Seek, go create the leadership journey, inspiring Christian entrepreneurs and

leaders to integrate faith and business.

Join me, Tim Winders, for conversations that will transform

your life and your work.

What does it truly mean to lead a life and business that earns the words?

Well done.

Join us as we welcome Ken Gosnell, author and founder of CEO Experience whose life

mission is to guide faith-driven CEOs toward achieving both kingdom impact

and business success.

Ken, drawing on timeless biblical principles and his own father's

legacy of hard work and integrity

helps leaders create a meaningful legacy.

We'll discuss how you can align your professional achievements

with your spiritual calling

for an eternally rewarding

journey.

Ken, welcome to Seat.

Go create.

Go Create.

Hey, thank you Tim.

I'm glad to be here.

I am glad you're here too, man.

We are fighting through some good technical issues, but us

two bright and mature smart guys.

We can figure it out, I'm sure.

So,

hey Ken, let's jump in here.

We're gonna have a great conversation.

We've got a lot of good things to discuss, but I wanna start off, wanna

give you a choice between two questions, answering the questions, what do you do

or who are you?

Pick the question and go ahead and start answering.

I believe who is always bigger than what And, so, who I am is a strong,

faith driven entrepreneur and CEO that has been called to work with Christian

leaders to help them grow their business.

but to do so, to hear the words well done by having kingdom impact.

I believe in Ephesians two 10 that says we're God's workmanship and that

we've been created to do good works that God has prepared in advance.

many years ago I was working with the non-Christian businesses and

helping them grow their business One day God kind of convicted me to say,

what am I doing for his kingdom?

And I thought, after a period of time, that'd be nice to work with

Christian businesses and help them to grow their business, but also to have

a longer term impact, for eternity.

And so that's where CEO experience was birthed.

And now we've been doing it for almost 20 years.

so you worked with what we'll call heathens, I guess, is that

what, can we use that term?

I prefer that they weren't c they were, not Christian yet.

yet

phrasing.

But yes.

They, you

the Gentiles of the world, you went out to the bars and all that?

No, no.

I'm,

no.

and I think though.

Ken isn't, isn't that the journey that a lot of people go on?

You know, you probably had a faith, I'm guessing it sounds like you

grew up with that and have had that.

You went out, you were

were.

pursuing your riches.

That sounds bad, but you know what I mean.

And then, and then over time that journey transformed.

Tell me a little bit about what it was like when you were out

in the, the non-Christian space.

'cause I'm gonna, I'm gonna dig into the things you have done within

the space you're in now, but I'd like to get a, before GI gimme

a glimpse of what that was like.

Absolutely.

You know, I was trained to work hard.

You mentioned my father.

My father taught us the importance of discipline and hard work and.

And, so I was raised to work in many ways and believed that work was one of the

most valuable things that we could do.

I also had a faith and my faith journey, you know, had its own different stops

or, or ups and downs along the way.

So I'm not, claiming that I was a great Christian all the time, 'cause

I made my share of mistakes as well.

But I knew that I was, really created for business and I wanted to grow businesses.

I wanted to grow my own business.

And so, my desire and drive was to help businesses to succeed.

but through that process I also believed in wisdom and understanding.

I read a lot of great business books, had a lot of great experiences,

myself, all those types of things.

But the best wisdom that I had found was really found in the Bible.

And so what I found myself doing was teaching a lot of these secular business.

Individuals business principles that were good.

They made a lot of business sense, but they were also

really founded in scripture.

I just didn't tell them that, if that makes sense.

You know, so like the idea of always taking the second step, going a little

bit further than what's expected or anticipated, every business will agree

that that's a good concept or a good idea, and to really try to practice

that not only in their customer experience, but maybe in how you treat

employees or how you treat vendors or a variety of different topics.

But what I found is that all of a sudden God kind of challenged me

to say, Hey, why don't you tell people where this wisdom comes from?

And what I found in my own personal journey is I could go a day or a

week, or maybe even a month, and I was thinking about business and everything

business, and I was thinking about the businesses that we were working in but

I wasn't necessarily thinking about God.

Or what God was asking me to do with that particular business owner.

And I'll never forget, I was working with a business owner and he was out in Ohio

and, he was building his business and growing it and dynamically growing it.

I worked for him for a few years and, I noticed that there was some cracks

and not in the business, but in him personally and in his relationship with

his spouse and all these kinds of things.

And you know, I mentioned it to him and I said, Hey, you

might want to shore that up.

It looks like there's some, there's some, you know, 'cause we had

developed a friendship or relationship.

I was a trusted advisor, if you will, to him.

And he's like, no, Ken, I got it.

It's all good.

It's all good.

You know, no worries.

So anyway, we got the business up and it was really highly functioning.

Finished my contractual relationship with him, and I remember about six

months later, he called me in the middle of the night, and, which was a shock.

I wasn't sure what was happening, but of course, he answered the phone

when he get a call in the middle of the night and he, he started the

message with, everything's gone.

And I said, what, you know, what are you, what are you talking about?

He said, I came home tonight and my wife and my three kids and

everything in my house has been packed up and gone, and she's left.

And the only note that she left me was, don't contact me, I'll contact you.

It's over.

And then he said something I'll never forget, which is pretty powerful.

He said, I've done it all for nothing.

Right?

He had built this great business and there's a story in the Bible,

by the way about that, right?

There's a story about a guy that all of a sudden has this great surplus and he

built these bigger barns and God says.

You know, you fool, I'm gonna take your life from you tonight.

And he says that that'll be the way you fool for everybody that

builds great bars for themselves, but is not rich towards God.

I was living life, I was enjoying it.

It was good.

I mean, I was having good success.

I was, you know, traveling a lot, helping a lot of businesses that were growing.

So it wasn't a terrible life.

But when that challenge came and I had to discern was I really rich

towards God and was I helping other guys not just get rich, but was I

helping them to get rich towards God?

That was a real defining moment for me.

Hmm, that's, it is fascinating And

unfortunately that's a story.

story.

it, it's a very specific story for you, but it's also a story that's

not uncommon, and I know that you've probably heard it before.

I'm curious, Ken, I don't know what age you were at or when that was

in your life, but prior to that,

would you say that your faith and your work life were sort of

segmented or were you just a little

silent about it?

Did you keep it under a bushel?

I mean, what,

how would you describe how your faith was prior to that or how it sounds like

you were living it, it's just you weren't

you weren't

sharing it as much.

It was still segmented though, because, you know, it didn't

really bleed over necessarily into my business life unless I saw.

Lets it like a plank that hit me in the face, if that makes sense.

Right.

so something that was so easy to blend it over.

And, so, you know, but I was kind of taught you go to work, to do your work.

