Episode Transcript
[00:00:01] Okay, dad, you're earning more. Your debt is dropping. So why do you feel so exhausted and your wife still feels like an employee?
[00:00:11] You're pulling a Jacob.
[00:00:14] Fellas, this is a short series we're calling Stair Steps to Mastery, where we walk you through biblical archetypes from financial goofball to financial genius.
[00:00:26] First, there's Hophni, the fool who's drowning. And then there's Lot, who drifts with the culture. Next is Jacob. Grinding selfishly, Isaac plants faithfully. And finally Abraham, the goat who multiplies gloriously. So which of these family archetypes are you?
[00:00:45] Now, let's say that you have graduated past Lot, who we talked about in our last episode. Your money has some direction now. You actually have a plan that's thoughtful. Your debt is starting to drop. Your income might be rising, and suddenly you've got some plans. But you're a man alone. You're the one who decides.
[00:01:09] You push, you strive. Your wife nods along while the kids who are left behind watch you hustle.
[00:01:18] Now, Jacob, biblically, this character of Jacob, he was not lazy at all.
[00:01:24] He was hardworking and he was actually blessed in his efforts. But he was ultimately alone. And God had to dislocate his hip to get him to pause from all of his selfish ambition and all of his striving and actually start clinging to his creator, which we don't think of that as a manly leadership role sometimes, but clinging to God and seeing him as the pilot of the ship that you're working on, that's actually a leadership move. So let's look at the Bible character of Jacob. We kind of center on him in Genesis 28:32. He is ambitious, he's making deals, he's hardworking, and he kind of outsmarts people around him. He's very clever. And there's a famous anecdote about him wrestling with God all night long and he sees a ladder to heaven. And that wrestling with God, that's definitely a picture of faith. And there's something that God really likes about the dude who really is hustling.
[00:02:35] As it was taught to me, the idea of being greedy for God and saying, I want the good stuff, whatever you promised, I want it for me, I want it for my family. And the picture of Jacob was, he was demanding of the angel of the Lord, you will bless me, you will bless me. I will get what you promise and blessing. I think God likes all of that stuff. The problem with Jacob was that he was still self centered until he surrendered and he actually became Israel. The whole word Israel, he struggles with God.
[00:03:14] We now think of that as a nation. It's a people group. It really started with this man. God saw this man and gave, gave him this name. And that name then applied to all of his descendants. This is Jacob. When you hear Israel, it is Jacob.
[00:03:30] So what his problem was was ambition without surrender. And if this is you, you want God's blessing for your plan. I have a plan. I'm going to do this thing and I want God to bless me.
[00:03:44] So you stand over there, God, I've got an idea. I want you to bless it. Not the idea of I want to come to you to lead me.
[00:03:54] So one of the kind of family symptoms of the Jacob archetype is that the wife is a helper. She's not a co heir. She's not someone that you go, God gave me this woman. She's my partner. Through us together, God has a vision and a plan. I want to work this out with her to understand why did God give me this one woman in particular and what is God doing among us as a couple in our family?
[00:04:22] Your thought is, I have a plan. I will execute my plan. She can help me or not help me. And the best case scenario in your mind is she should just help me, she should just do what I want done and then she won't be a problem.
[00:04:36] So there's no real money meetings in your family of let's seek God together, let's make plans together. There's really just, if there's any reports, it's just reports to the underlings. Just want everybody to know this is what's going on. Okay, I got it. This last quarter was down, but the next one's going to be great. I got some deals in the pipeline. It's going to be great. That's all you need to know. Instead of, wait a second, we're on the family team and we're all trying to track toward what we understand that God is saying with us. And everyone has a part to play and I'm the tip of the spear for the family. But we're all trying to trend towards what we feel God is saying.
[00:05:16] So the financial symptom, as you can hear, is that there's progress. There could be progress. Unlike with Hoffney, who's just not giving it any thought at all, or Lot, who is letting the culture lead him around. And he's a consumer, Jacob. He's getting it done, but there's no rest involved.
[00:05:36] He's not at a healthy pace. He's Very driven. The debt might be going down, but there's no generosity system in place. There's no Sabbath for rest. There's no shared owners with the family. It's just you and your ambition against the world. And the family's along for the ride at best. They're along for the ride.
[00:05:57] So let me ask you a couple of questions to see, perhaps, are you Jacob?
[00:06:02] Can your wife explain the family vision and the financial plan without you in the room? Dad, is your calling being pushed out into the world through your giving dollars? And yes, they're your children.
[00:06:18] Is the path that you're on right now sustainable for the long haul?
[00:06:24] If you took what the last six months of your life looks like, could you multiply that times 50 years, is that sustainable, that pattern? If your answer to any of these questions is no, you've got some maturing to do. It's not the worst thing in the world. If you're a Jacob, that's fine. You've just got some maturing to do. Let's look real quick at the spiritual and relational side side of the Jacob archetype.
