Welcome back to the Christianity and Business Podcast, an initiative of the RTW Dunham College of Business at Houston Christian University. I'm your host, Darren Shear, and this is a show that helps Christian business leaders to integrate biblical values into business. On today's episode, we're joined by David Kroll. David is the chief executive officer for Church Home, which is an interesting title for a pastor. Maybe we'll get into a little bit of that. Um through online services, sermons that are being preached, mostly by their lead communicator, Judah Smith, many of you, I'm sure, are aware of, um, and have been blessed by his ministry and this wonderful church. And prior to stepping into the CEO role, David began his career within investment banking, wealth management, and technology, and served in a variety of pastoral roles within Church Home. And he's husband to Jenna and father to William, Teddy, and Charlotte. And he's passionate about helping people everywhere hear the story of Jesus, which I know you're gonna, uh, this is gonna come through in this discussion we're gonna have today. David, welcome to the Christianity and business podcast.
SPEAKER_01Thank you so much for having me, Darren. Appreciate you uh having me here.
SPEAKER_00So I don't know if our this is gonna blow some minds here, but in 2019, one of your church's goals, or as y'all referred to them as thematicals, um, was to pivot from being a megachurch with 13 weekend services to a focus on church at home by March 2020. And of course, as we all remember, that's exactly when the COVID lockdowns started and churches were scrambling to try to reach people online. Um, but so COVID wasn't the impetus for this paradigm shift. Um, why pivot uh when by the typical pastor's standards, you guys were already incredibly successful?
SPEAKER_01That's a great question, Darren. Um, and I'll tell you what, uh, looking at arrears, I would change nothing. And I also ask myself that same question all the time. Why did we do this? Um you know, a lot of it comes down to um some things that that we felt like God was revealing to us as far as um ways in which we were having doors open to reach people with the gospel. Uh, we were seeing a lot of people reached um through those 13 services, and I believe it was seven different locations we were operating at that point in time. And you're right, by every sense of the word, um, you know, Western Christendom would take a look at what we had going and saying, this is incredible. Um, why change anything? Just do do more of what you're doing right now because it seems to be working. Uh, Sunday services were packed, uh, the bank accounts were comfortable, uh, the staff was happy. And um, you know, for all intents and purposes, uh, church home, church home, and it's really city church at that juncture was a um a great place to be. And there was really nothing wrong. But what God was showing to us was um the realities of a the call of God on not just the the Western church and the methodologies we were using, but when you take a look at the gospel, the transformative nature of the gospel and the saving grace of Jesus, and saying, even if you just take a look at the city of Seattle, which at that point we were doing um services both in in multiple locations across Seattle. We had a campus in Guadalajara, Mexico, uh campus in Beverly Hills. Um, but if you just took a look at Seattle, there's multiple millions of people that live in Seattle. Now, um, if you were to take every single auditorium space on a Sunday and fill it to the brim with people, that wouldn't even scratch the surface of being able to reach the populace of Seattle with the gospel of Jesus. So we knew A, okay, there's limitations to the ways in which we are reaching people with the gospel. Uh, B, Christianity Today came out with a survey that was released in late 2016. And this survey took a look at who actually makes up the average uh congregants in any church. And what they found is that of all church growth, 96% of church growth was transfer growth. Meaning church home could go to, uh, and we were seeing this happen when we would open a new location, is uh a lot of people would show up on day one. Now, uh a lot of that probably has to do with the fact that Judah, who's our lead communicator, is a is a very well-known speaker within Christendom. And so a lot of people enjoy listening to uh him to listening to him preach. And so um what we were seeing is that people, um, not just us, but others, were opening up buildings and all of a sudden, day one in a city we had never been before, um, it where we had never been serving the community, we hadn't been involved, hadn't been building relationships, um, we could have a service and have a thousand people show up day one. Well, who were those thousand people? Odds are, uh, on that day one, it's even more than 96%, are people who are curious uh and maybe prefer the preaching of one preacher to another. And so we uh were out here celebrating a lot of things that um when we were looking under the hood, we realized, well, we believe the gospel is so good and so so transformative. We believe we should be reaching a lot more than 4% of the growth of our church should be people who are new to the message of Jesus. And um, so that was one thing. Another thing is we saw the utilization of things like technology proliferating um, not just young people, but um my parents' generation, even grandparents' um technology has changed the footprint and the landscape of pretty much the way we all digest information. Um, you take a look at the Bible app and the way that's been transformative and the way that Christians consume the scriptures. Um, you take a look at so many different things uh within technology and its proliferation into the modern day era. Um, yet the church um was not optimizing the use of these tools that are in every single person's hands um globally. I mean, I've I've been I've been to Africa and seen people who don't have shoes but have an iPhone. Um, and that for me was shocking. I'm like, this is crazy. This person doesn't have a lot of food. They don't have a home, they don't have shoes, but they possess an iPhone. Um, so realizing we have these little devices that have the ability to do both good and harm, and uh that they were being