Welcome to the win at home first podcast. I'm your host, Cory Carlson. This podcast is where we talk about how successful business leaders win, not only at work, but also at home. On this podcast, we will go behind the scenes with great leaders to hear stories of how they win. Thank you for listening and on to today's episode.
(00:26): Hello, this is Corey today's episode. Brian holds is a great one. He has had many ups and downs in his life, but yet has the vulnerability and wisdom to share with us so that we all can learn from serving time in the military, having to file bankruptcy, shifting from a corporate to a nonprofit, he can share different insights. What that was all like. I love the part of the discussion. We're talking about how to serve our spouses and our kids and making sure that we're intentional. I really enjoyed the part where we talk about money and how often the Bible talks about money and how that's helped his mindset with money and what he does now for a living. And I love this idea about what is good. So the podcast hope you enjoy it as much as I did on to today's episode.
(01:15): Hello, this is Corey Carlson. You're listening to the win at home first podcast today I'm joined by Brian Holt and he has a very interesting story that we can learn from in the standpoint that he had a corporate career and was doing well, climbing the corporate ladder, and then made a choice to shift into a company called compass where they help families with their finances from a golly perspective. So transitioning from corporate into a nonprofit. And so obviously there were sacrifices made there. So we'll, we'll dive into what that was all about. He's been married for less than 15 years has four kids. And so welcome to the show today, Brian, thank you, Corey. I appreciate you having me on the show. What is the key trait for leaders to win at work and went at home?
(02:04): To me, what I've really found is it's all about intentionality. And I know that sounds simple in premise, but it's not so simple in practice. I'd had success in school. I'd had success in sports, I'd had success professionally, and it was all because I was intentional know, I, I, I wouldn't show up to work, not knowing my customer, not having a goal and an objective, a way to measure my performance, a way to to mitigate risk. And really what I found was I would come home and I didn't do any of those things. You know, I turned the car on, in the parking lot and I'd drive home and try to shut off work. And by the time I got home, I'd effectively done that, but I didn't really know what my plan was when I got home. It was just kind of in cruise control. And when I turned the corner on that and really started being intentional, intentional at home, my marriage improved my, my relationship with my kids improved and, and there's a whole lot more that comes with that. And it's more work than just being intentional, but it, me, it really has just started with being intentional in making the choice to treat my family relationship the way that I've always treated my professional. How long ago did you make that shift being intentional and home?
(03:11): Yeah, I would. I would say that, you know, I, I made the conscious shift a couple of years ago and I'll tell the, the story of how that came about. And it'll probably some of your listeners may wish I'd never shared this, but it was two years ago in the summertime. And we went on a family trip down to Helen, Georgia, which has never been a hell in Georgia. Great time, quaint little town. You go rafting on the, on the Chattahoochee river in a little inner tube. And it's a lot of fun for the family, but we were on the way back. And my son, my oldest son, he's 12. Now he was 10. Then he just wanted to watch my phone, you know, the navigation app. And he wanted to see what was around. And so I gave him the phone on ways and then we were just driving and he asked me a question and it caught me off guard.
(03:55): And he just said, Hey dad, your phone says, you're speeding. Are you speeding? And it was such a simple question. And then obviously I was speeding and I knew I was speeding, but in that moment it stopped me in my tracks and put me to the choice of as the Christian father who shares the gospel with my kids who teaches the gospel with my kids. Am I ready to tell my kids that there are certain laws I don't follow? Right. And it felt like that moment lasted 20 minutes while I thought about it. It probably wasn't. But my answer was, you know what, you're right. I am speeding. I'm going to slow down. And I know that that sounds indirect to the intentionality, but, but what it taught me, it taught me something I already knew. I just wasn't paying attention. These kids are always watching, right?
(04:44): They're learning about, you know, what I do, how I act, the way I treat people who cut me off on the road, the way I treat my wife, what I believe about work, what I believe about God in the way that I actually act in that question from that 10 year old has slowed me down on the, on the streets for sure. And it's funny, Corey, it, it doesn't change my decisions a whole lot. It really changes my attitude and just kind of the way that I view it. I think about, you know, when I, when I get angry at my kids, I still get angry at my kids. I stop halfway and kind of think, what am I angry about? And what am I teaching them here? Because as I'm, as I'm correcting their behavior the behavior needs to be corrected, but why does it need to be corrected? And so I have to be careful and I have to be intentional. Okay. Great story. And so you do not speed anymore. Huh? I don't.
