May 2024 | Keynote 5 “Kingdom Culture”

Jeanna Roach: [00:00:00] I’ve already got my Kleenex, because we just might as well.

We’ve talked a lot about humility this week, and I don’t know if you’ve noticed, but Carrie is kind of a picture of that, you know, um, Cal was also my leader, by the way, I mean, and these are tremendous, tremendous business leaders, not just the level of humility and love is outrageous, you know, and that’s what I get to talk about actually a bit, um, today, and I know, uh, Gina, it doesn’t look like it should be Gina.

I get a lot of Gianna, Jenna. I had a counselor one time call me Janaya in high school. I don’t, just threw her off, you know? And, uh, what’s fascinating to me is my mom is actually full blooded Italian. Somebody was asking me about her. She’s 4’11 I’m on the tall side for my family, and I mean, dark skin, black hair, um, when you [00:01:00] see us together, you just wouldn’t really recognize that I even belong to her.

But she is Nanette Rose Bonanno. And so she actually, she wanted the name Gina, but my dad had three kids that he brought into the marriage, my three siblings, and they all started with J. And so she had Joy, three letters. John, four letters. Janelle, five letters. And so she needed a J with six letters and an Italian name.

And so that’s how you get J. Gina. So here we are. And so my name is Gina Rose Marie, because when you’re Italian, you typically have two middle names. A lot of Hispanic families are like this too. And I mean, my mom is as Italian as they come. It’s so funny to me. And this is just an example where she’s going to get that name.

My grandmother, y’all used to send me checks for my birthday and spell it G I N A. Because you’re just, sorry, that is, this is not how you spell Gina in an Italian family. And I think, um, I mean, let me just [00:02:00] show you what this group looks like. This is one third of my mom’s family. And when you think of Italian families, you kind of, you honestly have some stereotypes that you come up with.

Andrew and I were recently in California. And it had, I saw this towel and it said, dress Italian, uh, drive German, uh, kiss French, drink Napa. And I thought, I saw the Italian part in the dress and I mean, Italians, you’ve known them as they’re loud, they’re opinionated, they’re over the top. They do care about what they wear.

Some of the best clothes in the world are made by Italians, shoes. suits, right? You just have an opinion. I mean, this is one, this is only my uncle’s side of this family. And you know, just like Italian cultures and German cultures, right? All these people groups, they have behaviors, customs, traditions.

That’s where those stereotypes come from. This is just living proof that, uh, some of those are very, very accurate when you think about those things. But you know, you’re, you have a culture. There is a people group in your [00:03:00] organization, and you have a work culture. And that’s what we’re going to talk about a lot this morning, and it’s one of my just most favorite topics because it is the collection of these things, these traditions that you have, behaviors that you have, beliefs, attitudes that are within your organization that you already have, and it starts, y’all, it’s, it’s not just the CEO.

It is the next person that enters into our culture. Everybody plays a part in a culture. That is how this works. And since we spend a significant amount of time at work, then of course it would have a profound impact on us when we’re here. I’ve, we’ve had talks of people working 90 hours, 70 hours, right?

50 hours, whatever those hours are in a week. You are spending a lot of time in a work culture. And so it is going to be able to influence you in ways that you can’t imagine. It right now. The world values things like what? Busyness. I mean, striving, right? Um, [00:04:00] achievement. These are all things that are happening in our world in most business cultures.

But in the kingdom, right? God says, Hey, if you’re going to have the fruit of the spirit, it’s going to be things like love, peace, patience, kindness, gentleness, right? Goodness, faithfulness, self control, all of these things. And that is very different than what we see when the world is saying, you know, you do you.

I love that one. My kids are like, you do you boo, my nine year old. And you know what that saying is, you put you at the center of every decision. You are the most important thing. The world revolves around you, but man, in a kingdom, it just goes so different. It’s seeking what’s best for the individual, but then for the collection of people too, it, the kingdom desires, the flourishing for all.

Trevor actually said it in that video. I don’t think I’d heard that before. Wanted a place where it was flourishing for all. And we oftentimes hear talk about our culture like it’s a garden. And I don’t know if there’s a better example of a garden than the one that’s actually right now [00:05:00] hidden, but we have a picture of it to show you.

Man. I’m not sure there’s anything that is more flourishing or thriving than that image right now. You guys came at a good time. You know, the group that came in February It doesn’t look like that. You guys got the good month, right? Heath was here. This is Y’all have been out there this week, this is a picture of what it looks like to flourish.

