The Carey Nieuwhof Leadership Podcast
CNLP 067 - Chris Brown on Pastors, Personal Finances and Creating Margin
(upbeat music) - Welcome to the Carrie Newhoff Leadership Podcast, a podcast all about leadership, change, and personal growth. The goal? To help you lead like never before, in your church or in your business. And now your host, Carrie Newhoff. - Well, hey everybody, and welcome to episode 67 of the podcast. My name is Carrie Newhoff. I hope our time together helps you lead like never before. And hey, if you're listening to this in real time, Merry Christmas, advance Merry Christmas. I hope your Christmas service is, if you're part of a local church. You're gonna be amazing, I really do. And as we hone in, not only on Christmas, but the very end of 2015, I've got sort of a trilogy together for you. Starting last week, and then again today, and then again next week, that's gonna help you, hopefully have a better 2016. So last week, in episode 66, Wayne Cordova, gave you all kinds of like mostly free tech hacks and productivity hacks, that I think are gonna make a big difference as you try to get a little more efficient and free up more time for like leadership and people and family and prayer next year. So if you miss that one, you wanna go back and listen to it, if not today, then on the Christmas break. And then today, my guest is Chris Brown. A lot of you will know Chris, he has listened to literally by millions of people each week. And he's part of Dave Ramsey's group. And does a lot of talking these days with people and church leaders about finances. So Chris has been a pastor himself at Elevation Church and then again in Florida, and is now with the Ramsey group and speaks all over America, all over the world, actually he has an audience where he helps people with their personal finances. So I got a chance to spend some time with Chris and ask him about why, you know, how are pastors good at personal finances? Where do we struggle with it? So especially here we are right at Christmas, right? It's like, did we go over the budget? Chris is gonna have some help for you that I hope is gonna make 2016 a better year for you. And then next week, we're back with part three of the trilogy. And you're gonna hear from Joe Sangle. Joe has been a friend for many, many years. And we're also gonna talk about money and a little bit about personal finance, but an awful lot about church finance. And Joe has actually helped our church, connects his church tremendously over the last four or five years, helped run our capital campaign, got us into a brand new building a few months ago. And Joe is just packed with practical advice. And actually so many of you who listen are bi-vocational pastors, I actually had a little conversation with Joe because you got some fascinating concepts on how to maybe supplement your income if you're a struggling pastor. So that is for the end of the year, next Tuesday, December 29th, we're coming out with that episode with Joe. So it's a little bit on time productivity and then personal finance, then church finance and also some help with your career if you're one of those bi-vocational pastors. So you don't wanna miss it. And the best way to make sure you don't miss anything is to subscribe and you can do that for free on iTunes, on Stitcher, or on TuneIn Radio. And if you haven't done that, just pause right now and subscribe. It's free, that way this will all be in your inbox and you can go back and you can go forward. I also wanna say a number of you been asking, "Hey, what happened to the early episodes?" I think we actually solved a problem with that. It was just file size. And so now you should be able to go back and look over all 67 episodes in your browser on whatever app you use. If you're having problems with that, just let us know, but we think we got it fixed. So this is awesome. We had episodes disappearing for a while. And so we got rid of that, I hope, I hope. And all the episodes are back. So you got the full archive, which makes me really, really happy. So maybe you wanna do some year end listening and catch up on some stuff you missed. You should be able to do that flawlessly. Also wanna thank all of you who are leaving reviews, which is great. We are just almost, as I recorded this, at 300 reviews on the American US iTunes store. And there was one that came in that I just wanna read. It just so encouraged me. And I read every single one of them. So thank you. But Dave Camp left a review a few weeks ago. And he said very kindly, in my opinion, this is the best podcast out there on church leadership. But then the next part is what really got me. He says, "I am a 31 year old youth pastor." And this podcast is like getting leadership coaching for free. I'm glad that's what my goal is, Dave. So I'm glad it feels that way for you. He says, "Amazing, deep, theologically robust and applicable content each and every week." Now, this is the really cool part. He says, "I am also an adjunct theology professor at a local university. And I've made listening to this podcast, part of the course requirements for an intro to youth ministry class that I teach. Grateful for you, Carrie. Hey, Dave, that's really super cool. I never thought when I launched this that it would be used as required listening as part of a seminary course. Hey, and if you're one of the students listening to this, I am so sorry that you have to put up with this, but I really do hope it helps. And for those of us on the other side of seminary, 'cause I did seminary too, I think most of us wished we all had something like this that was this practical along the way. So it's one of the reasons I love doing this. Anyway, that's a little bit about what's out there. And thank you for everybody who leaves ratings and reviews, and now let's jump right in to my conversation with Chris Brown. Well, I'm really excited to have Chris Brown on the podcast. If you follow him on social media, you know him as Chris Brown on air. And also, if you follow anything Dave Ramsey does, Chris is speaking at conferences, does a daily radio show, has his own podcast, and just so thrilled to have you with us today. Welcome, Chris. Oh, thank you, I'm honored. Hey, yeah, it's been fun. We've been connecting a little bit via social media and chatting a little bit online, but this is the first time we've almost been in the same place together, right? Well, it feels like you thank God for technology. Yeah, although I was saying last week I was in Nashville and stayed apparently right across the street from where you guys, where you're sitting right now, so. And you didn't come and visit? Yeah, well, I didn't, you know, you just show up and like, hey, how are you? I don't know. It was like we passed by Ramsey Solutions onto the way to the hotel, and I'm like, oh, that's cool. So. Well, you gotta visit next time. I will visit next time. That's for sure. Nashville was a lot of fun. So today, Chris, we're gonna talk about something that's really close to you, and something you speak about daily, and also to audiences all over the place, and that is to help people figure out finances, which is just such a perplexing subject. I remember one of the first piece of advice I got in ministry. When I started out, I was 30 years old, and there was a guy who had a fair bit of money in our church, and it was a real small church at the time, and he just said, carry money. It's a problem if you have it. It's a problem if you don't. And I've never forgotten that. But you're in Kenner, often when you talk about money, you go right back to the time that you were a kid, and you had a defining moment when you were, what, 11 