Kingdom Leadership Workshop | October 2025
Description
What if your work isn’t separate from your worship—but part of it? In this keynote from the Kingdom Leadership Workshop (October 2025), Brad Nelson shares how God transformed his view of business, leadership, and calling.
Raised in the church and long driven by performance and control, Brad discovered that true abundance begins when we surrender our own authority and invite God’s Kingdom to rule in every area—including the workplace.
Through humor, honesty, and personal testimony, Brad explores what it means to: Live and lead under God’s authority. See your business as ministry. Trade scarcity for abundance. Embrace your spiritual calling in the marketplace.
Whether you’re a CEO, team leader, or team member, this message will inspire you to view your daily work as worship and your leadership as a sacred calling. 📖 “All work is spiritual.”
So, I am really excited that I get to kick us off today. Uh, I get to talk
about a lot of fun stuff. And I always want to kick this off by saying, you know, there’s probably a lot of people
in the room, a lot of different types of people, a lot of people from different walks of life. And some of you were
probably like, “Kingdom at work? Yeah, kingdom. Yeah, God’s kingdom. I’m for
that.” And you’re like, “I can’t wait to learn more.” And there’s probably another subset of
you who were more like kingdom. I don’t know that this is for
me. I don’t know how God could even interact with a business. And so maybe
uh I’m just going to go. Maybe your boss told you what this was all about, but maybe you’re just here to kind of check
it out and test the water, so to speak. I just want to say that no matter what your background is today and no matter
what you believe about what we’re about to say or where you come from or any of it, uh I just want you to know you’re
welcome here and that we want you here. We want you to come. We want you to feel welcome. We want you to uh listen to
what we’re saying, but also just uh relax. We’re not expecting you to be anybody that you aren’t.
So, I gave this talk uh for the first time a year or so ago, and I really felt
afterwards that the Lord was telling me, “You got to change it up a little bit.” And I was like, “Well, what do you do? What do you mean, Lord? What what do you want me to talk about?” And he was like,
“Well, uh, testimony. You should give your testimony.” And I was like, “Oh, of course. Uh, Christians, right? We have
testimonies.” And, uh, I remember thinking in the moment like, “Lord,
okay, testimony, but what testimony? What? What do you mean testimony? I
don’t I don’t really have a testimony. Uh it’s it is funny like we’re supposed to have as Christians this colorful
testimony, right? I remember one time I was in Las Vegas and I was at an
industry event and we were we were getting this award and I was in the casino at the Bellagio. Yep. And I we
were sitting there by some slot machines and I remember a guy came up to me. He was with a ministry uh that we had
partnered with and he came up to me and he was he was introducing himself and the very first thing out of his mouth
was, “Hi, I’m so and so. How did you come to know Jesus?” And I was like,
“Oh, that’s how this conversation is going to go.” And I remember being really nervous because I could tell the
look on his face was like, “I hope that the conversation is, who is this Jesus
guy? Tell me more.” And like it became like, oh man, you know, I just gambled my last dollar away
on this slot machine and sold my child for a vial of crack. And
you know, but that’s not that isn’t actually me, you know. I I could tell he
wanted to lead me to faith right then and there, right? But the truth is and the the ugly truth of it is is that my
parents raised me in the church. they I knew Jesus from the time I was zero
years old to where I am today. There was never a time when I doubted the
existence of God or when I didn’t believe that I was going to be saved. Now, obviously along the way that uh
changed over time, right? I mean, I there were es and flows in faith and in my relationship with God, but uh the the
boring truth of all of it is is that I that was always there for me. It never really wasn’t.
And it was kind it’s kind of uneasy when people ask you about it. And you know,
growing up in the church is kind of funny for other reasons, too. Uh, you know, I don’t have the the colorful testimony, but I do have the experience
of growing up in the church. And, you know, one of the one of the funniest things uh is trying to explain really
complex theological concepts to young children. So, like when I was four, I remember asking my dad about Easter. I
was like, “Dad, what’s this Easter thing? It’s tomorrow and I don’t know what it And he was like, “Well, son, you know, on Easter, uh, Jesus came back
from the dead, and so because he came back from the dead, that means that we
when we die, we come back from the dead, too.” He was trying to explain the resurrection to me, but that’s not what
I heard in my head. Four-year-old me didn’t understand that. Four-year-old me heard, “Okay, so we’re going to paint
eggs, hide them, be visited by a giant anthropomorphic bunny, and then, you know, get to see dead grandma.