And even when I talked to my, a pastor at my church when I told him I wanted

to start a business, I said, well, how do I do this according to God?

And he said, well, you know, just go be successful and then

you can give to the church.

Right.

And you know, so even in that philosophy, it's a little bit of separation.

And I'm not downplaying that, that 'cause that's an important part to do.

But I believe in integration.

It doesn't have to be separate.

And one of the things that I found and where God challenged me was, I'm better

when it's not compartmentalized, when it is fully on display, when it's fully

interacted with, when it's fully, I'm considering myself a steward of the

business, not an owner of the business.

And I'm really asking God, what does he want me to do with this business and

what decision does he wanna make, even when it doesn't make sense to me or maybe

to my team or the rest of the world.

So, yeah, that's really good.

You mentioned segmented and I recognized that I

was that way also, and for me, it was

the two by four to the head that got my attention.

I mean, I would've said I was a man of faith and people

might've known it had they been around me,

but I probably kept some of it separate.

And the problem is it allows you to justify things.

I believe.

I think you can compromise and justify and all.

And there's another thing that came to mind.

mind.

I believe it's more stressful,

It is.

What are your thoughts?

thoughts?

Oh, absolutely.

'cause you're living two or three lives, right?

There was the business kin, then there was the spiritual kin, then there's

the personal kin, then there's the, you know, friend, friendship kin.

And you know, it's kind of hard to keep all those lives in order, right?

Because you're, you're having to show up one way in the business and

then you're having to show up one way at church and then you're showing

up one way in your neighborhood.

You're showing up these different ways, and that's not

what God's calling us to do.

He's saying, Hey, there's one you.

Right.

That's why I love that Ephesians two 10 passage, you're god's workmanship.

So the spiritual can can be just as spiritual at work

as he is at church, right?

And the work can be just as good at church as he was in, in the work world,

or with my friends and my neighbors.

And when I don't have to compartmentalize any longer, when I don't have to try

to figure out who I am, and I can just be the who that God's called me

to be, man, then it's all of a sudden my energy gets elevated, my passions

get ignited, my vision gets clearer.

That was my story.

What happened to me and what's what I've worked with business

leaders for now the last 20 years.

What's happened to them as well, right?

All of a sudden, their confidence goes up, their vision gets better.

Their, passions get stronger, their convictions get deeper, and

it's just an amazing experience that begins to take place.

Right.

you bring up often that you learned lessons from your father

and that he had a big impact.

tell me more about that.

Tell me more about some of the lessons you learned from the father, where'd you grow

up, and just some things about, you know,

Ken, the early years is the way I like to word

So one of the things about who, so if you go on my LinkedIn page,

I have a, instead of what I do, I have a little bit of who I am.

And, I tell a story of when I was 10 years old, my father was an alcoholic

and was the oldest of six children.

And his father, my grandfather was killed when my dad was 15 years old.

And so my dad quit school, high school back in the 1950s, went to

work to provide for the family.

And so he became a surrogate father for his brothers and sisters.

So he had a pretty rough journey throughout his life.

And in the middle of that journey, he came to know Jesus as his personal savior.

And so the story I tell on, on, when I tell people about who I am is that

when my dad, when I was 10 years old, I saw my dad take two things to work.

He eventually went to work at a Christian company.

after he got fired for his alcoholism, got started to have a transformational

experience, and his sponsor actually worked for a Christian company and

got my dad hired on the night shift, to go work at this clay refining

factory outside of San Louis, Missouri.

Christie Mineral, still a great company, great Christian company,

and, but that they had every reason not to hire my dad, right?

he brought nothing, didn't have a high school education.

Here's an alcoholic, you know, all the, all these kinds of things.

And yet they showed grace and gave a guy a second chance, and

it changed his life forever.

And it changed my life forever.

But he'd always take two things to work every day.

He'd take his hard hat and he would take his Bible.

And so the hard hat I understood, it's like you're going to a rec

factory, you know, it's dangerous.

You gotta have your hard hat on.

It's part of safety protocols and all those kinds of things.

But I was like, you know, and we didn't grow up in church at the

time, so I was like, dad, why are you taking your Bible to work?

That didn't make any sense.

And he said, son, I read it during my breaks because it makes me better.

And I say, if you know that story, you know, the two things that

really have evolved in my life.

I believe in business.

I believe in hard work.

I believe in understanding how business works.

And I also believe in the spiritual side that the Bible makes us better.

And so, that's really about who I am.

And that's one of the lessons that my, father, taught me.

obviously I, he believed in self-improvement and continuing to

improve himself, and he continued to do so all throughout his life.

Eventually overcame alcoholism, became a leader in one of our churches.

actually went on to preach some sermons and, and do some great

work in that aspect as well.

never had a drink again when he started at, Christie Minerals.

So he spent the last 35 years of his life sober and, overcoming a difficulty

or a demon that was hard to overcome.

And, but yet that's self-improvement.

So I was the first in my family to go to college, and then I went on

and get a, went on to get my master's degrees and so on and so forth.

So my father, I say, if I could become half the man that he was,

then I, then I'm doing okay.

And, that's really what I strive to be and who I strive to be a model after.

You mentioned, I guess the addiction and things like that, but also there's a

work ethic that people from, we call it a Midwest work ethic or something like that.

So you probably had that You mentioned that business is your thing,

but was there an entrepreneurial or business owner, or

what was the seed that led you to eventually work with

not just regular businesses, but CEOs of larger companies and all that?

Did you see that early on in life, or did that develop later?

Well, the entrepreneurial seed was early on, I believe, back to

the Ephesians, two 10 workmanship.

So there was an entrepreneurial seed that was planted in me.

I, started my own businesses in high school, you know, in college and, had,

you know, moderate success on those lines.

thanks to my father though.

And the idea of mentorship and personal development and leadership, I was also

very much attracted to, men that had men and women that had businesses.

And so I would often ask them about their business.

And so from even, you know, an early age in teenage years, I got to know several

business owners and business leaders and began to understand the value of business.

And that really is where kind of that got started.

So I didn't know that I was gonna work with, business owners and CEOs.

my goal originally was just to build a good business and to,

you know, get outta poverty and kind of, develop, decent living.

And then God began to reveal to me that it's not just about you, right?

It's sometimes it's about who you mentor, who you help.

And there was a lot of great mentors that I had along the way.

So God challenged me to take another step than to surround

myself and to kind of work together.

With groups of CEOs or business owners to help them to grow their business.

So it's been a story along the way.

And you know, that's, that's all back to that first principle that I talk about,

just always taking the next step, right?

So I took one step and God revealed another opportunity,

and then I took another step and then revealed another one.

and that led us to where we are today,

That kind of fits in with our,

part of our title, the Leadership Journey.

