MoneyWalk 480 You Need To Invest

This program will help you undo financial bondage.

401k, 457, 403b, and similar plans are the easiest way for most people to begin and continue investing. A portion of your pre-tax earned income can be placed in these plans. Currently, $19,000 can be invested when younger than 50 and $24,000 when older. Taxes are not due on principal or earnings until you withdraw the money from the plan. If you withdraw money before you're 59.5 years old you will also pay a 10% penalty to the IRS, unless for verified hardship or as part of an equal periodic payment over your projected life expectancy. On these employer-based tax deferred plans neither tax nor penalty applies in instances in which you borrow money from your account and pay it back according to your employer’s payment schedule. However, there will be double-taxation on the earned income used to pay off the loan – once prior to payback and later when that amount is taken as a withdrawal. In addition, when the money is not in the plan it cannot provide earnings growth over the years. Therefore, you should refuse to borrow from these plans except in extreme emergencies that would decimate your finances and life if not taken care of with available funds.

A brokerage account IRA also provides great benefit. You put in post-tax earned income. Currently, $6,000 can be invested when younger than 50 and $7,000 when older. When under a certain adjusted gross-income you can take a deduction on your federal tax return. Taxes on the earnings of IRA accounts are deferred until withdrawal and there is no 10% penalty when money is taken out of the plan after 59.5 years of age. A Roth IRA also allows you to invest post-tax earned income and to not be taxed on earnings or charged a penalty as long as you maintain the account for at least five years and do not withdraw earnings before 59.5 years of age. You can withdraw post- tax contributions at any time without additional tax or penalty. On both types of IRA’s there are a few situations where early withdrawal of earnings might not be penalized, but would be taxed.

Because money that you have chosen to invest into the above noted plans is usually automatically payroll deducted from your employer’s payroll or electronic funds transferred EFT from a savings/checking account, you are more apt to continually invest a set amount month after month throughout your working years. Automating the process helps overcome failure to launch investing and procrastination that overtakes many who failed to invest but know they should have started years ago. Once your financial situation is ready for you to invest, 10 percent of gross income is a good starting point that will afford you great long-term earnings over a long-term investing period when the money is put in no-load low-expense stock index mutual funds like S&P 500 or Total Stock Market. You will quickly realize you do not miss the dollars invested. In fact, you will quickly feel good about doing it and seeing your prosperous future unfolding. For example, a person who invests $500 per month or $6,000 per year and earns 10% annual growth would amass $1,130,000 in 30 years.

Research these plans and other types of brokerage accounts to determine which ones better fit your plan for reaching the wealthy place. Also, realize past earnings are no guarantee of future results, yet historical data generally shows the great benefit received by those who over many years buy and hold a broad array of stocks via no-load low-expense stock index mutual funds. This article could not give you a complete picture of these investment plans. However, they are certainly great tools to put your investment plan into action and on auto pilot so you can reap rich rewards. This will enable you to fulfill the plan God has for you and allow you to enjoy many things on earth while you go about your Father’s business.

Please pray for this ministry, email me with any questions, and contact me to speak at your business/ministry’s conference/workshop. May the LORD bless you richly as you follow His plan!

Proverbs 21:20, Ecclesiastes 11:2, Matthew 25:20-23, Luke 19:15-19

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MoneyWalk 479 Good Stewardship Produces Abundant Life

This program will help you undo financial bondage.

In 1992, we had over $135K in debt including a $76K mortgage. We were strapped and searching for a way to avoid financial troubles ahead. The Holy Spirit helped us see that a person will perish (suffer lack and other consequences) when (a) he/she does not have God’s vision for his/her life, (b) gain appropriate spiritual and practical knowledge, and (c) by faith walk in godly wisdom with regard to lifestyle and finances.

We accepted Christ into our lives and learned that God desires His people to be debt-free and abundant givers. We started tithing, offering, and budgeting so within the next few years we could get to a point of living on less than 50% of our pay. We made painful choices to cut spending and used newly found disposable income to eliminate our debts. The LORD helped us get out of debt quicker than we thought possible by supernaturally orchestrating a few promotions and raises that increased our income.

