Are You Living and GIVING Like No One Else?

[Music] welcome to the dave ramsey show you can be intentional about your character you can have money and a career you are the hero in your story live from the headquarters of ramsey solutions broadcasting from the dollar car rental studios it's the dave ramsey show where debt is dumb cash is king and the paid off home mortgage has taken the place of the bmw as the status symbol of choice dr john deloney ramsey personality and best-selling author of the book redefining anxiety is my co-host today here on the air we have been teaching you for approaching 30 years to live like no one else so that later you can live and give like no one else there's only three things you can do with money you can spend it on yourself and enjoy it and you should you can invest it and you should and you can be outrageously generous and when you do that you'll find it is the highest and best use of money it is the use of money that will give you the most joy on the eve of christmas eve it is a dave ramsey show tradition to take calls from those of you who have enjoyed generosity you have a great generosity story god was so generous that he sent his only son to pay our debts our sin and that's what we're celebrating here it's called christmas mary christmas and so we want to hear your generosity stories call us right now at 825-5225 if you've been on the receiving end of generosity or on the giving end of generosity and it's a great story and it will inspire the rest of us to be more generous that's what we want to hear for the next several hours open phones again triple eight eight two five five two two five and from a mental health perspective when people give it takes their eyes off themselves and a whole lot of neurosis is really comes down to being selfish they evaporate when you've when you find it within yourself to do something for other people you get outside of your own head and your own heart you will find that the things that ail you just simply poof like a vapor yeah and there's something magical and life-giving about being and living for other people very difficult to be depressed when you're out registering almost impossible when you're honest it activates a whole different counter set of chemicals in the body uh in the spirit uh and in the emotions right it really does looking for ways that you can support and help other people which gives you purpose so if case you hadn't noticed 2020 pretty much sucked that's the rumor so what we're going to do is we're going to give our way out of it so that we all have a little bit of a better attitude yeah i like that plan there we go we're going to give so this is the annual giving show our last live show of the season because uh we don't work between christmas and new year's i'm going out with my family to a warm place somewhere and uh we'll be back in the first week of january doing the show again so in the meantime you'll have this to remember these giving stories the phone number triple eight eight two five five two two five brianna is in austin texas to start us off tell us about giving brianna hi dave and dr d i love you guys so much merry christmas merry christmas to you we love you thanks i'm so blessed to be talking with y'all i'm going to share my given story um so my husband ralph and i are actually on the receiving end of the biggest blessing of our lives and it's funny dave in october when we received this blessing i actually called in and spoke with you to get some guidance so you might remember me so a little background ralph and i have been married three years and he has two older sons um being a mom has been a dream of mine i've wanted to be pregnant and experience motherhood my entire life after we got married we tried having a baby and a year into it nothing so we saw a fertility doctor and at that point after doing testing they said look brianna based on your age and what's going on you're gonna have to do ivf so obviously um that's a very expensive procedure and at the time dave we didn't know you so we were over the top in consumer debt like coming out of our ears just it was so stressful so the doctor came in and gave us a little price list and he says well you guys can finance it 20 to 25 000 we have finance options for a split second we said maybe we should and then i said you know what we can't so i cried a lot we left the appointment we never went back i was so sad and felt so defeated and i just didn't understand i didn't understand why this was happening i got on my knees and i cried and i prayed to god and i basically just said you know what god i'm giving it to you i trust you and that's that so 2019 october dave we found you jumped into fpu read the book budgeting everything and god willing we've been paid we've paid off almost 30 000 in this last year wow yes so blessed so here we are in 2020 october we celebrated my birthday we went to california to visit friends and family and dave and john a dear friend of mine over 20 years of friendship um he and his wife have been very blessed with wealth and for my birthday they blessed us with uh twenty thousand dollars to get ibs wow i love these people i love these people brianna you have way better friends than i do i'm telling you not only that y'all they basically said that if it's more than 20 000 call them and they'll take care of it so honestly i've never in my life had a blessing like that we came straight home back to austin saw a new fertility doctor and we're starting treatments in january yay congratulations now you gotta call back next year and give us the end of this story okay i promise i will yeah we have to finish we have to finish this story out because this is we're catching this blessing mid blessing we are and i just want to say one thing to your listeners dave um i just want to encourage your listeners no matter what's going on in life whether it's money issues the loss of a loved one marriage issues no matter what lean on god pray to him talk to him he's gonna get you through it honestly we thought there was no way and god made a way for this and it was on his time and we are so blessed and i just encourage others to just remember to lean on him testify sister i like it so uh you know here's what's interesting that i think about in this is that uh you you didn't have this motivation but the net result was when you started getting your act together and we're worthy of trust god just redirected some wealthier way he did yeah i mean and while you were living in chaos and impulse he didn't do it no matches up with a parable of the talents those who manage a little well are given more to manage and uh wow i love this well done great story hey thank you for thank you for calling in with that that's cool i do remember her call she was calling she was like freaking out do i have to put this 20 000 on my debt snowball i went absolutely not it was a designated gift like the nursery gift you and i got yesterday right that was 1500 right but uh it's a designated gift and um and yeah that's a that's a place in in a couple's soul when they're trying to have children that's special and i know that brianna is reeling from this extraordinary gift i would love to hear from the people who were able to give this oh yeah that they they they walked step by step live disciplined lives were were blessed and then just had the ability and then a need came forward to literally read reimagine somebody's family tree i can imagine this guy sitting there going you know we got two million dollars in our 401k let's give him twenty thousand let's give him two thousand dollars i have a baby and have a family touchdown good for you guys it's the annual giving show on the eve of christmas eve dr john dolone and dave ramsey on the dave ramsey show [Music] one of the things that makes the dave ramsey show unique from other shows is that we genuinely care about our listeners that's why we are very intentional about choosing our advertisers blinds.com offers high quality window treatments at unbelievable prices and then their customer service is truly unbeatable they make it simple to shop for blinds shades and interior shutters from home with easy online ordering and free shipping right to your door and blinds.com will help you every step of the way just like they've helped thousands of my listeners with free design help by phone and online plus they guarantee the perfect fit go today and take advantage of this week's special offer [Music] so [Music] it's the eve of christmas eve which is our annual giving show dr john dolone ramsey personality and author of the best-selling book redefining anxiety what it is what it's not and how to get your life back we're taking your calls about giving when you received something or when you gave something all about inspiring generosity and you know sometimes you're supposed to give on the down low what the bible says you know rory ryden doesn't know what the left hand's doing and it's you know you're not doing it for accolades and that kind of thing but i have discovered that that and that's how i do the vast majority of our giving most of the ramsey foundation family foundation giving or just dave and sharon giving somebody a high five with 100 or something we don't talk about that we just do it and we don't bring it up um but occasionally you need to be a vocal uh video playing video example for other people so that they see it and they feel it and so like you know the 10 million dollar debt that we have that we paid off around here so we did we've done some publicity on that we put it out and it's been on fox business i was on fox and friends this morning talking about it and that kind of stuff and you know the haters are like well you're not supposed to tell anybody when you do that you obviously you're just doing this for advertising it's like they had gum i could have bought advertising cheaper than that's right okay you butt and so obviously i didn't do it for that uh i but but i you know i have to when somebody says that it does kind of sting a little and i think well i wonder if i was doing it wrong motives but then i remember no we're called to teach you guys how to handle money and all of us are called to be an example to one another to lift each other up and so brag a little bit about receiving or about giving today to inspire others and to cause it to be paid forward i wrestled with that personally for years and until i learned that people learn more by watching you and that was a signal for me that i got to be more demonstrative for my kids for my family for my friends because that's how they're going to say oh that's what that looks like right in the real world and that's how that feels and here's an example of how you can do something with leverage there you go and um you know i've gotten to sit at some uh giving symposiums like i went to this one thing with these guys and the average net worth in the room was like a billion i was a wiener in a steakhouse right i mean i was not in my league you know they wouldn't let me in the parking lot but those men and women had different ideas on how to do stuff on giving that was really cool yeah and it lit me up and on my little small scale then i was able to come back and be motivated by that so those of you that don't like that we're trumpeting giving from the rooftops maybe we need to do that this year because everybody's been all concerned about not giving this year everybody's been all concerned about taking this year about divisiveness and polarization on the racial issues and the dadgum political disaster and mask or no mask and let's just let's just get all mad let's just spend the whole freaking year being mad at each other everybody no not today this is the eve of christmas eve calm your butt down we're talking about generosity and we want to hear from you triple eight eight two five five two two five trent is in phoenix trent tell us your giving story dave dr john this is a huge pleasure this is definitely one of the coolest things that's ever happened to me well we're honored you need to get out more brother yeah you've got to get better friends my trent you need way better friends how can we help man tell us your giving story so a few years ago my wife and i were living in the middle of the new mexico west texas oil field and i had a job i was working for an excavation company and i was making the equivalent of minimum wage in the oil field and the cost of living out there is horrendously high we were renting a two bed uh one bath i think it was probably about oh maybe six or seven hundred square foot uh you know four plex and it was 12.50 and we had to cover utilities on top of that so add on all the other you know food and everything else and it was it was draining more than we were making and when i was working at this company this excavation company i got put under the tutelage of this crusty hard old man he was he was larger than life very physically imposing guy but he was very hard very unkind very ruthless most of the time he