That's just the journey that we're all on.

Did I see somewhere that you did some work with Dale Carnegie and that?

Tell me more about that.

'cause that was a impactful book for me and probably

probably

a ton of people.

And so what'd you do with them?

Yeah, so my father had a couple books that he encouraged me to read

because he had a hard time learning and growing and reading, but he

had gotten hold of some books, that he thought was really important.

one of those books was Dale Carnegie's, how to Win Friends.

And influenced people.

Dale Carnegie, many people don't know, was from Missouri and had a big vision

and a dream to go be an actor in New York.

So he left Missouri, went to New York, but his acting failed.

But in that process, he learned self-improvement, self-help, and

that's where the, how the Wind friends and influence people came to be.

my dad encouraged me to read Booker t Washington's book called Up From

Slavery, which is a tremendous book.

And then PT Barnum's book that was actually written back in the 1870s called,

40 Years of Struggles and Triumphs.

And so those were three books that were on my dad's bookshelf that he encouraged me.

So as I started to grow in my, education, I also wanted to

grow in my skills and attitudes.

And so I read the book How to Win Friends and Influence People, but

I was able to make friends with, A business owner that owned one of

the Dale Carnegie franchises, there.

And so, that led to me going through the courses that Dale Carnegie had,

and then eventually going to work for Dale Carnegie becoming a master

trainer for them, so that I could train on all their courses as well.

So that was a great experience because just those principles, are, and

again, Dale Carnegie was a Christian.

They were rooted and grounded in scripture, but they're common sense

principles that everybody could, practice.

So I still talk about the, Dale Carnegie principles.

I'll tell you this real quick story.

So when I went to work with Dale Carnegie, I was a big fan, But

the first day that I was there, they handed us a 12 page script.

they said, your first week on the job, your job is to memorize

the script word for word.

at the end of the week, you're gonna give a presentation and you're

gonna say that script for memory.

And if you don't, you won't be here the next week.

that was their onboarding process, I thought, I can go memorize 12 pages.

I've never memorized 12 pages before, but if that's what I've gotta do and I've

got a week to do it, I'm gonna do it.

You know?

so anyway, we get up to the end to get to the end of that week.

it's all about Dale Carnegie and his background.

It's about the 30 human relations principles.

It's about, what business owners needed to understand to grow

their teams and grow themselves.

And it's just a wonderful, script.

I mean, they'd spent years working on it.

Dale Carnegie, by the way, is the largest training organization in the world.

It's been in existence almost a hundred years.

Trains all around the world, so they know what they're doing, And, so we get to the

end of the week and there's five of us.

Well, only two of us went through the entire script.

The other guys, they would mess up here or there.

They just didn't memorize it.

And they were polite about it, but they just said, thank you for attempting,

and, we're not gonna be continuing on.

So the two of us, they got done and they said, welcome to the Dale

Carnegie team, and, here's your office and we're gonna get you trained

on what's next, and go on to that.

And then they said something really interesting, which

I thought was very funny.

They said, now we know that you spent an entire week memorizing that script,

and we're proud of you for doing so.

Now, here's the secret.

You'll probably never say those 12 pages again.

Direct word for word ever again, for as long as you work for

the Dale Carnegie Organization.

But for as long as you live, you'll remember parts of this script from now on.

And they will help you wherever you go and whatever you do.

And I could still quote you parts that script though, that was,

almost 30 years ago, but I could almost quote you, word for word for

some of the script that's there.

I became a master trainer for Dale Carnegie could train on their

leadership courses and sales courses and then, work to grow, companies

using the Dale Carnegie program.

I, I'm a firm believer that along the way we do things that we don't

truly understand the impact they'll have till many years later.

I just was thinking about that book,

how to Win Friends and Influence People.

We're gonna put a link down in the notes, because I believe there's

possibly an entire generation that

needs to grab that book and read it.

I think it's still popular.

I know it is.

I still see it out there.

However, I'm not sure it is to the level it needs to be.

And to do agree, like you said earlier,

there were Christian principles, biblical principles throughout, but

I'm not sure that he called them that.

not like you do in your book Well done.

Where you basically, you will say that they're biblical principles, but

Mm-hmm.

What are you still using daily that you can trace back to

that time with Dale Carnegie?

Carnegie?

Well, the principles, I think the principles are evergreen.

They're everlasting.

And that was actually one of the inspirations that I had

when I went to write my book.

'cause we talk about 12 principles.

I didn't talk about 30 human relations principles, but the

principles serve as arbiters.

They serve as, compasses to help us to make our decisions.

So like principle number one.

Is never criticize, condemn, or complain.

Right?

And Dale Carne would say, never criticize, condemn, or complain.

Any fool can criticize, condemn and complain.

And most fools do.

We would describe that, right?

another principle is praise the slightest improvement if

you want it repeated, right?

So these principles that are profound, we know that they work.

And they work in every generation.

They worked a hundred years ago.

They'll work today, they'll work a hundred years from now in business.

That's what made, Dale Carnegie, how to Win Friends and Influence

People book So Profound.

I actually like his second book even better than that.

It's How To Stop Worrying and Start Living, which is a profound book to, and

he does talk a little bit more about his faith in that book because, the Bible

talks about how to overcome anxiety and he references some of those things.

But what Dale Carney that experience, what it did for me is it made me consider

and think about the principles that should guide every decision that you're

making in relation to somebody else.

Right.

should I consider, should I condemn them or should I praise them or,

whatever the other principles might that might apply at that particular time.

Right.

And the question I had to really wrestle with for, almost, five or six years was

what were the principles that should guide every Christian business person

as they make decisions in their business

In Dale Carnegie's case, it was, if you make decisions according

to these principles, you're gonna have better relationships.

So in my philosophy, it was what were those principles that

if you made decisions by these principles, you would have more of

a kingdom impact for your business.

And that's where then I began, a search reading other, Christian

CEOs, back into the 18 hundreds, but also, in the 19 hundreds as well.

But any book that I could find that was written by a Christian CEO that talked

about the principles that helped guide them, make decisions, and, guys like

JC Penney, who started his store in 1902 out in Wyoming called the Golden

Rule Store and became the largest department store in America, right?

still in existence today, 120 some years later.

Or true Kathy, who has built, Chick-fil-A and I could go on and on.

There's, I reference over, 200 books in my book.

Well done.

And that's because I want to show that these principles

worked, worked, in the past.

They worked today.

They'll work in the future, and they work in small businesses.

They work in large businesses.

they worked 200 years ago.

They worked today.

They'll work 200 years from now.

It's principles that can guide your thinking as you try to

build your business to honor God.

Right.

Yeah, they're

definitely timeless.

