Welcome back to the Christianity and Business Podcast, an initiative of the RGW Dunham College of Business at Houston Baptist University. I'm your host, Darren Shear, and this is the show that helps Christian business leaders to integrate biblical values into business. On this episode, we're joined by Jeff Jarina. Jeff is a Christian author, speaker, entrepreneur, and host of the Men Unplugged podcast. Jeff has a passion for helping men and women ignite their faith and succeed in every aspect of life. Featured on Moody Radio, Christianity Today, Point of View Radio, Talk Shows, and Podcasts, Jeff has spoken on a variety of topics, including what to do when your purpose does not equal profit, the three essential qualities of Christian leadership, and the five must-haves for a kingdom-minded business. Jeff is the president and CEO of two businesses, Site Spartan, a web design and digital marketing company, and Christmas Lights by Design, a Christmas lighting wholesale design and installation business. As a big fan of Yoda, Jeff has been known to impersonate Yoda while speaking. Maybe he'll do a little bit of that for us, as well as juggling and performing the moonwalk. I guess our listeners will have to use their imagination for that one. Jeff, welcome to the show.
SPEAKER_04Hey, Darren, thanks so much for having me there. Man, I tell you what, when I heard that, I'm like, okay, the moonwalk? You know, I said that because that's my really my only move when I'm dancing. So I got that down really well.
SPEAKER_01I want to see that someday. So, Jeff, when did you first realize God wanted to be involved in your work and business?
SPEAKER_04Oh man, that's a great question. Um, you know, I even before I started my business, I started back in 2001. Um, just before that, uh maybe several months before, six to nine months, I just became a believer and I grew up in the church. Um, grew up my whole life. I just never heard the gospel. I just didn't understand what salvation meant. I didn't understand that it's by what Jesus did on the cross for us. I thought I had to earn it, you know, this workspace mentality. And then somebody shared the gospel with me. Um, six to nine months before that, before I started a business, I was actually a division manager in another company. And that, you know, just radically changed my life. And I don't know, just without going into too much detail, I was before that, I was severely depressed, had suicide thoughts for four years of my life. I didn't want to live. I mean, I I walked around with you know, wearing long-sleeved clothes, I had a hat on all the time. And and I know the listeners can't see this here, but I lost my hair. I started losing my hair when I was about 24, 25 years old. Now I still miss my hair, Darren. I promise you, I still miss my hair. But I can deal with it now. And so what happened was from around 24, 25 to about that 30-year range, I developed a form of OCD called body dysmorphic disorder. And and I I probably a lot of your listeners don't know this, but they call the body dysmorphic disorder the broken mirror. So for for anybody that has struggled with that, a little scrape on your hand or a cut or whatever, to me, it was like a mountain. I mean, it was like the only thing that mattered. And I bought the lives from from the enemy, from Satan, that you know what, I the only way I could be viable and and lovable and significant was I had to look a certain way. And because, you know, having a scar on my hand from a car wreck and losing my hair, then I wasn't worthy. And then somebody changed that around by sharing the gospel with me, helping me understand that I'm valuable, that we're significant as we are, because God already loved us enough to send Jesus Christ to die on the cross for us. And once I accepted that, man, it was like 180 degrees running to God instead of running away. And my life ever since then has just been so much better. And so I know it was a longer probably response, but that's really how I knew that God wanted to be involved in my business, in my life, you know, personal, professionally, whatever. And that's really where that started.
SPEAKER_01Yeah. But there's a lot of Christians that um they're Christians, they're born again, but they they still kind of feel like God is is just left in the building on Sunday mornings or something. Um, like, how did how did you I mean, so this just kind of came second nature to you that of course God is is here in this office? Of course, of course, this is my ministry and business. Of course, I'm supposed to reach out to these people and uh live the Christian life and make disciples in the workplace and so forth. Like, was that just second nature to you?