years old? Tell us a little bit about that, and how this became a real passionate subject for you, Chris. - Yeah, so my passion for stewardship started when I was 11. I didn't know that word, of course, but at 11 years old, I was sitting down, it was actually on my birthday, and I was sitting down in a dark, empty, roach, infested apartment. And it was completely silent. It was just me and my mom, and I was staring out the window, and obviously I was wishing that my birthday looked much differently. I was hoping for some, I don't know, bounce houses like most kids have, and friends over and laughter. But instead, I was replaying the last several years in my mind, and I remember just thinking through the years of discipline, a disappointment in the pain, and I turned my attention towards the kitchen. I remember this moment where I noticed the kitchen was empty, but my mom was, she was in the kitchen, and she just looked, just had no hope. She was just staring off into space, and I remember looking at her face, and thinking, there's gotta be another way. Something's obviously wrong here. All the violence in the home, and multiple father figures going to jail, and spending the night sleeping in the backseat of cars, and abuse shelters, like this is really whacked. As I wonder, all those just thinking, there's gotta be another way. And so I didn't know what stewardship was, but I'm like, listen, I get it. You need to save, you need to spend less than you make, you need to get out there and get a good job. I just knew, and she was a heroic single mom, working three jobs, trying to do everything she could, but just wasn't making very good decisions. And so at that day, I remembered that when I grow up one day, I'm never gonna do that to my family. And all I had during those days was a Sony Walkman. I don't know if you remember one of those. - Oh, I remember those, yeah. Was it the cassette or the CD version? It was before Discman, it was the Walkman. - Oh, it was a true Walkman, so that's amazing. - Yeah, so that's really what I got raised on. I was raised, I was listening to Larry Burkett and James Dobson and Charles Stanley, and so I was sitting in this empty room, completely silent, and I just have my Sony Walkman. We couldn't afford tapes, didn't have tapes. And so I just listened to the radio, and that was usually the only thing that came in well, so I was kind of raised on the radio. - And was your mom a Christian, like were you introduced to Faith Young, or is that something you encountered a little bit later in your life? - She was a believer, and so we go to church maybe once or twice a year because she was always working so much. She was a believer that I think maybe had just enough Christ that maybe didn't have the real thing. I don't know, it's just kind of inoculated a little bit. And those are the hardest people to reach, so I don't really know, I know she knew of him, and I knew she had this little bit of relationship, but I just don't know how deep it was. - Right, so Christian, you're listening to Charles Stanley and focus on the family when you're a kid. - So obviously, you were introduced to Christianity at some level at a younger age. - Yeah, I was just intrigued by it. I was intrigued by some of the messages. The messages were overcoming anxiety and overcoming rejection and a handling fear in the midst of trials. So it was more of the content that was intriguing to me as an 11 year old. I was just drawn to the wisdom. So I was more drawn to that than the music that was on the radio. Okay, now that's fascinating. I didn't know that, Chris. And just a word of encouragement, a lot of pastors, a lot of church leaders listen to this. And to be honest with you, until you just said that right now, it never even occurred to me that there would be some 11 year old listening to a message that myself or some other preacher might have preached because he's looking for hope and trying to figure out how to overcome anxiety. That's a really encouraging word. And that's one of the amazing things. And one of the ways I think we first connected was because our podcasts are often positioned often next to each other on the iTunes charts. And so you started reaching out to me and I reached out to you. But you never know where those messages end up. Do you, Chris, you really don't? - No, not at all. And it's a powerful thought to think that I'm on the other side of the microphone now. And it just seems very full circle. And it's very fulfilling to know that I'm possibly being used every day to provide that for another 11 year old. - Yeah, very humbling, very humbling. So were you like going to start a tech startup when you were 13, or like how did the entrepreneurial sort of pastoral journey develop for you from that point from your 11th birthday? - Yeah, so I mean, I went through middle school and high school and college. I have no idea how, but I did somehow. And went to college, found myself at a Christian college, which there's no reason why I should have been in a Christian college at all. I just happened to play baseball. And the coach there said, hey, listen, why don't you come play baseball for free? So that was intriguing to me. - Wow, yeah, free. - I'll play, I'll go to college for free, that's awesome. And so my first month at college accepted Jesus. It was just amazing. It was like immediately, as soon as I heard the truth, I'm like, oh, wow, this is amazing. And so I accepted Jesus for myself, not just getting the wisdom and how to overcome anxiety and those kind of things, but actually a relationship with Jesus. So I got that and then married my wife, graduated, and was doing really well, you know, out of college. You know, we both got good jobs, we're living way below our means. And I grew up listening to Larry Burkett on the radio and folks like Dave Ramsey. And so we made some really good decisions out of college. But then I got a little cocky. And in 2007, I decided I was going to borrow a million dollars. - Wow, that's a lot of money. I was flipping houses and it was working. But I was doing it with cash. I said, why would you want to flip one at a time when you could do eight at a time? So I went out and borrowed a million dollars. And again, the year was 2007, recession hit, and I'm sick of a bunch of vacant properties. And so I paid on those vacant properties for three years, 36 months of paying for these vacant homes. And January of 2011, I hit rock bottom. And I went bankrupt. - Wow. So middle school, high school college had its, you know, had its pro ups and downs, but then of course, as an adult, I've had some ups and downs as well. - That was so devastating. You know, my wife and I, we went down with her parents to a vacation home in Florida in 2009, just for a week or two away. And I remember renting this place. We found it on the, there wasn't Airbnb, but it was like a vacation exchange type thing. And so we got the place, I don't know, for a thousand for the week. It was a nice high-end condo built in '06. And the guy was from Chicago and we sat there at the end of the dock and he had to give me the keys and that sort of thing. It was just outside of Clearwater. And he said he and his four buddies put their entire life savings into buying some condos in '05, '06, '07. And they were worth million dollars and now they were worth a quarter million dollars and they couldn't even make the minimum payments and like the end was near. And I've never forgotten that. Like so many people lost so much. In Canada, where I am, people lost something but it wasn't quite as severe. But man, that was devastating. So what was that like for you? I mean, as a Christian, as