Despite being in the financial world since I was in college, despite being "good with numbers", despite all the financial books I'd read, I destroyed my family's finances.

I dug a financial hole so deep it felt like I'd never be able to get my family out of it. So often as I looked over our debts, I just felt really embarrassed. I mean everyone saw me as the "money guy" - I was the one people always asked financial questions - so admitting that I had ruined my own financial health was a really hard pill to swallow.

So what happened?

In 2016 I started a business that focused on helping small businesses become more profitable (I helped in ways from bookkeeping to strategic analysis) and it took off! In just over a year I went from being a full-time employee making an average wage to being self-employed with annual revenue around $100,000.

I grew up fairly poor so that kind of money felt like I was on top of the world. And feeling so confident in myself and my ability left me vulnerable to bad choices - and boy did I make them! At the time, I called them "investments" but in reality they were really just frenzied, unbridled, spending.

Because I had never had money to manage beyond "necessity" I didn't know what to do. So, I took on debt to gratify me today thinking I'd definitely have enough to pay it all off tomorrow.

Then life changed. In 2018, almost overnight, I lost 2 major clients that equaled a 30% loss in income and we found out the home we were leasing was going to be sold in 2 months (6 weeks after my wife was due to have our second child) which led us to decide to make a move from Washington State back to Kansas.

Can you see the problem? All of a sudden money wasn't coming in as quickly, but it was going out - and fast!

By mid-2019 I had put my family in over $80,000 of debt (non of which was a mortgage), had a business that had stalled, and felt completely lost, discouraged, and like a major failure.

I had a business that was stalled.

I had failed at personal finance.

I had failed my family.

Here's the thing. Over the years I had 100% walked away from the faith. While in college I had ultimately denied Christ and decided life would be better if lived for myself.

I thank God for the financial disaster though, because by the end of 2019, my broken and hopeless condition led me back to the cross, back to Christ. There God began to do major work in my life giving me a desire to seek and follow him ABOVE all else.

Since then, I've found ways to increase income without taking time away from my family, stopped using debt, studied personal finance like never before, and began the long journey back to zero. It's not been easy. It hasn't come without a cost, but it has been worth it because today we're paying off debt at warp speeds!

So that's my story, and why I'm here. Because I know the pain of making a mess of your finances. I know the frustration of feeling like you should "just get it" but failing over and over to actually DO IT. And ultimately, I know that we as believers are called to SO MUCH more than remaining slaves to our poor financial habits and choices.

I'm here to help fellow believers find freedom. I'm here to do my best to share Biblical truth - about money and life - so that my life, my work, and business may be a witness for Him and so that YOU may find financial peace.

Freedom IS possible.

Hope IS available.