Kingdom Wealth PRINCIPLES

In 1996 I lost my home. My parents struggled to pay the mortgage and at the age of 14 we were being evicted from the only home that I ever knew. My mom said to me “Jase you have to get your things ready because next week we have to leave this house.”

With little warning my whole world was turned upside down. I didn’t understand how or why someone can lose their house. It was a real world lesson that shook me to my core. I began to identify as someone who was poor and came from a poor family. I promised myself to never let that happen to myself and at the age of 15 I got my first job and created a hard work ethic ever since.

Then, In 2006 I married the love of my life. We moved from Staten Island to New Jersey and bought our forever home at the young age of 24. We fulfilled Nellies childhood dream of a beautiful honeymoon in Maui and we were living at the top of the world.

And then came the 2008 recession…

Prior to 2008 we were already beginning to struggle. We over leveraged our credit to furnish our home and to live a life we were not financially prepared for. We were going to lose our home. I was going to lose my home, AGAIN. We were unable to sell the house because the recession devalued our home by almost 30%. We ended up renting it to a family for LESS than what it cost us to keep it. That summer we moved out of our “forever home” and into a 300sf basement apartment.

Our little basement apartment was equipped with a “kitchenette” but no stove. Our source for cooking meals was a toaster oven and an electric camping burner. I could not afford a storage unit so we crammed the contents of our 1800sf house into our 300sf apartment. Because our new home could not fit a bed and living room set, we leaned the mattress and disassembled bed frame up against the wall and faced our sectional couches together to make a double wide couch/ bed.

The move left me unemployed, and I fell into a deep deep depression. At that moment, I knew of the Lord but did not yet know the Lord.

Looking back in hindsight I wouldn’t change a thing, because that time of struggle in my life was a gift and one of the best things that could have ever happened to me. And one of the greatest lessons that I’ve learned from it is this:

Life’s struggles and challenges happen FOR you and not TO you.