somebody who listened to all those financial things, take us through the emotions. Because I know that there are listeners right now, leaders who either have been bankrupt or maybe are wondering, hey, is that around the corner for me? Walk us through that time. - Yeah, and the reason why I tell you that story is just because I want you to know where this passion for stewardship comes from. It comes from this childhood memory of seeing my mom completely lost with hope and saying I'm never gonna do that to my family. And then as an adult, doing the exact same thing to my family. - Wow. - And I can remember that morning, January of 2011, I finally filed bankruptcy, going into that courthouse. I remember what it felt like everyone's eyes are on me and I've got to look at the trustee in the face and say, hey, listen, I can't pay anymore. I've got to declare bankruptcy. I remember what that feels like. But the morning of going into the courthouse, I remember looking into my bathroom mirror and I can remember looking in the mirror and seeing the exact same face that my mom had when I was 11 years old, this hopelessness. And it was brutal. And so what I would like to just communicate to folks right now is that this passion for stewardship doesn't come from a condemning spirit of those who don't have their act together when it comes to stewardship. Obviously, my family blew it as a child and we've blown it as an adult. And so we were doing well, got cocky for one month and it totally didn't-- - Really? One bad decision. - Yeah, it's seriously. And then since then, we've just kind of been digging back out of the hole. So I just would want folks to realize that when you make a mistake, you can dig out of it. Don't feel condemned and guilty. You peek at the past, but you focus on the future. - Wow. - And I mean, that you have in common with Dave Ramsey too. You know, one of the reasons he's so passionate about money today is because he ended up going bankrupt. - There's some more story, just the numbers are different. - Yeah, yeah, yeah. So that was a number of years ago now that was back in 2011. And so what's happened since you've been digging out and you were a pastor of a church at the time too. You were on church staff when that happened, correct? - Yeah, I worked at Elevation Church in North Carolina. I loved my time there. I was a campus pastor and then I moved to Miami and was an executive pastor down there at potential church and I loved my time there. And then resigned in May of 2013 and started consulting and helping coaches all over the country. And then January of last year I joined the Dave Ramsey team to lift up the banner of stewardship all over the country. I've always had this passion for the local church and always had a passion for people and had a passion for stewardship. And so now this is the perfect intersection of all those passions where I get to help people, especially because this idea of stewardship is deeper than just money. I wanna help people with the fact of that we're supposed to live this life, God's way and for his glory, it's not just resources. - So Chris, pastors often have a weird relationship with money. Either we like it too much, which we definitely see in some church circles, or we're afraid of it or we're afraid to talk about it, but there's often a funk around money. What have you seen? And I mean, because you do love the church and you've got experience in the local church, let's talk about church leaders for a moment. How have you seen sort of what are the typical profiles you see in church leaders from the people who love it too much to the people who are just like, "Ah, we'll never talk about that, ever." - Right, well, I think just in general, politics and money just source subjects to talk about in general. There's lots of reasons for that too. I mean, a lot of it is because of people's position financially, the huge gap between what they're really experiencing in their life and what you see, what you see. So they might've just bought that nice Range Rover, but they don't want you asking any secondary questions about how they got that Range Rover. - That's right, that's right. They're driving a car payment, they're not driving a car. - Yeah, exactly, it's a source subject. And another one I think is there's just a huge stigma out there that pastors and church leaders bringing up money at all because of some of the things that have happened in church culture in the past where you've got folks who have really abused that right to speak into people's life in that area. And so those who have a real clean conscious are scared to even bring it up. But really, we need to bring it up. We need to overcome that because we're supposed to be teaching the 360 degree full council of God. And so we have to bring it up. And then lastly, and this one's hard to hear for our leaders is a lot of us aren't modeling in this area. And it's really hard to bring up something that you're not doing well at. I know during my time of that huge mistake and digging out of there, my effectiveness as a pastor just plummeted to delete people in this area. I couldn't speak with authority. I couldn't speak with, obviously I tried to leverage vulnerability. So man, my effectiveness and my voice, it didn't carry as much weight because I wasn't living it. - Isn't that interesting? How did that manifest itself? Like did you just find that you wanted to not talk about it anymore? Or when you tried to talk about it, you were pulling your punches or how did that play out? - Yeah, I mean it's exactly that. It's exactly you're talking about something and you just find yourself shying away because you can't speak boldly about it. It's like you can't speak boldly about a prayer life if you're not praying. You can't speak boldly about a devotional life if you're not in your devotions, about journaling. You can't speak boldly about it. And so you can tell a lot by pastors and leaders what they're actually disciplines they are doing, what they're not doing, by what they talk about. Eating healthy. You can't talk about eating healthy if you're not doing it. So this is, money's no different. It's not about money. It's about not being, you know, not living out while you're speaking, which there's some great things to that that pastors want to be authentic. And they, the heart is I don't want to talk about something that I'm not, I don't want to preach about something I'm not practicing. But at the end of the day, if we're not, we're not doing well in an area, we really just need to be vulnerable about it, appropriately vulnerable. And tell folks, hey, I'm struggling in this area too. Let's all get better together. - Right, let's talk about that for a minute because I'm sure there are leaders. And I mean, we've, there've been seasons in my life where money's been tight. My wife and I have not been on the same page about it. And, you know, one of the things for a lot of church leaders is you know, Chris, is we put a microphone on our face on a Sunday. It's one thing to get up there in front of your whole church and go, hey, it's not going well. And that could be on money. That could be in your relationship. That could be with your kids or whatever. But I think in the absence of telling everybody, like I'm not going to tell everybody, people end up telling nobody, right? So if somebody's listening right now, what would you suggest that they do? Who do they turn to, to just go, hey, can we talk for a little bit? We're struggling right now financially. Who is safe for that sort of thing? Or how would you handle that? - Yeah, the key is appropriate vulnerability. You know, you want to make sure you're going to the right audience with the right issue. Interview Dave Stone and Southeast Christian a few episodes ago. And he had said something, he made a, he said a story about some, a pastor getting up and saying, I struggle with pornography. And to his whole congregation. But that's great, the vulnerability, but it's not the right audience. 