Tuesday, August 26, 2008

Don't Let the Monkeys Pull You Down!


I'm sure that seems like a strange title, but hang in there. A couple posts ago, I wrote about a book called "The Total Money Makeover" by Dave Ramsey. I got the book on a Thursday afternoon, and by Friday at 10:30pm, I had already read it cover-to-cover. Well then I let another friend of mine borrow it, and she happened to have it with her at work today. Since I didn't have anything else to do on my lunch break, I decided to take another look at it...I knew that I blew through it so fast the first time in my excitement that I probably missed a few things. Long story short, I wanted to share this piece about Debt (taken directly from the book):


"Debt has been sold to us so aggressively, so loudly, and so often that to imagine living without debt requires myth-busting. We have to systematically destroy the inner workings of the myths. Debt is so ingrained into our culture that most Americans can't even envision a car without a payment, a house without a mortgage, a student without a loan, and credit without a card. We have been sold debt with such repetition and with such fervor that most folks cannot conceive what it would be like to have no payments."


Is that not so true??? Up until a couple of weeks ago, I was the same way....thinking that I'd forever be in debt in one form or another. But God is showing me that that is a lie. I'm not going through all of this in order to get rich. That's not the point. Jesus was poor and that's ok. But I am trying to learn how to be a better steward of everything God has entrusted to me...not just my finances, but my time, spiritual gifts, etc.


Next week, Ed & I are going to the orientation at church for Financial Peace University. It's a 13 week class taught by Dave Ramsey via video. Then we break up into small groups for more detailed learning and discussion. I am ridiculously excited about this!! Since my lunch break is almost over, I don't have time right now to explain the whole story, but the way this has worked out shows that God had His hands all over this! Now I'm just praying that Ed's schedule will allow him to join me every Wednesday night for the classes.


Okay, enough yammering. But seriously, I highly recommend Total Money Makeover...or any of Dave Ramsey's other materials. Even if you just check out his website, you'll find tons of information and free budgeting forms.


Have a great day :)


3 comments:

Life Glimpsed: The Denglers said...

happy debt busting - that's AWESOME!

Jenny | The Balow Bunch said...

You'll have to give us weekly reports with what you learned from class, so you can pass it on and we can all work on managing finances better. Managing finances is probably one thing that everyone can always work on improving, no matter how financially saavy you are.

BrandiB said...

I just finished reading "Financial Peace" by Dave Ramsey and couldn't agree more! Wish they would have those classes down here in ol' Calabash :)