was a notorious scrooge 365 days a year unless he was around women in which case he had charm and charisma at a burn and he was just the life of the party um so he took me under his wing and he taught me how to drive heavy equipment and stuff like that and slowly but slowly we became friends and and he knew how much i was making he made considerably more than i did so um a few months later i had left that company for a job that paid a couple dollars an hour more and my wife was working for a pharmacy that was in town and he came in there to get his prescription and he came in and this was right before christmas and he was wearing a santa hat and he came in and he started talking to my wife and he said how's that boy that you married and she said well we're doing good you know we're just doing what has to be done and he said well that's just you know that's good good for you guys awesome and then he picked up his prescription and then he had an envelope in his hands and he slid it across the desk to her and he said now you wait until i leave before you open that merry christmas merry christmas to everybody and then he he rushed out the door and uh i had already resigned that christmas to be just horrible and no presence and we're going to be behind on bills and and everything and she hurried and opened up the up the envelope and uh she found this really expensive looking card inside and she opened it up and uh inside it had in his his hen scratched writing to mrs j and that that guy that she married i hope that this can make your christmas a little bit more magical and uh there was 10 100 bills in the envelope wow she rushed out to the front door past everybody that was in line she got outside and she said it was the most magical scene she'd ever seen he got into his truck and he was just getting out of the parking lot as fast as he could and she said i'll call him bill for the sake of the story she said bill we can't accept this that's too much and uh he said santa doesn't take gifts back and then he just roared out of there and uh a lot of people have descriptors of what santa is to them you know he you know rides in a sleigh he wears a suit he you know gives toys to people for me at least for that christmas my descriptors of santa was he's vulgar he smokes camel wise he's an alcoholic and he drives the shed yeah but dude when you're making that kind of money a thousand dollars might as well be a hundred thousand dollars yeah that was a lot of money that was like changed your whole net worth yep that's huge man i've been right there i know exactly how that crap feels in in west texas speak um that guy you married is is um a special language for my friend that i can't say those words out loud or i'll just break down and start crying [Laughter] amen i don't know people say that about me all the time they tell sharon that guy you married yeah yeah this is totally different from tennessee yeah that's definitely what they tell sheila sheila and sharon are in that same camp yeah they get that guy you married that's exactly right and there's a bit of an eye roll yes yeah it's like a sympathy thing that guy you're married that's exactly the special group special groups i love it well done santa claus cables and a chevy i love it got a cigarette hanging out of his lip roaring off into four-wheel drive i like it go santa oh ho baby if you live like no one else later you can live and give like no one else on the eve of christmas eve this is our annual giving show here on the dave ramsey show [Music] good tidings we bring if you're financially conscious you know that healthcare expenses can take a big bite out of your budget christian healthcare ministries or chm is here to help trim those expenses and make sure your family is cared for chm is not health insurance but it is christians helping other christians by sharing each other's medical bills most people have the means to pay for basic doctor services but when it comes to something at a much larger scale say several thousand dollars for surgery or hospitalization folks are worried they'll be left to try and find a way to pay for that themselves not too long ago i was diagnosed with ovarian cancer and they really came through so far we've had over 180 000 worth of bills and got close to 75 discounts chm shared the rest of the expenses to see if chm is right for you and your budget check out chministries.org backslash budget [Music] ah my co-host today dr john deloney ramsey personality best-selling author of the book redefining anxiety what it is what it's not how to get your life back today's the eve of christmas eve and the way we always celebrate that around the dave ramsey show is we do a special giving show where we take your calls and you tell giving stories stories about a time you gave or you received in order to inspire 17 million listeners to greater generosity pretty cool on the debt free stage but with a giving story hillary is with us live in the lobby from lakeland florida hi hillary how are you i'm good dave how are you better than i deserve what brings you to nashville well born and raised actually here in nashville currently living in florida i'm here to tell a little bit of a giving story okay i want to start that out with saying i appreciate just a few weeks ago you sharing a little bit about in one of your podcasts human trafficking and actually work in that field and after that podcast is when they talked about the giving show and so i actually wrote in after that and i just appreciate you sharing um getting the word out about about the work that we're doing out here so um that led me to our story about giving and um a little bit of back story with that is that i have a little girl out here running around like crazy in the lobby but she's a year and a half now and while i was pregnant actually had multiple complications with her with several several hospital visits that i was spending weeks at a time days at a time multiple times that i just had to be in the hospital while i'm pregnant with her and then after giving birth she actually had several complications as well and so um in december of last year she was born in september in december of last year my husband and i found ourselves getting a bill every day you know you check that mailbox and it's supposed to be one of the happiest times of the year and it was one of the most stressful times of the year every time that we would check the mailbox it was another doctor another you know another hospital bill another this another that another hospital you know all of that and so at that time it was um stress it was just stressful all the time and i'll never forget and it's a family member of ours and our giving story begins with him because we opened the mailbox one day and for the first time we didn't have a bill but we actually had just enough of a check to cover her hospital stay visit and in that moment it was like oh okay we can breathe because for the first time and if you you know if you've ever had a child in the hospital you know when that bill comes it's just this heavy burden and to have that little or a lot amount to cover just enough to be done with that bill was like just such a relief on us and and honestly from then we were not doing we we did you know your whole um everything before we got married but we were not to actually participating in it until kind of that moment and that's really what i wanted to share today because he gave us um and then from there we realized like okay we gotta honor not only him um but we gotta honor ourselves and we have to honor the lord and it took a couple months and a few more hospital visits to um really get our budget under control and kind of do that whole back and forth thing but once we got that budget under control um starting kind of mid-year this year we've um on our baby step two and we've paid off about twenty thousand two hundred dollars so far wow good for you we have a little bit more to go a lot more to go but we're super motivated just in you know honoring what people are out here to do it's really just to like bless your lives and to honor your family and being able to do that and honor the lord and that too gave us such an opportunity to say okay we got to be out here doing it and so um we have one more hospital bill left and then student loans from there and we'll be done with our debt and hopefully back here doing our debt free school i love it i'm so happy for you yes well done well done i appreciate that that's a great story because there's something about like you said a child being in the hospital there's a hopeless feeling you can't not hopeless not that you don't hope for the child but it is helpless absolutely you don't feel like there's anything you can do you're stuck absolutely and then the bills are piling up and you're stuck again and then this one check breaks them loose that's a big deal it's one of the most um vulnerable places i've ever been in my life because you just in the midst of having all of this come in the mail you're also trying to take care of her make sure she has the best care as well and and so that little bit of relief was like the thing that it was like okay this is it and this is our sign that we have to get on board and kind of do this we actually i'm happy to share but just last week on our anniversary we got an email stating negative negative negative negative i love it and so um you know i'll say this our since doing this we're consistently tithing for the first time in our our whole marriage and we feel like we're more of a team than we ever have been anxieties are lower um which is such a big thing people think a budget won't do that to you but it really actually helps yeah and it's a sense of power yeah really truly it is so we're grateful for you well you too we're happy thank you congratulations and what a great great giving story thank you for sharing that thank you merry christmas merry christmas open phones at 825-5225 taking your giving and or receiving stories rick and william are in utah hey guys how are you hello dave and john it's good to talk to you merry christmas merry christmas to you tell us your giving story hey we wanted to call in i wanted to brag on my son william here for a little bit he's a junior at desert hills high school here in st george and every year desert hills uh does a fundraiser to benefit or bless somebody in need in our community and this year they decided to raise money for a little girl in a community that has leukemia and they were partnering with make a wish to raise money and uh benefit uh give her some benefit that way and um william saw this and and he he was thinking about it he's got a little sister about the same age and he said you know i've got this money and uh he said if somebody uh you know if my little sister was having some problems i would hope that somebody would help help her out and so he um you know unbeknownst to us he didn't he didn't talk to us or anything he just he just decided he's like i've got 500 bucks i'm going to throw that down and try to help jim out here so wow later and ended that but i mean that's a huge deal for a 16 year old kid to throw 500 bucks into the fundraiser that way hey man well i got to tell you as a dad of uh three kids that do a lot of giving and are generous it makes us proud it makes us stick our chest out doesn't it no for sure yeah where'd it go i don't know why we were blessed to have such a good generous kid like this but all the beatings paid off i'll tell you rick kids generous kids come from generous parents and that apple hit that tree all the way down so congratulations to you and i want you to know all the the extra tips and the extra kindness that you showed people over the years william just absorbed that and now he is able to take that and magnify it and give it to people who he's never met he's never gonna meet but are gonna be blessed by nonetheless so good for you man hey man william are you there thank you i'm here hi brother you are a different kind of what 16 17 year old i'm 16. when i was 16 500 in my head would have bought me a lot of things but not a anonymous gift to a young girl and i want to tell you brother i'm proud of you and you are paving the sidewalks that my little kids out here are going to be walking on as they get older and you are a reason that we can be optimistic about what the future is going to look like young people like you in your hearts so i'm grateful for you man william your stud man we're proud of you well done i love it and uh that's what happens um rachel says in the book um smart money smart kids that more is caught than taught they are watching everything moms and dads very unusual for you to have us out outlandishly outrageously generous 16 year old now you can when they're a lot of them when they're three are generous right right but life knocks it out of them by the time they're 16 and if they're not seeing mom and dad model it and 500 for 16 year olds a million bucks right yeah that's a lot of dates and a lot of music