The Everyday Apostle
The Everyday Apostle
The Everyday Apostle - EP014 - Jose Cueto
Welcome to the Everyday Apostle, where ordinary lives meet extraordinary faith. Join our host, kendall Peterson, as we explore how everyday men and women bring the gospel to life wherever they live, work and play. Let's dive into it right now.
Kendall Peterson:Hello and welcome to episode 14 of the Everyday Apostle. I'm your host, kendall Peterson. It's a joy to bring these stories and these guests that get to share how they are living their faith in the everyday life. And today I have a very special guest with us and I'm really excited to introduce Jose Cueto, the CEO of Grove Bank Trust, who will be joining us in the studio today. But today first, our sponsor of today's episode of the Everyday Apostle is sponsored by Fugoid International.
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Jose Cueto:Thank you, kendall, excited to be on the Everyday Apostle and look forward to our next half an hour together.
Kendall Peterson:Awesome. I'm excited to have you here too. I know we've been working on this for the past couple of months and I'm glad that you're here, so let me read your bio. I can't do it justice for my memory, so I'm going to read it Today. I'm honored to welcome Jose, the Chief Executive Officer of Grove Bank Trust, to the Everyday Apostle.
Kendall Peterson:With over 36 years of experience in the banking industry, jose has built an impressive career, leading teams, managing assets and strategically growing organization. Jose's journey began at Republic National Bank of Miami and he has since then. He's held leadership roles at First Union Capital Bank Bank, lumi and International Finance Bank, before taking on his current role at Grove Bank and Trust. Along the way, he's earned accolades like Lender of the Year and the Ponce de Leon Excellence Award and recognition as South Florida Business Journal Power Leader three years in a row. That's amazing. I didn't know that was three years in a row.
Kendall Peterson:Beyond banking, jose is deeply committed to serving his community. He is the immediate past chairman of the Florida Bankers Association, a member of the Orange Bowl Committee and sits on multiple boards, including the Federal Reserve Bank of Atlanta's Miami branch and the Sebastian Strong Foundation. Jose is a proud graduate of Belen, jesuit Prep and Florida International University. Jose is also a devoted husband to his wife of 28 years, ashley, and father to their three children, alex Madison and Christopher. Jose's story is one of leadership, service and faith in action, and I'm thrilled to have him on today's show. Welcome once again to share your journey and your insights, jose.
Jose Cueto:Thank you, kendall, excited to be here and share that journey.
Kendall Peterson:Awesome. So from your bio you sound an awful lot like a Miami guy, Were you born and raised here.
Jose Cueto:Born and raised. Born and raised in Miami and, you know, born here, schooled here, college here and, have you know, the majority of my career has been in South Florida. So yes, I am a Miami native.
Kendall Peterson:Awesome, awesome. How about your wife? Was she born and raised here as well?
Jose Cueto:She's born and raised here as well. She's a product of Gables High Okay, but she is multi-generational Miami.
Kendall Peterson:Very nice.
Jose Cueto:She's been a longtime Floridian and native to Miami as well.
Kendall Peterson:Okay, and culturally, where's your family from?
Jose Cueto:My family is originally from. The majority of my family is a combination of Sicily, spain and then the Canary Islands, but you know everybody migrated to Cuba and then from Cuba they came to the United States. The majority of my family arrived in the late 50s, early 60s as they fled Fidel Castro and, you know, communism.
Kendall Peterson:Right To start a new life in this country. Well, it looks like they did a good job of that they did.
Jose Cueto:They did. I owe a lot to them for the opportunities that were afforded to me because of the sacrifices that they made. I'm always very happy to be an American, but also very proud of the Cuban heritage, and I think it's the best of both worlds. I've been very blessed.
Kendall Peterson:That's amazing. It's easy to forget one or the other, and I think it's a blessing that you hold on to both.
Jose Cueto:Yeah, I mean they have. This isn't an amazing. It's an amazing country, but I also take a lot of pride in where my family came from and our Cuban roots, and what Cubans have done in this country is something that I'm proud of, despite the fact that I was born here.