And I think that was a little bit much for my four-year-old brain to really take in. But, you know, that’s the being raised
in the church has other problems as well. My main expression of faith when I
was growing up was just going to church on Sundays and like maybe occasionally go to youth group and other events. And
for me, like, yes, my faith had saved me, but now the point of my life was really just to maintain my faith and
maybe not try to sin so much and maybe do some praise and worship every now and
go to heaven when I die, right? Has anyone ever felt that?
And I don’t I have absolutely no idea where we got this idea from. Like, that’s not in the Bible that we’re just
supposed to go to church and not sin so much and then go to heaven when we die. Um, you know, a long time ago here, we
did this thing where we read through the whole Bible together as a company. It was a long time ago. I can’t even remember when that was now. It’s probably 2012. But I remember uh getting
to the Gospels and reading through the Gospels cover to cover and thinking, man,
I must have been missing something my whole life because my whole life I thought that being a Christian was about
going to church. But reading the Gospels, Jesus really
never talked about it. He never talked about going to church even a single time. He said the word
church a few times, but he wasn’t talking about a building that you go to on Sundays. He was talking about the
body of of believers, right? And it’s so crazy that we’ve lost this, right? And I
and I have to say it blew my mind and kind of caused a bit of a crisis of faith for me. And it’s not that like I
didn’t believe. I did. But I was having to reconcile that faith that I grew up with this thing that I read in the Bible
that was like, man, this so different. And you know, it’s funny. Jesus didn’t
talk much about the church because he spent most of his time talking about the kingdom,
right? I mean, he mentioned the the church like a handful of times. And literally, he was talking about the
kingdom all the time. It’s like all he ever talked about was the kingdom. And
you see it from the very beginning of his ministry. And he went throughout all Galilee teaching in their synagogues and proclaiming the gospel of the kingdom
and healing every disease and every affliction among the people.
And it’s basically through the entirety of the gospels in scripture. This is what he’s talking about. He’s talking
about the kingdom. But what does that even mean? What is like what do you mean the
kingdom? And sometimes he says kingdom of heaven, sometimes kingdom of God, right? And but like what is what is
that? And I think what does that mean for us as believers today that he’s not
talking about going to church, but he’s talking about the kingdom? Does does the kingdom mean church or or the other way around or what what does that even mean?
And I think a lot of times we get this image in our mind of like um a castle, right? I think you think kings and you
think medieval castles and knights and squires and all the things, right? And I think
one of the ways to think about this is when we say kingdom, what we really mean is anywhere a king.
So does you you look at this castle and you don’t really have any ide.
And if there’s a road where you don’t pay the tax, that’s probably a place where it’s not really under his
authority. And so it’s pretty simple in that regard. Another way of putting this might be
that we might say that this the kingdom of God is the emerging order of God in the affairs of mankind. Where is his
authority expressing itself in our day-to-day work, in our day-to-day lives, in the day-to-day affairs that we
have? Another way of thinking about it is wherever God rules, where does God rule?
Does God rule in my school? Does he rule in my home? Do we take what he says seriously today? In my house, in my
marriage, in everything that I do. So, if this is about God’s authority
being present in the world, um, does that mean that his authority isn’t
already present in the world? Like, wait a second. Are you saying that God’s not here right now like with his authority
and not not fully right I think the fall made sure of that and we rejected God’s
authority and all the benefits of it right when when we left the garden and that’s why we were cast out of the
garden to begin with it was the sin and the entirety of the story of the Bible is about us getting back to that point
where we’re back 100% living under the authority of God
And but that lack of authority is what’s called all man caused all manner of
harms to fall on us. Sickness, we’ve got hunger, we’ve got sadness, we’ve got lonely. All these things, right? And
ultimately death is what we deal with. And that’s the world we inhabit. Not one
that’s 100% under God’s authority, but one that is lacking his authority.
And he wants to first establish that authority in our hearts but also in the fundamental aspects of how the world
works. And that’s really what we mean by his kingdom.