and a lot of other things that way to go william what a stud man way to go rick proud of both of you very good stuff that's fun set the bar man set the bar that's how it works it's our annual giving show this is the dave ramsey show [Music] oh [Music] [Applause] [Music] oh saint nicholas lean your ear this way don't you tell a single soul what i'm gonna say christmas eve is coming soon now it's our annual giving show dr john deloney ramsey personality is my co-host today budgeting doesn't have to suck you know most time when you say budgeting to people they're they like flinch like you swung at them or something uh you just need a budget that actually works so you tell your budget what to do until you get it done and then it tells you what to do so the whole thing's voluntary you don't have to do it so it doesn't have to be like this onerous thing however if it actually works it's probably on every dollar the world's best budgeting app which is a ramsey product and is inside of ramsey plus see with every dollar you get a plan on how to spend and save every month and how to connect your budget with your bank so that all your transactions are done boom boom just like that and you get custom insights on your spending and here's the deal when you can visualize what's going on when you hit what's going to hit and when you don't have to wonder if you have enough to cover your bills your stress level goes way down when you budget way down even if you have a lot of bills you can't pay even if you have too much month left at the end of the money when you budget you at least know i got my food my shelter my clothing my transportation and your stress level goes way down so when you can make a plan for your money that's when you start feeling control to start a free trial of ramsey plus text the word begin to three three seven eight nine that's begin to three three seven eight nine gail is with us gail is in jacksonville florida hi gail welcome to the dave ramsey show hey dave hey john merry merry christmas mary mary tell us your giving story so my husband has 15 nieces and nephews and every year they have children so every year we would pick one of them to buy for for christmas this particular year we picked a niece that her husband had left her because he didn't want to raise children and she had a two four and six year old she was working and he had decided that drugs was more important than the children yeah so me and my husband would go garage selling um every weekend and buy the kids clothes and toys and try to provide as much as we could to help her um i was listening to the radio and they had a contest which i entered on her behalf and i had to do an essay on why i thought she should get the vehicle and it was giving a vehicle to somebody in need she had a vehicle that was barely getting her back and forth to work so i did the contest and the day before the winner was announced they had called me and told me i was one of the three runner-ups and that if they chose us would we how would she pay the taxes on the vehicle and everything to get the vehicle and i said well if you choose her me and my husband will pay for everything we will make sure that she even has insurance for six months so about the next morning they called and said they had chose me and we had reached out i called her job and spoke to her both and we had the radio station go to her job pick her up she had no idea where she was going or what was going on we were at the place where the vehicle was they pulled in and she seen me and her uncle standing there and she started crying because we had already been doing so much they read the essay to her what i had said about her and then as they're reading this essay they're driving the van up behind us and then they said the gift that you have won is behind you and when she turned around she we all started crying she was crying they took pictures of us i love it so but it was just great it was so great and to say real quick two days ago i had told i was going shopping to buy my pastor's wife a gift me and my husband pulled in to mcdonald's to get lunch on our way and i walk in to the counter and the gentleman in front of me bought me lunch and he turns around and he says god told me to buy y'all lunch and i thought you know we're headed to get our pastor's wife a gift so you know god is just so good and so i just wanted to share hey man well thank you so much so fun it's beautiful it's all around you it's all around you this generosity thing but that's a fun one i mean they pull the car up behind her and everybody turns around starts crying i almost start crying when you're telling it that's great yeah it was awesome it was a van of all things and she had a two four and six um two four and six year old you know children that she's trying to provide for and um took her and got her six months worth of insurance on the car we bought her a cell phone um and paid for that in advance and we just set her up you know and it was just so heart feeling and giving is so better than receiving amen you know there's just something about it a lot more fun and the good news is you were in a position to do that yes yes amen amen yes all because thank you for your plan we've been listening to you since 2000. well i didn't know that you did it i'm proud of you yeah yeah you got yourself in a position you know being generous you know you can have an in great intentions if i intend to send my wife flowers it doesn't count [Laughter] you know but but you know you got to really you got to really do it and so you can have all kinds of great generous intentions in your little heart if you don't get yourself positioned to act on those then you're not ever going to really get to see the benefit of that generosity and you guys did gail i'm proud of you well done very well done that's cool that's so cool that's that's fine because that i mean it's a that's a a letter writing exercise that paid off real big and then also the cell phone and the insurance and all the knickknacks right that just the taxes those are game changers for that family yeah it's amazing absolutely a game changer beautiful stuff kevin is with us on our giving show kevin's in dallas kevin tell us your giving story hey guys merry christmas so my story begins back in 2013 i had just gotten out of college and had been offered an internship at a church here in dallas and so i was working part-time there and kind of figuring out who i was as an adult and what i was supposed to do with my life and as i was doing ministry i realized that i felt called to learn the bible and train for ministry and so uh just so happens there's a good seminary here in dallas called dallas theological seminary and so what i did was i felt like i was obeying god and uh put all of my savings that i had after college into my first semester there so i was able to pay for that in fall of 2013 but the problem was that was all my money and i didn't really have much money at that time so um i didn't really know what to do from there but i felt like i was in the right place and i remember i was coming to the end of that fall semester in 2013 and it was a friday and it was a friday that my money for the next semester was due and if i didn't pay for next semester i'd drop my classes and i wouldn't be able to continue on and i remember praying that morning to god and just saying lord i know i i think i'm in the right place um i don't have any money and i know i don't want to go into debt or anything to do this uh so hey if you want me here um you need to help me figure out a way to pay for this and uh otherwise you know i'm glad to take some time off school and take a load off for a while so anyways that was that morning that afternoon i showed up to my desk and nobody really knew about this except for a couple people who were close to me and my family who didn't tell anybody but i show up at my desk and there's an envelope on my desk and i'm i'm looking at it going what's what's that and i open it up there's no name on it and inside of the envelope is three thousand dollars cash unmarked and um with a with a bible verse on it that's romans 12 13 that says give to the saints who are in need and my bill for that next semester was just about fifty dollars away from three thousand dollars so wow that money uh that money covered my next semester and uh i was i'll tell you what i was floored and i've been in seminary for about seven and a half years and i just graduated about a week ago i wrote my last paper i love it well congratulations what a great story too don't you wonder who that was i do i really want to know who that was i really want to know who it was was it a professor was it a pastor was it a parent who who did that that's awesome that is that's almost to the dollar man well done well done and you just love it when got god's fingerprints all over it this is a giving show on the dave ramsey show [Music] [Music] the total debt is around six hundred and forty thousand dollars i want him to come clean out a credit card that he doesn't know about i'm gonna probably pay student loans for the rest of my life i just don't even know where to begin and i don't know what to do i'm not scared welcome to the dave ramsey show live from the headquarters of ramsey solutions broadcasting from the dollar car rental studios it's the dave ramsey show character where that is dumb cash is king and the paid off home mortgage has taken the place of the bmw as the status symbol of choice i'm dave ramsey your host you jump in we'll talk about your life and your money dr john deloney ramsey personality and author of the best-selling book redefining anxiety is my co-host today this is the eve of christmas eve which can only mean one thing on the dave ramsey show our traditional giving show we always do a giving show as our last broadcast of the calendar year heading into christmas because god gave his only begotten son hate our debts with it and so we're going to talk about giving generosity we teach you to live like no one else so that later you can live and give like no one else so if you have a great giving story you call in and talk to dr john and me we want to hear your great giving story it could be when you gave something or when you receive something but it's inspiring to other people to hear great giving stories as a matter of fact this may be one of the more popular shows we do every year so much so that we're tempted to do them all year but we reserve them for this special day stacy is with us in houston texas hi stacy welcome to the dave ramsey show tell me your giving story hey dave i i actually have a story of receiving and giving on september the 17th of 2017 our son was killed tragically in a car wreck and um he was thank you he was 24 years old and he was married they were expecting their first child very soon in fact the baby was born 12 days after jacob passed away so in those days that followed the vehicle that they had was destroyed and there was no vehicle for daniella and the new baby and our community and jacob's employer rallied together and donated money to provide a vehicle for her um and so we were so blessed as a family by the generosity of our community and people that knew jacob and loved them and knew us and loved us that we wanted to give back to our community and we wanted to do something for the the seniors the seniors for our high school that were graduating so our family has always been fundraising like for cancer fundraisers and such so what we decided to do to honor jacob and to give back to the community was um we made homemade chocolate chip cookies and my husband fries uh pork skins and jacob's oldest brother put together a flag football tournament that we try to do annually but this year we were unable to do due to the cova crisis um but the first year that we gave uh the scholarships we were able to raise money to give seven um scholarships totaling fourteen thousand five hundred dollars we live in a very small town i know it said houston but we're actually in buena texas oh yeah um so uh that first like i said the first year we gave 14 500 and this last year uh we didn't get to have one of our events so we were a little bit shorter on funds but we were still able to give ten thousand dollars uh to the high school students seven high school students received a combined total of ten thousand dollars wow this fall and we can plan on continuing to do this as long as the lord allows us um we kind of took a break on cooking food during the kobe crisis but this christmas season we decided to try the cookie bake and this this cookie bake we raised a thousand dollars in about a week so we have a thousand dollars to go into our scholarship funds and very fortunately we found out that our company that we work for matches um they have a matching gift program so my husband and i both work for the same company and they'll match our donation at 50 up to a total of 2 500 so we continue to be blessed to be able to give back to the community here that we live in