The TRUTH About Money + Christian Money Mindset!

It's time to have this talk, Lola.
 
It's been a long time coming... I'm ripping the band-aid off and doing a TELL ALL. For the first time ever, we are going to have an open, honest, vulnerable conversation about....
M.O.N.E.Y.
 
The good. The bad. The biblical. The TRUTH.
 
In today's juicy episode I will share my thoughts on MONEY. Worldly vs. biblical and why we put so much value on money. I go into the reality of money as Christians and how we can re-frame our money stories based on what God wants for us.
 
I also share my OLD money story, my NO money story, and my NOW money story. I hope God blesses you with fresh perspective.
 
XO,
Stef
 
Wanna work together, friend!?
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Full transcription available at the bottom of this blog post.

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 FULL EPISODE TRANSCRIPTION:

Hey, Lola, how are you, SIS? I can't wait to talk to you today. We're just going to have a really candid blatant, like no frills rip the bandaid off kind of conversation about money, about wealth, about getting the cheddar baby. Yes, I I'm so excited to talk to you guys about this because I think making money when you're not a Christian is like super accepted. If you're, you know, in the new age, it's like, you just call money in, you manifest it, baby. It just comes to me. It comes to me like rain and you know, it's like, why, why is it that versus when you look at Christian entrepreneurs and kingdom entrepreneurs, money gets all kinds of weird. And I just want to really talk to you guys about that today because there is a right and wrong mindset for money.

There is a, a biblical and a worldly view of making money. I think there is a, there's a greed that can creep in there's idolatry. When we look at money, wealth financial prosperity, like all of that. And I just want to really dig into it with you because I think that you deserve to hear this from a Christian coach, Jaime, who is making a large profit. Why? I think that it's okay. Why? I think that it is God sent how I know that how I differentiate between worldly wealth and biblical and God sent wealth. And then what the heck to do with all of this information and kind of six questions that I think you can ask yourself about your money story. So dig in, get a notebook and pen. Then this is going to get juicy.

Welcome back to The Mompreneur Mastermind Show, where we choose to run insanely successful, passive income businesses that light us up while consuming iced coffee, braless and flawless, and maybe breaking it down to some gangster rap while our kids aren't looking. Did we just become best friends? Yes. Yes we did. Hey, I'm Stefanie Gass, six figure corporate exec turned top 1% network marketer turn podcaster. I believe when we let God light our path, we experienced true miracles. Welcome sister. Let's get pumped up for today's show. All right, girl. So the first thing we're going to start with is maybe some of the reasons why Christians have weirdness around money, not even Christians. Let's first talk about why human beings have weirdness around money. I think when we look at our upbringing, when we look at our childhood, we're able to see some of our parents' money stories coming to life now embedded inside of us, because what, what you see you internalize and what you're told you believe at a young age, and why wouldn't we, why wouldn't we believe the things that we are taught?

Why wouldn't we watch what our parents do and say, and then, and then do it, what they do in St. Like we are innocent impressionable minds, and we don't always have parents that have a sound money mindset, and that comes from their childhood and their childhood, right? Like generational beliefs are embedded decades and centuries before they ever reach us. Well, when we look at our money story, as kids, sometimes our parents didn't grow up with much. And so they have a lack mindset, a fear-based mindset, a never enough mindset around money, which transpires to us, which we bring forward with us. Sometimes let's say your parents had a ton of money and they ignored you. And they worked all the time. And so you have this connotation, that money equals abandonment. And that's what you're carrying with. You. Maybe you had a mean uncle and he had all the money.

And so you associate money with evil or darkness or anger or whatever. Maybe you had money and then all your money was gone. And then your parents got divorced. And so you associate money and money going away or, or being taken from you as a break or as a heartache, or as tearing apart a family. There's so much of the stories that we, the worldly stories that we tell ourselves that are all tied to this piece of paper, or now this digital number that we have in our bank accounts. And it's just really interesting when we look back at that and we recognize and realize that the only reason money plays such a heavy role in society is because we tie worthiness love. It's a unit of happiness. Yes. It's a unit of joy. It's even a unit of love. It's a unit of attention.

