517. Leaving a Legacy in an Exhausted Economy W/Josiah Stowe

Summary

Apologia Radio Ep. 517: Leaving a Legacy in an Exhausted Economy w/ Josiah Stowe

Date: March 27, 2025
Host: Luke the Bear (filling in for Jeff Durbin)
Guests: Josiah Stowe (Dominion Wealth Strategists), Stephen Cortez (Apex Development Co-Founder)

---

Overview:

This episode explores how Christians can intentionally build, preserve, and pass on a legacy—spiritually and materially—even in the midst of a challenging economy. The hosts and guests lay out practical steps for financial stewardship, multi-generational thinking, entrepreneurial action, and the theological mindset that undergirds Christian economic activity. They also share personal stories and actionable advice for families feeling the pinch of inflation and economic instability.

---

Key Discussion Points & Insights

1. Why "Leaving a Legacy" Matters (02:55–06:20)

• Luke introduces the main theme: Many core families are leaving Phoenix to pursue generational wealth and self-sufficiency, often by starting new businesses in more affordable areas.
  • Houses and land in Phoenix are priced out of reach for most families wanting to build a multi-generational legacy.
  • "They're doing what we’re practicing. And you can’t do that here in Phoenix. It’s just not possible unless you have a lot of money… you’re looking at a minimum of $250,000 for an acre of desert." (Luke, 05:10)
• Legacy is not about survival alone: The conversation quickly connects legacy to active, generational planning—not simply “surviving until rapture.”
• Featured sponsors (Reform-oriented businesses) reflect this mindset.

---

2. Christian Excellence in Business & Work (06:21–08:39)

• Stephen Cortez shares about launching Apex Development, aiming for American-made, solution-driven quality gear for law enforcement, military, and civilians.
  • “Everything we want to do is going to be the highest quality… and to the glory of God. Christians should be striving for excellence in everything they do, not just being satisfied with mediocre products.” (Stephen, 06:52)
  • Partnerships: Now exclusively manufacturing Cordura-wrapped field Bibles for Valley Operations Group—Christian-owned, with future product launches teased.

---

3. Christian Wealth Strategy: A Reformed Approach (08:52–14:16)

• Josiah Stowe introduces Dominion Wealth Strategists: The only distinctly Reformed financial consulting company (as far as he knows).
  • “I’m here to help the average American, specifically the Calvinistic, covenantal, confessional congregant, put their money where their Bible is…” (Josiah, 09:21)
• Financial advice for ordinary families – Focus on homeschoolers, not just high-net-worth individuals.
  • Most services are free; only estate planning or business coaching are paid.
  • Intake process: Intro consult → Data collection → Custom recommendations.
• Notable moment: Realism about “chicken economics”:
  • “You’re not going to save money by having chickens for your eggs.” (Josiah, 10:24)

---

4. Entrepreneurial Realism: Starting a Christian Business (14:06–15:18)

• Making the leap: Josiah offers practical first steps for business starters, discourages premature LLCs for early-stage operations unless risk demands it.
• Business coaching: “I’ll help stop you from making a lot of really dumb mistakes that a lot of people tend to make early in business.” (Josiah, 14:58)
• Experience: Josiah is involved in ~30 companies through his firm.
• Background: Transitioned from Army chaplain’s assistant (finance-heavy role) to seminary admin, to personal finance consultancy.

---

5. From Army to Finance: Personal Story (15:24–22:34)

• Chaplains’ assistants: A unique blend of bodyguard, admin, and soul-care for soldiers.
  • “You’re the bodyguard… That’s the whole reason the job exists. You get an M4 and an M9.” (Josiah, 18:11)
  • “Day to day, it’s hard to say what my job was. One day plumbing PVC pipes, the next up 36 hours straight consoling a soldier.” (Josiah, 19:24)
• Called into ministry, but God directed him into kingdom service through marketplace work.
  • “There’s no sacred/secular divide in my theology anymore. It’s just as important… it’s dominion-taking work.” (Josiah, 21:50)
• Theology meets money management: Tithing, future planning, and the faithfulness required to break cycles of living “paycheck to paycheck.”

---

6. The Role of Eschatology & Mindset (22:34–23:45)

• Future-oriented theology shapes economics:
  • “Why polish brass on a sinking ship? Well, if the ship’s not sinking, then maybe we should polish the brass and make sure the ship’s in tip-top shape.” (Josiah, 22:50)
• Now is the time for Christians to enter business, as secular “woke” economics prove unprofitable, suggesting an opening for faith-driven excellence.

---

7. State of the Current Economy: Challenges & Opportunities (24:15–35:38)

• Post-war U.S. history: From world’s manufacturing hub to debt-ridden managerial class.
  • “We moved from manufacturing to a nation of managers… stopped being legitimately productive.” (Josiah, 25:09)
• Tariffs and “bringing manufacturing back”: Painful short-term, but vital for rebuilding real national wealth.
  • “Trump is finally kind of putting a stop to that… bring the wealth back home. But… we’re going to have to take that hit on the chin.” (Josiah, 26:16)
  • Stephen: Views this shift as opportunity for American manufacturers to reclaim skills and efficiency.
• Entrepreneurship requires margin: Many Americans lack buffer to start a business. “It’s almost a privilege to be an entrepreneur… not a lot of people actually have the capacity to make that leap.” (Josiah, 29:31)
• Macro & micro summary from Josiah:
  • Macro: Chaos and unpredictability lead to investor paralysis and make funding harder for small businesses (30:47–34:37).
  • Micro: The middle class is “effectively pressed into serfdom.” Lifestyle once taken for granted in the 1990s now nearly impossible to afford.

---

8. How Christians Can Respond Practically (36:09–44:54)

• Two options: “Either make more money or spend less money.”
  • Audit your budget and spending; deploy capital strategically.
  • Bring in a financial professional to spot "leaks" and inefficiencies.
  • “Eliminate your high interest debt… that’s moving your net worth needle back way faster than your investments are moving you forward.” (Josiah, 44:06)
• Build a strong foundation first (budget, emergency fund, no bad debt) then invest/distribute.
  • “Most people are trying to do that step when they haven’t even gotten their own household in order… it’s no surprise when they trip over themselves.” (Josiah, 44:54)

---

9. Long-Term, Generational Mindset (41:23–53:35)

• Take dominion within constraint: If you can’t move, work with what you have; prioritize increasing discretionary income, even in tough economies.
• Incremental, intentional steps: Start wherever you can, even if that’s just $25/month, and let compound growth work over generations.
• Community examples: The Mormons and Jewish communities built industrial, generational wealth by prioritizing their people in business and support.
  • “That’s what God has already called us to do. They’re just actually applying it.” (Josiah, 52:50)

---

10. Christians Should Lead in Excellence & Support (53:35–55:44)

• Conviction for Reformed Christians:
  • “We should be the best businessmen, the best business owners, the best employees, the best at everything, because we have no better reason to work than for the glory of God.” (Stephen, 53:41)
  • “Christians should be the hardest workers. At the very least… even if I’m working at McDonald's.” (Stephen, 54:01)
• Unity over division: “The Reformed community likes to fight each other… more than they like to actually patronize the businesses of other Reformed believers.” (Josiah, 54:22)
• Intentionality is key: “Be intentional… if you don’t start there, you’re just gonna buy two more Starbucks or whatever each month.” (Luke, 55:35)

---

11. Building Block Wisdom: Assets, Precious Metals, and Mindset (45:20–53:35)

• Precious Metals: Good as a store of value, not as a wealth-building investment; most people aren’t in a position to prioritize them over other needs (47:20–48:29).
  • “Gold is great as a store of value… but it’s not something you can use to actually build.” (Josiah, 47:22)
• Debt & Credit: Avoid locking yourself into big payments—bad advice abounds; stewardship is essential (48:30–50:11).
• Shifting mindset: Education and stewardship need to be generational—think like a builder, not just a consumer.