um so that's our our story we feel tremendously blessed by god by the people that he's put in our lives and i wanted to share our story so that some people may have gone through something similar may feel like they have no hope something bad has happened to them but there's always a way to take the bad and turn it into good um my favorite scripture that i've leaned on so much is romans 8 28 and we know that for those who love god and all things work together for good for those who are called according to his purpose all right well it's beautiful to hear you making meaning out of a dark dark time and blessing so many other people with your giving thank you yeah it's that's very touching it's unbelievably powerful um and you know it's interesting that um what what that uh you know giving you something to lay your hand to at some of the darkest moments of your entire life it gave you something to do that to to not quote turn it into a positive but just in the middle of your pain to do something positive and uh because you can't really turn his loss into a positive it's not that's impossible but but there can be good that comes of the the dark hours that you're walking through and and your pain and you just did something really really gorgeous with it that's so beautiful well done it's gotta feel great too it does feel good it's been a tremendous um part of our healing yeah for me personally it's like you know my child was 24 years old and you know when they're little you're always doing something for them and then when they get big you don't have to do things for them as much but you still do have to do some things but it's like when they're gone there's nothing left to do but now there is yeah well thank you so much for sharing and high five did the you know businesses get a lot of bad rap for being just money hungry grubbing jerks high five to the two businesses that in this story one of them helped out the wife of their employee that passed away they didn't have to do that and high five to her company for matching the donations up to a chunk yeah putting some good out into the world and the truth is that's generally what businesses do right that stories never get so they don't ever talk about that because they're going to talk about and cause division and cause other things so instead we get the beauty of this and we can see the bouquet of flowers it was made i love it uh over a a unbelievably difficult situation it's the eve of christmas eve which means that it's time to say merry christmas and it's time to stop and celebrate generosity and that's what we're doing today dr john dolone ramsey personality is my co-host and we're taking your calls about giving and about receiving and my team set this in front of me if you're still looking for great christmas deals you can also be a blessing and our famous 10 sale is still going that means that over 50 of our best-selling books envelope systems only ten dollars each number one bestseller the total money makeover approaching eight million copies now the new quick read that hit the best-seller list by dr john deloney 84 pages it's a couple chapters redefining anxiety what it is what it's not and how to get your life back is flying off the shelves we had to go to reprint twice just 10 bucks each and we extended our discount on the starter envelope systems and you can get them for only five dollars right now all kinds of goodies at daveramsey.com and uh the sale ends on december the 31st just a couple of days away when finally the year 2020 comes to a close one in the books man check it off maybe check it off this is the dave ramsey [Music] show [Music] folks it's an honor to tell you about the army national guard not only are they big supporters of our high school curriculum but they also give you the opportunity to impact your local communities whether your goals are to get an education serve your country or have a better life the army national guard can help get you there plus they offer unbelievable financial benefits secure your future today visit nationalguard.com to find out more [Music] dr john dolone ramsey personality is my co-host today on our annual giving show if you have a giving story or a receiving story that will inspire others to generosity that's what this show is about today open phones at triple eight eight two five five two two five faith is in cincinnati hey faith tell us your giving story hi dave and john how are you great i'm in college and last year someone anonymously donated 25 000 so i could graduate debt free wow that's a lot of money yeah you have no idea who did this no idea no it was handled through my pastor and the church wrote the check so i wouldn't find out wow that's cool what are you studying linguistics and i have an internship with a bible translation nonprofit so i'm studying that side of language learning and translation so someone felt like that they were investing not only into you but into the ministry that you're going to be doing right yeah which was very affirming because i was kind of thinking maybe it might be just my plan and not god's but um i think god and somebody else believes in what i'm trying to do so wow that that you're right affirming is a good word that's like the ultimate high five a 25 000 high five yeah yeah and i i don't know who it was because i wasn't necessarily um checking in with my church family i moved about an hour away from my hometown so i don't know how they found out about where i was or how long i'd been in college and trying to paid off uh cash flow as i went so um so um i'll graduate december of 2021 and i had a question because i'll have about 13 000 left after graduation and i want to give it to someone else but is it wise for me to put aside an emergency fund or just give it all away i think you should ask god what he thinks you ought to do and i think you'll have a good indication based on two things one is the circumstances will present themselves to where it's wise to do what you're thinking and two you'll have a sense of peace about it okay if you don't have a sense of peace if you have a troubled spirit about it and or the circumstances are sideways if both those things don't line up then you're probably supposed to hold on to it okay so the only way you would release this and i love your spirit that you're willing to pass it on and continue to pay it forward and uh it might be that that spirit is activated a decade from now and there wouldn't be there wouldn't be anything in noble about that um there was no expectation of by this giver that you pass it on if there was any left there was no stipulation uh you just are unbelievably blessed and want to continue that that pattern and i appreciate that um i think the intent of the giver and really for that matter i'll even speak for god momentarily it was probably to make sure you get set up and get on them to get on this mission and i think that's a first priority above the pay it forward idea that's my opinion okay and it's worth what you paid for it by the way [Laughter] thank you very much so you know but here the the thing i always look for is if i do not have peace about something or if the circumstances are screaming at me otherwise then i or especially if both of them aren't there if i don't have peace and the circumstances are screaming then i i'm going you know i i i don't think that's what this is for that you know god wants to line these things up and so uh but for instance if you were to leave and uh leave college and you were to walk into a a linguistics thing with the amount of money paid being paid to you that you could support yourself and you have housing lined up and you have your transition lined up and you got furniture and your utilities are set up and you don't need any money and you have this true this unbelievable piece then maybe now is the time to pay it forward but maybe this money is to be used for those kinds of things and then later on you'll have the opportunity to look back and go i remember back when i was in college and i'm gonna write that check i just i i love that and i think your wisdom is wise i think when somebody gives something to us that we don't expect we instantly feel this burden that we've gotta now it's our job we gotta go do something right away and there's something about putting yourself in a position so that you can secretly make sure that somebody else can give somebody else 25 000 and that takes years to be able to earn that kind of money to be able to give freely that way what a gift yeah very powerful well done very well done melanie is in uh if i pick up the right phone okay kelly help me out picked up i hit the wrong button here thanks all right now let's try this there she is melanie is in des moines iowa hi melanie how are you i'm good dave how are you better than i deserve tell us your giving story um it's not really a surprise to anyone that 2020 was an absolutely horrific year um but i went through a lot this year that goes even deeper than the pandemic unfortunately i started out 2020 in a really terrible marriage full of heartbreak and pain and just tremendous amounts of hurt and i was carrying it on my own and was really secluded in that and finally had the confidence and the courage to confide in my sister and her husband my name is there megan and ben and my story is really truly about them once i confided in them they quickly began helping in any way possible in encouraging me and really just supporting me by both spending countless hours on the phone with me during the darkest moments of my life and from moments where i was crying on the bathroom floor to moments where i just really felt like i couldn't continue on and all the time we're just really trying to make sure that i felt safe and secure to do whatever i needed to do to be safe for the rest of my life and they also during that time converted their basement into an apartment for my son and i to move into if the time came that i needed to leave my marriage and i made the courageous decision in march to leave my marriage after continued attempts to fight to save it had totally failed um and at that point my sister megan spent well over a hundred hours between paperwork and communicating directly with the lawyers and helping me work through the loss of my marriage just countless hours doing things for me while maintaining raising her daughters and working full-time and being in a pandemic both her and ben came out to support me as i packed up my house and left my husband and my sister helped me drive across the country i was living in seattle at the time and we drove from seattle to iowa in an epic 26 hour straight road trip with my less than two-year-old son and my dog that's like a 50-hour road trip there yeah it was not a short trip by any means and then i moved straight into the into the basement that they had constructed for me and the most amazing part of that though is that they've allowed me to live here entirely rent free um which has allowed me to pay off every ounce of debt i had accrued during my fight for custody and everything with my marriage ending my parents and ben and megan had paid for the lawyer's fee and i paid all of that back to them i've also managed to entirely fund a six-month emergency fund from my son and myself and i'm well into saving for a down payment on a house now wow um and it's just truly i cannot even be more thankful so because of them they pour the elixir on the ashes and you were rebirthed out of the ashes absolutely i couldn't have said it better myself and they've just given me a safe place to live and to recover and to mourn and to heal and it's been everything i could have ever asked for and more a lot more and i've also i i can't even say that that's it because i was also blessed my uh brother-in-law ben as a pastor of a congregation out here in des moines and one sunday i was in church and i completely broke down and i was crying in my sister's arms at the loss of my marriage and a beautiful couple that i refer to only as my guardian angels approached my brother-in-law asking if they could fund me getting back on my feet and they have anonymously given to me and my son multiple times and continue to do so in order for me to just survive wow god is going to make sure you recover that's pretty amazing you got people all around you and he's seen to it that's very powerful well done melanie thank you for sharing that beautiful stuff this is the annual giving show here on the dave ramsey show one of the things that makes the dave ramsey show unique from other shows is that we genuinely care about our listeners that's why we are very intentional about choosing our advertisers blinds.com offers high quality window treatments at unbelievable prices and then their customer service is truly unbeatable they make it simple to shop for blinds shades and interior shutters from home with easy online ordering and free shipping right to your door and blinds.com will help you every step of the way just like they've helped thousands of my listeners