It happens at least once a month, sometimes more. Someone comes to me seeking counsel because they are feeling the pressures of debt. They’ve dug a deep hole…so deep that they feel like they’ll never be able to dig out.
Debt has become a marketed product in and of itself. It’s not a free service or a convenience like people think it is…it’s a massive industry. Its extremely well marketed and many (I’d say most) people bite.
As soon as you get into serious consumer debt, you start working for them. They don’t work for you.
Myth: Debt is a tool and should be used to help create prosperity.
Truth: Debt isn’t used by wealthy people any close to as much as we believe it is.
Debt is dumb. Most normal people are broke because they are in debt up to their eyeballs and have no intentions of changing. If you’re in debt, then you’re a slave because you do not have the freedom to use your money the way you want to use it.
Or another thing I see regularly is people who pay off all of their debt…only so that they can rush back out and rack up some more debt. They get into this strangling, stressful cycle.
I think a general idea of what is taught today is that debt is like a fulcrum – it allows us to lift what we otherwise could not lift. We can buy a home, a car, start a business, or go on vacation and not have to wait.
According to Proverbs 22:7, “The rich rule over the poor, and the borrower is slave of the lender.” When Amber and I finally broke down and took Dave Ramsey’s Financial Peace University course, I was confront with a spiritual decision. I could listen to my broke friends who thought that debt is a tool or I could listen to God, who says plain and clear that debt is a great way to become a slave.
It takes a lot of will, courage, help, discipline and some serious commitment to ditch your debt. But it can be done. Imagine how much you could put toward retirement if you just didn’t have a stinking car payment? This is how the wealthy really build their wealth!
GO FOR IT. If you attend Revolution, check out our next FPU class. If you live anywhere else, go here to find a class close to you.
