Article originally posted here by Impact Foundation

by Impact Foundation

Imagine you just received a life-changing medical diagnosis. You stumble out of the doctor’s office thinking, “What do I do? How will I get through this?” Then imagine immediately finding yourself connected with someone who walked through the exact same journey. That’s just one kind of powerful connection the peer support platform Think Native facilitates daily.

Think Native is a Community Engagement Platform that smart-matches trained peer supporters, mentors and champions to those looking for care, resources and support in their journey. The platform helps hospitals, patient care programs, nonprofits, churches, educational establishments and other great organizations facilitate meaningful relationships and measure personal growth and transformation among the people they affect.

Lance Villio, Think Native Founder and CEO, created the platform after his years in the nonprofit sector fostered a desire to leverage technology to catalyze human flourishing. Prior to Think Native, Villio served as the president of I Am Second and the executive director of Q Ideas. We asked him to share the Think Native story with us.

“How do you know that you are winning?”

“One of my mentors, Peb Jackson, raised this question early in my career and it used to haunt me as a nonprofit guy. I knew I wasn’t using the same metrics that were the standard practice for profit-making businesses — things like ROI, sales growth and KPI’s. Ultimately, it was this penetrating question that set me on a mission to create a SaaS platform that we call Think Native.

I soon learned that before I could answer the question of ‘winning,’ we would have to determine how we were going to keep score — in other words, how were we going to measure our success?

In the nonprofit space, we’re often making possible a fascinating and truly significant intangible known as life transformation. So how can we possibly measure people experiencing this kind of growth and development?

While exploring this critical issue, I was introduced to Jack Nicholson, a doctoral-level mentor, coach and consultant. He’s a life-long learner who has been researching the principles and processes of human development for nearly 40 years now! Jack explained:

‘Human transformation can only happen as a result of a relationship of trust, and I’ve got the research in Interpersonal Neurobiology to prove it.’

It was right about that time that I asked Jack to join me as a co-founder of Think Native.

Why did we create the Think Native technology platform, you might ask? The background for our company name is found in the Book of Acts. It was my wife Hannah who shared with me this interesting fact:

‘Did you know when the Holy Spirit came to earth to commune with people, the Spirit never made them learn some new ‘god-language?’ The Spirit spoke to everyone in their native tongue.’

Do you see where I’m going with this? Statistically, there are more mobile phones in the world than people, and social research shows the average American spends up to 9 hours a day on their technology platforms and devices. Technology is not foreign to them.

It is their native language.

At Think Native, we leverage the common language of technology to develop relationships of trust in a way that is measurable and scalable.

There are any number of terms for these groups—from peer support, to mentoring initiatives, discipleship communities or even sponsorship programs. For these organizations to succeed, each of them must develop relationships of trust.  Each relationship of trust will typically have an individual with some level of experience. Think Native calls that person a Champion. A person seeking guidance or support we call a Community Member. The way we measure success is not by the total number of mentees, members or disciples. We count our success when we develop relationships where the Community Members grow and then eventually become Champions themselves. This organic multiplication of relationships is the key to any great movement.  

A good example is our client, Susan G. Komen (Oklahoma). The Champion, a survivor of breast cancer, is smart-matched and connected with a newly diagnosed patient, who is a Community Member. Once the survivor’s treatment has been successfully completed, the Community Member develops into a Champion to guide and support another recently diagnosed person, and so the relationship of trust is now replicated.  

This Champion / Community Member relationship exists in organizations, associations, and businesses throughout various industries and it makes up our primary and secondary target markets. Think Native is diligent about helping great organizations accomplish their mission through leveraging the power of human-driven design. We help them scale and keep score, so decision-makers know when they are making a significant impact. 

That’s how we know we’re winning.

[ Photo by Ramón Salinero on Unsplash ]

by Matt Elsberry

When taking a stroll along a sidewalk outside a significant number of Pentecostal churches, you might try saying the word “shalom” to a departing congregant. As often as not, they’re likely to respond back without missing a beat: “Nothing missing, nothing broken.”

And there it is. 

In a perfectly brisk, four-word reflexive response lies the intent of the God of the universe. That shalom would reign and that reign would mean perfect completeness: nothing missing, and perfect wholeness: nothing broken.

