Money in a Ministry Family

PSA: I know this is lengthy ;)

My husband always says "more is caught than taught". Growing up, I "caught" a lot in regards to how to view and manage money. Money is a sticky subject in every aspect of life. Jesus preached A LOT on money and yet we tend to stray away from any conversation or message involving the "m" word. But, if the church (& christian families) don't set the example, who's going to? The world? The world isn't exactly the place where I want my money influences to come from.

As a pastor of a "large" Baptist church that was faithful in giving and saw the fruits of their giving, my parents did okay financially when I was growing up. We lived in a gated "golf-course" community with 5 bedrooms, a pool, a home office, dining room, family room, living room, kitchen, and plenty of house to move around in. We ate out once or twice a week and somehow my parents managed to feed my two ever-growing-athletic-brothers. We never went without things (that were necessities). My sister and I had jobs to buy what we wanted; clothes, jewelry, shoes, movie tickets, and weekend activities. My brothers played sports so my parents didn't make them work. So yes, we had nice things and we had what we needed to live on. What pains me is when people think that pastors and church leaders should live well under their means "to be some kind of example". If you are giving back to the church and not using your money in an immoral way, should it matter to others where your money goes? My parents decided to put their money into a house where their kids could grow up in and our friends wanted to hang out at. My mom always said she'd rather our friends hang out under our roof than for us to be hanging out who knows where. So, they strived to make our home a place that us and our friends wanted to be. And, honestly, I loved being home.

People have always, and will always, choose to spend their money where they see fit. Some spend it on cars, others on weekend vacations, others on expensive schools, some on adopting kids, some on college funds, some on food, some on their kids, etc. I'm saying this because people have their priorities when it comes to how they choose to spend their money and that's OKAY.

We have decided that from day one we are going to instill in Brooklynn that nothing belongs to her/us. Everything we have belongs to our creator. One way we are going to instill this in her is by having "give", "save", and "spend" jars in her room. As long as she tithes and saves, I really could care less where she spends the rest (as long as it's ethical of course).

As a PK and wife, my family has always lived in a "glass house". People like to make assumptions about how we spent/are spending. For example, Hux and I eat out almost every dinner-time meal so they assume we spend money we don't have. 75% of the time, we eat on a gift card or a coupon and we always share a meal and get water. Essentially, for us, it's cheaper for us to eat out (most of the time) It's always so easy (and Hux and I do this, too) to judge how someone chooses to spend their money. raise their family, or run a church. Only God knows the heart of a person and He's the only one fit enough to judge a person's intentions in the decisions that they make. We, as people, never really know the reasoning behind why people do what they do but we like to think we do. Being a part of a ministry family has taught me the importance of not judging another's decisions because we, too, have been judged and watched and it's not fun.

These kind of posts are not meant to say that I'm a "victim" of being in a ministry family. They're more intended to open eyes. You can say I'm passionate about ministry families because I've been in one my whole life, my sister married one, and my brothers want to plant churches/play a role in church programming after college. Ministry families are held to a standard that most are not held to, unfortunately, and always treated differently.

So, lift your leaders and their families in prayer because a lot of their lives revolve around serving yours :-)