Why Are Money Talks So Awkward (and Stressful) with My Family?

Speaker A00:00:01

You love your family, you share everything with your family. But when it comes to money, well, that gets awkward, Ralph. That gets stressful. And for many families it ends up in a fight.Let me ask you this, what if those conversations could actually bring peace instead of tension? Let's talk about how money talks can create unity instead of conflict. That's what we'll talk about on today's show. It's going to be a great one.This is Financially Confident Christian, your daily dose of gospel, grounded insight and faith driven tips to help you break the cycle of financial shame with confidence. Welcome back to Financially Confident Christian. I'm Ralph and I'm so happy that you've chosen to join me again today.If this is your first time visiting the show, this is the show where we answer that big question, how do we become a financially confident Christian? And we're in our series, Breaking Financial chains. We do 30 day series right now on how to break free of those financial chains.And yesterday we, we talked about breaking free from those advertising pressures, those constant social media things that are bombarding us from all directions. So if you missed it, I'm going to encourage you to check it out.You can find all of our shows@financially confidentchristian.com but today we're going to talk about the family. Why money talks are so awkward and sometimes they end up in a full blown fight. But today I want to really talk to you about how to make them healthy.Because if we want to grow our families, one of the things we've really got to do is we've got to grow these financial conversations.I don't know how many times I've met with couples and that idea of talking with their spouse about a budget usually ends up in an argument or a shutdown completely. We're in different sides of the house. One person is like, Ralph, I'm really trying hard to get our affairs in order.And my husband or my wife, they just don't get it. They just keep on spending. They don't get that we can't continue to run into debt. And for so many families, we just avoid the topic altogether.And the problem with it, this, it breeds a problem, especially with our kids. So many families that I work with, they don't talk to the kids about money.And then they wonder when the kids get older, how come the kids don't understand how to manage their money? Well, for so many families it's, oh, that's a boring talk. We don't want to bore our kids with that.Or maybe for so many And I work with so many families that it's just so overwhelming. They're in this constant financial anxiety. They're in this constant financial struggle.They don't want to talk about it because it just brings up pain, it brings up fear, it brings up anxiety. But the problem, and this is really the big problem, this avoidance, we don't talk about these things. It creates silence.And that silence, it creates all kinds of misunderstanding. I want to start with something bold today. I've said this on the show many times. Money is a tool. If it's used wisely, it's a beautiful tool.It's like a carpenter's hammer. When the carpenter uses the hammer in the right way to build stuff. Carpenter builds beautiful things. But here's the other problem with money.And for so many families, you might be listening right now. You're sitting at the kitchen table, or maybe you're on your way to work or you're out walking. Whatever it is you're doing, you think about money.And money brings out some fears, maybe for you and your family brings out wounds because you've been through tough times financially. Maybe you've had that bankruptcy, you've had that lost job, or you've had that debt that's been over your head for years.And for so many families, it really brings out a discussion about values. A lot of times people don't want to talk about values because husband and wives especially, I see this all the time.Maybe the husband was raised in a family where money wasn't so tight, there wasn't this constant anxiety. Or maybe the wife was raised in a place where, man, we barely got by Ralph. It's hard to have those discussions.And that's why these money talks become so emotional, because it exposes these fears, it exposes these wounds, and it makes us really address our values. And that's where we want to start today. Because God calls families to walk in unity.If you hear nothing else I talk about today, I want you to hear this. This show is all about bringing the world of faith and finance together.Because I truly believe with all of my heart, it's the reason I do this show every day. God wants us to be successful financially, and he especially wants our families to walk in unity. So let's rub right into the Bible.I found this one in the Book of Amos. I don't think I've ever quoted the Book of Amos on this show. This is Amos, chapter three, verse three.It says, do two walk together unless they have agreed to do so. It's more of a question, but you got to have an agreement to do that. And that's really what God is calling us to do.Let's look at the book of Proverbs, chapter 15, verse 22. And I've used this on the show many times. Plans fail for the lack of counsel, but with many advisors, they succeed. What's the scripture telling us?Have advisors talk. Have counsel together. Let's look at one more verse. This is the book of Ephesians, chapter 4, verse 29. And this one kind of nails it.If you really feel like every time you get into a family discussion about money, it gets ugly. Ralph, listen to this. Ephesians, chapter 4, verse 29.Do not let any unwholesome talk come out of your mouths, but only what is helpful for building others up according to their needs, that it may benefit those who listen. That's a tough one. You know, sometimes scripture is a little piercing. I know it is for me.You might be sitting there right now that, like, hit me over the head with a mallet. Don't let any unwholesome talk come out of your mouths. But what it is saying here is to help us to build each other up according to our needs.And see, that's what I'm talking about when I talk about having family discussions about money. It's all about building an agreement.It's all about finding wise counsel between each other and lifting and uplifting ourselves with God's word and making a blueprint for our family. Money talks. And for so many people, this is a struggle. I've heard people say this time and time again.They say, ralph, we talk about a budget at home. It started tense, but then we did. We took your advice, Ralph. We just sat.You know, first thing we do before we talk about money, we're going to pray about it and say, lord, listen, this may end up in a battle, but help us all to stay calm today. Help us to understand that the goal here is to build our family up, not tear it down. And once we did that, Ralph, something amazing happened.We started to have real calmness. We were able to actually have a discussion. I remember as a kid, my mom used to get involved in sharing money things with us.To be honest with you, sometimes I think she shared