HT to Mint

Note: I’m on vacation this week. My family has a rule for daddy– It’s not a vacation if daddy brings a computer. Each day this week I’m highlighting my favorite post from the adammclane.com archives. These are oldies but goodies.

Yes, I am Wasting My Life

August 31st 2004

Again this month we are short financially. Grad school came calling. Preschool came calling. Uncle Sam gets his cut in a few days. A combination of expected and unexpected expenses draws a little more money from savings to checking in a constant game of robbing Peter to pay Paul. Life’s expenses are again expensive. Each time this happens to me I start to reminisce about what life could have been like for Kristen and Megan and Paul. Had we stayed on the path of corporate success in Chicago we wouldn’t have this to worry about. The bills always got paid in full. There was always a little extra at the end of the month. We could always surprise someone with a special gift. Vacation? No problem. New tires? How about the best? New clothes? Why not. Yet in the same moments I recall the emptiness I had as I laid in bed at night, longing for my life to be wasted for something more important than getting richer… or more precisely, helping rich people get richer.

Read the rest

It’s 2010. I am still here. I am still wasting my life. And I still love every minute of it.

New feature at Chase.com

I am thankful for Memorial Day weekend. A beach day ahead– but that’s not why I’m so happy it’s the official start to summer. I’m just happy to get May out of the way.

The last 45 days have sucked for us financially. Like, literally, there has been a vacuum attachment having its way with our bank account.

A mistake on a tax form. SLURP. A little fender bender with an uninsured driver. SLURP. Some bi-annual bills. SLURP. SLURP. SLURP. Paying for our summer vacation. SLURP. Going on a mission trip. SLURP. Replacing some broken stuff. SLURP.

Two points of celebration. This series of unscheduled bills brought out all of the temptations.

• Celebration #1: Savings!
• Celebration #2: We didn’t put it on credit!

I logged into Mint the other day and I expected a pop-up to slide down and go… “You’re kidding me right now, aren’t you?” May was a blood bath of a month for us. But we got through it and we’re happy to see it go.

I can’t wait for June. I’m ready to start off a new month.

I would greatly appreciate any financial support you can help us with as we head back to Haiti to lead a team on July 19-25. As I mentioned in the video– we are trying to offset these expenses so we can not only honor God with our service but also our financial stewardship at the same time. If you’d prefer to mail a check, here is a link to our Chip page which has our address.

People don’t like to talk money and the church. It makes people instantly think of TV evangelists.

And while those TV evangelists swindled millions out of well-meaning, hard-working Americans, the truth is that 99% of churches are great places and not full of crooks.

I have an encouragement for my friends just entering their 30s, you’re finally hitting the earning power to make a difference in your church.

Here’s something that may be news to you: It only takes about 10 solid givers for a small-to-medium-sized church to stay solvent.

Working for a small church this was clear. 6-7 core “giving units” provided a solid foundation of giving on which our monthly budget was built. We didn’t really know who they were but we were thankful for their faithfulness. But the $200-$500 a week they each gave weekly was the difference between the staff having a heart attack about the budget and knowing we’d at least make payroll! And, of course, people beyond that core group gave substantially too which made all the difference in the world for doing more than making payroll. Yet the fact remained that without those 6-7 anonymous folks we would have been in deep trouble.

Now, I’m sure $200-$500 per week seems unattainable. You’re saying that’s a lot of money! In some parts of the country $800/month is more than the mortgage. So you’ll have to do the math to figure out what that translates to in your local economy.

But here’s the point: These weren’t a special breed of super-givers. These were regular Joe’s and Mary’s. The median family income in that part of Michigan was about $60,000. That meant the median family brought home about $800/week after taxes. ($80/week if they tithed) Yet most of the folks in our church had professional jobs which paid much, more than that. All of a sudden you realize… the 6-7 families funding a big chunk of the church are really just average professionals tithing about 10% of what they brought home.

That’s where you come in. If just 5% of the church actually tithed, your church could stay solvent. I don’t mean they’d be in great shape. I just mean that 5-10 solid givers per hundred forms the foundation of giving for your church.

And if you are wise with your money you can be one of them soon.

Again, that may seem impossible. But if you got serious for the next 6-12 months on reducing your debt load you will be able to give a lot more. And while most people in their early-mid thirties are just starting to dig their way out of mountains of credit card debt, college loans, car loans, and the fat part of a mortgage… as they do that they are discovering they can have a lot more giving power.

It only takes 10 givers to fund a church. The question is simply– Do you want to be one of them?

