richly as you follow His plan!!!

Please pray for this ministry and email any questions. May God bless you richly as you follow His plan!!!

Proverbs 16:20, 21:17, Matthew 6:19-34, John 10:10, 1Peter 5:6-10

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You can find books authored by Randy and Karen Parlor at www.Amazon.com

MoneyWalk 194: A Husband’s Gift That Lasts

This program will help you undo financial bondage.

Husbands have an awesome responsibility that comes with a pathway to greater prosperity. Yet, many of them are not aware that the greater blessing is reserved for husbands that love, understand, pray for, and care for their wives according to the will of God for marriage and the family unit.

Hardships, trouble, divorce, and broken family units are the by-product of a husband’s failure to love their wives like Christ loves the Church. He laid down His life for it so that we could have an abundant everlasting life filled with the positive vibe of belonging to the Father’s family and be of great use on the earth in His service to bring Him glory.

Some husbands provide what they consider to be the needs of the wife, but once done they believe they can move on to satisfying their own pleasures such as purchasing boats, season sport tickets, going to the bar with friends, etc. In most cases they have not organized their finances, budgeted their income and expenses, and set the family on a pathway to consistent good stewardship by tithing, eliminating debt, saving, and investing.

Some even pressure wives for agreement or mentally or physically bully their wives into accepting such purchases by lording it over them with comments like “God made me the head so I get to make the decisions around here” or “I don’t know why you don’t want me to have anything when you always get what you want” etc.

It may be true that the wife is afforded some leeway to purchase things she wants, but in some instances it is meant to help alleviate the husband’s guilty feelings that come from spending too much time at work, hanging out with friends too much, buying toys the family really can’t afford, and not spending enough quality time with the wife and kids.

Some of our harmful marital attitudes and actions were formed when we were kids socialized by watching interactions between our parents and our friend’s parents and some of our problems come from mimicking the worldly interactions we see all around us today. We mimic them without using biblical truth, instruction, and guidance to sift the beliefs, customs, traditions, and behaviors to know which ones we should and should not mimic.

Of course, your parents, other parents, and even some unbelievers may have been great examples in some areas that you chose not to follow. No matter the reason for your current dysfunction you can stop the flow of negativity in your marriage, see the dysfunction and lack of leadership for what it really is, and correct it to greatly enhance your marital unity and financial condition.

Here are a couple of suggestions. First, surprise your wife every now and then with a bouquet. Second, make sure you honor her birthday and special days with a gift that fits your budget. Third, always be open to her input, suggestions, and ideas that will help discipline you all to be good stewards. Fourth, reduce your monthly expense that is going out to pay for desires to a level that fits well within your budget, savings, and investment goals. The increased marital care and discipline will greatly increase the blessing on your life and annually increase your net worth.

Please pray for this ministry and email any questions. May God bless you richly as you follow His plan!!!

Malachi 2:14-15, Matthew 19:3-6, Ephesians 5:28-29, 1Peter 3:7-8

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You can find books authored by Randy and Karen Parlor at www.Amazon.com

MoneyWalk 193: Prosperity’s Two Extremes

This program will help you undo financial bondage.

Some preachers teach that nothing will come to you unless you plant a seed for it and whatever type of seed you plant is the type of plant that will grow. They believe that people are stressed and not blessed because they plant weed seeds that grow up and choke the good plants out. They also believe that nothing, including millions of dollars, will come to you unless you plan for it to happen and plant a natural seed for it. In essence, they believe that no good thing comes by mistake. It must be obtained by hard work directly related to obtaining the material good.

Other preachers believe that work profits you little. Therefore, you must faith-demand the material things that you want in order to receive them. These are two extremes: prosperity by faith demand versus works based prosperity. The truth is in the middle including these scenarios:

• God provides your need because He loves you

• His principles, that require work to employ, provide a level of comfort above your need

• He provides some of your desires without you having to work to earn them

• He blesses a small percentage of people to inherit riches.

• He blesses others with wealth through ideas and inventions they never thought would lead to riches or the level of riches they ultimately obtained

• Others had a vision that what they were pursuing would make them rich

• Many rich people over the centuries have worked very hard and that hard work has been a great part of the reason they are rich

Stories of patriarch and matriarch’s lives in the bible as well as many testimonials throughout the history of man and contemporary today confirm all of these scenarios and probably a few others and each have been ways through which great wealth came into people’s lives.

Vision, declaration, giving, and faith are very important and should be a part of everyone’s life plan. You will certainly do better speaking into existence those things that be not as though they were. And, you will often do worse when you fail to have a vision, fail to make positive declarations, refuse to be a giver, and fail to take action by faith (work) to achieve the aim of the vision and declarations.