And you see uh it’s easy to get this confused right because you see the apostles are always getting this confused. And in scripture I mean even
after he comes back they’re like so when they had come together they asked him Lord will you at this time restore the kingdom to Israel? is they are hearing
him talk about the kingdom and they’re constantly thinking, “Oh, he must be coming to like kick out the the dumb
Romans and reestablish a very physical kingdom on earth immediately.” And we
see in scripture where Jesus is constantly having to push back on this idea. His ministry wasn’t just about
teaching people to think differently though or bringing them to faith, although he did those things. I mean,
you see it in him feeding the 5000. Was is hunger an expression of God’s authority in the world? No. So, he fed
them. You see them constantly healing people? Was was sickness or blindness
an expression of God’s authority in the world? Is that how he wanted people to live and and exist? It’s like, no. So,
he healed them. He made the blind see. And you see it when he talks about the least of these my brothers when he casts
out demons and when he teaches his entire ministry was about reestablishing God’s authority in the world and curing
the scars that were left behind by sin. Way to put this if you think about it
from that lens is he was trying to bring the rule of heaven down to earth. He was
trying to bring heaven to earth. And that’s kind of the crux of what we mean
and what he meant by kingdom. And if we’re so excited and if that was
Jesus’s purpose, shouldn’t that be ours, too? I mean, if we’re thinking about eternal life and going to heaven,
shouldn’t we be excited to build that future today, right here, and right now? Yeah.
And you know what? We can get started on that right now. If Jesus was here to set right the
wrongs caused by sin, shouldn’t we set ourselves about doing the same things? When we see someone hungry, shouldn’t we
feed them? If we see someone naked, shouldn’t we clothe them? Should we care for the widowed and the fatherless?
Isn’t this true religion in the sight of God according to James? But we’ve forgotten it. We’ve forgotten
it in recent years. We see our religion as going to church on Sunday. And we,
you know, we believe that the wrongs of the world uh need to be writed, but we sometimes don’t think it’s our job to
do. But it is. And that work has to happen in every single hour and every single
day of our lives. And that includes our, by the way, and especially our
businesses. You know where most of us spend most of our time? It’s at work.
Spend way more time at work than I do at church. Now, you might be saying to yourself,
“Wait a second. Is this guy saying the local church isn’t important?” And let me be very clear on that.
The work of the local church is still exceedingly important, but
the kingdom doesn’t fit within the church. The church fits within the kingdom.
And you might also be saying, you know, this all seems like really abstract and you know, Jesus spoke in a lot of
parables and maybe this is just not a concrete idea that we need to concern ourselves with in this life and we’ll we’ll figure it out later when Jesus
comes back. Uh, and does God even care about like what I do in my business? The, you know, and what I’ll say to you
today is that the entirety of the next three days is going to be about answering those questions for you. And
like I’m really excited to explain it, but I don’t want to spoil it for you.
Okay, maybe we’ll talk about one thing. I want to talk today about one of the
really important ways that this becomes very real in a business and it’s called abundance.
Abundance is so fundamental to how God’s kingdom works. Right? If you look back
to the way things worked in the garden before the fall, did we ha did we have
an abundance? It’s like absolutely we did, right? We had an abundance of everything. There was an abundance of
food and animals and God’s love was an abundance. And nobody had to worry about health or sickness or dying. And I even
was thinking like, man, God, there was probably an abundance of mice and rats, too, because there were so many snakes
lying around. But after the fall, scarcity kicked in in a big way, right? We started to lack
things. We started to have to toil in the field to have food. And this
scarcity thing took over. And now by the sweat of our face, we would eat. But
that wasn’t God’s plan for us from the very beginning. That was our plan. That was our authority that took over, caused
us to starve, caused us to get sick, and ultimately caused us to die.
