Episode 200 - Host A Party. Watch What Happens Next.
The global Faith Driven Movement is well served by a virtual conference that is “attended” by a network of local Watch Parties. Director of Operations Sue Alice Sauthoff sits down with several Watch Party hosts who have gone on to spark a movement in their own neighborhoods as a result. Listen to this inspiring conversation. Who knows how God might inspire you to host or join a local Watch Party of your own?
All opinions expressed on this podcast, including the team and guests, are solely their opinions. Host and guests may maintain positions in the companies and securities discussed. This podcast is for informational purposes only and should not be relied upon as specific advice for any individual or organization.
Episode Transcript
Transcription is done by an AI software. While technology is an incredible tool to automate this process, there will be misspellings and typos that might accompany it. Please keep that in mind as you work through it.
Henry Kaestner: Welcome back to the Faith Driven Entrepreneur podcast. Today is, yes, you guessed it, a special episode, and I say that a lot and every time I say it, though, it's true. And today, though, is maybe a little bit extra true and that we're doing a little bit of a behind the scenes about what makes Faith Driven Entrepreneur work. And so I'm with the person who makes all that happened behind the scenes, our director of operations Sue Alice Sauthoff from beautiful western North Carolina, Sue Alice. Thank you for being my co-host today.
Sue Alice Sauthoff: It's great to be with you today, Henry. And it is a beautiful day in western North Carolina today,
Henry Kaestner: and every day is a beautiful day in North Carolina and I miss I miss North Carolina. Guy called me out here to the West Coast, but I miss it. I miss it. OK, so today is a chance for us to talk to our audience and help them to understand a little bit more about what their part of this broader movement that they found themselves in. When we think about our strategic plan and where God has called us with Faith Driven Entrepreneur, we come down to two things that we really feel are things that we focus in on number one content, and the other one is community content. You'll understand, of course, the blog and the podcast are Eric Content Community, and many of you are familiar with FDE groups. We had FDE groups in the January Shepherd cohort. I guess we had six hundred plus faith driven entrepreneurs getting together in the community from 88 countries. A place, though, where content and community come together is our conference. And yes, I think it's probably pretty easy for people to understand about how that means great content. You've seen it before. We've had several and we have some of the very best minds across Christendom from dude perfect at Tim Keller talking about what they see God doing in the marketplace as a way to equip, empower, encourage a Faith Driven Entrepreneur. But what many people might not know is that actually really learns in the community as well. A couple of years ago, as Rusty probably told you in the intro, we had a volunteer that said, You know what? I'd love to go ahead and do it watch party. We had an online event. I guess we had maybe 800 people and there's one watch party. Well, last year we had 300 watch parties among thousands and thousands of people downloaded from around the world. That's a really special time to come together and even in the midst of a pandemic to be able to celebrate what God is doing locally. And that's one of the things that's so key because entrepreneurship can be a lonely journey, but it doesn't need to be an a must surely is not if we're together in local community process and content and meeting people like yourselves. So oftentimes we hear from Faith driven entrepreneurs when people say, I think I'm the I thought I was the only one until I met these other 30 people to watch party. So two hours, thank you for joining before we introduce our guests that are great representatives from the Faith Driven Entrepreneur community who've been such a great encouragement to both of us. Who are you? And where do you come from?
Sue Alice Sauthoff: Yeah, well, I'm Sewell's Saraf. As Henry already said, I'm director of operations here at Faith Driven Entrepreneur. I live in a little college town in the mountains of North Carolina called Boone and have been a part of this faith driven team for just over a year now. And it is really exciting to just see how God has been bringing our team together and entrepreneurs and investors who are partnering with us in this movement as we are taking this mandate from God to go into the world as we're called to create and find ourselves made in his image. We want to be a part of what he's doing in the world, and so I want to go ahead and pass it over to our guests because
Sue Alice Sauthoff: they are the real stars of the show who everyone wants to hear from. So, Ryan Lacey, Martin, Bonnie, we're really glad you're here.
Sue Alice Sauthoff: Why don't you tell us who are where you come from and how you got connected to the faith driven movement?