SPEAKER_04I think it probably happened just maybe by osmosis or just naturally because I knew what my life was like without Christ. And I knew, be honest with you, it was so bad. So I knew, you know, without Jesus in my life, I wasn't gonna get to where I wanted to go. Okay. I wasn't going to have the success that I thought, at least the success in the right way. I think that's a big component here that we need to talk about here in Christian, as Christians business owners, leaders, whatever, is that doing things, having the success the right way, a way that you know is honoring the Lord and the way that honors others. And at the same time, at the end of the day, where you can sit back and go, you know what, I did the best I could do that day. And maybe everything didn't work out, which we know a lot of times it doesn't. But you know what? I still can look in the mirror and go, you know what, I'm happy with who I am, and I know that God's happy with who I am. And so uh to answer the question, I would just say, I don't know it was something I tried. I think it was just, you know what, I don't want to go back to a life without Christ and and having that joy, that eternal joy that I never had. I'm like, you know what? I just want Jesus with me and around me and leading me as much as I can.
SPEAKER_01That's awesome. Was there someone that you've looked to as uh as a model for how to apply biblical values specifically in business?
SPEAKER_04Oh boy, that's good. I really like that. I've never been asked that question before. I would say for me, um, I always look to my dad. I mean, my dad is you know, has kind of been a little bit of a role model there. I just a lot of times he doesn't really say it, but you just can kind of see it, right? You just kind of see the way he acts. But at the same time, I I look biblically, I look at Peter and I look at Paul, and I I love the way Peter is just so courageous and he's just so forthright, and he's just out there. He's like, Look, this is me. I'm gonna be the first one trying something. I may not get it right, but I'm gonna be the one stepping out of the boat, and I I love that. Can I share this story here? My thought about this, go for it. Is that, and I talked about this in it's either the book Faith Without Fear or the New One, Cut Through the Noise. Um, I talked about that. I think we as believers give Peter a bad rap a lot of times because we look at him as Jesus was out on the water and and he says, Come to me. And he was the only disciple that was willing to step out of the boat. And then we all know the story. As soon as he took his eyes off Jesus, he got distracted. What did he do? He started to sink. But I say this he was the only one that had the courage to get out there and say, You say you're Lord, I'm gonna get out of the boat, I'm gonna trust you. And he's the only guy other than Jesus, who is the God man, he's the only guy that has ever walked on water. I mean, he was moonwalking on that water.
SPEAKER_01I like that. Yeah, I mean, that's a that's a great point. I think um a lot of times people have a tendency to we'll we'll put the safe person in charge. Um, we'll put the put the person that's not gonna it, it's gonna make everybody feel uncomfortable or comfortable and and safe and secure and everything. That was not Peter at all. Like Jesus kind of picks the the most, uh I guess audacious might might be the word. Um, there's a lot of words we could use to describe Peter, but he was a go after it kind of kind of guy, like do it first, think, think, think about it later, type of guy. And um I I tend to lean more in that direction. I think those of us who are entrepreneurs probably have a lot more of that tendency in us, but you know, it is interesting that Jesus puts a person like that um at the really kind of at the helm. I mean, the the rock on which he's gonna build his church, right? Um and and so that's that's kind of good news, isn't it?
SPEAKER_04Yeah, I love that. I and when you were talking right there, Darren, I was just thinking here, it's the analogy of somebody like Peter, somebody who's an entrepreneur, and and your listeners here that are entrepreneurs that are visionaries that are out there trying to get stuff done, you know, you you can try stuff, and it doesn't mean it's always going to work right. It just sometimes not, it's not. But you know, it's like you always, if your listeners have kids, you're always telling your kids what and what your parents told us. What my parents told me is that look, it doesn't matter how many times you fall down, it just matters that you get up one more time than you fell down. And and the analogy here I'm thinking of as somebody like Peter, who is an entrepreneur who's out there just, you know, hey, I'm just gonna go do it. I'm gonna have this courage and I'm I'm just gonna see what happens. It's the mentality ready, fire, aim. Yeah. Right? Instead of ready, aim, fire.