At LivFul we interact with a number of stakeholder groups. On any given day you might find our team members working with investors, government officials, academicians, NGO and non-profit workers, global and public health officials, suppliers and customers. I’d like to share a bit of our thinking when it comes to how we invite employees and our investors to enjoy and bring shalom. 

We Are Not Building a Christian Company

It’s harder to get more biblically sounding than our company’s name. 

LivFul. 

Live Full…or…Live Abundantly. 

As you may have guessed, it’s really just a paraphrased version of the second half of John 10:10. “He has come that we might have life and have it to the full”. It’s in our DNA. It’s the whole rationale for why we exist as a company. 

But we have zero desire to label ourselves a Christian company. There will be no strategically placed fish symbols in our marketing, you won’t find Bible verses listed amongst the claims on our product labels, and you won’t find us seeking to exclusively recruit Christians

Companies are simply a collection of imperfect people (some Christian and some not), who are all mostly seeking to serve people with a product or service that attempts to make life better, fuller, more worth living.

At LivFul we believe a company can be a tool for bringing shalom to this very dark world, a world where things are missing and broken, and that it should actively work towards the setting right of things (one of the definitions of shalom is “the way things ought to be”). If we are successful in creating a culture that goes about “the setting right of things,” we will appeal to all people who have eternity set in their hearts.

A company is defined by its culture, and while that culture can be based on anything, it is at its highest level of winsomeness when it’s based on timeless truth. All are welcome to join us in this noble effort to be about the “setting right of things.”

A highly capable and accomplished friend, who is considering joining our company, told me: “You guys spend WAY more time on theology and culture than any company I have ever met!” This is a high compliment to us. We will only grow as far and straight and true as our cultural bedrock will allow. Or as Peter Drucker emphasized, “Culture eats strategy for breakfast.”

Challenge to Internal Stakeholders (people paid by LivFul)

How do we create a company culture that resonates with the “better angels” of each person’s nature? For the believer this means connecting them to their identity in Scripture. Proverbs 25:2 states that it is the glory of God to conceal a matter, but the glory of kings (or men) to search it out and Romans 8:19 says that all of creation is waiting for the sons of God to be revealed. For those from other faiths or belief systems, this is an invitation. Perhaps, though faint, each person’s lineage as a distant son of Adam and daughter of Eve might stir in them a sense of their Imago Dei; whispering of a soul-deep yearning for shalom, an inkling that things once were whole and set right and peace full, and that creation and their very souls are longing for it to be put right again. That they themselves would be revealed as caretakers and stewards of this great garden we call earth.

A friend of mine likes to say, “We invite people to live life the way it was meant to be lived.”

How does one go about inviting people close and far from God to a culture that is committed to shalom, or the way things ought to be?

If culture is a flowing river, any person invited to swim will naturally flow with the current. If that current happens to hint at universal truth, they might just find their true self as they acclimate to the rhythms of shalom.

Those of us that share the Judeo-Christian faith believe that God is the perfect shalom maker. Just because your life has a different script about the origin of the universe doesn’t mean that the “putting right of things” won’t resonate with your worldview. In fact, LivFul gains when you ascribe your personal value statements to the world the company is trying to create. 

When a mentor of mine was working as a senior leader for Apple, the company’s worldview didn’t always seem to line up with his. So, since he was a Christian, he assigned Bible verses to each of the company’s core values. He felt much more alignment and personal devotion to the company because of the congruence that was there; more than dissonance over occasional conflicts.

While indoctrination to a particular faith is not our aim, indoctrination into the LivFul way, or culture, is mandatory. Organizational development guru Verne Harnish admonishes companies to hire and promote people that are the best examples of an organization’s values and to quickly fire values-violators. Therefore at LivFul our chief task is to inspire imperfect people to follow a culture of shalom.

LivFul’s job is to humbly invite our stakeholders to become carriers and purveyors of shalom to the world…to wake up every day just itching to be about the setting right of things. That this one life would be a best attempt to live out God’s will on earth as it is in heaven…to be a force for restoration.

These are LivFul’s values and what they mean to us as we consider shalom:

Mission First – Shalom is insistent, restless until things are set right.