(05:35): I do on accident every once in a while, but whether I'm late or otherwise you know, because I, I don't want to answer that question. I don't want my kid to know that as a Christian, there are laws, I don't obey they're God's laws and he says to a them, and so I got to, I can't speed. So yeah, No, the hypocrisy that our kids can observe out of us speaks volumes. And so it, it definitely is a wake-up call to us from the standpoint they are always watching. Can we talk about iron sharpening iron? Usually I kind of refers to friends with friends. I'll tell you some of the questions my kids have asked me have sharpened me, made me think about my why's and made me better. So very grateful for that. You talked about intentionality at home in, you used to go home without a plan. What does going home with a plan look like? What are some of the things as an intentional husband, as an intentional father you are looking to do on a daily basis as well as a weekly basis? Sure.
(06:39): Yeah. I think a lot of it is, is just how do I meet the needs of my wife? How do I meet the needs of my kids? And so some of the tactical things that I do is, you know, Tuesday nights I have men's Bible study and, and my poor wife has to try to put our four kids to bed by herself. So I stop every Tuesday night and I buy her a cupcake or sometimes a beer, but I never stray, you know, a dozen roses or some flowers, but I never show up empty handed. I don't want her to ever think that I, I thought it was easy for her to do that by herself for my kids. It's, you know, I spend meaningful time with them and that's not always playing catch. Are you one of the trampoline park? You know, I take my sons with me when, when we go mold somebody's lawn from church and they say, do we really have to?
(07:23): And I said, yeah, we do, because somebody's got to, and that may not be the quality time they really wanted, but it's a training opportunity of what it means to serve others and to be a godly man and a godly neighbor and a godly husband. And so, you know, I really try to build those things in, again, with intentionality that it sets up the conversation and answers the question that maybe they're not asking of, of what do I really believe and how do I, how do I want to live my life when I grew up
(07:52): Getting a gift for the spouse, or I was talking about the five love languages a day with the client. So whatever they love languages are, maybe it is gift. Maybe it's words of encouragement, you know, of those five. It is making sure we do those and not take it for granted. I think usually when I start losing points, if you will, with Holly, it's when I've not acknowledged her efforts, whether it's, I mean, right now, we've got some longer carpools than normal. I think it'll be cleaned up here as we kind of, we get into school rhythm. But when I acknowledged the fact that she spent an hour and a half in the car driving around getting, and she appreciates it so much, as opposed to when I just blow it off. So I love that awareness that you're having for the sacrifice she's got to make. So you can go do your thing.
(08:43): Some of us just, you know, I, I, this was a few years even before intentionally becoming intentional, but we'd moved from Indiana to Iowa for work relocation. She, you know, she was the trooper and packed up and left, you know, our home of 10 years. And when we came up here, I, I came to the realization that, you know, she was in her, in the home all by yourself, right. With these kids. And we all love the kids, but they can be pretty exhausting. And, you know, when I went to work, I was really focused on work, but I knew I had to really build in a plan that I was going to text her. I was going to call her in the middle of the day. And I'm kind of one of those I'm either on, or I'm off, I'm doing work and I'm not doing home.
(09:22): And then when I'm doing home, I'm not doing work. And I just had to bite the bullet and say, you know what? My wife needs adult interaction in the middle of the day. We're in a place where she doesn't know anybody. And so I'm going to provide that for a, and as a husband, that's, that's part of my responsibility and my duty. And I think we have to look for that sort of opportunity in our lives. And other thing that I've learned in conversation, you know, the, the organization I work with compass was founded by a gentleman named Howard Dayton. And a few years back his wife was dying of cancer and he shared with, with a mutual friend of ours, how wonderful that was for his marriage and just a real head scratcher. But his perspective was, you know, he now understands what it means to serve somebody because she couldn't care for herself. He was able to care for her. And that really changed my perspective with my interactions with my wife, that every day I have an opportunity to make her life better, to serve her to love her. And so that, that was another big shift that, that I made in my thinking
(10:27): Love that thought of how can we make our spouse's life better? Because the other mindset is the, obviously the unhealthy one is what can they do to serve me, absolutely. To help me achieve my goals, my dreams. Yeah. You made a comment in that about leaving Indiana to now go to compass Iowa. That was a pivotal moment. I know, leaving corporate, leaving Allsteel how long did the process take for you to leave and then kind of what was the decision-making process in fact for you to do?
