Ep. 72 / How Software Success Reframed My Faith with Lewis Cirne

You can build world-class technology and still feel the harder question pressing in: what keeps you fully human when everything around you rewards speed, scale and control? In this episode we sit down with Lewis Cirne, a software entrepreneur whose work in analytics has helped companies see what’s happening inside complex digital systems, and maybe unexpectedly, rewired his own journey of faith and spiritual entrepreneurship. 

Lewis traces the journey from his first computer at the age of 12, to his formative years working in Silicon Valley, starting companies with no formal “model” beyond learning the hard way. The conversation becomes candid as he shares how ambition and vocation can align, and how culture is formed by a leader’s actions more than slogans. We then get a little more personal, as Lewis describes coming to Christian faith through rigorous investigation, the humbling impact of 9/11, and the slow, real work of spiritual formation. We also talk about caregiving, marriage under pressure, and the kind of trust that gets tested when family needs collide with business demands. 

Finally, we explore generosity and stewardship through a striking first-fruits decision: setting aside half of his early equity before success was guaranteed, which later became the basis for the Beloved in Christ Foundation, supporting churches, evangelism, Christian education, and meeting the needs of people all around the world. If you care about faith and entrepreneurship, Christian leadership and sustainable success, this episode is for you. 

If you'd like to learn more about the Beloved in Christ Foundation you can go to their website, and you can also follow Lewis Cirne online. And please don't forget to share this episode and join the conversation on YouTube! 

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Transcript

Welcome And Big Questions

Brian Stiller 0:10

Hello and welcome to Evangelical 360. I'm your host, Brian Stiller. Today I welcome a technology entrepreneur and founder of one of the world's leading software analytics and observability platforms, tools that allow companies to monitor, understand, and improve the performance of their digital systems in real time. In many ways, his work has been about making the invisible visible, bringing clarity to complexity in an increasingly interconnected world. But Lewis's story is not only about technology or business success, it's also about vocation. Raised in a context that exposed him to faith and shaped by experiences of both success and loss. He has thought about what it means to lead, to build, and to live with intention. In this conversation, we explore the intersection of faith and entrepreneurship, how values are formed and tested in high-pressure environments, what responsibility leaders carry for their cultures they create, and how one navigates success without losing a sense of grounding. Lewis brings a perspective that is both analytical and reflective. Someone who has spent his life diagnosing systems yet attentive to our inner life. His journey invites us to consider a larger question. In a world increasingly driven by technology, what does it mean to remain fully human and faithfully present? You need to excuse my growly voice. I picked up something en route to South Korea.

Lewis Cirne 1:50

It's a real honor. Thank you for having me.

Brian Stiller 1:52

So here we are, two cancucks, two Canadian boys. We infiltrate, you know. That's right.

Lewis Cirne 1:57

People can't tell the Canadian in the room in the States anyway, sometimes, unless it's Blue Jay's time.

A First Computer Changes Everything

Brian Stiller 2:03

So you have a remarkable history. You live in the States now.

Lewis Cirne 2:08

Yes, I do.

Brian Stiller 2:09

Uh unwrap that for us.