---

12. Closing: Hopeful Rebuilding & Lasting Legacy (55:44–end)

• The time is now: As secularism collapses, it's time for Christians to shine in rebuilding culture and institutions.
  • “We are coming out of the ashes… there is a Christian way to rebuild.” (Josiah, 55:44)
• Practical household examples: Luke shares how inheritance and wise stewardship echo across generations (56:49–58:28).
• Encouragement to act: Don’t get stuck in indecision; faithfulness means taking the next step.
  • “Try something. Take a step of faith. If it doesn’t work, that wasn’t God’s will. Try something else… We can’t just set our hands and God’s just not gonna magically sprinkle success dust on us, you know.” (Luke, 60:01)
• Contact & resources:
  • Josiah: Find him at reform.money for free, distinctly Reformed financial consultation.
  • Stephen: ApexDevelopment Co and Valley Operations Group for field Bibles.
• Final exhortation: “Repent of your gnostic asceticism, get down to work.” (Josiah, 61:34)

---

Notable Quotes and Memorable Moments

• "Desperate times call for faithful men and not for careful men. The careful men come later and write the biographies of the faithful men, lauding them for their courage." (Josiah, 00:13)
• “Christians should be striving for excellence in everything they do and not just being satisfied with mediocre.” (Stephen, 06:52)
• “We’re seeing secularism collapse under the weight of its own stupidity, and we alone have the proper alternative.” (Josiah, 23:45)
• “Business runs on optimism.” (Josiah, 34:29)
• “He who does not provide for his family is worse than an infidel.” (Josiah, 39:10)
• “Start somewhere, be intentional… it’s about good stewardship.” (Luke, 55:35)
• “We have the chance to rebuild now, and that’s not an opportunity you should even think about passing up.” (Josiah, 59:45)

---

Timestamps for Key Segments

• 02:55 – Intro to "Leaving a Legacy in an Exhausted Economy"
• 06:21 – Christians in business: Stephen & Apex’s ethos
• 08:52 – Dominion Wealth Strategists – Josiah’s mission
• 14:06 – Starting a business: practical & theological advice
• 15:24 – Josiah’s Army and seminary experience
• 22:34 – Eschatology and economic mindset
• 24:15 – The state of the U.S. economy and opportunity
• 36:09 – What can Christians do? Macro/micro solutions
• 41:23 – How to think long-term and build in a tough economy
• 53:35 – Excellence and unity in Christian business
• 55:44 – Hope for rebuilding, legacy stories, and final exhortations

---

Final Takeaways

• The path to Christian legacy in hard times is holistic: mindset, stewardship, entrepreneurship, and generational vision.
• Now is a unique moment—Christians can play offense, not defense, in business and cultural leadership.
• Real-world steps are necessary: audit your finances, eliminate bad debt, start small if needed, and always act with intentionality.
• Support and invest in fellow believers' businesses and prioritize kingdom stewardship in every area of life.

Resource Links:

• Dominion Wealth Strategists / Reform.Money
• ApexDevelopment Co
• Valley Operations Group

---

(Advertisements, product mentions, and sponsor plugs were skipped except where they directly illustrated a discussion point.)

Transcript

[Luke the Bear]

Non Rockabotus must stop.

[Josiah Stowe]

I don't want to rock the boat. I want to sink it.

[Luke the Bear]

Are you gonna bark all day, little.

[Stephen Cortez]

Doggy, or are you gonna bite?

[Josiah Stowe]

Delusional. Yeah, delusional is okay in your worldview, I'm an animal. You don't chastise chickens for being delusional. You don't chastise pigs for being delusional. So you calling me delusional, using your worldview is perfectly okay. It doesn't really hurt. She hung up on me. Desperate times call for faithful men and not for careful men. The careful men come later and write the biographies of the faithful men, lauding them for their courage.

[Luke the Bear]

Go into all the world and make disciples. Not go into the world and make buddies. Not to make roses. Right. Don't go into the world and make homies. Disciples. I got a bit of a jiggle neck.

[Josiah Stowe]

That's a joke. Pastor. When we have the real message of.

[Stephen Cortez]

Truth, we cannot let somebody say they're speaking truth when they're not.

[Luke the Bear]

Take an amazing journey to a place that will blow your mind and move your heart so you will never be the same again. A good man leaves an inheritance to his children's children, but the sinner's wealth is laid up for the righteous. That is Proverbs 13, verse 22. What is up, everyone? Welcome back to another episode of Apologia Radio. Luke the Bear hosting today. Pastor Jeff is, I believe, on his way back from Georgia. It's been a whirlwind of a few months here. He had the hearing yesterday in Georgia for our bill there, which went really well, and he was able to. Actually, we have videos up already of. Of him being grilled by a Jewish representative is really, really good stuff, so you can check that out. Zach Conover is off today. He had some stuff to do. So I actually have, for the first time, my. My dear friend Stephen Cortez with me today. And Steven's one of our deacons and one of the team leads on our security team for church and all around good dude. And we'll talk more why he's on here today. But what's up? Say hi to everybody.

[Stephen Cortez]

What's up, guys? Stephen Cortez. Happy to be here.

[Luke the Bear]

You nervous?

[Stephen Cortez]

I get stage fright, but I'm doing all right.

[Luke the Bear]

And before I bring. Before I bring our other guests on, I want to mention, you know, let's just do it because this is going to tie in. I'm gonna. I'm gonna go ahead and bring Josiah in. And then there's. We'll just hide all together. Josiah Stowe from Dominion. Wealth strategist. Correct. What's up, brother? Welcome to the show.

[Josiah Stowe]

Yeah, it's good to be here. Thanks for having me.

[Luke the Bear]

Yeah, man. So I'll just, I'll mention the topic here and why we're. Why we're doing all this. So Josiah's actually Dominion is one of our main sponsors at Reform Con, which we're very excited for. And he was like, hey, any chance I could come on and before Reform Con? And I was like, actually, yes. And this topic we're talking about today is, if you see the title, obviously, Leaving a Legacy in an Exhausted Economy. And this is something that. It's been on my heart a lot. We've had. I was trying to do math. In the last two years, we've probably had like six core families from our church leave, not because they were upset with our church, but because they're practicing what we're preaching. Because they are saying, hey, I want to leave a legacy. I want to think long term, multi generationally. Um, you know, I want to leave an inheritance. I want to go start my own business, you know, so we've had families go to Utah, Louisiana, Montana, and then we've had some move up to Prescott, Arizona, recently for those very reasons. And it stinks because I don't want them to leave. But I'm also can't be upset with them because they're doing what we're practicing. And you can't do that here in Phoenix. It's not possible unless you have a lot of money to start out with. It's just not. It's just not possible. You can't buy. I was looking the other day because I was just curious, you know, if you want an acre of desert on the outskirts of town, you're looking at a minimum of $250,000. And so if you want to do that, if you want to, you know, have acreage and think multi generationally and, you know, have your parents come stay on your property, like, you can't do it here. It's just. It's very difficult. Inflation's crazy here. And. And so I've been thinking a lot about this and even in my own life, like, how am I, you know, as a pastor? Like, how can I do this, leave a legacy for my children? A lot of mine's going to be intellectual. But so anyway, so then I was like, hey, what do you think about this idea, Josiah? And he was like, yes, let's do that. So, you know, so. And that's Kind of why Stephen come on today as well because he's in the process of trying to do that, you know, but, but like all of, all the, a lot of, well, pretty much all of our sponsors that we work with have, are doing that. Like they're thinking that way. Amtech, you know, Iron Layer, which I'll talk about, you know, Landmark Roasters, Heritage Defense, all these companies, page 50, all these companies that we're working with, they're, they're like minded and they're thinking that they, they're trying to, it's not just, you know, survive until we get raptured. They're thinking long term, multi generation down the road. I want to make sure my grandkids and great grandkids and great, great grandkids are blessed, you know, by, by what I'm doing here. It's not just in vain. So I will mention, I mentioned Iron Layer. I'll mention them real quick. We love Iron Layer and the NAD patches. I got mine on my side right now. Super grateful for them and their partnership with us. You can go to ionlayer.com and put apology coupon code and get a sweet discount on that. And then of course we've been mentioning it. They also have the glutathione patches now so check that out. Super awesome product. Good brothers. And we're grateful to be partnered with them. So. Well Stephen, real quick, why don't you just tell us what you're up to. Why, why, why you're on here and then yeah, thank you guys. We'll switch to Josiah.

[Stephen Cortez]

So yeah. Stephen Cortez Co founder with Apex Development we are a purpose built tactical nylon company. We specialize in gear for law enforcement, military and some civilian applications as well. One of our missions and something that we're really passionate about is everything. Design is solution driven, purpose built. The American made stuff goes without saying. For us, everything we want to do is going to be the highest quality, sourcing the best materials made right here in Phoenix. And so one of our mottos is without compromise. So everything we're going to do, we're going to do it to the highest standards and to the glory of God. We think that and truly believe that Christians should be striving for excellence in everything they do and not just being satisfied with mediocre products or mediocre businesses. And I'm sure we're going to talk a lot about that today. But so Apex Development Manufacturing right here in Phoenix and we are partnering with a new company called Valley Operations Group and they make these awesome field Bibles, Cordura wrapped, they actually drop tomorrow. So these are great for servicemen, for police guys who just want to be better protectors and they can keep it in their kit. And so we're now the exclusive manufacturing for Valley Operations Group. And so Christian owned business seeking excellence in everything we do.

[Luke the Bear]

Yeah, I love it. Steve and I have talked a lot. You'll probably be hopefully seeing some more stuff from him soon. But just in partnership with us. But you know, we've been talking for a while. Since when did you launch? This was like a few months ago, right?