Maybe it’s just me, but I’m shocked to see how many people carry $50-$100 in cash in their wallets. Just so I know if I’m weird or not, humor me and let me know how much you typically have on you. (Totally secret, no way for me to know who said what.)

Americans borrowed less for an 11th consecutive month in December, paying off credit cards while increasing borrowing for cars and other products. link

This is great news. For 11 months in 2009 the American people not only covered their bills, but they paid down debt. The irony of that is clear. 2009 was a horrible year financially for a lot of people.

This next line in the USA Today article clears up why the stock market tumbled on this news.

The mixed picture raises hopes that Americans may soon return to spending, a necessary condition for economic recovery. link

Our national economy, jobs in America, and some would tell you the future our our nation itself… depends on you and I going deeper and deeper into debt to buy stuff we don’t need with money we don’t have. Cute, eh?

Maybe we should all collectively just hold on to our money for another 11 months and enjoy this recession a little more so we can all get out of debt?

Think about it like this. In the worst economic year in decades and we collectively covered our monthly bills and paid down our debts for 11 straight months. This is great news! And it also reveals that debt is a head issue and not always a money issue.

I know for our family 2009 was a hard year. We had to wrestle through stuff we didn’t like to wrestle through. But the flip side is that we are way better off financially for it. Less debt, more savings, and an attitude of frugality we hope lasts a lifetime.

You want this chart to keep going up

It may not look like it yet where you live, but there are signs of life in America that things are looking better.

As the chart above shows- stocks have been rebounding for basically 12 months.

You want this chart to start going down

The unemployment rate, while still horribly high, has begun to turn… following the comeback of Wall Street.

As church folk, we know that these two charts are closely tied to people’s ability/willingness to give. When people feel good about their money [and 401k, and for retirees, their investments] than they become more generous. Once unemployment starts to turn, then happy times should come in the offering plate… and begin trickling into staff dollars and budgets.

The upside of 2009′s double crotch kick

Let me explain what I mean by the double crotch kick.

First, going into 2008-2009 pretty much every church in the country was re-evaluating and re-thinking how they do ministry. This was a crotch kick as we all wrestled through the realities that our ministries probably need to change significantly to adapt to culture faster and reach more people.

Second, 2008-2009 were rough years financially. While not in every single church, most churches saw a dip in contributions. This was a swift kick to the groin because you either had to cut staff or cut programming (or sell assets at the bottom of the market) to balance the budget.

The upside, just like in real life, is that getting kicked in the crotch twice in a row causes most people to wise up and get ready to fight.

As I talk to ministry people all over, almost universally they have come through 2008-2009 with a new sense of calling and determination.

While the signs of life haven’t trickled into every corner of the church just yet. It is awesome to report that there are signs (more than the two economic ones I’ve shown here) that things are truly looking up.

May we take to heart lessons learned in the hard times. And may we never again need to get kicked in the crotch twice to be awoken from our slumber.

HT to Mint

We’re having a crunch month. It seems like during every calendar year there is one time when the vacuum cleaner has been attached to our accounts and we suddenly find ourselves going from “feeling comfortable” to “How much do they give for blood these days?” That’s about how things are for our family right now.

• Semi-annual and annual bills just got paid.
• All the regular bills paid, but were higher than budgeted.
• Bought a car. (paid cash, huge win!)
• Silly kids are growing and needed clothes!
• Travel expenses, haven’t been reimbursed yet.

Even as a family who lives rather simply we come on tough financial times from time-to-time. In this case, we got through it because we had budgeted for it to happen and had the cash on hand to make it through. We’ve had times in the past where we didn’t plan so well and literally had to depend on the kindness of our church to eat. You live a little and you get a little wiser, I guess.

In some ways I wish we felt this crunch more often. These times in the calendar are refreshing! I rest in our routine. I rest in our budget. I rest in simple things. I rest knowing that when we make things even simpler it is better for our family. I rest knowing that we’re not touching our long-term savings to ride out a short-term crisis. I like wincing when we give to our church. I like scrutinizing what we spend. Actually, I kind of like even noticing what is being spent because all-too-often I get into habits where I don’t see how much we are spending.

Of course, I’m really thankful because I know three things are true. First, I know that things will go back up from here. We have an annual low point, this is it, and we can budget ourselves out of it again. Second, I know who provides for me. God sustains us no matter what. Kristen and I will never forget the mystery bags of vegetables we received in Oroville. God is our provider. Third, while we have less cash than we’d like we also have less debt than we had a year ago.