Article link: Does Jesus Despise the Barefoot Investor?, by Dave Moore (from The Gospel Coalition Australia website)
“A down to earth farmer-turned-financial-advisor, Scott Pape holds the record for Australia’s best selling non-fiction author in the last 20 years. That means if you haven’t read his book, The Barefoot Investor, there’s a good chance one of your friends has.
“In this article, I want to raise one massive concern I have with the book, and then highlight the one important ‘Barefoot lesson’ Jesus wants us to learn.”
For those too lazy to read the linked article and drawing the wrong conclusion, the Author is following the Barefoot Investor book and seems to recommend it but he reminds Christians to put their faith in Jesus and not their Mojo account. I personally believe Scott Pape is a Christian (there’s many clues in his books) and giving is a big part of his Barefoot Investor for Families book that ties in with tithing.
There is a very similar program called the “7 Baby Steps” by Dave Ramsey who uses a more biblical approach but the first step is still create an Emergency fund. He notes, if every Christian learned better money management and was free from the slavery of debt, church tithing would increase dramatically.
I believe most churches take a more spiritual approach of praying for people to be “delivered from debt” instead of having practical programs in place to teach Biblical approach to money literacy (or relationships or healthy living etc). God wants us to be good stewards of the time, talents and treasure he has given us in all areas of our lives but where is the Biblical teaching for how to be a good steward?
Sadly, Scott Pape has probably done more to deliver people from slavery to debt than all the churches in Australia combined. I would love to read other people’s views on this.