Kendall Peterson:You have every right to be so since you grew up here and there's a history a lot of families that came out of Cuba at that period of time. It was usually led to a lot of hard work, usually led to a lot of tight-knit family groups and I've seen a lot of people come out of that and cling to their faith. Come out of that and cling to their faith. So, since this is the Everyday Apostle podcast, what was your faith life like as you were growing up?
Jose Cueto:I mean I grew up Catholic Sundays at church, I went to a Jesuit high school and faith at every stage in my life has been present from the moment that I was born. You know it's a journey, I think. You know that. I know that I think most people who are on this journey understand it. And you know you go through different chapters of what that faith looks like until you're comfortable with who you are and you know where you are at a certain stage in your life, I believe. But my upbringing was, you know, christ and faith were always part of the discussion and part of the DNA of who our family is. You know it's always been.
Kendall Peterson:So did you have any like super high moments, epiphanies, kind of big bang moments in your faith, or was it more of a steady moment?
Jose Cueto:Well, I mean, you know, I think it was steady. I think when you're young, you know, I think you don't always have a complete understanding of what faith looks like, nor do you have a complete understanding of the Bible. I think, you know, I grew closer in my faith in 2015. I had a I don't want to call it a come to Jesus moment, but let's call it a come to Jesus moment when my father passed away. I had assumed leadership of International Finance Bank as a very young CEO at the time. I had probably been there, let's say, three months and, you know, three months into that, I lost my father.
Jose Cueto:You know that was followed by a friend approaching me and saying hey, you know, I'd like you to come, you know, and join me at BSF, which is Bible Study Fellowship. And you know, I don't need any commitment from you. I just, you know, I want you to come and I want you to listen and just, you know, just observe what we're doing at BSF. And I think that was, you know, the initial inertia that started to draw me into, you know, what I would call now more than a decade journey into strengthening my faith, and I think that you know that was certainly a catalyst. I think at the time it happened you know that was certainly a catalyst, I think at the time it happened.
Jose Cueto:You know, my wife was further along in her own faith journey at that time and she certainly had a big influence in terms of what my journey has looked like right, and some of her boldness and her faith. So I don't, you know, I think it's hard to pinpoint one specific moment in history. I think it's a culmination of things, maybe leading up to a life-changing event where you need to lean on something bigger than yourself, and I think that was my case.
Kendall Peterson:Yeah, it's kind of funny how God uses those moments in our life. I won't necessarily say that I believe that he creates all of those moments, but everything exists to glorify God right. And so in those moments, even tragedies, house fires or deaths or whatever, can be great moments of us, you know, attaching to God, yeah, and I think that's you know.
Jose Cueto:I think you're spot on there. As you grow in your faith, you start to, I think you start to better understand the interconnections right, and how everything is ultimately connected to God. You know, I think, like everything I think, whether it's professional or in sports, sometimes connecting dots and things slowing down to a pace where you can better digest and understand them. I don't think that faith is, you know, much different than certain other things. I think that there's a moment, like when you have a come to Jesus moment. There's also a moment where you get it, you have a deeper understanding and through that deeper understanding, I think that there's an inherent path where your faith is now growing organically. It's not growing in a manner where you're trying to understand. You've understood and accepted, and now it's about growth and you know what that journey looks like for each person, because every person's journey is somewhat different and unique, and I'm certainly cognizant of that.
Kendall Peterson:So since you're kind of calling out that 2015-ish time frame. So before that?
Jose Cueto:what did you living your faith look like? I had faith and you know I was clear in terms of who my Lord and Savior was, but I wasn't maybe necessarily living that, you know. I think you know the people I surrounded myself with and some of the things that I was engaged in not that any of it was you know anything crazy, just really it started to become something that I didn't necessarily want to be a part of and you know that coincided with some of my own. You know growth personally and you know also propelling my growth, you know on my faith journey or my Christ journey, whichever you'd like to pick.
