S02E008, Money Matters! Marriage Matters, Part 1
Introduction
In this episode of Marriage Matters, Andy B and Jo focus on finances in marriage – Money Matters on Marriage Matters, now that’s a mouthful!
Actually, as Andy and Jo discuss the issues and share their own stories, it soon becomes apparent that one episode on this subject is not enough – so they promise to come back with Money Matters Part 2!
Although, as Jo informs us there are as much as 2000 scriptures relating to money, Andy and Jo do not choose one! Instead, the episode is centred around the scripture that talks about how quarrels happen because let’s face it money and everything financial, in marriage, is in the top 10 reasons for arguments!
James 4:1-3
However, Jo brings up two other useful scriptures. The one when Jesus provides money for taxes by fishing and the women in the bible with the jar that kept on giving:
Mathew 17: 24-27
The Meaty Section
Andy and Jo chew through some difficult topics and try and make sense of it all.
#RealTalk and #RealLife is just what we do!
Tips and Resources
The Take Away
Andy – Andy’s Take Away is to let Jo go first! And then reflected on the fact that you don’t need any money to do whatever God is asking of you.
Jo – Burying your head in the sand doesn’t help. It’s more honouring to God, and your marriage, to have a good understanding on everything going on with the finances in marriage.
Andy B 2 Minute Video – Stuck In The Middle With You
#TestimonyTuesday - A Sudden Answer To Prayer, Part 1
Andy and Jo
Andy B
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Transcript
Andy 0:28
Well, hello there, and welcome to another wonderful edition of the gloriousness of Marriage Matters with me, Andy.
Jo 0:35
And me, Jo.
Andy 0:37
And this is matters of the marriage that matter because Marriage Matters. So we talk about it and it's clear for called Marriage Matters.
Jo 0:42
Yeah. And to confuse things further our title might not help.
Andy 0:47
No, the title's gonna compleetely throw you. Anyway, if you don't want to miss out on what we're doing as a family, in the ministry, and I promise you, you want to stay in touch with what's coming up, and what's going on, because it's really, really exciting. And you best thing you can do actually is go to the website, www.BerryBunch.family. And if you sign up to the newsletter, top left hand corner, you can get a weekly or monthly newsletter, and you'll know all that we're doing.
Jo 1:12
Yes.
Andy 1:12
But what's this, what's this wonderfully complicated title?
Jo 1:15
Well, it's called Marriage Matters. And we're going to focus on finances. So it's Money Matters.
Andy 1:21
Marriage Matters covers Money Matters. Yeah, because matters of the money matters in marriage.
Jo 1:26
Absolutely. And so money is what we need to use to function in life, in this, in this country, and across the world. You know, you have a love hate relationship with it, sometimes some of us have got lots of it, some of us not so much. But you enter a marriage, and I think it's part of marriage preparation, isn't it? that you look at how you might sort of look after your finances. And I know some people take in turns to function and look after finances.
Jo 1:55
Sometimes people do it together. But it's, it is a bone of contention. It can be. You know, we talk about how you argue in marriage, in relationships and, oftentimes, you can't rmember what on earth you are arguing about. But if you talk to people and they say, what you were arguing about? Sometimes, and many times, it is finances isn't it. It's money can cause many arguments.
Andy 2:15
There are a few common topics. Money is definitely up there.
Jo 2:18
Yeah.
Andy 2:19
Money, or sex? In laws?
Jo 2:21
Yeah.
Andy 2:21
These are these are kind of other common ones really I think.
Jo 2:24
Yeah, absolutely. So we thought it'd be really good to spend some time talking about money in marriage because money in marriage matters.
Andy 2:34
Money Matters, Marriage Matters. Matters of the marriage that matter because money matters. Gets worse!
Jo 2:38
So have we covered that then?
Andy 2:41
We have.
Jo 2:42
Excellent.
Andy 2:43
But we have got some really cool, new, little adverts.
Jo 2:46
Ooh.
Andy 2:46
Super exciting, starting with, I can't see it. Ooh, that one.
Jo 2:52
Family Prayer Time. So what is it Peter?
Peter 2:56
Well, it's where me and mum, or, well, Jo, we look at, we find a subject for a prayer. So maybe a Psalm or a country. And then we pray as we feel led, and Bob's your uncle.
