When Navigating How to Raise Your Child, Only One Thing Is Needed.

If you’re in your thirties like me, I’m sure you’ve had those quiet moments where you look back on your teens and twenties. You think about the struggle, the hustle, and inevitably, the things you wished your parents had taught you or provided for you.

I remember sitting in dorm rooms with college mates, listening to them talk about their tuition being fully covered by their parents. They walked across the graduation stage with the brightest outlook on their future. If it took time for them to land a job, who cares. Meanwhile, I felt the heavy burden of student loans waiting for me on the other side. That’s why I set up a college savings fund for my daughter now. I want to do everything my parents did for me, plus all the things I wished they could have done.

It’s easy to fall into the comparison trap. I was scrolling through Facebook recently and saw a friend post a picture of their college sophomore standing next to a brand-new car—a Christmas gift so they wouldn’t have to walk all over campus. I stared at the screen and laughed. I didn’t get a car until my junior year, and that was only because my dad bought himself a new one and handed me the keys to his old beater.

We hear these stories all the time. Parents paying down payments for houses. Trust funds that act as a safety net, ensuring their children never have to panic over job loss. 

I admit, there was a time I harbored a little resentment. My parents always told me, “You are going to college,” but the bank account didn’t match the mandate. There was no envelope of cash waiting for me. There were no stocks in my name.

Some parents can make their child’s future bulletproof with a checkbook, while others can only wish their child luck.

But as I’ve grown older, and now that I am raising a child of my own, my perspective has shifted. Regardless of the financial head start I wish I had, my parents gave me something that money literally cannot buy: they raised me in the church.

My pastor gave a sermon on Luke 10:42, when Martha was asking Jesus why won’t her sister, Mary, come help her in the kitchen. Jesus replied, “But one thing is needful: and Mary hath chosen that good part, which shall not be taken away from her.”

While Martha was more concerned about preparing food, Mary was concerned about receiving the Word of God.

My parents didn’t give me a trust fund, but they did teach me how to have a relationship with God.

When I look at where I am today—a husband, a father, a man standing on his own two feet—I realize I have everything I need to not just survive, but to thrive. And I wouldn’t be in this position without that faith.

The Bible isn’t just a book for Sunday morning; it is a survival guide. It has taught me about money management, relationships, and conflict resolution. It taught me how to deal with difficult coworkers, how to love my family, and how to navigate enemies.

There were times I looked at my credit card statements, sweating over the balance, wishing my parents had sat me down for a lesson on financial literacy. But then I realized: I knew what the Bible said about debt and stewardship. I had just chosen to follow my own path. The tool was there; I just hadn’t picked it up.

My parents didn’t leave me a financial empire. They didn’t hand me a portfolio of stocks. They didn’t buy me a house.

But they taught me how to pray. They taught me that when the bottom falls out, I have a rock to stand on. That is the greatest foundation you can give a child.

You can see the contrast clearly when you look at the world stage. I look at someone like President Trump. He grew up with every financial advantage imaginable—wealth, access, and power handed to him. Yet, when you strip away the money, what do you see? You see an unfavorable character. We see the racist comments, the sexism, and a lack of humility.

He had the inheritance of money, but he wasn’t raised in the church. He wasn’t raised to value a relationship with God above his own ego.

It reminds me that you can give your children the whole world, but if you don’t give them a moral and spiritual compass, they can still end up lost.

So, while I am saving for my daughter’s college, and I hope to buy her that car one day, I am prioritizing the real inheritance. I’m taking her to church. I’m teaching her to pray. Because money can run out, but God never will.