Why looking poor can be the key to being rich?

Ralph
00:00:00

Are you tired of watching others flaunt their wealth while you struggle to make ends meet? What if I told you that looking poor could actually be your key to building real wealth? Well today, I'm going to share two fascinating stories that completely changed my perspective on what true prosperity looks like. Including one right from my own church's finance committee. Stay with me to discover how living below your means can lead to extraordinary financial abundance and the ability to serve others in ways you may never have imagined.

Narrator
00:00:33

Welcome to the Ask Ralph Podcast where listening to an experienced financial professional with over 30 years of experience can help you make sense of confusing questions, current headlines and industry trends about taxes, small business, financial decision making, investment strategies, and even the art of proper budgeting. Ask Ralph makes the complex simple by sharing his real world knowledge from a Christian perspective with all things financial.

Now here's your Host, Ralph Estep Jr.

Ralph
00:01:02

Thank you for joining me today, I'm honored to help you on your financial journey. And that's just what we're doing together. We're on a financial journey together. And if you missed yesterday's show, I talked all about protecting your retirement account from those online scammers. I'm going to encourage you to check it out. And if you found value in it, do me a favor and share it with a friend.

Today's question comes from Michael in Tennessee, and he writes this, "Dear Ralph, I'm struggling with something that's been eating at me. I make a decent income, but I feel constant pressure to show it. My coworkers all drive new cars, wear expensive clothes, and live in fancy neighborhoods. I'm living well below my means in a modest home, driving a 10-year-old car and shopping at discount stores. While I'm saving money, I feel like a failure. My wife is starting to resent our lifestyle, especially when her friends post their luxury vacations on social media. Am I doing something wrong by living so frugally?"

Well Michael, I want to just honor you for asking a very honest question. And the truth is we all feel this societal pressure. That's what I call those social media snapshots or that social media highlight reel. Has this all trying to keep up with this perception, but are those perceptions reality? And listen.

I love to answer questions just like yours today. So join me each Tuesday night at 7:00 PM Eastern time for the Ask Ralph show live. And the best part is I'm going to give a hundred-dollar Amazon gift card every week to those of you who joined the live show. You join that by going to askralphpodcast.com/live. Again, that's askralphpodcast.com/live and you can bring your questions there and join our community.

You know Michael, your struggle reminds me of a great Bible verse. It perfectly addresses the situation. It comes from the book of Matthew 6:33. And we read it says this. "But seek first his kingdom and his righteousness, and all these things will be given to you as well." Well, that certainly makes it clear, doesn't it?

Well today, I'm going to share two really powerful stories that really shaped my understanding of wealth and stewardship. Let me start with the first one. I'll tell you about Harold. Now I'm not using Harold's real name. I just want to make sure we're keeping things secure, you know what I mean? I don't like to use people's real names, but I met Harold a few years back. My family was attending a different church, and Harold was actually a member of the finance committee. He was that guy you see shuffling into church on Sunday with those worn suits, certainly wasn't a flashy guy. As I recall, he carried a tattered Bible look like he had it from the stone age. And he, I said, I think he's been carrying it for decades. In the parking lot, Harold drove a very old car. And you'd always know when he was there because that car was loud. I don't know if the muffler fell off 20 years ago or what. I guess he had to been hard of hearing because everybody else heard it. But that sound never seemed to phase him. Now from outward appearances, you would think he's not very wealthy. I think he's just getting by, or even below, below the poverty level, to be honest. But here's what everybody didn't know. Harold was a multimillionaire and that's just the truth. Through years of disciplined frugality, Harold had wise stewardship, and he had built up a massive investment portfolio. And I can still remember one Wednesday evening, Harold invited me to his home. Now, let me tell you about his home.

It's a very modest home. I had a guess it would be about 1200 square feet. It was a nice, but small ranch house. He said Ralph, I've been here for 40 years. He invited me in. We sat at his kitchen table. He served me coffee. Well, you know, I don't drink coffee. He listened to the show, he know I don't drink coffee.

So he gave me a hot tea. I looked down at the mug, it's chipped. You could tell it had been around for probably 30 years, but they worked, they were functional. And I knew Harold wanted to talk. He had never invited me to his house before, but I wasn't really sure what he wanted to talk about. And listen. He passed me a piece of cake. Now as a type two diabetic, I should probably pass on the cake. But it looked pretty good to me. He passed me the cake and he said, Ralph, I learned early that every dollar spent trying to look wealthy is a dollar that can't be used to create actual wealth or serve God's kingdom. He had just laid it out for me.