We have not had car notes since 1996, have not paid interest on consumer debts since 1997, and paid off our mortgage in January 2004. We experienced terrible economic periods during 2000-2002 and 2008-2010. We refused to cut tithing and offering and continued to utilize a giving, saving, spending plan (budget) that helped us keep outgoing expenses below take-home pay so our upkeep (lifestyle cost) would not be our downfall. By the grace and wisdom of God we cut unnecessary expenses so we could continue to give over 25% of our gross income and save over 25% of it. Aiming for a debt-free lifestyle and deciding in our heart that we would remain that way throughout our lives is the key to being able to live very comfortably on one-third of our gross income. We agreed with the word that being in love with the world was to be at enmity with the LORD and that the abundance of life does not consist in the material things one could get.

We know people can overcome severe economic problems and avoid giving all their would-be-wealth to creditors when they engage the debt-free lifestyle the bible speaks of as available to everyone. In order to embrace it you must stop believing society’s lie that everyone must have debts and continue to seek more debt as they move through life in order for their lives to be worthwhile. The devil is a lie!

Please pray for this ministry, email me with any questions, and contact me to speak at your business/ministry’s conference/workshop. May the LORD bless you richly as you follow His plan!

Genesis 14:20, Psalm 75:6-7, Proverbs 22:6, Matthew 23:23, Romans 13:8, Hebrews 7:8

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

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MoneyWalk 478 Principles That Bring Reward, Part 6

This program will help you undo financial bondage.

Diversify your savings and investments so all your eggs are not in the same basket. Scripture instructs you to give a portion to seven or eight because you do not know what troubles may come upon the Earth. It also instructs you to seek safety in the multitude of counselors. When all eggs are in one basket all of them can be destroyed by one person’s malfeasance, but when they are in different baskets one person’s malfeasance does not destroy the wealth God intends for you to manage, live on, and distribute to help other people.

Per the biblical diversification principle, it is prudent over time to have accounts at different brokerages and/or 401k type plans that contain a few broadly diversified index funds (such as an S&P 500, Mid-Cap, Russell 2000, Total U.S. Market, etc.) because you do not know the financial / economic troubles that may come upon the earth or the evil that an investment manager may engage in that could cost you all or a significant portion of your wealth if all your holdings were in one account. Historically speaking, it is highly unlikely that more than one in eight brokers or investment managers would engage unsound or illegal activity because most of them appear honest and would not intend to strip clients of their money. You simply do not know which one might act unwisely or illegally. Thus, it is better to follow the LORD’s diversification wisdom by putting savings in seven or eight investments so you are not worried or very sorry later on because you followed earthly wisdom and concentrated all your wealth at one brokerage, one investment, or one investment company.

The Holy Spirit wants you to follow biblical principles, like those in the last six articles so you always chart and know the state of your income, expenses, assets, and liabilities because they are necessary for developing your ongoing monthly budgets (giving, saving, spending plan) and at least once per year charting your financial net worth. They will also help you achieve total debt-freedom and build wealth by setting aside more income each month and putting the money in investments that multiply it so you are good ground that over time returns 30, 60, and 100-fold more than the LORD initially entrusts to you.

Continual intimacy with Him through prayer, praise, worship, mentoring from and accountability to Christian lifestyle & financial good stewards will help you run and win the race set before you while helping you avoid many mistakes that would otherwise derail you and the purpose He made you to accomplish.

Please pray for this ministry, email me with any questions, and contact me to speak at your business/ministry’s conference/workshop. May the LORD bless you richly as you follow His plan!

Proverbs 15:22, Ecclesiastes 4:12, 11:2, Matthew 25:14, Luke 19:12

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

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MoneyWalk 477 Principles That Bring Reward, Part 5

This program will help you undo financial bondage.