under-leveraged and that we were still looking to expand as a church, church home this is in this way is you know, could we go buy uh an old Sears building that's vacant for $10 million, spend $5 million on a remodel, have it be a 2,500 seat auditorium. We can fill it up within five years, we could have a budget of $1.5 million to operate that building, a staff of 20 people. And uh out of that 2,500 people, we are reaching uh what is that, some 100 people, 100 new people with the gospel. And for us, we just couldn't put our heads on the pillow realizing that people in the globe that were actually transforming the way that people think, the way that uh people digest, not just news, but content, everything, these people are leveraging themselves to spend thousands of dollars to reach millions of people. And here we are spending tens of millions of dollars to maybe reach a few hundred new individuals with the gospel. So we're just naive enough to realize that not only were there constraints on the mechanisms, even if we were to operate this model to the end degree, it wouldn't be able to fulfill the mission and the mandate. So built into our model of just opening as many campuses as we could, um, while that would be effective to a degree, we knew it was going to be impossible to fulfill this incredible mandate that God has on his church. So we we went down this path and this journey to do church a different way, which led us to change our name from the city church to church home about five years ago. And within that, yeah, we had this crazy idea that people could um could not just do church um in a way that made it feel like a home. We actually believe people could do church in a home. And so um a lot of people thought we were crazy until COVID hit. And then everybody thought we were geniuses. And then everybody got fatigued of Zoom, and and that changed again real quick. So we've been on this incredible journey of um God really clarifying to our church community how it is that we're to serve the community of church home and to reach people who are unreached with the gospel.
SPEAKER_00Yeah. And so basically what's been happening is somebody says, Yeah, I want to host um, I want to host a service in my in my living room on Sunday morning. And so they just stream in a live service, right? And invite some friends and family, and they they have church right in their home, right?
SPEAKER_01Yeah, and that that's really the way that that it did start for sure. And I realize that's also the way that a lot of church communities were forced to to do church in 2020. And so it was incredible to see churches realize the opportunity that laid in front of them uh when it came to the ability to reach more people and to equip the saints for the work of the ministry, which is actually the job of the church, is to equip the saints for the work of the ministry. And so for us, um, we had built a little bit more of a country club where it's come get everything you need and then leave. Um, and and there wasn't necessarily a creation of habits and practices that were facilitating spiritual growth to the degree that we desire to see in people's lives. And so, you know, we realized very quickly into the journey of church at home that church at home is one aspect of what is going to be fulfilling in the journey of a believer. But that is not all that church home desires to bring to somebody is hey, we just we're gonna create a weekly service and you can play it at home. We realized that we wanted to provide holistic spiritual growth to the believer. And so uh I forget if it was in 2018 or 2019, but I believe it was late 2018. We launched an app called the Church Home app. And the original vision of this app is that when you would download the app and you would open it, it would almost be like somebody's experience in a physical church, meaning that all of the traditional services and options that you would have to grow in your faith or to participate with Church Home would exist in a digital context, in addition to the physical context that people experienced in those seven different physical locations. Um, mind you, we've learned a lot on our journey with technology through many different iterations of the app. We're actually about to uh release uh a brand new app at the beginning of October, might be mid-October, um, but we've been working diligently for years to lay a new foundation of technology for that. And we just launched a brand new uh website. Uh, so churchhome.org is actually a brand new holistic uh website. And really what we found is three things is number one, the ideal way that Christians grow in their walk and in their faith, which uh was done through the largest longitudinal survey ever done. It came out of Bill Heibel's church back in the early 2000s, studying, hey, how does spiritual growth actually occur? And what they found is that there's no statistical change in spiritual growth, basically uh dependent upon your attendance in church. So whether you go four times or 40 times to church on Sunday, it barely ticks the needle as far as your individual spiritual growth. But what does make a difference is your ability and your cadence in praying and meditating on scripture. And as a believer, I'm sure you've experienced this too, Darren. For me, I can absolutely raise my hand when I read a survey like that and say, yeah, 100%. When I am consistently practicing my faith and ensuring that I'm praying to Jesus, when I'm ensuring that I'm reading the scriptures and not just reading them, but meditating on them, thinking about the implications they have on my life. A lot of this podcast is talking about the implications that our faith life has on business, right? So the integration of those things all of a sudden starts to become a little bit more holistic in my life when I'm consistently practicing my faith. And so um we started developing faith practices that that assisted with that on a daily basis. So if you go to churchhome.org or to our app even today, even the existing app, we have brand new guided prayers every single day. So it's about a five to seven minute prayer. We read scripture and we guide our church every day through prayer and meditation. So that's one key aspect. The second is what you talked about, which we previously really talked called church at