Jose Cueto:But you know, it's a lot of pieces kind of put together. Right, I would say that I maybe was more human and of the world than a person of faith, where, today, faith comes first and some of this outside noise doesn't even really, you know, influence the way I live my life. It's a great place to be now.
Kendall Peterson:It's a great place.
Jose Cueto:I mean listen, you know, you know how this is is. Sometimes I feel I take many steps forward and sometimes I take a couple of steps backwards. But I think, when I look at the net effect of all of those steps, as long as I'm continuing to move forward in my journey and I'm forging what my faith is and my own expectations of myself in front of God, I think that I give myself the same of God. I think that you know I can, I'm, I give myself the same grace God gives us all, because I realize that I am an imperfect sinner at the end of the day and you know it's, it's lofty goals. You know, in terms of, you know what perfection looks like.
Kendall Peterson:We know it's only one person, so yeah, it's kind of interesting and you know, I would imagine that we're fairly similar, we're guys and professionals and all of that, and there's such a struggle in a worldly sense to to push forward and be the best you can be and be high, achieving and do all of that stuff. And what's easily recognizable in somebody that's really really come to the point where their faith life has matured is, you see, that shift from I don't need to be perfect, I can accept the fact that I'm a sinner, I want to be better, but I can accept the fact that I'm a sinner sinner. I can accept the fact that I'm imperfect and I'm consistently striving for more, versus maintaining a facade of living in big houses and driving fancy cars and living, you know, the high life, thinking that that says that we're successful. It's interesting that you kind of confirmed that, yeah, I mean I.
Jose Cueto:you know, I've been, you know and I'm open that you know, god in my life is number one, you know.
Jose Cueto:Then, closely thereafter are my friends, my family, and a distant third is what I do professionally every day.
Jose Cueto:It's not even really close to number one and number two and you know, I think that is the realization where you start to understand that you know that some of the things that maybe the world likes to define as success is is maybe quite the opposite of that and that success is, you know, what you define your life in parallel to God, really kind of is.
Jose Cueto:You know, I think that I don't measure my success. I measure my success by how close I am and a reflection of God. That's how I measure success and it's it's not has nothing to do with wealth, what I do for a living or or any of that, and I think that you know when I came to that realization, I think that the biggest takeaway from it is the peace One I'm not in control, I give it up to God, I give my fear up to God is much more in line with what God wants for us than a life filled with why am I not perfect or what's the next milestone in my career going to be? I literally that doesn't even enter my psyche. Whatever tomorrow brings, tomorrow will bring, because it's going to come anyways.
Kendall Peterson:Exactly, no matter what you think is going to happen Exactly.
Jose Cueto:I'm not controlling, I'm just a child of God. God knows what my story will look like when all is said and done, and I'm okay with giving that to him and letting him be the author of what that story looks like.
Kendall Peterson:So, um, I guess for the audience that doesn't know um, I have had occasion to see you in the workplace and interact with you in a professional sense as well, which is why you're here on the show. And and there was aside from the fact that you wear you know, what would Jesus do bracelets and stuff like that there was a moment in a particular meeting where you mentioned very openly among your, your coworkers and the leadership of of the organization. You mentioned the importance of glorifying God in what you do, and that really stuck out to me. That was something that is so rare in my experience, somebody that can just so openly do that. That definitely sounds like something that came after your come to Jesus moment in 2015. I don't imagine you were doing that a whole lot before.
Kendall Peterson:So you know, one of the reasons I started this podcast was people would come to me and say, hey, you're very openly a believer in Christ, you're very openly Catholic even but you don't cram it down people's throats. How are you able to do that? How are you able to feel comfortable enough to do that? So that's why I started the podcast. So that's kind of where I'm going to go with this next question what was it like for you to become comfortable? Was it an instant thing, or did that kind of grow for you?