[Stephen Cortez]

About, about three months now.

[Luke the Bear]

Yeah, yeah, yeah. So I'm excited for, you know, we want more Christians to be business owners and to be out in the, in the culture, you know, affecting it in that way. And so I'm excited for the products you guys are making and I know it's going to be good stuff and I know you have big plans.

[Stephen Cortez]

Oh yeah, yeah. The Bible is great. It's a service that we're offering for the manufacturer. But the Apex Development owned products are going to be launching here pretty soon and those are going to be pretty sweet.

[Luke the Bear]

Yeah, yeah, I'll just, we'll keep those under wraps for now, but be watching for those.

[Stephen Cortez]

Yeah.

[Luke the Bear]

And where can they go to get.

[Stephen Cortez]

These, did you say? Yeah. So the Bibles you can actually get at Valley operations group.com you can find us Apex Development is Apex Devco on Instagram or Valley OG on Instagram as well.

[Luke the Bear]

Sweet. Awesome man. So yeah, that's why I want to bring Stephen on because I think be able to contribute to the conversation. So. So yeah, Josiah, I've talked a while. Please tell us more about yourself, what you do and we'll go from there.

[Josiah Stowe]

Sure thing. So my name is Josiah Stowe. I am the founder of Dominion Wealth Strategists, as far as I could tell, the only distinctly reformed financial consulting firm in the world. Because I've been to a lot of conferences, I figure the other people would have shown up. So we tend to be the only distinctly reformed financial consulting firm there. Not that we're the only reformed guys in finance, but we're the only reformed company it seems in finance. And that was essentially just to fill a gap. There's a lot of financial advice out there, most of it legitimately counterproductive or niched down so tightly that it's not applicable to any particular individual individual or really only catering to the high net worth individuals is how it tends to go because there's more money there naturally. So I'm here to help the average American, specifically the Calvinistic, covenantal, confessional congregant, put their money where their Bible is essentially and take dominion over their finances to do it the biblical way and in particular the theonomic, the reconstructionist way. But we'll have plenty of time to dive into that specifically.

[Luke the Bear]

Yeah. Now I appreciate that, just the point, you know, because you're right. A lot of the, you know, guys that I have talked to or I feel are trusted in the money market, if you will. Usually, you know, if you want to get, get business with them, you, you have to have a lot to start out with. So I appreciate that. You're like, hey, let's help the homeschool parents who, you know, are struggling to, you know, pay the bills and you know, and maybe have to have chickens to have eggs or something like, you know.

[Josiah Stowe]

Yeah, you're not going to save money by having chickens for your eggs.

[Luke the Bear]

I know I didn't try it, but I did look into it because when things were crazy a couple of years ago, you know, and you couldn't buy eggs, I was like, man. But then I started doing the math and I'm like, the time and money to feed the chickens is going to cost more than me just buying, spending $2 more and a dozen eggs, so.

[Josiah Stowe]

Right, right.

[Luke the Bear]

But you know, if there was a zombie apocalypse, hey, yeah, you're good.

[Josiah Stowe]

Or you've got a five year time horizon where eventually you'll break even, but in the meantime it's going to be really expensive.

[Luke the Bear]

Yeah, yeah. Which if you're listening, I see this people in the comments section, they have chickens. I'm not good. Good job. That's all, that's all I'm saying is good on you. Like, no judgment here. I wish I could do it. So, so yeah. So how long is your company? Pretty new or relatively. You just kind of popped up on my radar the last, over the last year or so.

[Josiah Stowe]

Yeah, that sounds about right. So we, we were, our articles of incorporation say February of last year, but we were operating a little bit before that.

[Luke the Bear]

Okay.

[Josiah Stowe]

Under, under a different auspice. Yeah. Dominion. Well, strategist now is about a year and a half old or a little. Just, just over a year now.

[Luke the Bear]

Okay.

[Josiah Stowe]

Technically, so relatively new on the scene, but we're going to be here for a long time. At least that's the hope.

[Luke the Bear]

Hey, as you're thinking long term. I appreciate that. Okay, so just quick question for those listening is like, okay, what does that mean for me? Like if, if say a homeschool family contacted you and we're like, hey, let's talk. Like, where does the conversation go from there?

[Josiah Stowe]

Yeah, depends. So we usually start off with an introductory overview. So it's an hour long meeting where I tell all of our potential clients a little bit more about who we are as a company, what we do, what we can offer and explain how billing works, I think is kind of the main objection to overcome because we're, we, we're free of charge. We don't charge our clients anything for our time. And the only time money changes hands is when there's an opening of a new account or they're purchasing estate planning specifically, or business coaching specifically. But everything else, and most people don't need those two things is going to be free of charge. So there's a fair bit of explanation because I guess most people, when they hear free, they think that, oh, he's somehow scamming me or he's fleecing the church somehow in a way I don't understand. So it's like a 30 minute conversation about, no, this is how it all works. And yes, it is free. And yes, we are Christians. And here's where we go. We'll have that meeting and then we'll go straight into data collection. Because generally you sit down with us and we explain everything. Oh, when do we get started? As typically how that meeting ends. So we'll go straight into data collection. We need to collect a lot of data, first and foremost. I can't make recommendations based on feelings or stories. I need actual data. So we'll spend a while collecting their current assets, their goals, where they want to go, how they want to get there, what they really need to have kind of sitting in their back pockets in order to feel comfortable, their current liabilities, their current life insurance coverage, kind of the whole nine yards there. And then we'll spend a couple of hours minimum in the back rooms actually crunching the numbers, doing the math. And then we'll come back for an hour and a half long financial consultation where I'll go over all my recommendations.

[Luke the Bear]

Gotcha.

[Josiah Stowe]

And then sometimes there's a financial follow up or two because certain situations are far more complicated, require more of my time, but our time is always free. So.

[Luke the Bear]

Awesome.

[Josiah Stowe]

That's essentially how we go. For homeschool couples in particular, it's usually a longer conversation. They have a lot more they want to discuss.

[Luke the Bear]

Yeah.

[Josiah Stowe]

So it's just person by person, individual by individual, not telling everybody, hey, go out there, liquidate your 401ks, invest in mutual funds, open up an IRA like that's not going to be particularly beneficial for any single individual. So we want to make sure that you're taking Dominion over your finances, not the median American's finances.

[Luke the Bear]

Gotcha. Now, what about if, say, like, someone like Steven came to you and was like, hey, you know, I'm thinking about starting this business? Is that some coaching plan? You can help.

[Josiah Stowe]

I give them some cursory advice, like, hey, are you over $117,000 worth of revenue? No. Okay. Don't form an LLC. That's probably not necessary. All right, you want to get going, make some money, and then once you're. Or if you have the high likelihood of being sued or you're actually hiring on employees, there are other reasons to start with forming an entity, but we'll just have a cursory conversation then if you want more. I also run Hexagon Consulting, naturally, where I do marketing consulting as well. That one's a little bit more expensive, but the business coaching through Dominion is about 300 bucks an hour right now. It'll more than pay for itself, because I'll help you. I'll help stop you from making a lot of really dumb mistakes that a lot of people tend to make early in business.

[Luke the Bear]

Awesome. Maybe you should. No, I'm just kidding. Well, we'll talk.

[Josiah Stowe]

So I'm currently part of, like, seven different companies, so it's. Yeah, like 30. I think near. Near 30 companies between all of the agents at our firm.

[Luke the Bear]

Oh, my goodness, man.

[Josiah Stowe]

Yeah, it's a lot.

[Luke the Bear]

That is a lot.

[Josiah Stowe]

We've got some experience in the matter.

[Luke the Bear]

Right on. So how did you. Because I know you. You said you were chaplain in the army and stuff, so how did you get into this?

[Josiah Stowe]

Yeah, close. Chaplain's assistant.

[Luke the Bear]

Chaplain's assistant. Yeah.

[Josiah Stowe]

56 Mike, not 56 Alpha. So religious affairs specialist is the formal term these days, mostly because chaplain's assistants had a terrible reputation. They earned it. But, yeah, I was a 56 mike in the army for five years, three years in an infantry unit, deployed to Iraq for a while, and ended up becoming the funds technician for all of Fort Campbell because I had the best math scores of any chaplain's assistant on the base. So they're like, oh, you're the money guy now. Okay. So basically, I got pulled into finance just because I scored highly enough. I also got, well, got mad at one of my chaplains for using a machine gun on a range, and they kind of pulled me away from that situation pretty quick. So I got moved, you might say aggressively quickly into a new position as the funds technician on Fort Campbell and did that for two years. About $180,000 a year passing through that office. So not a ton, just all the money that was collected during offerings on post and then making sure it was spent legally, ethically, and morally, since the buildings are bought and paid for and so are the chaplains.

