One of the strongest themes in the conversation is persistence.

Steve observes that, over the years, he has seen a common pattern among people who eventually do well:

They refuse to quit when others would.

The conversation does not romanticize failure. Failure can be costly. Business involves real risk.

But Steve makes an important distinction: persistence is the prerequisite for receiving a return on failure.

Without persistence, failure can become final.

With persistence, people can continue, adapt, and learn.

Chris connects that persistence with risk and faithfulness. He also raises the concern that people can be encouraged to remove risk, avoid discomfort, and pursue safety.

The conversation presents business as a place where risk cannot always be eliminated.

Entrepreneurs make decisions under pressure. They face uncertainty. They experience moments where success and failure can seem very close together.

That environment can also become a place of spiritual formation.

When Steve asks Chris how business disciples a person, Chris begins with a simple point:

You have to allow that possibility.

A business owner must recognize that the opportunities, pressures, and difficulties within business can refine them and draw them closer to the Lord.

Chris describes business as a form of daily discipleship.

One of his mentors described business as walking a tightrope every day between what the world would call success and failure.

There are decisions every day that could move a company one direction or another.

In that environment, Chris describes the need for dependence on the Lord’s guidance and direction.

He also emphasizes the importance of remembering moments where God showed up in ways that could not simply be attributed to the entrepreneur.

Over time, he warns, people can begin rewriting those moments.

Something once recognized as God’s provision can later be explained away as the result of personal ability or circumstances.

Then the next difficult season comes.

The entrepreneur becomes anxious.

The outcome is uncertain.

Expectations are not being met.

In those moments, Chris says it is important to remember the previous moments where God was clearly at work.

Steve shares his own experience of returning to business after reaching a point where he could have retired comfortably.

He and his wife had to decide whether they were willing to put resources at risk again and become uncomfortable.

The business required more money than Steve originally expected.

For him, that experience became part of a deeper lesson about trust.

He says that business discipled him in a way that helped change his relationship with anxiety and trust.

Chris also shares that he is currently involved with a company that is failing.

He does not know the end of that story.

He does not claim that every faithful risk produces the desired business outcome.

Instead, he asks deeper questions:

Can I still rest?

Can I still trust?

Can I still have faith?

The conversation presents business discipleship not as a formula for guaranteed success, but as a place where faith can be tested and formed.

One of the companies Chris and his wife started was a staffing agency focused on placing refugees into jobs.

After moving from Colorado back to Georgia, they bought their first home in Clarkston, a highly diverse community outside Atlanta.

Their neighbors came from many different parts of the world.

Chris began having conversations with people from Muslim, Buddhist, Hindu, and other backgrounds. He wanted to hear their stories and understand where they were coming from.

During that time, refugees were often being described in the media in narrow ways.

But Chris's direct conversations revealed something different.

Again and again, people asked for help finding jobs.

Chris began to see them not simply through categories presented in public conversation, and not simply as charity cases.

He saw people who wanted to work.

He saw a workforce.

What began as a side effort to connect people with employers became a for-profit staffing company.

Over approximately eight years, the company placed around 20,000 refugees into jobs across the United States and grew to 14 offices.

The company created meaningful economic opportunity.

But Chris also began wrestling with another question:

How could the company pursue spiritual impact while still dealing honestly with the financial realities of business?

Chris describes a tension familiar to many business owners.

A faith-driven entrepreneur may genuinely want to:

• serve people,

• bring value,

• help others know God,

• keep the doors open,

• remain profitable,

• reach goals,

• and meet responsibilities to investors.

Those goals can feel difficult to hold together.

The question becomes: How can a company pursue spiritual impact without creating activities that work against the financial health of the business?

Chris and his team began asking whether they could identify spiritual metrics that were positively connected to the company’s financial direction.

He observed that some companies set spiritual impact goals that are disconnected from, or even in tension with, the financial drivers of the business.

When financial pressure increases, those spiritual initiatives can be the first things removed.

Chris suggests starting with what the company already is.

Look at:

• the mission,

• the vision,

• the values,

• the company goals,

• the vendors,

• the stakeholders,

• and the groups the business already serves.

Then identify an area where the company could have meaningful spiritual impact within the direction the business is already moving.

For Chris, that became the foundation for simple spiritual impact planning.

As Chris tried to help other businesses think about spiritual impact, he wanted to make the process simple.

He describes two categories.

1. Spiritual Integration Activities

These are intentional actions a company chooses to pursue.

Examples mentioned in the conversation include:

• a weekly prayer call,

• praying over the business,

• a monthly voluntary devotional,

• hosting an event where people intentionally engage others,

• offering marriage counseling,

• offering trauma counseling,

• creating space for a chaplain,

• praying for people,

• or integrating the Gospel into relationships within the business.

