SID: Hello. Sid Roth here. Welcome to my world where it’s naturally supernatural. My guest, Steve Foss, had a prophecy in the year 2000, about the economic collapse. I want to hear about this. What did God tell you?
STEVE: Well in 2000, God spoke to me about the presidential election that was coming up at the time. He told me that George W. Bush was going to be the next President of the United States. He told me he was going to be elected to two terms. He said during his time, there would be a season of unprecedented wealth creation. We all remember the housing boom.
SID ROTH: Sure.
STEVE: It seems like forever now. But we remember that.
SID: Anyone could have made money back then.
STEVE: Right. It was so easy, and it was. But He said at the end of the Bush administration, the economy would collapse. The economy collapsed. And we saw this begin to take place just as we turned, just as September hit, we saw the trembling before. But boy, the stuff that happened in September and October, we all remember, and the threat of the total economic collapse. And I began to pray at that time, too. I said, “Lord, is this the final End Time collapse?” Because I believe, Sid, that I know that in order for the one world economic system to rise up, for the Anti-Christ to come in, for nations to give up their freedoms, there has to be a world economic collapse. I said, “Is this that one?”
SID ROTH: Right.
STEVE: And He said, “Not yet.” It’s laying the groundwork for it. The foundations of the world economic system are being shook right now, and being cracked and broken. But He gave me an incredible word. He said there was a time of wealth creation that was going to come back, a time of prosperity, short seasoned, that was going to come back. And He told me, He said, “You tell my people get out of debt. Get out of debt.” That He’s going to give us one more opportunity to get out of debt.
SID: If we don’t get out of debt, what’s going to happen?
STEVE: We will be so bound up, because those who are debtors are slaves to the lenders, are subject to the lenders.
SID: Well, you know, I believe what you’re saying, too. I believe that we have a short window of opportunity to get our house in order. And I also believe, Steve, that you are almost like an Old Covenant prophet. You go through the experience–
STEVE: Yes.
SID: –to get extraordinary supernatural wisdom to help others. Now you were warned–
STEVE: Yes.
SID: –not to get in debt. Tell me about that warning.
STEVE: Yeah, I feel like I’m being rebuked by my father right now, yes. In 1989, God told me, “Don’t go into debt.” He said, “Or it will hinder what I have for you.” But by 1994, I forgot. [laugh]. You know, circumstances–
SID: Welcome to the human race.
STEVE: Circumstances come and people, other preachers even, influence the way that you think. Oh it’s not so bad. It’s okay. As long as it’s done for God purposes. Well we were going through a struggle in our church at the time. A church split went on, and I became concerned about the finances. And so I started borrowing on credit cards, and started living off of credit cards. Within eight months, we were $18,000 in credit card debt.
SID: You totally forgot that word you had from God: Do not get into debt.
STEVE: Yeah. I forgot it conveniently.
SID: I understand.
STEVE: You know, you’re aware it’s there, but–
SID: But you see other’s doing it.
STEVE: That’s right.
SID: So you say I guess it’s okay.
STEVE: That’s right. And here is the biggest thing I would say. I didn’t know what else to do, which was the trap. I didn’t know what else to do. And that came back to give me a revelation later on. Well Sid, then our economics got better. But every time there was a down season, we would lean on the arm of debt. Lean on the arm of debt. Lean on the arm of debt. But we thought it was manageable. We could manage it. And we’ll borrow now and God will bring in the provision. God will bring it in. Well it kept building and building until it got overwhelming. And we were doing another church, I had just planted a separate church. We did another church, and we lost our facility. We were renting. We lost our facility, and we had to start meeting Sunday afternoons. We lost 70 percent of our crowd.
SID: Just out of curiosity, were you giving money? Were you tithing? Were you doing what the Bible says to do?
STEVE: Absolutely. I was, we were radical sowers and tithers. And we saw supernatural provision come in. But the debt was overwhelming to the provision that was coming in. Now some people say, oh well that shouldn’t be so. But Sid, when this all broke through, when it all got said and done, I found out, I did the math, all the money I spent on interest payments and penalty payments, had I not gone into debt in the first place, that money was equivalent to everything that I actually bought.
SID: So somehow, you thought you had to help God out.
STEVE: Yes. Yes.
SID: But he actually provided had you not gone into credit card debt, because then you owed, you still owed all the principle.
STEVE: Right.
SID: Because you had just been paying the interest and penalties.
STEVE: Right. Just the minimum payments. And so I kept having interest, and it kept building and building. And that’s what the trap was. Had I waited, God had provided. The sowing, the tithing, the offerings, all the principles, God had provided had I waited and not gotten into debt in the first place.
SID: How bad did the debt get?
STEVE: My unsecured debt, credit card loan debt was $125,000.
SID: But, you know, the thing that is tragic, is when the credit card companies came after you. Tell me about that.
STEVE: We tried, we got a point where God started dealing with me, and finally I said, I was borrowing from this card to pay that card. I finally said no more. No more, God. I can’t do this. And I cut the credit cards up. And God started speaking to me about debt. But we didn’t have the money some of the big ones that were due right away. I owed one company a lot of money. They turned us over to collections. I tried to work out payments with them. They wouldn’t work out payments. They called us up and they started to threaten us. And I remember getting the phone call, Sid. They’re saying, “We’re suing you today.” And I said, “I don’t have any money.” And they said, “We have ways of getting money. We’re gonna send our people in. They’re gonna take your children’s toys away from them in front of you, and they’re gonna turn to your children and say, ‘Your dad is a deadbeat father.’”
SID: They really said that to you?
STEVE: They said that to me.
SID: How could they do that to you?
STEVE: They were lying. But I didn’t know they were lying. And Sid, I understood the pressure of financial collapse. And I know there’s people. I can feel it right now. There’s people right now. You are connected with what I’m saying right now. You’re feeling it. You know what the threats are like. I was in tears. I had sold my family into slavery. They’re gonna, what they’re gonna do to my children. I wasn’t squandering money out there. It builds step by step. I wasn’t a bad person. I wasn’t living, taking ridiculous vacations. I found myself in situations that I was making bad decisions, but I didn’t realize it. And now my family was in slavery.
SID: And you know what’s so wonderful? There is light at the end of the tunnel. He has been given supernatural wisdom on how to live this life not being a slave to debt. I can’t wait for him to tell you a bit about it. We’ll be right back after this word.