[Luke the Bear]

Gotcha.

[Josiah Stowe]

And then I got out. My body was not keeping up. Three years in an infantry unit. Not, Not. Not a fun time. Yeah, spinal arthritis and labral tears and.

[Luke the Bear]

All that good stuff.

[Josiah Stowe]

And then so I let my contract run out and started working at the Southern Baptist Theological Seminary. I was the executive administrative assistant to the vice president of operations and finance. And basically the same thing I was doing on Fort Campbell, but a little bit more secretarial and with a much larger budget, about $31 million a year. So Southern's annual operating budget, so did that for a little bit. They were paying me $12.50 an hour to do that. So I lasted eight months and eventually quit there. Got out of organizational finance and into personal finance. Bounced around a few companies didn't really like being told exactly how to build plans or what to do or what products to push. So eventually we started Dominion Wealth Strategists as a. As a way to build out those plans for the people I wanted to serve without having to make any compromises.

[Luke the Bear]

Excellent, Excellent. Just curious back another army question, because I think a lot of people always wonder, like, when. When you're a chaplain's assistant, are you. I think people just picture like. Like from MASH or something, you know, you know, what's his. I can't think of his name right now, but, you know, you just like, sit back in. In the barracks and read the Bible all day. What. What does that look like when you're actually deployed with a. With a unit as a chaplain's assistant?

[Josiah Stowe]

Different, that's for sure. But yeah. Father Francis McCully.

[Luke the Bear]

Yes.

[Josiah Stowe]

Thank you. Thank you. Yeah. So, yeah, when you're deployed, essentially, chaplain's assistant's a weird job because you're the combatant, you're the bodyguard. That's the whole reason the job exists on paper is because chaplains are non combatants, so they need a combatant assistant.

[Luke the Bear]

Okay.

[Josiah Stowe]

To make sure that they're, you know, staying safe, which is why they issue you two firearms. You get an M4 and an M9. And then if that M9 disappears in the heat of battle and you get confirmed kills on opposite sides of the base. Oh, no, but that's sort of on the down low, but, yeah. Essentially bodyguard, altar boy, church secretary, whatever they need you to be. You are. You're the only other guy in the chaplain's office. So as the nco, IC of a special staff section, you're doing everything. You're briefing the colonels, you're briefing the other chaplains in the area. You're doing all of the paperwork that the chaplain is supposed to do so that he can just sign his name on the bottom and say that he did it. You're doing basically everything except actually giving eulogies at memorial ceremonies, doing formal counseling, a lot of informal counseling, though, and signing the documents for, like, religious exemptions. So there are a few things only they can do because they have the master's degree and you don't, but you're practically doing everything else as a unit ministry team. And day to day. It's hard to say what my job was. It's like one day I was in a storage closet making slosh pipes for a chaplain PT event. So I was doing plumbing work, filling up these massive PVC pipes with. With water so that, you know, you're going to have a tough time holding onto them during the runs. And then, you know, the next day, I'd be up for 36 hours straight consoling a soldier who was attempting to commit suicide. Okay, so day to day, everything. We use the acronym a lot because. Yeah. Hey, what do you do? Because you're always doing work in the background. And so we do a lot. Administration, logistics, operations, integration, technical support.

[Luke the Bear]

Right. That's funny.

[Josiah Stowe]

And a whole lot of religious support. So helping the. The Jews with their stuff, the Muslims with their stuff, the Buddhists with their stuff, the Orthodox guy with his stuff, and mostly the Army's full of Baptists, so helping them with their stuff, making sure that Bibles are readily available, kosher meals are available, kufis and prayer mats are available.

[Luke the Bear]

Wow.

[Josiah Stowe]

And just trying to take care of people and do some soul care in a pluralistic environment, which is why I didn't particularly care for it.

[Luke the Bear]

Gotcha. So you were basically like a John Knox to George Wishart then. Yeah, just stood in front of him. Instead of a sword, you stood in front of him with an M4.

[Josiah Stowe]

Right. I was a professional. Bulletproof vest, and they issued me extra small plates.

[Luke the Bear]

Oh, man. How did you get it? I know we're way off track here. How did you get into. What made you decide to be a chaplain's assistant in the Army?

[Josiah Stowe]

Yeah, so I joined the army at 19 because I was living in Northern California as a hosted ihop with no prospects, I didn't really want to go to community college. I was running my grandparents 18 acre ranch and like I want to go into ministry. How do I do that? And I can't afford the, you know, $80,000 it's going to take to get my degree.

[Luke the Bear]

Yeah.

[Josiah Stowe]

Wait, the army exists and they'll pay $60,000 to get you that degree. So. All right, so I ended up joining the army and you know, Navitay, I figured joining the chaplain corps, I'd be able to do ministry. So background in ministry work and then go straight into, you know, the pastorate from there. So five years in the army. Five years and, or five to seven years in seminary and then off to the races going somewhere, doing the Lord's work. The Lord obviously had other plans, but that was kind of how he got my foot in the door and got me out of my. Got me out of California at the very least.

[Luke the Bear]

Yeah, well, amen for that. Stephen can. Stephen can Amen.

[Josiah Stowe]

Attest to that.

[Stephen Cortez]

Yeah, amen. I'm soaking it all in. I mean, it's quite a, quite a background there.

[Josiah Stowe]

Yeah, I've lived a couple of lives at this point.

[Luke the Bear]

Well, you're still doing the Lord's work, just not as a pastor.

[Josiah Stowe]

Yeah, yeah, not as a pastor, but there's no sacred secular divide. At least not, not my theology anymore. So it's just as important. It's not the, the highest calling per se, but it's dominion taking work. And it's very theological the way that we do things.

[Luke the Bear]

Yes.

[Josiah Stowe]

Like talking about tithing and how to do so biblically and how do we prioritize? Why are you not planning for your children's future? How can we get you to stop living paycheck to paycheck so that you can meaningfully build some wealth here on the earth?

[Luke the Bear]

Yeah.

[Josiah Stowe]

And you know, do. Do the work necessary to build the wealth to leave to your children and your grandchildren.

[Luke the Bear]

Yeah.

[Josiah Stowe]

So it's. Yeah, usually a lot of Bible verses, a lot of articles and just. Here you go, man. Here's some resources and let's, let's get down to it.

[Luke the Bear]

Yeah. Well, on eschatology matters.

[Josiah Stowe]

Right, right. I was just on eschatology matters, I think earlier this week.

[Luke the Bear]

Well, I just meant in general, but.

[Josiah Stowe]

Yeah, yeah, that too.

[Luke the Bear]

Just like, I mean it affects your view of wealth and leave an inheritance for your children.

[Josiah Stowe]

Yeah. Why polish brass on a sinking ship? Well, if the ship's not sinking, then maybe we should polish the brass and make sure that the ship's in tip top. Shape and make sure that everyone on that ship believes in God.

[Luke the Bear]

Yeah, well, and I think, and we can get into this, I think now is, now's a, a great time for Christians to get into the market and create businesses, you know, because we've seen, I think we're kind of coming out on the backside now of the whole woke agenda and a lot of these huge companies realize like this actually wasn't profitable. No, we actually lost a lot of money playing this game, you know, so now is the time for, for Christians to really take the lead and get back into creating businesses and you know, making money not just for the here and now, but again for our children and then be able to, you know, put some back into the kingdom as well.

[Josiah Stowe]

Yeah, yeah. We're seeing secularism collapse under the weight of its own stupidity and we alone have the proper alternative.

[Luke the Bear]

Amen. Amen to that. So, okay, so that, so let's, let's get into this discussion. And so the economy right now sucks. Amen. There's not much to say. You know, I think we're all hopeful that drill, baby, drill, maybe we'll get, you know, maybe we'll start to see some prices. I think stuff's coming down a little bit, but it's not been noticeable.

[Josiah Stowe]

Yeah, just wait till the, the tariffs actually start impacting prices.

[Luke the Bear]

Well, and that's the thing. This, I mean this, you actually, I think you were on, you were talking about the Devin Walken, right? Yeah, I heard this.

[Josiah Stowe]

Yeah.

[Luke the Bear]

And this is a great conversation because short term it's going to be painful, long term it's going to be really good. But immediately it's going to. And so I want to actually take a few minutes to explain why it's going to hurt short term, but then it'll be benefit us in the end.