a little bit too much, and it felt like a burden. But you can do this in a correct way, but share that with your kids.Because one of the things I think, and I've said this on the show before, I think we do a terrible job in this country of preparing our Kids financially. We wonder why our kids struggle. We wonder why our kids get themselves in all kinds of credit card debt and all that kind of stuff.Have we taught them the valuable lessons? Because here's the truth. Intentional conversations.The conversations that we're intentional about, the things that we plan out, the things that we think about, hey, we got to have this conversation. Those intentional conversations can bring unity and they can be increased in life. So now you might be saying, ralph, how do I make this happen?We've never done this in our family. Ralph, this is something. I get it. Ralph, we need to do this. God's been putting this on my heart.I think you got to start by having regular family money meetings. And maybe they're short at first, maybe they're light, you know, is the positive check in, how are things going?But over time, it's going to build trust, it's going to reduce stress, and it's going to help you align your family with the biblical goals or your God given goals. So let me tell you right now, your one action step for today of how to do that. Now here's the thing. It's the hard work.You're going to have to take the lead here. You might have to be that gentle guide for that first meeting. You have to be to pull a family in and say, hey, family meeting time.You might have to take the lead because maybe your spouse or maybe somebody else is not going to want to do that. This is hard work. That's the first thing. Maybe take the lead. Second thing. This is super important. You got to be really strategic in doing this.You got to pick a relaxed time. This is not the thing. When everybody's stressed out, when everybody's rushing around, this is a great thing to do.Maybe after dinner, everybody's belly's full, everybody's calm, everybody's happy. It's a good time to do that.Or maybe it's if maybe it's just for you and your wife or you and your husband, you need to sit down and have just a talk. Again.Not when everybody's upset, not when the credit card bill just landed, not when the bank just called and said there was another overdraft notice. That's not the time to do it. Maybe over a weekend coffee, just 15 or 30 minutes. Keep it short, keep it brief, but keep it positive.That's my third thing I wanted to say today. Keep it positive. Just one goal, one light topic.Listen, if you come at this with the intention of, I'm gonna whale my husband over the head with a Hammer, because he doesn't stop spending money on stuff. It's not gonna be effective. You're not gonna get anywhere with that. And then I'm gonna encourage you to one more thing like I talked about.Start with prayer. Pray together about this, begin it, and end it with God's wisdom, because he's the one that can solve this.We need to understand it from the very start if we want to fix these awkward conversations about money in our families. We got to take it right to the God. We got to take it right to him first. Begin with that, end with that. Start off with saying, God, help us to be.Help us to be calm in this discussion. And at the end, thank him for that calm discussion.Because when you do this, when you pick that intentional choice to do this, it's going to build peace and it's going to stop that game of blaming everybody else for what's going on with your finances in the family. Why would we pray together, Lord? We just start today by thanking you for the gift of our families, Lord, so many times we take that for granted.And yes, warts and all, Lord, we appreciate what you've given us. And we have to say right now, Lord, we have to confess you that money has sometimes divided us as a family.We just ask that you will forgive us for those times, Lord, and help us to have courage to start to talk openly about these things. Give us wisdom to shut up and listen sometimes, Lord, and to really have grace to find unity in our family.And, Lord, as we do this, we ask that you would come into those discussions. Give us alignment with the will you have for our lives, Lord. Help us to be wise stewards of that.Help us to teach our kids to do this well, Lord, so that they become financially confident Christians, Lord. And we ask all this in the confidence of Jesus himself. We ask this in Jesus name. Amen. Family money meetings aren't about conflict. Don't have to be.You may have experienced that your whole life. Because, listen, I know this myself so many times the family, because it's a discussion of we spent too much money last month.We did this, we did that. They don't have to be about conflict. They can truly transform into a time of connection. I'm going to encourage you to do that.Start small, keep it light, and remember, invite God into the beginning and the end of that conversation. And as we're talking about inviting, I would really like it if you would share this show with other people.Maybe, you know, another family that's struggling, you can say to them, Hey, I listen to this guy Ralph. He's got this podcast called Financially Confident Christian. You can send him right to our website.That's@financiallyconfidentchristian.com Send him an email, send him a text and just say, hey, you want to consider this? I listen to his show every day and it's really been impactful for me.It's helped me break that cycle of financial shame and it's helped me find confidence. So share the show with them and while they're there, you can point them to something absolutely free. You can get this yourself, too.I'm giving you everybody that listens to the show. You just go to our website. That's financially confidentchristian.com becoming I want to give you a copy of my book.I just finished writing my third book. Yes, three books. What was I thinking? But this one's really impactful. It's called how to Become a Financially Confident Christian.And it really is your way to start stepping out of that financial shame that so many of us find ourselves in that cycle and, and to start build confidence and build confidence in the rock of Christ to change the financial dynamic. So I'm going to encourage you to get that.Go ahead and you can go to financially confidentchristian.com becoming now, tomorrow we're going to get really practical. Tomorrow we're going to talk about those forgotten subscriptions, those sneaky budget leaks.But bigger than that, we're going to talk about how to reclaim that money and put it to use for God's will of your life. So I'm going to encourage you to catch tomorrow's show. And as I close today, I just want to remind you this. You can do this.You can have those difficult family conversations. Just invite God into it. Say, God, show me your path for this. Keep it short, keep it simple, keep it positive, but you can do this. I believe in you.Believe in yourself. Now go live as a financially confident Christian, because you can do this. God bless you. And you have a great day today.