A very simple philosophy. Let me tell you that again, he said, I learned early that every dollar spent trying to look wealthy is a dollar that can't be used to create actual wealth or serve God's kingdom. And I thought about it for a second. I said, Harold, that is a profound statement. And then he said, I want to show you something. He left the room.

He came back with this worn ledger book. It's one of those old financial diaries. I hadn't seen one in years. I remember when I was a kid, my dad had used those for some of his clients or something. But it'd been 30 years since I seen one. Red cover on the thing and just a thick book, kind of look like a diary. Let me tell you, Harold was proud of this book. And the next thing he shared was truly amazing. It's what he said to me.

He said, Ralph, I've learned to live on just 30% of my income for decades. Now think about that for a moment. What Harold said to me is he was living on just 30% of his income. And he said to me, Ralph, the rest goes to investments and giving. So again, think about this. He was taking 70% of his income and splitting it between investments and giving. It certainly was no 10% tithe for Harold. And I could see the pride in Harold's eyes. And the next thing he said, he said, Ralph, let me tell you about the missionary families I've supported. And the church building projects I've quietly funded.

He didn't want anybody to know what he was doing. He provided scholarships to seminary students. And then he said something striking it and it, it's with me today. He said, Ralph, no one needs to know it's me giving that. They just need to know it's God providing. And see as I think about it even right now, see, you know, Harold had it right. He didn't want or need the accolades. He didn't want the glory. He saw his simple mission as being wise and providing for God's kingdom. What an amazing man. And I learned he passed away a few years ago. As I understand it, he left the most of his fortune to charitable organizations. So I guess in the end, you could say Harold still continues to quietly bless others. Now let me tell you about my client. Let's call him James. Now James had a much different story. As I recall, he came to me about 12 years ago. He was buried in credit card debt. So pleased, he had just leased a luxury car, but he said, Ralph, I really can't afford it. And I was doing a financial series on Sunday nights at church and I was sharing seven biblical principles to achieve financial freedom. And I'll mention later how you can get my updated gift. How to escape the bondage of living paycheck to paycheck. I'm going to give you that as an option today at the, when I do my closing at the end.

But now he had done the first step. He had taken that first step. He booked an appointment with me. Because he realized, he was in trouble. So you might be asking Ralph, what did you do? And I'm going to tell you, that's a great question. And the first thing I did was with James, as I said, I stressed one of my core principles with him.

And that was intentionally choosing to live below your means. And it's not rocket science. This is not complicated stuff. It's really quite simple. You got to make a conscious decision to spend less than what you're earning.

And then the next part of that is you got to learn to view money as a tool for God's purpose instead of a measure for success. And I could see James, he was taking it all in. He was ruminating it and his eyes were wide open. And I've seen that same look on other spaces I've shared it with.

So you might be asking, what did James do? I'm glad you asked that. To be blunt, James made radical changes. The first thing he did was he traded his luxury car for a reliable used car. The next thing James did was he downsized his home. He started shopping at discount stores. He told me, Ralph, my friends and family thought I'd fallen on hard times. But the reality is, Ralph, for the first time, I'm actually building wealth. Looking back at it now, in fact, he was building tremendous wealth. So let's fast forward, 10 years. James had zero debt. He had a seven-figure investment portfolio.

Think about that for a second. He had over a million dollars in investment portfolio in just 10 years. He gives more to charity annually than he was spending on that luxury car lease. Now James still lives in a modest home. He's used his wealth to launch a scholarship fund and he funds an after school program for underprivileged youth. And James is very proud to tell you, he supports five mission families.

So you might be saying, Ralph, what are these stories telling us? Well, in the end, these stories illustrate a very powerful truth. And I want you to hear this, true wealth isn't about what you display. It's about what you can deploy for God's purpose. Let me repeat that. True wealth isn't about what you display. It's about what you can deploy for God's purpose. And when we finally break free from society's expectations and embrace biblical financial principles, we can discover a kind of prosperity that goes far beyond mere dollars and cents. And I'm going to share some action steps with you that you can take right now to move forward towards this prosperity, but first let me ask you a few questions. Do you feel overwhelmed with your finances? Do you want to find that financial freedom that seems to be eluding you? Do you want to escape the bondage of debt? Do you want to align your finances with your faith? Do you feel like you live in paycheck to paycheck? Do you feel frustrated? Do you feel hopeless, and do you feel stuck? Well guess what? I'm happy to tell you, there is hope. And I want to give you my free guide.