(11:00): Yeah, so it was, it was a pretty long road. So the move from, from Indiana to Iowa was still with the corporate world. And then the change more recently to compass with a couple of months ago, but really, you know, about a year and a half ago, I got this, this idea on my brain and this itching, and really, you know, focused on prayer at that point. Back in early 2020, I was ready to leave corporate America. I was ready to go into full-time ministry. I was excited. I was amped up and, and God kind of put the brakes on the thing and told me now is not the time a year later, I get in a similar position and really was, you know, I wasn't ready to go into nonprofits. So, you know, I'm, I'm in nonprofit. I will grow to appreciate nonprofit, but I have a passion for for-profit business.
(11:48): You know, I, I enjoy the dynamics of a for-profit business and the impact that Christian leadership can have, you know, there's so much more impact when you don't expect Christian morals. People expect a Christian non-profit to have Christian values, right. But as leaders in secular corporate America, when we have corporate values, that really gets people's attention. And there's a ton of kingdom value there when we do that. And so, you know, earlier this year, I'd kind of gotten to a point in my career. I was frustrated, which wasn't new. I could deal with it, but it was just kind of a, a point where I knew the frustration had built to a level that I wasn't going to get over it. Like I could, I could continue to sustain what I was doing, but I was never going to, I was never going to get over it.
(12:34): And so I decided it was time to move on. Really got moved past the nonprofit because of the pay cut, you know, the pay cut was 50% so sliced right in half. And no matter what your starting point is, that one is a punch in the gut, right. No matter what it is. And so I turned around and applied for a couple of a couple of jobs one with a girl, great location that I was pretty well suited for. And the other one was a pretty good location. But I mean, it was, you could have laid my resume over the top of the job description and the very next day, it, it, you know, it just truly divine intervention. I'd been mentoring a young man. He'd been dragging his feet on the reading. You'd skipped a couple of meetings wasn't prepared.
(13:20): And so the week that I'm applying for these jobs, we read a chapter about it. Second Kings, 13, 14 through 19, about king Joe Ash and the property license. And you know, if you look that one up, it's kind of this weird, obvious cultural context is lost type of thing where you know, Eliza tells Joe Ash to strike the ground with his arrows. And, you know, it's just weird. And when you read it and I've never understood it. And then he lies shot kind of gets on to Joe lash and says, well, you only struck the ground three times. You should have struck at five or six, and then you would have defeated your enemies. And I never quite understood it well, just so happens the week that I applied for these jobs, I read a study about this particular passage, and it explains that the moral of the story is that Joe Ash was holding back.
(14:11): He didn't want to get rid of all of his arrows. So striking the ground was shooting his arrows. He didn't want to get rid of all the zeros because he might need a couple of them. And it was that moment that I realized I was holding back on God. Right. I wanted to do the compass nonprofit thing, but I was afraid of having the pay cut in half. I was afraid of losing the predictability of the corporate world. It was pure fear. And I just kind of, it was that moment where I said, you know, am I going to follow him on his terms? Or am I going to follow them on my terms? What's the real choice here? Have I fully surrendered to God? Does he get all of it or does he just get most of it? And so I came home and kind of told Erica what I'd gone through in the day and said, you know, you've got the opportunity to talk me out of it, but I'm pretty convicted on this. And she said, yeah, it sounds pretty clear. Let's do it. And there was no turning back after that.
(15:08): I absolutely love that story of Elijah and the arrow. And I've never talked to anyone about it all on this podcast. Oh, that's so good. I too had some major breakthrough because of that story, that a God got me through it, and I don't need to have the stamp anymore because God got me through it. So I love the fact that you shared that story. That story was impactful to you. So very cool. Brian, now I want to kind of press in a little bit on your story. Some of the battles I went through mentally, but even just as listeners think it's like, okay, great. I'm going to get rid of all my arrows in my quiver, but 50% a lot of money. So how did you do it, but also how did you do a mentally on those days where you're just like, did I make the right decision? Where's the money going to be? I mean, how did all that work out? Because yes, it sounds good to get rid of all your arrows and the quiver, but there's still a practicality of every day you wake up.