Principles

and,

I want to, we're going to,

we're going to,

we're gonna do a deep dive in just a few minutes on the term well done, because

I think it's good to understand that.

But there are a few terms that you use that I want us to define

and talk about a little bit more,

bit more,

because I think sometimes in the business world, I remember funny, when I went

first, went to work at Bell South,

they had all these acronyms and terms, and they literally had it all in a book.

And I said, it sounds like you're speaking a different language.

And I think at times we can do that

as Christians, as Christian business owners, et cetera.

And I, I kinda like to pick apart some of these terms.

So

the first term that I wanna

discuss is kingdom driven.

And I think we used the term kingdom driven leader, kingdom driven, CEO.

Tell me more about what that means to you and I, and we may go back and forth

on this 'cause I love the word kingdom,

but I'm concerned at times when we use it, people don't know exactly what that

what that means.

Absolutely.

And actually in my book, I have a glossary of different terms because

to your point, sometimes these terms can be, as I define them, or what I

would challenge leaders to think about, because, you know, sometimes it can mean

different things to different people.

When I talk about a kingdom driven leader, what I'm talking about is somebody

that really wants to make a difference for the kingdom of God, that they

have it in their heart and their mind.

That it's not just about.

Themselves or their business, that they recognize that part of their

success in life is partnering with God, welcoming God into the conversation

of their life, and that they want to do something, that God would look at

them and say, the words well done.

I'm proud of what you've done.

You've done something for my kingdom as much as you've done it for yourself.

And so that's how I define Kingdom Driven leader.

I love, there's a book that's popular right now in a lot of Christian service

called Faith Driven Leader, and I had that word kingdom driven long before

faith driven leader ever came out.

But, I think there's a distinct difference.

I don't call it this in the book 'cause Faith Driven was written after my book

was released, but, faith-driven leader just basically means that, you want to

incorporate your faith into your business.

I think that's okay.

And that's definitely a first step along the process, right?

But a kingdom leader, kingdom driven leader says, yeah, I'm

already taking that for granted.

I'm a Christian, so my faith is really critical to who I am.

And it's critical to the identity, but it's not good enough.

And let me give you one example of this real quick 'cause I wanna illustrate this.

So I went to talk with A-C-C-E-O years ago.

He called me up and he said, Hey Ken, I'd love to talk to you.

I understand you're working with Christian CEOs.

I said, yes, I am.

He said, I'd love to find out more.

So I go in and talk to him.

He tells me he's a third generation business owner.

His grandfather had started the business, right?

His father then read it.

Then they had a president that became there.

And then he ended up taking it a few years ago.

in the DNA of that business.

They had that faith was important to them.

one of our core values is faith.

Faith, family, you know, it's, it's really critical to who we are.

And so they weren't shy about their faith necessarily.

so they had moments where they shared their faith with it.

he says to me in the meeting, we talk a little bit and he said, Hey, you know,

our company's been in existence 80 years.

We've been a good faith driven company.

We've been, you know, we try to, you know, testify and we try to show

people that, you know, our values and, and all these kinds of things.

and so he asked me the question actually.

He said, so why would I want to be a part of what you're doing?

He said, aren't I doing enough?

And I said to him, well, I'm proud of what you've done, and I'm proud

of where your company has been.

But let me ask you a question.

I said, so you've been in the bus business 80 years?

And he said, yeah.

And I said, and you've had hundreds of thousands of employees throughout

the 80 years of your existence.

He said, yeah, we have absolutely.

And I said, well, how many of those employees have ever come to know, have a

personal relationship with Jesus Christ?

And he said, what?

And I said, well, if you've been in business 80 years and you've been

talking about your faith and you've been doing all these great things

for God's kingdom, then don't you think you should have some results?

Like when you get to heaven, you know, God's not gonna say, oh, great job.

You've been in business 80 years.

But where's the results?

Don't you think that in the parable of the talents, when the

leader went away, he didn't just come back and say, oh, good job.

you told everybody, you were a good servant.

he said, how many talents did I give you?

And how many talents did you deliver?

And not that it's all results oriented.

Sometimes it's about obedience.

But what I suggest to business owners and business leaders is we

ought to have something to show that we're impacting the kingdom of God.

you care about if your bank account's impacted, you're

looking at profitability, right?

You're looking at products.

You care if your products are being used.

You care if there's results there.

So why in the world have we bought off on this philosophy as Christian

leaders and CEOs that we can just give lip service to God without

any results and think it's okay?

Well, needless to say he was convicted.

He said, again, I'm all in.

I'm ready to go.

And so one of the things we did just to end that story, I said, well,

let's talk about your first result.

What do you want your first result to be?

And he said, well, you challenged me to have somebody come to

know Christ through our company.

And so, you know, maybe my first step should be that I want one of my

employees to come this year to ask me about my faith and so that I could

lead them to a personal relationship.

I said, well done.

I said, what a goal, what a vision.

Now I believe in supersizing goals.

So I said, how about instead of one, we put three, right?

Three of your employees in the first 12 months that you're here,

let's strategically go after these results for God's kingdom.

That's a kingdom driven company.

That's a kingdom driven C. Well, let's end up happening.

And sure enough, at the end of the first year, he kept

calling me throughout the year.

He is like, Ken, guess what?

I said, what?

He said, I just had a guy come in and ask me about my faith for the very first time.

I said, well done.

I said, that's fantastic.

So we get to the end of the year.

Sure enough, the third guy comes.

He said he wants to, and this CEO was able to lead him on

his part of a faith journey.

Matter of fact, he started going to church with the CEO, right?

The business owner, which was, was just profound.

And so he calls me up and says, Ken, I get it.

I did it.

I got number three, I got number three.

I said, fantastic.

Great.

Now we need to start thinking about next year.

I said, you know, the only regret I have is instead of three, we should

have said five, or we should've said 10.

Right.

Because we could have done so much more.

Right.

And, he laughed at that.

And of course, we've been continuing to set up bigger goals

and doing more and more things.

And I could tell you stories, stories, if we had the time, today's, like we were

talking about where I could tell you a story after story of somebody that was

in business for 20 years or 30 years or 40 years, that they were faith driven.

They, they gave lip service, but they weren't kingdom driven.

They weren't results oriented to bring about the results that they needed for

their company or for God's kingdom.

So that's, a long story

no, it's good.

It's, it's good because it leads to the next thing I wanted to address,

which is this issue of results, which to me, I think is related to impact.

You used the word impact quite a, quite a bit.

Interestingly enough, just last week,

we had a.

conversation with Justin Eklund who had written a book Brand for Impact.

And it was a lot of the same topics we're talking about here, but

specifically related to marketing and branding, which was really kind of cool.