Save for emergencies, so you have resources to help care for needs during rainy days. A wise person stores a portion of his/her resources to meet future material needs, but a foolish person quickly spends everything he/she gets and engages debt obligations above his/her income that ensure all his/her future income gets sucked away and transferred to creditors for many years to come. The foolish are unable to build wealth because this pattern strips them of money in order to build creditors’ wealth and keep them in bondage.

You need an emergency / rainy-day fund to discipline you against unreasonable spending habits, to overcome bad economic cycles that will occur throughout your life, and to help you stop relying on debt to get you through problematic situations that require large infusions of money. Your main savings should be an emergency fund of at least $1,000 until you pay off all non-mortgage debts, unless more money may soon be needed because you are facing a situation like unemployment, impending layoff, or uncovered medical costs where without more available funds your necessary bills would go unpaid.

Put this money in an account that protects principle and interest earned, since it serves like an insurance policy that you need to make sure is available when an emergency occurs. Once all non-mortgage debt is paid off increase the fund to at least $10,000 which for most debt-free families will allow them to cover the emergency and/or three to six months of household expenses.

Invest excess disposable income to accumulate greater return. Investing should be a major initiative undertaken with a reasonable portion of savings (at least 10% of gross income) left over after all your budgetary expenses for each month have been paid. You should be looking for greater compound interest / exponential growth than you can get from accounts in which your emergency reserve funds are parked. God desires that you be like the servants in the Parable of the Talents and the Parable of the Minas who went about trading (investing) the assets He had given them in order to multiplying them for greater use for His glory and to care for themselves and their families and for establishing inheritances for their children’s children and future generations.

A simple place to invest a reasonable amount of income each month is no-load low-expense stock index mutual funds. These provide automatic diversification in each fund because they purchase hundreds or thousands of stocks of a variety of publicly traded companies in a variety of industries. Employer 401k type plans and brokerages like Vanguard, Fidelity, Charles Schwab, TIAA-CREF, etc. often require no more than $25 per paycheck or month to invest in one of their plans or funds. So, getting started is not difficult to do. You simply need to be committed and focused on doing the right thing concerning investing for your future.

Over long periods of time you will find historical data showing that the average annual growth of these no-load low-expense stock index mutual funds has far outpaced the growth / compound interest of other types of non-stock investment options. As you age, you may want to also have a portion of your money in fixed-income funds to provide principal protection during the time period of your life when you know you will need to continually draw money from these funds on which to live during your senior years.

Please pray for this ministry, email me with any questions, and contact me to speak at your business/ministry’s conference/workshop. May the LORD bless you richly as you follow His plan!

Proverbs 13:23, Proverbs 21:20, Matthew 25:14-30, Luke 19:12-27

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

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MoneyWalk 476 Principles That Bring Reward, Part 4

This program will help you undo financial bondage.

Refuse to accumulate more debt and eliminate current debt. The borrower is servant to the lender and thus God does not want His people to be in debt because it often causes people to make bad decisions and move away from God’s purpose for their lives and brings trouble upon them and their families. His desire is that you owe no man anything but love.

Refusing to live in a way that brings debt-freedom has brought great turmoil and upheaval in people’s lives via the enormous finance charges they incur as well as problems with repossession, foreclosure, and bankruptcy that millions of people deal with each year, some over and over because they never learn the lesson the LORD shared with them nor see that the bible never speaks positively with regard to borrowing money.

The debt snowball method (using all extra discretionary income after minimum payments are made to pay off the smallest debt first and afterward using all of it to pay off the next smallest debt) tends to be the best method because it is easier to chart debts and eliminate them and it gets you quick victories that positively affect your psyche and motivate you to continue to stick with the debt elimination plan. Also, it generally helps you eliminate total household debt within a few months of other methods that seem superior mathematically.

If you stick with them, other methods will work (like paying off the account that has the highest interest first, then moving to the next highest interest account) and on paper may work out better mathematically. However, they do not appear to have the same positive psychological and motivating effect in that a much higher percentage of people continue on to eliminate debt when the debt snowball method is used. Also, if you were a math genius, conceivably that would have already motivated you to stay out of consumer debt and/or get out of it quickly because you would recognize it greatly hampers your ability to properly manage your income and build wealth.