Lacey Ellis: Absolutely, yeah. My name is Lacey Ellis and I'm from Kansas City. I'm on the Kansas side. For those of you who are familiar with Kansas City. We're kind of split in between Missouri and Kansas here. We live on the Kansas side and I've been an entrepreneur now for think it's close to nine years. I can't really believe it's been that long, but it's been about a year and a half since I got actually acquainted with Faith Driven Entrepreneur through a friend that has an awesome business, and we ended up figuring out we were both following after God's call for our lives. And he said, You need to check out Faith Driven Entrepreneur. Have you heard of this? And I said, That's a thing like what? I've been looking for something like this for so long. So I was so excited to hear that it was happening because, as you guys know, following God's call and really co-creating with him is a very different path. And it's just so encouraging to walk alongside other people who are doing it that same way. So that's how I got plugged in. My first group was about a year ago. It actually started in January last year, so I got to go through the foundation. Eight-Week course with Steve Miller, who facilitated that group, and that's where I got started.
Boni de Jesus: I'm Boni de Jesus. I'm 72 years old, by the way, and I'm married to one wife, Stella Sterling, and we have three adult children. One is unmarried and one I'm married, have one grandson. I'm a chemical engineer by college background. But I went into finance. I'm know freelance financial consultant and I help companies expand by accessing finance from banks and financial institutions. And we started this Facebook called Market Project Community before joining. We had small groups talking about all of these things. And then one day one of the members of the market project, I must say, I said, You called me and you attended actually one of the conferences a year ago that was 2020 during the pandemic that they called me. And he said that there's this group called three BAM to be your best or he wants me to be in the store. I said yes and I was introduced to Christianity. And it was a breakthrough, actually, because it's not easy to start a movement. The market projects a movement without any more. There are company. It's not easy to do something you feel that the Lord is asking you to do and you feel like, are we the only ones globally? And when you talk to Christine, I saw God doing something globally where we were just a part of, and that's for us very important. That's very significant for us.
Martin Kibisu: My name is Martin Kibisu and I love working with entrepreneurs. So I think that's important to note I really believe. But and apprenticeship is the answer to a lot of the challenges we face with exposure to reduction with eight unemployment. Yeah, I believe so. Where do we come from? I come from Nairobi, Kenya. That's where I live. And I connected with the faith driven movement through a gentleman that I met who's become a very good friend, Mr. Aigburth. So we met with him over lunch. I was introduced to him by a mutual friend and we met over lunch and we just took it out. So that's how I learned about and got invited for the first Faith driven entrepreneurs meeting. Yeah. So there is no connection through it, but so I consider myself as a support system to the enterprise. So I have attempted entrepreneurship in the past, but the passion I have is to come alongside the enterprises because I have a vast experience in the corporate world on strategy development, on innovation management. And my training is I have a master's in organizational development and I've worked in the aviation space for over 15 years in different roles. Whether it's project management, change management, innovation, continuous improvement strategy. And so my passion is to be able to take that skill that I've learned over the years and use that to be able to put into print to support them in terms of help them put structure. I have them come up with proper strategies that would enable them build businesses that will outlive them and that will have an actual impact.
Ryan Crozier: Well, one is Ryan Crozier. Romania is an incredible country for those of you that have been and if you haven't yet, you've got to come. It's amazing.
Henry Kaestner: It is amazing. So a quick plug on Romania. Henry Kaiser. It was one of the great highlights of my professional career, my ministry career, which one in the same was being with you all in October. And this the warm reception from Faith driven entrepreneurs and five different cities in Romania. And it's amazing what God is doing there. An incredibly beautiful country. We had an event, of course, in Transylvania, which my kids thought was really, really cool. But colder than that is just this ecosystem that's been developed through your leadership and so many others. So yeah, Romania is awesome.
Ryan Crozier: I'm very blessed just to get to be part of it, and God's doing some really cool stuff here. And there is, as you experience the desire among Christian entrepreneurs to wow, like you said, to find community and to be themselves and get to be an entrepreneur and talk about faith in God is it's rare environments where you feel safe to do that. And you guys have helped create that. And so we're really glad to just to be part of it. And it's been fun to be on the journey here as God is moving in this country in incredible ways.