home. We've kind of shifted that verbiage now where the goal is really weekly community, and that can be facilitated around a multiplicity of things. Our weekly service is absolutely one. For example, my wife and I have um three children and we have several families who uh live around us. They come to our home every Sunday, and the kids do service, and we do service, and we do church together in our home on a weekly basis. And so um, that's pretty incredible. And uh, but a lot of people will do weekly community through a variety of different groups. Um, and then on the monthly basis is where we gather as the global church, um, meaning all of the different uh arenas of church home and we worship together with a service that is live uh with in-person community, with worship, with preaching, and ensuring that we are connected globally as the body of Christ together. And so my wife and I are fortunate, we live in the LA area. So we'll go down to um the Saban Theater on the last Wednesday of every month and participate with our church. And we do the same thing in Seattle. We have a church, we call it church home experience. The last Sunday of every month, we do church home experience um in Seattle last Wednesday in LA. And uh our church worships together. So that holistically, that journey um has really been transformative, and it's been a journey that we have um has been informed by scripture, first and foremost, and been informed also by what we've seen um to be most holistic in the growth and development of our spiritual walking journey.
SPEAKER_00Yeah. And what results have you seen? I mean, the the goal is to reach the unchurched. Obviously, it seems like there's a lot of dechurched as well. Like, what are the kind of results that you're seeing?
SPEAKER_01Yeah, that's a great um call out. Um, I'll just give you a story from yesterday. So, yesterday I was on the phone with a business uh person, a very successful man in business. And he did not grow up in the church. He grew up um, he actually grew up Hindu. And, you know, kind of fast forward, you know, through through a bit of his story. Um, but he basically found himself in a place to where he had given him so much himself so much to success in business that um a lot of his his faith journey um, you know, and and his life was kind of turned upside down. He started practicing his faith with church home on a daily, weekly, and monthly basis um through a relationship. Somebody who who kind of found him at the bottom, uh, if you will, and said, Hey, listen, um, here's a community I'm part of. Why don't you just start doing guided prayers on a daily basis? And so he started doing that. And then he started participating in in doing weekly service every single week. And then he would come to the church home experience. And the vibrancy that I experienced from this gentleman yesterday was incredible. Um, he holistically is following Jesus in a way, you know, when you meet somebody who is fresh to the faith and they encourage the seasoned believer, like, oh my gosh, I got to return to that beautiful moment when I first met Jesus. And it's so encouraging to for me just to um just the fire inside of somebody. I mean, I saw that in this man's eyes yesterday. Um, and then conversely, he's become an evangelist for Jesus and also this way of experiencing uh spiritual growth in his faith. And so he was telling me a story about how he went to this couple who is you would define as dechurched. They used to be a part of church community, and there was a variety of factors that led them to, you know, no longer be a part of church. And they got into conversation with this gentleman because they saw the vibrancy within his faith life, knowing his background, and they said, gosh, we kind of missed that. So um we would love to get re-engaged. And they've started also practicing their faith every single day through guided prayer, doing weekly community and doing weekly service, church home experience, and they're experiencing vibrancy in their faith. And so um, we're seeing people who are new to the faith, people who are de-churched, um, as you say, unchurched. Um, we're seeing, I mean, I don't know what I would be defined as, probably churched, um, but uh I am experiencing a level of depth and intimacy in my faith with Jesus that um is incredible. And watching it, I would say specifically in my children, has been the most transformative thing for me. Now, I will the big disclaimer here is it's not as easy as just showing up to a church on Sunday. I have had to take ownership of my family's faith as a father, um, which is really silly to say. Uh, it's almost embarrassing to admit because that's my responsibility no matter what. But the realities of the contracts that we built is that even as a pastor within church home, operating in the existing structure, it was kind of plug and play. And while there's nothing wrong with that, as a dad, I realized, oh my gosh, I really got on autopilot there. And so the vibrancy of the conversations I'm having with my kids is we're doing their guided prayers called church kids stories, um, which are on Alexa every single night together. And they're asking me questions about these incredible Bible stories. And um I'm just I have been very well served by our church community. So um I'm not, I don't just work here, I'm very much a part of the community. And I will say that um, yeah, we've seen, you know, statistically, I, you know, I don't have the best stats to necessarily share with you because we're very much um we have I would say it's taken us this long to refine the model, is the full disclaimer too. So church at home, we thought that was it. Well, then we realized, okay, that's a peg in the wheel. That's not it. Um, an app. Well, that's a tool, right? And that tool helps facilitate spiritual growth, but that's one aspect. And so we've really had to paint um the definition of what how do you define church and go back to the apostles' doctrine in Acts chapter two and say, okay, this is how we define church. How do we facilitate that in 2023? And how do we do so in a manner that is both integers to who we are as Jesus following believers to scripture as far as the way scripture says the church um should be operating in, as well as how do we optimize it with the mechanisms afforded to us?