with free design help by phone and online plus they guarantee the perfect fit go today and take advantage of this week's special offer [Music] it's our annual giving show on the eve of christmas eve dr john deloney ramsey personality author of the best-selling book redefining anxiety is my co-host today here on the air we're taking calls and comments from the lobby from people who want to tell a giving story to inspire generosity it could be a time you gave or a time you received i don't care all i care is that it's inspiring and dustin magen i'm matan i got that wrong dude you got it know him well has been with us a year and a half is on the ramsey trusted team he works here at ramsey for the last year and a half has a great giving story so he dropped by the lobby on our debt-free stage so dustin tell us your giving story my giving story is a receiving story um 13 years ago my wife and i were in the middle of adopting our first son and um we were fundraising for it so we baked pies and we're telling people hey for a pie just give us a random donation whatever you're led to give us so one sunday a member of the church comes up comes up and asks tammy questions about the adoption and that kind of thing and then asked so how much do you need and my wife just kind of flippantly said ten thousand dollars you know not thinking much of it and he goes okay next week she's delivering the pie to him out in the parking lot and gives gives them the pie he hands her a folded up check and she don't want to be rude and look at it right there so thanks and comes in the church i see her coming to church she opens it up and is just stunned mouth open stunned and so she comes over to me shows it to me as for ten thousand dollars wow ten grand i said honey you should ask for twenty [Laughter] and that just sent us on a wonderful journey that adoption and then even in the hospital uh when our son was born the birth grandmother slid us to check for five thousand dollars wow we're like adoption's super easy so easy then we adopted two more and realized this not it's not it's not easy but amazing very hard but i i am convinced adoption is close to god's heart that suffer the little children to come unto me i just uh he adopts us you know and it's just um paul talks about that real clearly in scripture and so what you and your family have done is amazing and for that guy to get to come alongside you is also amazing so you get to you get to experience your giving by adopting and um and you're receiving by adopting but you're also receiving you know you're giving a pie and you're getting a ten thousand dollar check for it yeah it was a good business model yeah it's like yeah that better have been an excellent it was not just thinking it was not you know why you weren't even biking paws you're proud of come on man come on my ten thousand dollar product oh yeah okay are you sure are you still in contact with this gentleman uh no um you know he's up in church in in anchorage alaska and we've since moved so lost touch but uh we became friends yeah absolutely and the important point is they weren't a rich family you know they just got a little chunk of money i just it hold it with an open hand exactly and that meant so much to us and obviously will always mean so much to us and he's a part of our son that family is a part of our son forever sure that's right absolutely what a beautiful story dustin that's amazing yeah wow so my challenge is when this lands on youtube go ahead and pull the clip and find him and send it to him absolutely yeah i didn't want to steal his crown from glory and mention their names yeah that's all right it's all good i'll send it to him you made the point and it's a beautiful story yeah anytime you can assist in adoption and we had one another hour with uh infertility somebody assisting in that and it's just powerful it's powerful well done thank you for sharing that brother thank you open phones at triple eight eight two five five two two five you know you can hold money with a really really tight fist uh and it won't get away right but no more will get in and when you hold it with an open hand like that that's the sign of kindness even a dog understands that yep come here yeah you double up your fist even a dog understands that i mean you know it's just that's a double fist is a sign of anger in any culture yep and when you have it when you have it held tight like that just remember that when you die some undertaker that you don't know make a minimum wage is going to pry that hand open and take it from you because you can't take it with you yeah i never saw a router truck falling a hearse never all right rachel's with us in montana hey rachel welcome to the dave ramsey show and our special giving edition tell us your giving story hi dave hi dr john um so i was in college and i was living at home with my parents trying to save money in cash flow school and i was trying to save up for my second semester and i was working at a local restaurant and i waited on a lady one day who spent quite a bit of time uh in my section and i kind of got to talking to her and letting her know my story that i was paying cash for school and she said you know that's so great because i'm i'm a self-made woman and i i admire those qualities about you and i was actually going to sponsor my nephew to go to school and he won't even register for classes he has no motivation so she was really happy to see all the motivation that i had and she said you know how much do you lack for school and books and i said well just six hundred dollars and so she left me a hundred dollar tip that day which was more than generous but then showed up later at the end of my shift with a cashier's check for six hundred dollars and said thank you you know thank you for sharing your story with me um i want to sponsor you next semester if you come show me that you got a 4.0 so she paid for that you know that 600 and then the whole next semester yeah because you went and got a 4.0 i made sure i got that 4.0 thinking motivation well done absolutely so you graduated in what uh business management okay cool and how many years ago was that uh it was about gosh probably five years ago now wow okay cool so uh what do you think the chances are that when you're what do you think the chances are that when you're in your 30s or 40s that you're going to be sitting in a diner somewhere writing a check like that oh i fully intend on it i think i think that that was hugely inspiring to see someone have that kind of generosity and believe in me and and support me in that way when she didn't even know me she didn't all she knew was just the time i had spent with her waiting on her that day in my section yeah i i think she knew you yeah [Laughter] people who go through life looking for people to support and invest in they identify it they can say they can feel it smell it yeah you smell it she knew you she knew you better than you knew you probably right then well i'm proud of you well done and a great story thank you for sharing that very very cool open phones at triple eight eight two five five two two five larry stewart was uh from kansas city and um i got to meet larry and i actually had him on the show a couple of times before he passed away of cancer and he was known as secret santa and his story started out that way he walked into a diner in mississippi and didn't have a dime and he was hungry and he sat down and ordered food anyway fully intending to act like he lost his wallet or something and not have the money and he's talking to the guy over the counter that owns the little diner and the guy realized that he was broke and realized he was running running a game and he walked around behind him and uh reached down under his stool and he said hey man i think you dropped a 20 bill and he the diner guy planted it you know handed it back to him and larry became a billionaire later uh in the cable industry and he would dress up as santa claus and go and hand out thousands and thousands and thousands of dollars randomly on the streets of new orleans after uh after katrina on the streets of new york after 9-1-1 he would go into areas that had been hit by something and uh he was wildly generous ended up actually writing a whole thing up on his website before he passed away on how to be a secret santa wow and so he's wearing santa claus outfit and he's got cops with him because he's walking around with thirty or forty thousand dollars right suitcase right there and he's just handing out a thousand here 500 here and just walking around looking at people and just walking through the grocery store giving people money out there carrying holding their bag out in the parking lot and just hands them money and then not not even like that you don't even know what's going on he just randomly is throwing money around just like and i have to believe that was more fun than earning it oh you bet i mean the guy was he was a fireball i mean it's everything about him was fun but i mean you can't be that wildly generous and not be fun it's impossible i love it this is the dave ramsey show [Music] [Music] dr john deloney ramsay personality is my co-host today on the eve of christmas eve as we do our annual giving show thank you for joining us call in and tell us your story about giving or receiving an inspirational generosity story to inspire everyone listening to greater generosity more creative generosity generosity that has more impact and just in general giving barbara is with us in sacramento hey barbara welcome to the dave ramsey show tell us your giving story hi dave and john thank you it's a pleasure and an honor to speak with you so my giving story unfortunately begins with my my mom passing away on thanksgiving and she was 91 years old and she lived an amazing life never a burden to anyone but what i didn't realize is that when you lose your mom you could feel anger and i did and so i was fighting with my siblings and i felt hurt and sad and mad but one day after storming out of my mom's condo that we were cleaning and i was so upset i was driving home and it came to me my inspiration came to me give my whole portion of my mom's ira to my favorite charity st john's program for real change this incredible program lists women and their kids off the streets gives them drug and alcohol treatment counseling they can get their ged daycare job training and housing and they were my favorite charity and i wanted to do something in a big way so i called them and let them know that i was giving them my ira which is going to be about um 28 000 and it made me instantly feel 100 better i was like smiling and joyful and um so i just that is my giving story and i'm gonna be working with um and also in addition i didn't need the money thank you i am retired and i was like what am i going to do with the money why don't i give it away in a really big way and so we're going to honor my mom with a plaque or a bench or something but that's what i decided to do just so you went back to cleaning out the condo and you weren't mad anymore well i wish it's not quite not quite that simple is it it wasn't quite that simple but i'm still grateful and i'm so grateful for the both of you because i listen constantly and here's the thing i got out of debt paid i'm retired but i never budgeted and you know what i'm gonna start budgeting and maybe i can give more away it feels good doesn't it it does feel good it feels good to say it to tell you the story so thank you for that too because it's a tough day today well it is and i want you to know that there are thousands of people across the country experiencing the first christmas season without somebody and that that weight that you feel that anger that sadness that overwhelming i don't know how we're gonna get through this finding somebody else to bless finding somebody else to give to is such a release it's such a relief it's such a gift for everybody involved and you may not have gone back to that that uh condo less angry but when you sent that check on man i i just i can just see you walking lighter and taller right yep wow what a blessing powerful powerful well done thank you laura's a beautiful story and i'm um it sounds like your mom lived a beautiful life i'm really sorry she's gone for you thank you thank you yeah she was amazing well i wish both of you a merry christmas and a happy holiday thanks for all the work you do and for the positivity that you send out into the world every day it it makes a difference for all of us well thank you we appreciate you calling in and uh merry christmas to you too wow you know there i i've often connected generosity to gratitude and gratitude to generosity as a cause and effect both directions really um but i never think about it with the other g word grief yeah and um the three could get stirred up and make some really cool gumbo that's exactly right yeah grief gratitude generosity grateful for mom her life and how beautiful it was and that she was self-sufficient she lived on her own she left