Money!

I was just thinking about all the money I have made over the years, and comparing that to my bank balance, and asking myself: “Where did all my money go?!” You know, I used to think I was bad with money. The truth though is that I simply did not know what to do with it, and I had never had strong money management modelled to me. So the truth is that I largely spent my money, and on quite frivolous things too.
Making good use of money is just something that I would never have guessed at by myself, as it involves such a precise combination of habits and attitudes. So thank God for the internet, and money-management articles. You know, I have been reading these things for years, but it just never stuck. So I just continued spending my money, somewhat carelessly.

You know how there are some things in life that we understand implicitly, from having them modelled to us? Well what I understand implicitly is relationships, that is, marital relationships. I just get it. I’ve still had to learn quite a few lessons regarding those, all the same. And I still definitely do not know everything, despite so many years of writing this blog. But this is all the same something that I naturally feel fluent in. What definitely does not come naturally is money. Or that used to be the case anyway. Now I have practised these behaviours so much that they almost feel like second nature. Now I know that I should try to get rid of all this stuff that I spent my money on. However, I took so long to acquire it all, and I spent so much money, that I just can’t bring myself to just let go of it, just like that!

I’m smiling to myself as I write this, but it is a somewhat sad smile, as I can’t help thinking how different things might look currently, if only I had known these things all along. There is no point beating myself up of course, as I can’t turn back time even if I wanted to. Thankfully, I have not really lost anything tangible other than time itself and at least I know now. And to be honest, while I have spent time making all these mistakes, I don’t really feel as if I have lost time, because God in His power can put me into a situation where it is like I never made those mistakes.

Now you know I was going to go into a little bit of detail about things, but it feels a little too personal. What I can say though is that looking back, I can’t help but be a little proud about how far I have come in my understanding. I literally feel like a different person in terms of my attitude to money. Putting aside the thought of all those seemingly wasted years, I feel so much more confident moving forward. There are still so many aspects of money and finance which seem to me so nebulous, but I don’t need to go near them. For instance, I have tried to understand crypto, but I just still don’t get it. To me it seems akin to a pyramid scheme, so I don’t think I would invest in it even if I did understand it, even if it seemed to be a surefire way to make money.

After throwing my money away for so many years, this is something that I am so wary of doing now. I am especially wary of anyone who seems eager to help me spend my money. Have you ever met people who seem to volunteer your time or your money for you? It is time for me to start walking away from such people, and putting very firm boundaries in place.

You know what? To be brutally candid something that has been great for my finances is this: walking away from church, especially Pentecostal, or Prosperity Gospel churches. Somehow these churches seem to have no qualms about pressurising you to give your money, even sometimes, knowingly pressurising you to give money that you don’t have. And because you want to seem supportive of the church, and you don’t want to seem difficult, you just sit and watch your money flow from your own pocket to that of the pastor. And the thing is that I still tithe! But when I am not in a church that is all I do, tithe, whereas when I was in a Prosperity Gospel church a few months ago, the tithe was the baseline of the financial activity. And thus it is in every Prosperity Gospel church that I have ever been too. And there are so many good causes that each church would bring out for you to support. Man, I am so happy that I am free of all that. I’m thinking to myself: “Never again!” You know, I am a born-again Christian, and I definitely know that the cause of spreading the Gospel needs money. However, lets be candid. In many of these churches, the money that you gave did not go towards spreading the Gospel. Instead it goes towards – who can truly say? In many churches there was no clear financial transparency and you know how many business people find it hard to keep firm boundaries between their money and the business money? I’m sure that that is how it is for many pastors, especially if they often have to pay costs out of their own pocket. Seriously, what is called “church” can so often be such a hot mess. Honestly, I am tempted to say that I am never going to go back to a church. The problem with this though is that my parents worry that I am going to fall away from the faith altogether, so they pressurise me to find a church, which is how I found myself going to that last Prosperity Gospel church, even though it was clear to me from the outset that financially it was a disaster (although the congregation were lovely).

And the thing is that I really do want to find a church. It is just that church after church produces one ugly or unacceptable scenario after another. People say “there’s no such thing as a perfect church!” OK, should I go to the Prosperity Gospel church that practises low financial transparency, where the pastor literally did not appear to know what “character” meant, and regularly demonstrated that fact in his behaviour? Or should I go to the church where I received dodgy vibes from the male pastor? Or should I go to the church that claimed to not be a Prosperity Gospel church but was still constantly asking for my money, and then the pastor completely disregarded my tons of effort, because, I strongly suspect, he thought I was not giving any money to the church? Maintaining a simple appearance will often get you that assumption in church. I think he eventually realised that actually I was giving money, and actually, I was a very strong giver – and it was only then that I warranted a phone call… Also in that church, I felt like I was treated as automatically inferior by that same pastor, apparently because of the combination of my gender and ethnicity, even though he himself was a dark-skinned African with skin as dark as mine, or arguably even darker. I believe the term is misogynoir, and I’d never knowingly experienced that before in my life. (From fair skinned people, I would simply call it “racism”!) Honestly, it needed to be seen to be believed. There are a few other church options, but they are so far away, and from my experiences over the last few years I am not expecting anything great. I might yet go for the sake of “fulfilling all righteousness” (and placating my parents), but the era of giving big money to church is emphatically over in my life. I am not even going to tithe to a church. I am committed to the principle of tithing, but where I tithe I am going to tithe to a charity, or to individuals. The only thing that would change this is if I were to get married, and my husband asked me to tithe to our church. As far as the decision is solely mine to make – nup!