Dartmouth And The Apple Years

Lewis Cirne 2:12

Well, I I I grew up, yes, in in southern Ontario, near Toronto, in a small town. Wonderful only child with two amazing parents. And I I think an important moment to note was Christmas of 1982. My I was 12, my parents bought me my first computer. My mom said she never saw me again because I was just locked away. I found what gave me passion and joy um creatively, which is writing software. So that was a moment a moment in my life where I kind of I was fortunate. Many people don't have this, but uh, you know, I was very fortunate that I knew at the age of 12 what I wanted to do professionally. If I I would I would do it if someone didn't pay me. Oh my goodness. It was just, you know, you get this magical device that you, you know, you start with, you type it, and the words come on the screen, and then you say, Oh, you can make it do things. Um, and you, you know, there were these magazines that taught, you know. Uh you know, it was at the time when people were playing video games in those arcades, and you put a quarter in and you play Space Invaders. So I never was very good at playing video games, but I learned how to write them. So I wrote Space Invaders for my computer and some of the other games. And that just got me hooked on the joy of doing creative work through software at the age of 12. And so I I went to an amazing uh private school in Ontario that we in no way we could possibly afford. You know, my uh through the generosity of people before me, there were scholarships and bursaries available, so I managed to to get one and and attend uh a grade school, Trinity College School, which really had a big impact for me. And and then I went to States for college. Being from a small town, um, I was really attracted to a a small, smaller school that had a breadth, a very broad educational offering, like uh, you know, um I had a lot of little liberal, smaller liberal arts schools in the northeast offered. So I went to Dartmouth College where I could, you know, study computer science, but I also dabbled in things like classics and other things. Um and um and I think that was that was rewarding for me. Um, but as a junior at Dartmouth, um I got an opportunity to get an internship at Apple Computer. Um and I couldn't believe they they would pay me to write code for them. So of course I jumped at the opportunity and and I started my professional software career in Silicon Valley, first as an intern for Apple, and then when I graduated from college. Five years after that were formative in teaching me how to be a professional builder of software. But I had a dream or a desire to um to build companies. Um at that point, and I wasn't a believer yet, but you know, my parents had been so good to me, and they mortgaged their home to put, you know, pay for my education. They had no retirement savings, and they did that joyfully and selflessly. But so I felt like, you know, my dream was to build a company that could, you know, take care of them. Um and in the process, um, you know, I I viewed also my companies as a vehicle by which my creative work and building software might reach lots of people. Did you have a model of building a company? I mean, no. Where did that idea come from? Oh man, I I I learned I definitely I went to the business school of hard knocks, I call it. Um, I just learned it all on the job. I mean, my first company in 1998 was called Wiley Technology. And I had this idea for a technology that's quite esoteric and hard to explain. But then the general thing to know is it was a technical idea that I thought could help lots of other builders of software. Um and uh I was so excited about it, I said I have to start a company to build out this technology and maybe figure out a product that could build a business. And so my parents couldn't afford to invest in the company, but they had seven friends who could each afford $5,000. So they all committed an aggregate of $35,000. And I was like, that's an infinite amount of money. I can live forever on $35,000. Of course, I'm gonna quit my job and start this company. And uh afterwards, you know, the headmaster of my high school put some money in and some other people, and so that that got seated. And Wiley Technology um ended up um having quite a bit of success. And uh we got to, you know, I don't know, about 50 million in revenue and 300 employees, and we're we were acquired for 375 million in 2006. Um but more important than any of that, the most important thing was um uh I met a beautiful young woman in 2000, uh late 2000, and and uh shortly after we began dating, she said, I'm not gonna go on the third date with you unless you come to church with me. And my dear bride Kirsten. So I just did it for the girl, but uh, you know, I I came away with Jesus. Um, and um I got the girl too, but um that was that was really important.

Brian Stiller 7:21

So you go to church, yeah. You're attracted to this young lady, she's using the leverage relationship to get you there, and you're yeah, you're sitting there. What are you thinking as you're sitting there? Did you have did you have any religious training in your in your upbringing? Did you have any orientation towards faith?

Lewis Cirne 7:39

So interesting because of, you know, you have exposure in certain ways, and you can hear the gospel, but you know, you don't have ears to hear, right? And so I I was in a spot when we started, when when I started going to church with Kirsten, where I said, I, you know, I didn't want to believe just because other people told me to believe, or that's how I was brought up. I really wanted to do a rigorous examination of the facts. Well, you have a bit of an engineering mind. Exactly. That's right. So I wanted to be deliberate about that and say, you know, this is a question worth uh in retrospect, loving the Lord with my whole mind, right? Yeah. Um and so I went through that process over the course of early 2001 and and and there were several sermons that you know God meant for me to be in that church at that day. And so that and reading The Case for Christ and more than a carpenter, some some great books to help you bring your mind to um an understanding and a belief in the truth, the gospel fact that Jesus did rise from the dead. Right. So I got my mind to there by the summer of 2001, but my heart wasn't there yet. Because at that point in time, um, you know, my company was having some success. I've got a beautiful girlfriend. I thought I was pretty good at running my life. I didn't like the idea of giving over decision making for my life to someone else. Full of arrogance and hubris when I look back at it, right? To think that I could make decisions for my life. And the tragic day of 9-11 happened. And that was a horrible day in history, but it did, it was also the day I was reborn. Um, because for me, it was a wake-up call of you fool, who are you to think you know how to run your life? It was kind of like the end of Job. Like, who do you do do you have any idea? Like, this is the creator of the universe who loves you, who died for you. Why would you think you could make better decisions on how to lead your life than him? And so that was the day that my heart came to Jesus. Because he humbled me through that terrible tragedy.