Authenticity – Shalom is light shining into our personal darkness, restless until festering evil is brought into the light, unsatisfied until each of our individual purposes become evident in how we interact with or bless the world.

Service – Setting things right around us – the outworkings of justice and righteousness. It’s more blessed to give than to receive. A generous person will prosper; those who refresh others will they themselves be refreshed.

Curiosity – The playful wondering of what secrets are concealed for us to search out in this world that would aid our efforts to set things right. If creation is waiting in eager expectation, then the wind is full and at our sails as we set off.

We invite imperfect people to pursue a mission bigger than themselves, by becoming their very best self, in order to serve others, by seeking out and liberating innovation for everyone. 

This must be pursued with humility so that our passion and conviction is never presented as arrogant superiority. We all have our part and we need others to fulfill their part.

The invitation is clear, when you see something missing or broken, you’re invited and empowered to mend it.

Challenge to Investor Stakeholders

I have long been a student of economics in the Bible. I worked with Crown Financial Ministries for nine years, and even when I left, it was to put into practice the rich foundational economic principles that had been baked into my DNA. 

There are two basic ways to use money to make money. You can deploy it to create something new, different or better, using it to fulfill the Genesis 2 mandate. Or you can use it to purchase something others cannot, and collect economic rent. I’ll leave the discussion of whether the collecting of economic rent is pleasing to God for another day. For now, I’ll make the case that the best and highest form of the deployment of capital (stewardship) is to use it to do what God does: create. Since we are made in His image, I see this as a logical conclusion. 

From the dawn of time until now, folks seeking to grow their wealth often did it by enjoining in a global game of monopoly where the winners collect rent. Land was aggregated and the more you had the more you could gain.

That’s why God’s proposed economic system is utterly captivating. Every 7th year, debts (another form of economic rent) were to be forgiven (Deuteronomy 15). Every 50th year was intended a massive reset – a redistribution of wealth that would make Bernie Sanders blush. 

God set the rules of the system to direct funds away from the mundane collecting of economic rents and legislated that excess land could never be amassed for longer than 49 years. This directed the smartest members of society to create wealth in ways other than collecting economic rent. They needed to create! It also served as a Kickstarter campaign for those who had lived for years without capital, perhaps dreaming of the start-up they would launch if only they could get funded.

In today’s society, overtime, hard work and diligence often get rewarded with wealth. And unfortunately, with the accumulation of wealth, often comes a desire to protect that wealth through the accumulating and collecting of economic rent, rather than putting it at risk to further steward God’s mandate of subduing the earth; of searching out what God has concealed; of seeking to be the solution for a groaning creation waiting for God’s sons and daughters to be revealed.

Solomon says that people curse the one who hoards grain, but bless the one who is willing to sell. 

How do we build a company that invites stewards of capital to “get off the bench” (of collecting economic rents) and join God on the playing field, using capital to search out what God has concealed, to be the creative image bearer of our Creator, to fulfill the eager expectation of creation, answering its groaning, by becoming one of the revealed sons and daughters of God.

How do we invite our investors, and others in our ecosystem, to be co-creators with us and other kingdom companies as we seek to co-create with God? How can we entice them to pray about and alongside their investment companies? How can we challenge them to fully embrace the mantle of steward, asking God (and not their financial advisor) what risk profile is right for their God-loaned, kingdom money that God’s asked them to temporarily steward? What’s missing or broken in the world that desperately needs their investment?

This paper’s purpose is not to claim we have it all figured out, but simply that we are striving for shalom. We strive to find and work with investors seeking to use their resources to bring shalom in the world. We strive to run the type of company where our employees can experience shalom in the workplace, as we invite them to bring shalom to the world through the way we do business. 

Shalom in the Workplace and in Your Investments

No Shalom:

1. A “purposeless career” – Working for a paycheck so you can do something meaningful later in life

2. A single purpose investment strategy, solely focused on increasing your portfolio

3. Dissonance between your work/investments and your charity/passion

4. Being asked to compromise your integrity at work, or investing in companies askance from your values

5. Leaving your full self home when you go to work. Leaving your stewardship responsibilities behind when you’re blindly following your financial advisor’s recommendations without prayer or viewing through a kingdom lens.