Lacie Ellis: I'm so glad to have you guys here. So let's start with the why behind faith driven movement. How you guys got connected, Lacey, you kind of alluded to this already, but dove in a bit more to why is the faith driven movement important to you and tell us, maybe even just practically how it has made an impact in your lives over the last few months, years as you've been connected?
Lacey Ellis: Yeah. So it's always been really important to me. As I started my company back in 2013, I actually didn't even really think of it as starting a company so much as I thought of it, as partnering with God and really following this calling that I had to create this tech product found out pretty quick as I plugged into the entrepreneurial community here in Kansas City that, well, Lacey, that's going to have to be a company because if it's not, there's not going to be any way to raise money for it and to really do what needs to happen to bring this to market. And so I said, OK, Lord, OK, friends, we're going to figure this out. And so I started learning how to raise money and do everything that it takes to essentially become an entrepreneur and to start a company. It was definitely the most challenging thing I've ever done in my life, especially since my background is art direction and design, and I'm having to learn how to build projections and investor decks. It was a whole new vocabulary, everything. Thankfully, the Lord sent lots of amazing people that made that possible. No way I could do it alone, but the whole time I'm thinking, you know, I would love to walk alongside or being community with other entrepreneurs who are doing this, not just to build companies that are about making money, but really fulfilling a calling to co-create with God. Like, I knew there had to be other people doing this. I just didn't know where to find them. And even though I was so deeply plugged in to the community here, nobody talked about it, even if I would bring up matters of faith. Once you get comfortable people, you start talking about your lives and you meet people that are comfortable talking about it. But still, there is no organization here, nothing even through the church that I could find. And so I just always kind of had that in the back of my mind. I wish there was community, I wish there was a space and people that I could talk about this with. So honestly, when I heard about this movement in this group, I was just so excited to start getting plugged in, and that's kind of what got me to this point. And then it's just over the past year really been huge for my own personal journey and my business journey to meet people continually. I didn't really think that I would actually jump in and host a watch party or do any meetings at that time. But I was really encouraged by Steve, who was the facilitator in the group that I was in the first group last January. And then he connected me to some people here that I had never met before here in Kansas City, who were really excited about it and had some connections to faith driven. And it just started to bloom, and I could tell that the Lord wanted this, that it wasn't me. I always know that it's God moving when it's not Laci willing it into existence and it just starts. It starts happening and people start coming and things start kind of falling into place. So I really just wanted to be a steward to just let this be God's, and we were able to connect.
Lacey Ellis: So Martin and Bonnie, how did you guys pull up your event? Give us the details.
Lacey Ellis: How did you decide to host, who'd invite and all of those details?
Martin Kibisu: We got a couple of enterprise ideas about 30 give or take 30 35, and we met at a place called Harry Haight, some restaurant called Skip's. So we had two screens and we planned to have some snacks and buy things because the idea behind it is we had then to produce come earlier and we wanted people to meet and get to know each other and get to connect and get to network and get to fellowship a little before the watch party began. And so after that, of course, we had to watch party and post the words, but we had a Q&A session, which was also very insightful and informative, where then the producer would talk about what is it that was the biggest inspiration for them? What was their biggest take home, what impacted them? And so the which part was really impactful. I mean, like because of one, the content, the different case studies. I think for me, as you remember the guy who who designed a little coffin to be interesting, but the different case studies and interpret as really being able to feel a connection because they are also in the trenches to see other people in the trenches who go on ahead of them. And maybe it's coming back to tell them how they did it and the challenges they face and how they. Fight to stay on course in terms of I'm a person of faith and compromise my faith. I will also value people over money. That was it. I think the watch party was a very good preamble to the Faith Driven Entrepreneur groups that then I got the privilege of leading because then the words parties almost like it gives you a sneak peek into what the Faith Driven Entrepreneur ERG movement is about. What I'm going to have to done, as I've alluded earlier, is able to lead and FDE group of about 15 people, 15 members, different into producers from different places. And it was during COVID. So most people were holding their stuff online. But we wanted to do an in-person meeting just to be able to connect better. And it was very impactful. Literally, every single day, they kind of sometimes encouragement, sometimes transformation. Somebody would come for an entrepreneur who would come for a meeting, like a young lawyer who just tired of his law firm. And after the meeting, we had a lot of conversations like this is exactly what I needed for today at the end of myself. And today's session has just lifted me up and given me New Hope somebody would come and say, Wow. Today's session has clarified why I need to stand firm and not compromise my faith in my principles. And we had a lot of stories like this, and we will not somebody who gave their life to Christ through the FDE movement, the decisions we had and we had people coming out of the group of those living that then went ahead to lead other groups. So I feel like the words, but it was a good preamble to usher people into the FDE groups that then enables Faith driven entrepreneurs to understand the value of the FDE movement. Yeah. So it was really important