And if we want to advance God’s authority into every area of our lives, including in our business, then we have
to adopt an abundance mindset. And this is about the belief that we’ll
always have what we need. God is our provider, and therefore, we don’t really need to worry about having enough of
anything. And I’ll be honest, you didn’t get the guy who’s the best at
this talking about this. You got the guy who’s if you saw the
real me, you would see scars. I would be missing a finger, maybe have the peg leg
where I got beat up, right? And
so we, you know, but I think I’ve learned a lot about abundance over the years. And having an abundance mindset
is also about looking at what the Lord’s given us today and choosing to be content with it. I think it think it
means we think about relationships differently. It’s not always like financial resources. You know, when we’re looking
at a deal, when we’re negotiating a deal with someone, are we just looking to get as much as we possibly can out of that deal because we’re scared we won’t get
another chance to get more or do we look at that as an opportunity to lift both of us up, me and the person I’m
negotiating with? And you know, it doesn’t really like a
lot of times we look at that as like it doesn’t really matter what happens to that person. All that matters is what I get out of this at the end of the day.
And that’s hard for a financial guy to to get up there and say, believe me, you know, debt is an example of that in our
business. We our business doesn’t use debt to finance its operations. And I think
like the ultimate scarcity thing. It’s like especially credit cards, right? I think we all we’ve all heard Dave Ramsey, but maybe another way to
approach this is like when you are functioning on credit cards, it’s really a lack of an abundance mindset and you’re running on scarcity. It’s like I
need more and I don’t have enough. So, I’m going to borrow the money to get more because I have to have more.
But when we’re running on abundance, it’s whatever the opportunities God has given us the resources for, those are
the ones we’re going to chase. And I remember there was a time when we were like running dangerously low on
cash and I was thinking, man, like I am I the only person who’s concerned about this situation? Like we’re about to run
out of money. Like we don’t like we’re not like other businesses where we run out of money and we just go borrow more.
Like we run out of money and we and people don’t get paid. That’s how that works. And I remember just looking
around the room and everybody was just like so calm and collected about it. And it really freaked me out cuz I was like,
“Man, you guys need to be more concerned about this.” And you know, it’s like they were like, they just knew that God
was going to provide. They didn’t know how. They didn’t even think that we weren’t going to run out of money. They
just knew that whatever happened, no matter how bad things got, God was always with us. And it cut to the core
of my control freak self, if I’m being honest. And the funny thing is, the Lord
actually did provide exactly what we needed. And I got to see that happen.
And you know, this is not the same as like prosperity, right? Abundance isn’t being like we’re all going to have wild
financial success. It’s a mentality, not a reality.
And it’s not a it’s not like some kind of reward for our faithfulness where if we could just be more faithful, God
would give us more money. The Bible clearly says that the Lord sends his reign on the righteous and the unrighteous.
So, we could totally find ourselves in a time when we don’t have enough of something. And this happens all the time
to believers. You know, another way I’m really uh really excited to share this story
because I haven’t ever shared it before, but uh another way that this happens is with people.
I remember when I started with the company
and you know, one of the things about us, as you get to know us, you’ll learn that we promote and hire people who have
absolutely no earthly business being involved in the job that we’re hiring them for.
And I use that word carefully, earthly business, because it’s not, but it is heaven’s
business. And it’s and the way to think about that and the way that I really struggled with
this because I watched it over the years. I would watch Rick hire somebody and I’d be like, “Oh man, this person’s
a disaster. How could you have hire hired this person?” Or I’d watch people hire and hire and hire and then they
wouldn’t work out and I’d be like, “Look, look what you’ve done. You’ve you’ve made such a mess of this.”
And it hurts people. And it’s it’s painful for all of us who have to clean up the mess of all of it. And
like honestly, that was scarcity thinking. Fullon scarcity. It’s like this person
is not enough for what we need. The Lord didn’t send enough of a person to help us solve the problems. And is that true?
No, it’s not true. The Lord did send somebody. And you know what was happening was that the people who were
making the decisions had this abundance mindset. And they were seeing people for what
they could be, not for what they were, but what the Lord called to called them
to in their life. And that same thing happened when they hired me.
And I just didn’t realize it. You know,
I remember uh the scarcity in a in a big way for
myself and I think a lot of it was uh was an issue of pride. I felt like I am
bringing everything that I need to be bringing and I have the skills and I have the talents to do this and if we
would just focus on putting people in place who had the skills and talents just like me, we would be good. And you
know the scripture that comes to mind when I think about that is the one of the tax collector and the Pharisee and they’re praying right and the the tax
collector is like, “Oh man, Lord, thank you for having mercy on me.” And the Pharisees like, “Man, aren’t I great?