To me, this is a picture of what it can be like in the kingdom. It is so beautiful. But what’s fascinating is it sits in complete contrast to everything around it. There’s an aerial view. And so you want to think that that just happens, right? But do you see what it looked like in its rawest form? It looked like everything that was around it.

There’s been intent. There’s been a lot of work there. It sits beautiful right in the middle of the mess. And this is what God wants for every business that we have. He wants us to flourish right in the middle of the mess and look completely different than everything around us. And so we’re going to talk today about what are some things maybe we can actually [00:06:00] do in our business to start to create this flourishing environment.

And so first things first, I think you got to develop some house rules or your core values. You heard Ashley talk about it on the video. These are kingdom core values in your organization. And I want to start by kind of telling you a story about our family. So these are our three kids. This was last year.

And so, um, they’re already so much taller. Uh, the big kid in the back is Andrew, my husband. Uh, Olivia is our daughter. She’s 13. Liam is the next oldest. He’s the one right to my left and he is 11 and a half. And then Colin is nine and a half. Liam is like right here now. So this is in a year. He’s, you know, he’s going to surpass mom real quick.

And we love these little faces. When I see this is one of my favorite pictures. That’s why I still keep it up here. Uh, but have you ever really, really loved someone and just not liked them some days? Woo! Last night. Last night. It was just a story on its own, but you know, we would just, we love these little [00:07:00] faces so much.

Sometimes I’d be like, I’m so glad you’re so cute. You know, you’ve survived another day and we would just find ourselves coaching on the same things over and over. Like these things that were constantly frustrating Andrew and I, we’re constantly saying things to our kids like, Hey, if you can’t be kind, be quiet.

It’s okay. Then they knew it. And so we stopped, we stopped finishing. We didn’t finish the sentence. We’d go, Hey, if you can’t be kind, and they’d be like, be quiet, you know, now they’re at the sassy teenage years. So they’re like, keep talking. You know, they’re sarcastic now. And it’s like, look, they know. And what we realized is we were getting frustrated with them, but we actually were never really clear on what the expectations were for them.

And so how was that fair? And actually in some moments, if we’re honest, we probably weren’t clear. ourselves. Really, what are the expectations? Because what we know is if everything is important, then nothing is important. So we thought, what is important to us in our home? And so Andrew and I sat down and we talked about this, like, what are the things that make us unique and different [00:08:00] in our home?

And we developed some house rules. And here they are. In this home we are kind, we take responsibility, we serve others, we laugh, and we try new things. And if you know us, this will not surprise you, if you know our home. But see, now all of a sudden these are values that we carry with us, that we talk about all of the time, still.

And put intent behind, but this is how we’re going to act when we’re at home, when we’re at work, when they’re at volleyball practice, you know, we’re on the basketball court in a game. These are all the things that we’re thinking about. And we’re constantly talking about constantly talking about in our home.

And so just like us, you need to define your house rules in your organization. You’ve got to define them because organizations that don’t have this defined set of rules, you know, for people boundaries cause confusion. And that kind of ambiguity can be very, very scary. I mean, think Lord of the Flies, that’s how that goes.

I always wonder what would it have been like if we’d asked those three kids, well, what do they think the house rules should be? [00:09:00] You know? And so it’s like, if you don’t define them, they will define them for you. And so you have to make this really, really clear so you don’t cause confusion, frustration.

Sometimes little subcultures can happen too within the organization when it’s not clear. The expectations that can lead to such toxicity in the organization. So you have to define them. And there are things that are unique, you know, to you and your group. Those wouldn’t be your house rules. I know that right now.

Those five things are unique to Andrew and Gina Roach. You know, things that we value. So they’re unique to you and your group. They’ve kind of organically built up over time. We created our, uh, core values in 2011. Uh, at the time, you know, Carrie and Rick and Ron, there was a leadership team. There was a management team.

And we got to be involved in that. We got to have a little bit of a voice. There are a few of us in here that they just said, Hey, how would you define our culture? Cause see, there was already a culture. It was just, it was already built up. It was just, Hey, what words would we use to [00:10:00] describe it? So you have it, you just maybe need to sit down and really think about what makes us unique, what is different and what do we value really to our core.

Now, although we got to be a part of that, Cal told us yesterday, you get a voice, but you don’t always get the vote. And we didn’t get a vote in that. We did get to have a voice. And then all of a sudden that senior leadership group, they were the ones who came together and got aligned around the core values and they rolled them out to the group.