[Josiah Stowe]

Yeah. So in order to do that properly, we'll actually have to go back to like the 1940s and 50s, the post war boom, where America was the kind of the manufacturing hub of the entire world. We were at Detroit was the richest city in the world because of our car manufacturing, because of, because of steel, because of copper, because of oil. So we were an incredibly productive nation. We were actually creating things. We were producing value. And then slowly but surely we decided, well, you know, it's actually more efficient for us to become a nation of managers and outsource all of our labor and the productive activities to other, other countries so that we can just all sit in offices nice and air conditioned and tell other people what to do. So we ended up really bloated. We moved from manufacturing to an entirely sort of white collar, at least with regards to the entire nation as a whole. Obviously there, there are still some manufacturing hubs out there in the United States, but the nation as a whole moved away from that, stopped being legitimately productive. And then we started borrowing money in order to pad our, our quarterly statements essentially because we need to make sure the shareholders are happy. And so now corporate debt's at an all time high, productivity is at an all time low, and we're just kind of having to come to the realization that we hyper overextended ourselves in a couple of industries and now we're facing the consequences. Right. We kept putting it off. That just compounds the debt. So now we're. Trump is finally kind of putting a stop to that. Nope. We're going to bring manufacturing back. We're going to make this a productive country again. We're going to stop importing everything and outsourcing the legitimate productivity and bring the wealth back home. But in the meantime, we're going to have to rectify those debts, the national debt and the corporate debts. And that's going to be very painful in the short term. But once we can finally balance the books, we can start moving forward in the right direction. We're going to have to take that hit on the chin, but it's the only way forward in order to make us a legitimately productive, legitimately rich nation again. Not one that's founded on debts.

[Luke the Bear]

Yeah, so, yeah, so it'd be great for, you know, guys like Steven or have small businesses here because they can, you know, produce the products that need, they need to produce because we're not getting it from outside of the country when these tariffs hit. The problem though is it's gonna raise the cost of everything a little bit because it, like you said, like we're not having super cheap labor in China and Mexico or wherever anymore. So but again, long term it's gonna be great because then we're bringing business back to our, our country and our own soil and it should start to even out. It just may be a little bit of time.

[Josiah Stowe]

There's a, there's a switching cost. We've been a blue collar country for a long time where office buildings were our primary way, way we do work. And now moving back to manufacturing, we're going to have to spend a lot of capital to, to get those systems up and running again. So yeah, it's going to take a little bit of time, but long term we're going to be A rich nation again.

[Luke the Bear]

Amen.

[Stephen Cortez]

Yeah, we at Apex, we primarily manufacture, we design and prototype and we actually kind of see this as a great opportunity where if manufacturing truly is going to come back to the United States, as long as we keep our operational expenses as low as possible, this would be a great time for guys who are into manufacturing to get up and running. Something that we've noticed is there's this like, this missing knowledge because American manufacturing just isn't what it used to be, that like you said, everyone knows how to manage these things, but very few people actually know how to manufacture things efficiently. I truly believe that, at least in our industry, you can make good quality stuff using less materials, losing less inventory as long as it's quality and make it super efficient where you can actually manufacture and sell at an affordable rate to Americans. So it is, I think, a skill set that a lot of guys need, but it's not impossible. It takes a little strategic planning, little bit of critical thinking, but it's not that hard. It's not as hard, I think, as people think it is.

[Josiah Stowe]

Yeah, that, that tends to be the way it goes. A lot of people are terrified of starting a business because of all the unknowns, but once you get down to it and you overcome those first rather sizable but manageable hurdles, you can usually get off the ground within three or four years and actually start making a profit.

[Luke the Bear]

Yeah, yeah, that's a great point. I mean, I think it's a lot of, it's just comfort. Right. Because we've gotten so used to just having our nine to five jobs, guaranteed income, you know, benefits, all that. And we're like, I don't, I don't want to go six months where I don't know if I'm going to have, you know, some insurance. It's like, well, just plan ahead for six months and then when you know, you, you're over that hump, then your business is good. But yeah, it's, it's a lot of just, I think, fear of discomfort, really. Right.

[Josiah Stowe]

And that, and most people don't have enough margin in their budget to save up enough money to have a six month buffer.

[Luke the Bear]

Yes.

[Josiah Stowe]

To actually get off the ground and get going. So it's almost a privilege to be able to be an entrepreneur. It's, it's a painful privilege, mind you, but not a lot of people actually have the capacity to make that leap.

[Luke the Bear]

Yeah.

[Josiah Stowe]

Let alone the comfort to make that leap.

[Luke the Bear]

Excellent, excellent point. Well, that, that reminds me, I'll go ahead and mention Amtek Blades. Speaking of Entrepreneurs and, you know, retired warriors and great men of God. Bill Rapier from Amtec Blades. Long time Navy Seal, dev group operator, super great friend and brother. And he started amtech Blades a few years ago when he got out and he's. Their blades are incredible. I, I don't have my knife on me, but I obviously have the battle ax. You can go to amtechblades.com and put, put up, put apology in the coupon code and you'll get 5% off your order. And he gives 5% to an abortion now to help us save babies. So love that brother and I love what he's doing. And again, he's doing what we're talking about right now. So. Well, let's. Okay, so let's switch a little bit here then. Not completely, but like I want to hear from, from your perspective, like what, what do you, what is the state of the economy and your, and your, from your position.

[Josiah Stowe]

Yeah. Essentially I agree with David Bonson's assessments probably nine times out of 10. So if you're looking for a deep dive and just go, go look at David Bonson stuff and then minor tweaks here and there because he's not a full blown reconstructionist. And we've got a little bit of a different idea on some things, but in a word, the economy does not like chaos. It does not like unpredictability at all. A lot of the value that the economy has, sort of the, I suppose subjective value of the economy is duplicatable, replicatable, consistent systems. So when you have a president who is threatening tariffs, 250% on some items or tariff or tariff sort of practices, and the political sphere is thrown into turmoil because we have a bull in the White House, things get dicey and investors start getting really conservative and the money doesn't flow nearly as aggressively. And so it's harder for folks who are entrepreneurial to find sources of funding. Not impossible, but harder because people are less likely to take those risks. They want things to stabilize before they're willing to kind of deploy capital. So just kind of tightens everything up. So the entire economy is basically just tense where there's a lot of people waiting, a lot of people moving their assets into more conservative, more, more reliable streams of income, even if they're, they're not technically a higher rate of return. And then you have some other investors who are just going buck wild because they're super happy that Trump's in office. So you have a sector of the economy that's just making some dumb decisions. Because they think they can get away with it. And another entire sector of the economy that's just tight fisted right now. But that's all kind of macro as far as microeconomics. Wages have not basically increased at all since 1971, at least adjusted against commodities, whereas our productivity has shot up nearly 2, 300%. So we're massively overpaid or underpaid rather. And the average American, well, basically the entire middle class has been almost destroyed. If you look at like even just Home Alone. If you, if you go back and watch Home Alone, 1990s Kevin McAllister gets an entire week's worth of groceries for 21 bucks. Yeah, or like $19 and some cents. And this guy who we don't know what Kevin's dad does for a living, but he's able to take his entire 12 person family on vacation to Paris. Yeah, like that was kind of upper middle class, but you would have to make something like $450,000 a year in order to afford that lifestyle these days. Days. And it's just not feasible. In fact, the, the middle class ideal, kind of what we would consider middle class with like 2.5 kids and a house in the suburbs and one week long vacation a year. And like you're unable to save enough for a comfortable retirement that's still upwards of $175,000 a year. Right. So we've, the middle class has effectively been pressed into serfdom if we want to get old school. And there's. Despite the fact that it's outside of our control, it is our responsibility as individuals to do the work necessary to get over those hurdles, get over those humps. It may not be practical for a large number of people, but we should be the minority that makes it happen. So no, the economy's not doing great, we might say. But I think we're just finally coming to terms where we're not deluding ourselves anymore and we're finally realizing, oh no, we're actually not living nearly as well as our parents did. We're not living nearly as well as our grandparents did. Things aren't constantly improving all the time. Sort of the post millennial American attitude of sorts, the functional post millennialism, if not legitimate, is kind of dying away. And people like, oh actually things suck. And it's good that they're finally coming to terms with reality. But it does mean that there's less optimism in the air and business runs on optimism.

[Luke the Bear]

Yeah, thank you for that. That was excellent. And speaking of David Bonson, he will be speaking At Reform Con.

[Josiah Stowe]

Yes, he will.

[Luke the Bear]

In a month. Maybe you guys can have a little, little debate over the, your minor differences, huh?

[Josiah Stowe]

Like, yeah, come on, read Rush tuning.

[Luke the Bear]

David's great. Love that guy. He has been very gracious to us. So, yeah, I mean, that's excellent. Thank you for that, man. It's just, there was just a lot to think about and I mean even, I mean, this is something we've, we've been talking about here. I, I don't, I don't know what it's like across the nation, but like here in Phoenix, everyone's electricity is literally doubled in the last year. You know, and of course it all goes back to, you know, the cost of fuel and all that stuff. But like literally our electricity is like literally per kilowatt hours doubled. You know, I just got a letter in the mail yesterday, I think, or two days ago from the town we live in saying that they're gonna add an extra $26 per month to our water bill.

