Faith or Fact in Finances

Question: How do you lead people to accept a vision of faith in financial matters when they are focused on the facts?...and vice versa?

Answer: Wow! Is it just me or do these questions seem to be getting harder?
1. I think either way (faith or fact), it’s a matter of progressive education. Stewardship is a matter of balance and for me a place of healthy tension. Regardless of what side of the coin they are seeing it from today, each one needs to be open to a balanced perspective. If one is living in the fact camp then there needs to be encouraging conversations of “our” need to balance our fact with faith. Likewise, if one is living strong on faith, we must remember that faith without works is dead. Rather our faith must be able to work in every day situations and God requires action on our part. We should not presume that He will perform a miracle for every situation. That is not consistent with James Chapter 1. In both cases you can not assume that one sermon or one discussion will change things overnight.
2. I think you will also need to lead/encourage each to take small steps toward the other perspective. If one is already in the “fact” camp then Amos Dodge’s sermon from Tuesday morning at the 2006 ICFG convention is a great lesson. If one is already in the “faith” camp then encourage them to accept some realities, plan to live within budgets and when God does the miracle anyway there will be that much more $$ available.