It's called how to escape the paycheck-to-paycheck bondage cycle. Using 7 simple biblical principles. And this guide's going to give you a fresh perspective on managing your finances and more importantly, a roadmap to escape the cycle of financial bondage, because here's the thing. You can achieve financial freedom. Here's all you got to do.

Go to askralphpodcast.com/escape. Get your guide today. Again, that's askralphpodcast.com/escape. And as I promised, let me share some action steps that you can take right away. In fact, you can take them today. These are some tried and true things you can do. Number one. You got to know where your money's going.

So start tracking every dollar you spend on appearance-based purchases. If you think you're spending money because well I want to see what this person would say, hey, I've been there. I remember buying a Corvette just a few years ago. I was so excited. I found this car online. It was red. It was the high end, flashy, convertible top. You name it. Wife dropped me off at the dealership up in the middle of Pennsylvania has ever caused about a two hour ride. Got to the dealership, showed me how to work the car. And man, I was on the road, and I'm driving along and look at Ralph.

Well, by the time I got home, I realized, it was emptiness. And that's what I'm going to go into number two, and that's create a kingdom impact savings account. Create an account that actually does something for the kingdom. That Corvette didn't do anything for the kingdom. I came in this false sense of look I've arrived. How vain was that at the time?

But think about the stories I've told you and the way that those folks were able to have a huge impact because of their wise financial stewardship and their intentional decisions to spend the money for things that actually matter to the kingdom. And one of the things I'm going to tell you, number three is finding an accountability partner who shares your values. This is not a journey that you have to go on by yourself.

And I'm going to tell you that people I know who are the most successful at this have that accountability partner. Have that person they can call when they're struggling or have that person to bounce ideas off of. And number four, not the last thing I'm going to give you today is begin practicing contentment with what you already have. You know, a lot of ways

I do a show every day and I seem to always come back to this theme. And that is, I think we've all got to learn to embrace that contentment. We got to really understand that we have been given so much. Stop chasing air for those social media highlight reels, because that's all it is. I was on a show the other day, and we were talking about Christmas. And I'll be talking tomorrow and the next day about how to get my Christmas guide of how not to go broke.

So take a look and watch out for that. But you think about it, you know, on Christmas day, people are posting on X, were called Twitter or X, whatever they call it. Now, Facebook. You know, posting a YouTube and TikTok. You see all look at this shiny thing I got. Look at this. Look at these, the gifts under the tree. And that's the highlight reel because what you don't see is when those credit card bills come due in January and February. You don't see the struggles that, that having an over-the-top Christmas, that doesn't really mean much, because guess what?

In two or three months, you're not going to remember what you bought. You're not going to remember what you got for Christmas. Let me tell you a little secret. The greatest gift you could ever get was the gift of Christ. And if you know him, you've got the greatest gift you're ever going to receive. But it all comes down to practicing that contentment. Be content with what you already have. Now, I've gone a long way today, but I really believe that's the message for today. Big picture.

Stop spending money on those appearance-based purchases. Create that kingdom impact savings account. Find that accountability partner who shares your values. And look around and appreciate what you already have. Now tomorrow, we're going to tackle another important topic for small business owners. I get this question a lot in the practice. And that's understanding what an EIN or what they call an Employer Identification Number is and why you might need one. A lot of people don't realize it until it's down the roads on that, man I wish I got that set up at the beginning. So that'll be on tomorrow show. I want to encourage you to listen to it. And remember, my passion is to help you achieve financial success. Everything we talk about on the show, every time I turn on this microphone, I turn on this camera. I play these episodes out is all about helping you to achieve financial success. I want to see you break free from that financial bondage. I want to see you live out your dreams, whatever those look like, and everybody's dreams are different. And I want to see you grow in your faith because I know together, we can master your finances from that Christian perspective. So as I always end the show, I would encourage you to stay financially savvy and may God bless you abundantly.

Narrator
00:16:12

Thank you for joining us on the Ask Ralph podcast, and with a simple click to subscribe, we'll invite you back to our next episode. And remember, financial issues don't have to be complicated, just Ask Ralph.

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