It is even more important for you to know that it does not profit a person to gain the world (riches, power, position, fame or even opposite things that one might desire) but lose his or her soul. Therefore, you should look to the Lord (who is omniscient, omnipresent, and omnipotent) to set the vision for your life according to His will for you in the marketplace and ministry service He designed you for and gave you innate ability to effectively use and enhance.

Be on guard against prosperity extremes and poverty acceptance (that lead to idolatry and foolishness), rather look to the Father, accept Jesus Christ, and be led by the Holy Spirit to pursue His plan for your life so that you will prosper on earth and throughout eternity.

Please pray for this ministry and email any questions. May God bless you richly as you follow His plan!!!

Genesis 25:5, 1Samuel 16:6-13, Matthew 6:26, 2Thessalonians 3:10-14

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MoneyWalk 192: Teaching Children To Manage Money

This program will help you undo financial bondage.

Many children are being left to raise themselves because parent are making other issues more important than spending quality time teaching principles that will make the children’s lives more purposeful, meaningful, balanced, peaceful, and joyful, as they grow into adulthood.

A lot of parents are giving children the impression that:

1) It is important to have every material thing and career position you want and to be willing to pay any cost to get it.

2) Keeping up with the Joneses is the priority of life.

3) Being in debt is a great way to live and obtain all the comforts of life.

4) You should work as many hours as seems humanly possible to make as much money and gain as much notoriety as you can even if when it means spending little time with the family (in essence destroying the marriage and the family unit).

Most parents are not teaching biblical money management principles that will help their children be content, self-controlled, service-focused, and prosperous in life nor are they directing them to sources that could help them learn these valuable virtues and the methods that can help employ them.

Leading children to Jesus Christ should be the first priority of every parent and guardian. They should also be led to pursue God’s will for their lives and incomes and any money and resources that come into their hands.

This will not happen when the parent or guardian is not focused on pursuing God’s will in his or her own life. Children usually absorb what they see in parents and guardians more than they absorb what parents and guardians say and usually to a greater degree.

When the children see a continually ungodly (bad) example, many times they develop a greater addiction to it and bring greater destruction into their lives than the parents experienced. When they hear and see what is good (a godly example), most times the children will have a much greater influence that keeps them in the Light that enables them to achieve greater levels of prosperity on earth than the parents achieved.

You will probably not teach the correct principles and lessons of life if you don’t follow them yourself. Is your child’s future important enough to make sure he / she inherits eternal life and has the tools to live prosperously on earth using money management principles that please God?

Thank God there is hope even when parents have not taught or exampled the right lifestyle and money management principles and methods because the Holy Spirit never stops reaching out to people, including children, with the truth of eternity and of living in purpose and meaning here on earth. You simply do not want to be used as a tool of satan that serves as a stumbling block whose attitudes and actions lead your children, teens, young adults, and those you influence away from the Truth, biblical principles, faith in action, and good stewardship that lead to eternal and earthly prosperity.

Please pray for this ministry and email any questions. May God bless you richly as you follow His plan!!!

Deuteronomy 6:5-7, Proverbs 22:6-7, Luke 2:39-52, Ephesians 6:1-4, 1Timothy 3:4-5

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You can find books authored by Randy and Karen Parlor at www.Amazon.com

MoneyWalk 191: A Good Education Does Not Require Massive Debt

This program will help you undo financial bondage.

Higher levels of college education are being called the great prosperity equalizer for mankind. Everyone you hear is touting educational degrees as the pathway to success and fulfillment. Our politicians have gotten into the game as well as business leaders all claiming to be for education and touting it as the greatest investment our nation, state, and individuals could ever make.

They want more and more money to be put toward higher education even though they have not yet shown they can balance budgets, spend revenues responsibly, or produce enough jobs to cover the majority of graduates who have racked up tens and hundreds of thousands of dollars in student loan debt.

Thousands of schools, universities, and new extremely high-priced degree mills are taking up an ever increasing portion of people’s income each and every year to provide this education. It is not uncommon to see many people graduate with bachelors, masters, doctorates, and/or law degrees with $25,000 to $175,000 of student loan debt. Some incur this level of debt and do not graduate. I’m an advocate of good education, but I’m not an advocate of education that warps people into ungodly mindsets and into debt-ridden conditions that work to destroy their future before it’s even started.

Many people are unaware that the United States legacy of education and institutions of higher learning started under the auspices of Christianity. Yet, so much of God’s plan, perfect will, and commands for mankind have been lost to humanistic educational thinking that is self-serving and destructive for individuals and nations. This is simply a shame and is leading us down a path of destruction and people are paying much more for that destruction.