SPEAKER_01Yeah, yeah, absolutely. What would you say is your favorite Bible verse or passage related to business?
SPEAKER_04I would say it's Second Corinthians um 4, 16 through 18. And this may kind of catch you off guard here. You might guard here, you might be thinking, well, that doesn't make sense, but that's the passage, and I'm just going to paraphrase here. Um, to me, this is what I call this the eternal perspective. And it says that even though our outward man is perishing, we do not focus on the things of this world, things that are temporary, the drama of the world, which most of it is, right? But I can say this wholeheartedly that when you're in the drama, and I'm just telling you personally, you don't think it's temporal, you think it's gonna last forever. But the verse continues to say, it says, okay, so we don't focus on the temporary stuff, we focus on the things of God, things that are eternal. And for me in business, I have to do that a lot because you can get sidetracked, you can get distracted, you can be taken off course real fast biblically, and as a Christian leader, if you're not maintaining that eternal perspective, yeah, yeah, well said.
SPEAKER_01Yeah, I'm looking at that verse right now. It's also interesting in verse 17 where it says, For our light and momentary troubles are achieving for us an eternal glory that far outweighs them all. You know, just thinking about any of the adversity people are facing in business right now. Like this isn't just talking about um, you know, you had a death in your family or you know, some of the the more just catastrophic life experiences that that we go through. But, you know, the the moment light and momentary troubles, um, I mean, that that kind of um, as we were talking about before we got on the call, some of the own, some of our own challenges we're facing in business, that that's encouraging that they are achieving for us an eternal glory that far outweighs them all. Wow.
SPEAKER_04Yeah, and on that note about the eternal glory, and this is hard for me, and this is hard for me to grasp sometimes, is that it says eternal, which is infinite. And I have to remind myself that I'm finite, I am not God, I'm only here for a little bit of time. To me, it seems like a long time, but compared to eternity, it's so minuscule, it's so short. So we have to look at it like okay, if I'm in this situation now, I don't like this situation, but God is doing something here that's far surpasses what I can see, and it's eternal. I have to trust that. And and I'm not saying it's easy, but we have to do that, and I'm still learning to do that every day. Yeah.
SPEAKER_01Does an example come to mind? Um, maybe uh a recent example of that that kind of shows how this plays out in business.
SPEAKER_04Well, I don't know about recent, but I I can go back. You know, it's funny that you asked me that question because I was just thinking here in my mind, thinking he's gonna ask me a follow-up question to this. I know he is. That's what I was right before we got on this call on this episode. I'm like, he's gonna ask me this question, so I better be prepared. You bet. And so what I thought about was uh by the way, you're doing a great job here. You're doing a great job. I love this because you're pushing me, you're challenging me. Uh so I thought about this, and what happened to me about nine, 10 years ago? Now, one of my businesses, obviously the Christmas lighting business. Um, and you know, that really only goes two to three months. So it gives me a lot of flexibility to do all these other things. But what happened was I was it was it was it was probably December 14th, okay. By now we'd have been done putting all the lights up, but for some reason, one of my existing customers didn't call me till late. They were out of town. They said, Hey, we want to put the Christmas lights up, can you come by? And instead of hiring this big team to do this, okay, because it was a smaller job, I just hired a buddy of mine, okay? And I said, Can you come help me do this job? And we're out there and I'm on the roof, and I'm thinking, man, this is not good. I don't need to be doing this. But anyway, I'm on the roof doing putting the lights there, and he's holding the ladder down there, and I get a phone call, and it goes to the voice message, and we get done with the job. I listen to the voice message, and it's a customer, it's an existing customer. Call the customer up, and he had said that he had a section of lights that were out. And now his lights, Darren, have been already up for a month, running with no problems. Okay. And in my contract, in those agreements with the customer, it clearly states that if it is something that is not our problem, if it's something like a squirrel or a rabbit chew to wire, axe of God, whatever that is, then we're not responsible. We'll come fix it, but there is a labor fee to it. $40 an hour. I thought that was really fair. $40 an hour. So I explained that to him, and he was very upset, very mad. And I said, Look, we'll come out there and fix it, but this is what it is. And he was mad. He said, Look, we spent a lot of money on this, which he did. And he just hung up the phone. And here's what happened that gentleman that helped me out do that installation, he was kind of like a mentor. And the first thing he said to me, Darren, he said, I think God wants you to share the gospel to that guy. And so what I said, Darren, I said, sure, for $40. That's terrible. That is a bad mentality.
