Abrahams Wallet

Mark Parrett joins Steven Manuel to talk about the coming financial changes under the Biden administration, and how Bibilically-thinking family leaders can prepare their finances for those changes. Mark shares his research regarding Biden’s financial policies (11:30), including tax changes, charitable giving (17:00), Roth IRAs (24:00), real estate investing (27:45), estate tax changes (33:30), and free money for first-time home buyers (50:20)… Steven also rants about inflation (51:15). The fellas finish with an assurance that you don’t have to agree with us about any of this (1:04:00).

Steven Manuel and Jeff Davenport get together to discuss a new president, new policies, and how Biblical family leaders should get upstream of today’s most pressing cultural issues. They discuss how to pray for President Biden (9:15), failed election prophecies (13:30), and what the Biden administration promises to look like culturally (and how we might respond) (20:30). Jeff also describes his love of Larry King, and shares his timeless impersonations of Tom Brokaw and Keith Jackson.

In a recent talk given at the semester kickoff of a Cincinnati-based discipleship group (Jump School, http://www.crossroads.net/jumpschool), Steven Manuel shares that, when institutions around us are shaking, it becomes clearer that tethering ourselves to God is job one. Discipleship is urgent business.

Mark Parrett and Steven Manuel are joined by Jeff Davenport to review the best books they read last year. They also cover reading books to your children, whether the modern man has the mettle of men from 1895 (he doesn’t), and what the novelization of Rocky III can teach us about race relations (nothing).

All we’ve got for you this week is a quick admonition to take a gander at your own upcoming year. Set some goals! We can help with that. Back to our regularly scheduled programming next week.

A few weeks ago we discussed how financial ratios (along with many other tools) can be used to measure the financial wellness of your household. A big driver of those ratios is the cash you’ve got on hand – but where should you keep cash? We explore different types of accounts and wrap up 2020 with a highly practical episode for our crew of Abrahamic family leaders.

Mark Parrett and Steven Manuel have a chat with Aaron Renn, hitting issues like how the home interfaces with the church, on being fiscally conservative (Aaron has never spent more than $5K on a car), and how the Masculinist became their favorite emailed newsletter.

Mark Parrett and Steven Manuel consider celebrating Christmas for the Jesus-loving family. Is it right? Is it pagan? What about yule logs? What about lighting up the front yard? What about giving gifts? Anyway, they discuss it all. And whether or not a Charlie Brown style tree is charming or just plain pathetic.

Mark Parrett and Steven Manuel enter the year-end giving season by discussing the idea that family vision drives financial giving. Mark lets Steven pull apart, in real time, his family’s vision statement, then together they take that vision statement and apply it to several year-end giving opportunities that have come the Parretts’ way. Steven also gives tips on giving to individuals vs. organizations, giving to the local church, how to be a hilarious giver, and not giving only to “needs”.

Quick hit this week to give you a few ratios that you can use to check in on how your family is doing when it comes to spending, saving, giving and managing debts (both good and bad). Hope you all had a great Thanksgiving and we’ll be back next week with a full length episode.