[00:06:50] Spiritually, relationally, he is striving, as we said, not surrendering. It's about ambition and grunt work, but no peace. For Jacob, there's no feeling of being led or loved by God. This is, I've got a job to do. I'm going to go do it. God, don't make this hard on me. So you push and you push and you pray for God to bless your hustle instead of asking, what are you building? What. What have you done with this family? God? I want to study what you've done in the generations prior. I want to be a student of my wife. I want to understand the gifts that you've given me to manage, and I want to understand how you want to use me. What are your plans for my family? I want to partner with you, God. You are my leader. I know that I'm called to lead this family. Let me be in partnership with you. Secondly, the marriage is divided, which is that you earn and you decide.
[00:07:46] She spins and she adjusts. She's constantly trying to adjust to you because you're the Grand Poobah.
[00:07:53] That's not biblical headship. That is more like corporate management.
[00:07:58] You react to what I say. You spend where I tell you to spend. I'm in charge here. As for the financial side of Jacob, one you're engaged in like grinder math.
[00:08:11] Hey, my income is trending up. If I look at the big picture, my income is trending up. My debt is now moving down. At least I'm not like Hoffney over there.
[00:08:20] But your margin is still zero because your lifestyle always rises with your income. That's what your ambition is like. Your selfish ambition sees to it that you don't have any margin. If you ever have any room, you'll fill that up with more duties and obligations. Because I think I could get a little ahead a little more. And your selfish ambition is just driving you. There's a spirit of performance on you which never lets you rest.
[00:08:46] There's also no co owned plan. As I said with your finances, you're the mastermind. Nobody sees past the curtain. The path forward in your mind is your smarts and your elbow grease. And the end goal, if you're totally honest with yourself, the end goal is me.
[00:09:02] What do I end up getting to do with my life? And how do people see me? And I don't care what those people think.
[00:09:09] They'll see when it's all said and done. All the. All the haters.
[00:09:14] So if you think this is you, I'm going to give you, as we've done with the other episodes, one killer move to help you break out of this Jacob place. It's going to get us to the next place of Isaac and to Abraham, which we'll talk about in a second. But here's the killer move.
[00:09:28] Make your wife your CFO via one meeting a week.
[00:09:35] I do this with my wife. I have for years met with her. Today about this same time every week. Let's start with a 20 minute meeting with the wife, same time every week. Don't skip it.
[00:09:48] Put your phones down, eye to eye. Have a meeting with the wife.
[00:09:53] Give her a one page summary that she can digest.
[00:09:58] Not. Not that you understand. Oh, you don't know how to read a P and L statement?
[00:10:03] No, no. Make it clear for her. A one pager that describes here are debts left. Here's the payoff order of what we're going to kill. As far as our debts go. Here's what our giving plan is. And here's the next milestone for the family. Maybe that's investments, maybe that's we're going to fully fund insurance which we've put off. Maybe we're going to start funding the. The Children's 529 plan. Whatever. Here's the milestone that I've set out.
[00:10:32] We're gonna pay off these debts at this time. Then we'll be able to save up for the vacation or whatever. There's just a plan with Some milestones, you present that to her. I just did this for a young couple. It was so exciting for them to just have a plan.
[00:10:47] And it changed the husband's position in the cosmos of his family. Because his wife saw this guy cares, he's put something together. I helped him put it together. It was his plan, he presented it, it went great. It's very exciting. So then she talks and you ask her what worries you about this plan? What should we change, do you think? You listen and then you decide together and you make adjustments.
[00:11:16] If you'll have that one meeting a week for 20 minutes, talk through that plan, then you could say, well, next week let's talk about groceries. I know that's been a budget item that we haven't worked on. Let's work on that next week, the week after that, let's talk about clothing issues. The week after that, let's talk about my earning, whatever. But it starts with, let's just look at where we stand right now and what the plan is. And you start incorporating your wife and her vision, like her perspective on things. You start that incorporating that into the family plan.
[00:11:51] Jacob became Israel when he stopped scheming alone and he started clinging to God along with his family.
[00:11:59] Patriarchs build with their wives fully informed and fully involved. There is no Abraham without Sarah. Many scholars believe that Proverbs 31 was a song that Abraham wrote about Sarah. She was a go getter woman. If you read the Proverbs 31 woman, and if that was Sarah, then it's for sure Abraham could not have accomplished what he did without her help. Because biblically she reads like a very with it woman who was very aware of all of the finances and even God's vision for her family.
[00:12:38] If you're thinking we might already be doing some of this stuff that you're describing, I feel like we're on the same page. I think we might have a giving plan in place, et cetera.
[00:12:48] And I think we're ready to start planting, going to the next stage. Well, that's Isaac and we're going to talk about him next week.
[00:12:55] Subscribe and you'll get the whole ladder. But before we go, three thoughts. You can leave the self centered Jacob archetype when your wife can explain the money and vision without you present. And your kids can see joy and blessing, not just stress that comes from your hustle.
[00:13:15] As we look forward, we're going to see that Isaac plants habitually. It's like on autopilot for, for Isaac, the way that he plans and Abraham multiplies with a map in his hand for his great grandchildren. He's thinking that far down the line, that's where we're climbing. So leave a comment we'd love to hear. Are you a Jacob right now? Are you grinding? But you're alone?
[00:13:40] Come back next week. We're going to talk about Isaac and how to plant on autopilot and give your kids a real meaningful part to play. That's coming up next week.