And that’s how this should go. You know, uh, Liam didn’t get to have a say in our house rules. Gina and Andrew Roach are the senior leadership team in the home. We defined them and rolled them out to the group. And that’s how this should go. You guys have to agree on this. And we would just suggest that you limit the number of values.

I used to say like, you know, four to six, five might be a cap, honestly. And the reason is you need to be able to recall them and explain them. Your people are going to need to do that. I’ve heard organizations. There’s one really strong organization that if I [00:11:00] said it, you all would love. They have 13 core values.

I mean, I don’t know. That, to me, almost a bit seems like propaganda. Something to put on walls, you know, in your space. But once you do that, some of those end up being confusing. They can contradict each other, actually, in some moments. They just cause confusion, ultimately, for people. They become valueless.

Of course, the more you have of something, then of course, you’re going to decrease the value in each one of them. And so limit the number. Get to what is really core to you. And then once you have them, test them. Test them against the individuals that are in your culture, that are thriving, that are already operating in that.

You know, that’s what’s unique about some of us that were there in 2011. Those were actually things that were in us. That’s why it was easy, probably, for us to identify. Because we all loved those things. That’s what we loved about working here. And so test them. And then also, test yourself. Test them against people that have left.

You’re just trying to identify, is this the truth? Is this something [00:12:00] really that is core to who we are? And this is, we are willing to part ways because of it. And so check out that list. You know, it was interesting for us as we did that, and we had this list of employees who were just excellent and thriving in our organization, and these that we separated with, we noticed there were Christians on both lists.

So that just affirms this is not a Christian organization. Culture. That is not what it’s about. Yes, it’s illegal. We’ve said that. So number one, don’t do that. Don’t hire only Christians. But you know what? The Lord, that is not how he went about his days. But you do need to use words that connect with Christ, but are not overtly Christian.

You know, this isn’t about all of us getting in a holy huddle. That is not about being exclusive. It’s quite the opposite, you know. It says he came, right, for the sick, not the healthy. And I can say, uh, in our culture, we do not ask anybody where they’re at on their faith journey. That is not a concern. And I get to say that with [00:13:00] full authority because it’s part of my story here.

I came here just looking for work and a job and did not know the Lord had never even seen the word ministry before and had to Google what it meant. So don’t be inclusive. Let people join regardless of where they are on their faith journey. So you got to define them, but then you got to defend them. This is where the real work comes in.

You have to get these values off the wall and into your daily conversations. We select, review, celebrate, separate based on these things that are important to us. That is how valuable they are. And we actually start the conversation on day one. with someone. We start, Casey mentioned this, we start in the interview process with people.

We’re looking to see, hey, do we value the same thing? And so we start that conversation and we continue that in the interview process. And then when they enter the organization and we’re just going to walk alongside one another as we get them off the [00:14:00] walls and into our daily conversations. And we are going to make core values operationally real to the people that we lead and we must hold them accountable to what is core.

If you believe that they are important, then you have to fight for them. You have to have intention. See that garden didn’t happen without a lot of intention going on behind us. And so for us, you know, you have to clarify in our home. We have to clarify what take responsibility means to our kid. Our kids, one in particular, could you tell?

Uh, last night we got to practice this again and today. So we go, Hey, taking responsibility. And that also means like, Hey, when you don’t do the right thing, you need to be honest about that. When we ask you, we need you. We’re trying to teach you integrity. We’re talking about this. So we have one child today who said his project was done and it wasn’t done.

So he doesn’t get to go today and be with his aunt. He gets to go home with dad. And finish his [00:15:00] project. And so we are constantly correcting, right? That’s how this goes in an organization. We’re going to talk about it. We’re going to try to explain to people what it means. And then we’re going to go and hold them accountable to what is core in our organization.

But I would say anyone unwilling to commit to the house rules cannot stay. Cannot stay. Look, they are adults. Liam is 11. He’s gets to stay in the home, but these are adults. They’re coming. We’re agreeing on what we’re doing. When you enter our organization, we’re agreeing. We’re not hiding anything. And so if they are unwilling to commit, then they cannot stay for us.

Um, we just realized that you have to have a pruning. Yeah. Pruning has to happen. You know, our flower beds in the front of our house. I mean, they just get overrun sometimes with things that are dead and they’re just stealing all of the good nutrients from all the other things that are flourishing. You got to prune sometimes in your organization, but remember that [00:16:00] you are the culture keeper.

I know sometimes people like to think that maybe like, well, HR is the, the culture keeper. This group is no, the leaders are the culture keepers. You are the ones who open the gates and allow people in and out. You are making that decision. So you must take this so, so seriously and you have to model them.

