Go to the Christian Business Review Academic Journal, articles, videos, and news about upcoming events by visiting our website at Christianity and Business.com. And now, on to update 20. Today we're going to be discussing the topic of being led by the Holy Spirit in your business. And we're joined by Dr. Jim Harris, author of the book Our Unfair Advantage, Unleash the Power of the Holy Spirit in your business. And Dr. Jim is the president of the Jim Harris Group, which is an international speaking and advising firm that helps believers in business to unleash their unfair advantage in the marketplace. And in addition to writing Our Unfair Advantage, he's also the author of The Impactor, a parable on transformational leadership, along with numerous other award-winning business books. And he's got a lot of practical experience in the business world. His clients are a who's who in business, including Walmart, IBM, Best Buy, Verizon, Johnson Johnson, and the list goes on and on. He speaks to corporate and Christian business groups all around the world and also serves on many boards of directors with marketplace and teaching ministries. And uh he's really a leader of leaders. I've had uh incredible opportunity to get to know Jim and uh just become uh friends over the last um how long has it been? Uh so maybe uh a couple going on a couple years now, I think, maybe at least a year and a half or so. And um, and and I've just grown to uh just love this man. He's just an incredible, uh, incredible friend, incredible leader, and uh it's an honor to have him on the show today. Welcome to the Christianity and Business Podcast, Jim.
SPEAKER_00Well, thank you so much, Darren. I've just decided I want to take you on the road with me. You're gonna be my official introducer at all of my events. So I want you just to be right there close to me. That was a very nice introduction. I think we could just end the podcast now. That was well said.
SPEAKER_01Well, I know he doesn't uh he doesn't always appreciate it, but I'm gonna have to call you Dr. Jim in this in this interview. Uh he's uh he's a humble man uh as well. Uh so so kind of going into this topic of partnering with the Holy Spirit in your business and being led by the Holy Spirit. Uh, whenever we f you first introduced this topic to me, it reminded me of a paper that I wrote back in seminary. Now, I'll say that not everything I learned in seminary was particularly useful for the business world, but this particular assignment was to write a paper and explain the miracles of Jesus, explain the resurrection of Jesus, explain the virgin birth of Jesus and all these other miracles as though the Holy Spirit never existed. And so try to explain the resurrection if there was no Holy Spirit. I mean, was Jesus actually dead? Well, what was of course the Holy Spirit had a role in raising him from the dead. You know, it's one God and three persons, or or even the miracles. I mean, if Jesus was able to do miracles just because he was Jesus and there was no activity of the Holy Spirit, you know, I'm not God. So where does that kind of leave us? And and so we have to have a healthy understanding of the Holy Spirit and the role of the Holy Spirit. And so what you've done with this, with this book and with this concept, uh, Dr. Jim, is to bring it into your business. And it caused me to start asking myself the question if the Holy Spirit did not exist in my business, what would be different about my business? And and it should look very different, but but I think uh I dare say that not too many people's businesses would look all that different uh because there's not a from what I've experienced, there's not a ton of reliance on the Holy Spirit or even awareness that that he wants to be involved in our daily lives. So, so Dr. Jim, tell us a bit more about your background and how you became so passionate about this topic of being led by the Holy Spirit in business.
SPEAKER_00Well, after my corporate climb in the 80s, which was traditional back then for business guys, I went all the way to the headquarters of a Fortune 500 firm where I led, as corporate manager, led all the nationwide management leadership training for a 40,000 employee company, decided to step out on my own. And that's when I began my own company some 23 years ago. And I began speaking on employee retention, leadership, corporate culture, the traditional business stuff, wrote several award-winning books, a lot of keynotes on the same platform with the Ken Blanchards and the Malcolm Gladwells, and was just rolling along real well, a believer growing in the faith. And as I grew and I grew and I grew, Darren, one of the most important things I realized was there was a point in my career that I recognized I was a fence straddler, which meant, yes, I was a believer. And on stage, if I wasn't thinking I would be too offensive or not pushing too hard, I might try to say Jesus. Something like, well, if you know, if Jesus or Aristotle didn't say it, then it's just not worth repeating. So I would try to sprinkle some Jesus. I was straddling the fence on my faith in the marketplace. And more and more and more and more I just felt this internal, here's the key, this internal urge, this internal, come on, come on, come on, come on, get off the fence, come over to my side. That was very scary because I had a very fine business, a lot of speaking, a lot of consulting. You know, it's nice to get all the applause and all that stuff. And it took a couple of years for the Lord to really grab me, and I came to a point, my friend, of what I learned, at least in my experience, what I sense submission is. And it came to a point in my life, my personal spiritual life, I just said, Lord, whatever, wherever. And it was very clear to me that it was, I want you to speak on the same kinds of issues, but I want you to base it upon me, not upon contemporary, current business, innovative thinking.