Brian Stiller 9:55

Take us back to that day. Where were you? What were you doing? How did how did all of this come about?

Starting A Company From Scratch

Church For A Girl Becomes Faith

Lewis Cirne 10:02

Well, you know, uh virtually anyone above a certain age will remember exactly where they were when they heard about that tragedy on 9-11. And I was driving into work, it was in the Bay Area, so we were uh three hours behind New York. So it was about seven in the morning when I heard about it. My mom called me as I'm driving in. It devastated me as it devastated everyone. But I'm a uh a 31-year-old leading a learning how to lead people and lead a company. So I have to go into work and stand up in front of our 50 employees and try to provide the right words to say to everyone who was processing this tragedy. But in my mind, it was also the Holy Spirit saying, You have no idea how little you know and how much grace God has given you. And you've taken far too much for granted in your life. And you, you know, what a fool to think that anything good in your life came without God's grace. I'm just thinking of it now. He took out a heart of stone and put in a heart of flesh. Um, and so I went to a Menlo Park Presbyterian Church where we had been going with my wife that night after after we got through the day, and I fumbled through the words to say and do to lead my company through the day. Um, and we went to church and we prayed, and I stood instead stood in a circle full of people holding hands, and I just wept and gave my life to the Lord. That's an interesting day to have as your your Christian birthday, bittersweet day. But even as I say and think about that, you know, that's that's Jesus. He died for us. That's bitter, and yet the sweetness of so that we can live. What were you like the next morning? I wish I could say it was like so many of the great stories of Paul's instant conversion. Uh I felt uh my Christian growth has been gradual since that day. I know that was the day when I became born again, but I wasn't in the Word every day. You know, can't wait to go every Sunday to worship with my whole heart. Like that has grown and will continue to grow by God's grace for me day by day. So I can't sort of point to a um that that dramatic a change. It was more like every little thing in my life kind of changed. But it wasn't that long after where we got engaged. Um and shortly after we got engaged, my wife got very ill. Um, and it was six months before the wedding, and I'm leading at that point, you know, several hundred people in the company. And she went from you know, vibrant, active, marketing professional to unable to like wash her own hair. So I had to, God definitely was it was James One. Like, he was giving me trials where he forced me to say, all right, what's more important, your future wife or this company? And I had to stop everything and be your her full-time caregiver for six weeks. Now, mind you, at that point in time, I had managed to find a successor as CEO. So I was chief technology officer. And I think I would have had to have more faith to do that if I was CEO. Um, but the right thing would have been the same thing regardless. But as chief technology officer and founder of the company, I stepped away from work for six weeks and was Kirsten's caregiver. Um, and boy, there were there were great business lessons in that because I thought I was so indispensable for so many decisions that I didn't need to be a part of. If you have a great set of people, they find a way to make things move forward. And if you can, if your job is to align people, set the tone, try to establish um um the culture by how you act, not what you, not just what you say, um, then good people will step up at times like that. And so that helped me, you know, again, like it's so interesting how we can, with with the benefit of hindsight, see how God was at work in our lives through the darkest times or the hardest times. In that case, um, it was I never could have become the scale, you know, had the ability to lead at a at a higher scale if I didn't have this forcing function of you're not gonna have a choice in this matter, you gotta be with your wife. Um, and you got to figure out how to let, you know, for this company to to thrive without you being in as many decisions. And so that was an interesting thing in retrospect. So that was in around 2003 when we got married in 2003, and um and she's had her medical challenges for most of the last two decades. And, you know, thank God it's been really good recently. I was just talking to her today, and her energy is is great. And I I prayed that next year or if there's something, an event like this on the other side of the world, she'll have the energy to be there with me. Christ was pruning me, has been pre-prunes all of his believers. We know that, that's his word, John 15. And without that pruning, you know, because my company it had my company had the same success it had, you know, the easy times are the times when you fall away from Christ. Um, and so he wouldn't let me give me that option.