(16:09): Yeah. And I think, you know, the first thing I want to remind everybody, including myself, is that, you know, everybody's calling isn't to cash out of corporate America. Like we need, we need Christians in corporate America. And I wished I was one of them, but that, wasn't what God had planned for me. It's not what he asked of me. Right. And so, you know, it, it really is just a matter of, of surrender that God promises he'll take care of us. And so one of the scariest things with just that thought process was I did the math. And so we have a budget on, on an Excel spreadsheet. We do all of the tracking of expenses. We're disciplined to it. And so as I went through, you know, what my pay would be and what a monthly budget would look like, one of the scariest things was this idea that I might actually have to use my emergency fund.
(16:54): Like we have an emergency fund and we've had one for, for 10 years. But if a car broke down, when I was in corporate America, you know, that was, it was a drop in the bucket. We could, we could fix the car. We can move on. Things would be fine. But as we move into the nonprofit world with the lower income, the pay is still sufficient to live the lifestyle we live. It's just that security net. It, it's scary to only have, you know, a little bit left over to think that I would actually have to use the emergency fund. If an emergency happened, it brought some anxiety for sure.
(17:31): Now, Brian, on a day-to-day basis, as you're showing up to work and, you know, leading what you do at compass, which we'll talk about more about in a minute, but also leading the family. Do you have a specific daily routine that helps you get ready for each day?
(17:46): It's been an adjustment for sure. So one, the things, you know COVID kind of introduced it. And the, the move to working from home with compass has, has made it a little bit, even more difficult. A few years back. I, I made the conscious decision that I was going to separate work from home. You know, I'd kind of get gotten in that routine where I'd come home from work. There was still work to be done. So I'd, I'd sit on the couch with Erica and she's sitting there reading a book and we'd, we wouldn't talk at all. And so I kind of set, I identified that there was a problem there and said, you know what, I'm going to stay as late as I need to at work. And when I come home, I'm going to be at home and the two are going to be separate.
(18:27): And, and there are times when I have to stay late and I ask Erica, do you want me to bring work home? Or do you want me to stay at work? And she shares that opinion, but, but like we talked about earlier, that routine had trained my kids, that when I'm at home, I'm all theirs. And when I'm at work, I'm working. And so then, you know, moving into into the basement and working from there, they come down all the time and they're like, dad, can you make me a piece of toast? And it's like, Hey man, I'm presenting to 70 people right now. Can I get the piece of toast in like 10 minutes? Cause they don't recognize the difference. Right? I, my, my action has trained them that when I'm home, I'm all there. It's they haven't quite figured that out.
(19:07): So that's been a really difficult time with the transition. But, you know, I've, I've kind of gotten into the habit where I go to either the garage, if it's cold out or out on the front porch, I do my Bible reading. I do my prayer time and I put in the hours. I mean, it's not it's not flex scheduling. Certainly there's more forgiveness in the, in the nonprofit Christian world for life events coming up and, and taking my kids out. But the truth was, you know, in my last chapter in corporate America, my boss was phenomenal. Adam aims, if he, if he ever listens to it, congratulations to him. If I had called him on a Wednesday and said, Hey, man, I got to clear schedule. I want to take my kid camping. He would have applauded me and said, yeah, man, get out of here and don't let the door hit you on the way out. You know, he was great. And so, but there's the culture of corporate where there's going to be somebody who takes an issue with me taking time off on scheduled. And so there is some more flexibility, but I still have office hours. You know, I, I log in at eight 30, I log out around five o'clock I put the time in and, and work through issues and situations and, and move the ministry forward. The same way I did in corporate America.
(20:16): Yeah. We've all worked for the bosses that are, have more grace towards the home flexibility than others who don't. And we've all been a part of that for sure. What are you hearing from God right now in your quiet time?
(20:29): Two things that he's put on my heart lately, you know, the first is really around what is good, right? I know that's deep and profound and you know, I I've, I've gone through this journey a couple of times before, but we take for granted what that means when we say we're a good husband, a good father, a good employee, and its fundamental good means fulfilling its purpose and in order to be good you know, if you think about, let's take a rock, for example, if I'm walking and I want to skip a rock, I need something that's flat on both sides. Right. And I pick up a rock that's flat on the top and it's jagged on the bottom. That's not a good rock. If the purpose is to be a paperweight, that is a good rock because it fulfills its purpose. Right. And so I've got to take a step back and say, if I'm a good husband, what does that really mean?
