The Christian Marriage and Money

The Bible
does not specifically address the handling of money in a marriage, but the
principles regarding the relationship dynamics between the husband and wife
touch on all aspects of the marriage. In other words, the principles set forth
by the Lord in Ephesians 5:22-33 and Colossians 3:18-19 speak to all facets of
the husband-wife relationship. This means that the spiritual balance of the
spousal relationship, in all aspects, is directly impacted by the individual spouse’s
choice to walk in obedience to the Lord.

Both spouses bring to their union strengths and weaknesses. Molding these
individual characteristics into a workable relationship is a matter of
understanding the order of God and the gift of grace. Financial decisions that
impact the success of the family are a shared responsibility. Whatever the
source of God’s provisions, whether the result of the husband’s employment or
the wife’s employment, or both, the assets accumulated are the responsibility
of both partners together as a team. The important principle in regard to
financial decisions is to “…do it all for the glory of God.” (1 Corinthians
10:31)

Few of us
were left unchanged by the economics of the last four years. Recession,
recovery, unemployment, housing and fuel prices, etc. In addition to that,
let’s add toddlers, dinnertime, teenagers, weight gain, and dirty laundry. Is
it really any wonder that money, along with poor communication, can be one of
the most difficult areas for couples to manage together?

Now, if you
and your spouse can already agree on how to manage your finances, have a
complete understanding of your goals, and work well as a team to accomplish
your dreams—I am genuinely excited for you. And you need to move on from
reading this post and go mentor another young married couple who has not yet
figured out how to reach those milestones, because, trust me, there are many
out there who have not arrived there yet.
It took my wife and myself almost a year to work this out, whereas others
might take even longer.

For those of
you who have decided to continue reading, I’d like to suggest 10 steps to begin
managing your finances together:

1) Pray

“When famine
or plague comes to the land, or blight or mildew, locusts or grasshoppers, or
when enemies besiege them in any of their cities, whatever disaster or disease
may come, and when a prayer or plea is made by any of your people Israel–each
one aware of his afflictions and pains, and spreading out his hands toward this
temple–then hear from heaven, your dwelling place. Forgive, and deal with each
man according to all he does, since you know his heart (for you alone know the
hearts of men), so that they will fear you and walk in your ways all the time
they live in the land you gave our fathers.” (2 Chronicles 6:28-31)

I cannot
stress this enough, pray before you move forward. Few couples invite God into
their financial lives.  I think God has some amazing things he can do with
our finances if we allow him to enter into the process.  Marriage is
always a joint relationship between husband, wife, and God.

In your
prayers focus on the following:

Pray that
God would allow you to put your marriage above any individual concerns.
Ask God to guide you in how he wants the funds earned, used, and
distributed.  Request a double portion of humility so you can be prepared
to accept God’s guidance.  Plead with God to give you the necessary
strength to release control of your money and give God control.   Remember, God knows your heart.

2) Be Partners
and Honest in Everything

“So if you
have not been trustworthy in handling worldly wealth, who will trust you with
true riches?” (Luke 16:11)

Marriage is
an amalgamation of all the pieces of life.  The husband and the wife lose
their individual identity and become one.  “I” is dropped from the
vocabulary and replaced with “We.” The married couple no longer uses “my”, but
“our”.  This includes finances.  Every dollar brought into the home
is a dollar that belongs to the home.  Every dollar that goes out the door
is a dollar that the household spent.  Erase all notions of individual
finances.  Forget about who bought what.  It doesn’t matter who first
signed for the loan.  From
now on “we” are in this financial situation together.  “We” have an equal
responsibility and an equal opportunity.

Gather up
all the statements, checkbooks, and insurance documents to one place. If you
are not joint on your accounts, make it so.  If you have a debt your spouse does not know
about, be completely clear about it.  If
you are the one receiving this surprising news, commit to being completely
involved from this day forward.

“For this
reason a man will leave his father and mother and be united to his wife, and
they will become one flesh.” (Genesis 2:24)

3) Define Long-term
Goals

This might
be painful, but list all of your debts.  Yes,
all of them.  Do the same for your
assets. What are your cars worth?  How
much is in savings? Now set goals.  Goal
setting is a form of practical dreaming—and who doesn’t like to dream about
what the future could be?  This goal setting is not just about finances,
but it is about all things in life.  Where do you want to be?  What
do you want to be doing?  What do you want people to say about your life
accomplishments?  Goal setting is where a husband and wife look at each
other and say, “Where do we want to be in 5 years? In 10 years? In 15 years?” 