'Cause now you've got every woman in the audience won't look him in the eye. We'll avoid him for the next six months. Won't talk to him. And it was vulnerable, but to the wrong audience, that's just more like a small group of men. And maybe it's the elders, maybe it's the deacons. Maybe it's a group of friends. I don't know what it is. But there's got to be an area where you can be appropriate about it. So I think you just got to weigh out that appropriateness. - Yeah, I couldn't agree more. And just to be clear, that wasn't Dave Stone. That was a story he told you. Just don't want to start any rumors here. - Thank you for the clarity. - No, no, no problem. Just in case. I had to think twice about that. But, you know, I've had that too, where, you know, I have a great relationship with our elders and they'll often be the first guys if I've got something like, hey, I'm not sure this is 100% or working out. I'll talk to them first. And then my own rule, I'll just see what you think of this, is if I can talk about it in the past tense with my congregation, even if it's like last year, then I feel it can be helpful. Because I think when I'm standing up there, and if I've, you know, got some active problem in my life to say, hey, guys, I have a problem I don't know how to solve. I didn't help anybody. I just freaked everybody out. I should get help with a counselor. I should get help with a best friend, with our elders or with leadership team or executive team at the church. But I don't necessarily need to go to everyone with that. Is that a general good guideline or like, how would you call it? - Yeah, I like that. And I think we've got to watch the frequency as well. You can't be going up all the time, saying how you're not measuring up every other weekend. - Oh, yeah. You better have some success. - You better start to question your competence and you just gotta, you gotta be, you gotta space them out with some victories. Because you are supposed to be winning and you are supposed to be leading them, which means that in theory, you're supposed to be out in front of them. So you just gotta be careful of that. - Yeah, yeah, you sure do. You sure do. That's a really good point. So one of the challenges a lot of church leaders faces, the church does not have a reputation for paying well. And in many cases, for most leaders, they probably could make a little more money in the marketplace than they can working for a local church. And that leaves them sometimes living on less than otherwise. So any advice for church leaders who are in that situation who just have to live on less. - Yeah, well, first of all, I would love to say, man, pay your pastors well. I just want to say that boldly. There's an non-compensation research studies out there for free online from very reputable sources. There's no reason for you not to be paying your pastor well. And by that, I just want to go one step further and say, even with the marketplace, with the similar industries. So service providers, relational providers, not like you're not going to try to go up against tech stocks and tech companies. - Yeah, that's right. I want to make what Jack Dorsey made. Yeah, that's probably not going to fly. - Well, I just don't, I don't get that at all. So-- - Okay, so let's stop there for a second. Because I mean, that is something, I didn't make a lot of money when we started, but one of my sort of songs over the last two decades as a church leader has been, and our elders fully agree, let's pay our team well. Let's make sure, don't pay them crazy, but let's make sure that people, I believe the scripture says you pay people well. I just think that's air on the side of generosity if you're going to air, not crazy generosity, but pay them well in similar things. What would you say to the church board member who's listening to this who says, well, Jesus was poor. How do you respond to that? Why is it that so many church leaders want to keep their staff broke? And how would you rebut that? - Yeah, I don't know, I don't want to say that I understand the motive behind keeping them broke. I don't know if it's because of fear or because of a budget constraint. I'm not sure the reason why, but what your top priority needs to be to make sure that you pay the leader well. And I don't see well in disproportionately well. I mean, do the research and find out what that is. And if they're only working three quarter time, then pay them three quarter time. They're only paying half part time. Don't pay them a full time salary for only working part time. But the whole idea that Jesus was poor, that the Bible is very clear, don't muzzle an ox. And it says pay your people well. It is clear as day in the scriptures. And we either value the church, the local church, the bride of Christ, God's plan A, or we don't. The services that we provide to the community on the weekend drives me nuts when people say, I don't want to give to that church because they don't do anything for the community. What they do on Sunday morning is for the community. Right on. I mean, that is a service provider for the community. Of course, you should do more than that. But don't devalue what happens on Sunday morning and don't devalue what a pastor provides. They should be paid well. That's a good word. I'm very, very strong on that one. I'm with you on that. And, you know, I've had that conversation many times. It's like, what are you guys doing for mission? And my answer is, this is the mission. Like, this is like, like, we live in a community where 95% of the people don't go to church on a Sunday. We are the mission guys. Like, come on. Let's do a good job. - And when they're doing a hundred value in the Sunday morning experience. It's exactly there. And they're not doing it on purpose. They just don't see it as a service being provided. And if you look at Ephesians 4.12 by equipping the saints for acts of service, you're doing that on Sunday morning. And so they're supposed to go out and be the church. - So you give an awful lot of advice. I mean, on your radio show slash podcast, on a daily basis you're hearing from people who call in with their problems. What are some of the common money mistakes you see people making and church leaders making? And I mean, I understand this is so basic. Like, weight loss, I heard a personal trainer a few years ago, he's like, eat fewer calories than you burn, right? And it's like, it's so simple. And yet we pay people thousands of dollars so that we can learn how to take care of ourselves when, you know, and I understand, spend less money than you make. But like, where are the pitfalls and why is this such a troubling issue for so many? - Yeah, well, I'm glad you're bringing this up on a leadership podcast because a lot of times from the platform as church leaders, we model how to steward the 10%. We model how to steward maybe even the top 20% for those who are just leading above and beyond. But very rarely are we modeling in a very intentional, strategic way how to fully steward the 100%. And so a lot of times we're asking people to give, but we're not teaching them how. How can they put themselves in a position where they actually can do what we're asking them to do? And many people are, he got great intentions, but being intentioned for ministry is nothing