We tie all of these different components of life to money, and we give it this worth that it actually doesn't have it. Shouldn't have it. Shouldn't carry and bear the weight of worthiness of love, of meaning, of purpose, of, of more of after fluence. Is that how you say that word? You know what I'm saying? Right. Like power money is literally just a means of exchange here. We're on planet earth for hi, here is this money, whether it be paper or digital in exchange for a needs in exchange for needs and things that we want to do, whether it be a want or a need or a desire or a physical thing, it's a means of exchange and money. If you look back money used to be, let's say cows or grain or fruit that was then exchanged for what meat or weaponry or goods, physical goods, things of that nature.

And as money evolved and became paper, currency, and gold and silver and things that could be traded, the more you had, the more power that you had, the more power, because you could buy more stuff at the end of the day, that's it, right. When you have more money, you can buy more stuff. You can initially like that's where my brain goes of. Like, well, when I have more money, I can have a bigger house. It's a bigger car. I can travel more like all the way, worldly things that equal joy, happiness, and success are tied to this concept of more, more money Mo money, baby. All right. However, so, so that's like what money typically would mean. Okay. But here's where it gets a little crazy as we dig into money. What we realize is if it's simply a means of exchange, it actually has no power at all.

And if every means of exchange, if everything on planet earth, if our homes, our lives, our food, our clothes, our money minds, if every single Adam on planet earth is from God, then it's from God. It's not ours anyway. Right? And so even if you accumulate all of this money, all of the paper, all of the digital currency, whatever, if it's from God, God can take it away as fast as he gives it. So it actually has zero power, zero power and money. Doesn't equal worthiness, success, happiness, none of those things, because it's just a means of exchange. So to put value, to put so much worth into a thing that equals idolatry, okay, that equals you worshiping some thing that is a earthly product, an earthly item and not turning away from him, all the tangible things, the physical things, including money to find your worthiness, purpose, happiness for fullness in Christ.

So the first thing that I want to talk to you, I said all of that, that's just foundationally like some groundwork for what we're going to get into today. So what I first want to bring up as a couple of verses that that could be those of you that feel that money is bad, evil, dark, and it can be, and we're going to talk about why it can be. Absolutely. And it's kind of back to what I was saying about if money is an idol, if money holds a worth for you, if money is associated to hard times in your life, you're going to put a stamp on the concept of money in your mind that says, no bad, stay away. Dark don't actually want it, or I need it. Have to have it must have it more like you're going one of, one of two ways.

And there's a very slim percentage of people that I think have a biblical money mindset, which we'll also talk about today. So first, why do we perceive money as bad? And if we look in the Bible at some of the verses, when I type money into my Bible app, here's what comes up for the love of money is the root of all kinds of evil. And some people craving money have wandered from the truth through faith. That's first Timothy six, 10 don't lie, have money, be satisfied with what you have for God has said, I will never fail you. I will never abandon you. Hebrews 13, five don't store up treasures here on earth, where moths eat them and rust destroys them. And where thieves break in and steal Matthew six, 19 store your treasures in heaven, where moth and rust cannot destroy and thieves do not break in and steal Matthew six 20, wherever your heart is or sorry, wherever your treasure is there.

The desires of your heart will also be Matthew six 21, I mean, on and on and on and on. So here, here's what, I'm what we take from the Bible. When I type in the literal word money, we get warnings. We get, we get warnings. We get signs from Christ that is trying to open our eyes and enlighten us to the fact that the love of money is evil. Money in and of itself is not evil. It's like, it's a dollar. Like here's my dollar. I would like my bubble gum. Okay. Like you guys it's, that is literally what it is. Okay. There's no power, nothing. You don't, it's not magic. It's not going to change how you feel about yourself, how you love others. It's not going to change your worthiness. Sorry. And I'm going to tell you about why money equals worthiness for me for many, many, many years.