[Josiah Stowe]

Yep.

[Luke the Bear]

You know, it's just like they voted on it and I'm like, that's significant.

[Josiah Stowe]

It is, right?

[Luke the Bear]

You know, I mean, it's not a ton of money, but when you look at like it's a significant percentage of our normal bill, you know, and it's like that for everyone all across the board, I think. And, and you know, we have some of the highest inflation rates here in Phoenix, so we're definitely, we've been, everyone's feeling the pinch and so. Okay, so what, like in your, from your perspective then, like, what's it going to take to kind of come out of this a little bit, maybe give some people some breathing room?

[Josiah Stowe]

Yeah. And there's, I suppose, two answers there. There's the macro one where we need to change up some policies, change up the politics, institute a few more or a few less programs, we might say, so the free market can actually do what it does best.

[Luke the Bear]

Yeah.

[Josiah Stowe]

We need to bring back manufacturing so that our wealth is not so tight against commodities, so that food prices can actually go down. Right. For like $4, you can feed an entire family across the sea, but you can't feed an American because dollars don't go so far against American food. But so there's a few things macro that we could do. I won't belabor that because it's not going to be legitimately helpful for most of your listeners. Micro. It just means that you have to pare down essentially we're. Or there's two solutions to this. Either make more money or spend less money.

[Luke the Bear]

Yeah.

[Josiah Stowe]

If you want more in terms of discretionary income, those are the only two options. Make more or spend less. And most people are already spending about as little as they can manage. And there's only so far you can go because your mortgage is static. That doesn't go up and down with market rates. Your food only goes up with regards to inflation. So if you're losing, I know. In the Phoenix area in particular, because we have clients in Phoenix. Thanks, guys. That, yeah. Utilities shot up aggressively. We normally see utilities at about $300 a month on the high end for gas, water, electric, and trash. Like across the nation. If you're spending more than $300, we're like, what? What are you guys doing? Are you running your showers 24 7? Have you sealed your doors and windows?

[Luke the Bear]

Electricity?

[Stephen Cortez]

I'm in an apartment and I'm spending more than $300 on.

[Josiah Stowe]

And it's just your area, by the way, that's painful. Well, it's like your area and like one area of Connecticut. But for our clients, it's really just you guys who are feeling the pinch, definitely the strongest, at least in that particular area. And you have a functional monopoly there with your electricity. You don't really get the choice of who's providing it. And you've got a bunch of liberals in your city hall that are upping the prices and introducing more policies that are just gumming up the works. So a lot of things you could do macro, but with regards to the individual, the individual family. Get someone who knows what a budget is supposed to look like. And you may think, you know, until you sit down with someone who does and they're okay, hey, you can save money here, you can save money here, you can save money here. You're overspending here, here, here, and here. You could do this instead of that. How about you buy half a cow, you know, in six months for six months worth of protein at $6 a pound, instead of going and buying a log of ground beef for, you know, $4 a pound. But it adds up.

[Luke the Bear]

Yeah.

[Josiah Stowe]

Or whatever you need to do. Hey, this is. These are different ways you could save money or go make more money, which means increasing your marketable skills, starting a business, doing another side hustle, not that we all don't already have three, and trying your best to make more money so that you can provide what God has called you to provide for your family. And he who does not provide for his family is worse than an infidel, worse than an unbeliever.

[Luke the Bear]

Yeah.

[Josiah Stowe]

So it's not A optional thing for you to do the work necessary to either make more or spend less. And if you do that, you'll find yourself in a better financial situation mathematically.

[Luke the Bear]

Yeah, yeah, yeah, for sure. I'll just. I don't want to belabor this point, but, like, I have a bunch of solar on my house, you know, and this. It was last summer when I started to notice that the cost of electricity had gone up so much. And I'm like, I have solar. Why am I still paying, you know, 200amonth, you know, to the, to the electric company? So I call my solar company and I'm like, what is going on? I'm looking at the numbers and they're like, oh, yeah, they started charging a different rate if you have solar.

[Josiah Stowe]

You dirty rats.

[Stephen Cortez]

Yeah.

[Luke the Bear]

So you get solar to help balance everything, and then they're just going to charge you more to make sure that they're still. And they're going to take the solar you're making for their own. It's like, you dirty rats.

[Josiah Stowe]

And then hit mortization, and then you hit the amortization period on your loan and that goes up.

[Luke the Bear]

Oh, my goodness. I was so angry when I discovered that. But there's nothing you could do. It's like, you know, you're just like, you got to eat it. Like, you just got to figure it out, you know, Otherwise you just will literally burn up in an oven during the summer. So.

[Josiah Stowe]

Right. But that, that's a gift horse. You should absolutely look in the mouth. Solar is, is a way. It looks nice on paper, but then you end up spending more and it increases the equity of your house. But you can't refinance right now because of the rates. Yeah, it's generally not a great idea, monetarily speaking.

[Luke the Bear]

I will say my, my cost, total cost has still been considerably lower than a lot of people I know. But it's still, you know, it's. You still feel it. So. But yes. Anyways, okay, so we got 20 minutes left here. So. So, so how do we then in this economy? We've laid it out. The economy is not good. This is why. This is what we need to do. How do we than intentionally think long term? Right. So say you're in a place like Phoenix and, and you can't move away like some of our families have. You don't have those opportunities. And so you're stuck in this economy. You're stuck where you're at. How do you, how do you build this wealth in long term? Yeah.

[Josiah Stowe]

And it starts with taking dominion Right. Taking dominion over your own finances. So do whatever work is necessary to increase your discretionary income so you have something to set aside. And there's a million ways to do that, which means you're going to get decision paralysis, potentially. Just pick one. Oh, well, I could go back to college and drop another $60,000 in debt for a degree so that I can make a little bit more money. I could do better at work and ask for that raise. I could get these certifications or I could look into getting another job and a lot of things you could do. But whatever I'd say it's going to depend person to person. So I can't give any general advice there except increase your income and decrease your expenses. But a lot of practical steps, an audit of your own personal budget, a basic financial inventory, income expenses, liabilities, assets, identifying your financial leaks, your subscriptions, bad spending habits, things that you don't know you're overspending on. Just do like a general, hey, what, what? How much does the average family of my size spend on this nationally? You do that research. Most people haven't. So just build out a budget and itemize everything and then understanding your opportunity cost. A lot of people are deploying their capital when they don't even have a solid financial foundation. They're, they're, they're investing without a position of security and strength. And so it's, it's no wonder when they actually have to pull some back with some regularity or go back into debt, further into debt, and now every dollar is worth less because they're having to pay 20, 30% on top of everything else. Real, real practical steps like eliminate your high interest debt. If you do have discretionary income, the thing that's charging you 26% is moving your net worth needle behind way faster than your 10 to 15% investments are moving your net worth forward so you're peddling in reverse. So let's get rid of the thing that's holding you back, cut the ballast off. Then we can might be able to raise your ships. Some general investment principles. Although talking investments here, I, I intentionally don't carry that license, which means, so I don't fall under SEC jurisdiction. So I can't really talk about that in too much detail. But if you do, we've got an investment guy, Justin Johnson, that I might be able to refer you to. And then just like owning productive assets, make sure that when you do deploy your capital, it's not on a speculative thing that you hope will increase in value, but something that is Actively producing value, or you can actively deploy to increase value. So if you get a car, which you should never buy, a depreciating asset with debt, it's not a great idea. But if you, if you buy a car, then do something with it or sell the car and go down to something that technically meets the function without being nearly the same cost. Because we're just going to be looking at practical functionality, not. Oh, but I really like heated leather seats. Like you can't afford heated leather seats. Not necessary here and not in Phoenix. Yeah. So whatever you want in terms of features, you might just have to make those sacrifices because they're not financially viable. Viable where you're at. And then finally, once you do most of those steps, you have more than a thousand dollars a month in discretionary income, then we can actually start doing some legitimate financial planning. You have your checking all the way full. You have your savings all the way full. You have your high yield savings, your emergency fund all the way full. Now let's start talking about what you can do for building that wealth and making that kingdom impact. Most people are trying to do that step when they haven't even gotten their own household in order. And it's no surprise when they kind of trip over themselves and end up going further and into debt or never really making any headway.

[Luke the Bear]

Yeah, I think that's a great point there at the end. I think a lot of, a lot of Christians probably like, oh, I'm gonna do this. They sit down, they do it for like a month or two and then they realize that they don't have the funds to keep it going. So they just. That didn't last long, you know, So I, I appreciate that. It's like you get your stuff lined up first and then you, then you do that. So it's almost like you gotta, you know, walk before you can run sort of a deal.