And how for-profit and non-profit businesses can create brand.

And so if, if someone's listening in here, this is gonna be a great

conversation to match up with that one.

But

let's talk about results and impact, because many people, I wouldn't say

all, but most people I think that go into business, there are ways to measure

measure

results and then also that leads into impact.

And we use words like growth and scale and how many employees do we have and

what is our year over year growth and EBITDA and all these things that we use.

How

How

should CEOs.

That are kingdom driven, kingdom impacting CEOs, how should they be

considering results and thinking about the numbers and KPIs and things like

that?

things like that?

Mm-hmm.

I say it's the same thing as everything else in business.

So, here's one of the things that I think is unique about

CEO experience and what we do.

So when I went to business school, people that go through their MBA

program are usually trained in six key areas of business, right?

Strategy and vision, accounting and finance, sales and marketing, operational

excellence, customer competitive advantage, and human resources.

So your MBA programs are built on those six things.

As you learn in school, or if you don't have your MBA program, any business

owner will know that you can develop metrics, KPIs on all six of those things.

So what is our strategic plan?

Do we have it written?

do we have it marked out?

What's our top priorities that we're trying to accomplish?

What's our accounting and finance metric?

What's our ebitda?

What's our, net gross margin?

what's our profitability?

what's our cost, to our products and service?

You know, what's our, customer service?

What's our NPR or net promoter score?

how do our customers re relate us?

How do we have referrals and so on and so forth.

So there's numbers to each one of those key areas.

Now, what I found is that that was still lacking, and for most businesses

that I had experienced, or I had been myself, there's actually three more that

I think aren't talked about in business schools or businesses that need to be.

One is personal leadership, right?

That goes back to Ephesians two 10, where we're at.

God, a lot of times will grow a company by growing a leader.

Enron was one of the greatest companies, you know, from a profitability

standpoint, they weren't brought down because of their bad human resources.

They weren't brought down because of a bad customer experience or bad operations.

They were brought down because of lack of integrity of a couple key

individuals in the organizations that didn't have personal responsibility

or develop as a personal leader.

I separate, human resources out from team culture and development.

I noticed as Jesus started in the very first thing that he did when he.

Started his ministry was, he called his disciples.

So could you call that human resources?

Yes.

But really what he was doing was he's developing his team

and he's building a culture.

The great Peter Drucker said that, culture will eat strategy for lunch.

So having the idea of culture and team culture and how do we develop our team

and an organization, and even for small businesses, that team culture can bleed

over into your, vendor relationships.

It can blend over to subcontractors, all these types of things.

But too few leaders really think about the cultures that

they're really trying to build.

And I think that we can have a kingdom culture now.

I think kingdom principles and biblical business principles can,

can be in every one of those aspects.

So like principle number one, taking the second step, that's just

not a customer service principle.

That's an accounting principle.

that's a strategy and vision principle.

That's a sales and marketing principle.

You know, that goes into every aspect of your business.

But here's what I do.

I elevate the ninth area, which I actually, it's number seven on my list.

It's no number nine, but I'll say it's number nine today is

what I call kingdom impact.

So kingdom impact is just as important as accounting and finance.

It's just as important as human resources.

there's a Christian organization out there today that works with CEOs and

business owners, and they have the mantra or the statement, no margin, no mission.

So basically what they're communicating to Christian business owners is that if

you're not successful in your business, that you can't have a kingdom impact.

You've gotta have success as a business in order to do

something for the kingdom of God.

I think it's just the opposite.

I think if you don't start out your business with kingdom impact.

So, you know, the reality is most businesses aren't profitable in the first

three years that they're in business.

Right?

We gotta get up, but you ought to be kingdom impacting on day one if I don't go

out there and elevate my kingdom impact.

And you know what?

Sometimes God uses the best kingdom impact when I don't have much, right?

And he shows us that in the Bible over and over again.

Daniel had his greatest impact when he is in the lions den, not when

he is sitting up in the palace.

Noah's got his greatest impact when he is in the ark, or he is

building the ark when he has nothing.

You know, he has nothing left and nobody, but he's doing something for God, even

when it doesn't seem to be necessarily profitable from the world's perspective.

Moses, I mean, I could go leader after leader after leader on this.

So what I would say is you need to have a metric, you need to have

a performance result that you're driving for in your kingdom impact.

I'll give you another example, right?

So I had a business in Washington DC that, he came to me and he said, Hey Ken,

I've been in this business for 30 years.

I'm the only Christian in the business.

I don't know anybody else, but I hear you work with Christian leaders

and I wanna sell my business in a few years, and it's in a bad shape.

I don't have a lot of money.

I put everything in the past 30 years into the business, but you know, I

wanna do it, I wanna finish well, and I wanna do it the way that God would

have me to do it, whatever that means.

And I said, okay, let's go on that journey together.

And so, yes, we built, we begin to build his business, right?

But I told him that just what I told you, I said, your kingdom

impact needs to be important.

I said, you've been in business for 30 years.

What have you done for the kingdom of God?

What results do you have?

And he said, Ken, I haven't done anything for the kingdom of God.

And I said, well, let's change that, right?

whether you sell your business or not, that you know, that's important,

don't get me wrong, but what God says to you eternity for eternity,

that's gonna be more important than how much you sold your business for.

And so I challenged him to pray about it and think about it.

I said, let's develop a number and a result.

And so a few days later, he calls me up and he says, Ken, I got it.

I got it.

And I said, what?

And he said, here's what I wanna do.

He said, I've got this beautiful showroom, Washington, dc it was

a finishing type of a business.

He said, I've got this beautiful showroom.

He said, I think I oughta give Bibles away in my showroom.

He said, there's a pop.

There's a lot of people that come through my showroom, you

know, all throughout the day.

And so maybe I should put some Bibles out and I can track that.

I can track how many Bibles that I gave away.

I said, fantastic.

I said, welcome to Kingdom Impact.

You've created a number that you can track, that you can now, you

know, tell people here's part of what you're doing for the kingdom.

The kingdom of God, right?

And so he finish that story.

So he goes out, I said, when are you gonna go get the Bibles?

'cause you know accountability's important right along on this journey.

And he said, well, I'll go out during lunchtime.

I said, where are you gonna get 'em from?

He said, there's a Christian bookstore not too far down the street.

So he goes down, he didn't tell me how many Bibles he's gonna give, but we

didn't have that kind of a conversation.

I probably should have gone deeper with him.

But anyway, he goes down the street, picks up five Schofield

study Bibles, these big gigantic.

He goes into the Christian bookstore, he says, tell me the best Bible you have.

They point him to this go field study Bible, nice leather, you know, the whole

thing, like $75 a piece, whatever, right?

He says, how many you have?