unknownYeah.
SPEAKER_04I didn't have the right mindset. I mean, my it was a very tough season that year, and I was just wore out. And he said, All I'm saying is that I think God wants you to share the gospel to that guy. And I was like, You're wrong. So we went to lunch, got done, and I had to do some last minute shopping. And I was at a store. It was a store home goods. And you know those end caps that a lot of times they put them in the middle of the of a big aisle so you can see all this other stuff they're selling. And all of a sudden, it was just like the Holy Spirit just like, I mean, he just like hit me up the side of my head. And I just, I just leaned over that end cap and I felt the Holy Spirit, this is what he told me. He said, Jeff, I want you to soften your heart to one customer today. And I was like, No. And he goes, You know who I'm talking about. And I'm like, for $40, he said, no, for free. So I called the customer up, you know, feeling like a complete, you know, loser or whatever. Called him up and I said, Look, I apologize for what happened before. I want to come out there and make it right. We'll come out there and fix it. Whatever the problem is, we'll get it done. And you're a great customer. I'm not even going to charge you. So I'll be there in about three to five minutes because that's how far away it was. I show up there, fix the I find out the problem within about three minutes. A rabbit had chewed the wires. And I said, See, this is why we need to charge you. And he said, Well, are you going to charge me? I said, No, I told you we're not going to worry about it. Great customer, whatever. I fixed it, and he's what he said to me. He said, Jeff, where do you go to church at? I go, That is funny you asked me. Because a guy that I was just working with, helping me put Christmas lights up, said, I should probably tell you this. I shared the gospel with that customer, Darren. He came to know the Lord. Praise the Lord. Right there. That's awesome. And so that's when I realized this lesson.
SPEAKER_01Yeah. Wow. Way to keep Christ in Christmas. Man, that's awesome. Yeah, I'm supposed to do that, right? Yeah. Man, wow, what a great story. I apologize. No, that was perfect, perfect. Exactly, exactly what I know I wanted to hear. Um, I'm sure that our audience did as well. Wow. Thank you for sharing that. Um, can I add to that?
SPEAKER_04Yeah. That's when that made me realize that as a business owner, as a Christian leader, whatever that is, and you're a leader right now in your home. Somebody's looking up to you. You're leading something. You may not know it, but somebody's watching. That made me realize, you know what? That person, that customer, my customer's salvation is more important than my pocketbook. The money they're gonna pay me.
SPEAKER_01Yeah. I mean, I really believe literally every decision we make in business is either leading people toward Jesus or away from Jesus. That's right. Um, there's really no in-between. And the Great Commission is to make disciples. I mean, it's to lead people toward Jesus, and we do that by how we respond to angry customers, um, right, how we respond to um just adversity of of all kinds, and and everybody everybody's facing it. Um, but that's such a great passage to point out, and I'll just read it again. Um, Second Corinthians chapter four, verses 16 through 18. Therefore, we do not lose heart, though outwardly we are wasting away, yet inwardly we are being renewed day by day, for our light and momentary troubles are achieving for us an eternal glory that far outweighs them all. So we fix our eyes not on what is seen, but on what is unseen, since what is seen is temporary, but what is unseen is eternal. And um, you know, that guy's life, his eternal salvation was an eternal matter. And, you know, for that matter, the the decision you made was an eternal matter. That business decision was an eternal matter. So let's not get the idea that you know Christmas lights don't matter to God because God will use your business as a tool to draw people to himself, or we'll use it as a tool to lead people away from him. You know, it's really gonna be our choice.