Jo 3:08
Excellent. Yeah, absolutely. It's Family Prayer Time. Me and Pete pray together, and we'd like you to pray as a family. So join us for Family Prayer Time.
Andy 3:33
Hit the button a bit early on that one.
Jo 3:34
Did you?
Andy 3:35
The end hadn't quite ended. We do this live. This is a whole recording you know.
Jo 3:41
I know, I know. And it's new adverts. That was a really good one, even though I say so myself.
Andy 3:45
It was. Thank you. I edited it well.
Jo 3:48
Well done. So we've got our tea. We're here for The Meaty Section, the main part of
Andy 3:53
Cam you have tea with meat?
Jo 3:54
Yeah, I think so. You can have tea with anything I reckon.
Andy 3:56
That's fine.
Jo 3:57
Perhaps not ice cream. So, meaty section. And this is where we sort of really explore this area of Money Matters, finances of the heart, isn't it? We've got a scripture. I saw you poised there with your Bible.
Andy 4:10
I's poised!
Jo 4:11
This one came to mind about arguments wasn't it.
Andy 4:15
It was. And I've lost it.
Jo 4:16
James. I think good old James.
Andy 4:18
No, it is James. And it's chapter, Hosea, no.
Jo 4:20
No that's not right is it.
Andy 4:21
I was trying to think that he's not it's not
Jo 4:23
I remember the content. But I couldn't remember where it was in the Bible.
Andy 4:26
I dunno. It's fine. James 4, 1. hold on to your hats.
Jo 4:28
Ok.
Andy 4:29
"What causes fights and quarrels among you? Don't they come from your desires that batle within you? You want something but don't get it. You kill and covet, but you cannot have what you want. You quarrel, you fight. You do not have because you do not ask God. When you ask, you do not receive becaus eyou ask with the wrong motives tha tyou may spend what you get on your pleasures."
Jo 4:50
Ooh, straight talking there from James again.
Andy 4:55
I'm just gonna duck.
Jo 4:56
I know, yeah.
Andy 4:56
Duck and cover.
Jo 4:57
I mean, I think the reason why I thought about that one it was, again, because in marriage, we do argue about money. And we do need to talk about it. And sometimes you don't really want to. You want to bury your head in the sand don't you about money. We've had our ups and downs, haven't we? And we're going to share something of that weren't we!
Andy 5:15
Yes. We call this RealTalk for a reason.
Jo 5:16
Yeah, it's been, I don't remember the marriage preparation, to be honest. It was quite brief for us. And I don't remember about finances. But we've had some serious arguments haven't we, around finances?
Andy 5:30
We've had some serious financial strains.
Jo 5:32
Well, yeah. Yeah, to be fair, and we've got through some difficult times. But yeah, it's sort of, we have different perhaps ideas of what we'd like to spend the money on. And there's a finite amount,
Andy 5:44
What to spend. How to spend it. When to spend it. All that kind of stuff.
Jo 5:50
Yeah.
Andy 5:50
We have no savings. We haven't had savings for years and years. And everyone's like, 'Oh you must have some savings'. It's great to have savings.
Jo 5:56
If you can, yeah.
Andy 5:56
We've had savings and they all went. So, you know, if you can have savings, it's brilliant. But it's, we'll come on to that.
Jo 6:02
Yeah, I mean, the thing is, what's interesting about marriage is you, you. It's like any, any any sort of, you've different periods of times in your life. So, we always think like ,when when we first got married, we would were DINKYs. You might have heard that expression before.
Andy 6:14
Double Income, No Kids Yet.
Jo 6:15
Yeah. So quite a nice time, where you've got quite a bit of money, and you haven't got a family to spend it on. And you're just starting off in life. Although, arguably, you've got a lot more to pay out. So you go through different periods of life. If you have children, you've got money to spend there. All kinds of different periods of time. And we, as a couple, we, in our marriages, need to get through these times, don't we? So,
Andy 6:40
Shall I tell some of our little stories?
Jo 6:41
Go on then.
Andy 6:42
So, when we were first married, Jo cared for the finances. I'm not even sure how we decided, or split it up, to be honest. It's just, Jo did the finances, so she did. And that was fine.
