Two Financial Strategies—But Only One Worked

When Emily and William McCauley first married, they didn’t see eye to eye on finances. 

“I didn’t want him to keep buying stuff until he was out of debit with the other things,” Emily says.

Emily continues, “We would argue a lot about all different kinds of financial problems. He knew that that's what I did with my money was, you know, give 10% to the church. I was a waitress, so if I made $80, I took $8 and would set it my drawer until Sunday when I would go to church."

“Well, when we first got married, we both had our own checking accounts anyway,” Williams says. “So we just kind of kept going, ‘This is her money; this is my money.’ She did what she did with hers. And I did what I did with mine.”

The couple bought a working farm near Lexington, Kentucky, and William started an excavation business. Emily worked as a medical billing specialist. “Most of my debt we started off with, came from buying the equipment to start out excavating,” says William. “That business has kind of high cost of entry.”

“You know, ‘You’ve got to spend money to make money,’ is his mentality on things. But I also think that God is going to provide if we are doing the right thing with our money,” Emily adds.

William admits, “It didn't take long to snowball a lot of money together in debt. It did strain our marriage. It was tough.”

William and Emily continued to have separate bank accounts, but Emily tithed faithfully from hers. “Her expenses never did exceed what she had in her account,” William observed. “She was always able to save money. And I could run six or seven days a week and never could get ahead.”

After the birth of their first child, William asked his wife to consider being a full-time mom. She agreed—but under one condition.

“She pretty much told me for her to quit her job that I had to start tithing,” Williams says. “I was so amped for her to come home and raise our kids that I said, ‘Sure, sure. We'll start tithing.’” 

Soon, God began to bless their business. “Instead of having a day or two-long jobs, we were there for months,” William says. “So all our jobs were getting longer and better, better paying jobs. Checks just showed up.” 

Now nearly all of their debts are paid off and William is sold on the principle of tithing.

“I’ve probably turned 180 from where I started. I was trying to pay my bills first before I give the money to the church. That's obviously--that was wrong. That's completely wrong,” William laughs. ”But it took a long time for me to figure that out.”   

“He's excited about it as I am,” says Emily.  “And, he'll say now that there's no way that he would ever go back to not tithing.” 

Today the McCauleys enjoy giving to their church, to missions, and to the local community. “We're able, at church, you know, to be able to help all the missionaries,” Emily adds. 

“Because we tithe, the Lord has blessed us and we’re able to provide for more people in the community,” Williams says.” At the end of the day, you just can’t afford not to give. It’s just not worth it.”

“You see people every day that is working night and day, working so hard, and you just want to sit down and tell them like, ‘Look, if you just knew that if you would give 10% to the church, that things would drastically change for you,'” Emily says.

“Rich or poor, it doesn't matter. Until you realize that this is all God's and it's for us to be generous with, you'll always be chasing the wind looking for the next dollar.”