Faith Filled Family Magazine September 2016 | Page 33

suggests that generosity to the
poor puts God in our debt! Proverbs 19:17 says that “Whoever
is generous to the poor lends
to the LORD, and He will repay
him for his deed.” God views our
attitude toward the poor as a key
barometer of our spiritual health.
I enjoyed your statement that
‘Tithing is not a requirement
but can be an excellent starting point for Christians seeking to honour God through
their generousity.’ p38. With
your comment about Jesus
always raising the bar on Old
Testament Law, it shows God
to be passionately in love with
generousity. Would you agree
with that?
Generosity is the very heart of
the Gospel. “For God so loved,
he gave…”
Love Brandon’s quote on p 40,
‘steward of the mysteries of
Christ’. What sort of a bracket
does this put our finances in?
We don’t always understand
exactly what God will do with
money we give back to Him. I do
believe we are called to wisely
monitor the impact achieved
through our giving – it isn’t
enough to simply cut a check
and then absolve ourselves of
any further responsibility. At
the same time, God’s plans
are bigger than our plans, and
we’ll never fully understand His
broader purposes in our lives.
Part of the fun of walking with
Christ is looking backwards and
seeing God’s plan in reverse:
how God used relationships,
experiences, and even money to
achieve His purposes.

do I need to keep’. (P 68) It’s
the personal adventure with
Christ that can come alive in
us.
Have you encountered
many Christians who see it
this way?
More and more. It’s so encouraging when we meet people who
have a change of mindset. One
business owner decided he was
done saving, forever, because
he had enough. Another individual decided to not keep all of the
inheritance they anticipate getting from their father, but instead
giving a good chunk of it away.
You have an interesting perspective on philosophy outside the Christian faith which
also honours giving more or
less on a communal basis. Do
you think this responsibility is
ingrained in human beings, or
in human nature (a very different thing?)
We believe that we are made in
the image of God, and part of
this image to be relational, altruistic, and ultimately, generous.
It’s part of our natural makeup
as humans, as intended by God!

Page 83 compares stinginess
with the death defying habit
of smoking, and generousity
with the great energy rush of
the daily jog. Love it. Love it.
There comes a time when we
stop smoking and take up jogging financially, does there?
What do you call financial
maturity?
I believe financial maturity is
when our time horizon gets
longer. The first step is to stop
thinking about today, and realize that we should plan for the
future. The next step, to true
Love the story of Will arriving maturity, is to stop thinking about
at the conclusion ‘How much this life alone, and plan for eter-

nity. Generosity is better than
the S&P 500… it will pay dividends for ten million years – and
beyond.
Lifestyle Limits with Denise,
and then the churches, is
rather a shock. How do we
change us?
The biggest change for me personally occurred when I realized how fun generosity can be.
Being generous is one way God
opens the door for us to step
alongside Him in accomplishing His purposes on Earth. Not
that He needs us; rather, He graciously invites us to participate
alongside Him. Once I finally
understood the opportunity I
have to drive an eternal impact
on God’s behalf when being
generous, it changed my heart.
P 131, The best way to bring
up a child is broadly middle
class… $50,000 - $250,000.
That looks like a broad-ranging statement to me? How
many couples that you know
have subscribed to such a
statement and worked on that
hypothesis, and with what
success?
We know fewer couples who
have purposefully raised their
children “below” their means to
live an [upper] middle class lifestyle. We are thinking about
how best to work this out in our
own lives. I suppose that this
quote is based on the idea that
[a] being raised in poverty is
sub-optimal, and [b] being raised
in wealth is actually bad for our
souls. Therefore, when it comes
to groundedness, humility, work
ethic, etc., being raised middle
class is ideal.
Note that we don’t think that