Husband and
wife then look at the
financial implications of those goals they have jointly set.  If a husband and a wife have separate goals it
will be nearly impossible to have financial stability in marriage.

“Jesus knew
their thoughts and said to them, “Every kingdom divided against itself will
be ruined, and every city or household divided against itself will not stand.”
(Matthew 12:25)

4) Combine
What You Have

Since there
is a union between husband and wife it is essential that couples combine bank
accounts and all other financial items.  It is difficult, but possible, to
function financially with separate bank accounts.  However, what do you
seek for in your marriage?  To “function” or to “thrive?”  I do not believe a marriage can thrive
until there is intimacy on all levels.  This involves combining all
financial resources.

It
doesn’t matter who earns it.
Some couples think that the one who earns the money spends the money or
dictates how it ought to be spent.  Instead, you should respect your unique contributions to the
home.  We made the decision that my wife would continue in
her art business.  She had been a professional artist for many years
before we even met, and is still well known in the dog show world for her
custom portraits.  At the time we met and
married, I was traveling on contract for a security company.  The decision was made that I would stay home
and manage her art business affairs, such as business accounts, show
applications, inventory and shipping, and so forth.  But it was a decision we made as partners,
together. 

“The
wife’s body does not belong to her alone but also to her husband. In the same
way, the husband’s body does not belong to him alone but also to his wife.” (1
Corinthians 7:4)

While
this passage speaks of the physical relationship between husband and wife, the
principle of joint ownership applies.  What previously belonged to the
wife/husband (his and her body) is now shared with the spouse as he is now a
joint-owner of his/her body.

5) Distribute
Responsibilities

Money
management takes time, energy, knowledge, and wisdom.  One of the common
complaints about the modern family is the burden of so many responsibilities and
commitments.  This makes its way into the home as
couples are forced to decide who will take care of the different tasks related
to personal finances.

Here is my
suggestion:

  Take out a blank piece of paper (or open a
Word document on your computer) and list all of the jobs related to personal
finances.  This list might include things like balancing the check book,
transferring funds, paying bills, researching retirement options, making
investment decisions, etc.

  Make a copy of that list.  Both spouses
should write one of the following phrases by each tasks:    (a)
I enjoy doing that, (b) I am willing to do that, (c) Yuck! Please don’t make me
do that.

  Compare your lists.  Assign
responsibilities first according to the task you each enjoy.  Next, assign
responsibilities by rotating every other task in the “willing to do that”
list.  Then finally, if both of you are “Yuck” for the same task, consider
(a) outsourcing it if possible, (b) splitting the responsibility 50/50 , or (c)
assigning the task to one partner and the other will assume another household
responsibility that you both rate as ‘Yuck!’
In our case, I handle the business checking account, and she handles our
personal checking account.  It works well
for us. 

6) Develop a
Budget Together, then Meet Regularly

Having
defined your goals, you now have a general direction to follow in your
lives.  Now
your job is to apply those long term goals to the short term—this month’s
budget.  The budget represents the small goals you meet along
the way to achieving your ultimate goals.

Once the
budget is set, it is important that you track your progress.  The best way
is to meet together regularly.  Imagine if one of the children became
sick, and you purchased a bunch of medications.  Your spouse needs to know
what you did because you may need to adjust that budget item to make the budget
work. 

Here is what
my wife and I do. The first Wednesday of every month is budget night, because
we now also receive Social Security as well as her income from artwork, and we
sit down at my desk together.  We look at the income for the previous
month and type any change into our budget on the computer.  She then reads
off all the expenses for the past month, which I then type into the
budget.  One of us could do the job, but
as she reads and I type, we are both
aware of all the week’s expenditures.  We then take a quick look over
the budget to be sure the dollars we allocated to each category is still
sufficient.  If we have overspent, or the cost of an item has increased on
a category, we take the money from somewhere else in the budget.

After your
initial budget development, the following meetings shouldn’t take any more than 15-20 minutes per month.  If
your paydays fall on a different time frame, then schedule your budget meetings
accordingly.  It’s possible you might
want to meet weekly at first, but once you get a handle on the process, you can
adjust those meetings to suit your needs.

7) Remove
Any Financial Pressure

Too many
money discussions in marriage happen in high-stress situations.  Chuck
Bentley at Crown Financial Ministries frequently talks about creating financial
margin.  Where there is a margin, stress is removed from the
situation.  You
need to take away the pressure that every financial decision could break you. This must be done by paying off debt and
saving for emergencies.  Once you have taken care of those financial
pressures you will find that all your financial discussions are suddenly so
much easier because there is now space to breathe and even room for error.