What I know is that what’s modeled is multiplied and I will never forget the first time I heard that saying it is so true. When you see your kids doing something, have you ever gone, Oh, that sounds familiar. I think I’ve said that before. I mean, you have to model these so well and consistently. And I’ve used this example for years, but it’s just a good example.

Respect, integrity, communication, and excellence are all seriously really worthy core values. Truly, if those were in your organization, they would be strong. But they are meaningless when I tell you that they were the core values for Enron. I don’t know if anybody that [00:17:00] worked there would say they had integrity.

Or they respected them, the people that lost their jobs. So it is really important leaders that we model these so consistently. And because look, if they kind of covertly connect to Christ, well, then we are walking out our faith during the workday through our actions, by living out these core values, we get to reflect and reveal Christ through them.

Okay. So you’ve defined them, you’re defending them, but some of the best ways to multiply this is to celebrate them. That is the fun part. Yet, we are just not as good at that as we need to be, right? But in most cultures, uh, Casey told us, people feel unappreciated. Like they’re not cared for. And so why don’t we go and celebrate if what’s, uh, you know, what’s celebrated is repeated.

And there’s a slide that I want to show you that has an image here. And just ask yourself, what’s the last thing you celebrated? In our culture, Um, Ashley Morgan, she works at our title company and [00:18:00] she got an award for unity. We have defined unity very clearly in our organization. We even have sub bullets to help people understand, well, what does that look like to walk that out?

We teach on it. We just taught on it at our last rally, the entire rally. And then what happens is when our people see someone walking that out, we go and celebrate that. We put them on a stage. Because what we know is what’s celebrated is repeated. And so get, you know, make a playbook for celebrating in your organization.

We are all really good planners in our operations, but sometimes we don’t make a way to do things like this. We undervalue the power of celebrating things. So celebrate them and ask yourself, what, what is the last time I celebrated something, you know, every time, like, you know, God would, uh, he, he was creating the earth and he would stop every day and he would go and it was good.

It’s like he celebrated his work. We have to be better about this. So I’d say, ask yourself, what is the last thing you celebrated? [00:19:00] It’s probably gonna, might be a little convicting, actually, that tends to be, uh, our story. Okay, so you have your house rules, but a kingdom culture also has to create a holy place, a place that is set apart, that is different.

And so how do we do that? Right now, the biggest challenge in our world right now is busyness. It is busyness. It is what is keeping us from the flourishing life that we have. This is an article just from last year in the Harvard Business Review. Talking about activity and the hurry. Y’all, there are so many books on this.

I love to read. I’m an avid reader. Hundreds of books a year. And I cannot tell you how many I see on this. I mean, I, there are so many books on sabbaticals, on rest, right? And it’s all because this is a problem that we have in our culture. And. You know, Casey said, you know, he was talking about yesterday when you walk through and you ask somebody how they’re doing [00:20:00] and they say, good, you know, when I call my friends, I go, Hey, how are you?

They go busy. That’s actually their response. Busy. And they go, how are you? So busy. Just so busy. Everybody’s everybody is busy. And it’s true. You know, in this article, they said that 80 percent of Americans reported they never had enough time. And if you’re honest, you probably feel this, you know, I have a friend, uh, who we were going to California together.

Our flight wasn’t till like 10 in the morning and she had to wake up at 4am to work. And this is kind of a norm four to 6pm, you know, every day and busy is just another way for people to say that they are exhausted. You know, they’re overwhelmed, they’re stressed, And sometimes it can lead to this depression.

And so we have to pay attention to this problem in the world. And you think about it, like it starts with young children. And if you’re, you know, if you’ve got college students and it’s like, Hey, you got to have the best resume, right? You have to go out and have all [00:21:00] these activities. I always laugh because look, I’m a high achiever.

So if you tell me what the rules are and what to do, I’m going to go do them. And I had decided in high school, I was going to be on the most pages in the yearbook. Nobody, I was going to have my name and I was gonna have the most pages in the yearbook. So I was president of Crime Stoppers. I led Quill and Scroll.

I was in Pals. I mean, I did anything and everything to do that. For what purpose? You know, but it really, it’s, it kind of starts there and then these people enter our workforce. And so now what? You know, this is becoming a lifestyle for people that is not healthy. Corrie Ten Boom once said that if the devil can’t make you sin, then he’ll make you busy.