without being positioned for. - Right, how that's good. - You know, obviously we need to model budgeting. So whenever you bring attention to your budget process as a leader, that's modeling the budgeting process a common mistake 'cause we don't have a plan. Proverse 2918 says where there is no vision that people perish. - Yeah. - And that's a lot of times where we're spending our months where the month has absolutely no vision. And so therefore the month just it perishes. I think another verse says that people cast off restraint. And that's exactly what happened. You get these impulse situations and you know, I deserve it and that's what happens. And so you need to have a plan for your month and for your year. Another one would be not saving, that's a huge issue, right? Proverse 2120 says and the house of the wise is choice, food and oil. And so we've got to make sure that we're modeling saving. And so we can't really talk about them the platform if we only have two weeks of savings for our church. - Right, yeah. - You've got to have more than that before you ever start talking about it. Or if you don't have any savings as an individual, it's hard to say those things from the platform. You know, the common mistake is this is probably the biggest one for church leaders specifically, is they're not even thinking about retirement, not even a little bit. And so that's why we see so many church leaders lead the church way too long 'cause they don't have another option and they can't stop. - So true. - Or they go all the way 'til they die and until the church dies. - That's right, need that paycheck, need that paycheck. - Yeah, they do. - I'd say the biggest mistake out of money mistake for all church folks is not to engage in the church provided matched 401k retirement 403b. I'm not sure what it is in Canada, but the program that's available, they're not matching. I think it's under 20% are engaging in that. - Yeah, so that's basically a private funds for retirement that your employer would match. So in our case, it'll be an RSP, yeah. - Yeah, it's unbelievable. It's like why in the world are you not taking advantage of that? I know the reason why. The reason why is it's all broke. - Right, I haven't got the 500 bucks a month to put aside. - Right, you don't have it because we have latte breath and because we're driving a $400 car payment and we have $400 in student loans. And that's the same reason why they're not tithing also. - Yeah. - So investing would be another one, obviously not thinking about, you know, their kids college future. - Oh, we're in the middle of that right now. - Oh my goodness, like, you know, I remember when our kids were little, so my kids are 19 and 23 and somebody said, you know, you're gonna spend $100,000 on your kid's education. I'm like, I don't even own a house. I can't imagine $100,000. That was conservative. And I mean, we did some savings over the years, but oh my goodness, like it is, I always thought, Chris, and this is maybe advice to young parents. I just thought, you know, once your kids are out of diapers and they stop eating baby food, they really don't cost any money. No, every year they get more expensive. They just do, and eventually that stops. My oldest son is in his final year of engineering right now. So I think he's off the family payroll next year. So we will be doing a little dance around that one, but hey, it's something we're pleased. I heard somebody else say, you know, tell your kids they're responsible for their education, but you can help. And so, I mean, our goal has been to get our kids out of university debt-free, and it's been a partnership. So we haven't gotten into debt to get them through school, and they haven't gone into debt to get through school. But as long as they do their part, we'll do our part. If they stop doing their part, we won't do our part anymore. So it's not a free ride. But it's worked out very well in both cases, but like, you are so, so right. Let me ask you a question, and I don't know, this was in our notes when we were getting ready for this, but I hear conflicting things about how many people walk into retirement with anything beyond like we call old age security or social security. What is the stat that you generally find? Do you know that stat, or do you have a sense from just talking to people like, do the majority of people have decent savings that will carry them through their retirement years? Or are most people flat out, like if the government doesn't rescue me? I've got nothing. - Yeah, the majority of people actually have less than $10,000 saved for retirement. - Seriously? - Yeah, I think it's over 70% of folks have less than $10,000. Like it's a really big issue. - Yeah, and the thing is, is people are just living the here and now that you just do it. Like, just do it, you deserve it, you feel it. I mean, go for it, it's a what in the world are you doing? I just don't get it at all. And the thing is, it's with cultures teaching us. And we're all trying to keep up. It's an entitlement comparison deal, and everyone's trying to keep up with the Joneses. So it's not, the church is not, the church is just as bad. I mean, there's a big, I know I caught myself a few years ago, and I went out and got a really nice car because I was the guy on staff who was going to pick up guests from the airport, and I was thinking about the assets from the airport. No one told me to do that. It was no one's fault with my own. But I went and upgraded a car that, and I could technically afford it, but I should not have bought it. It was only because I felt the pressure that I didn't have a nicer car when I picked up people at the airport. - Yeah, you know what? Let's talk about that, honestly, 'cause yesterday I picked up Bobby Grindwald from Life Church who invented U-version, and like church online and all this stuff at the airport to spend a couple hours interviewing him for a TV show I do, and also for my podcast. And I picked him up at the airport. I'm driving my eight-year-old Honda Pilot. It was clean, I wax it. But you know, it smelled a little bit like winter, and I was kind of embarrassed. Like, it's got almost half a million kilometers on it. And I thought, well, I'm just gonna drive it because, you know, my wife and I will finally trade it in probably next year and get something newer. But that's just pride, isn't it? Isn't that pride? - Yeah, and listen, church folks are no different than, you know, we're human beings, and so we struggle with it, and so I'm glad we're talking about on a leadership podcast 'cause we're not immune to it at all. - Yeah, so if you feel bad about your car, just know mine has almost half a million kilometers, which is like 300,000 miles, and it looks nice on the outside, but it's old, and the heat doesn't work properly in I live in Canada. So I think I'm gonna go get that fixed to get me through the winter. But there's nothing wrong with that. Is it true Dave Ramsey once said, you need to have a net worth of a million dollars to afford a new car? I think I heard that. - Yeah, exactly right. A brand new car, yeah. - Brand new car. - 'Cause they lose 70% of their value in the first four years. - Which is crazy, isn't it? - It is nuts, isn't it? - Yeah. - It is nuts. And the average car Pamp in America is $486. So if you were to invest that, from age 25 to 65, you'd have over $5 million. So we usually say, "I hope you like your car." - Yeah, yeah, yeah. Wow, that's crazy. Say that again, just in case people miss that. So. - If the average car payment is $486 a month, and if you were to take that and invest it into a gross stock mutual fund, like a Roth IRA or your 