The specific activity can look different from company to company.

The important point is that the activity should be tangible enough to measure.

For example, if a company decides to pray over the business once per month, it can track whether that happened.

At the end of the year, the company can look back and say:

We planned to do this 12 times.

Did we do it?

That is a measurable activity.

2. Spiritual Formation Outcomes

These are the deeper outcomes a company hopes and prays to see in people.

Chris gives examples such as hoping to see:

• people come to faith in Christ,

• customers get baptized,

• or people become actively involved in a local church.

These outcomes cannot be controlled in the same way as an activity.

A company can organize a prayer gathering.

It cannot control the result of prayer.

A leader can create opportunities for people to hear the Gospel.

The leader cannot control a person’s response.

The goal, then, is to identify intentional activities that could increase the opportunity for meaningful spiritual outcomes.

When something significant happens, the company can celebrate what God is doing.

That celebration can also motivate the team to keep pursuing meaningful spiritual impact.

Chris's advice is simple:

Start somewhere.

A company does not need a perfect system before beginning.

Put one item in each category.

Pray into it.

Measure what can be measured.

Watch what happens.

Near the end of the conversation, Steve asks Chris what advice he would give to Christian entrepreneurs who are where he once was—trying to figure out how faith and business fit together.

Chris gives three recommendations.

Find Faith-Aligned Mentors

First, work hard to find mentors who share your faith alignment.

Entrepreneurs need people with whom they can discuss real struggles and business challenges.

Chris emphasizes the value of receiving counsel that is consistent with Scripture and aligned with the entrepreneur’s values.

A good mentor will still challenge the entrepreneur.

But that challenge will remain within the boundaries of faith and trust in the Lord.

Pursue Faith-Aligned Capital

Second, work hard to pursue faith-aligned capital.

Chris explains that capital can come through:

• investment,

• loans,

• equity,

• or other forms.

The source and expectations connected to capital matter.

Capital with conflicting motives can push a company toward the financial bottom line alone and gradually move leaders away from the desires God has placed in their hearts for the business.

Chris also advises entrepreneurs to build these relationships before they urgently need the money.

Do not wait until a crisis to begin developing relationships with people who may become aligned sources of counsel or capital.

Practice Intentional Generosity

The third priority is generosity.

Chris acknowledges how difficult generosity can feel when a business is under pressure.

There are seasons when leaders feel they need to squeeze every dollar and every hour simply to make it into the next season.

Yet generosity can involve both time and financial resources.

Chris discusses giving God the Sabbath and trusting that constant work is not the answer to every business challenge.

He also discusses contributing financially to things that advance the Kingdom, even when doing so feels countercultural to the immediate pressures of supporting a family or a business.

He does not describe generosity as a transaction or a dollar-for-dollar prosperity formula.

Instead, he describes it as stewardship and trust.

When Chris and his wife began considering selling their company, they thought about giving part of the proceeds after the sale.

Their initial thinking was straightforward: sell the business, receive the proceeds, and then give a percentage away.

As they explored the process, they learned about the possibility of giving a percentage of the business they owned to a donor-advised fund at the National Christian Foundation before the sale.

Chris explains that this process allowed them to give more than they originally planned.

The experience changed their perspective on generosity and stewardship.

After the business transition, Chris moved into his current role leading the Jacksonville office for the National Christian Foundation and helping other companies think through stewardship and generosity.

For Chris, the story connects business, generosity, stewardship, and vocation.

Something God had already placed in their hands became a resource for giving and for the next chapter of their work.

One of the most practical ideas in the conversation is also one of the simplest:

Start somewhere.

A faith-driven business does not need a complicated system with dozens of initiatives.

It can begin with one intentional spiritual integration activity.

It can identify one spiritual formation outcome it would love to see.

Then the team can act faithfully, measure what it can control, pray over what it cannot control, and watch for what God does.

The larger conversation is a reminder that business can be more than a financial vehicle.

It can become a place where people learn persistence.

A place where risk exposes the need for trust.

A place where entrepreneurs are discipled.

A place where people are served through dignified work.

A place where prayer and faith become part of everyday relationships.

A place where leaders practice stewardship.

And a place where generosity changes both the giver and what they are able to support.

For the faith-driven entrepreneur, the question is not simply whether the business is profitable.

The conversation invites another question:

How can we be faithful with the resources, relationships, opportunities, and responsibilities God has already placed in front of us?

Watch full episode on YT - https://youtu.be/dgS4qUp-OV0

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