a ira to each of the kids in a sense and um you know grateful for all the good times and all that and in the middle of that it creates generosity and in the middle of the grief yeah it's just there's a lot going on there yeah and dave i i just i can't iterate enough i can't say it over and over again people have been we've been seeing the statistics the anxieties going up the depression's going up the grief is going up and if you will just stop and find somebody to give to find a group of people to give to let some of that stuff pass out of you and through you to someone if you don't have a diamond so okay go down the go down to the homeless shelter and serve soup just go look somebody in the eye and say hey you i want you to know that i love you go serve soup go surf sleep for an hour and talk go pick up trash in your neighborhood go do something on behalf of somebody else get out of your head and go be for someone else and it just has a way of healing us from the inside out yeah well i mean it's a it it's probably not appropriate when we're talking about serious mental health issues and comparing them with uh this but there's something really selfish about a pity party absolutely it's it's you get stuck wondering why did this happen to me and what did i do and you become a common denominator yeah instead of how can i help how can i go make sure someone else isn't going through this and we all rise together with them i lost a friend of mine in cancer about a decade ago and he was a savant a philosopher kind of a character uh classic i mean a redneck savant but you know still you know what i'm talking about and um he said he got cancer and he's sitting on the thing and got doc coming in and goes look this is bad and he goes that's strange i was wondering what he's gonna feel like if somebody said that huh and he said i never thought why me i thought why not me why not other people get it yeah why not me and i thought wow that's a different outlook because the pity party is why me right poor old pitiful me well you know and we all have them i mean i can have a big one i'm i'm a drama queen so i can have you said it not me i can hey hey hey hey hey but yeah but if you're able to to immediately whatever problem life lays at your feet if you're able to back out 30 000 feet and say why not me why not me and we all dave we're all on the clock right we're all on the clock why wouldn't i but when someone says your clock's short now you know oh i can really start living turn 60 i think i'm gonna jump out of an airplane why wouldn't i well why not with a good parachute right yeah and somebody else with another one so i did it it was fun it was actually actually all really fun darcy's with us in denver darcy we're on the clock tell us your giving story right quick hi dave and john um i made the decision in august to leave my toxic marriage and because of that i have found a great place for my kids and i to move into but we had no furniture we had nothing moving out and i opened up to some of my friends about my decision to move i actually talked to john shortly after i made the move so hi don hey good to talk to you darcy you too um so i opened up to a few of my friends and just told them they have known what had been going on but they didn't know when i was going to move and within a week of me telling them my decision and all of this they went out and they found people to either donate or they bought furniture for me and my kids they moved everything in on the trip the last triple digit weekend of september they moved three flights of stairs all of the furniture set everything up filled our cupboards and our fridge with food they filled up our bathroom with toilet paper and cleaning supplies everything you could possibly imagine how are you doing now you need in an apartment i am actually doing incredible um it's been so humbling honestly and the kicker yeah the kicker is that they loaned us their van until we were done with the divorce um because we only had one vehicle for our family and um so they loaned us their van they paid for our subscription to streaming services so we wouldn't have to pay that um well they take great care of you darcy that's incredible what a beautiful story man that's great friends show chance of redemption everybody gather around here we go game on that's right i love it that puts us our the dave ramsey show in the books [Music] welcome to the dave ramsey show you can be intentional about your character you can have money and a career you are the hero in your story [Music] live from the headquarters of ramsey solutions broadcasting from the dollar car rental studios it's the dave ramsey show where debt is dumb cash is king and the paid off home mortgage has taken the place of the bmw as the status symbol of choice i'm dave ramsey your host thank you for joining us dr john deloney ramsey personality best-selling author is my co-host today this is the eve of christmas eve so it's our annual giving show meaning that we are taking calls from you as you tell inspiring stories about generosity whether you were generous or someone was generous to you and uh hey we uh we want to talk to you the phone number is triple eight eight two five five two two five now moments ago john right before i went on the air uh our radio team sent me a fabulous email just a minute ago i'm so proud of them speaking of giving our ratings on the dave ramsey show have gone up dramatically in 2020 obviously people need the information on getting control of their money in a pandemic year and so we kind of cheated in that regard but we also was in an election year there was a lot of reasons for people listen to political talk radio and uh instead they've been listening to us and also our number of affiliates has gone have gone up we've just added um a whole bunch of them coming on the first week of january uh we will be at 638 radio stations uh rush limbaugh our good friend is at uh 651 last count we had on him uh sean hannity is at 5.75 but has more listeners than i have because he's got some pre a lot of premium positions and so he's uh legitimately the number two talk radio guy in america and without a doubt we're number three there's no one else in the 500s or the 400s wow it drops down to 375 to get to number four and uh that's because of you folks out there and you give us of your time when you turn this show on your generosity towards us is amazing thank you and those ratings and that popularity has allowed us to not only become uh well one of the top three uh talk radio shows in america uh but also um we're the number five podcast on all of itunes in the world last year with the exact same thing and so there's about 10 million of you listening on radio and about 10 million million of you listening on podcast roughly and so thank you guys we appreciate it it has been a a wild and wicked ride this year right and uh i think it's important to note that um with the spike of listeners in 2020 you had one new key addition dave who might that have been that could have just helped send these ratings through the roof you know i got rachel cruz on here pretty regularly and then uh and she started teaching us about humility she did so she did a good job well played my mom's out here for crying out loud i'm just trying let me just tell you it is the uh the rock star of 2020 definitely has been the doctor john delaney ramsey and the uh redefining anxiety book is flying off the shelves no kidding it really really is all kidding aside uh and um no i'm having some fun i know you are your your faux humor is just amazing oh so we're gonna be generous here and we're gonna take generous calls from you guys calls about generosity and uh it has it you know one of the things we did do this year is we added a co-host to the show and so every day one of the ramsey personalities is on the air and that has been a huge addition all joking and prodding and kicking and butt kissing aside and all that stuff but the uh you know john's a huge addition and the uh guys and that work on my show work on his show as well on his podcast and taking live calls in the mental health field and some of those are rather tricky not exactly your mother's 401k question that he gets so um but he does have two phds and i don't so there's always that he's doctor squared there we go there we go there we go all right let's let's get out of this i think we're stuck here all right kim is with us in dayton ohio hey kim welcome to the dave ramsey show hi dave and dr john i am so excited to talk to you you too tell us your giving story well i'll tell you i am a nurse anesthetist i went to anaesthesia school as a single mom and i've been blessed and i just want to give a shout out to all the crnas out there amen and okay this story is true it happened to me about i would say eight or ten years ago well it was about three weeks before christmas and i was in the dollar store and i when that i put my stuff up on the counter and the lady asked me to put the clothes sign at the end of my step because she says i have to get out of here and get to my other job and i'm like oh wow that's a bummer you have to work here and then you go to another job she says yeah i'm a single mom and you know i have to take care of my kids and i said hey i get it i'm a single mom too and so i put my uh put the sign there and we just got to talking and i said what what's your other job and she said i'm a nurse's aide and i'm like oh wow that's cool i said well i'm a nurse and actually i went back and did anesthesia and i said why don't you go to nursing school and she said oh i couldn't do that i don't have the money i'm not smart enough on and on you know so we talked for a couple minutes and i put my hand in my pocket and all i had was two twenties and i pulled it out and i said here take this and give something you know get something for your kids for christmas she said i can't take your money i said listen god has blessed me and i'm supposed to pass it on so just please take it and i also had a business card and i gave it to her and i said if you ever want to talk you know you can call me or email me whatever and i walked out of the store and i didn't think about it again and i bet you it was two to three years later probably three wow i'm in surgery i'm in the locker room changing out of my scrubs getting ready to go home and my phone rings and i don't recognize the number and i never answer those calls but for whatever reason i answered the phone and she said kim this is kelly do you remember me i'm like no and she said well the dollar store and i said oh yeah yeah i remember you and she said i just want you to know that i kept your card and i looked at it every day and i thought about you and she said i'm about to graduate from nursing school wow oh my gosh the room started to get dark i had to sit down i'm like this is a god moment right now and then she said i want to know if you'll help me study i'm like well yeah sure so she came over you know within a week or so and helped her study with her for her finals and i don't know six eight weeks later i went to her graduation wow you can do it that's right i mean it was five minutes i didn't think about it again but anyway i did keep in touch with her and i called her last week when kelly your kelly called me to see or emailed me to see if i wanted to be on the show and i told her i said you aren't going to believe this but i'm going to tell our story on the dave ramsey show i just started yelling it's all true it was great wow 40 bucks in a kind word i love it that's a good one well done kim well done all you do is just stop and notice people instead of being jerks to them as you go through the line it's not hard that's amazing isn't it wow what a what a hey you know what you can do it what that'll do for somebody this is the dave ramsey show [Music] [Applause] [Music] cliff and i joined christian healthcare ministries because we really liked the concept of christians sharing each other's burdens and we really experienced that firsthand when cliff was diagnosed with heart disease christian healthcare ministries or chm is not health insurance but rather a federally approved exemption to the health care law it's a time-tested model to help take care of your health care costs it's christians helping other christians by sharing each other's medical bills adjusting to a new system of paying for health care was kind of tricky but that's where chm stepped in and they really help navigate that water with the hospital and the payment want to see if chm is the right fit for your healthcare needs check out our website at chministries.org backslash budget that's chministries.org backslash budget it was just such a relief to know that financial burden was going to be taken care of [Music] [Applause] [Music] if you feel like you should have made more progress paying off your debt by now i get it when it comes to paying off debt sometimes it feels like a grind and no reward here's the thing when you try to do it on your own