Andy 6:51
And then, when our first son came along, so 18 years ago and a bit, I became a Stay At Home Dad, full time so I, around that time, started looking after the finances. I can't really remember much of that.
Andy 7:03
I know Jo was using bits of paper, and I know it infuriated me, because every time so can we just reconcile the banks, or just check something, we'd be there for hours. How many? Like 15 times going through all those hundreds of calculations.
Andy 7:15
So my first job was to go to a spreadsheet on Excel. I'm not exactly an Excel fan! I've just learned to use it for what we need. And it worked for us. 'Cos the one thing that Excel, and this is one of those things, it's an interesting little allegory for life, ut when mistakes and errors easily creep in, so does frustration and all the rest of it. And the one thing that I found with a piece of paper, is you can spill a cup of coffee on it, you can lose a page, the dog can chew it. And there's all these things.
Andy 7:43
So we have a spreadsheet. It's also in the cloud on our, on our cloud storage. So if we ever lose it, we've got the details. And that's kind of important! And I didn't want to just trust the bank. Because banks are businesses. Don't ever think banks are your friend. They're really not! Their businesses actually make money from me, like anybody, any other business.
Andy 7:59
So I took over the finances, and I used spreadsheets. We've had some humongous challenges financially, including but not limited to, we had a bankrupt we're not not a bankruptcy, we had a time when our business was forced to close during a recession. We didn't actually go bankrupt, we actually managed to stave that off, we just about survived. We stayed just on the black side of okay, in terms of banking, and that was good. But it was really hard.
Andy 8:24
You know, when you've got 10s of 1,000s of pounds of debt, you got people wanting money, and you're like, I have no money, I have no job. That was my job. That was our business. So, that was a really tough time coming out of there with no jobs, no income, all the rest of it.
Andy 8:35
God provided a way through there. And I managed to get us through with God. But I got us through that time. It was difficult.
Andy 8:42
We've had four periods of unemployment, three, four periods of unemployment. That's a tough one. That's really hard. How'd you get through unemployment.
Andy 8:50
We've moved have so many times because of the joys of renting. I remember some people say, "Oh, you should settle down, you know, stay in the same place". Do you know, we'd love to, it's called landlords, and they want to sell the house. You know, we've had to move times, much more than you know, we're more than most military families. We've moved house. And it's not choice. It's, it's life. And that happens. And the thing about moving a house, it's like, grand and a half, two grand a time, £2,000 quid to move, whatever you, however you want to do it. And we do it all ourselves. So, I've managed to get us through, navigate us through all this time, and it got to a few months ago, and I said to Jo, I can't do this anymore. I really I feel like a battle hardened veteran, with PTSD, from finances. Because we've had these financial traumas .I've carried us through. But there is a cost to having to be on the bank sometimes three and four times a day, waiting for some money to come in, so you can pay a bill, and all of that stuff.
Andy 9:40
So, there's a bit of a long segue there. But, I mean, that's what we've been through. That's been 25 years of marriage. That's a snapshot for you guys about some of the things you've been through. And, yet, through that, God's been there and we've got throug. But we've, literally, just switched, on the first of this month. We're in September 22 goes now looking after the finances. There's a little bit of a you know, a handover and stuff. But, I couldn't cope anymore. I've brought the family through traumas and I'm quite happy with that. But I'd come to the end. And I think that's interesting.
Jo 10:08
Yeah, I think I think we might do another part on this 'cos Money Matters could be Part 2, Part 3, and maybe fill you in on how it's been going. 'Cos, as I say, we, as Andy says, we've changed things.
Jo 10:18
Going back to what you're saying, I suppose you need to find systems that work for you. Whether it be an Excel spreadsheet. I just remember fond memories of your, your grandma, who always kept her books, and she was absolutely meticulous. And she was very good. I mean, you get really decent bookkeepers and things, and they have got it on this book, and it is absolutely perfect. So,
Andy 10:36
She was meticulous. When she passed away we came in, we tried to look at the finances, that kind of thing. Ok, where are we at? She was accurate to the penny.
Jo 10:43
Yeah, fantastic.
Andy 10:44
It was phenomenal. But the thing is that the bank accounts don't stand still. Life doesn't stand still. An allegory for life in here.