Based on
Financial Peace University recommendations, Alice and I have set aside 3 months
of expenses in case of an emergency (this is only touched in case of emergency).  Then we have paid off all credit cards and
any other debt costing us interest.  Now
we have “breathing room.”

The budget,
then, makes sure we can meet any regular monthly living expenses. And remember,
if you are considering any major expenses in the future, such as buying a new
washing machine, then make sure it will fit within the budgetary constraints.  If possible, always save up the money and pay
cash for the purchase. 

“The rich
rule over the poor, and the borrower is servant to the lender.” (Proverbs 22:7) 

8) Agree on
Some Guiding Principles

You should
only need to make some decisions in your marriage once.  Unfortunately,
many couples have not put those boundaries in place so when it comes to making
financial decisions they are forced to keep re-addressing the same issues.

Here are
some examples of guidelines you might have: We will give a least 10% of our
income to our local church or other charities.  We will save 15% of every
paycheck towards retirement.  We will buy things with cash and will not
borrow.  We will always make a car payment to ourselves.  We always
put down at least 25% when buying a home.  The list could continue.  

The point
is, when you set your goals some decisions only need to be made once and then
you budget according to these guidelines.

“Commit to
the LORD whatever you do, and your plans will succeed.” (Proverbs 16:3)  

9) Always be
Willing to Seek Outside Help  
Sometimes a
third party can be an invaluable resource.
Couples who find
themselves at an impasse often just need someone to help them hear what the
other spouse is saying.
When communication in marriage has failed, find a church counselor or minister
who can guide you back on track.  This does not need to be a costly
endeavor as many churches have resources available to offer assistance free of
charge.

Perhaps you
need a different type of outside help.
Ask a friend or parent
to watch the kids for
an evening or a day, so you and your spouse can discuss these issues without
the children distracting you.

“Plans
fail for lack of counsel, but with many advisers they succeed.” (Proverbs
15:22)

10) And
finally, Always Put the Needs of Your Spouse above Your Own

Often our
financial discussions are a sign of our immaturity and our carnal self.
We hunger and lust for things.  We desire those things even above the
welfare of our marriage.  Give up the insignificant things of life so that
you can gain the greater reward of a unified marriage.

“Each of
you should look not only to your own interests, but also to the interests of
others.” (Philippians 2:4)

Work out a
system that works best for your personal situation. However, always keep the
goal of oneness and agreement in mind when it comes to money and marriage.

Always use
biblical principles as a guide when managing your Christian budget and planning
for your financial future. Do some research on the Scriptures about finances,
look on the internet for free articles, and buy one good practical, biblical
resource you can study together.  I
highly recommend Financial Peace University by Dave Ramsey.  A very practical study on the scriptural
basis for good stewardship, and developing a strategy to handle your money in a
way that glorifies God. 

Finally, we
are also given principles such as the one in Luke 6:38, which states that the
more freely we give the greater the blessing. This means that there is a
correlation between the giving that we do as unto the Lord and the blessing
that we receive in return, both spiritual and financial. We cannot out-give
God.  Is it easy? Not at first.  

Shortly
after Alice and I were married, I told her that I felt God calling us to
tithe.  At first she was afraid.  She was concerned we wouldn’t be able to meet
our financial obligations each month.  So
I suggested we try a six month test.  If
in those six months of tithing we had difficulty paying our bills we would
discontinue tithing.  But I insisted we
begin by praying and asking God to honor our decision to give back to Him, and
that He would receive glory through it.  At
the end of those six months, not only were we able to continue tithing, but we
were actually able to increase the amount we tithed each month.  And we have faithfully tithed ever since.  The more faithful we are in giving back to
the LORD, the more we find that what we retain is multiplied and, indeed, more
than sufficient to the point of abundance.

I am not a
professional financial counselor, but I share only what has worked for us. Have you taken any of these steps? What
is holding you back, or what is your biggest challenge?

I would love to hear
from you. 

Don’t miss out on the complete marriage series:
What is a Christian Marriage – Part 1
What is a Christian Marriage – Part 2 
An Ephesians 5 Husband – Part 1 
An Ephesians 5 Husband – Part 2 
An Ephesians 5 Wife – Part 1 
An Ephesians 5 Wife – Part 2 
Communication in Marriage 

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