It is a key way for him to keep you disconnected from people in your life and from God. Wow, we have to care about this thing. There’s such a beautiful example in the story of Mary and Martha. I’m just gonna [00:22:00] paraphrase it for us out of Luke 10, uh, 38 through 42, but it says, Martha welcomed him into her house, and she had a sister called Mary, who sat at the Lord’s feet and listened to his teaching.

But Martha was distracted with much serving, and she went up to him and said, Lord, do you not care that my sister has left me to serve alone? Okay, martyr, tell her then to help me. But the Lord answered her, Martha, Martha, you are anxious and troubled about many things, but one thing is necessary, and Mary has chosen the good portion which will not be taken away from her.

Are we at our best when we’re busy? And the problem is right now we tend to make, you know, everything in idle. That’s our problems, right? And now work not leisure is becoming kind of the new social status. See, actually when my friend says she was at work at 4am, actually that for her is a good thing.

That’s speaking to her level of commitment, you know, [00:23:00] not her disconnection from so many other things actually that are happening in her life. And we start to reward these things inappropriately. And so we just have to be aware of these things. God brings them to us. So we’re aware of them. We can try to combat them because, uh, Man, I think Cal said it this week too.

We have to be careful not to begin to worship our work and when we put it in the place that we are and that is what is stealing from all the other things that can happen so easily, especially when we were made to work, when we love what we’re doing. But we are overstimulated most of the time in our lives right now.

You know, um, being still is like, we have an aversion to it. We don’t know how to do it in our culture. It’s so awkward, you know, and I’m like that, you know, our kids, they constantly almost want to like be entertained. Um, even our people sometimes when we see feedback from stuff, it’s like we all want to be entertained.

We want things going on all the time and we [00:24:00] can’t just disconnect, you know, enjoying making dinner with our family or just taking a leisurely walk, you know, and even sometimes we feel guilty about it. Like that was the wrong thing to do. My husband likes to make fun of me because I love productivity.

And, you know, sometimes when I’m, one time he walked in and I’m getting ready and I’m curling my hair and I’m doing squats and he’s like, really? And that’s a funny example, but it’s like, I’m built for like always doing something and this, and God’s saying, no, no sit at the feet, rest. Rest, it’s killing us.

Like we don’t know how to slow down. And so as kingdom cultures that we want to have, we have to cultivate regular rhythms of rest for our people. We just have to make it a priority, you know, because how can we hear God or be in right relationship with him if we have an aversion to being still? We heard that in some of the videos this week.

You know, hey, you just need to be still so you can hear and we must be [00:25:00] still. Make room for people to breathe y’all. Just try to make this a priority in your business. And as leaders, you know, our view and our rhythms of rest. I mean, that is what is being revealed and modeled to people. How well are you doing at this?

Is this something that you value? We have to help people. We, we first need to make sure for ourselves that we’re putting things in the right kingdom order for ourselves. And then we can help others do that in our organization. And that is the story of Beaten Boat Companies for me. But you know, how many hours are people working in your organization?

Do they have a day off or days off? You know, these things you’re thinking about and look, we had conversations, uh, in some of our breakouts and we know that that is not easy. And sometimes look, it’s not perfect. Are you trying to make a way there though? Is it even something you’re thinking about? You know, our cafe is a challenge.

Um, uh, we have sweet Catherine. She’s in here [00:26:00] with us now. She was leading the cafe. She was working 65, 70 hours a week because you know, you think you got it figured out and then somebody doesn’t show up. And so we know that there’s real life. And so we’re not perfect at this. That’s why I tell you that, but we, it’s our constant conversation.

If you have children, you know that they don’t withhold feedback for you, you know, for you. And, um, when I was VP of sales and marketing, look, I like to work. This is something that I have had a challenge with. Um, honestly, and many of us have, cause we love this work and we felt we have a purpose in our work too.

So you have to be really careful though, to make sure that you’re not getting that out of alignment with what God would have for you. And my daughter, you know, This is how she talks about my time, uh, as VP of sales and marketing. She says, Oh, that’s when you would come home at bath time. Right before we went to bed.

Do you know how hard that is to even say out loud? Because look I knew this and I thought I was doing it, but we [00:27:00] have to do help each other in this It’s very important, you know, but here’s the good thing She says that was when because it’s not the story anymore And that’s what God can do put a focus on it though be intentional about it There was a year here where we would go around, um, you know, Cal and Corey and their team, Beaton Bow Homes team go around and we are getting together and making our plan for the year.