Andy 10:49
Bank accounts. I mean, Jo said 'Do we have to spend some more money, I've just got the bank sorted?'. 'Sorry, more money's gone out'. That's life. It never stands still. And, in financial terms, it never stands still, because there's direct Debits. And there's Standing Order payments. And there's extra payments for this. And, oh, I haven't paid that yet. And yoy know, you can make as many plans as you want, it can still go wrong.
Jo 11:08
I remember what you said. You said, you know, we set, we need to set budgets and things like that, and we're, as we were discussing and transferring across to me but you said something about, 'But don't forget about there's also faith, isn't it?' Hang on, I'm just getting me head around like the practical side. And what's this? And, as Christians, as a married couple, you know, we know God provides. And there is, you know, we do need to walk in faith.
Andy 11:27
I've got more on this.
Jo 11:28
But yeah. Go on then.
Andy 11:29
So, one of the one of the real challenges is we've been living by for a long time. We've been in full time ministry, we know what full time church ministry is like, that's really hard and tough. When you're serving the people that are paying your wages it's, it's, it's a, it's a challenge. We came out during COVID, but now Jo works full time, but actually, we still live by faith because I stay at home with the boys. But I stay at home to do Berrybunch. So I.
Andy 11:50
Jo was saying how many hours do you do a day? And I'm like, I'm sure it's maybe two or three hours, every hour? And I love what I do. But there is an element of faith. So, as Christians, we should be planning for the future. We should be making preparations, and all this stuff.
Andy 12:04
When the energy crisis came, we sat down as a family and prayed about it and said, right, what's our half? So we bought a slow cooker to make soup. So we're trying to meet God in the middle. There's an Andy B video we will link to, all about meeting God in the middle, and what does that look like with an omnipresent God? Where's the middle?
Andy 12:21
But yeah, there is a faith element to being a Christian. For example, we bought the camera that you're watching us through right now. We had a gift that paid for half of that. We didn't have the other half, we had no money to pay for it actually. We could not physically afford it. We paid for it anyway, because we had peace and we believed in faith that's what God was asking us to do.
Andy 12:38
Five months later of paying this camera off, through a scheme we were able to find, which was really helpful.. we were given a thousand pounds to buy a computer. And that was,that was stunning. We didn't spend £1,000 because some of that money actually went to the camera. So, 5 months on from buying the camera, God then provided the rest of the money for the camera.
Jo 12:57
Yeah.
Andy 12:58
That's living by faith!
Jo 12:59
Yeah, just thinking about what you're saying that we, you know, we didn't go bankrupt. But we did have like, what was it called? A sort of debt, sort of support. People, didn't we? And I remember how awkward it was because they asked us to write down what you needed to spend. And of course, as Christians, you know, you know, we wanted to have our giving, or a tithe, sort of 5 to 10%, or whatever. And they just couldn't get their heads around that. It's really hard to explain to a non Christian about that kind of,
Andy 13:27
They couldn't get the rent actually. We, they said , ooh, we're rather concerned. You know, your rent is like half what everybody else is paying in this area. How can it be 50%? It was really simple. We worked for a church and they care about thneir staff. Yes, but, you know, we're very, this never happened. Yeah, well, the church does some good things sometimes. So we were paying 50% the going rate, which was you know, quite a lot. We've moved into quite an expensive area. So it's what we've been paying somewhere else in the country. Where we'd moved to it was 50% of the going rate. Well, that was that's called being in Ministry.
Jo 13:57
Yeah.
Andy 13:57
God's always provided.
Jo 13:58
Yeah, absolutely. So in and amongst this whole Money Matters, you've got the practical side, you need to find systems in place between you You need to work out how you're gonna have your spending, there's an attitude of heart towards it. I mean, I couldn't believe it. I checked somewhere. I think there's about 2,000 references to money in the Bible. So it's an important thing, you know, you know, you have to have the right heart and attitude towards money. And all kinds of things. And so we've obviously just taken one piece of scripture, which isn't actually about money, but we know that money can cause problems.
Andy 14:29
Well spending on earthly pleasures, you want money, because you want to spend it on pleasure.