Jose Cueto:No, I think being bold in your faith takes time. You know. I think delivery timing and correct moments exist and I think you can pick and choose right. There's settings where pick and choose right. There's settings where you know it maybe is inappropriate, and you know I've. What I deem inappropriate today is a much smaller, you know it's a. It's a much smaller sample than maybe before I entered this Christ journey. I also because I'm at peace and don't really fear, because I understand that you know God will provide. He always provides, um, and he in the end is, you know he's designed a plan and that's his plan for me, um.
Jose Cueto:That has emboldened me to be more vocal in my faith and to not have a fear of crossing Christianity with corporate America. You know, when it's appropriate, you know I say those things because we live in a world where oftentimes it's about me Right, it's about how is something affecting me to? A workplace conversation is more about not only expectations in terms of the way you should behave or what the expectations are within an organization, but also trying to put it in front of people that the expectations in the way we carry ourselves in this world, you know, span far broader and deeper than anything in corporate America. But you know, I think there are some things that you can take away.
Jose Cueto:I think that you honor God in the way you work.
Jose Cueto:You work hard to honor your God.
Jose Cueto:I think that if he's bestowed gifts upon us, whether it's a gift of knowledge, whether it's a gift of communication, whether it's the gift of leadership, acknowledging the God that is the source of those gifts to you and honoring him by really taking the gifts that you've been giving and trying to make the most out of them, I think that's how you honor God.
Jose Cueto:And you know, I think sometimes, you know, we forget that God is very graceful and humans to each other oftentimes are much less graceful than God is with us. So I try to use those opportunities to teach, coach and, you know, hope and inspire. And you know, sometimes wearing these bracelets on my wrist will invoke a question from someone, on my wrist will invoke a question from someone, and that is an easy platform to be able to, you know, to have a conversation about what faith looks like, and you know what a journey may look like for a particular person, or you know how you can invoke your faith to deal with, you know, things in this world that maybe keep you up at night, you know, and if I can bring peace to someone by reinforcing the strength of what faith can be, then, I take those opportunities.
Kendall Peterson:That's great. So that's in the professional sense. How does that look in your home life? You had mentioned just a couple of things you had mentioned. Obviously, you have three kids and kids can pose a challenge, but it's a struggle.
Jose Cueto:I mean it's, I'll tell you that it's a struggle. It's a struggle because there are a generation you know that is, you know in many ways has a lot more being thrown at them that maybe the generations before Um, I feel that you know social media and other influences in their life, you know, can have, you know, an oftentimes, you know, negative or addictive effect, and maybe those are things that we didn't necessarily have to deal with in our time.
Jose Cueto:So I think, you know, trying to emphasize you know, what faith looks like, what control the value of the things that we place in a place of importance in our life. I think those are lessons that my wife and I both are constantly trying to pass on to our children, to varying degrees of success. I can tell you that when I was that age, I didn't necessarily want to hear that and that my real journey of faith began when I felt that I was ready for it. And you know, and I think you know, I'd be remiss not to say that those are challenges. You know I pray about it constantly. You know, and as much as I always try to lead by example sometimes my example I'm not perfect. I'm a sinner. I make mistakes, I say things I sometimes shouldn't say. So what I do is catch myself, and I think focusing on God provides me with certain guardrails. But you know, I think we're all we all struggle with.
Jose Cueto:You know the dichotomy of trying to be a Christian in the world, right, I think that I think that struggle never goes away. I think that it's a lifelong struggle and one that ends with your entry into the kingdom, right, I think that's where your entry into the kingdom.
Jose Cueto:I think that's where you leave the world behind. So it's a struggle. I mean, we attend church. I told you my son, all of my kids have gone to Christian schools. But we're living in interesting times and times that were you know the enemy is everywhere you turn Right. So sometimes it's about identifying what the enemy looks like and trying to paint a picture of you know what faith and what God look like.