They said five.

He buys all five, right?

Brings it back to his showroom, puts 'em down on the table, gets a piece

of paper with permanent marker, writes on top of the permanent mark

or free Bible, sticks it on top of the Bibles and walks back to his office.

He calls me, he said, can I just did it?

And I said, fantastic.

And he said, it's okay.

You know, and he's, he's, you know, he's being honest.

He's like, Hey, you know, if I give away one Bible, that's more than I've

done in 30 years of business, right?

And that's okay.

That's a number I can track, right?

I said, just wait.

I said, you'll never know what God's gonna do.

Principle number seven, by the way, is believe in asking the impossible.

Start believing that God can do something in your life that you don't believe

that you can do on your own, and you'll welcome where God into your life, right?

So anyway, he waits about 30 minutes, walks back out into the showroom,

and all five Bibles are gone.

But the piece of paper's still on the table, right?

And he looks at his guy that's in the showroom.

He said, Hey, where'd those bibles go?

And the guy says, his name is Ju, he says, geo says, I don't, I don't know.

I didn't take 'em.

You know, he thought he was being accused of doing something.

He said, man, I was working the showroom.

I don't know where, I don't know where they went.

I guess the customers took 'em, or the, you know, the employee

took em or whatever it was.

And, so he, anyway, he, he goes back into his office and he calls

me, he says, Ken, guess what?

I said, what?

He said, all five Bibles are gone.

I said, I said, congratulations, well done.

I said, can you imagine?

I said, you gave away five bibles in a matter of 30 minutes, and after 30 years

you finally did something for the kid.

Oh, that was an indictment.

That was an encouragement.

Right.

That was, Hey, wow, you just, you just stepped into something

different and now you can track it.

Well, today he's given away over 3000 Bibles out of that showroom.

And so he had regular Bible.

Now, he didn't go get Schofield study Bibles, but you know, he had, he has

a stack of Bibles in that showroom.

And then he waited about a few months and he said, Hey, you know what, I've got

some people that English isn't their first language in Washington DC so I probably

need some Spanish Bibles in the showroom.

And then he thought about it a few months later and he said, Hey, I

need to have some kids' Bibles.

'cause probably some of the people that come in, they have children and

we can, and so he can track each one of those metrics now that he can see

how many Bibles a year he's giving away, how many Bibles are impacting.

And I could tell you story after story after that.

And I tell him that's one of, and he would even tell me, he said, that's one of the

most important numbers in my business now.

It is not about the number of sales we have.

It's not, I mean, those numbers are important too.

Those are critical numbers.

The bank wants to see those numbers, you know, those are critical.

But I said, and he knows, he says, but God wants to see this number.

And so we treat it equally.

We treat it as the same as all these other areas of your business.

that's phenomenal.

And you know, the cool thing is, is that

he probably had some of his employees that were picking up those Bibles, you

know, that he had never had communications with, and so it opens up the door to

have some of those communications.

The reason I love what you're saying is it's.

I believe he was probably having impact on the kingdom.

There was just no measurement.

he wasn't sure.

He didn't know, and he questioned it.

and I do think a lot of leaders in business have this thought

that the pastor down at the local church, he's doing things, but

I'm just out here doing business.

And you mentioned it earlier, sometimes even the preachers will say,

you go out and make money and just send us a check.

I don't like that mindset, by the way.

I, I think that the marketplace in many ways is a much more fruitful,

fruitful area than some of our churches.

I, I was saved in a business setting

because my personality was probably that I was never gonna probably

go into a church setting much.

So

we could go into that.

You use the term

well done often.

And I've got your book right here.

Well done.

So before we go into the book and a few things here before we, finish up,

tell me,

tell me about the term well done.

Well done.

Yeah, so well done was the, you know, when I read that business parable

about the, the leader that goes away and he leaves the servant and then

he comes back and he says, well done, good and faithful servant, you know,

enter into your master's happiness.

Right?

And, you know, the well done resonated deep within my spirit and was like,

that's, that's what life is all about.

That's really what I want to hear.

I want people to tell me, Hey, that's a good product.

You did a good job.

That's a good company you've built, you know, it's built on integrity, all

these different types of things, but I also want to hear it in eternity, right?

And so when I began to really understand that, and then when I'd

start talking to other business owners and I said, Hey, what are you really

trying to accomplish in your world?

And what do you, what's the most significant thing to you?

And what I found was almost every single business owner that I

talked to over a period, like I said, about five or six years.

Every one of them said the exact same thing.

They said, well done.

I want to hear the words.

Well done.

And so, you know, that's really, I call it a well done mission.

That what that means, those are the two words I said.

Life is too short.

Business is too hard, and eternity's too long not to hear the words well done all

throughout this life and for all eternity.

And so we're on a well done mission to build great businesses.

We wanna do that.

Build great products, build great services, build a great life, Have

our children love us, have our families really appreciate us.

Connect to that, but also have an impact on the kingdom of God.

And well done to me signifies not just in one area, but all those

critical areas being successful.

And I think that's the well done mission.

And so that's why I use those words and, and that's really

what well done really means.

We talk about these 12 biblical business principles, but

they're life principles as well.

They're spiritual principles as well.

They'll help you make every decision from this point forward.

If you read the book and you go through the, and I didn't create

the principles, I've just kind of elevated them and highlighted them,

and like you mentioned, I mentioned specifically where they come from.

But they will change every single decision you'll make from this point

forward because you'll do it in a way that you'll wanna have breakthroughs

in your business and in your life.

I love the term, and I recall years ago, man, this was in a house

that we had probably 25 years ago.

My wife and I had this plaque or a picture that we had made.

that basically you walked through our front door and I don't even

know what happened to this picture.

We.

I've been through a lot of stuff.

I live in an RV now, so I don't have a lot of wall space,

but you know, we had it, it was something to the effect of that verse.

It was, you know, our family motto.

Our family goal is to hear the words well done and good and faithful servant.

You know, when we are finished with this life, when we move on to the next realm.

I, one of the things that's cool to me,

12 biblical principles for leaders to grow their business with kingdom impact

is, you have pulled this from the book of Matthew.

I'm reading in Matthew right now.

I spend a lot of time in Matthew

and often I will listen to the Sermon on the Mount

as an audible.

It's about 15 minutes.

It's a great quiet meditation for those that want a good tip there.

tip there.

Why Matthew?

Why?

Why did you choose Matthew?

I know why I would and I love it, but why?

the book of Matthew?

of Matthew.

Yeah.

So really I found the principles all throughout the Bible, but I found

that Matthew did the best job of articulating these 12 principles.

And when I thought about it and started really analyzing, that

made sense because Matthew was really the business guy, right?

He was the accountant, he was the tax collector.