Refuse to cosign for the debts of other people. You will not help other people live in the responsibility God desires for them and you will bring financial trouble upon yourself by eventually being on the hook for paying the bills of irresponsible people. Bottom line is the debts are ultimately on your record when the people do not pay them and most don’t and it will severely crimp your life and likely put you in financial bondage.

Learn to tell family and friends NO to cosigning anything and simply give them a cash infusion toward worthwhile endeavors when you are in a debt-free and asset rich position where you can do so. You and they will be much better off in the long run as this approach teaches them to be financially responsible and disciplined. If they don’t learn the lesson, then you will not be drug down the hole with them when they become encumbered with debt they will not pay.

Please pray for this ministry and email me with any questions. May the LORD bless you richly as you follow His plan!

Deuteronomy 28:12, 15, 44, Proverbs 22:6-7, Romans 13:8, Proverbs 6:1-2, Proverbs 11:15, Proverbs 17:18

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

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

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MoneyWalk 475 Principles That Bring Reward, Part 3

This program will help you undo financial bondage.

Tithe and give offerings. Your local church should be your first recipient and you should also select a number of other reputable, worthwhile ministries and organizations as secondary recipients. Make sure that some of these organizations use a reasonable percentage of overall donations to support the poor and those in need in your community and beyond.

The LORD instructs each believer to give for these purposes and it is well-pleasing to Him when we do so because we are supporting the spread of the gospel message to lead other people into His Kingdom. Also, it makes us more useful in sharpening others via disciple-making so that each of us have tools and encouragement to fulfill the purpose and reach the destiny He imparted when He created us.

Budget your income and expenses. A number of free resources exist on the internet and you can feel free to contact me to help you craft a 3 to 6-month plan that shows:

a) Your income each pay period.

b) The tithe (10%) and offering (free-will) to be subtracted from take home pay.

c) Each minimum bill payment that must be paid from that pay period’s income (mortgage, rent, credit cards, car note, etc.). There will be a category for federal, state, and city tax to be remitted each month or quarter when income shown in item (a) above is not expressed as after-tax income.

d) Other miscellaneous amounts that must be taken from the income (groceries, personal money, gas for car, monthly amount of annual property tax payment, monthly amount of annual home and car insurance premium, monthly amount of annual life insurance payment, 2 or 3 low cost weekend vacations each year, low cost monthly entertainment, etc.).

e) The amount left over (which we call discretionary income surplus) or nothing left over (which we call a deficit). When your budget shows a deficit or the surplus does not provide enough discretionary income to completely eliminate all your non-mortgage debts within the next two years then you should work with an accountability partner who is a good financial steward to (i) determine which bills receive priority for payment at the current time, (ii) identify current expenses that can be immediately reduced or eliminated, and (iii) find additional work to increase income to help expediently get you out of the financial bondage you are in so you can build wealth to carry out His call upon your life for the future.

Please pray for this ministry and email me with any questions. May the LORD bless you richly as you follow His plan!

Genesis 14:20, Malachi 3:8-12, Matthew 23:23, Hebrews 7:8, Proverbs 27:23-27, Habakkuk 2:2-4, Luke 14:28-30

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

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

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MoneyWalk 474 Principles That Bring Reward, Part 2

This program will help you undo financial bondage.

Be content. Choose delayed gratification instead of instant gratification. Do not buy that bigger house, more expensive car, new furniture, new jewelry, etc. until you have reached the priority goal of being a faithful tithing member of a local church and have become totally debt-free. Stuff to buy, places to vacation, ministries to give to will still be there at prices you can afford to pay after you reach your goal.

Show self-control. This is fruit of the Spirit shows that you walk in the Spirit and not according to the flesh (carnal nature). Pleasing God is the ultimate goal and can only be displayed by living according to His commands and guidance. You must learn to be obedient to biblical principles in order to control your fleshly appetite and put the focus back on fulfilling His purpose for your life. This will help produce wealth and increase giving in a way that is pleasing to the LORD Jesus Christ. The wide path that the world is following, spending with reckless abandon on many things that have no eternal value, would otherwise compromise and possibly derail your relationship with Him.