Brian Stiller 15:35

We often think that uh life begins with God with a big bang and is good and upward forever. But this metaphor, the pruning, that's uh how he moves us from day to day, from change to change.

Lewis Cirne 15:54

I think you're right. Wait, when you say that, what comes to mind is I mean, the metaphor that Jesus uses is being born again. So what does that mean? It means you're a baby, right? And and just as as a father, I nurture my newborn, you know, Paul speaks about this with spiritual milk and things like that. Like being born again means you are new, brand new in and and you're gonna be a baby and an adolescent. And by God's grace, maybe a mature believer. Um, you're never done. Um, but and I still I I'm not enough of a theologian. I I think I'm better understanding that the soils, I feel some days on my best days, I'm fertile soil, and on some days I'm rocky soil, and I'm distracted by the worries of this world. Um, but that could also be like the printing helps me emulate fertile soil more often.

Brian Stiller 16:52

How do you nurture your life? So you're a hard driving entrepreneur or young man that's that's moving moving into success fairly quickly. And you come into the

Lewis Cirne 17:05

very few people have called me hard driving who's worked with me. Uh my my nickname is Sweet Lou. I uh I have to surround myself with very good operational leaders who can make tougher decisions because I'm a softie. Um but I would say I think your your your overall question is an important one.

Brian Stiller 17:24

Because you you but you but you kind of have energy to accomplish. Right. And so you may not be tough to as a manager, but you have you have that grant to oh to drive forward.

9 11 And A Changed Heart

Lewis Cirne 17:36

Right, and to persevere. That's important. And and I feel like so let me set a bit of context. You know, in my early mid-40s, I would I would say what many people have heard and and many believe is like the most important thing you have is your time, right? You hear that over time. So how do you manage your time? And I think that is super important, but I've come to realize what's even more important than managing my time is managing my energy. Because I can have a free afternoon to be as productive as I want. But if I feel completely drained and unwilling, I'm useless. I can be actually a net negative to my org. I can I can make people's experience worse and make them less productive as a leader. So you have to recognize you're not doing your company, your org, your family any good. If you're pushing yourself to the point of emotional exhaustion, um, you know, you can make life worse for your for your spouse, your family, your coworkers, et cetera. So it was hard and sometimes still is hard to feel like you're indulging yourself by doing things that energize you. Because I'll tell you, when I'm writing code, that doesn't feel like work. When I'm building software, that feels like something I get to do. And I get a little frustrated if I have to drop off and jump on a on a meeting or you know, do some other necessary portions of my work. But I realize that if if I am a lot less, and and so I mean, when I was running my company, I would, I would insist on having four coding retreats a year, week long. I'm off the grid, I'm unreachable, I'm just gonna be alone writing software. Whether or not, and sometimes that software is just thrown away. It's like an author going away or an artist going into the recording studio, and hopefully they come out with a song. But my team would say you're a lot, you know, easier to work for and more effective to work for after those coding retreats. Yeah. So, and and that's an interesting forcing function, because by the way, so how do I manage to be away for those four weeks a year where I'm unreachable and writing software? And you you better have the right team around you that's doing the things that you don't love to do, that don't energize you, and delegate broadly to them. Um, you know, I I had the privilege of spending time with Rick Warren last night, and he said something, as he often does, said something profound. He said, You you can have control or you can have growth, but you can't have both. Right? God, God wants us to to have an open hand. And and we have a a human desire to control, right? That also affects how you work with your team and how you bring your people in. So I've found that um the more I've tried to control, the less I've been able to, and my organs have been able to grow. And and so um, the extent I have the right team in place um so that I can do what I love, um then things tend to flourish.