SPEAKER_00Yeah, I love that. It it seems like it's it's not just about this dichotomy between in-person church and online church, you know, because it's that's still sort of stuck in that weekly gathering model, which, you know, as you mentioned, that's that one study, it doesn't move the needle on just because you go to church four times a month uh doesn't move the needle on your spiritual growth. It sounds like it's the difference in just sort of a Sunday morning Christianity and bringing that into your everyday life, right? I mean, I I I a couple years ago started doing daily Bible texting with a group of guys where we're going through the same chapter every day, like today we're in Psalm 85, and so we're all reading Psalm 85 today, and we text one verse from that chapter to each other, and you know, everybody reciprocates it, and and it it is the most power effective, powerful. I've I grew up in church. My dad was my pastor growing up, been in a lot of different churches. By far, this little program here where we're just reading a chapter, texting it, has been the most effective church program I've ever participated in. Because 100% it, you know, it gets into your because it's the daily, you know, it's a shift from just sort of the weekly on Sunday morning to the daily, but it's still in community, right? You know, it we're still doing it together. It's just, you know, it's not happening at a at a gathering place at a specific time in a building that's very expensive and very expensive to operate. And it's been uh it's just been so powerful. And it sounds like this is really encouraging to hear what you guys are doing, you know, with the and I'm I'm seeing more and more of these uh, you know, pre guided prayer apps, and I it's because we're finally recognizing that we've gotta we've got to bring church and our Christian life out of our Sunday morning experience into our everyday lives where we live.
SPEAKER_01I couldn't agree more. And you know, you're touching on it obviously from a perspective of individual faith growth, and I and I couldn't agree more. And you also said something prior to that, which I think is profound, which is you know, we can't the the ticking the needle from showing up on Sunday morning, um, not just from an individual um perspective of growth, but from a community perspective. I mean, we were seeing people come into our building. Um, I would see them in the lobby, give them a hug, hey, how are you? How are you doing? How are the kids? Any ways that we can be, you know, you know, helping you guys, supporting you with you. And oh, everything is good, Pastor. Everything is great. We would see some of these individuals go on when we launched the app and go on to a tool that we launched called Pastor Chat. And all of a sudden, you know, I would be hugging people, hey, everything's great. Hey, they go on pastor chat, hey, my mom just died. Will you pray with me? I'm really struggling with some suicidal thoughts. And you're like, whoa, I just saw you like in a church lobby and ask you how you're doing. And it just was incredible to see the dichotomy of what you expected to have happen in the context when you get, you know, a thousand plus people who love Jesus together and what you'd hope to happen. And mind you, that was definitely happening to some degree, but it wasn't ideally, uh, it wasn't um ideal in its effectiveness. It worked for some, for others, that just isn't the context that they've Build meaningful community. And so, you know, we were seeing seeing some of these things like that is incredible. How much more honest people are willing to be with us online around the real needs they have in their life and how we can pray for them versus in person. And I don't know all that went into that, but um it's probably very much individual. You know, I'm sure there's a lot of factors, but um it was pretty incredible for us to see the fact that, you know, that meaningful community aspect. Um, okay, how do we create that? Because it's not a it's not a versus. This is not in-person versus digital. There at the end of the day, my ideal, our ideal would be that um real meaning, meaningful community would happen where you live, no matter where you are in the world, and that the digital means we use would help facilitate that. Um, we all need, I mean, there is a loneliness epidemic in this country and in this world, and technology is not benefiting it. Um, I would say every statistic would show us that people are only becoming more isolated the more we give ourselves to technology. So, but I do believe that technology can benefit that if we allow it to, and if we focus on using it as a facilitator of meaningful community.