Is aren’t aren’t I just so lucky to not be like this tax collector?” And was
that me or what? It was. And
you know, I didn’t I don’t think I had a malicious mindset in any of this. I in my heart, I felt like, wouldn’t it be
great if we could just help more people and we could be more efficient and we could operate better and that this would lead to more change from more people’s
lives. We could build more homes. We could make them less expensive. Wouldn’t that be awesome?
And uh this mindset was so deep in me at some point and I didn’t get it at all. I
didn’t get it at all. and and people around me got it. And I I actually found myself, and this is a long story and I’m
shortening it a lot, but I found myself at a point where I had been demoted a couple times largely because of this
pride issue. And I remember uh I wasn’t even hearing from the Lord very well back then
because I was it was like so the the pride was so loud in my head that I was struggling. And I remember one day Cal
came to me. Cal, my friend, he came to me and told me that the Lord told him that I was supposed to go that Randy
Wilson was supposed to go start a distribution company and that I was supposed to go be his right-hand man
and that I wasn’t actually supposed to be the guy to lead it. That I was the guy who had all the leadership experience and I was the guy who had the
most capability and I was the guy who had the most talent at processes and procedures and things like that. Right?
And that that cut to me and and he also told me at the same time
and I’ll paraphrase this because I really don’t remember the exact words but uh that I needed to stop making everything about me. Do you remember
that? And I wish that I could say in that
moment that I got down on my knees, had a big change of heart and said, “I’m sorry, Lord.
Man, I’m recommitting myself to live in humility.”
But that’s not what happened. And my response in the moment was, “There’s nothing wrong with me.”
But I knew the Cal loved me. We had worked together for over a decade. I
knew that he cared about me as a person. And I knew he wanted what was best for me. And so even though I didn’t
completely understand what was going on, I said yes to go do it. And at first, I brought the same broken
approach that I always had. For the first six months, I tried to be the best at all the things that I was
doing. Distribution, warehousing, and I found out that I was actually terrible at pretty much all of them.
I didn’t know the first thing about any of it. I came from a world where I was a software developer and my job was just
to know the most about everything. I remember I got the first forklift at the warehouse and the guy shows up and
the forklift’s on the back of the truck and he unchains it and he’s like, “All right, here’s the keys. Go ahead.” Like, “Go ahead. What? It’s like, you can
unload it now. It’s like, oh, I’ll just let you do it. I don’t know anything
about driving a forklift. Never driven one in my life. I remember a time when
uh I was unloading the very first truck that came to Elevate Building Supply. And it had been raining. And I didn’t
know that when it rains on the dock plates, you cannot drive a forklift over them. And so this guy shows up in a
semi-truck and I need to unload the truck, but I cannot get the forklift over the dock plate because I am too dumb to know how to do it. And I
remember just like screaming out at the Lord in that moment, like, Lord, what have you done? Like, how is this possible that I found myself in a place
where I can’t do it? And that first six months was all about
failure. And the Lord and that started to change
when the Lord sent people who actually knew what they were doing to help me.
He sent somebody who knew how to operate a forklift, who knew how to run a warehouse.
He sent someone who is a world-class expert in building products and building product development and change the
course of that business. And every time I failed at something, I
had the privilege of watching them be really good at it and the Lord be responsible for it. And
over time, I really learned about living in my own weakness. and finding my strength in it.
And at one point, I knew that the Lord uh was calling me away from Elevate.
I remember him telling me that uh my time was coming to an end and that
Sawyer Reynolds, the guy who is uh the building product expert, was supposed to be the guy to lead it and that I didn’t
really have a place there anymore. And I remember telling my wife that that one day and just being like, “Jess, I
know this is going to sound really crazy, but I think God’s telling me I’m not supposed to be there anymore and I’m supposed to leave.” And I don’t know
what that means cuz there’s not another job for me. And I had no idea what would be next. I
actually thought maybe I could get Sawyer to keep me on as a forklift driver. I had learned since then
how to actually operate one. And even though I wasn’t the best forklift operator there, um maybe they would have
me, but at least I wouldn’t think I was the best at it anymore.