401K, for age 25 to 65, you'd have over $5 million. - Wow. Okay, there you go. Done, yeah. I was looking at used cars 'cause I'm probably gonna buy used again, I think. And it's amazing. Like you can get some really nice cars for half off, three or four years old. And I bought this one. I bought this one, this Honda Pilot, 18 months old. Was a $50,000 vehicle in Canada new. It's got leather and everything. I mean, it's a nice car. But I got it for half price because nobody would touch it with 166,000 kilometers. I drove like three hours to buy it. And it was the other side of the province. I picked it up and I'm still driving it all these years later. But let me just, this is a confession time. I feel like you're my pastor today, Chris. But I learned that from my wife who had said all along, we should not buy new cars, but I always bought new cars until we bought a 2000, year 2000 station wagon that was $35,000 brand new. And I could afford the payment. But, oh my goodness, that was the biggest lemon. It was built by drunk people on a Friday or Monday. Unconvinced. I sold it four years later. I got $6,000 for it. And I said, okay, honey, you know what? You're right, we have not bought a new car since. So, fascinating. Okay, you got me on my little soapbox. - I try to tell folks that can I afford the payment is the wrong question. The question is, do I wanna spend $35,000 for a $20,000 item? 'Cause that's what you're gonna spend an interest over those six years or five years. - Wow. - It just doesn't make sense to spend that much on it. It's just, and we don't wanna live life living through the rear of your mirror or something we've already bought and pay for something that we've already bought. We wanna look through the windshield and we wanna make sure that we're living a proactive life with cash. - Okay, so, failure to save. So, somebody's really sad. Let's say people are like, yeah, but you don't understand how busy my life is and the kids are in activities now and we have music lessons. And so, when you're in that web, how do you start to get out of it? Like, what do you need to do, Chris? - Yeah, and it sounds so boring, I promise, but this is the deal, to make sure that you get a budget. You gotta get out of budget. A lot of folks have a, they monitor their spending after the fact, that's not a budget. A budget is writing down a plan and having that plan, they're in ready. And so, when you do that, what you'll realize is how much money you're wasting. It is slipping out of your pockets. And a lot of folks are asking for a raise. Your quickest way to get a raise is to get on a budget. You will notice all the money that you're wasting. - Yeah. - And you're like, oh, I didn't know that. Oh, I didn't know that. There's a lot of forced subscriptions of magazines and things that I hadn't even gone to in forever. And you just, you know, there's money there that you didn't even know. - Hmm, you know, my wife and I also, we've had a couple of different financial planners, but we sat down with one in this last year. And he came to our house. I mean, he was a fee for service. He's not trying to sell us stocks or mutual funds or whatever. We have investments and, you know, I just turned 50, so I'm trying to figure out, okay, what do I need to be? Where do I exactly do I need to be? - It was so tremendously helpful because he said, here's exactly how much you need to save every month. Here's exactly how much you need to have for an emergency fund. And then you can do what you want with the rest. And that was just liberating for us. It's like, wow, if this happens and these are the assumptions and this is how much we're gonna need, it actually is very freeing. - Yeah, my wife and I had that debate for years. She wanted a budget for three or four years and we didn't have one. And I didn't have one. I felt like I was a great provider because I said, no, you can do whatever you want. I felt like I was great. She drove her nuts. - Yeah. - Because she was, I want parameters. I wanna know if a shirt is too expensive. I wanna know. And it actually is not a restrictive process. It's freeing because now you know where the out of bounds is. - You can go. - So you can have a lot of fun in bounds. - Yeah, that's true. Do you find this too? I don't know. I've talked to, you know, in the media, women always have the reputation as being the free spenders. In most people I actually know, like my friends and so on, the women are the breaks and the guys are the gas pedal. What do you discover? - Well, I think, I don't know if it's necessarily gender. It's how they spend money. So for instance, women primarily are going to be spenders on smaller things and more often, and the guys are gonna be putting on breaks on the small stuff and they'll go out and spend money on a $20,000 object. - Oh, yeah. - So they'll blow it on a forerunner or a four-wheeler or a new gun or they'll do something huge and you're like, what in the world, why are you getting on her about 14 bucks here and 14 bucks there? And you just went out and spent 20 grand. - Yeah, I got a good friend. He's like, I don't spend money very often, but when I do, I just go and buy a new boat. I'm like, yeah, okay, yeah. And it is a problem. And I guess it operates on the spiritual level too, doesn't it, Chris, because money is an idol. - Oh, yeah, it definitely is. You know, the way we keep money from becoming an idol in our life is we have to realize who's it is. And it's not ours. And Psalm 24 one says the earth is the Lord's and the fullness thereof, which means all it contains. It's all of our relationships, our time, that's our energy, that's our leadership, our sphere of influence. That church that we keep calling our church, it's his church. And if we're not the owners, that means we're the managers. And 1 Corinthians chapter four verse two says, "Those who have been entrusted to be managers "must prove faithful." So when we get through this entitlement stage, we're right there like, oh, I work so hard. I work hard for my money. That entitlement can be transferred over to contentment or transferred over to gratitude very quickly. If you remember, that's not even ours in the first place. And so a lot of times we get into our entitlement problems because we really think it's ours. - That's a good word. - I'd really like to teach to the belief system, not the action. So it's not about saving. It's about believing the fact that we get to manage the creator's resources. That's a big deal. And that motivates you to save. So let's talk anything else on personal finance 'cause I wanna switch gears and talk in the last few minutes just about church leadership. And I know the two are related but anything else you would say to church leaders just by way of practical financial everyday advice. - I would just say, start with the budget obviously. And then the power of modeling. When you start doing this for your congregation, you start modeling this in your own life, it's going to come up in conversation. And the lobby and the hallways in your meetings, all those decisions that you're making financially, it'll come up. And when it does, it'll trickle throughout your congregation and you'll find that your entire congregation is now positioned in a better position financially which will yield higher giving, which will fund the vision. But it all starts with you doing a budget and modeling. - We did this thing at our church called Thrive a few years ago, Casey Graham helped us out. And it's basically live with margin, live on mission. And we tried to help. We did this financial learning experience. We just, it's same like financial peace university