SPEAKER_00Yeah, agreed 100%. I mean, like I just said, from from just texting. I mean, that's simple platform. And you guys have you're you're you've got a very robust platform. I was also curious how much of this engagement is happening kind of in that nine to five uh hour when I mean obviously you've got some weekend services going on. Um how much of this engagement is happening kind of in the course of a a person's work day?
SPEAKER_01Uh you mean engagement as far as which aspect specifically?
SPEAKER_00Uh I don't know, just people using the app, um, you know, praying, connecting, like, hey, I got I'm about to go into this meeting, or you know, because we're trying to reach business people, which is where 80, at least in the US, that's 85% of the Christian workforce is in a for-profit company, spending the majority of their waking hours there. Um, is there what are you seeing in terms of engaging business people?
SPEAKER_01It's it's all across the board. Um, it really is all across the board because then you've got all different kinds of business people. You have business people who are nine to five, and then you've got business owners who are uh 24-7. And then you've got you've got the full spectrum. And so um, I would say, you know, we've got everything from the person who can't really message in between the hours of nine to five um to the person who um on their lunch break already needs reprieve and needs somebody to pray with them and needs an encouragement and needs to listen to a guided prayer to recenter themselves so they can make it through the afternoon. So we've got um, we see the whole gamut, and then you think about internationally as well, is the app is not just a US-based app. And so there's people all across the globe utilizing uh church home's platform to practice their faith. And so, because of that, just the simple sheer uh delta of time zones across the globe uh means it's kind of a behemoth uh to think about servicing. So for us, we've really had to figure out um, and we do use data as much as we can to determine, hey, when are these kind of peak hours where from Pastor Chat, for example, right? Our digital pastoring tool, where, you know, kind of agnostic of location, we can help somebody in their faith. Um we do that based off of demand and where we see demand trends. Um, just because from a resourcing standpoint, it's hard to do 24-7, although that is absolutely our goal. And I think we should be there shortly, um, is for the time being, we kind of have to do that based off of when we see the prime hours that people are engaging with the platform as.
SPEAKER_00Yeah, gotcha. I'm fascinated that your title is CEO, um, which obviously resonates with our our business folks. Um how is that received among the church folks? And why do you go why do you go by CEO as opposed to like executive pastor, director, or something um maybe a little bit more traditional?
SPEAKER_01Um, yeah, I think a lot of it for for us was was twofold. I mean, first of all, people can call me whatever they like. I don't really, I don't really care about the title of CEO. Um, it is especially if it's a distraction for any. So people can think of me however they they would like as an executive pastor, right? It's a lot more comfortable for people within the church world. But um, it's not just my role to explain that. It's it's it's actually Judah, Chelsea's and our boards as well, uh, because we aren't a traditional uh structure where you've got a lead pastor and then the executive pastor reports to the lead pastor and kind of so on and so forth, um, is we we have uh a board, um, and that that board is uh a board of directors, very much a spiritual board as well. Um, but they help run church home um holistically from an accountability standpoint. In addition to our board of directors, we have um a lead pastor council, and they help from a spiritual perspective ensure that the leadership team, which is myself, Judah, and Chelsea, um, are um are basically right in our spiritual lives that we're not uh that we're staying faithful to our wives, that we are um staying within the confines of what is healthy and good and right to be in Christian leadership. Uh we have doctrine councils, we have we've got a lot of of accountability um over here at Church Home. Um and then what Judah and Chelsea did um was was pretty phenomenal. I would say you'd be hard-pressed to find a lot of leaders who um who would be quite so open-handed is uh the three of us are actually equal peers. Um I don't report to Judah and Chelsea, all three of us report to the board. Um, and the three of us are uh equals within a team. So Chelsea is our lead theologian, Judah is our lead communicator, and I am the CEO. Um and so because of that, our functions are very distinct. Um, CEO definitely would denote for I would say most people in the globe, uh, when you take a look at the functions of my role and of my job, they would fit into a CEO role and function because I holistically run um all of the aspects of church home when it comes to operations. And then um, but but to but you know, the aspect of that that's funny is that when when I would say some within the Christian world see CEO, they make the incorrect assumption that somehow that means that this is not spiritual, or all of a sudden that we are a business and not a church. Now, mind you, um, all churches are a business. And that may be a provocative statement for some to understand. But the number one reason churches no longer exist is because they were not run well from a business perspective and they can no longer um service the needs of the community from a fiscal perspective. And so um we we need to be um gentle as a dove and and and and and also wise and shrewd as a servant. So we we absolutely operate uh within that