6. Having your company/investments work against you becoming who you are meant to be, so it can keep you as a cog in its machine

7. Working/investing in companies where their ways of serving the world are unclear or a potential net loss

8. When working: micromanaged – not trusted. When investing: your ability to hear from God and obey is divorced from the decision-making process since you are not an expert or told to leave these things to the professionals. 

9. Working/investing in companies disconnected from the searching out of the mystery of Romans 8/Proverbs 25:2. 

Shalom:

1. Feel good about what you are paid to do or where your money is invested

2. Your purpose and your company’s (or investment company’s) purpose have alignment

3. You bring your full self to the office or alongside your money as you invest

4. Getting paid (salary or ROI) to bring justice and righteousness to the world

5. Challenged to get better at your job or stewarding investments (and at living full life) every day

6. The company trusts you to carry important tasks. You carry the weight of prayer and stewardship with what and how you invest.

7. Adventure: What things has God concealed that man can search out? What insight/healing/truth/restoration can be discovered in creation when the sons and daughters of God are revealed? How are you scratching this itch with how you spend your time? With how you invest your money?

This is one of the 2020 CEF Whitepapers. For more information on the Christian Economic Forum, please visit their website here.

by Amanda Joseph

In Leviticus 19:18, we are commanded to “Love your neighbor as yourself.” Soon after we read, “The strangers who reside with you shall be to you as your own citizens; you shall love the stranger as yourself, for you were strangers in the land of Egypt” (Lev. 19:33-34).

When we look beyond the socially constructed and restrictive barriers of race, class, faith, and gender, we may at first see the stranger, then we recognize our neighbor, and verily, we also see ourselves. By embracing the diversity of our communities, seeing ourselves in the “other,” we open ourselves to possibility, abundance, hope, and opportunity for people, planet, and all of creation.

During this past year of great upheaval amidst global pandemic, climate crisis, and moral awakening, many Faith Driven Investors have asked these questions over and over again: Where can I invest my money so that my neighbors, my community, the stranger—so that those in need and in deep crisis, and those disenfranchised by entrenched systems of discrimination, systemic racism, and disempowerment, can also thrive and partake in an abundant future? Where can my investments support a world that benefits people and planet, rather than create harm? How can the decisions I make today about my portfolio create a sustainable and just future for my children’s children—and for my neighbor’s children’s children as well.

Faith Driven Investors are stewards of their resources and those of the communities they support, serve, and lead. The prospect of embracing diversity and equity in approaches to investing offers us profound opportunities for positive impact.

At Calvert Impact Capital, we have been investing with an explicit commitment to justice and equity—in the US and globally—for more than 25 years. Our mission is deeply rooted in addressing structural inequities, channeling capital to communities traditionally excluded from our financial system, particularly low-income communities, women, and communities of color. This is a key reason for why, in 2020, we signed the Racial Justice Investor Pledge, an initiative led by institutional faith investors, that includes both faith and secular signatories. Our approach is supported by our investor community: 26% state gender equity is a top concern; 36% state racial justice and equity is a top concern; and 70% are more interested in investing to support racial equity since spring 2020.

Faith Driven Investors have been our partners since our earliest days, and today include congregations, churches, health care systems, mutual funds, and foundations, and span denominations and affiliations—Catholic, Baptist, Evangelical, Mennonite, Jewish, Unitarian, Methodist, and many others. Here atCalvert Impact Capital we seek out portfolio partners who share these commitments to diversity and equity, expressed not only through who they lend to, but also how their management and leadership reflect the diversity of the communities they serve.  

A few examples from our portfolio that embody this commitment include:

• Benefit Chicago, is a $100 million collaboration by The Chicago Community Trust, the MacArthur Foundation, and Calvert Impact Capital to finance nonprofits and social enterprises in Chicago, like Autonomy Works that provides meaningful employment for adults with autism and Sweet Beginnings that provides job training to residents who were formerly incarcerated.

• Chicanos Por La Causa (CPLC) helps migrants, seniors, refugees, and other low-income people in the Southwest US achieve self-sufficiency through access to quality housing, healthcare, education, jobs, and political representation. 