that you guys do. And the whole idea is similar. You got to do something for your people because if you're going to ask for something from them, hey, we want you to give generously to the mission, to this project, to a new building, to a new location, whatever that happens to be, they have to have money to be able to do that with. And they're often so grateful. We've run hundreds of people through the financial learning experience. They're so thankful because now they can go for dinner and not worry about whether they can pay their credit card balance, right? They can have a vacation. And that was very liberating for me as a leader to be able to say, hey, I don't want you to just give to the church. I want you to be able to go on a family vacation and pay cash for it. I want you to be able to pay for your kids' education and we will help you. So maybe that's a good segue into church leadership. What are some best practices and worst practices you've seen among churches when it comes to financial stewardship? - Well, the same principle that applies in a personal life is applied to the church world as well. And it's planning ahead. And when we think, oh, I've got to raise a million dollars in 18 months, just to throw a figure out there. I know we got people listening from all size churches, but you're right, that is nuts. That's crazy. It's a big deal. So you have to immediately go into frantic fundraising mode. So you've got to plan ahead. And I think sometimes we do just enough strategy and long-term planning that we think that we did it. So what I'm saying is, oh, in three years, I want to be at this amount. I want to have this many people in groups. I want to have this much giving. That's not really long-term planning. You've got to put that goal out there and then backtrack in benchmark. Where do we need to be? How are we going to get there? And that's one thing I've learned here at Ramsey Solutions is how little strategic planning I've done in the past. That I really should have been a lot better. There's a huge long strat-up process that has to happen where you really break down, what does this mean for infrastructure? What does this mean for staffing? What does this mean for IT? What does this mean for HR? What does this mean for budget? What does this mean for revenue? You've got to really back this down per quarter and find out what are our goals per quarter? And so that's one of the biggest things is not planning ahead. - Yeah, we just went through a strat-ops, strategic planning process this fall at Connectsus Church where I am and man, that's another level. That's not just goals on the wall. It's like what's happening down the hall and you've got very specific objectives to hit. That's a good point. - Yeah, if your brain doesn't hurt with your long-term strategy planning, you're not doing it thorough enough. Your brain should hurt. You should have to really think more than you've had to think in quite a while. - That's great. - Another thing would be, you know, again, I talked about infrastructure, not putting enough money towards infrastructure, putting the money into things that can't be seen, like IT, like web, graphic designing, discipleship. Every conference they go to, everyone asks, what are your biggest weaknesses? Oh, discipleship. When you're asking like one part-time hire to lead the discipleship program for a large church, you know, that's a problem. And so we're not, we're not, a lot of things that aren't seen on the weekends, we're not funding data entry, accounting systems, HR, staff training, those kinds of things. When I look at budgets around the country, those are usually the things that are lacking. That's it. So you've got this huge vision. That's awesome, that's great. And you're actually pulling off some great weekends. But at the same time, your staff is running around with their heads cut off. Then you're dealing with lots of transition. People are leaving every six months to 18 months. And then you're having to spend all that energy on the transition, but not on, it's more of just a reactionary leadership instead of pro-action, you know, pro-action or leadership. - So that would be another big one. Of course, not saving enough. You probably knew I would say that, but saving more. - No, but that's a good one. You know, we have about three months revenue in the bank at any given time, that's sort of our minimum threshold. - Yeah, and I would recommend anywhere from three months to 12 months, depending on the environment, depending on the season of the church, depending on a lot of different variables. But you're gonna be amazed if you don't have that and you're listening, how much better you sleep at night. - When you sleep better at night, you're a better leader. - Yeah. - And then you make better decisions, you know, if a tornado is coming and you're like, oh, well, it's not really gonna hit our church. It's gonna be around our church, but we still need to have church because we need to get those offerings. You start making these really bad decisions where everyone's still coming to church and there's a tornado warning because you've gotta get the offering. You just gotta be really careful that you don't put yourself in that corner. - Yeah, that's true, you know. And I mean, that's a journey for us. That's over $300,000 we want to have in the bank at any given moment. And I mean, that sounds like a lot of money. You know, for some churches, it'll be three million. You need in the bank and for others, it might be 30,000 that you need in the bank. But it's quite a bit of money just to keep things operating and then you can build from there. - Yeah, I mean, I know the Russell. I know that, you know, folks who get called into ministry aren't bankers. They're pastors with huge hearts. So they see the money there and they're like, lives touched and marriage is restored and families put back together, I totally get it. But you will be better at all those things if you can have a clear mind knowing that you have that security, knowing that you're in a good position. - So you'd recommend minimum three up to 12 months in the bank? - Yeah, and I think, you know, you wanted to be for two different reasons. It's not just for emergencies, it's also for opportunities. - Yeah. - And so when that opportunity comes, a lot of times we get this merger opportunity or something happens and it's like, oh my goodness, that's so great. Oh, but we're going to need 500K. Well, you could have it. - Yeah. - If you had it saved. And so, and I guess that leads me to another thing I was just thinking about that would be another mistake that a lot of churches make is, and I don't say this in a condemning way at all. This is something that I've made these mistakes myself. We take advantage, we do, we take good opportunities instead of just great opportunities. - Okay. - A lot of times with good opportunity comes, you're like, oh, that's good, that's a good one. That's a good one, let's do it. Let's jump all over it. And you do it right a month before the great opportunity comes. - Yes. Yeah. I've done that, I've done that even with my speaking schedule where, you know, I end up saying no a lot, but every once in a while, I'm like, ah, should I do that or not? Yeah, I'll do it. And then I've actually had to turn down this year one great opportunity because I was previously booked and I thought, ah, shouldn't this settle for good? - Yeah, yeah. Another one would be that the budget sometimes doesn't reflect the values. So you talk to a leader and they say, and I just love youth group. I mean, we're passions for youth. The next generation, it means everything. And then