context. But uh my role is also uh very much spiritual uh in the sense that Judah Chelsea and I all three are are leading this church community. We all have individual roles, but as a team, uh we are leading this church community. So um that I hope that gives a little bit more context to it. But to be honest, executive pastor, we were looking at the executive pastor job title. And Judah and Chelsea really wants to say, hey, uh, we don't feel like this describes this role um really, because at the end of the day, um they are not uh just, hey, David, here's the vision, go make it happen. We're the lead pastors, give you the vision, you make it happen. And I understand that's also not the way that it may work for all executive pastors, but for all intents and purposes, from an org chart standpoint, that's kind of what an executive pastor is, where um holistically we are discussing vision together. We are determining vision together. Um, it is absolutely my job to ensure that the ship is steered in the right direction to accomplish those goals. Um, but uh it's not a vision cast of David and an execution from there. Um we're holistically all very much involved in the spiritual leadership of church home together.
SPEAKER_00Yeah. So you've got a pretty extensive background in the marketplace working in investment banking. What are some of the main differences you've experienced between working in a church and working in a business?
SPEAKER_01Oh, that's a great question. Um I mean, so much of it is dependent, right, on which church and which business. For me, I would say if you're called to work in the context of, and now listen, it's all ministry. Let me just get that out there up front. So no matter what you do, you're in the ministry. It's not really optional uh as a follower of Jesus. So if you were called to work at Taco Bell, you were in the ministry. And I and I mean that with every sense of the word, and I don't mean to I mean mean that in no comedic way. Um if you're meant to be the CEO of a church, that's obviously that that's ministry as well. Um, but no matter what you do, God is going to be using you to love others in the way that he loved us and to demonstrate the gospel through the way that we live our lives. And so um, you know, for me, I was doing that primarily through the business context. I thought my job was to, you know, I had a skill set to be able to make money. And so I thought I would utilize that to make money and give that money to the church and then use my time um to volunteer. And so I did that for kind of the first decade or so of my career and um felt fulfilled, but I always in the back of my head knew that there was something else uh that God had called me to. Um and I'll say this statement, which was said to me by a mentor at one point. If you're called to vocational ministry, meaning ministry within the context of a church or parachurch ministry, um, and you try to work in the business world, you're just gonna be unsettled. You're gonna, and that's what I experienced. I was there was a level of being unsettled that I was experiencing on a daily basis. Conversely, um, if you are trying to work in the context of vocational ministry and you're called to work in the business world, you're gonna be unsettled. Um, and so I had experienced a decade of um kind of having a back of my brain unsettledness. And I think God was preparing me in a lot of those roles for what I did uh next. But yeah, my first role within vocational ministry is I was an area director for Young Life, which was a ministry that's had a huge impact on my life. That's how I came to know Jesus as a 17-year-old Jewish kid, uh, was through the Ministry of Young Life. And so, you know, I was on, I volunteered with Young Young Life for years, came on staff with Young Life. Um, and then I was uh, you know, on staff with both Young Life and then a part-time youth pastor at uh City Church, which is church home now. Um and so it was this really crazy, bizarre journey that God bless my wife. She was on through the twists and the turns, and just being obedient to what we felt like God was calling us to do is I took 300% pay cuts and you know, just did very illogical stuff in the terms of the way that people would think about a career and what success is. So um, yeah, it's been a very crazy journey. So I it's been a um, I'm not sure exactly how to answer that question best, to be honest with you, because my my journey, I think, has been, I don't know, unique to me as I feel like everybody's probably is, but it's been very different working um in the context of uh uh of vocational ministry uh in regards to to business. I will say this we we have a uh somebody who works with us on the on the technology end. And I was talking with their CEO a few weeks back, and I felt pressed just to ask him this question. I was like, hey, I'm so curious. They, you know, you guys work with Google, you work with Microsoft, you guys build massive tech platforms for them. Um you're working with the team at Church Home. Obviously, I think our technical expertise is is probably nowhere near what a Google, a Microsoft, et cetera, is, but what do you see as being different about us, or what do you notice as far as differences? And I would say this was a really interesting thing, um, which I hope could be said of all believers and in the way that we approach our work is he said, you know, my team cannot understand the level of care, concern, and passion that your team brings to the table in regards to what they want to see out of these technology products that we're building for you and the impact that they can have. And I think um, you know, that to me, the ability to merge what I do vocationally with what I care about most, which is the love of Jesus, um, has been just a pure gift.