He was the one that was really officially running a business.

And so that's really why we resonated with Matthew and the way that he

articulates, the 12 principles as he outlines them in his book.

You.

You know what's interesting about that?

I was study, I'm doing a deep study right now on the timeframe between

80 30 and up into the first century, you know, 80, 70,

and I was doing some study on Irans who was a disciple of Polycarp,

which was a disciple of John,

and I had never thought of this.

They said one of the things that the early church had to consider.

With four gospels floating around

was that there's some people that only wanted one and there was a popular

one, and that at the time, Matthew

Matthew

was the most popular.

Now

it's sort of my most popular too.

I actually, I love Luke, I love the timing of Luke and things like that.

And

yeah, mark and John that they, you know, John is like a whole different thing.

But

anyway, it's awesome.

There's one principle that I wanna discuss a little bit more before we finish up,

and to me it's foundational.

I don't know if it's foundational to other CEOs, and I think you had it as fifth,

and it is make the move from owner to overseer.

And I like to use the word steward

right?

for my business, for my business, when I've been successful for my

business, when I believe I have failed,

failed,

when

I

act like an owner.

Things start unraveling.

unraveling.

But when I remember that I am just a caretaker, things just seem to go well.

That's for me.

How foundational is the ownership versus overseer as you word it?

Here

I'm looking on page 80.

You can see I've got it highlighted.

highlighted it here.

Um,

Well

how, how critical, how critical to being,

to hearing the words well done, is it

to not be an owner and to be an overseer.

to be an overseer?

Right.

It's actually the first kind of, the first real critical principle.

We outlined the book kind of in three buckets, right?

So four principles tied to proclamations that Jesus made, or statements

that he made, like go the second mile, the second set of four, talk

about parables that Jesus told.

And so that principle comes out of the parable of the talents, right?

That they didn't own it.

They were just stewards of what the owner had given to them.

And then the last four principles really talk about practices of Jesus and the

way that he, did his, did his ministry.

But that move from that, I own it all.

It's my business that I created it, I designed it, it's all mine versus it's

all god's and God's asking me to be a steward of it, I think is really critical.

And again, I think we've done some damage, quite honestly, because

we talk a lot about, in Christian circles about servant leadership.

And servant leadership's really critical.

Obviously it comes from Jesus serving his disciples and serving others, and Robert

Greenleaf wrote a book, great book, back in the 1970s about servant leadership.

But I believe what Jesus calls us to and what Matthew

illustrates is steward leadership.

And if you do steward leadership, that'll include servant leadership

because now you extra, you understand it's not all about you.

You're not the boss, you're not the one that owns everything.

You're a steward of what God has given to you.

I'm actually getting ready to release this year, later this year, another book

called The First CEO, and the first CEO is about seven choices that'll either

break or break through your business.

And I talk about Adam and Eve in the garden.

As the first CEO.

They were the first business owners.

They had a little landscape business.

they had a little petting zoo that they were in charge of, right?

But what's interesting about that model that Jesus later illustrates

that Matthew talks about is Adam and Eve never owned the garden.

It was God's garden, right?

God is the one that developed it.

He's the one that designed it.

And until we wrestle with that and relate it to our business,

I don't own CEO experience.

I steward CEO experience.

God owns it.

if I wanted to continue it, I better have it as a steward.

Because Ken's not always gonna be around, right?

Adam and Eve's not gonna be around.

Even Jesus himself wasn't gonna be around.

Jesus treated his ministry as a stewardship.

He started it.

He was the founder.

He created it, but he was ready to hand it over so that it could

flourish in the next generation.

And I find that this is really critical.

So we really start there with every single leader because every one of us,

in some ways, we have a responsibility gene or an ownership gene, where we feel

like as owners, if it's gonna get done, I gotta do it right, or I need to take

charge of this, or I need to make this decision, or I'm responsible for this, or

I'm responsible for that, eventually that ownership mentality will break us down

because it is gonna change our philosophy.

I mean, and I could tell you story after story in the Bible and story

after story in real life, right?

where when, when the leader moved to ownership, it changed their behavior.

When they moved to stewardship, it changes their eternity.

Right.

And so that's, that's why I love that principle of making, I call it making

the move from owner to overseer.

Because you're really making the move from, I'm not the owner of

this business any longer, God is to now I'm a steward of it.

And I just use the word overseer as a, make it for, from a sentence,

a re reminder of a principle.

Hey, I need the, I'm, am I owning this or am I overseeing it?

Am I stewarding it?

And I better, I better think in stewardship terms,

it's a fundamental principle.

it, it is absolute.

And the way I keep myself in check.

is that a steward, overseer, caretaker, trustee, there's a lot

of words we could put in there,

has a responsibility as a caretaker to return something in

a better condition than when they

received it.

and if you think in that way, there is more of an eternal

versus an owner, you're really

sucking everything out for your benefit.

I'm right now working with a client that we're talking about an exit

and we're talking about what to do to build towards

how we structure things.

And this is a principle that's so important.

I also love Ken, I appreciate you bringing up

the servant leadership because I have seen servant.

Leadership abused more than I have seen it working out well,

especially in church circles,

but it spilled over into the business world too,

in that it just, it basically has been abused and people says,

well, hey, you're here to serve,

do this, don't do that.

Whatever.

and so

I believe that that's fairly unhealthy.

Tell me about, there's so many things we could talk about.

You and I could go for hours, but

tell me about CEO experience and what that looks like and give some information

Yeah, so when God called me to make that transition into the, you know,

working with Christian CEOs and business owners, I went as God as the owner of it.

I wanted to see what the framework should be and what I found in the marketplace

at the time was there was a lot of one trick ponies or one product types

of organizations that they said, Hey, we'll work with the Christian business

owner, but you know, they have to do executive coaching or they have to do.

Round tables or forums or whatever it is that they might, or prayer groups

or whatever it is that they want.

And what I found was that Jesus actually taught his disciples,

in seven different ways.

And so part of our philosophy is we wanna start with the CEO rather than

start with our products and services.

And so Philippians four, two four says, consider others be, have the

same attitude of Christ Jesus to consider others more than yourself.

So our philosophy is a little bit like David and Nathan, that Nathan was part of

David's circle, all of David's kingdom.

So he was there during David's high points.

He was there during David's low points, and then obviously he was

there during the critical moments when David needed him to speak.

And he was able to talk to David in such a way.

So as I noticed these seven kind of models that Jesus established, what it does is

it allows CEOs and business owners to stay with us for a long period of time.

Maybe in different products or services, if you will.

So we have executive coaching.

so our goal is to help CEOs hear the words well done through hosting retreats.

We use the word retreat, and the retreat serves as seven different

ways that we can have retreats.