you go into their budget and you realize they have absolutely nothing that's plotted for the youth group. - Yeah, $14.32. - Right. - Enjoy guys. - That's another one too, I think. - Yeah, and you know, a big one with that, Chris is family ministry because people are like, oh, family's kids, so important. You look at it and they're trying to run it on fumes, $10,000 a year understaffed, under resourced. Huge mistake, meanwhile, weekends are getting, you know, huge dollars, that can be a big mistake. - Exactly. And then I guess another one would be trying to expand outside of your geographic region or your brand awareness. I think folks are trying to do that more and more. - Right. - And I've only seen a handful of ministries do that well. And people might see maybe 10 or 15 or 20 of them out doing it well. But the reality is that many of those are bleeding financially. Like it is a really big undertaking to expand outside of your brand awareness. So I would just strongly encourage, you know, leadership teams that are listening in to think about launching a local pastor there. And maybe, and I'm all about church plants and also campuses doing both. - Right. - I like both, it's not either or. But when it comes to remote areas and far away from your brand, I just strongly lean more towards a church plant model. There's very few models that are doing that well. Maybe a handful or less. - Even the mega churches have discovered over time that the further you get away from where that ministry started, the harder it is. And there are exceptions to that. There's always exceptions to that. Chris, can I ask you about debt on buildings? I see a lot of churches, particularly in the US. And I mean, they're impressive, they're magnificent. And then I discover that 90% of its debt, long-term debt. Do you have any rule of thumb where you think, hey, I think, because we have that discussion all the time as elders, we generally wanna make sure that we're no more than half the value of what we're moving into is financed by debt. Is that a good rule? Like, what is a good rule? - Well, I mean, this is not a popular opinion, but I think you can do ministry debt-free. Right now, 73% of churches have debt. The good news is, is 27% of proven that it can happen without it. And so there's very large churches out there right now that are completely debt-free. It is possible. But what I see with some of those visions is, in the beginning stages, they were smart. And they went all the way up to like five or 6,000 people in portable facilities. They didn't go out and buy the building right away. So, but obviously you want that debt ratio as low as possible. So while you were talking about the 50%, you wanna get that as low as possible. And you wanna work towards paying it off as soon as possible. The reality is 73% have debt. But the reason why you have debt goes all the way back to personal finance. It goes back to the people in the seats. The reason why you have debt is because they're not paying it. They're not paying ties and revenue. So if we can fix the congregation, the seat problem, it'll take care of everything else. And so I just wanna lean everybody away from fundraising and towards people building. I know it takes longer, but food tastes better than a crop pot that it does in the microwave. I mean, make sure that you are taking your time for these people over 18 to 24 months and teaching them how to give, getting them in a financial position where they can give more. And they will. And like for instance, our financial peace research shows over 4 million people have graduated from financial peace university. - And that's amazing. - They give 2.9% more within 12 months. So if they were given 3% then they give 6. Their mess is getting cleaned up, their worldview is being changed. And they're going, they were given 6, they're given 9. And so a lot of times we're in leadership meetings and we're primed for a, man, a 3% increase in giving, 5%. What would that do? That'd be amazing, that'd be incredible. But the reality is that research that I just showed you just now, if you were to put your whole church through financial peace university, and many churches have done this, you would experience like a 40% increase in your offerings when everyone's giving 3% more. - Wow. - So this just gives you an example of what we could do if we were ministering to the masses. And so many times our focus is on donor development on maybe the top 50 givers, the top 100 givers that moves the needle maybe 2%. Instead of focusing on the entire congregation and getting it in place where they can give. - That's a really good point. And we'll link to financial peace university and everything we talked about in the show notes. Chris, anything else you want to share? And tell us a little bit about your podcasts too. And that's plural, not singular, so. - Yeah, so you can find me on social media at Chris Brown on air, on all social platforms. And the two podcasts, one is called the Leadership Momentum Podcast. Very similar to this podcast. The whole heartbeat is to resource the church and research leaders and make a digital round table for us to talk about best practices. So it's called the Leadership Momentum Podcast. It can be found on iTunes. Then there's the Chris Brown's True Stewardship. It's a Monday through Friday national radio show that we made a podcast as well that's found on iTunes. The websites for each one of those are stewardship.com and stewardshipcentral.org. - Cool, cool. Well, Chris, this has been great. You've helped a lot of leaders today. I just want to say thanks so much and it's been great hanging out with you. - Oh, thank you. - Well, that's super cool. Chris, man, that was so helpful and really great to finally connect. We're gonna have to hang out next time I'm in Franklin. And if you don't listen to Chris's podcast, you should do it. He's got a Leadership Momentum Podcast that comes out monthly. It's fantastic, you should subscribe to that. And don't miss his Chris Brown's True Stewardship. Okay, that's Chris Brown on air, True Stewardship. All the links are in the show notes. Of course, you can find that stuff on your own as well. But if you want the show notes for this episode, just go to carryingnewhough.com/episode67. And as I said, next week we're back. And this time we're gonna look at church finance and sort of corporate finance and some help finally for some bivocational pastors. And Joe's got some really cool ideas in that area. And I want to come back next year and do like a whole episode on bivocational pastors. So for all of you who are like working a day job and then doing church on the weekend and evenings and in all your spare time, hey, I salute you. Thank you so much. And to all of you at Very Merry Christmas, I will be praying for your Christmas services. Please pray for ours. We hope to welcome somewhere between 1,500 and 2,000 people this week. We are so excited. God writes incredible stories in our church at Christmas. And even in a profoundly unchurched culture like Canada, we just find Christmas is our very best time of year for outreach. And I hope that's true in your community or wherever you are in the world. And we're back next week. We don't take a break. So Joe Sangle's back. And then we kick off the new year in style. Make sure you subscribe to this podcast to make sure you don't miss a thing. And I hope that this really did help you lead like never before. - You've been listening to the "Carry Newhof Leadership" podcast. Join us next time for more insights on leadership, change and personal growth to help you lead like never before. (upbeat music) (upbeat music)