• VisionFund International is a Christian microfinance network providing small loans and other services to families struggling with poverty in Africa, Asia, Latin America, and Eastern Europe.

• Volunteers of America is a national faith-based organization providing comprehensive services to the elderly, veterans, homeless, people with disabilities, and those recovering from addiction. 

• Through regionally-based COVID recovery efforts and cross-sector partnerships (across state and local governments, banks, corporations, foundations), we are working with local community development financial institutions (CDFIs) to provide critical capital to small businesses and nonprofits, especially those operating in low-income and harder to reach communities, often run by people of color and women. These efforts are working to ensure a more equitable and inclusive recovery. The latest fund to launch is the Southern Opportunity and Resilience (SOAR) Fund, working across 15 southern states.

Calvert Impact Capital considers diversity in all its forms, including gender equity, and we have been providing research and guidance to investors on gender lens investing. We know from our own lending and research that gender equity is not just good for women—it is good for investment, for business and for society. When women are valued, they have more power and influence over the broader economy and better investments are made. We seek gender equity across our portfolio, for example a solar finance business that not only impacts the lives of women and girls by providing energy access in their homes, but also encourages gender diversity across the workforce; and a fund in the Middle East and North Africa that focuses on lending products for underbanked women entrepreneurs. 

As it relates to diversity, at Calvert Impact Capital, that starts with the diversity of our own staff and extends to how we build our portfolio, and ultimately the impact we measure in communities.  Both the percentage of our staff and the end clients we reach is currently 71% women. As for racial diversity, 64% of our portfolio’s clients, on average, are people of color, and more than 50% of our portfolio partners’ staff, leadership, and boards are also people of color.

Over the past year, in our many conversations with financial advisors and investors—both secular and faith driven—we’ve been asked how investments can be used to support black, brown, and women-led small businesses, where can an investor find a community development bank or credit union, or how do we identify funds (across asset classes) that focus explicitly on racial, gender, and climate justice. We welcome these conversations as there are increasing opportunities to answer these calls, and so much more, with one’s investments.

As communities of faith and stewards of these resources, may Faith Driven Investors transcend the hesitation to consider the implications of their investments, locally and globally, and instead celebrate the opportunity that investing for positive impact, aligned with one’s values, presents. Let us commit to investing with purpose and mobilizing our abundance to create change. And through these choices, we can greet and embrace the stranger, love and support our neighbors, as we would hope they might do for us.

——

Calvert Impact Capital (CIC) makes impact investable. We’ve helped over 18,000 investors and hundreds of advisors get involved in impact investing through our Community Investment Note®, Syndications Services, and more. We are dedicated to growing the number of faith-based impact investors and expanding the impact investing community as a whole. 

As part of our Faith Investor Program, we develop resources and offer trainings to support investors–across all faiths–and their financial professionals along their impact investing journeys. We welcome opportunities for conversation, collaboration, and partnership. Please visit www.calvertimpactcapital.org/faith or email Amanda Joseph, Director of Faith-Based Initiatives directly – ajoseph@calvertimpactcapital.org

“Kingdom Impact Investing” is a term that gets thrown around a lot in the Faith Driven Investing world. But what does it actually mean? In part 1 of a 3-part series, Impact Foundation set out to try to define the phrase “Kingdom Impact Investing.” Below is just the start. Stay tuned for parts 2 and 3 coming soon…

by Impact Foundation

The Ford Foundation recently made headlines for announcing plans to move $1 Billion of its endowment to impact investing. While I celebrate their move, I’m also left wondering what keeps others on the sidelines.

In the community of people who love Jesus and are stewarding large sums of charitable capital it seems there are two major issues standing in the way of broader adoption: (i) lack of a clear and unified understanding of the role impact investing could play in faith-based initiatives; and (ii) lack of documented evidence – i.e., metrics –  that these types of investments accomplish kingdom good and produce adequate financial return.

Over the next few blogs, we’ll explore these issues including a definition of the term “kingdom impact investing”. But first…

Can’t We find a Better Term?

Nope. Wish we could. Please tell us if you can find one that will get broadly adopted.