Boni de Jesus: that this conference in 2021, I invite that some pastors I invited some members of the market project and some of them called me up after that one Praxis. And they said, What is this? I get one taking down notes, and it's so good. You know, it's revolutionized my thinking. We changed the way I understood the gospel. And for me, that's that's a good start. There were about, I think, six to seven people and I took the number for start, and I believe that I scene was planted in the people who attended. God is a creator God, and he created us his image and likeness, and therefore we're able to create a vision of how we see it. Why is it that some people don't know that they should? Because like most of us in the Philippines, we were trained to think that we need money, that we need full of money, and therefore that life is going to get stronger. As the saying goes, the guy looks like a boy. Life gets even harder and harder. And if you raised in that kind of environment, the moment you reach the age of fending for ourselves, we're looking for just an employment and be able to make money, not realizing that we have got to give things that are even more valuable than money. So that's where either an interpreter. Dealing with interpreters. And when they saw that in the Bible, I realized that everything is in the Bible.
Henry Kaestner: Super cool. Super cool to Alice. There are likely some listeners that are saying, Wow, this sounds really cool. I think I could launch a watch party. How do I get started? But before you do that, please also mention a little bit about this year's conference is really special. It's going to be a little different than last year. We can have a little bit more time for people to gather and interact in between speakers. But it's going to be broadcast from a pretty special place. Tell us about it.
Lacey Ellis: Yeah, we are so excited. September 28 Faith Driven Entrepreneur September 29th Faith Driven Investor We're going to be coming from Nairobi, Kenya. There is such a vibrant, entrepreneurial and investor community in Nairobi, and we are so excited to partner with some of our friends there to host the conference from Nairobi. As Henry said, we are going to adapt the format just a bit so that we can do exactly as Lisa alluded to, that we're able to open up a little bit more space in the time of day for everyone to just stop looking at the screen and start turning and looking at each other and talk about what impacted them. We have some incredible speakers that we're just starting to share a little bit about who those are. But we are really excited. We have Andy Crouch coming back. He's always a favorite. He's going to be talking about reclaiming the right balance of relationship and technology. Strive Mathekga is going to be joining us to talk about opportunities in Africa if we're sold out. Jenny Allen is joining us to talk about. Importance of finding our people, our community, which is just what we've been talking about, and you have Tim Tebow talking about spending weeks in Africa and just what that has done, even in his own life in his journey as a Faith Driven Entrepreneur. David Greene from the Hobby Lobby and Enterprise is going to be talking about running a family business. And then we also have Nicky Gumbel from HCB Alpha Course is going to be joining us as well and several other voices from across Africa. I'm not going to give too much away because we want to direct some of us along to keep people excited. There are so many more incredible speakers to come. But as you heard, Ryan and Lacy say, what's so exciting is that this is a global movement. As you've heard us say, we are in the podcast goes to over 150 countries around the world. But what really makes it special is when this global movement takes roots in the local community. And so, as you heard, the passion from both Ryan and Lacey about what this has done to bring together entrepreneurs and investors in Romania and Kansas City, I'm seeing it in my own tiny little town of Boone, North Carolina, right now as well. There is just something so exciting about seeing transformation come in the place that you live with the people that you pass at the store and as you're driving down the road or that you're sitting beside in church each week. And so we want to make that opportunity just so easily available to any of you. So all you need to do to host is have a screen and a space and invite people. That screen could be in your house. It could be in your backyard, it could be a boardroom, a local church. Actually, I think there is rumor that there might be at a castle in Transylvania at some point. I mean, if you have a castle, use that too. So wherever you have the screen and the space to host people to bring them together, whether that's five people, 50 people, 500 people, whatever that looks like for you, we want to help equip you to open that space so that you can spark this movement in your local community. Find other entrepreneurs and investors like yourself who love Jesus and want to see transformation come where you are. All you have to do is go to our website Faith Driven Entrepreneur live dot org or if entrepreneur is really hard to spell for you, like it can be for me, Faith Driven Investor live dot org as well. Go on there. It'll give you all the details about hosting. You can connect with our team and we'd love to just start a conversation about how you can be that spark in your community.