All right. The love of money is the root of evil. Why? Because Satan uses tangible goods here on earth to distract us from what true peacefulness and purpose and prosperity actually means. He's distracting us with the love of money, allowing it to become an idol that we believe has the power to change. Our lives has the power to make a difference. Has the, all of that. Like we are. So hyper-focused on the fact that we think money will transform everything that we fallen away from the true Waymaker the true person who will transform our lives, which is Jesus Christ. What else? Don't store up treasures here on earth story, your treasures in heaven, where moth and rust cannot destroy. This brings me to the concept of when we die and we will all die. We don't, tomorrow is not promised sisters. We die with nothing.

We die with our spirit. We die with what we've done. Our good works here on earth. The the books that God has written about us up in heaven, and we go to heaven and we leave every earthly possession here on earth. We leave loved ones. We leave clothing, we leave our home. We leave our homes. We leave our 401k. We leave our, everything, our podcast, our businesses, all of it, because all of it is worldly, except souls, spirit, your spirit, your soul, and the souls of other humans. That is the only thing that we can take with us to have. And the only thing we can impact, we can't impact. We, we can't take with us the battles that we won, the political battle that we won. We can't take with us the multi-billion dollar business. We leave it here because it's of the world.

So we have to store up our treasures, our real true wealth in heaven. And what is real true wealth? Real true wealth is the goodness we do for other people. The impact. We make the moments with our children, teaching them, being patient with them, stewarding them. The time that we lay all the idols down, we turn off social media and we rest and we pour into other people and we take time that we don't have for people in need. We show up for others in a way that's uncomfortable for us. We give freely of our resources, our time, our hearts. Those are the stores that God is talking about that we store up in heaven.

That is where our treasure is. And that is where our heart will lie. Where ever your treasure is there. The desires of your heart will also, how many of you maybe get some money? And then you hoard that money and you save it and you keep it. And you, you, you hide it away and you watch it grow. And you're so almost obsessive about the fact that you have to keep all of this money because it could be gone or you don't have any power without it. You don't have any stability. Any safety that money brings you safety money can be gone overnight. And it has been for me. And I will tell you that safety never came from money. It only came through Christ because he always makes sure that we are safe. So I've talked a lot about maybe why money, why we think money is bad and why money actually can be bad because it can become an idol.

So let's first talk about my old money. We're going to go through three phases of my life. Number one, my old money story. What, why I thought the way that I did and what power that I thought money had over me, number two, we're going to go through my no money story. I had a no money story for a hot minute, and then we're going to go through my now money story. Okay. So let's start with my old money story. Growing up, we didn't have a lot of money. My dad grew up very, very, I don't even know the right word to call this. They just didn't have any money at all. Okay. There was like lots and lots of kids in a two bedroom home. They also slept in bunk beds and everywhere. My, my grandpa worked, my grandma stayed home with them.

And every dollar, you know, was sacred because they didn't have money. They just didn't have it like living through the great depression and my grandfather being in the Wars and just all of that gave them a fear of lack of money. And that created, you know, this desire to, in order to have stability and to have no fear in your life, you must have money. So then money hard work then. Okay. So then hard work equals worthiness and, and love. And this has nothing to say negatively about my parents or my dad specifically with the way that he was raised. It's just what it is. And our parents' money stories is not a fault of their own, but, but here's the beauty. Is that anything that was done to you? The beliefs that you have now can be undone. They can be unwritten as you learn.

And you see a wise friend once told me once you see, you can never unsee. We have the power to rewrite any money story. That was pre-written in our book because that's not a book that's for us. Okay. So that's the great news. Anyways, when we look back, that was the money story. It was work really, really hard and achieve because then you'll have money which then equals success and it then equals safety and it then equals happy life ideally. And so then from my mom's upbringing, she as well they didn't have money. There was a whole lot of children again, and my mom was the one raising the kids. And I'm sure that she hold held a lot of grief, frustration, resentment towards those money stories, because when the parents were working, she was taking care of children, her siblings. And so then again, you know, you've got to work really hard because you cannot be in that situation.