And you know, the Lord did have a next thing for me, but that’s not the end of the story. That’s not the point. The
story ended with me giving up everything and stepping into my true identity, giving God control over all my work. And
I had found true abundance in that and losing everything.
And none of that would have been possible without someone like Cal who is committed to being a spiritual leader.
To me, honestly, that the way that conversation should
have gone is Brad, this is your last day at Bebo.
That would have been the right thing to do, especially by a worldly standard.
But they had learned to seek God’s spirit and to ask him what was best for me.
They saw me not who I was, but what the Lord was calling me to be in my life.
And they rejected my other identity and continued to redirect me even when it
was hard. And that was that’s what spiritual leadership is all about.
And you’re called to be spiritual leaders, too. Every single person in this room is called to be a spiritual
leader. You know, you saw that uh video with the kids talking earlier about what they
want to be when they grow up and like how they’re viewing sacred sacred and secular callings. And I remember this
one time uh key guy in my church growing up was talking about this divide and he was saying, you know, there’s just like
two types of people in the world. There’s people who go into full-time ministry and they’re called to it and they’re
called to go to Africa or some place like that and those who are called to fund full-time ministry.
And in a way, he was saying if you aren’t called to spiritual work, then you’re just called to live as moral a
life as you possibly can and give money to ministries and just wait around until you die.
That’s that’s really what he was saying. And uh if we have a kingdom mindset, we can’t think that way, right? We if God’s
if God wants to establish his authority over all things, then all things are spiritual.
And our calling as believers is to advance God’s authority into every area of our lives and the world in which we
live. And from the beginning of the creation, there was no spiritual or secular divide. Even Adam had a job,
right? It was he got to name all the creatures and that was great, right? is
like elephant and giraffe and you know duck build platypus and God
wasn’t mad about that even though you know that’s kind of a funny name
and one of the ways that uh we see this play out in scripture is this word uh avoda
like to introduce you to the word avoda this is a Hebrew word you see the root in a lot of words in scripture when you’re reading and this word
simultaneously means work, worship, and service.
You see, they didn’t really have a distinction in their head. Everything was spiritual. Work was the same as
worship, and it was the same as service. And we see this when we look at like Genesis 2. The Lord took the man and put
him in the garden of Eden to work it and take care of it. That word, the root is avo.
And this is what the Lord says, “Let my people go so that they may worship me.” In Exodus, that root is avoid.
But as for me and my household, we will serve the Lord from Joshua. That word serve is avoda. There was no difference
here. And really, all things are spiritual and
all work is spiritual. And you know, in spite of the occasional outlier, somewhere in the past 2,000
years, we lost sight of this, right? It used to be this way. Jews and Christians
actually both used to believe this way in the very days. But somewhere along the way, the work of
the pastor became more important and the work of the world became a means to the end of salvation.
But I can tell you today that the work of that each of you does in your business is just as important and
critical to God’s kingdom as the work of a pastor and the work that happens in the local church. Your business is a
ministry and you’re called to care for the people around you and advance God’s kingdom into the areas for which you
have authority. Now, one point to add to this is some of you may be thinking right now that like
I run my business on the highest Christian ethics and I give money to ministries all over the world. And man,
that’s great. You should give yourself a nice pat on the back for that. But
that’s actually not what we’re talking about today. We do it. But that’s not what this week. We’re talking about
repurposing your business and your relationships in the marketplace to be an intentional
ministry to care for God’s people and reveal his love to them. And that starts with your own employees.
You know, in a way, I guess I really do have a testimony now. I was lost in this secular mindset and
God found me in the marketplace. 30 years after Rick and Ron made a
covenant to give their business to God, uh, it transformed my life, renewed my
calling, and now even a task oriented, spreadsheet loving guy like me gets to come to work every day to heal the
brokenness in the world and care for God’s people. If God can use a guy like me to do that,
what’s he going to do with you? So Lord, I pray for these business
leaders today. I ask that you give them wisdom, that you give them peace in this new calling,
that you equip them this week for all of the spiritual things that they need to do in their life and in their business.
That the love that you have for them would be felt acutely. and that you and that they would all
adopt the spiritual calling to which they’ve all been perfectly called.
Amen.
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