Jo 14:32
Yeah, yeah. Absolutely, and we do, do need money. And of course, we need to be good stewards of our money.
Andy 14:38
Do we need money?
Jo 14:39
Well, well, in terms of winning money to buy stuff.
Andy 14:41
You made me learn a lesson that we don't need money.
Jo 14:43
Oh know, what did I do?
Andy 14:43
So when we wanted to, we wanted to, we said to God, please God teach us faith. And the first thing that God made absolutely crystal clear, beyond any shadow of a doubt, loads of confirmation, 'Sell your house'. Right. So we actually had a house we owned.
Andy 14:57
Now being in the market as it is I knew at the time we're probably never gonna own a house again, unless the business that we're gonna invest into actually makes money, enough to buy another house. We invested all the profit out of the house into this business. The business grew phenomenally. And we're like, oh, great, we'll buy house one day. Then the recession hit. Now, that act of faith was us saying to God, what you want us to do. And I remember saying to Jo, at the time, put a house in the market, well we need the money for the business. And Jo said, we don't need money for God to set us up in business. And it took me a year, almost to the day, to say to Jo, 'We don't need money, I've finally got it'. And then the house sold the next day.
Jo 15:33
Yeah.
Andy 15:34
You don't need money, ever, to do what God's asking you to do.
Jo 15:37
That reminds me of another story, in. Whilst we were in business, the, we just weren't getting the income. People weren't coming into the shop. It might have been something to do with there was this road closure, and things like that. And we thought, oh, crumbs. This is really bad. We really need some more money. And we got worried if we were, 'cos we did worry. And then, anyway, we prayed about it. And then just, so one day, we were like crumbs, we're on our last legs, the the, the shop's gonna have to close. And then within 24 hours, we had loads of people coming in, and loads of money. And it taught me a lesson, like from day to day is God does say, one day at a time, doesn't it? Yeah.
Andy 16:12
it's really easy. We've hit time here, but I'm gonna carry on.
Jo 16:14
Yeah,. yeah ok.
Andy 16:15
We've, it's really easy to see the situation human here think, well, this is what we have to do. I tell you what we're gonna do next week, we'll do Marriage Matters. Money Matters. Part 2,
Jo 16:25
I think so yeah.
Andy 16:25
'Cos we haven't touched any of the stuff we planned.
Jo 16:26
Absolutely yeah.
Andy 16:27
We've just shared some of who we are, really, and our story. But I think what was important to say in this one is, money is one of the single greatest stresses in life, and it can be a strain. It really won't work very well for you, almost guarantee this pretty much.
Andy 16:44
If you're trying to do everything equally together. Because the thing about marriage is you commit to the relationship. And we were having this chat off air a little bit earlier. If you look at your marriage, 'I need to make lots of compromise, we'll compromise together', you're gonna have a. How do I put this in delicate terms? Your marriage aint gonna be as good as it can. Why? Because marriage is not about compromising. Marriage is about sacrifice.
Andy 17:07
It's not about what do I have to give up to get what I want? Which is compromise? How much am I willing to give to have peace or happiness? Actually, marriage is about sacrificing of yourself, to another person. And if you both commit, the more you commit, the more vulnerable you become towards one another, the better that marriage can be. It can be bad too. But we don't really focus on those things. This is you know, we always talk about gold standard of marriage. Not that ours is the gold standard, but was God's gold standard. And we've got one version of that.
Andy 17:34
So the more you commit, the more you give, the better it's gonna be. So one of us has always looked after finances. How many times I've heard people about saying, really like, good 30, 40, 50, 60 year married couples. And they're saying, you know, one of us looked after the finances, don't ever try and do it together.
Jo 17:49
Yeha, yeah.
Andy 17:49
One of you needs to make decisions. Because if you're both making decisions, you're gonna compromise. And the problem of compromise is you're giving up stuff of yourself, which isn't necessarily helpful or healthy. Because, rather, than giving, you should be sacrificing, and there's a big difference. And it's the difference between 10% tithing and giving in the New Testament. The Old Testament, New Testament tithing model is really appropriate here.