Brian Stiller 20:36

And how did your faith uh merge, interact with your entrepreneurial instinct, your responsibilities?

Caregiving And Learning To Delegate

Lewis Cirne 20:48

Well, in many ways, obviously. Um, but I'll share a couple stories. Um so right now I'd say um if people ask what I do, I've got a few projects going on, but an umbrella for it is what we call the Beloved in Christ Foundation, our family foundation. The basis or the funding from that came from a decision that we made shortly after I founded my second company, New Relic, that was founded in 2008. And somewhere around 2009, um thereabouts, um, the company was still in its infancy, and I think the stock would have been at about 90 cents a share, but private. So we have an illiquid private stock that may or may not be of value in the future. And I was reading Hebrews 11, 6, where it's not even a full verse. It was just the first half of the verse. Hit me right here. Because it said, Without faith, it is impossible to please God. What does that mean? It means none of my good actions, none of the nice things I say or do, nothing to please God without faith. Faith, not how we get, you know, please God. And we all want to please God, whether we know it or not. Right? Atheists want to please God whether they know it or not. That's why there's so many great agnostics and atheists doing great work. Um, but we're getting it confused because he just wants us to trust him. So in in 2009, my bride Kirsten and I, we said, How do we, what does that mean for us? And we said, well, why are we trusting on whether this company will succeed or not? As if that's going to be, you know, the foundation of whether we have the life we want to have for ourselves, the people who matter to or who we love. Um, and we decide to set aside half the stock we owned in the company. And we said, while we don't know, that's act, that's our act of faith. Not after the company has succeeded, what's left over for God, right? So it's it's classic, I get in many ways, first fruits. Um and we just said, you know, God might or might not bless the company. We're not trying expecting the company to thrive in return. Um, but we felt like the Bible was saying this is how we please him, by trusting in him, not in whether we have enough shares. Um, and God did bless the company. So we were acquired in 2023, about 14, 15 years later, went public in 2014. So by the time we are we were acquired, that 90 cent a share stock was acquired for $87 a share. So about a hundredfold increase in the value of the stock. You know, that stock we set aside has been the basis of the Beloved in Christ Foundation, which um, you know, we fund evangelical, um many evangelical organizations. Uh uh we also like to fund organizations that just serve the needy. We call it the Matthew 25 list of I was hungry and you fed me and I was thirsty and you gave me something to drink, and I was in prison and you visited me. So we like to give a portion of our grant making there. Um, we like to give directly to churches, um, and then to Christian education. That's been, you know, you asked how has our faith affected? That's that's a big part of it. Um so um, yeah, I should probably pause there because I imagine there's a question or two that I I may have glossed over that might be of interest to you.

Brian Stiller 24:22

So in do in doing this, yeah. Obviously uh very successful in your in your act in your business development. And as you as you walk with the Lord, what lessons has he taught you about the the integration of of money, enterprise, gifting, opportunity? You people that are that are listening and listening to you and they're wondering, what do I do with my life? And and so for so Lou, as you look at your own life and your experience and your you're growing up, what would you have to say to those that are wondering how God might use them?