you're more likely to fall back into old habits and lose hope and that's when you stop making progress that's why you need ramsey plus ramsey pluses are step by money plan that will give you the accountability and the practical tips you need to pay off your debt faster than you can on your own when you have someone in your corner cheering you on you make the tough choices that get you where you need to be ramsey plus helps you go from sort of to all in so you can finally keep more of your money to start your free trial of ramsey plus text the word trial to 33 789 that's text trial two three three seven eight nine our question of the day comes from blinds.com find out for yourself why blinds.com is the number one online retailer of custom window coverings you get free samples free shipping and with new promos all the time you get the best deal the promo code magic word is ramsey today's question comes from dante in tennessee dante writes i am 27 and still live with my mom who's a widow i want to move out but my mom's really attached to me how should i tell her i want to be more independent and want to move out dante you should be gentle and you should be kind and loving and be direct tell her that you want to be more independent and that you are ready to get your own place tell her with a good spirit you pay for the meal but be honest and direct and kind and it may hurt her feelings she may be sad but she's gonna understand that it's time for her baby boy to go and those are always hard yeah this is going to be really good for her because you used the word attached and she's a widow right and um you're uh you're feeling a companionship role that you shouldn't be right i think i think i don't like that word and i'm with you and she is also feeling a purpose role for him that he needs to move on from as well yeah he needs to get on with it for sure there's no question about that but for her sake the completion of her grieving from the loss of her husband and moving on with her life and having her own dignity her own independence standalone emotional state uh doesn't need to be leaning on her 27 year old that's right it probably is it's uh it's probably stunting her from going through the grieving process the rest of the way her finding am i wrong no not at all i don't like that word attached that ran all over me when i saw it that's right and this doesn't mean that we're not still having lunch every sunday together we're having breakfast and things like that yeah but the there's a there's a one degree or 1.25 degrees too far of uh relational connection here that's that's not good for her right and so you're going to be doing her a favor by moving out that's what i'm saying as hard as that will feel oh it's going to be awful yeah it's going to be bloody yep and uh and uh because there's because there's it's it's too there's the roots are too far in they got to be ripped out it's gonna it's gonna hurt but uh it has to be done be gentle direct yeah be kind calm do not raise your voice use lower your octave even intentionally because when we get nervous our octave goes up and so um you know when you're in conflict and so just mom it's gonna be okay you do your chris hogan imitation right and uh right mother mother it's going to be fine mother mother all right dan is in charlotte north carolina hey dan how are you man hey great merry christmas merry christmas tell us your giving story yes i've been the recipient of a very generous gift from dear friends i'm a quadriplegic so i've been paralyzed um almost 14 years and my accessible van is basically 14 years old as well so i have some amazing friends from church um my friend charlie and we actually co-lead a small group together and so he drives me to group sometimes and is aware of the the man's in great overall good condition but um each time i drive somewhere i literally say a prayer just thanking god for keeping that thing going because i've had those kind of cars yeah so 2007 dodge you don't expect it you know to go on forever um and so charlie and his wife are just amazing generous people built up a business uh for just multiple decades and recently sold it and their mindset was just how they're going to be generous and loving and show god's love and generosity to people and so he told me that he wanted to buy a new van for me um and just uh two actually a month ago because it was actually on thanksgiving wow we uh we made that yeah and wheelchair accessible we're not talking about a cheap purchase here this is serious yeah um yeah it's a very very large purchase um something that um i didn't i didn't quite know what where where the next one would be coming from um so it speaks to his heart uh that he's a generous individual but doesn't even take credit for him and knows that god gave him the idea just to show love yeah towards me that's powerful so how old are you i'm 34. okay so this happened when you were 20 what happened yes i was a junior in college and i was on a missions trip in mexico and i did a back flip and uh injured my spinal cord oh my god wow oh my goodness yeah wow well i gotta tell you it's a beautiful story what a great guy and what a huge purchase too and that gives you freedom beyond money and beyond words doesn't it uh yeah incredibly so yeah what an affirmation of the type of friend you have been to this gentleman over the years as well i i wouldn't take any credit there that's just i've been uh god's been good and generous to my mom and i um so i'm yeah thankful for despite challenging life circumstances that just to have a life and people to to love and be loved by yeah it's beautiful man wow very very cool good for you and a great story dan thank you for sharing that so joni erickson tada has become a friend over the years and uh similar thing uh dove into a swimming pool and they're running water ant and or want enough water in it or whatever and um uh broke her back and she's been in a chair for gosh man uh 40 years maybe i don't know maybe more and they've got a huge ministry of just uh chairs yeah they collect wheelchairs people donate wheelchairs and they give them all over the world and uh tens of thousands of wheelchairs over the years it's powerful and she's i've spoken with her and she's a great speaker and great teacher and she's actually uh did a devotional here one time years ago and uh but a similar similar story to that and um her ken her husband ken is a uh an incredible guy but they have a wonderful ministry uh and it um i mean she has a unique ability to raise money for people in the chair because she's in one you know so and she's uh so such a powerful speaker and such a powerful force of nature uh and dan it sounds like the same thing that's very cool that's super cool man yeah that's a good observation too because there's something about uh giving it is uh i probably shouldn't say this but it is just tougher to give to unattractive people of unattractive character yeah you you know if dan was a whiner that's right you know that's cold i shouldn't say that but that would make it more difficult for most people including me if you rub shoulders next to a good friend for years and years and you see how much good they're putting into the world how much positivity they are making of a messy ugly you want to write a 50 000 check and buy him a van you can do it that's right because it becomes an roi in your community yeah right it's an investment in your neighborhood it's an investment it does speak highly of down it really does that's a good observation it really does and i don't we probably don't like to say that kind of stuff out loud but i just did this is kind of what i do no there's something special about leaning into somebody whether it's a waitress that we've heard today or somebody at the dollar store they see something they see something in them you see something in them often people can't see in in their own mirror reflection yeah and maybe you're maybe the uh maybe just the spirit is revealed maybe holy spirit's revealing it to you that this guy is just this is this is one you should invest in this is one of my kids yeah yeah it's good it's good this is the dave ramsey show folks it's an honor to tell you about the army national guard not only are they big supporters of our high school curriculum but they also give you the opportunity to impact your local communities whether your goals are to get an education serve your country or have a better life the army national guard can help get you there plus they offer unbelievable financial benefits secure your future today visit nationalguard.com to find out more [Music] live like no one else so that later you can live and give like no one else put yourself in a position to be outrageously generous on the eve of christmas eve this is our annual giving show dr john deloney ramsey personality is my co-host today our 500th team member years ago when we announced it we exploded a confetti cannon on the stage beside him he didn't know it was coming scared him to death and uh now we have 967 team members by the way so he started with us five years ago is steve lind in the round on the ramsey plus team one of our directors of sales there and uh he is on the debt free stage here in the lobby to tell us a giving story hey steve hey guys merry christmas merry christmas to you yeah so like you said i work on the um the ramsay plus team and the team that i lead works with churches specifically that catch a vision and want to get their whole congregation into ramsey plus to start changing their life and so used to be financial peace university church-wide now it's much more comprehensive and it's all under ramsey plus absolutely um so uh we um we got a call back in the spring from uh from a young lady who remains uh wants to be anonymous so that's why i'm here um uh and i wanted to tell her story so she got a call from her grandfather who lives across the country from her and he invited her to attend his church's online easter service right because churches all went online back then and she attended the service online and every day she has a time of of walking and talking with god in the morning and she was as she was doing that after that service um she kept getting this idea that i want to put my grandfather's whole church through financial peace and what would that look like and how could i how could i do that and she's grown up living by our principals she's 24 she's cash flowing in an mba 24. she's amazing and so she called us uh she went online found our page uh called us and we started having conversations with her and we even she you know she has this this crazy idea and we even try to do our best to make sure that the idea that she had in this decision that she was going to make was the right decision for her so she had some money stocked away for giving and it had it just happened to be the exact amount that she needed to to buy this for her church so for her grandfather's church so uh in august she um called the pastor of the church and worked it out with him and they have about 65 of their of their churches in ramsey plus today and they're they're budgeting for the first time and they're living on living on our plan and and you know we trusted that that that church is going to be healthier because of it wow powerful yeah that is so cool yeah a 24 year old 24 year old puts her grandpa's whole church through ramsay plus and so there which gives them access to financial peace university every dollar bank sync and everything right yeah two classes i'll turn this into an ad because people need to know what this means i mean yeah they need to know that this means that whole that whole congregation is going to learn how to money handle money god's ways now that's right when a whole congregation starts doing that in their own home uh the church no longer has to worry about giving because it automatically occurs that's right and it's going to give a whole community of people the same language yeah right they start becoming each other's accountability partner and their own community members and you know what's the irony of this is is that there's somebody there who has a 14 year old that's now going through this that 10 years from now will be that 24 year old that's exactly right i mean there's financial peace babies in that church that as they grow up their lives are changed their family tree has changed their direction has changed their mentality has changed because that's what happened to her you said she grew up this way right that's right that's right but so this this is uh this is turning and looking back and going i'm gonna tip my hat that's right that's exactly it wow that is so powerful now we have a lot of churches do church-wide ramsey plus it's not that unusual a lot a lot of them do it but i think this is the first time a 24 year old bought it for a whole church i think it is as well i think that i think that's pretty impressive yeah it is special i'm amazed wow well steve thanks for stopping by and thanks for all the stuff you guys do