What are our goals for the year? How many homes are we going to close? What what’s all the numbers, all the things, but you know, one year, the biggest concern was workload people, how many hours they were working. And so every time we went into a meeting, Cal. That would be the first point he hit, he would say, all right, we’re going to do a 50 hour work week.

We don’t want you to basically be in our on our campus more than 50 hours in a week, including lunch. You know, when you come on Monday morning and you leave on Friday, 50 hours, how are we going to make that happen? And we had to resource that in some ways. Okay, we had to add positions to make that happen.

We talked to the team because we said, that’s the goal. How are we going to hit [00:28:00] the goal? And we just put it at the forefront of every leader’s mind in the organization. We even, y’all, we even went, Brad created some reports for us. We could see when people were logged into our system. We had a heat map to see like how, how engaged were they actually?

How many, how many clicks were happening in our system? And we could, we could check the hours. So when we saw a salesperson was here at 7am, and their hour started at 10, we can go, what’s going on there? And try to help them put things in the right order, you know? Because the devil is in the distractions.

He wants to distract us, even with our work, to keep us from keeping things in the right order, like our family. And oftentimes that’s what was happening is people were using work as a distraction from going and dealing with some of the things God wanted them to lean into Carl Jung the famous psychologist had a saying Hurry is not the is not of the devil.

Hurry is the devil Busyness is the [00:29:00] devil. We have to be careful not just to be busy running from meeting to meeting How can you even see people? That’s why when you say, how are you? They say good Everybody’s running Just slow down, make some white space in your calendar and ask yourself, is that really that important?

Or can I just get up and go talk to that person? You know, there’s sometimes we’re just behind our computer and we, we were limited time behind a computer, you know, and you’re like, I need to respond to that person that’s waiting. And as someone walks in, and you know what, it’s just like, which one’s more important.

And in that moment, it’s going to be that person standing right in front of us. So make a way. And so how do we do that? We’ve got to create, you know, models for this. Like have boundaries around this for us, for people. So get control of your calendar. Take breaks. Walk around. I mean, if you’re a planner and you need to do that, even put that on your calendar.

It doesn’t matter. Just go do it. You know? Encourage time off. Take it yourself. You know, don’t abuse it, but make sure other people are [00:30:00] taking it. Make it just as important for them to have rest as it is for you. You know, our PTO policy, it ends, uh, in your year. It never rolls over into your next year of employment.

And that’s not because we’re stingy and want to withhold something. It’s actually because we’re saying, Hey, we want you to rest within the year. We don’t want you to withhold it and then take it into the next year. We’re trying to encourage this. It’s one of the ways that we can talk about it with people.

Cause Ron Beatonboe told me years ago, Gina, your kids will never remember the things that you bought for them, but they will always remember the trips you took them on. The time you spent with them. And it is true. We have table talks around our home at dinnertime and that’s what our kids talk about. We went to Mexico like three years ago.

They’ve been all over, but that is one of their favorite trips they talk about. So that’s the truth. Are you, are you encouraging that for other people? Cause we know it’s true for ourselves. That should happen in your culture. Help people disconnect from work. If you, if I get an email, if somebody here was to send me an email at 8 [00:31:00] PM, I would think that the building was burning down.

We have put so many good boundaries around this. People don’t, we don’t try, we try to really honor people’s time when they’re at home to give them rest. You know, I know Corey does this all the time. He might type up and he might think something that he needs to get out of his head, but he’s going to delay that send until the next day because he wants to honor that time with a family.

That is what you do when you’re putting things in the kingdom order. of life, really practical things. And sometimes you just got to check your expectations. Look, this is a high accountability culture. We have high expectations around here. And sometimes we just have to go, is that really that important?

Sometimes we’ll ask ourselves, why do we do that? And people go, well, you were so passionate about it. We go, Oh gosh, that was me. That, are you sure that wasn’t you? No, that was me. Oh, no. I’m so sorry, but it’s because all of us sometimes we, so is that really that important? Is that going to matter in five minutes, you know, five days, five months from now?

Well, [00:32:00] five years. Uh, John Mark Comer wrote a book called the Ruthless Elimination of Hurry. And I love this. He said, the new speed of life isn’t Christian. It’s anti Christ. He said, think about that. What has the highest value in Christ’s kingdom? Love. The greatest command is to love God and love your neighbor, but hurry and love are incompatible.

They know they’re oil and water. They don’t go. That’s what Olivia was telling me. Does she feel loved when I was coming at bath time? Nope. I was moving and going. And even then when I would get home, have y’all ever done that? You’re in that frenetic pace. You can’t even stop yourself. So you get home and everything is moving at the pace that it was at the office.