Managing Energy Not Just Time

Lewis Cirne 25:07

Well, I always feel hesitant to answer or give broad advice because it is so personal and every every person's journey is so different. The mountain I have to climb is very different from we understand so I but I would how do I say it? It's not something that's new in any way. Is trust the Lord, you know, with all your heart. And he will he'll make your path straight for his name's sake, right? And so um uh what that practically means day to day is very different from person to person. Um, in my case, it often meant, and and the most stressful is often how do I balance being a great husband to with a with a wife with many health challenges, a great leader to my company, um, a great son to my parents, great father to my daughter. And so you've only got so many hours in the day and so many, and and so trying to balance that and and looking to the Lord for guidance there is super important. I feel like everybody feels like they wish they had more in the hours in the day and more, more time to achieve the one what they want to achieve or serve the way they want to serve, recognizing that even Jesus went away to be alone to pray. He only had three years to do his ministry to change the world. And there was an infinite number of sick to heal, an infinite number of people to tell to repent and turn to the Lord. But he would still say, John, Peter, I'm going over here to pray for a couple of days and I won't be available to any of you. Because he was rejuvenating himself with the Lord. And why? I think to set an example, right, to us all. So learning to be kind to yourself because uh we tend to be our own toughest critics. That's very true for me. And so we're taught to love others as we love ourselves, and so that that's pure scripture. Uh, help me find the scripture that says also um, maybe it's resist the devil and he will flee from you. But that inner critic that slows you down, that tells you um, you know, you could call it imposter syndrome, you could call it um just um uh a self um deprecation is the wrong word. You can you can be so hard on yourself, and and like he's he's the same as the accuser in Job 1, right? And depreciate your set your own sense of and that can bring but it yes, that's right. God created you with passions and gifts, and the world will have a very flawed measure of with the value of those gifts, and so I think it's a little dangerous to have someone who's been fortunate enough to have financial success and say this is an example, because you know, you know, the kindness that someone shows um by giving a hug at just the right moment. You know, my daughter, she's a sweet, sweet child. And she's not at the point yet where she knows like she didn't have the same, I found out what I love to do professionally, I'm gonna do it. But I've seen many times where she will walk up to a stranger and give them a hug, and that stranger who she's not like in a by an elevator in New York City, and the person just broke into a sob and sobbed on her shoulders, said, I just feel like you need a hug. Right? So, like her gifting is not gonna be building software companies, but her impact on that person is far more important than you know whether my software had a bug in it. Right. So I I just I feel like ever God made everyone, everyone precisely a He knew He's counted the hairs on our heads, He has a purpose for each of you. And don't let the world tell you that the measure of your purpose is measured in dollars or size of your organization, you know, or any of these earthly things. You know, that's very tempting to do, but it's not it's not biblical.

Brian Stiller 29:23

In business and in your following the Lord, do you have a particular kind of format of devotion about building your own spiritual life? Is there something that uh we could learn from that?

Lewis Cirne 29:39

Oh, I wish I God did not make me to be a very organized or disciplined person. So I love having uh open calendars for creative moments. I think of myself as a creative and a technologist. And so um I try to rather having a routine or a ritual, that that's not how I God made me, but uh, but I he I do try to cultivate habits. And so um habits of turning to prayer, habits to of being thankful to God for things that I've taken for granted. And and so that works better for me than you know, it's devotional every morning at this time, or it's this many passages per day.

Brian Stiller 30:26

You don't know how good it is to hear you say that. I'm the same way to develop habits, yeah, but the ritual bores me to death.

Lewis Cirne 30:42

Amen, brother. We're we're cut from that cloth. We're cut from that cloth. Yeah, yeah. And but I need to surround myself on the you know, on the team building. Um, I've got some remarkably disciplined people, and that's how God made them. And without those people, you know, it would be a disaster. I wouldn't be here. There's there's this wonderful sterling right here. She's like, okay, Lou, this is where you need to be. And don't be, I can't tell you how many times I've almost missed important things I need to be doing. You know, like my like my anniversary for my wife. She's like, Lou, if you don't forget, right? Because I'm an airhead on the important stuff sometimes. Um, and so I'm like, oh my goodness, my dear bride, she's the most important person in my life. Of course, I gotta take care of that, right?

Brian Stiller 31:29

So to know yourself, yes, really important.

Lewis Cirne 31:33

Yeah. And be okay with who you are in Christ.

Brian Stiller 31:39

How do you decide to whom and how much to give money to? You're a philanthropist, which is which which which is a a wonderful word that describes people with resources provided for others. But how do you go about doing that? Everybody wants to be your friend, everybody wants your address. How do you decide?