[Josiah Stowe]

Yeah.

[Luke the Bear]

So what are your thoughts on precious metals?

[Josiah Stowe]

You should go talk to Jim Hunter at Alps Precious Metals. We've got a relationship with him. So tell them that we sent you so we can.

[Luke the Bear]

That's great.

[Josiah Stowe]

Yeah. For precious metals in particular, they're, they're stores of value. So this gets into a little bit of macroeconomics, talking about currency. If you ever talk to someone about Bitcoin, you're going to get this conversation too. Because God has called certain things valuable. There was gold in the land of Avila. When there's two human beings on the face of the earth down there, down the river, there's a place with onyx and gold where? All right, look, there's a medium of exchange down there. When the economy gets built in a pre falling world, you will still need a medium of exchange, something to fractionalize bartering systems so that if you have cows and some other guy builds houses, you don't have to always trade five cows for a house house. Because maybe you, maybe there's other systems in play that you want to. Okay, I'll sell a gold, I'll sell a cow for five pieces of gold and I could take those five pieces of gold and I could buy this, this, this and this with it. But a way to make sure that we can. It's a more efficient way to barter essentially with a store value medium of exchange. Gold is a store of value. It is not an investment. In fact, it's, it's not even traded. It's currently treated like a commodity, which means you pay capital gains tax on it. That's no fun. But it's essentially a currency. It's a place where your money goes to situation and remain relatively static compared to commodities. So you can buy the same amount of bread, the same size house. That's the way it's supposed to function. Gold is kind of on a little bit of a uptick because of how bad the dollar is doing. But it depends on what you're using as your, as your denomination, your denominational of currency.

[Luke the Bear]

Right.

[Josiah Stowe]

If you compare everything against Bitcoin, everything's getting really cheap all the time because bitcoin keeps going up, or so they tell me. But if you're using the dollar, everything gets more expensive against the dol because of inflation. What was the question again?

[Luke the Bear]

Because I just want to know your thoughts on precious.

[Josiah Stowe]

Three tangents in. Right. So gold is great as a store of value, but let's say in 1920 you bought $1,000 worth of gold. Today you have a fairly substantial amount of dollars you could trade that gold back for. But if instead you deployed that thousand dollars into a productive asset, even just something like hypothetically the s and P500, you'd have like 50, 15, 20 times that. Because you're putting your money into an, a legitimately productive investment as opposed to a singular store of value. So precious metals certainly have their place, but it's where money goes to sit. It's where money that you're not actively using can go to sit and hopefully keep its value compared to everything else. But it's not something that you can use to actually build. Yeah, and most people are not in a position to say oh yeah. Well, I've got dollars that I shouldn't be using to do something else. So let me just put it in, in this asset class for a while so that I can protect it before I go and deploy it elsewhere. That's. That's generally not the attitude most people should be taking.

[Luke the Bear]

Excellent. Go ahead.

[Stephen Cortez]

So I have a question too. So on one of your other podcasts, you were talking about Christian mindset, and I think it might be good to kind of tie this all together. So. So I got some really bad advice when I was younger, like early 20s, where it was a good thing for me as a Christian to lock myself into a big car payment and max out my credit cards because that shows that I can make monthly payments. And that's good because now I can month to month make payments. And that really hurt me, like even now, you know, like that took a portion out of my life of like paying that back and still and stuff. So it seems like most Americans, and especially Christians have no idea they're not having these conversations, at least not enough. So with everything, we just talked about poor debt management, but then also that post millennial mindset of being future oriented. My daughter's one and Dr. White's really adorable. She's the best. Objectively speaking, she is. She's the best.

[Luke the Bear]

She happens to really like me too, but.

[Stephen Cortez]

Yeah, she does. But Dr. Weitz talked about this, Jeff, all of our pastors of when you have kids, it changes everything, right? You start thinking more about the future and Lord willing, I'll have grandkids and great grandkids and a large family. But how can Christians, even if they don't have children yet, or if they do and they're not thinking about this, what does it take to change that mindset where you're not just thinking about your month to month expenses, but thinking about that generational wealth, whether it's building a business or just spending less and making more. What does it take? What does it take for a guy to like, take control of things?

[Josiah Stowe]

A lot. But I would say it's primarily mindset. 90% mindset, 10% actual action. So I suppose you would need to be more specific in the question because it is going to depend person to person. I can't just say every man should go start a business because there are men who are not gifted with those talents. That would be a bad financial decision for them to even try. Some men are built for middle management. A corner office is about as good as they could get with their particular giftings. So just Making sure that they are being strategic in their deployment of capital, in their saving of money, in their spending, and making sure that they are constantly working toward those ends where they begin with the end in mind. Every decision has those things in mind. And eventually, even if it takes longer than another man, man, he should end up, as long as he's wise in a financial position to leave an inheritance to his children and his children's children, making sure that compound interest is working in his favor instead of against him. And then time is the biggest factor there. So if he starts early, he starts often. And it starts with something. 50 bucks a month in your teens is going to equate to potentially hundreds of thousands of dollars later, as long as it's. As long as it's compounding, as long as it's working for you. So, yeah, I'd say a level of education is going to be necessary and a level of stewardship that parents need to have over their children and their children's financial education in particular to start moving that needle forward. And it's going to take probably three or four generations before we start seeing a substantial shift. But eventually, I think we're going to be able to build from granite again and stained glass windows because the church is going to be the one with the wealth or the church is going to be the people with the wealth. And for a practical example of this, because we're not just talking theory, look at the Mormons. Incredibly industrious people. That's why Deseret had a honey hive and where they've got honeybees on their stuff, because they were just incredibly industrious. They went out to the middle of a barren desert and created a civilization because they had that post millennial view. They had that continuous or, yeah, that continuity in that community where like, okay, we're all working toward the same goal. I'm going to make sure that this man gets my business, all of my business. I'm going to make sure that we build this thing here and that it supports these industries here so that we can grow as a community. And because of their sort of isolationist tendencies and their incredible industriousness, within five or six generations, they have a $100 billion investment portfolio, the Reformed Church, just since that's. That is the Christian playbook. All we have to do is apply it. It's not like they came up with it. They just reverse engineered the proper biblical principles of wealth building did it and surprise, now they're wealthy. So all we have to do is the same thing or Again, look at, like, the Jewish community, incredibly insular, incredibly industrious within their particular industries that they seem to be good at. And they, not they. They make it a priority to go after wealth, to keep it in the family, to keep it in the community, and to grow it. Right. To deploy it in the way that's the most efficient for their people. So all we have to do is take that mindset, take those. Those same playbooks that we've seen play out over community and over community and over community and just do the same, because that's what God has already called us to do. They're just actually applying it.

[Luke the Bear]

That's good stuff.

[Stephen Cortez]

Yeah. Last thing I'll say on that. Like, that should be convicting for all of us as Reformed Christians, we should be the best businessmen, the best business owners, the best employees, the best at everything, because we have no better reason to work than for the glory of God. And if someone's talents necessarily don't make them the best, like, I'll never be the best at golf, and I'm okay with that. But Christians should be the hardest workers. At the very least, if I'm working at McDonald's next to an unbeliever, I should be the hardest working one there, even if I'm, you know. So I think that should be convicting, especially in the Reformed world of, you know, we. We have such great theology, and we. We can have excellent podcasts, but are we the best at all of these other avenues? You know?

[Luke the Bear]

Yeah, excellent point.

[Josiah Stowe]

Or it's setting aside our petty differences and actually working together as the reform community likes to fight each other and tear each other down at large. Obviously not here.

[Luke the Bear]

Yeah.

[Josiah Stowe]

More than they like to go and actually patronize, quite literally, the. The businesses of other Reformed believers.

[Luke the Bear]

Sure. Yeah. And I appreciate that. I think. I mean, I've been saying this a lot for the last several years, but there's this word I keep coming back to, and it's just intentional. Intentionality. And, you know, to kind of go back to your question, like, how do you. It's just be intentional. Right. And so I think we, as Christians, a lot of time, just, we think of these things in theory. You know, we don't actually put them. The paper put it to work. And so just be intentional. You know, it takes literally, just like, all right, that's 25 bucks a month. That's what I have right now to put aside. We'll start there. You know what I mean? If you don't start there, you're just gonna buy you Know, two more Starbucks or whatever each month, you know, so like start somewhere, be intentional. And like you said, it's about good stewardship. And you know, that applies to all areas of life, not just money. And it applies to your, your children, you know, your, your, if your husband to your wives, your family. Like you should be a good stewardship of your time, like all that stuff. So be intentional in all those areas. And I think that's, you know, that's where you're going to start. But if you don't do that, just, you're spinning your wheels, right, because we.

[Josiah Stowe]

Are coming out of the ashes as a nice segue into your conference.