Be willing to sacrifice. Delaying gratification results in great benefits accruing to you in the long-run because it replaces short-term pleasure for long-term financial soundness and helps keep you out of financial trouble. Being willing to sacrifice is shown by being more interested in tithing and giving to evangelistic, disciple-making, and good works aimed at gospel purposes than you are interested in hoarding things of comfort, glamour, and prestige for yourself. Take up your cross and follow Him, for those who love the world and the things of the world are at enmity with the LORD.

Please pray for this ministry and email me with any questions. May the LORD bless you richly as you follow His plan!

Luke 3:14, Philippians 4:11, 1Timothy 6:8, Romans 12:1, Philippians 4:18, Hebrews 11:4, Proverbs 25:28, 1Corinthians 7:5, 9:25, Galatians 5:22-23

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

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

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MoneyWalk 473 Principles That Bring Reward, Part 1

This program will help you undo financial bondage.

The first five principles are connected to the whole of your life, not just how you manage money. They should be a foundation for how and why you decide to do anything in life. They allow you to accomplish much, be very successful in your endeavors, and please God when incorporated with other actions like praying, studying the bible, listening to the voice of the Holy Spirit within you, fellowshipping with believers (attending church regularly), and before making major decisions getting the input of a group of counselors that believe in Jesus Christ and who seek to do His will. These principles help you fulfill the purpose for which God created you.

Understand that God owns everything. We are only managers of His estate. God is, always was, and always will be. He is the creator of all things including you, yet He is so gracious to allow you to live in His presence and receive His blessing. You have a choice to live with Him or live without Him. At the end of your days on Earth your choice becomes an eternal one. His desire is that you would choose to live with Him by inviting Him to live in you as Savior & LORD, because this is the only choice that makes Heaven your everlasting home while bringing great blessing and reward while you’re on earth, even in the midst of trials and temptations, because you choose to follow His instruction & guidance confirmed by biblical principles. Living without Him means you choose Hell as your home, which is a grave eternal consequence that does not have to be. according to His instruction and guidance confirmed by biblical principle.

You are to do good works. God-pleasing works should be your aim. This involves performing legitimate service to earn money and obtain resources to take care of yourself and family as an employee of someone’s enterprise or by crafting and selling your own products and service. It also includes engaging with His Church to be a witness of Jesus Christ to people around you and in other parts of the world and in some instances to help meet people’s physical needs (food, clothing, shelter, etc.).

Please pray for this ministry and email me with any questions. May the LORD bless you richly as you follow His plan!

Revelation 4:11, Psalm 50:10-12, 1Chronicles 29:11, Genesis 2:15, Ephesians 4:27-28, 2 Thessalonians 3:6-11

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

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

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MoneyWalk 472 A Rich Life Is the LORD’s Will

This program will help you undo financial bondage.

You cannot out give the LORD! This is a reason some people can consistently give 30 to 90 percent of their income to ministry work and yet still accumulate great wealth. His forgiving and giving character and their desire to give Him glory via funding ministry work results in abundant harvests that continue to be reaped by them through many decades and indeed by their children’s children.

We often look to unsaved multi-millionaires for the roadmap to riches and our eyes gleam when we mention their names and give them great honor for what they have done in this life. We listen intently to what they say because deep down we desire a similar financial future in order to live the extravagant way they appear to live.

Yet, some of us refuse to believe that the same One who allowed them to be blessed on earth will reward us immensely now and throughout eternity. He simply wants you to exhibit faith in Him by applying biblical financial principles throughout your life because they will help you exhibit the right motive, actions, and aim while using the power He gives you to get wealth so you can establish His covenant in the earth. In this way, the inner-working of the dominion He gave man from the beginning will reward you spiritually and naturally to reach a rich level of abundance that is far more than you need to pursue and complete your purpose and callings throughout life when it corresponds to the Great Commission. In this way, He keeps you on the path of righteousness for His namesake and your best financial, lifestyle, and spiritual maturity outcome.

