by Joe Ranney

Is it really worth the effort to establish and live by a budget? What could it possibly have to do with my being a Christian desiring to be a good steward? What could a budget do for me? Is one hard to set up? Let's try to answer these and some other related questions.

But first, what is a budget? Webster defines it as: "A clearly defined statement of income and expense incurred, or to be incurred over a specific period of time." To establish a budget for next month or year we must understand where we spent our income in the past.

Oliver W. Holmes said, "To understand what is happening today, or what will happen in the future, I look back." You start a budget best and most accurately by figuring out where the money went last month and even six months ago. To develop the best picture, review your expenses for the past twelve months. In many ways, your current budget is an average of what was spent for various wants and needs. If you don't have a record of past expenses, you need to start recording all expenses now and develop the necessary data over the next three to twelve months. The budgeting process is then perfected (or fine-tuned) over the next year as you try to live by the guidelines you have established.

But maybe you are thinking, "I don't want a budget. Why should I go to all that work?" I would have to ask some questions in response:

• Are you completely satisfied with your spending and saving patterns now?



• Do you have extra money left at the end of the month, or do you have some month left at the end of the money?



• Are the credit card bills mounting?



• Are you able to give all of the tithes and offerings you really want to give?

If your answer is "No" to any of these questions, you need a budget. But here is a Scriptural reason for budgeting, too.

IBM and others have most effectively used the slogan-principle "Plan your work, work your plan." All good business management practices work on this basis and well they should. Work is God's creation. He made "work" so that man could be productive, responsible and be representative of God.

In Genesis 1:26, 27 we read: "Then God said, 'Let us make man in our image, in our likeness, and let them rule over the fish of the sea and the birds of the air, over the livestock, over all the earth, and over all the creatures that move along the ground.' So God created man in His own image, in the image of God he created him; male and female he created them."

Amazing, after planning what He wanted to do, He used His omnipotence to work His plan. He thought His concept was so important that He placed it in the first book of the Bible, and so doubly important that He placed it in the first chapter of that first book. Does that not say something? PLAN YOUR WORK, WORK YOUR PLAN. Plan your budget, then work it! I conclude that a budget is biblically mandated.

There are so many families and individuals enslaved to the monthly payment on credit card and/or installment debt that they are not able to be the kind of stewards they want to be. Many have told me, "As soon as I get this debt cleared up I'm going to start tithing." It almost never happens. 

More will be forthcoming on budgeting in my next "Gleanings" article, but before closing let's review the keys to budgeting success:

1. It's not how much money you make, but how you spend what you make. That is the key to your future success. I therefore recommend a philosophy of life towards spending. Constantly challenge yourself to make one of three choices: 1. Do I want it? 2. Do I need it? 3. Do I have to have it? [Can I get along without it?] I strongly recommend learning the discipline of #3.



2. In financial planning, think Olympic gold! Those fine young people plan their work, then with much self-sacrificial personal discipline work the plan. Nothing less deserves, nor gets, the gold.

The Apostle Paul put it this way in I Tim. 2:3,4: "Endure hardship with us like a good soldier of Jesus Christ. No one serving as a soldier gets involved in civilian affairs--he wants to please his commanding officer." If you know and have accepted Jesus as your personal Savior, then please let Him be Lord--your "commanding officer." He wants you to be His faithful steward. As a stewardship evangelist, I believe God sets this mandate before His children: If God did not call me to go to the mission field, then He wants me to send others through frugal spending on myself.

Living within my means and spending less than comes in, I have more to give.