SPEAKER_00That's awesome. When you're a David, and when you're in the throes of a typical work day, you know, things are things might get a little hectic, um, maybe some frustrations going on, or maybe just just a normal work day. What's one of the scriptures that you kind of fall back on and rest in?
SPEAKER_01That's a great question. I don't know if I have one. Um I I would say uh I would hope that a lot of times I would fall back into scripture. A lot of times I can just sit there and just try to first thing I'll do is I'll sit down and I'll just tell myself just to breathe. And I think if you take a look at scripture, the power of breath is all over scripture. Um, so calming myself, reminding myself of the goodness of God. And then I actually will go to not just a, I'm not trying to be a hype man, I promise, but I do go to guided prayer. Uh because sometimes I don't have the right scripture. I don't have the right word, I don't know what I should be going to. I don't have my, you know, my my rock is is is Jesus and um as I know is yours. And and so for but for me, um, yeah, I feel like it's ever changing. And um going to guided prayer has been been really something that's been helpful for me, which is funny because I've been following Jesus for a couple of decades now. And you think like, oh no, no, no, like hers. I can pray on my own. I definitely can, but um, it's great to have help sometimes. And sometimes even I need help in what scripture I should go to and how I should pray and what I should say. Um, so I think it's been beautiful for me to feel like I have help, um, even in the ways that I need help um to just connect with God and to release. And so um, but yeah, honestly, like yesterday, I I was just kind of in a moment and um I opened up the book of Galatians, and um, I will do the classic sometimes, just really boom, open it up and see what's there. So uh that that method is not beneath anybody by the day. By the way, God has met me many times within the uh uh let me see and put my finger here, and um, it's been astounding to me. God is just so big and so powerful, he can speak in so many ways. So um, yeah, I I don't think there's one necessarily scripture that stands out to me.
SPEAKER_00Yeah. Well, that's uh that's such a a powerful resource to have that guided prayer. Um and and so churchhome.org is the website, church, and then a om e at the end. Um for those who are who are not familiar, everybody can go there and register, right? Anything you want to say about how people can connect and get involved?
SPEAKER_01Yeah, churchhome.org um is is huge. Um, like I said, uh stay tuned, follow uh us on social media. Um, as we are, you can download the churchhome app uh right now, but we are uh have been working for quite some time and are very excited to be launching the new church home app in October. So um I'm not sure when this episode is gonna air, if it's like in October or September or who knows when. But whenever this airs, um, go ahead and take a peek at the Church Home app. But uh starting early mid-October, um, it should be the brand new Church Home app. And if you follow us on social media, we can kind of keep you in tune to all that. But in the time being, churchhome.org is a place where you can find guided prayers, weekly service, how to connect to monthly community and all that.
SPEAKER_00Yeah, it'll be October when this comes out. So it should be live and ready. So everybody go check out the new Church Home app. Um, and also you can go to churchhome.org. Um, David, this has been fantastic. Uh, thank you for the important work uh you're doing there with with church home and reaching the unchurched, the the dechurched, the the churched and everybody um and uh sharing the message of Jesus. It's it's awesome what you guys are doing.
SPEAKER_01Same to you, Darren. I really appreciate you having me on and uh and bless you guys. I'm really grateful for the work that you do. And again, thank you for having me on.
SPEAKER_00We hope you've enjoyed this episode. And if so, we would greatly appreciate it if you'd leave us a quick rating and review for the Christianity and Business podcast on iTunes. You can get more information about HCU's Center for Christianity and Business and sign up to receive free access to all issues of the Christian Business Review Journal by visiting our website at Christianityandbusiness.com. Thanks for listening, and remember to keep integrating biblical values into your business.