“Impact investing” may be a buzzword that fizzles out in a few years, but for now it’s the dominate phrase in the industry to describe investing to achieve aims beyond simple financial gain. A google search of the phrase “impact investing” returns 12,900,000 results. Case closed (for now).  

Those of us working to bring the practice to Christian investors agree that we need a unique word or phrase to distinguish the practice of seeking spiritual good along with social and environmental. Rather than invent a wholly new phrase, it seems wise to add a simple modifier in front of “impact investing”. No one can agree which word – kingdom, Christian, spiritual, Gospel, godly, or evangelical – is the least bad. For purposes of moving on to the definition and metrics we’re going with “kingdom impact investing,” but we’re certainly open to other suggestions.

“Kingdom” in our usage refers to the kingdom of God, as Jesus described it in His teachings. Not every follower of Jesus is comfortable with this phrase. For some it feels too “Evangelical”. Others say it’s a phrase for Southerners. I just know Jesus used the word a lot to paint a picture of the world rightly oriented to God. A world of peace, justice, beauty, equity, celebration. A world so valuable that once discovered, a man would sell everything he had just to be a part of it. For us at Impact Foundation, the hope of this Kingdom drives everything we do. Thus, it seems a suitable adjective to differentiate our version of “impact investing.”

by Robert Loughery

 “There is more.” I’ll never forget when I heard those words and the impact they had on me. I realize there is nothing deeply theological or philosophical about these three words, but the context in which I heard them and how God has reminded me in my journey of what they mean, have had huge implications. 

I was attending my first Wild at Heart conference in 2003. I flew out to Young Life’s Frontier Ranch to meet my high school buddy who now lived in North Carolina. My friend invited me to attend this conference, and after reading John Eldredge’s book, Wild At Heart, I thought it would be great. It was. However, on the last day, I realized that I could catch an earlier flight home to Philadelphia. Being away since Wednesday, I thought it would be nice to get back earlier, especially since my wife was gracious enough to encourage me to go and she was home alone with a 3 year and 1 year old. So, Sunday morning, during the last session, I discretely packed up my things in the row I was sitting. My bags were already in the cabin. As I maneuvered my way out of the row, I heard John say the words: “There is more.” Immediately, I froze thinking he was singling me out amongst the 300+ people in attendance and was about to tell me to sit back down. As I casually looked up, I realized he wasn’t talking to me, but he had more to say. So, as I continued walking out of the auditorium, what I heard wasn’t that he had more to say…it was that God had more for us; that with God there is more – exponentially more. The message was that when we are faithful, obedient and trusting in God, His more is always greater than my idea of more.  

It’s taken me nearly 20 years to better understand this. Truthfully, on that day, I didn’t really think much about it. My mind was too focused on getting home. But those words have stuck with me. My idea of ‘there is more’ revolved around accumulating things: more money, more possessions, a bigger home, fancier car, etc. As a real estate developer and investor, more meant: more projects, more capital, more returns, more profits. And, I thought, that if I was faithful, obedient, and trusting in God I would see more – He would reward me with more things I could use and enjoy, now.  

I have discovered that I was both correct and incorrect with what I thought. I was correct thinking that if I am faithful, obedient and trusting In God, He does provide more. I was incorrect thinking that the more would all come to me now, on my terms and the way I would like it for my immediate enjoyment, satisfaction and use. What was worse about my thinking was the notion that somehow my more could be greater than His more.  

Scripture is replete with examples of how God’s more is greater than we can fathom or ever achieve on our own. Throughout the Old Testament, story after story shows how God provides for His people more than they could ever provide on their own. God tells Isaiah that “As the Heavens are higher than the earth, His ways are higher than (our) ways” – meaning we can’t even begin to touch what He can do and how much more He can produce. When Jesus shows up on the scene, His miracles demonstrate what Isaiah proclaimed. No human could even conceive how to make the lame walk, the blind see and the deaf hear – but Jesus could and did. No human could stop a storm or cast out foul spirits – but Jesus could and did. No human could feed thousands of people with a loaf of bread and some fish. Yet, on two separate occasions, Jesus uses a few loaves of bread and a couple of fish to literall feed thousands of people. His disciples couldn’t see how it could be possibly done, there wasn’t anywhere near enough to feed the masses. Yet, when Jesus was done ‘there was more’ leftover – talk about compounding growth!  