Kendall Peterson:It's challenging, it's not easy 100%, totally agree with that for sure. A hundred percent, totally agree with that for sure. So you've mentioned a couple of things. You know, things that kind of help you along that journey. One, obviously going to church. You mentioned Bible study, yeah. So I'm curious are there any other things that you do that?
Jose Cueto:you find help, ground you in your, in your faith, you know. You know, I think maybe it's about the things I don't do. Okay, I don't watch news. That's got to help. I'm not on social media. I have very limited time, as you know, so the little time I have I want to focus on God and my family and whatever time I have left I try to focus that on on my career.
Jose Cueto:But I think it's not walking into something by never walking towards it is, you know. I think that's a plausible, you know, manner in which to you know, embolden and strengthen your faith. Outside of that you mentioned it earlier in my bio I do see God at work, working in a pediatric cancer foundation as a director of that board. I think that has definitely brought me very close to God and, I think, helped me reconcile. You know that there's certain things that are in God's plan that sometimes we don't understand Right, and it's a process of faith and I think it's a combination of all of those things is really what, in the end, really keeps you grounded and planted and disciplined and structured in your journey, despite the fact that we fall off all the time Because I do fall off, I fall off quite a bit, but you know I always get back on the horse and try to do better the next time around.
Kendall Peterson:And maybe that's the key right there. Right, it's just knowing that, no matter what we do, it's not going to be enough to be perfect and that we have to keep trying, and trying and trying.
Jose Cueto:Yeah, and I, it's perfection and I'm a, I'm a type A, and perfection was always part of that vocabulary. Today it's not anywhere in my vocabulary. I, I, I accept my imperfection, I accept my struggle, I accept my desire to want to be better, but better in the eyes of God, not better in the eyes of the world, and that's a huge difference, and it's one that brings a great sense of peace, you know, and you know, and it strengthens it. I think you know that peace and the elimination of fear of what tomorrow may bring and what we have to be for tomorrow, that doesn't exist anymore, and that you know that's the beginning of your change and what that journey may look like for each person.
Kendall Peterson:That's awesome. So I'm going to wrap it up. We're, believe it or not, at the end of our time I told you it would go quick. Your marriage is kind of the last piece that I wanted to touch on. You said your wife was a little bit ahead of you. You know, back at one point in time, since you have kind of made the adjustments that you've made, uh, where have you seen those differences in your, in your marriage?
Jose Cueto:I mean, I I think there's much more alignment on what we believe to be important. I think that there's much more alignment in in terms of the values that we want to instill in our children. I think there's a joint philosophy about not fearing what tomorrow may bring, and I think that you know that comes all of it kind of. You know, transitions you into a place of peace, a house where there's a lot of laughter and a lot of fun and and not so concerned about the outside noise at times, and, um, I think it's brought our family closer.
Kendall Peterson:You know that's worth the price of admission in itself right yeah even over and above the uh, the eternal joy in heaven part Absolutely.
Jose Cueto:I think that you know, I could think of a few things you know that are better than spending an afternoon at home with my family versus being out doing something else, and I think you know, it's a big change. You know that's a big change in my life in terms of you know where there's value and what it is we should be prioritizing.
Kendall Peterson:Awesome. Well, thank you so much for sharing all of that and sharing your story and, um, and you know we say it over and over on the show it's a continual march toward that greatness that we hope for in heaven, right, it's not. We hit perfection and stay there, and I think you did a really, really good job of encapsulating that and sharing that. So, thank you, thank you for that, guys. That's it for episode 14, short and sweet. Again, I thank you all for your prayers, I thank you all for your messages and I thank you for your support. If you feel the need that you would love to support what we do, support this mission and sponsor an episode, feel free to reach out at everydayapostlecom. That is everydayapostlecom. And until then, guys, stay in prayer, stay focused, keep God front and center in your life, and that's it.
Speaker 1:Thanks for tuning in to the Everyday Apostle. Don't forget to like and subscribe on YouTube, on your favorite podcast outlet, and at our website at everydayapostlecom. Until next time, stay blessed.