SPEAKER_01So tell us about this concept, our unfair advantage. You've written a book on it, you're doing speaking on it. In fact, uh, even tonight, you're going to lead a group into week two of this study on this on this material, on this concept. So, what is our unfair advantage?
SPEAKER_00The Lord taught me very, very clearly after I had finished writing The Impactor, a parable on transformational leadership. I was in the middle of writing the sequence to that. And of course, Darren, you published that book for me. Thank you, and you're brilliant at that. I was in the middle of writing the follow-up, the second of a four-part series, and I heard God clearly say to me, Stop writing that book, write this book. And he gave me the phrase, unfair advantage. And I said, Well, what do you mean? He said, Write on Holy Spirit and business, Holy Spirit in business, holy in spirit and business. I said, Lord, I'm just really beginning to learn this myself. He said, Write the book. And I went back to, oh, whatever, wherever, yes, sir. And so I started just writing down my personal story on how I went from being secular led to spiritually led in everything I do in business, my speaking, my coaching, my advising, my consulting. How does I was making that big shift? And I write about that in our unfair advantage, the big shift.
SPEAKER_01So so what so what do you mean when you say that that we have an unfair advantage in business over as opposed to uh somebody who doesn't have that advantage? I mean, what does that look like in a practical sense?
SPEAKER_00It became absolutely totally clear to me, suddenly, if you will, as particularly in the book of Acts, we read about a lot of suddenlies. It suddenly became apparent to me that I have living inside me the Spirit of God, the one who knows everything about everything, will teach you all things, will bring into remembrance all things that he teaches you, and will even tell you things to come. He's your helper, your advisor, your counselor. He's with you 24-7, never goes to sleep, never needs any time off. All he I want you to do is tune in to him, connect with him, and as Romans 8:16 says, the Holy Spirit bears witness with our spirit that we are the children of God. And that phrase bears witness with was the first time, just a few years ago, I realized, wait a minute, I'm a spirit, God's a spirit, Holy Spirit's a spirit, spirit speaks to spirit, not to in a in a vocal way in my ears. I've stopped looking for burning bushes and six red cars to come by for you know to take my next move. I need to tune into the Holy Spirit inside me, who is my ultimate coach, my business advisor. He will help me and show me to make the right decisions at the right time, every time, to the glory of God. That is our unfair advantage. We have this inside us, and very few believers, very few believers even recognize it, and even fewer leverage it.
SPEAKER_01Yeah, right. So, so you've you've noticed as you've been uh teaching these principles to people that that they're they're kind of surprised. It's kind of an aha moment. It's like, wow, the Holy Spirit wants to be involved in my business, or do you find that people generally are they feel like they kind of already know that? I mean, what have you known what is it, what is it, what has your experience been as far as how people approach business in terms of a spirit-led way?
SPEAKER_00I see a couple approaches, Darren. One is it's very difficult for many who have been in traditional and or embraced denominational doctrine so tightly that they refuse to open up that the Holy Spirit is more than just a ticket out of hell. There are those unf you know they say, No, I'm I'm in heaven, that's all I care about, and they move on. But there is a huge group that see it differently. Something, something uh there, as the as the Bible calls it, an unction in the King James Version. There's something inside that resonates, the spirit bears witness, and people are going, whoa, I never thought of it that way. That's right. I've got the same Holy Spirit in me that Jesus had walking on the earth. Why shouldn't I rely on him more? But here's what I found, Aaron. No, including me in my life, no one, number one, I never, if I was taught this, it wasn't obvious to me that I can be led by the Holy Spirit inside of me. And number two, here's the big one. No one ever taught me how to do it. What are the fundamental steps of just tuning in to Holy Spirit and tuning out everything else that gets in the way of God speaking to me through that conduit we call Holy Spirit?