Andy 18:11
In the Old Testament, you give your first 10%. That's it. In the New Testament, well you, it's a good, it's a good guide, 10% ish, that's a good starting point. We don't tithe in the normal sense, we spend out for BerryBunch. So a lot of our money that we would tithe goes towards what we do for our ministry. And there's different ways of doing it. And we give time. So I give time to other people. And I do other projects for other folks off the back of what we do here. So I'm using some of our same skills, resources. but it's not money, but it's time and that's the difference between the Old and New Testament. You have to give you 10%. New Testament says, you need to give, and give with your heart. And if you give with your heart, your marriage, when it comes to money, your marriage will prosper as a result.
Jo 18:51
That's a good place to end innit.
Andy 18:53
It's good, that one. So we'll do Marriage Matters, Money Matters Part 2, next week, but there's more yet. Don't go away!
Jo 19:06
You'll never guess what? Dave The dog has his own show! And it's called Dave Unleashed.
Steven 19:13
Are we sure about this?
Jo 19:14
Well, I'm gonna be there on hand. I'm gonna help him.
Steven 19:20
What mayhem are we to expect?
Jo 19:23
Well, to keep him on track. He's got Story Time, he's got Art Time. So, you know, and I'll be there to help him.
Steven 19:30
What could possibly go wrong?
Jo 19:51
Some great new adverts there
Andy 19:52
It's all very exciting stuff.
Jo 19:52
to listen to and watch. Yeah, so this is our Tips and Resources section. An absolute wealth of resources and tips around finances as you can imagine.
Andy 20:04
I've got some websites, you've got some books.
Jo 20:05
Yeah, so I mean, obviously CAB was it CAP, Christians?
Andy 20:10
Hey, it's my bit!
Jo 20:10
Oh, sorry, sorry. Alright, then I'll leave that. This is a couple of books that, that helped us. Because we had, we talked about some of our financial struggles. And so there's this one. I don't know if you're experiencing debt, or would just like to get your money under control, or there's someone that you know could do with some help, or just prevent it from happening. This is a good one. 60 Minute Debt Buster. When I did read it recently I thought, well, some of it's a bit out of date, but none of it really, it stands the test of time, doesn't it? Because nothing changes, you know?
Andy 20:40
Principles dont change.
Jo 20:40
Yeah, the principle is that you don't spend more than you've got. But that's a really helpful one for staying out of debt, or dealing with debt. And this one,
Andy 20:49
So good, this is so good!
Jo 20:49
Absolutely brilliant. So Rob Parsons, The Money Secret? Yeah, I can't, I just I've just started to read it again. So I'll come back maybe next week with what I've learned from it, but I can't remember. But it is, it's a really powerful book that will, will really help you stay on track with your finances.
Andy 21:05
It turns on its head, I haven't turned this on again. It turns on its head some of the ideas of our assumptions, our stereotypes, our generalisations about people with money and without. That's one of the bits of the book that I think is especially valuable. And it paints, 'cos I remember this picture, of a poor family looking across this canal or something, at this rich person. And it tells a story of both of these people. And actually, well he might have a nice looking house, but he still can't buy food. And then I have a house that's less nice, but they still can't buy food. And
Jo 21:35
Yeah.
Andy 21:35
It kind of makes htis balance of do you know what? You can't look and assume.
Jo 21:39
Yeah, it's funny, 'cos Corona virus days sort of put, you know, sort of rich and poor at a sort of level playing fields, 'cos we were all unable to get about doing our own business and stuff. And even this sort of energy crisis, although arguably the poor may be more, more, but then there may be more help for them. So, you know, it's we're all going to be hit by it, and affected by it, aren't we.
Andy 22:02
No one's unaffected. I mean, the billionaires maybe.
Jo 22:05
Okay, so yeah. Top tips, those books and we'll send out those links won't we.
Andy 22:09
Can I do my websites now, that you were gonna nick?
Jo 22:10
Oh, yeah, sorry, yes.
Andy 22:10
We planned all this!
Andy 22:12
Anyway, Christians Against Poverty, absolutely brilliant charity. If you've not heard of Christians Against Poverty, or CAP, go and check them out. Absolutely superb. I've done a CAP course in a church, where you go and they help you think about how you're managing money. That was really, really good! I didn't learn a huge amount. But, actually, even though I didn't learn loads, I gained loads of confidence that actually I had been doing a number of things that were good. And I picked up some useful things. So go and check out Christians Against Poverty, absolutely brilliant charity.