Henry Kaestner: Indeed, to ask one of the things I want to do is close out our podcast time, like we do with everyone asking What is God telling you through his word, through the Bible? Maybe it's today, maybe sometime recently, but we believe that the Bible is alive and hoping you can unpack something that he's speaking to you about.
Ryan Crozier: You, for me, I have one son, he's eight years old and I just got a Bible with kind of a margins to write, and so I started going through the Bible, just underlined and highlighted and taken notes and prayers for him and want to gift it to him when he's 18. And man has really just let my fire
Henry Kaestner: better than scripture. That's better than writing down trash talk, by the way.
Ryan Crozier: Yeah, I'm enjoying it, and it's been more helpful for me and my spiritual life. You know, now that's the benefit as well. But I came across some thirty seven trust in the Lord and do good dwell in the land and befriend faithfulness. And man Henry, I can really struggle to trust God, especially when it comes to business. And so that just jumped out for me and for me specifically because I love doing good. I have good all over lead, a nonprofit called Good Bureau, and even our agency name is the Romanian word for good. And so I just love that trust in the Lord and do good and dwell in the land. Now I live in a land that I know God has called me to dwell in. And so it just man jumped out for me, and I remember I came across that scripture right before moving here, and it was just around the same time. It disobeyed 10 years living in Romania. So it just kind of reignited that passion and the love I have for this nation and my calling. And yeah, it just meant a ton for me enough that I went to Etsy and I found a thing where I can put it on the wall. If you can get me to sign up for Etsy, that was meaningful.
Henry Kaestner: That's a great encouragement. Super cool, lacy. I love
Lacey Ellis: it. Well, there's a couple. I'm trying to decide which one. I think I'm going to go back to my tried and true. So my life reverse is Proverbs three, five and six, which most people know and just trust in the Lord with all your heart. Lean on on your own understanding and all your ways. Acknowledge him and he'll direct your path. And so that's been my first since high school, and it's been really interesting to see how God has shown me new things in different seasons of my life. And I would say specifically, as I've gotten into the entrepreneurial journey to think that the Lord knew that I was going to be here is a really cool thought, right? Like, I knew that he was giving me that verse back then for a reason. But now it takes on such a different and powerful meaning because so often the journey of the entrepreneur is fraught with risk, and it's a little bit unsettling and you just don't ever really know what's next, and you just have to really trust that God is there with you and that he will make your path straight, that he will guide you, and that you're really with him. And so, so often I just think about that verse, and I am encouraged that he's right there with me, that he's my father, that he's walking beside me, that he's in control of the outcomes and that I'm just supposed to to walk, walk with him and to have faith and know that we're going in the right direction.
Henry Kaestner: That's a great word from you both. And I've got to be careful about taking God's word and bring it too much into the thing that we're talking about today. And yet I can't escape the concept of dwelling in the land and what that looks like as we get involved in local community and watch parties and groups. So thank you both. Grateful for you. You're both such incredible encouragement to me, Solis and our team here. May God bless you and all the listeners to this podcast. To find out more, two hours closes out final instructions.
Lacey Ellis: Yeah. To find out more about hosting a watch party, go to Faith Driven Entrepreneur Live dot org or Faith Driven Investor Live dot org. And you've heard us also talk a lot about groups. If you go to our website Faith Driven Entrepreneur dot org slash groups, you can learn all about what it's like to jump into a community of ten to 15 like minded entrepreneurs, just like you looking for a place to connect with others like them online in person. We have groups all over the world and would love for you to join us there.