And it’s like, sometimes you just got to take a pause, take a pause and help your people because we are at our best when we are Are at rest and operating from a place of rest, not just seeking to get to rest, you know, [00:33:00] okay, a kingdom culture. If love is a secret sauce, then you have to create community.

This is so important. Ramsey Solutions had a speaker that came and talked to our leadership group last year, and he said, this is the loneliest generation. Nobody in this room is surprised. That’s a scary thing. We all know that we have more access and we’re more connected than ever yet. People have never felt more alone.

Golly, what are we going to do about that? You know, God made us for community to be together in this. And so around here, we do things like friends and family would do. That’s just what we do. We go to dinners, we celebrate birthdays, and company anniversaries. Like, y’all, we make excuses to hang out, basically.

Like, a 70s date night or something happens. Our title company, they’ve been so good about creating community. They do Pickleball weekly. You know, people are, uh, Midland’s doing this. Like, we just, this is what we like to do. Okay, the people here are special, [00:34:00] we’re the gatekeepers, we’re allowing them in, and they find, we find excuses to be together.

We try to have our spouses come and be involved when they can. Our last all company meeting, what we call a rally, our spouses were invited to come again, you know, just to be a part of it. We’re trying to develop this big community. We don’t want people to feel isolated. That’s not how the kingdom works.

And so try to make a way to do that. We pray for each other. You know, in that, that, that just helps us build relationships. Cause yeah, we’ve talked a lot about the leader and, you know, your direct reports and developing relationship here, but now we’re talking about the whole, how do we as a group connect and what, how does the kingdom play out in this bigger group?

And so it really comes down to, is this something that you desire for your people and for you? And then you put intent behind it. That’s it. It’s just work. And here’s the thing is all of those little small moments. See, they, they seem like they’re just not that important until they are. [00:35:00] And all of a sudden that community comes around you with the loss of a spouse or a mom who has cancer.

We get to show up in the real moments for people because we have this community. This is what we do for one another. You know, Holly Beaton Bell, I’ll never forget. You know, one time my mom was going into surgery. And Holly was at the hospital same time we were just there just to pray with me and my mom, you know That’s what this can look like and then what happens is it’s no longer what Holly does it becomes what we do It’s contagious, you know, everybody starts to do this stuff.

They start to love people. Well, it’s like this example This is you’ve heard this scripture This is the Friends of the Paralytic. It says they find a way to get their friend to the presence of Jesus. And when they do, it says when Jesus saw their faith, he said to the man, friend, your sins are forgiven.

And then he proceeded to heal him. [00:36:00] It was the faith of the friends, his community, that saved him. Do you notice there’s no story about him? It’s the friends. It was the mat carriers that he had that were right there. And so when I joined the organization in 2006 and I, um, I don’t think I realized all the pain I was bringing.

But I was. A lot of hurt. And I get emotional because it’s what we see when our people still join our group. Um, so it’s not about me anymore, it’s about this is real. People come here with so much pain that they have gone through. See, I had a dad who really did love women more than he loved hanging out with his kids in the backyard.

You know, I had a very different experience with my dad than my siblings did. And he had so many anger issues, you know, like all of my memories. I’m sure there are good ones. I just don’t remember them. [00:37:00] But I remember the time he held my sister up by her throat in our hallway. I remember the time he chased me into a bathroom and my mom did everything she could that he would not make it through.

I had to lock the door. Or the time he came and kicked me in the ribs. Well, I was just sitting in my room because something made him mad.

Then I walk into this place and I go, what the heck is this? You know, Ron Beatonboe is the first person at the door that morning when I started. You know, the founder, just sitting there hugging me, welcoming me. Gosh, who knew what I was coming into, bro? I was so cynical, skeptical, very independent. Did not want community.

Surely didn’t want to know anything about the Lord, you know. But I knew that there was something. Cool with this place. I just thought I’m going to do this. There’s not many PR jobs in Lubbock and this place seems pretty awesome. And I’m going to come. And then y’all over the years, [00:38:00] people would do things like, uh, buy me gifts while they were on vacation in Italy or on Beatonville or, uh, every year we have an annual Christmas open house.

We have Santa and Mrs. Claus for years. Uh, that was Carrie and Holly Beatonville. And so the day my second son was born was. A Christmas open house. I was always involved in those. So after four hours of sitting with hundreds of children in the city, we get a knock on our door in the hospital and Santa and Mrs.