(21:14): What is my purpose as a husband? And I've just spent a lot of time, you know, on the lawnmower and, and praying through the summer of, of what does that mean? What does it mean to be a good husband, to get to a point where I'm, I'm enhancing my wife's relationship with God, what does it mean to be a good parent where I'm setting up opportunities for my kids to grow in faith and to be successful and just, you know, that good is some, we just throw it around. We never really defined it. Right. it's it's a challenge to remember what my purpose is. I've got to ask what are the couple tips on what it takes to be a good husband?
(21:49): The, the quarter is, you know, if first of all, to be a good person our goal is to glorify God, right? The Bible tells us that our purpose in life is to bring glory to God. And as a husband that's, that's kind of the root of it as well. It's, it's not only am I loving and caring for my wife, but am I putting her in an emotional and an, a physical position to become a follower of Jesus to really live out her faith and to fulfill her purpose. And that's really our mandate as, as husbands and as fathers is to put our wives and our children in a position where they can have a more intimate relationship with Jesus and with the creator in order to grow in their lives. I Like that. How are you doing that?
(22:33): Well, one, you know, going back to the beginning, it's intentionality, the conversations I have, you know, when I, when I, I still plopped down on the couch after a hard day's work, but when my, when my son asks me, Hey, can we go outside and play? And my answer is I need a break. It's not just, I need a break. It's I need a break because I've worked really hard and I need to rest so that tomorrow morning I can do it again. Right. And so it is that intentionality that I don't just assume my son knows why I'm doing what I'm doing. I don't just assume my wife knows why I brought her a glass of water when she was thirsty, but it's because I love her and I care for and I don't want her to be thirsty. Right. And, and, and it's it, it feels in masculine to say those things, but it's just very much the opposite.
(23:23): And as we serve our spouses, not that it's a, it's a give to get, but as we serve our spouses and even serve our kids, And I think that's our, I mean, we're training them, right? I mean, we're, we're teaching them what it means to be a faithful follower, to be a servant. They're just mirroring our behavior. We're giving them the opportunity to learn and to do the same thing. And so that, that's part of the purpose of being a father and a husband is to teach those.
(23:51): Yeah. There's nothing better than when one of our kids shares a story of something they did to serve somebody else. And, oh man, that's what I can start getting my happy, proud tears in my eyes. That's right.
(24:03): Thank you very much for listening to today's episode. I hope you are joining so far before we go back to the rest of this episode. I want to share with you my book when at home first, some of you have read it. So thank you very much for others of you. You have not. And I encourage, if you're looking for a resource to help you with these times of your work is now in your home and your home is now in your work and what this looks like. This book is being helpful to many leaders like you whores magazine said it was one of seven books. Everyone on your team should read in the book is broken up into four different sections that help you versus about you understand who you are. The second is marriage in ideas and tips to help with your marriage. Third is parenting and then last is work. So these four different sections to help you recalibrate during this time and to help move forward. So if you are needing additional resource, I encourage you to check out my book went home first. It is available on Amazon, as well as audible and so on to the rest of the episode. Thank you very much.
(25:11): So, yeah. And then the second thing that God's really been putting on my heart is the topic of contentment in terms of, you know, just recognizing that I have enough and again, enough to fulfill my purpose. But, you know, I think we get into the trap so often, you know, I'm committed to the fact that the, the destroyer of contentment is comparison. You know, three of the 10 commandments are based on comparison it's that somebody else has something that's greater than what I have, or I want what they have or what I have isn't enough. And really I've found in my life. And I keep going back to it that if I just look at, do I have enough not comparing to what somebody else has not comparing to what I could have in order to fulfill my purpose? Do I have enough? I always come back with the answer of, yes, there's never been a time that I, that I walk away and I say, you know, I just don't have enough to get done what God's asked me to do. And that's really what contentment is surrounded in is do I have enough?
(26:11): I've never heard of the three of the 10 commandments around comparison. And I love that because that's something I can battle with. That's something the devil will come out at me with his comparison didn't and to know it has, can have such a strong hold on us that God put that in the commandments as a, as a watch out three times productive, Almost a clean third of them. Yeah. It's a big deal.
(26:36): Your story of going from corporate to a nonprofit was to join. So compass must mean something of significance to you to take that 50% pay cut. It aligns with your values. I mean, there must be some reasons that you chose to go to compass or her God pointed you in that direction. How did compass come into the picture for you?
