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I have been in the Home Loan Financing business for 29 years. In those 29 years, I have been a straight commission income Loan Officer for 20 of them. Commission income isn’t for everyone. There are pros and cons to it. The biggest con being the pressure to stay consistently successful, all while the possibility of coming up empty always lurks in the back of your mind. If a loan doesn’t close I make no income, and it doesn’t matter how much time or effort I put into it. Time and experience have helped along the way. I will say it has been a good living.
However, I have the worst personality to be a successful loan officer in the lending business. At heart, I am shy, have a small circle of family and friends, and when it comes to marketing myself…well, saying I am not good at it is an understatement. I don’t drink at all, which makes me a fish out of water at a happy hour, a main networking event in my line of work. And one of the best ways to help yourself succeed is to put yourself out there. Market yourself like a madman and get your face in front of as many people as possible. Network like crazy and develop as many referral partners as you can. Not the greatest news for someone who is totally content to stick to himself, stay on his one-lane highway, and serve the God whom many shun and laugh at.
With that being said, if anyone asks me how I keep it going to bring in loans (and I have been asked this a few times throughout my career), I always give the same answer: I pray that God will send me a loan. Now, at first read, you might think…”Oh, c’mon! really? Let me get this straight. You ask God for a loan, and he just always sends you one?” And for those who don’t believe in God at all, they even chuckle at this notion that there is a God who you can actually pray to. I am sure in their mind, they laugh and crack some kind of joke that I am praying to a non-existent force with no power to do anything. Fair enough…I understand that line of reasoning, and I’ll explain this as I continue here.
So does God send me a loan when I ask Him for it? The answer is almost always, yes. And believe me when I say, I ask God for loans a lot. The last thing I want you to think or get from this blog is that God is some vending machine where I can put my prayer in, push the button, and a loan comes out. So, what is the point of this blog anyway?
Here it is.
There are two important things I hope you get out of this. The first thing I hope you get out of this is this: make no mistake, God is sovereign. When I pray for loans, I intentionally pray and tell God that I will praise and worship Him regardless of the outcome. “God, I need a loan, and I am asking you to send me one, but if You don’t, I will praise and worship You anyway. You are my God and my King, and I submit to your sovereignty.” Now, I can’t fool God. I am not hoping to stroke some kind of vanity in God in fooling Him to send me a loan. No, instead, God, because of who He is, knows my heart, and because He is my God, I want him to know my heart. I want to pour my heart out to Him as I bring my prayers to Him. Prayer, is the ultimate sign of worship.
The second thing I want you to see and get out of this blog is this: Me asking God for loans and God answering my prayer is just a small snippet inside of something way bigger and significantly way more important. And that is, I have an intimate, personal relationship with God. There is nothing greater than a relationship with the God who created not just you, but all things! No matter what I am going through in my life, God is in my life. My relationship with Him is personal and the most relevant part of my whole existence. You see, when you look at my prayer for loans, and God blessing me with loans…this can’t be put into proper perspective until you understand that God is at the center of how I want to live my life. I try to be kind to people because of God. I try to be generous because of God. I try to be honest because of God. I try to love because of God. I want to impact someone’s life because of God. I want to praise and worship God when He answers me the way I want and when He answers me in the way I don’t want. He is God, and I am not. What I do know is…whatever God’s answer is with anything I ask of Him, I can take peace and comfort knowing that I can only see what is in front of me. God can see the full picture of my whole existence, both in my past and my future. And here is the other thing that is sobering and the best perspective in my opinion: When I pray to God, I don’t even know if what I am asking for is the best thing for me. God and God alone does know what is best for me…ALWAYS! Again, submitting to God’s sovereignty is so liberating and comforting that I can’t even describe it in words that give it justice. All I can say is there is nothing like it!
As I look to wrap this up, let me circle back to the above comment that I made when I said I understand why someone might laugh off my answer about how I get loans when they think God is some pie-in-the-sky non-existent being who can’t help anyone, let alone me. The reason I understand that, with all due respect to them, is because… how can they understand? Without a relationship with God, how would one understand the person who does have a relationship with Him? Think of it this way. Whoever you have the greatest relationship with in your life…a spouse or significant other…a parent…a brother or sister…a friend that would jump in front of a truck for you…Would anyone outside of your relationship with that person ever truly understand the importance of that relationship? Sure, you can talk about it, just as I have here about my relationship with God, but without them experiencing it for themselves, it’s an easy discard to the side as non-believable, right? And when it comes to talking about a relationship with God in this way, which would require prideful man to bow, submit to, and be accountable to… well then all bets are off on that nonsense, right? So, again, I get it.
But here is my plea: If you don’t have a relationship with the God who created you and everything that exists, I ask that you consider it. In times of struggle in your life, He will carry you if you bring it to Him. In times of great victory in your life, He will be there to celebrate with you as well. In both the highs and the lows, God wants a relationship with You. This relationship is intimate, personal, and unique to you. And I can tell you that no matter what side of life you’re currently in, the highs or the lows, having a relationship with God is unmatched by anything else you can have.
So if anyone asks me how I make it in a profession that is so opposite from what my personality should be to make it, and how I can still be successful, I always answer: “I ask God for loans.” I have the Trump Card that will always sustain me…not because I have a puppet god who gives me what I want when I pull the strings, but because I serve a sovereign God who loves me more than I love myself and knows what’s best for me. He will answer me accordingly…loan or no loan! It just simply doesn’t get much better than that!
I encourage anyone reading this to come to God with all your hopes, fears, and asks, and then be prepared to praise and worship Him regardless of the outcome. It works for this reason: God is alive and well and wants a relationship with YOU!
In fact, He made YOU for this very reason.
Have Character!
J. Noah Russell
