Archive for October 2015

Put Your Oxen to Work – Part 3

Proverbs 14:4 – Where there are no oxen, the manger is empty, but from the strength of an ox comes an abundant harvest.

PART THREE – Acquire oxen.

The manger is empty when there are no oxen.  The manger is designed to hold food.  When faced with the decision of “empty manger/no food” versus “abundant harvest”, I am going to choose the abundant harvest every single time.  It is my belief that this would be your choice also.

Obviously, the critical step toward an abundant harvest is to have oxen.  These oxen, however, can be expensive.  Acquiring a McDonald’s franchise can cost hundreds of thousands of dollars.  Starting a business can also cost an enormous amount of money.  So where does one start out?  We must start out just like everyone else – start where you are with what you have.

I challenge you to write down your plans, hopes, and dreams on paper.  Seriously, take five minutes to ponder your goals and write them down.  Now, next to each goal, write down how much each goal will cost.  This process will help you understand the necessity of acquiring an ox or two.

My oxen acquisition started by fully funding my 401(k).  I contributed the maximum amount allowed by law.  Notice that I did not contribute just enough to gain the company match.  This is a great start, but to truly get the 401(k) ox to work for me, I needed to maximize my contributions.  If you simply can’t contribute the maximum, start with a little and increase it on a consistent basis so that you will be maximizing it in just a few years.  These investments seemed so little at the start that it seemed pointless.  Just 15 years later, however, the 401(k) ox is healthy and doing a LOT of heavy lifting for me!  It will do the same for you.

I use to live paycheck-to-paycheck but by applying myself little by little every single day, God has continued to bless me.  I am convinced beyond a shadow of doubt that He can do the same for you.

TRUTH:  Oxen acquisition can allow you to enjoy an abundant harvest.

Put Your Oxen to Work – Part 2

Proverbs 14:4 – Where there are no oxen, the manger is empty, but from the strength of an ox comes an abundant harvest.

PART TWO Identify your oxen.

In Part 1, we investigated the meaning of this verse and discovered the truth that “To accomplish more financially, you’ll need oxen to help you.”  Now that this is known, it is important to identify the potential “oxen” that could work for you – in place of you – and produce additional income (abundant harvests).

A retirement investment account (such as a 401(k), 403(b), 457, TSP, or Roth or Traditional IRA) are oxen.  Think about it.  When your retirement investments go up in value over time, does it require much effort from you?  Absolutely not.  Like an ox, you will need to occasionally provide direction and guidance to the investment account, but it will do the heavy lifting for you and take your finances places you can not get to on your own.

Another form of oxen is business ownership.  An owner of a McDonald’s franchise makes money even when they are at home asleep because the system is producing profits without their active and direct involvement every minute of the day.

All of my books are oxen.  People purchase the book during all hours of the day and night.  It helps them prosper with their finances, and it provides income so that our team can stay focused on developing new resources to help people and live out our call and passion.

Real estate such as rental houses, commercial properties, and land can increase in value regardless of your attention or effort.

It is time for you to acquire some oxen and put them to work for you!

TRUTH: Significant wealth is achieved when one identifies ways to produce income regardless of effort or time invested.

Put Your OXEN to Work – Part 1

Proverbs 14:4 – Where there are no oxen, the manger is empty, but from the strength of an ox comes an abundant harvest.

Perhaps no verse has had more of an impact on my financial management than this verse.  I believe that if you apply these principles, your finances will be forever changed.

PART ONE  Understand the verse.

I was reading this verse several years ago, and it literally changed my entire mindset about financial management.  Perhaps it is because I grew up on a farm and connected with the talk about farm animals and equipment.  Maybe it is because I am continually learning more about finances.  Whatever the reason I like this verse, I promise you that it can completely change your finances!

Think about your ability to work.  No matter how strong you are, how much energy you have, or how determined you may be, there is only so much work you can do.  There is only one you.  You can work more hours.  You can work 20 hours per day, but you will reach a limit.

As a farmer, there is only so much you can do.  Help is required to accomplish more.  With oxen, so much more can be accomplished.  They are STRONGER than you are.  They have MORE ENDURANCE than you do.  They even have SKILLS you don’t have (ever attempted to pull a barn by yourself?)

TRUTH: To accomplish more financially, you will need oxen to help you.

We’ll discuss how to identify your oxen in Part 2.

The Definition of Investing

I recently conducted a survey and received hundreds and hundreds of responses. One of the questions I asked was:

Which financial topic do you struggle with most? 

One of the top responses was Investing.

With phrases like mutual funds, ETFs, stocks, bonds, brokers, margin accounts, rate of return, yield rate, P/E, market capitalization, and current ratio, it can literally feel as if investing is another language!

I know the feeling as I’ve been there! Because of the results of this survey, I am tasking the I Was Broke. Now I’m Not. team to aggressively address this issue. We are hard at work developing resources that are going to help take people from clueless to financially confident and competent investor! We are also focusing on the topic of investing for the whole month of October!

First, let’s start by presenting a working definition of “investing.”

Investing  Using your money and possessions to create more money and possessions.

The goal for any investment is to gain more in return. There are countless ways to do this and we’ll dive more into this over the month.