Welcome again to our broadcast of Business, Money, and Christianity. We're a financial podcast from a faith perspective. We thank you for joining us.
We encourage you to like or make comments or ask questions. We will get back to you during this broadcast. We're going to be over the next few weeks taking an excerpt from a public session that I did.
And so we're going to be talking about entering into God's system of provision. So I'd like to invite you to be a part of this and like I said, like or comment on this podcast. We appreciate you stopping by.
So join us today as we talk about entering God's system of provision in our blog post of Business, Money, and Christianity, a financial podcast from a faith perspective. Thank you for joining us.
So again, God knew the beginning from the end. He knew how to walk in everything He has provided, yet He gives you and me a choice. And you and I are constantly making decisions.
Unfortunately, most people make decisions based on the culture they grew up in. And when I say culture, I don’t necessarily mean country. I mean the culture of the family you were raised in, the culture of the school you attended, and the broader culture of wherever you live.
We’ve learned how to do things according to that culture rather than learning how to live in the culture of heaven. The Bible says that you and I can have heaven on earth, but if we’re going to experience it, we must learn the culture of heaven. Because the kingdom of God is the system of operation for the kingdom of heaven.
And you and I get to decide. “I have set before you life and death… choose.” It’s essentially a true-or-false question—A or B. And then He even tells us the answer: choose life.
But do you know how many people still choose B? “Well, A is right… but B looks better.”
“No, A will work.”
“Yeah, but I feel like…” — uh-oh.
Now, verse 12: “Then you will call on Me and come and pray to Me, and I will listen to you.”
Think about two people praying. One person says, “God, give me more money.” Another says, “God, if I’m going to do Your work and expand Your kingdom, I’m going to need more provision.” Who is God going to listen to?
In another place it says, “You ask and do not receive, because you ask to consume it upon your own desires.” In other words, “I just want more so I can live more.”
Why don’t we simplify our living so we can do more—so that God can entrust us with more? There’s a system to how this works. It’s just not always the way we like it. I’m being honest here.
It’s not necessarily fun. Because if I’ve got dinero in my pocket—yeah, that’s money—I’ve seen how often that dinero starts to burn a hole in people’s pockets.
I remember telling someone once, “Take $20, put it in your pocket, and go a whole week without spending it.”
Their response? “Oh, I can’t do that.”
That always struck me. One time, while I was talking, I pulled out my wallet and had two $100 bills in there. I said, “Do you know how long these have been in here? Three, maybe four weeks.” They weren’t burning a hole in my pocket. Why? Because I’m living with purpose. I’ve made allocations I’m not going to violate just because I have money on me.
That’s a whole sermon right there—“A Hole in Your Pocket.”
Now verse 13: “You will seek Me and find Me when you search for Me with all your heart.”
Notice, He didn’t say, “Just pray and you’ll find Me.” He said, “You pray—I hear you. You seek—you find Me.”
Have you ever searched for something with all your heart? I mean really wanted it—not necessarily God, just anything. Something you deeply desired. Let me shift it—have you ever chased something you really wanted, got it, and then regretted it?
If you truly want something, you’ll find it. The question is: do you really want God?
Because a lot of people don’t want God with all their heart—they want God as a supplier. “Just give me this… I want that… You have everything, just share a little with me.”
But if I truly want God’s system, and I seek Him the way He wants to be sought, then I will see the manifestation of everything He intends.
Remember Psalm 37:4: “Delight yourself in the Lord, and He will give you the desires of your heart.” God is not against you having things. He actually wants to reveal Himself through your life—even through provision. I’m talking about more than enough.
He wants to show Himself through your life by you having more than enough.
I’ve shared this before, but it’s been a while. Tammy and I went through a very difficult financial season—our net worth was negative. In the middle of that, I sold a rental property we had, took the gain, and paid off a bunch of debt. That helped us move toward freedom.
Eventually, everything settled. We were debt-free. And then I wanted to get back into real estate—but this time, differently.
So I started praying and asking God for a rental property. I wasn’t out looking—I just asked Him.
One day I got a call from Henry Serrato. His wife’s mother was sick in Mexico, and they needed to travel. He asked if I would drive with him to Los Angeles. Logically, it made no sense—six to eight hours round trip. But I felt to go.
So I went.
We spent a little time there, then started driving back. We stopped for dinner, got back on the road, and somewhere past Bakersfield, in casual conversation, he said, “I know a guy down the street from me who wants to sell a house for $75,000.”
I said, “Are you going to buy it?”
“No,” he said, and explained why.
I said, “I’ll buy it.”
I didn’t have the money. But I recognized an opportunity. I had prayed—He heard—and now there was an opportunity, even though it didn’t make sense.
A few days later, I followed up, got the number, and set an appointment. I partnered with Darrell to split it 50/50. When we saw the house, the price had gone up to $85,000—but I knew he’d take $75,000.
So I held firm. “I’ll take it for $75,000, but I won’t go higher.”
He agreed.
Now remember—I still didn’t have money.
I found out he owned the house outright. So I asked if he would carry $50,000 as a loan—interest-only, ten years. He agreed.
Now I still needed $25,000.
So I went to Tammy’s mom and asked if she would fund a second mortgage. I offered her 8%—better than anything she was getting. She agreed.
We structured it: $50,000 first mortgage, $35,000 second. That’s $85,000 total… on a $75,000 purchase. We closed—and I walked away with $10,000.
We rented it immediately for about $800 a month, with a small positive cash flow.
Years later, that same property—rebuilt after a fire—is worth close to $300,000, renting for around $1,500 a month.
That’s the provision of God.
To most people, none of that would make sense. It didn’t fit the budget. But I prayed—He heard. I sought—and He provided. I had to be willing to walk it out.
And it doesn’t matter where you are right now. When we started, our net worth was negative $75,000. Even if we sold everything, we still owed money.
But when you begin to trust God—really trust Him—and align with His system, things begin to shift.
Did I battle thoughts? Of course. “What if the tenant leaves? What if it sits empty?” All of that. But over time, it became a major blessing.
God’s provision is real. The earth is the Lord’s, and everything in it. He wants His children to walk in it.
But too often, we’d rather spend than build. We’d rather follow what we think than what He says.
And God is constantly working to align us with Him—so that He can reveal Himself through us.
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