It is not unspiritual for you to believe a similar plan has been made available by Father God and by faith you can grab a hold of it and fund the gospel to a greater degree than you otherwise would be able to. Don’t seek the wealth level of any person nor compare yourself with any man. Simply seek Him first, His kingdom and righteousness by believing and employing every biblical financial instruction. They will make your life abundant in every way as you live and move and have your being in Him. A life of continual increase will be made available to you and you will never be on the path of one who obtains the world while losing his soul.

Please pray for this ministry and email me with any questions. May the LORD bless you richly as you follow His plan!

Genesis 1:26, Deuteronomy 8:18, Matthew 28:19-20, Mark 8:36, Galatians 6:4-5

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

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MoneyWalk 471 Take Good Care Of Your Family

This program will help you undo financial bondage.

Scripture points out that a believer who does not take care of his house-hold has a spiritual condition close to that of an unbeliever. Being cured of this negative condition and caring for family in the way that pleases the LORD requires that you daily make spending time with Him the number one priority of your life. This will help you adhere to biblical principles, including those related to finances (personal and business).

The intimacy you develop with Him will lead you to a display of faith via budgeting, so you consistently spend far less than the income you bring home. It will help you identify monthly payments for unnecessary products and services that are not good for your life right now because they are keeping you from entering the Wealthy Place designed for you. It lets you know to build an emergency fund to help cover unexpected / non-budgeted costs that arise. Also, it helps lead you into the practice of debt-elimination so you can live debt-free for the rest of your life.

It helps you understand that surety / cosigning is another form of debt that should be avoided because it does not help guide you or others down the financial path of good stewardship. Also, it often leaves the borrower and cosigner under a stressful debt load, especially since the loans generally cover depreciating assets and most borrowers are not faithful in repaying the loans and the cosigner has no legal right to take the product to try and sell it to mitigate a small portion of the debt. It leads you to save beyond an emergency fund and to invest throughout the rest of your life to tremendously grow wealth to increase tithes & offerings for the spread of the gospel of Jesus Christ at home and abroad. It moves you into philanthropy to widows, orphans, and the needy in your community and beyond.

There are a few things you should do immediately even as you employ the principles above. First, you should identify primary and secondary (contingent beneficiaries) and name them on each of your financial ac-counts (bank, credit union, employer sponsored retirement, financial services brokerages like Vanguard, TIAA-CREF, etc.). In some states, a Ladybird Deed filed with your county recorder of deeds allows you to initiate an equivalent process for your home. Beneficiary designations help your heirs gain almost immediate access to funds associated with them without having to get approval from probate court. The probate process may still be needed for the conveyance of property (real and personal) not covered by a beneficiary designation or Ladybird deed.

It is wise to seek the advice of an attorney that handles property / estate matters for issues other than simple beneficiary designations on ac-counts and to help you draft a will, durable powers of attorney for finances and healthcare, and trust documents. For simple estate situations they can often charge reasonable prices and allow you to avoid mistakes you could make on do-it-yourself forms. The bottom line is, this type of documentation helps fulfill the taking good care of your family principle. You should craft such documents immediately so you dictate the disposition of your wealth / estate and thus do not allow the court system via state law to impose its will on the assets you leave behind and charge your heirs/estate hefty estate administration fees for doing so.

Please pray for this ministry and email me with any questions. May the LORD bless you richly as you follow His plan!

Psalm 115:14, Proverbs 13:22, Ephesians 5:28-33, 1Timothy 3:5, 5:8

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

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

You can find many other MoneyWalk articles on Facebook by looking at the NOTES created by Randy Parlor at https://www.facebook.com/#!/profile.php?id=100000444069041&sk=notes.

You can connect with Randy Parlor on Twitter and Linkedin

You can also view and/or listen to MoneyWalk articles at https://www.youtube.com/channel/UCXnztOIesOKIrSd_H6c-8mQ