Thursday 22 July 2010

Thinking about the future: Credit Cards

For many people, ensuring that there is enough money at the end of the month to pay all the bills can be difficult to balance.

This can be more so when interest is added a large rates to credit card balances, so those of us who have been able to ‘service’ debt before may be struggling to do so now and making use of overdrafts and other things..  

For lots of reasons, how we manage our money may not be something we talk a lot about, but perhaps we need to think about being more open about it?

Here’s one reason to think about it….   in the future, Rugeley Community Church may want to expand the current building facility, move to a different location, support additional staff or undertake a project. To do this will require lump sum gifts, increases in monthly giving or both!

Each year I review what I’m giving and how I’m spending money. Sometimes despite my best plans, the situation I thought I was in, isn’t always the one I find when I’m looking at the cold hard figures… – this can be especially true with credit cards.  Credit cards work great for short term ‘cashflow’, but when the amount of money isn’t cleared each month the amount of interest that can be added in the month adds up very quickly.

This got me thinking.

Simply by changing my attitude to ‘credit’ and managing money better we might be able to free up money that would be going on paying off credit to use for kingdom purposes! In my case, on one card, interest each month is around £90. That’s £90 added every month to the balance, even if I make a payment (unless I clear the balance in full).. That would be over £1000 that could be given to something much more valuable!

It won’t happen overnight, but if I prioritise paying off the balance now instead of carrying the balance and living (albeit momentarily) above my means when we’re ready to take the next adventures of faith together my finances might be ready to respond as well as my heart?

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