Claus have shown up. So Liam can have his first picture on the day of his birth. Who does that? Gosh, just. So many prayers, so many people. I just, I mean, look, they were coaching me. They were teaching me. Ron gave away everything. He did that to Rick. I mean, Carrie, gosh, the prayers of so many people, the love of so many people, Corey, Cal, it’s just, these are my Mac carriers.

Do you see how this goes? I [00:39:00] did come for the core values. You know, that’s what I came for. I did value those things. Excellence is something I value. And then I just got to walk with people and everything changed for me. I was soaking it all up going, what is this? And then one day I went from soaking to seeking.

I want what they have. Why are they always joyful in the midst of this? And I felt, I’m, I felt different. And so God met me on a beaten boat trip in the middle of the Amazon. That’s where he was just waiting for me, an invitation for me. Now mind you, when Andrew and I got married, we were equally yoked, neither of us had faith.

So we both came in here highly skeptical of this kind of kingdom idea. It’s not what we called it, but I want you to hear his story though, what it was like for a spouse to kind of watch this transformation happen. And then there’s Andrew, my husband, my kindest person you’ll ever meet. Zero judgment, loves every person he meets, but does not believe in God.

But [00:40:00] he cannot ignore the way he has been loved on, cared for, prayed on, and prayed over. And he goes to church with me every Sunday. He actually serves at our church every Sunday. He’s actually in a small group. God is doing something. God gave me a vision when Olivia was a baby that they would be baptized together.

And I hold onto that. He still doesn’t know that. So don’t tell him. But I know that God’s promises are always yes and amen. So I know that one day I tell you that. So one day. You’ll see on video him standing here, maybe giving his testimony about how his spouse was impacted by this culture. He came to Christ.

One month to the day, Andrew came to the Lord in Europe. And it was, it’s just been the biggest miracle in our lives. And it’s changed everything. I grew up in a Mormon church. First, [00:41:00] uh, my dad was Baptist. We lived overseas. I went to a Shiite mosque, a Sunni mosque, I went to Buddhist temples. All my friends were different religions.

You know how confusing that is? Most of the time I was talked at. This is the way you’re supposed to believe. Whether it was Christian, whether it was Buddhist, or Muslim, it didn’t matter. Most of what I witnessed most of the time was more religion than it was love. And I was never talked at here. And that’s a big deal.

I think, you know, now I feel like I’m the person I’m supposed to be versus when I was them. I let all this other stuff get in my head that shouldn’t have been there. You know, uh, I don’t work at Beatonville. I don’t work at Beatonville. I don’t work at Beatonville. That, that’s what you need to know. Um, I haven’t worked there, but as a result of it, that I am changed.

You know, [00:42:00] um, it will never get old. That story, our story, um, and so many of you didn’t know as he was leading the hearing from God session that you were witnessing a miracle, you know, one month to the day. See, we, we actually didn’t go to church. Ever. We actually learned about God through our work and then started going to church.

What can God do in your business? You know, when it is a flourishing for all the people. Look, I had to come and put in the hard work too. There were some tough days around here. Okay. But I was always loved. Ron would say that love is the secret sauce, but just try that. Start these things. Try to create this flourishing culture for people and watch what God can do for us, right?

It’s eternal and it’s generational. Just last year, our boys were actually baptized. And so it’s just been the sweetest little [00:43:00] story for us. You know, our whole family now, here they are living their personalities up. We’ve got the one he wanted to be baptized in front of the 200 plus people. And then we had the one that just wanted it in our pool.

And what I love is that Andrew got to do both of those. I couldn’t see past that little vision that God gave us more. That’s what he’s doing here, so much more. So I just have to ask you, if it’s not like this in your culture, what are you waiting for? Why would you not do something different as soon as you get back?

I’m gonna tell you, it changes lives. And it’s still doing that here. I just get the honor and privilege of telling you my story. I’m one of so many, I represent so many. And so father, we just thank you for the power that you have God, for the courage of leaders to come and to put intention behind their work, you know, to just remove their kingdom and try to invite your kingdom in it.

Could we repurpose our work, God, for your [00:44:00] good and glorious purposes? Would every step that we take, would we recognize it’s holy? You’re with us. Could we carry our spirit to the people? Can we do that to where they don’t feel like projects, but just children? Move us from slaves to sons and daughters, God, kings and queens in your kingdom.

We thank you for your love. We thank you for the three days we are changed. We are marked by this time, God. So we ask that you be with us as we take our next steps, lead us, guide us, direct us, but thank you for your love for us in Jesus name. Amen.