SPEAKER_01Right. People are gonna be led by something. Uh so really, and this is a point that you make in the book uh that you're gonna be led by something. So if they're not led by the Holy Spirit, you know, what are we being led by a lot of times?
SPEAKER_00Oh, my friend, there are so many things we could say about what we're being led by. And for business people, here's a few examples. We're led by our head, we're head-led. Oh, let's let's think this through. We got to come up with an innovative idea. Let's analyze it, let's run some more reports. We can be head-led, we can be opportunity-led. This is a great opportunity. I've never seen it. Well, this may be the only chance we have at this opportunity. We've got to strike now, or we'll never have this opportunity again. And obviously, many of us are money-led. Not that money in and of itself is bad. It's a tool. Jesus taught profit. He taught an ROI. But sometimes, and I've seen it in business, how can we maximize, maximize, squeeze, squeeze, squeeze, squeeze, squeeze, squeeze more profit, and then squeeze, squeeze, squeeze, squeeze, squeeze more costs out. And that may not be exactly the best thing that the Holy Spirit wants us to do. We can be so money-led, think Shark Tank, think Mr. Wonderful. We can be so money-led that we miss what God wants us to do. We can be pressure-led. If you don't sign a contract today, we're never coming back. It's like calling the next two minutes and you get free shipping. You know, we're it's all over the place in terms of being pressure-led. We can even go in our personal lives, and this is one that really resonates for parents, we can be kid-led. I want to go to McDonald's. Well, we can be and succumb to, and here's the thing you have to answer. And this is one of the big what I call kingdom downloads, or one of the main points. Whatever leads your leader leads you. Yeah. So if you're being led by a leader, or if you yourself are being led by money andor opportunity, andor ideas, andor innovation, andor profit, andor anything else, you then you are being led by what leads your leader, but there's an entirely new and better and different way to be led, and that's being led by Holy Spirit.
SPEAKER_01Yeah. Is there an example that comes to mind of somebody that has made this, what you talk about in the book, The Big Shift, where they they went from being maybe money-led or head-led to really kind of going through the process, which really is not something that you I think you ever completely master this side of eternity, because you know, we know in part there's fear, there's uncertainty, there's all of these things that come against us. And so it's a constant, it is a constant struggle, but but maybe somebody that has uh started to figure this out and kind of like what that like what does that look like in a workplace setting?
SPEAKER_00There are several examples I could share from people just stopping, asking the Holy Spirit if this is the right place to go, just recognizing that they have a witness. But here's one simple business example. A very, very long-term, solid Christian businessman runs a great manufacturing company in Southern California, had an issue after I had given a program speech at um given a keynote at the Fellowship of Companies for Christ International, the Southern California meeting, and I spoke on Unfair Advantage. And this gentleman, we'll call him Paul, that's not his name. After the program, Paul was driving to work the next day and he had a problem, an issue. And typically he just listened to the radio, but he said, wait a minute, Jim suggested turn off all that noise, tune in to Holy Spirit and ask him what the next step would be because the steps of the righteous are ordered of the Lord. He'd never done it before. The man's almost 70 years old. Very successful, very successful businessman, long-term, long-term follower of the Lord. Turn off the radio, and the Holy Spirit said, call his executive assistant. His executive assistant is led by the Spirit. She is a very faithful lady. They got on the phone as he was driving to work. He'd never done it before, and immediately they had a co-witness. I write about that in the book, How to Get a Co-Witness. They had a co-witness on the solution to the problem. He said, Jim, I've never done that before. I turned off the radio, tuned in the Holy Spirit, and he immediately downloaded what the next step should be. It can be just that simple.
SPEAKER_01Yeah. Yeah. I mean, I know for me, one of the things that has helped is taking a Sabbath day of rest. You know, and obviously we need to be in a lifestyle of of rest, but but our work really ought not to be striving. You know, the word says cease striving and know that I am God. And that's really, I think, what just getting, but but there's something very practical about taking a day of rest where I'm not going to listen to business podcasts. I'm not going to read the Wall Street Journal. I'm not going to be in work mode. I'm just going to just get myself in a posture where I can really hear from the Lord, not necessarily as like a, you know, this is a strategic planning day or something like that, but just to be in relationship where, you know, I'm not here to ask some, you ask God you to to do something for me right now, except just be with me and and get into that, you know, that familiar relationship where so that when you are in the throes of work every day and the decisions that have to be made, you know your shepherd's voice.