(26:59): Yeah, so it started a long, long time ago. So you know, coming out of college, I was a high school math teacher for two years. It was not a great fit for me and I moved into the corporate world landed on my feet really well. You know, as the young ambitious, you know, degreed person got a good job making good money Eric and I weren't paying a whole lot of attention to our finances. We weren't we didn't no big vacations, no elaborate house or, you know, any crazy addictions. We just didn't pay attention to it. And so in 2009, like a lot of other people, my company downsized and my pay got cut in half with Erica seven months pregnant with our first son. So it was obviously a challenging situation. He was born a few months after that.
(27:44): I'm notified, I'm getting deployed to the middle east. And so cutting my pay in half again. And so all of a sudden, you know, the, the unintentional lifestyle was unsustainable. And so we put the car up for sale. We put the house up for sale. Eric was going to move in with family while I was deployed. But, you know, in, in 2010 houses, aren't selling cars, aren't selling. I always has been reliant on my work ethic that, you know, if I ever got in a situation, I just get a second job, but there are no second jobs in the desert. And so I remember sitting in that trailer in, in cutter looking at the bank account and seeing it go down month after month and knowing when we were going to be out of money, trying to figure out how, how can you actually pay a mortgage payment on a credit card?
(28:30): How can I do that? Because they don't let you do that, but there's gotta be a way to do it. And you want to talk about a, a real come to Jesus humbling moment was coming to that realization that I can't provide for my family. I haven't done the homework. I haven't, I haven't put us in a position to be successful. And so God saw that we'd had enough. He sold the house, he sold the car, we came back and we dedicated ourselves to never being in that position again and to sharing what we learned with others who might be in the same position. And so we've been, we've been really faithful. God has been twice as faithful. And so it has become a passion of ours to teach others how to manage their finances in a biblical fashion. So compass is, is actually you know, what we do is we are a nonprofit who teaches what the Bible says about money and how to apply it to your life and then how to teach others.
(29:26): And so, you know, when I learned about compass through a friend and a colleague, you know, it was just, it was amazing to me. The Bible has 2,350 verses that 7% of the entire Bible is related to money and possessions, 15% of what Jesus said was about money and possessions and 40% of his parables used it. And so, you know, one of the important things that we teach at compass is really that with all that said, it's not about the money. It's about the relationship to the owner of the money. God owns all the money. He owns all our stuff. We're just here to be stewards of it, to be responsible managers and to return it back to them with growth. And so when I learn more and more about what compass did it fit with my passion in life, with the experiences that God's put in my path and you know, you couldn't find as much as I would love to be in corporate for-profit business. I have no problem being a part of this nonprofit and, and sharing God's message with the world.
(30:27): That is awesome. I, what I do for a living is overcoming my own problems I had of not winning at home. And then now one others never to lose it home, which is my passion, yours, you know, lost in the, in the financial space. And now your life mission is to never have anyone else lose it and their financial space. Now going to, though that moment here you are deployed watching the bank account decrease, how are you not angry at God or feeling so helpless? How did you keep your head in the game when he hear you are serving the country, it feeling what God's having you go do, whatever else is going through your mind, how are you just not angry? And how'd you keep it together?
(31:14): 'Cause I knew God didn't do that. God, let me do that. I was the one who put us in that position. I was the one who wasn't intentionally tracking the way that we were spending money. That wasn't, God, let me do that to myself. It wasn't him. And, you know, it was a tremendous learning opportunity. And, you know, it's always tough in the, in the middle of it. And looking back, I, I see the lesson, God taught me that the Bible has real practical application for my life. You know, before that time, before I really applied finances specifically which is where my passion is, you know, the Bible was interesting reading. Some of it's not all that interesting. As I read through it, it was a little dry. And, and I read it because I was a Christian and that's what Christians did.
(31:59): But all of a sudden the financial aspect really taught me that, that God has something real to say about my life here and now. And it opened the door to this relationship with scripture that I've applied to being a father that I've applied to being a parent, that I've applied to how I serve the community. It's not just a book that you read and you memorize some scripture yet. I mean, it has real guidance for life. And so that was an important turning point in my faith to understand what the purpose of the Bible really was and how I could use it to make my life better and glorify God,
(32:36): I too found a lot of use of the Bible. But when I also had someone help me kind of read it and unpack some of the stories, because when you read it by yourself, it's, especially when you're reading something for the first time. It's like, I have no idea at this point. Like, what is this? So I've found some, you know, my coach who is faith-based, you know, Brandon, I mean, he teaches me a lot about the different parts of the Bible, looking at different translations on my phone. I read English, the English standard version on my, in a paper Bible, but I hop right to the message whenever I get stuck. It's like, what are they saying? So the same type of thing where it's, it's having that curiosity of what does the scripture actually mean? Because if you just read it kind of surface value, sometimes it doesn't, you know, go deep enough in your heart.