Andy 22:41
Obviously not a Christian site, but Citizens Advice Bureau, here in the UK. I'm not sure if you've got other ones around the world. You can let us know, but Citizens Advice Bureau is effectively free access legal advice. Anybody can go into and you can get help and support. We went in when we were unemployed one time and they helped us. They gave us some food vouchers for a food bank because, we couldn't buy food. So, Citizens Advice Bureau just superb. If you've not heard of it, go and support it, or make use of it.
Andy 23:10
Another one, which is really good. Again, not a Christian site is Money Saving Expert, Martin Lewis. Although he hasn't currently got any help around energy, because he doesn't know what to do 'cos this is unprecedented, it's a really good website. There's so much on MSE, Money Saving Expert. Go and check it out. Have a look. See what they've got. All these guides. If you want to buy car insurance, how do you save hundreds of pounds a year by the date you buy your car insurance, just for example in the UK, particularly. So these are really good ones.
Jo 23:38
Is that it?
Andy 23:38
Yeah. Another new advert.
Andy 23:43
Well, hello, my name's Andy B.
Jo 23:44
And I'm Jo.
Andy 23:45
And we've got some super exciting nose. Nose?
Jo 23:47
Nose? News!
Andy 23:48
No, new. We got some news.
Jo 23:50
You could do this, Andy.
Andy 23:52
Well I do try. Anyway, we've got some exciting news, not noses, coming for you. Because, on Konnect Radio, is a brand new Radio Show
Jo 23:57
Yeah.
Andy 23:58
called Family Focus. And it may be a shock, but actually we're doing it.
Jo 24:02
Yes. And not on our own because we've got a really cool dog called Dave.
Andy 24:06
Yes.
Jo 24:07
Dave, the Dog who joins us.
Andy 24:08
Yes, Dave the dog, who is a dog called Dave. It doesn't get much more complicated.
Jo 24:11
He's dead funny. He's dead funny.
Andy 24:13
He's very funny. He comes along and helps. We've got a good, a good contract for him. So that's coming up. We've also got the Doggy Cushion where we talk about family successes.
Jo 24:22
Highs and lows.
Andy 24:23
Highs and lows of family life. So, whether you're nought, 8, 88, 888, then you're welcome to join us.
Jo 24:31
Well, you don't have to do maths on this show.
Andy 24:33
It's fine. We don't! So come join us for some great chat, some great music and some great stuff coming up on Konnect Radio, Family Focus.
Andy 24:48
Like I said, there's some exciting times here on the BerryBunch.
Jo 24:51
Yey!
Andy 24:51
Whether it's Dave Unleashed, or Konnect Radio, you can't get away from us.
Andy 24:54
So, this is TheTake Away. I do like saying the Take Away. It is good. Anyway, the Take Away where we, we take away what we can learn. And, actually, we learn stuff too. So it's not just, you know, you go and take away. Actually, we take this away too. You know, it's quite good.
Andy 25:08
So, what have we got to take away? Well, the first part to say is there's a second Marriage Matters, Marriage Matters, Money Matters episode next week, when we're gonna look much more at the relationship side, and how do we think that should work. How can it go wrong? Where are the good things? And what have we learned and all that kind of stuff? Which is everything we were going to do today and didn't do?
Jo 25:29
Yeah.
Andy 25:29
Next week. So what have I learned today? Well, I think my Take Away today is this. What's your Take Away?
Jo 25:35
Oh, you know, I've been racking my brains. We've talked as you say, we've talked a lot about the money side of things, rather than the relationship. But I'm reminded I suppose I, I err on the side of burying my head in the sand, I don't really want to know about the finances 'cos I get a bit depressed. And so, for me, my takeaway is, come on, let's look at this. That would be more honouring and better in the relationship, better for the marriage, and more honouring to God?
Andy 26:02
Information is power.
Jo 26:03
Yes.
Andy 26:04
Why do you think social media, hypothetically, has all these algorithms to see what you can see and what you can't see? 'Cos information is power. There's a nice little political one for you. Whether they do, or not, is up to you.