SPEAKER_00That's exactly right. John 10 is a huge, uh huge lesson for all of us to realize when Jesus said, My sheep know my voice, and the stranger's voice, they do not follow. And that's what the book, our unfair advantage, really helps us do to tune in to Holy Spirit so that when we hear these other voices, that's not my shepherd, that's not right, that's not Jesus. I know how to follow Jesus. And that's what we're we're just tuning in to the Holy Spirit channel, to God's channel.
SPEAKER_01Yeah, yeah. I mean, I don't know if there's a more disbelieved verse in the Bible than when Jesus says, apart from me, you can do nothing. You know, it's especially in the business world, because it's like I've got my MBA, I've got this all this experience under my belt. I'm I'm into, you know, I'm I'm up to date on all of my trade journals, and you know, I've I'm figuring out what I need to be doing. And so where you know what is the role of the Holy Spirit in business? When, you know, especially when you look at the world and people that you know they're not believers, but they seem to be so wildly successful. I mean, how do you how do you reconcile that where you know you look you look at the Forbes 400 richest people and you're like, you know, if they weren't spirit-led and how they got to that point, you know, does being spirit-led mean you're gonna be more successful in the marketplace? Well, you've asked several questions.
SPEAKER_00Let me see if I can go back and summarize that, my friend. Um back to the one of your earlier points. Um as soon as we leave the sanctified holy grounds of our worship centers, we enter Satan's world. The enemy is the prince of this world. Every business, every for-profit, privately held or publicly held, every profit-focused business works under and within the enemy's playground. We have spiritual warfare every time we go into the marketplace. That's something believers don't really recognize. We're playing in Satan's playground, number one. Number two, that's why Jesus taught us it be shrewd, the parable of the shrewd manager. He was not commenting the manager on being deceitful. He was commending the manager that they used every available means they had to them to influence a better outcome. Learn the ways of the wicked, don't follow them in the marketplace. That's why I love to watch Shark Tank. I love to understand and just use my head, not be head-led, but use my head to see how they think and then go to Holy Spirit and say, how can we do it better? And number three, Holy Spirit already knows what's coming. He knows what's coming around the corner. Nobody else, I don't care who you go to on Wall Street, knows what really is going to happen in the market 90 days from now. But Holy Spirit can say, invest in that. Don't invest in that. Stop, go, sell, run, hide, whatever. He will, and if we learn to hear his voice, he will always put us in the right place at the right time with the right resources. He will always order our steps to the glory of the Lord. Is that mean we will always be the richest, the wealthiest, no, but we're focusing on an eternal impact. We want to dent eternity. And that might look a little bit different than denting, you know, um a large bank account.
SPEAKER_01Yeah. Yeah. And so I think I think it is important, and I'm glad that you clarified that there, you know, what do we mean by advantage? Is that an advantage over another person or advantage in the sense of this is what's going to make me more wealthy than somebody else or that I'm going to be able to get that deal and somebody else isn't. And I I think what you're saying is that it's it's an eternal advantage because ultimately you know it's like when Paul talked about running the race and only run in such a way that you may win but but it's it's not necessarily in the sense of that you're going to beat somebody else. You know, I don't think that's what you're what you're talking about here. You're talking about it's going to give you you the advantage over Satan, really, uh that and and all of the tricks of the enemy to try to rob you out of experiencing the fullness of what of what God has planned for you personally, professionally and even for your entire company is it is that is that what you're saying that's exactly right.
SPEAKER_00That's exactly right. So that when we go into our prayer room Ephesians 6 teaches us so well that when we go into our prayer chamber we need to go in fully armored. That's what Paul was teaching. Put on the full armor and the next verse is pray always in the spirit that's how we take the see the that's how we take the battle into where it is it's not a battle against flesh and blood. It's not a battle against my company against your company it's a battle in the spiritual realms. So we have an unfair advantage where the battle really lives Holy Spirit the angels of the Lord God himself will intervene when we leverage our unfair advantage.
SPEAKER_01Yeah I love that. Well in the final chapter of the book there's just there's this one sentence that really just sums up this entire concept that I think if people will write this on their doorposts, you know, engrave it on a coffee mug uh put it on your your wallpaper on your computer you know whatever you need to do but but the chapter title is the answer to 1000 questions. What is that answer to 1,001 questions?