[Luke the Bear]

Good job.

[Josiah Stowe]

Right, so we are, we are coming out of the ashes here. We, we do have a way forward. There is a Christian way to rebuild. And so anyone who's coming to the conference, they're going to hear a lot of, a lot of high level stuff, presumably about what you can do in this sphere, this sphere, this fear, this sphere. Because assuming that we're Hyperion sphere sovereignty, you should do this in your church, you should do this in your politics, you should do this in your business, you should do this in your home. This is how we rebuild and take dominion. And you're going to hear a lot of really practical advice in that regard. And then that's my entire or I, I've niched down so far as to only take on one entire sphere, which is the economic one, to help Christians take dominion over their businesses, over their personal finances and over the deployment of that capital for the Christian community, at least to, to a degree. Because obviously David Bonson, he deploys larger amounts of capital.

[Luke the Bear]

Yes, he does.

[Josiah Stowe]

But for, for the everyday man who doesn't have a million dollars ready to go in investable assets, we're able to help them get there or at the very least help their grandkids be able to take advantage of his services.

[Luke the Bear]

We know this. I got an example. My wife and I just literally had this conversation like three days ago. I think I'm at the age now where both my wife and I, our parents are getting older. And so we're thinking like, okay, we're gonna maybe soon need to get to a point where we're supporting them and helping take care of them as they get older sort of a thing. And you know, like, I thought of this the other day, I was like, you know, I might, I might not be able to leave my children millions of dollars, but I'll for sure be able to leave them a house. Right? But what's cool is like my wife actually reminded me, you know, I was able to take my inheritance from my grandparents that helped us get our house that we own, you know, and so like this thinking long term, multi generationally. So I leave that to my kids and my grandkids and here they'll be able to trace that all the way back to my grandparents, you know. And so like that's how as Christians we should be thinking, you know, so we can take those things multi, generationally and be able to, you know, it's part of the household. I got a lot of this from C.R. wiley and household for the war, for the Cosmos. Like that's all part of the household, the wealth that's in that. And so we should be thinking about how we can then keep that in, in the family, pass it down generationally and just so little things like that doesn't have to be, you know, I need half a million dollars. Like, no, you know, I think I got like 10 or 15,000 from my grandparents started there. It wasn't significant. It was at the time, it was amazing, you know, but it wasn't like a huge amount of money. But we'll be able to then multiply that generationally.

[Josiah Stowe]

So yeah, that's the end goal. Yeah, I think we're going to have a lot of fun at the, at the conference. There's going to be a lot of opportunity for learning, for growth, a lot of stuff that is going to go out. So I recommend anyone who is coming to take notes and then to do the actual work of applying everything that they learn once they, once they get home, it's, this is the time. This, as we talked earlier, this is the time where there's going to be a huge amount of opportunity in the United States, a huge, huge opportunity to start a business, to get involved. And as Christendom is actively trying to rebuild itself a couple of ways, mind you, and there's some competing ideologies on exactly how to get that done. But there's the Spirit, right? We're all trying. We all see that secularism is collapsing and that it is the time now for Christians to shine. So how do we go about doing that? Well, I'd say look to Scripture, not to Aristotle, but there's Amen, but there's a way to apply it. If you just have perfect theology, but you never actually do anything. Clanging CYMBAL clashing gong Right. We need to make sure that you're actually applying what you're learning so that your children and your children's children can take advantage of the work that you did. That even though your grandparents and parents didn't, weren't necessarily the best stewards and didn't leave us much. We have the chance to rebuild now and that's not an opportunity that you should even think about passing up.

[Luke the Bear]

Amen, man. I appreciate that. We'll end on here then. So for all our all accessors, I call them, you can stick around. We'll do an after show with Josiah. So if you have any questions for him, you can fire away in the after show. We'll be do about 20 minutes. But yeah, I think I'll just say this in closing this to something you just said, Josiah. I as, you know, as a pastor, I get a lot of questions from our congregants that are like, I don't know what to do. I don't know what God's will is. I don't know should I do this or should I do that? And I think a lot of times I've noticed over the years is that Christians kind of, we get hung up in that I don't know what to do zone, right? This is something you've been, you've been through, like, and so I think you and I even had this conversation. So instead of just trying something, you know, we just sit there and do nothing. And we're like. And we get like overly pietistic, right? We're like, I want to do God's will, but I don't know what it is. It's like, okay, we'll try something. Take a step of faith. And if it doesn't work, that wasn't God's will. Try something else, you know, and so like, and then Christians do that and then they're like, oh, that was cool, that worked. And you know, this is. Or maybe that didn't work. Let me try this. You know, and so yes, God's sovereign, but we still have to act, right? We can't. We can't just set our hands and God's just not just gonna magically sprinkle success dust on us, you know, like, we gotta actually do something. We gotta put forth some effort. So anyways, I appreciate the point you were just making there, but any closing thoughts from either of you?

[Josiah Stowe]

Yeah, I'd say repent of your gnostic asceticism, get down to work. And then I realized I didn't give anyone a place to find me. So if you go to www.reform money, that's a redirect for our website. It was available, perfect, surprisingly, but also unsurprisingly so go there. We'll be happy to talk with you. We'll fix up your personal budget. We'll help you with savings, debt management, life insurance, retirement planning, estate planning, business coaching as well if you want to get off the ground. But we do all of that for free. It's a business, not a ministry. But we don't have to charge you for it. So it can kind of be one that it's ministerial in effect. But we're just happy to help you apply scripture to your, to your life, to your finances and get you squared away so that you can bolster, boldly deploy that Christian capital or at the very least set your children up to do, to do that for you.

[Luke the Bear]

Awesome, man. And Stephen, remind everyone where people can find your stuff.

[Stephen Cortez]

Yeah. So ApexDevelopment Co to find more about our company and then the Bible's dropped tomorrow@valley operationsgroup.com Josiah, I bet you would.

[Luke the Bear]

Have loved to have had these as a chaplain's assistant.

[Josiah Stowe]

Oh, we had plenty.

[Luke the Bear]

Not like this though.

[Josiah Stowe]

Yeah, not those.

[Stephen Cortez]

It's not too late. We'll talk after and we'll ship some.

[Josiah Stowe]

The American Bible Society gives away waterproof Bibles by a truckload. So we handed those out like candy.

[Luke the Bear]

Interesting. The pages are all waterproof too. Not just the COVID No, no, unfortunately.

[Josiah Stowe]

Just the COVID It's a shame. So real quick, it's still like thin rice paper pages.

[Stephen Cortez]

We are making waterproof durable Bibles where the pages that cover everything will be waterproof, tear resistant, American made, all of those cool things. So keep your guys posted.

[Luke the Bear]

There's that post mill innovation right there.

[Stephen Cortez]

That's right.

[Josiah Stowe]

Every, every chaplain that's list can make sure to order those for your unit.

[Stephen Cortez]

Exactly.

[Luke the Bear]

There you go. There you go. Of course I want to mention our, our story and go to shop apologiestudios.com where I mentioned Landmark Grocers, they got this amazing preset blend coffee which they will be at Reform Con and they're gonna have all their coffee at Reform Cons to come get some. You got all the tracks and swag and stuff. And then I can't forget to mention Heritage Defense. Heritage Defense.org you can go there, put apology in the coupon code and get your first month free. And please, please, please, if you're homeschooling, sign up. Make sure you're protected against any three letter agency who comes to your door. Hopefully now that we have a different administration, you'll have a lot more freedom to homeschool. But regardless, you should be protected. It's Very, very affordable. So all that to say thank you everyone again for tuning in. We appreciate all of you. Like I said, we will be on the after show here in a minute for everyone. That's all Access. Thank you for keeping the lights on. And of course, I want to mention end abortion now. We're coming quickly, coming to a close here at the legislative session. I think we still have bills in Ohio and Kentucky we're working on. I again will be in Idaho next week.

[Josiah Stowe]

HB523 in Kentucky.

[Luke the Bear]

Yes. Pastor Jeff's been been working hard on that one. Did you actually did you see him when he was there?

[Josiah Stowe]

I missed him by a day. We went to the planned parent or the and not end abortion now is the Kentucky Family Life foundation. Their their demonstration the day after and crashed their party with HB522.

[Luke the Bear]

Oh, that's nice. Nice. Good time. That's awesome. Yeah. So I'll be in Idaho next Tuesday. If you if you have questions, if you're in Idaho and you want to come to that, we're having a pastor's meeting for our bill there in Boise. If you have any questions, let us know. We'll get you the information for that. But I'll be there. Daryl Groves will be there. And we're actually doing a live cross politics show Monday night and I'm doing Bryce Edie show Tuesday morning. So gonna be a busy couple days. Anyways, thank you again, everyone. Appreciate y'. All. And we'll see you next week. Peace.