Andy 26:16
My take away? Do you know what? I'm struggling with a Take Away today.
Jo 26:19
Yeah.
Andy 26:20
I think, I think it's a reminder of the importance of the fact that money's really important. It's not that we need money. I made that point earlier. You don't need money to do anything that God wants you to do! We were given this new computer, which is amazing. You know, someone actually bought us a computer, which I mean, who does that? Somebody who loves Jesus and wants to support the ministry does that! But we don't need money. Our computer was on its last legs. We had no hope, ever, of paying for a computer ourselves. We were desperately in need of one. It's the central heart of our video ministry, you know, thing. So, now, all the kind of busyness that we do, it's on a computer. So that's been an amazing blessing!
Andy 26:58
And that's a reminder. Actually, that's my Take Away. You don't need money to do what God's asking of you. But, actually, you can do so much good in the world without any money whatsoever!
Andy 27:06
I met, once, a guy at school. And he was, he was an older chap, and he was coming into he was doing like a tour of, you know, schools and whatever, and talking to us. I think he was from India originally. Maybe? I can't remember. It's a long time ago. And he had no job. He had no house, he had no bank account, no money. And he went around and he was a man of God. He believed that God was taking him about. And his ministry was going from country to country. How do you do that if you've got no money? And he would just go around and stay with people a few days. Live in a church for a bit, and go on. And he just talks about what God was doing.
Andy 27:38
He didn't take money off people. He wasn't after money. He just literally came, he shared what God had done. And it was quite phenomenal to meet this guy in his brand new suit. 'Ooh, I was staying with his family and the guy didn't like the suit, so I had it". You know, 'What happened to your old suit?' 'Well I'd just thrown it in the bin that morning'. You know, it's that kind of thing. And when you live live in this world, you need to be careful of your money and your finances. And you're running spreadsheets, and tracking your money, and all that. You've got your pensions and all these things are all good. However, never forget the importance of faith!
Jo 28:09
Yeah, two stories from the Bible come to mind. One, when Jesus told His disciples to put out for a fish, and then the money came in the fish woudln't it, to pay the taxes.
Andy 28:17
Ooh, yes.
Jo 28:17
I love that one. And the other one is, was it the lady with a jar and it just kept rolling through, you know, never, never gave up.
Andy 28:24
Corrie Ten Boom. There were there were two things in prison. One was a little bottle of vitamen oils and it just kept on pouring vitamin oils, in the prison camp. And it didn't seem to run out until they had another source of the same stuff. And it was just God's, you know, making an exclamation mark! It's gone on for, you know, it went for like a year or something after it shoudl have run out. And she's like, 'Well, maybe it's just, you know, it's aerating in the sides'. And her sister would say' Okay, Corrie, no that's just Jesus.' And, yeah, you don't need money to do what God's asking you to do.
Andy 28:51
I think where the conflict comes in is where we think, we want to do this, and we can't afford it, so 'God you've failed. you've let me down. I need money for this'. And actually, most of the time, we just need to go back to God and say, what was your plan here, Lord. What is it you want us to do? And God always provides.
Jo 29:05
Yeah.
Andy 29:06
So, that's another Marriage Matters for you. Next week more excitement. Marriage Matters, Money Matters, Part 2 and we're looking more at the relationship. So we've kind of shared more of our own personal story, and are sort of setting it up, I suppose a little bit. And next week, we'll talk about some more of the highs and the lows, and the hellish moments of, of not having as much money as we would prefer.
Jo 29:27
Yeah.
Andy 29:28
Shall we put it that way?
Jo 29:28
Yeah.
Andy 29:29
Well, I hope you're well, enjoyed the show. We'll be back for more for next week. And yeah, what else do we do? I've forgotten something haven't I?
Jo 29:36
Check us out on BerryBunch.family?
Andy 29:38
Oh, yes. If you're not already following us on the website, www.BerryBunch.Family. And don't forget to check out our Konnect Radio tomorrow, Sunday, 4 til 6, Family Focus, with myself and Jo on Konnect Radio. So yeah, bye for now.
Andy 29:52
Bye for now.
Jo 30:06
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Steven 30:19
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Peter 30:25
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Nathan 30:36
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Andy 30:49
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Andy 31:00
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