SPEAKER_04Yeah, that's a great point, and it works both ways. I mean, God uses our business as a way to draw us closer to him when things are going good and when things are not going well. I mean, just depending on him. That's right.
SPEAKER_01Yeah, I mean, it's like your business is like the boat that Jesus rode around the Sea of Galilee with his disciples in, you know. I'm sure they put in their nets from time to time, um, brought some fish to the market. Um and but Jesus used just that that context, you know, and those all those workplace contexts and parables um to reveal himself. Very good point. Um one of the the things you teach about is what to do when your purpose does not equal profit. I was I just wanted to ask you um for some of the highlights from that.
SPEAKER_04Yeah, that's kind of right along the lines there of kind of that story. You can look at it the same way, but I I think. If you want to look at it from a broader perspective, in business, a lot of times, let's take somebody who's a pastor. Okay, there's a lot of um vocational pastors now. They have to have a job to still minister to their congregation. Um, there's that's just a simple example. But a lot of times, um, as business owners, I will tell you for me that Christmas loting business, I hope my customers never hear this. I hope they never hear this episode, but that's not my favorite business. That's not my favorite job to do. It started out 21 years ago, you know, after I came to know the Lord, um, because I started to do ministry stuff, I started to speak, um, and and started to teach people and and share the gospel. And and I needed some sort of income. I mean, the apostle Paul, he was uh what did he do? He made tents. Um, but I I just I just can't think that Paul, when you read the epistles, that he was that excited to make tents. Like to me, he was excited and passionate about bringing people to Jesus Christ, winning souls. Like to me, that's what he was excited about. Yeah, um, but the tent making, he knew maybe it wasn't bringing him the profit that he wanted. But he had to do that so he could, you know, fulfill his calling, so he can actually live out his real purpose, and that is his God-given talents to what lead people to Jesus. And I think that's really what I'm sharing here is that maybe for somebody who who's just starting out in business that's listening right now, your purpose may be to be a good mom or a good dad. Maybe that's your purpose, but yet you have to work vocationally in the marketplace to put food on the table. Yeah.
SPEAKER_01Yeah. And um you know, like with Paul, it it wasn't like he was just making money so that he could do the stuff. I mean, it was happening in the midst of doing that. I mean, think about how much discipleship happened as he was doing his doing his work and the people that he was connecting with and the relationships that were being that were being built, um, you know, with like uh Priscilla and Aquila and and and others who were really instrumental in the gospel going forward to the Gentiles. Um, you know, it it's it's a context, it's a tool. But you know, we we fall in love with people and with God and with people. I mean, there's a lot of talk about like, you know, you gotta love what you do, you gotta love your love your work. Uh I don't know about that. Um, I mean, especially in light of um, you know, this this passage that you pointed out there from 2 Corinthians. Um, we I mean these are just tools. I mean, the money is just a tool, the business is just a tool, um, the for doing eternal stuff, right? Right.
SPEAKER_04And work we got to remember here is that we are ambassadors of Christ, and part of our role here is to work for the kingdom, work for the kingdom, and and a lot, I mean, that entails this is what it entails to me is that we gotta work more now, less rest, because heaven is a place of rest. This place here, earth, is not a place of rest. Yeah, we rest so we can get the the stuff done the next time, right? We do that, but how this is this is the way I'm looking at it. We have to work for the glory of God, for his kingdom, to me, more than we work for ourselves. Because the more we work for him, in my mind, these other things become easier, yeah, right? The path becomes clearer, becomes smoother.