in ramsey plus that whole team is they work their tails off man and there's uh they're working with churches with individuals and through some really challenging things this year because uh we had 12 000 financial peace university classes scheduled to start and then we didn't that's right uh and then they had to all go online and go virtual as a pastor friend of mine he said one night we were sitting around in march and he goes and just like that we're all televangelists that's it so uh but that's that's you know we felt the same way here and uh this team has done a great job pivoting and and still serving and getting this out and this right here is an example of that that whole church going 65 and the first swath that's strong yeah that's well done yeah steve thanks for dropping by merry christmas you bet thank you merry christmas very cool stuff meredith is in spartanburg south carolina meredith merry christmas tell us your giving story merry christmas dave and to you dr john so almost 25 years ago i met my husband i did not realize i was marrying him and dave ramsey um but i am very thankful hey i married my wife and dave it was weird for me only thing weird was those doggone envelopes um you know we we didn't buy anything if it wasn't in the envelope so you can imagine uh my surprise our very first christmas together he suggested we buy some bicycles um for some children that were in the safe home um you know very selfishly i thought that money could be used for a gift for me but my husband's common sense and his big heart kind of won me over so um they had like a spaghetti dinner you know at the school that that served the safe home and and we had purchased two bikes that was all we could you know scrape together to do and a little boy received one of them and he was just precious and there was this little girl charmaine um she received the other bike and we just fell in love with her just absolutely fell in love with her um my husband was teaching her to ride that little door explorer bicycle and i sat with crystal charlene's mom and you know just she told me about their life and how hard you know their life had been even prior to being in the safe home and so for a few years we kept up with charmaine and and crystal my husband would go eat lunch with charmaine at her school and um my husband had been saving and those blessed envelopes for this very ugly lazy boy recliner and thank god we gave it to crystal for deposit on her first little apartment and um you know we gave her some furniture and um you know but all of a sudden they were gone and we absolutely lost touch with them and and you know we continued through the years to buy those bicycles every year even when we had our two sons we just continued to do that and then fast forward to january of of 2019 um my precious husband following very routine surgery died of a blood clot and so as we approached last christmas my boys and i really just were just aimlessly wandering through the season and one of my kids just suggested you know we really should honor dad and we we need to buy bicycles we do it every year so let's do it so um i agree you know you guys don't need to buy me a gift and they agreed so we just got to be really generous and we bought um a large number of bicycles and so um i got with the principal and they don't do the dinner anymore and any of that stuff but um so we went to the school one afternoon and they had a couple of staff members there helping us unload all these bikes out of my son's truck and um one of the staff members just looked really familiar and almost about the same time i realized it was charmaine and she realized it was me and she was just kind of looking around and i realized just because of her eyes that she was looking for my husband too and so i had to tell her you know that he passed away and she was devastated and i couldn't quite understand i understand devastation we love that but i couldn't understand her level from devastation and it was then that she told me that he had given her the greatest gift that she had ever received and that was of hope wow wow wow powerful thank you meredith what a blessing i can't breathe nope thank you meredith [Music] now [Music] our scripture of the day luke 2 11 today in the town of david a savior has been born to you he is the messiah the lord ruth carter stapleton said christmas is the most truly is most truly christmas when we celebrate it by giving the light of love to those who need it most generosity takes a lot of forms today we've been taking calls from folks on the eve of christmas eve on our annual giving show we're going to take a couple more dr john deloney is my co-host today it takes a lot of forms sometimes it's just a smile and sometimes it's just an atta boy and a girl sometimes it's my hardest one is not saying something and sometimes that's really generous i've benefited from that gift dave or even not doing something right just uh not responding not responding and um because my tendency is to hit back i didn't grow up in a neighborhood where we were where passivity was taught it was quite the opposite so but it's it's sometimes it's a generous act an act of great courage to not respond and some of you are in situations with family members this week where you need to not respond you're out there and you're listening and you're going i love christmas because the family's around and by the way the family's around and you know we all have that right because if you think there's not crazy in your family it probably means it's just you there's family crazy in every family it's for the joy of the holidays so sometimes generosity is just you know it's okay i don't have to have a big debate with you on politics this year i don't have a big debate with you about masks hey i have another glass of something there you know yes wow i'll pour move on move on and sometimes it's money and you know baby walking around put yourself in a position that you're walking around with some some fun money in your pocket fun for someone else where you just run into somebody and you just have that moment you go oh yeah dollars really makes a difference a thousand dollars really makes a difference here and put yourself in that position and that's what these stories have all been today they've all been people who put themselves in a position to be generous because they got out of debt they're on a plan they lived like no one else and now they can live and give like no one else nicole is in salt lake city hi nicole merry christmas how can we help hello merry christmas tell us your giving story yes definitely we had our baby girl ryan in september of 2016 and everything was great january of 2017 everything changed and that's when our daughter had her first seizure that lasted well over an hour we spent the next months just barely surviving just trying to figure out what was happening to our beautiful baby girl and finally in november of 2017 we got our diagnosis which is something called gervais syndrome it's an extremely rare genetic type of epilepsy that's essentially kind of progressive a lot of these sweet kiddos are lost at a young age and then after that it's just life expectancy isn't really known because of how rare it is um words started spreading about our daughter in december of 2017 and the outpouring of love and generosity that our family received just changed our lives forever people had donated to a gofundme generously people gave us essential oils and diffusers and gift cards and a group of high schoolers made a handmade baby crib people gave us toys and gifts for our other kids for christmas and people offered airline miles and gave us food 12 days of christmas cash flowers constantly at my door just letting us know we were being thought of my brother-in-law even went so far as we give us the car so we could have reliable transportation um i had to quit my job as a nurse that month to just because we knew this was going to be our life and so for 20 24 7 care that she was going to need um so to receive so much during that time of year just just changed us changed us who we are to our core um gave us new perspective but with that money we were actually able to find get care from one of the top dravet doctors in the u.s which helped us learn just invaluable information on this horrible syndrome we were able to get a seizure response dog which not only helped our daughter but our whole family trying to adjust to our new life we were able to buy adaptive medical equipment pay bills and just stay afloat during the worst transition time of our lives um we just have been so fortunate and we we don't know how long we're going to have our baby girl here with us hopefully with a cure forever but what we do know is that god gave us and provided us a way um we've never asked why it's just it's not important to us but we've we've always asked for the strength to get through and he has always always given us that wow so that's that's our beautiful wonderful story of our the miracle of our lives amen you've got two miracles one little girl and then one community that hold your arms up in the desert and keeps holding them up and keeps holding them up we've been so lucky wow yeah you're blessed it's blessed and it's a and um here's the interesting thing to me is is that not a single person that has given you anything misses it they're not they're not their lives are not diminished by what they gave you they're enhanced by what they gave you and your life is enhanced and uh that is the beauty of this particular character trait which is a choice called generosity powerful nicole wow thanks for sharing that i just look at these pictures of your beautiful girl and i've got a little girl and whoo they were flashing them up on youtube and uh as we were sitting here and it's just amazing wow powerful stuff tom is with us tom is in san diego tom tell us your giving story hi dave i got a good one for you merry christmas merry christmas john uh my uh story is really unique it's definitely a god thing i have multiple sclerosis i've been a high school teacher and coach for uh 22 years and my uh wife found a contest to get us a mobility van i've gone from a a cane to a walker wrote a segway at school and finally i'm in a power wheelchair and as you've uh discussed in previous calls these vans are expensive they're 60 to 70 000 and my wife found this contest and you had to uh come up with a one minute youtube clip and uh they would enter you in the contest and then it'd be voted on well we had the audio visual cut the group from our school uh make a video for me post it up on youtube and we got uh in the top ten we didn't end up winning the contest um the local newspaper came out and did a an interview on me and then a follow-up interview on how we didn't win the contest and i was like that's kind of weird because you usually don't get interviewed for losing the super bowl [Laughter] and i'm like well okay i'll i'll yeah sure come on out we'll do another interview they did it and they posted it and about three days later my athletic director called and said hey good news and i'm thinking hey i got a new recruit i got a new athlete this is going to be great he's like no someone called and uh it's really good news i'm like okay so i call uh the number and uh talked to the gentleman and uh he said hey i read your uh story in the newspaper uh uh the other day he said i want to go to usa today and it was out uh in la times it was out and so the only paper that was left was this one copy of the san diego local paper he opened it up went to the local section and there was my story and he said i'm sorry you didn't win the van but i'd like to buy you a van and i said sir you do understand that these are 60 70 000 vehicles he said yeah that's no problem we'll take care of it well he ends up buying me the van and he's also the gentleman who rebuilt our stadium at our uh high school tune up a couple million dollars we find all sorts all over san diego places where he just gives like no one else that's exactly how it works wow what a great story i love it it's so cool imagine having the money to open up a newspaper and say i'm gonna change this family's life forever just gonna write them a chat i'm gonna write them a check i like it merry christmas america that puts us our dave ramsey show in the books we'll be back with you before you know it in the meantime remember there's ultimately only one way to financial peace and that's to walk daily with the prince of peace christ [Music] jesus [Music] you

Channel: The Ramsey Show - Full Episodes

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Keywords: dave ramsay live, dave ramsey, dave ramsey channel, dave ramsey live, dave ramsey live show, dave ramsey live stream, dave ramsey podcast, dave ramsey radio show, dave ramsey show, dave ramsey show full show, dave ramsey show live, ramsey, ramsey solutions, the dave ramsey show, the dave ramsey show live

Id: k9IoMumGPcU

Length: 124min 55sec (7495 seconds)

Published: Wed Dec 23 2020