SPEAKER_00Well this is a direct quote from one of my favorite preaching and teaching pastors Pastor Keith Moore and Pastor Keith Moore says the answer to 1,000 questions is be led I love that.
SPEAKER_01And I mean that about that about sums it up I mean because ultimately we're called to make disciples of all nations and you can't make disciples until unless you're being discipled and being led by the Holy Spirit because the Holy Spirit will disciple us and show us what we need to do you know he'll work through other people you know he's worked through you in my life personally but if if we will just get in tune with however he might want to to speak to us or to to lead us he'll he'll do it if we'll commit ourselves to being led.
SPEAKER_00What would be a a parting piece of advice that you'd like to leave with the listeners today it's well within our reach to be led by Holy Spirit even if we've never been taught this before. It's not some esoteric you've got to fast and pray for 40 days in sackcloth and ashes it there are some very practical ways to come closer to recognizing his voice over all the other voices that are out there. And our unfair advantage is just really my story Darren as you know it's just my story of how I was I have begun to tune into being led by Holy Spirit. It teaches us how to practice and how to check on the inside and how to seek a witness also how not to quench the spirit because we can easily quench Holy Spirit by by the way we think and act and do. And how not to be moved and really for business people one of the most powerful segments of this book and what I've learned is that the more you're led, the more you understand and hear his voice and you get that witness this is right, this is right this is right I'm not going to be moved that's when we can begin to pray the bold prayers every business person should and really is called to pray. That's how Jabez got his prayers answered that's how Joshua had the son stand still very bold prayers but you've got to understand you've got to be led it's got to be part of what God's plan is and when it is pray it believe it and it will come I love it.
SPEAKER_01Well tell people where they can pick up a copy of our unfair advantage unleash the power of the Holy Spirit in your business to learn how to do the things that to to really learn how to be led.
SPEAKER_00Well there's a lot of different places and you've helped me do that my friend my website drjimharris.com drjimharriscom you can go to my store there and order we can also order it from the publisher can't we daren I think that's called high bridgebooks is that correct indeed high bridgebooks.com that's it we can order from high bridge books you can go directly to Amazon um we would prefer if you come and give us credit though at either drjimharris.com or hybridbooks.com those are the two best sources and and tell us tell us a little bit about what what happened at church a couple weeks ago when when you brought forward this message and what's what's kind of been transpiring since then because I want people to also be able to learn more about your speaking and your coaching. Well thank you there's a lot of momentum around this more and more and more momentum I have learned just in the last two weeks there are two different business groups one in Atlanta one in Tampa that have on their own taken the book gotten together a small group of business people and started their own study their own mastermind groups on our unfair advantage that are asking me for curriculum. And it just so happens that two uh this is God's timing two Sundays ago I delivered a message to my home church and we announced an eight-week Wednesday night study on how to be led based upon our unfair advantage one quarter over one quarter of the entire church congregation signed up for this class what does that tell you people are hungry just to learn how to better be led we have young believers we have 40 year old 50 year old faithful saints that are taking this class so what I'm seeing Darren there is a hunger hunger hunger can we just learn a little bit more on how to get a little bit better in touch just like Jesus who said I could do nothing until the Father tells me until the father shows me he was perfectly and totally led by Holy Spirit. And the theme of the class of Be Led is simply this our the the goal of this eight week which will become a video curriculum and as I teach this at with pastors groups with other churches and other business folks the basic theme of the class is simply this that I purpose in my heart to always and only be led that's where we're taking this beautiful well Dr.
SPEAKER_01Jim thank you so much. Drjimharrism is the website uh we sure appreciate you coming on and share your time and uh expertise and your passion for this message. May God continue to bless it and cause it to go forward and continue to and just bless your class tonight and over these next several weeks and the many more uh classes that will that will happen as people just get a hunger to not just continue to go through life being head led or money led because it's lonely you know you feel like an orphan you feel abandoned you feel like if it's to be it's up to me and and all the while the God of the universe is right there saying let me let me guide you let me empower you and so thank you for being faithful to bring bring this message forward continue to go forward and do great things for God in the marketplace.
SPEAKER_00Thank you so much Darren I so appreciate it.
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