The best education that one can get is from the Word of God and it should be made the central focus of your life. Other education through schools, institutions, independent study, and experience should be sifted by the Word to ensure that only that which is good, useful, and glorifying to God is allowed to be put on the solid foundation of Jesus Christ as head of your life.

When you make the education you seek subservient to your relationship with Christ and the vision He gives for your giftings, abilities, and developed skills to be used in the marketplace (including the Church), then your education will not only be valuable while you are on earth but it will have eternal value. In addition, He will lead you to obtain worthwhile education in a way and from institutions, when necessary, that will not leave you with huge student loan debt that puts you in bondage and pierces you with sorrows for many decades to come.

Having taken a different path than all the other people who are running to and clamoring for the worldly education process and the massive indebtedness it heaps upon them, you will instead gain the education you need at the cost that is well within your budget and you will come out on the other side well-rounded with all the tools, mindset, and inner hope necessary to fulfill your God-given purpose.

Please pray for this ministry and email any questions. May God bless you richly as you follow His plan!!!

Proverbs 1:7, Matthew 6:23-24, Luke 9:25-26, Philippians 4:8-9, 2Timothy 2:15-19

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You can find books authored by Randy and Karen Parlor at www.Amazon.com

MoneyWalk 190: Biblical Financial Calculations

This program will help you undo financial bondage.

A friend recently asked me how the net-worth equation corresponds to scriptural truth. He figured that blessing equals obedience minus sin was equivalent to net-worth equals assets minus liabilities. We figured that blessing was not the right component for this equation because God blesses just and unjust people, therefore obedience is not always a determinate of whether someone will be blessed with earthly goods.

However, the equation rewards for faithfulness to God equals obedience to God’s commands minus sin could be more accurate because one who lives in Christ will receive the eternal rewards of everlasting life and will also receive natural rewards and prosper to give God glory in the earth and fulfillment of purpose.

Another biblical equation, salvation equals acceptance of Jesus Christ as Savior and LORD minus your old sinful nature is also valid. Salvation is the greatest reward that one can receive and results in true net-worth. Acceptance of Jesus Christ as Savior and LORD is the best form of obedience that results in the greatest asset and the old sinful nature is synonymous with a continual lifestyle of sin that is the greatest liability that one can ever have.

If you allow the old man (the carnal nature inside) to have pre-eminence over accepting Christ as Savior and pursuing obedience to His will, then you have a negative salvation (spiritual liability), which is really no salvation at all and no hope of an eternal home in Heaven. The fate of this condition, when not resolved before you leave this earth, is far worse than having a negative financial net-worth while you roam this earth.

Please pray for this ministry and email any questions. May God bless you richly as you follow His plan!!!

Jeremiah 29:10-14, Romans 4:16-25, Hebrews 4:1-7, Hebrews 7:15-28

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You can find books authored by Randy and Karen Parlor at www.Amazon.com

MoneyWalk 189: Who Truly Has The Most?

This program will help you undo financial bondage.

Looking through natural eyes men have always branded as “rich” the people with the most money and high cost material resources while at the same time believing those to be “poor” who currently have little money and low cost possessions. We many times think of multi-millionaires and billionaires as the haves and seek to be like them because we want to experience having the most just like they do. In addition, we tend to think they must automatically be acceptable in God’s eyes and pleasing to him because they would not have otherwise amassed worldly riches and the culture of fine clothes, good speech, and engaging public character that seems to be connected to it.

On the other hand, we sometimes believe the middle class, mom’s living on welfare, and low-income families are the have-nots who might not be acceptable to God because they have not displayed the vision, plan, actions, and networks to amass worldly riches and many times seem to barely get by. We avoid many of them because they lack a desire for finery, have slang-ridden speech, and their character is not trying to engage us in a next big endeavor. At the very least, let’s be honest about the fact that we tend to show greater respect for and cater to people who appear rich based on what we can see in the natural. They are our ideal of self-made, successful people who have it all and if we can only bump heads with them at some point we can have the same kind of wonderful life and spiritual worth.

Well, stop looking with your natural eyes and begin to see with your spiritual eyes. Jesus said the abundance of life does not consist of the things that one possesses (including money) and that it profits a man nothing to gain the world then lose his soul. While God may bless you and reward you on earth or allow you to be blessed, your worth is not based on how much money or fine things you have accumulated.

Your worth is solely and wholly based on having a relationship with Jesus Christ in accordance with the bible. This is the only relationship that saves you from the wages of sin, which is eternal damnation. It ensures that you are the most (in Christ) and now the Holy Spirit leads you in a way that seeks to help you have the most according to God’s plan for the rest of your life and the ways in which He wants you to help and be of service to many other people in your community and beyond. Being in Christ ensures that you truly have the Most of what really matters.