So we have private retreats, which is our executive coaching model.

We have peer retreats where we bring CEOs together in groups of 15 for mastermind

purposes and to have a day to hear God's voice and to challenge each other and for

accountability We have personnel retreats where we go on side and work with their

team just as Jesus would give with this team in the upper room, or have moments

in the garden or have time where he was deep diving deep in his, with his teams.

We have perspective retreats where we help their more strategic vision and

their once a quarter where we work with, companies or the CEO to develop vision

for themselves and For their company.

We have prayer retreats where we get together for spiritual purposes.

We have a prayer team that prays over the needs of others, and that's a free

retreat that we offer at no charge.

Obviously, these other retreats have different price points, but what we find

is as business owners go through life, all of a sudden, instead of just going

on one product, they can stay with us.

And our goal, one of our goals, is to work with a CEO for a lifetime.

And because we want to help them to hear the words well done.

And so we don't sign, have anybody sign any long-term contracts,

any of those kinds of things.

But somebody might start in a peer retreat as an example, and then all of a sudden

they might go through a business sale like you're talking about, and maybe they sell

their business and so they don't have a business any longer, but they still want

that private executive coaching piece or maybe they're in a startup phase,

they wanna restart another business.

And so they want that.

And then all of a sudden they bring a team along and they want the team to understand

some values and some principles.

So we talk business, we can train.

With the team, we still train back.

Like in my old world where I can talk about a business foundation,

you'll notice the 12 principles.

They're all really written in business language.

They're not necessarily written in spiritual language.

But what I do in the book is I'm not afraid to share the foundation of

where those principles come from.

you can find out more about our, we usually talk about three retreats

as a place for people to start.

You can find that on our website@atceoexperience.com.

If you're interested in our peer retreats, which a lot of

people start with that as well.

We have another site called CEO retreat day.com.

CEO retreat day.com.

But that's a lot about what we do at CEO experience.

We have other coaches that are using our products and services

as well all over the country.

So we're not a big organization right now.

We have about 10, chief experience officers that lead

those different retreats.

and it's not necessarily just related to states because it's really around,

related to Where their influences are and where people call us to go to.

So I just got, back from the West coast, not too long ago 'cause I

was hosting a retreat out there.

I was, talking to a CEO earlier this week about a retreat that

we're gonna be hosting up in Canada.

So, you know, we kind of go in different places based on what

the CEO needs and what's in the best interest of their business.

Thanks for sharing that and we'll make sure we include the links

and also the links for the book.

Well done.

That, is excellent.

I'm sure people can get that on Amazon and everywhere.

I think when I found out we were talking, I

had my assistant say, Hey, can you get me a copy of a handful

of days before the session?

And I was able to get a real copy of it.

I didn't even read this one on my Kindle, so well done with the book, by the way.

Let me just tell you that Ken.

Hey, one thing I want you to do right before we finish up here,

let's assume we've got some leaders, small business CEOs, maybe even

ministry leaders can, and they just need a word of encouragement.

Let's just say that they.

they

Have listened in, they've heard all these great things that you've had to say, but

give a word of encouragement for leaders out there that are attempting to impact

the kingdom with what they're doing.

with what they're doing.

Oh, absolutely.

you know, I know it can be hard at times, but the encouragement that

I have is that you're not alone.

That God has a big vision for you.

God has a big, ability to do great things in your life and in your business.

And my encouragement is just to try to draw close to him, to listen to his voice,

and he'll lead you to the next step.

And that next step can be one of the most significant steps in your life.

one of the principles is know your yeses and nos.

And I noticed that Peter said yes.

And I love that story in the Bible, right?

Where he's out just on a regular day fishing, doing his job, and

all of a sudden it tells us that day he didn't catch any fish.

And so he is on the seashore washing out his nuts.

Can you imagine how frustrating that is?

Right?

the entire night out fishing, throwing those nuts in and out, in and out, in

and out, nothing, nothing, nothing.

Right?

I'm sure he was ready to give up and he definitely wanted to probably get

home and have breakfast that morning.

And all of a sudden this guy comes along the seashore and he says, Hey,

can I borrow your boat for a minute?

Peter had every reason to say no to that guy.

He had every reason to say no.

I'm done.

I just washed out my nuts.

My wife's waiting for me.

Breakfast is ready.

I'm tired, I'm sleepy.

And yet Jesus calls him to go a little bit further and Peter said, yes.

He says, yeah, you can have my boat.

He doesn't even ask how long the sermon's gonna be.

he didn't say, are you a Pentecostal preacher or are you a Baptist preacher?

He just says, Hey, you know, Jesus, if you need my boat, I know I'm

gonna have to wash out my net again, but I just wanna say yes to you.

Right?

And he gets back into the boat, and then Jesus tells him to after he preaches his

sermon, and he says, throw down the nets.

And Peter says, well, you know, Jesus, now's not the right time.

And Peter wasn't, he was wise.

He'd been fishing for years.

He knew what time the fish were biting.

And yet Jesus says, throw it on your nets.

And he doesn't.

He just says, now's not the right time.

Jesus doesn't even respond in that, which I just love.

And probably just, Jesus looks at Peter with such eyes and such an intensity.

And Peter says, okay, you know, I wanna say yes to you, Jesus.

And so he throws down the nets, and of course the story is he catches the

biggest catch that he's ever caught.

So much so that his boat starts to sink.

And then they get on the seashore that day and Jesus says, follow me.

You know, I wanna make you fishers of fisher of men.

And Peter said, yes.

And so what I've learned in my life in difficult times and

hard situations, it doesn't mean that it's not hard, it's real.

That was a real hard story for, for Peter.

He had to wash out his nuts.

He had to take the boat back out.

Obviously he got a big catch up that day.

But that was still a lot of work to be done too.

But I find a lot of encouragement if I just find my yes right and I say

yes to Jesus, I think that's the most.

So every day when I get up, and especially in difficult times, and I would encourage

every business owner, just start saying yes, Jesus, you want me to do something?

I'm gonna say yes to you.

I'm gonna forget about the rest of the world and what they're

telling me to do or not do.

I want to hear your voice and I just wanna take it the next step to whatever

you ask me to, and I know if I do that, I'll find my way through it.

That's so good.

Ken Gosnell.

Thank you.

It also shows how just one encounter.

With the son of God, with Jesus Christ can change

everything.

So amen and hallelujah there.

I appreciate,

Ken, you doing what you do.

I appreciate you working with the leaders that you're working with.

I am.

have no doubt that this having impact.

I appreciate you writing the book.

Well done.

Well done.

12 Biblical principles for Leaders to Grow their business with Kingdom

Impact.

Get a copy of that if you're listening in.

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