First Fruits Giving And New Relic

How He Chooses What To Fund

Lewis Cirne 32:05

God has been very good to us in that regard. Very good. Um, in that um we didn't start with much of a strategy or a vetting process. We did start with Matthew 25, when we, you know, when the foundation was just worthless stock. So we felt like serving those who really needed to be served was important. But it's interesting. I'm gonna answer your question around about way because my business success has been entirely a function of God putting the right people in my path in completely unexplainable, like a secular person would call random ways. Like future leaders of huge companies when they were small companies, future, you know, recognized as the top three venture capitalists in the world, fresh out of business school before he had any credibility. And I was the first person that did a, you know, so like God was placing people in my path that led to amazing companies. And it wasn't because I deserved it and I was doing everything right by him, he was just blessing me. Um and and so um with the foundation, he has put amazing people in my path, our my wife and our path, and we just talk to each other, and it's so often we'll independently say, What do you think, and we'll come to the penny with the same idea. We say the Holy Spirit's in alignment here. And um, there is no spreadsheet or process that would rationalize this being like you've done your diligence and this is a smart or a wise stewardship decision. But we just feel like if you truly believe God is sovereign and there are no coincidences, and you and you and you say, you know, as Jesus said, if if if a son asks for a fish, would you give him a serpent, something like that, right? If you feel like you're serving a God who loves you if you as and will reward you if you trust him, um then we find ourselves saying yes to things that make a lot of sense. And God has provided the right things to us and the right relationships. One example, uh do you know Brian Allerid? He is um he leads uh um a ministry called World Praise. And Brian introduced me to Goodwill Shauna. He's introduced me to a lot of wonderful uh leaders, he's an incredible ministry, but we just heard about this guy who had a vision to have everyone in the world prayed for by name. And he's made a great start in the U.S. But he was God called him to leave, um leave New Mexico and come to Austin. And someone else that we were supporting with another great ministry just told us about him. And for some reason, we both felt like we've never met this person, but we just feel like we should provide the first year of funding so that he can, you know, get get this thing going. And that became a lifelong friendship of impact on his ministry, um, and and and the relationships that have come out of that. We've that's happened time and time again. So I wish, no, I don't wish. The typical business school answer is we have a very thorough and rigorous process. We have 14.6% going in here, and we expect it to be 16.8% next year. We actually do have a bit of a pie chart now, but it's done in retrospect on how has God led us to giving. So I gave you the four categories. We discovered that after five years of grant making. We didn't declare it up front. Jesus tells us not to worry, and he tells us today has enough worries for itself. And God doesn't give us a five-year view. He gives us, oh, here's what you got to do today. Right? He makes our path straight for his name's sake, but that's usually one day at a time. And then looking back, you say, oh my goodness, what a strategy God had. Um, and so that's how we've been running our foundation so far. And it's been through great relationships, and we support about 35 organizations. We do like to what we found in retrospect is that we like um for us, we like to have an impact on an organization that is um less than 50 million in operating budget, focused on um evangelism or education or um uh direct churches or helping the needy. We don't like to be more than 20% so that they're very, every, you know, their very existence depends on our grant, but we'd like to be impactful. Um, and we really like international, which is why you know we we got involved in a lot of projects, particularly in Africa. But being here at the WEA Global Assembly, I'll tell you one other thing I was thinking as I walked over here. Seeing all these amazing, beautiful people, children of God from all around the world, there is so much that we differ on on paper or culturally, but so much in common in being part of the body of Christ that I could meet someone from Sri Lanka, who I did yesterday, a wonderful young man, you know, or Nairobi or Canada, right? And we share something in Christ that the enemy can't stand. Um, we're not as distant from each other as social media would have us believe. Um, and uh moments like this where you get to see people from all over the world edifies me.

Brian Stiller 38:01

Lou, this has been a creative moment.

Lewis Cirne 38:03

Thank you.

Brian Stiller 38:04

And it's it's wonderful to see how the creative God takes his creative creature and uses him in wonderful ways. This has been so instructive and inspiring. Oh, it's a good thing. Thanks for joining us today at Evangelical 360.

Lewis Cirne 38:21

Thank you. God bless you.

Brian Stiller 38:22

Thanks. Bye. Thanks, Lewis, for sharing with us today. And to you, I thank you for being a part of the podcast. Please share this episode and join the conversation on YouTube. If you'd like to learn more about today's guests, just check the show notes for links and info. And if you haven't already received my free book and newsletter, just go to BrianStiller.com. Thanks for joining me. Until next time.