Please pray for this ministry and email any questions. May God bless you richly as you follow His plan!!!

Psalm 36:7-9, Luke 12:13-21, John 10:1-10, James 2:1-10, Revelations 2:8-11

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You can find books authored by Randy and Karen Parlor at www.Amazon.com

MoneyWalk 188: The Battle Rages But Believers Ultimately Win

This program will help you undo financial bondage.

We are in a spiritual battle for the use of our lives and this includes the stewardship of all the money the Lord entrusts to us. God He created us to worship and please Him so we will experience peace, joy, and contentment. He has given us principles in the scriptures to use for getting the most out of every area of our lives. We will experience His best as we walk in the newness of life lead by the Holy Spirit.

Yet, satan is opposed to God’s plan and is determined to try and destroy every area of our lives. He wants to usurp the Lord’s all powerful, omnipresent, and all knowing character. So, he tries to steal your affection (worship) by leading you to doubt redemption (salvation) in Jesus Christ. He knows that without redemption you will not have a home in Heaven when you die. Instead, you will make your bed in Hell, even though it was originally created only for satan and his demonic cohorts.

Satan also wants you to doubt the benefit of utilizing biblical principles in the management of your life and finances. He attempts to defile and destroy you by tempting you to live by the lust of the flesh, the lust of the eyes, and the pride of life.

Satan will never become God or succeed in his plan to usurp God’s authority. In God’s perfect timing, satan will be judged and thrown into Hell to suffer forever with fallen angels and humans who decided to follow him in rebellion. Yet, when you do not choose to accept Jesus Christ’s gift of salvation, satan’s plan for you succeeds in keeping you from the blessing of eternal life and from earthly rewards given to faithful believers.

Please pray for this ministry and email any questions. May God bless you richly as you follow His plan!!!

Isaiah 14:12-15, 2Corinthians 4:1-5, Galatians 5:13-26, Jude 1:24-25, Revelations 20:1-15

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You can find books authored by Randy and Karen Parlor at www.Amazon.com

MoneyWalk 187: A Lesson From The Widows

This program will help you undo financial bondage.

The widow had planned to fix her family a meal with the last of her flour and oil and then expected everyone to die of starvation shortly thereafter because the famine in the town of Zarephath was so terrible that there was no natural way she could get anymore food.

Unexpectedly, Elijah, a man unknown to her, came her way and asked for a drink of her water and a piece of her last meal and told her the reward that would come to her by doing so – the flour and oil would last and provide plenty for her and her family to eat well beyond the end of the famine. Even with doubt, a promise not yet experienced, and faced with certain death from starvation a few days earlier than otherwise expected, she gave him a piece of her meal.

Within her heart she believed the hope Elijah had spoken more than the reality she faced. Her family was saved from certain death and extremely blessed as a result of her obedience to the voice of the Lord spoken by His prophet in that the flour and oil never failed to flow until the famine was fully gone out of the land.

Similarly, a man was threatening to take two sons of a widow as indentured servants so that he would be repaid the loans he extended to their deceased father. The mother asked Elisha to intervene to help her family overcome the financial turmoil and bad economy these debts brought upon them. He asked what resources she had available to help overcome the situation and she said nothing but a flask of olive oil.

Elisha told her to borrow as many pots from neighbors as she could and start pouring the little jar over each pot until each one is filled and that she would be able to sell the oil and pay off the family debts and live comfortably. She believed and acted upon the word of the Lord spoken by His prophet and it brought financial freedom.

In the same way, God gives you resources (assets, belongings, gifts, and abilities) that ensure you have more than enough to make life fulfilling and successful in good times, bad times, and famine. The resource may be greatly under-utilized by you up to this point and thus may seem inconsequential like an overabundance of tools, ability to organize belongings, or great carpentry skill. However, I assure you the skill will be life preserving, income-generating, and profitable as the Holy Spirit and men and women that intimately know Him instruct you how to employ your resources.

When you listen to the voice of the Lord and take action upon His instruction you will give greatly to support ministry work and make it a priority to pay off accumulated debt so you can give even more to the things that please God’s heart. Other people may be scrimping due to over-indebtedness and catastrophe, but that will not be your lot in life. Instead you will be serving other people in a God honoring manner, fulfilling your purpose, reaching your destiny, and showing others how to humbly enjoy the creature comforts God so richly provides.

Please pray for this ministry and email any questions. May God bless you richly as you follow His plan!!!

1Kings 17:9-16, 2Kings 4:1-7, Malachi 3:10, Luke 6:38

Please forward these bondage breaking articles to other people who can use helpful insight!!!

You can find books authored by Randy and Karen Parlor at www.Amazon.com