SPEAKER_01Right. Yeah, well said. Um, and people can hear a conversation like this and they're like, oh well, I I need to I need to leave business and go to seminary and go go start a church, you know, because then I'll do something that really matters to God. Um, not at all the case. And I know I'm preaching in the choir here with our with our listeners because they know that's not at all what we're saying. We're saying that business is a tool. In fact, you could make the argument that being in business is from just a pragmatic numerical standpoint of of reaching people and truly making impact on people day in, day out, you can do a whole lot more of that in business where all the people are than you know waiting for them to come back into the church building on Sunday morning where you might get you know 30, 45 minutes to talk to them. Um go ahead.
SPEAKER_04Right. And the way the way to look at it is, and and I I don't know, maybe I I was getting on my uh pedestal there, you know, I was getting excited there, but it's really of in the workforce, it's expanding our you know circle of influence. You know, we're we're having we're able to take the gospel in places that we maybe never were able to before. And that's a good thing, and that's a good thing because that's how it should be. That's what the disciples did. They didn't just stay where they were, they went all about. They were they went everywhere, you know. What is it, Judea? I'm always forgetting that. Judea, how does it go?
SPEAKER_01Jerusalem, Judea, and Samaria, yeah, in the othermost parts of the earth.
SPEAKER_04Yeah, that's how that's how it goes. To me, it's it if you look at it from business, you can say, look, first our home, and then we're in the marketplace, and that can that can mean employees, that can mean peers, and then outside of that to customers and suppliers and things like that. I don't know. That that's my thought.
SPEAKER_01I like that. Jeff, what's um what's a way people can learn more from you, get connected with what you're doing?
SPEAKER_04Yeah, just go to my personal website, go to jeffgerino.com. It's jeffjerna.com. Love to speak with you guys if you you have a need for virtual speaking or or speaking in person or with my training seminars, books, anything like that. We'll love to speak with you guys. Um, jeffgerino.com, just go to the contact page and um really appreciate you letting me share that. Thank you so much, Darren. Really appreciate that.
SPEAKER_01Yeah, absolutely. And people and people can go subscribe to your podcast, right?
SPEAKER_04Yeah, just yeah, there's a link right there on that website. Um, there's a podcast link. Just if they click the podcast um on the page on the menu, go right to uh the Men Unplug podcast.
SPEAKER_01Yeah, and um maybe you can give us the website in your your uh Yoda voice.
SPEAKER_04Oh man, okay, or whatever you let me get warmed up. Let me see. Hold on, let me see.
SPEAKER_01He says, uh maybe give us some give us a parting piece of of wisdom with in Yoda and Yo's.
SPEAKER_03Oh, he says, he says, hmm, do or do not there is no try.
SPEAKER_01I don't know if that was good enough. Man, that was awesome. Um yeah, I'm sure I know we got some big Star Wars fans out there. I'm one of them.
SPEAKER_04Yeah, if they're not a Star Wars fan, they're like, oh no. But then he but then he told Luke, remember in Empire Strikes Back, the second one, that was my favorite one because Yoda's like really, you know, that's when he came on the scene. Luke's kind of slow, and and it he's just a good lesson here. Remember when Yoda could not, or I'm sorry, Luke could not lift the the the ship out of the water, out of that murky water. And then he just, oh, you want the impossible, he tells Yoda, and then Yoda lifts it up, you know, and then Luke's like, Oh, how did you do that?
SPEAKER_03And he says, Hmm, I was with you, not on what you can do, but I bet you cannot. That is right, you fail.
SPEAKER_01Man, that is really good. Um, and good advice. Well said, Jeff. Thank you for your time. Thank you for sharing your wisdom and uh the wisdom of Yoda with us today. We're better for it.
SPEAKER_04Thanks, Dan. I hope you don't edit out that last part. Thank you, sir. I love that I enjoyed it. Thank you so much. Good.
SPEAKER_00We hope you've enjoyed this episode. And if so, we would greatly appreciate it if you would leave us a quick rating and review for the Christianity and business podcast on iTunes. You can get more information about the HBU Center for Christianity and Business at Christianityandbusiness.com. Thanks for listening, and remember to keep integrating biblical values into your business.