Do you need more money?
Honestly. Sit with question for a minute.
Do you think you need more money? Would more money be helpful in fulfilling God’s calling on your life right now? Would more money be catalytic to making you more like Jesus? Would it enhance your prayer life? Or your relationships with others?
(Spoiler alert: You don’t need more money.)
You’ve probably heard the famous Rockefeller response to the question, “how much is enough?”
Just one more dollar.
Oof. That’s rough, John. Talk about a hamster wheel. Not me! No siree. I’ve found contentment in Jesus and never struggle with loving money.
…right?
Contrary to what you might expect, this is not a math problem. It’s a lack-of-clarity (i.e. fog) problem.
If you don’t know what “enough” is, every dollar becomes a question: “do I need you? should I keep you? or can I deploy you to someone else?”
fog is expensive
Last week, we talked about the questions under the question and how most money questions are really questions of the heart disguised as questions of the mind. This is the first place that fog shows up in real life: an undefined finish line.
If you’ve never taken the time to define “enough”:
Every expense feels stressful
Every market dip throws your future into uncertainty
Every generous impulse runs through a panic filter
Your spouse’s “can we afford this?” feels more like an accusation than a question.
It’s like flying through clouds without instruments. At least you know you’re still in the air, but for how much longer? You feel unsafe.
What “enough” is, and isn’t
Let me be clear, because this gets misunderstood in both directions.
“Enough” is not:
A guarantee that life won’t get hard.
A magic number that removes the need for daily trust in God.
A retirement fantasy copied from a Fidelity commercial.
Set in stone, never to be reevaluated.
“Enough” is:
A reference point that makes small decisions easier.
A tool for honesty between you and your spouse.
A starting place, not necessarily a finish line.
A working definition of what your family actually needs, plus what you’d love to be free to do. In a word, enough is choosing contentment.
contentment …and discontentment
Speaking of which, let’s talk about that for a minute. “Be content” is often a scold that’s really just demanding desire-management or hunger-mitigation.
Want less, ask less, expect less.
But contentment isn’t passivity. Or resignation. Or the compression or elimination of desire. In fact, it’s not necessarily holy — or holier than discontentment. It just depends on where your longings reside and where they lead you. There’s a kind of holy desire that saturates the Psalms. And that desire sits deeply rooted in God’s abundant plenty. And that’s the secret sauce—the ability to sit with what God has given right now without scrambling to control tomorrow. Content with what you have, but discontent this side of heaven.
That discontentment is desire. Longing. Ache. It’s yearning that’s ultimately aimed at the Kingdom to come: for your kids, your church, your work, your future, your legacy. It’s what makes you earn and save and give — and dream, for that matter.
Defining “enough” is where—in the context of your financial life—these two finally stop fighting. You name what’s actually needed for a reasonable lifestyle. You name what you’d love to be capable of (in work, philanthropy, legacy, etc.). And you stop treating every desire as suspicious or every limit as a threat. Simultaneously, you start to flex your “no” muscle as an active defiance against the culture of Vanity Fair in which we all live.
A small next step
If this is hitting close, you don’t need to overhaul anything this week. Try this:
Sit down with your spouse (or by yourself, if you’re single) and answer three questions in pencil:
What does our household actually need each year to be okay?
What would “good” look like: generosity, margin, real rest?
What’s one number we’re currently guessing about that we could actually define this month?
That’s it. Just tugging on one string at a time.
Next week
We’ve named the fear. We’ve started clearing the fog. Next week, we go underneath both: trust, control, and what generosity actually has to do with your view of God.
Because once “enough” is on the table, the next question shows up almost immediately.
If we have enough, what’s it for?