(33:25): Yeah. And that's, you know, one of the things that we're taught to do is we read scripture, we pray and we seek wise counsel. I mean, those are the three key elements and you don't want to do only one and not the other two. You'll get a really well-rounded learning. If, if you, if you read, you pray and you seek wise counsel,
(33:44): I love the wisdom that you have to know that God didn't do that to you with your finances. He allowed you to do it much like us with our kids, where we allow them to make their mistakes. We don't want them to heck no, I wish they never made mistakes, but the same time, I'd much rather have him make these mistakes. Now, when they're smaller consequences, then later in life when they're bigger. And so it's just kind of incredible. I recently heard a phrase that, and I think it applies to you a lot. I mean, and I've seen in my own is where God guides he provides. And so just as he's led you down this path, as you said, he is consistently provided. And even then some
(34:29): He has absolutely. And not just financially. I mean, he's provided me with, with the willpower, with the strength and with, with the experiences and the friendships and the relationships that he needs. He's absolutely wherever he's called us to go. And we've gone with him. You know, he's always made a way for us and provided the things that we needed in every area of our lives. And, and that's part of why we had the confidence to take this leap, right? We, we, we went through some little tests along the way, and you know, if God can bring us through near bankruptcy, he can help us, you know, run a ministry for sure. No problem.
(35:07): When you've had those different challenges and you've overcame them and you've seen that God did not forsake or did not abandon you during those times. It's, it's incredible. The amount of boldness you now have to go and take risks, whether it's with compass or with your family, or by yourself to take risks because, you know, God will, will be there with you.
(35:26): Yeah, absolutely. And we all, you know, it's another thing God's put on my heart recently. We all, we all desire, intimacy, right? And we all want intimacy with with our spouse and with friends and with God and intimacy, we know requires trust. Right. And we're, we're pretty good with that, but trust requires vulnerability. And, and I don't know about you, but I'm not good with that. I really like to have the trust without the vulnerability, but until we've really been wholly dependent on God, we can't trust him. And if we can't trust him, then, then we get into that situation where he never knew us. Right. And so when we have to be vulnerable, if we're going to build that trust, and I know I can rely on God, because he's carried me through it before, I don't have to wonder if he would, I know he has, it's a done deal. And I know he'll do it again.
(36:19): Yeah. There are a lot of years of my quiet time. I was like, Hey God, let's talk about this area over here. Nope. Nope. Don't go over here. I don't want to talk about this. I don't want to be vulnerable in that area, but let's just talk over here and having, you know, a mentor, just, you know, share with me the idea of open hands. Like when I go to break, this is kind of open hands, turn them down and just kind of let it all flood out and then turn them upside down. So then, you know, they're facing the ceiling, so it's not now I'm ready to receive whatever Trevor you have for me. Yeah. His, his choice, not ours. That's right.
(36:53): Brian, what is the best way for listeners to get ahold of you to just learn more? I mean, this has just been fantastic. All the wisdom you shared as well as the about compass. Yeah. So you can visit our compass website@compassone.org, and you can check me out on LinkedIn and I'll include a profile in the biography that we'll attach. And then also you can email me@brianatcompassone.org, B R I a n@compassone.org. And I would love to hear from you love to hear your story and to help in any way I can.
(37:28): That's great. Brian, we'll put all that contact information in the show notes. Thank you so much for your story and gave me a little extra boost of confidence and boldness to go after things to know that God is with us. So thank you very much, Brian. Thank you, Cory. And thank you for what you're doing here to help people when at home first,
(37:50): I want to thank you for listening to my podcast. When at home first, I am so grateful to hear from listeners like you, that this content has been helpful. So now I would love for you to pay it forward. I want to get this message in the hands of more listeners. We need leaders to be winning both at home and at work, especially during this time. So please take a minute to share this episode with somebody you think would find value in it, as well as rate and subscribe as a thank you, please visit my website@coriumcarlson.com to download a free resource that people are finding value in. Thank you very much.
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