So everything led to my belief of money equals everything, success, happiness, validation, love a life well lived. And in order to get money, I must what achieve. So that's my old money story. So what did I do? I worked like a crazy person. I always, and this is from like 24 on. So working super hard, never ending all night achievement get the, get the promotions and then later get the rank advancements, make all the money. And then finally, when I broke, you know, six figures in my, by 26, and then I broke six figures again, when I got into network marketing at 28, I'm like, yes, I did it. This is what it's worth. But for some reason it still wasn't enough. It wasn't enough. So it was like more because it could be gone, right? It could leave me. Then I would be unhappy.

And, and the enemy Satan literally used money as a idol and a distractor for me to pull me away from the actual purpose and the actual things of meaning the stores and heaven that God had planned for me, Satan was saying, but money, but money, but money, Stephanie work harder, do more hustle, show up, ignore that over there. That doesn't matter. Money equals everything and Satan, the little whispers that he so carefully orchestrates in your ear and the distractions that he places in front of you feel so real. So tangible that you are so terrified to break away, even though in your heart of hearts, in your gut, in your soul. You know, something's not right. As I, you know, ignored my child to take phone calls. As I worked early in the morning, instead of spending time with God as I was on my phone, on my engagement vacation trip, as I took, like, it's disgusting, but I don't.

I now I now don't blame myself anymore because I know that the enemy was working so hard to keep me from this very moment. Satan was using money as a lie. Satan is a liar. His entire plan is to steal, kill, and destroy, and he uses money to do it, which is what the Bible is. Warning us of money is not bad. It's the way that Satan uses it to Laura, us, to doing evil, literally to idolatry, to, to, to us, not looking to Christ for love, worthiness, purpose, and all of that, and looking to money for it instead, or achievement or the to-do list or the rank or the promotion, or the certain number in your bank account because sisters I've had it. And I still felt the need for more of it. So what did I do? I tried to get more of it.

I worked even harder. I dabbled in manifesting. I would sit there in my car and go, okay. I made a hundred K. Now I'm going to go to 200 K you know, like I can see it. Money is flowing into my bank account. I see $200,000. I would do quick meditations where I would look up and channel the white random light and see money falling down all over me. Hilarious. It's hilarious. It truly is hilarious because money from the world is money handed to you from Satan. And that money comes with a very, very heavy cost. That money comes with destruction, darkness tearing apart of families, marriages destruction of your brain, your mental health, so that you rely on other things to get you through the day. It it's a very dark space that just like the momentum of it. And Satan just takes it and goes, aha, I got you like, yeah, I know this is getting deep, but I really need you guys to stay with me.

So I did all of that in my old money story, but here's the funny thing. I was so grateful that God stepped in. You know, I know that God has always had a plan for me, and he has a big plan for me and it's audacious. And it's really scary at times to be, you know, to raise your hand and be like, I'm going from call to chose. And like, here we go, because being chosen is not always pretty in the worldly perspective. Like my inheritance is in heaven. It may not be here on earth. And right now my life is extraordinarily fruitful. And we're going to talk about that in a little bit, but it's not always, probably going to be that way. And I know that, and I'm okay with it because I choose to have my inheritance in heaven for all of eternity instead of a very short-lived inheritance here on earth in the flash that our earthly lives are.

And that's what I choose. And so Satan could have continued to string me along, giving me more and more and more money taking more and more of my life, my sanity, my mental health, my my relationships tearing them apart. I could have ultimately what gotten divorced, but risen, risen higher and higher and higher, and gotten to the very top and become a multimillionaire in my network, marketing business or whatever your business the business was. I was in it wouldn't have mattered you know, stolen my relationships with my children, but I would have had money. I would have had money. I would have had accomplishment. I would have had it all. And I would have looked around and found myself alone, alone on the stage alone in my tears alone in my heartbreak alone in my pain, but with money. Yay, thank God. Praise you.

Jesus, praise you so grateful. God stepped in and he ripped away the earthly success quote, unquote, that Satan freely gave. And I don't even know it was probably, this is where it gets weird. Like, is it God-given? Is it Satan? Get like whatever the money that I had allowed Satan to use for his good let's say it that way, because money's just a means of exchange. There was no power in it, but Satan uses these things, little simple things like social media, like money, like more your weight, the way that you see yourself flirting, that then turns into cheating. That then turns into a divorce. Like he uses little simple, very seemingly innocent things to steal, kill, and destroy. So God, thank God I was saved. And in my gut I'm like something isn't really right. And thank God he stepped in and he broke the plans that Satan had over my life and my money was gone, which then turns into my no money story. Dun dun, dun.

Oh, that's so fun. Okay. So when my network marketing business crashed and I was left with like, from very high income months to really know, Oh, income months, no income for like six months or so. And the cashflow was gone. Like we still had our home. We still had our assets, but like the actual money that you pay for those assets was gone. We had a big loan that we had to defer. My husband had to sell his Harley Davidson. You guys have heard me talk about this, but it's, doesn't make it easier. Like it's still rough man. Sell his prize Harley just to pay the bills. I had to borrow money from my son miles savings account at one point, like it was a hard six months. At the same time, I have a newborn I'm 60 pounds overweight. I'm having anxiety attacks.

And my entire worthiness that I thought was achievement and success was revealed to me again, praise God. Like he knows. He knows our hearts more than we know our hearts. And God knew that I needed some discipline. One of my favorite verses of this year, every two guys is Hebrews 12, 11, all discipline for the moment seems not to be joyful, but sorrowful yet to those who have been trained by it afterwards, it yields the peaceful fruit of righteousness. Amen. I was sorry, Ching and seeking like, Oh my gosh. Well, if money wasn't worthiness and happiness, cause it never really brought it to me. And here I sit here, I sit in my empty, broken miss in my anxiety here. I sit in my unworthiness. I sit, am I not? Enoughness in my comparisonitis and my lack of all alone, no money, no money, sad, lost all of it.

Well, here's the beauty of, of what God knows. God knows what you don't know. He can see the future. He is the future he's omnipresent. He knew that one day I would sit behind this microphone and share that story with you. He knew that one day I would find what true fruit of the spirit really truly meant. He knew that I would see what money was. He knew that I would see the devil's plans that I would, I would become aware. I would never unsee what he revealed to me. And he said, she can walk through this Valley of darkness. She can walk through it and I will bring her to the light. He knew me more than I knew me more than I know me. And he knew I needed this season of no money because the idolatry of money in my life was revealed.

It was Oh, having all of that success, money recognition. It didn't do anything for me. I'm still sitting here wallowing in my own self-induced misery. I didn't turn to Christ when I, when I, but I didn't know. And this is how he teaches us. He so beautifully orchestrates these moments of maybe hard heartache pain in our lives or uses them. Not that he necessarily orchestrated this, but he used it to bring me back to him, to bring my heart back to Christ and to what really was where I was rock bottom at this point. So I turned to him and I said, you know, father heal me, show me if it wasn't pain. If it wasn't money, worthiness success, the education, the certain money in my bank, account number, whatever, what is it? And he whispered daughter it's me. And, and we're totally ending there for today.

You're going to have to join me on Thursday for part two of this episode. As I finish up my no money, money story, and walk you through my now money story. And finally give you a few things that you can work on when it comes to your own money story and partnering with God in having a Christian money mindset, a biblical money mindset. So exciting. All right, so I'll meet you guys back here real soon, father, God, I pray over each and every one of these women of these listeners, I pray that you just lift them up, help them to recognize and realize that their treasures, their abundance, it all comes from you. And when they work with you, they begin to uncover the treasure and the gifts, favorite provision and blessings that only you have in store for them. And I just pray that you do a work in their hearts, minds, and spirits through this episode and through the scriptures that you bring to them and through the works, the good works that they are doing, that you reward them for that father. We love you. We trust you and in Jesus' name, amen love and God's light, Stef.

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