God’s returns are always more than we could ever create on our own. This type of compounding growth is evident in our lives, when we (our hearts) are in a place to receive it, accept it and share it. As the illustration in the Parable of the Sower demonstrates, the 4th Soil – i.e. the good soil – produces a crop 100, 60 and 30 fold. In other words, a noble heart driven to serve God can produce a return for the Kingdom of God that has exponential growth and far beyond worldly measurements and benefits, and more than we could ever do on our own.  

When it comes to investing, every investor wants more. We only dream of achieving 30, 60, 100x. The higher the return, the better the investment, which means more profit. Our way of measuring more profit is defined by multiples, Return on Investment (ROI) or Internal Rate of Return (IRR). We use complicated spreadsheets and formulas to tell us how much more we got or can get. Yet, we don’t consider measuring the impact of our investment nearly as voraciously as we do the financial return of our investment. For a Kingdom-driven investor, shouldn’t we consider the impact of our investment at least as much, if not more? Shouldn’t we redefine what returns truly mean to a faith driven investor?  

As a real estate developer and investor, our pro forma models always show the projected IRR calculation. This worldly metric evaluates the investment over a certain time period. But, as a Kingdom-driven investor, is this enough or is it all that we should measure? What if we looked at KRR instead of just IRR? Kingdom Rate of Return (KRR) considers more than just the here and now, temporary monetary rewards of earthly investing…it considers eternal rewards that have no time limit. It’s a measurement that can’t be computed with a spreadsheet formula. It’s more of a mindset than a measurement of how we choose to utilize and invest God’s resources to impact His Kingdom and to further the Gospel.  

Speaking from the perspective of real estate investing for Kingdom impact, these investments are more than just in bricks and mortar. Beyond developing physical community where people live, work and play, there is a purpose and intent to build redemptive community – this includes the physical (real estate) but also the spiritual and relational community that God desires and intended for us to dwell in.  

When we invest our resources to serve and impact God’s Kingdom, the returns can be more than we could ever create on our own. Those returns cannot be simply measured in formulas and economic data. It is more about the impact than the income that we must consider. There is more when we faithfully serve God by investing resources to impact His Kingdom. KRR will always be more than IRR.

Article originally posted here by the Oakton Foundation

by Bill Wichterman

Perhaps you know the Peter Parker Principle from Stan Lee’s Spiderman comic books: “With great power comes great responsibility.” It’s a variation of Jesus’ words, “From everyone who has been given much, much will be demanded.” 

During my time as Special Assistant to President George W. Bush, I had the honor of inviting Stan Lee to breakfast with me in the West Wing of the White House. We talked about the Peter Parker Principle, and I lauded him for smuggling into popular entertainment such an important idea. 

James Baker, former White House Chief of Staff, tells the story of being chauffeured to the White House with his security detail and seeing a former Chief of Staff standing alone on a Washington street corner. Baker was struck by the same thing that never ceases to fascinate me: power is fleeting. 

The Temptation of Power

For me, power presents a constant temptation to use it to exalt myself, my reputation, my kingdom, my legacy – things that will mean nothing after I’m dead and forgotten. And when I stand before God and am called to account for how I used the power I was given, I don’t want to be ashamed. I want to use it well, advocating for those without power — the poor, the oppressed, and the voiceless.

I have less power now than I did in the White House – a lot less. But how ever small our power is, it’s on loan to us to use it wisely. Every day brings new opportunities to faithfully use our power well. A smile, a soft response to an angry person, a word of affirmation – all of it is meant to serve others. Little things matter. In a way, there are no little things if God has called you to do them. We are foolish to plan for how we can serve God tomorrow in some big and flashy way if we neglect the things He wants us to do today.

Even the Smallest Amount of Power Can be Used for Good

You may have a lot less power than you’d like to have. You may be unemployed or under-employed, shunted aside in your workplace, sidelined by illness, or facing the realization that the dreams of your youth aren’t going to happen. Disappointment is hard, but it doesn’t mean we’re worthless. Jesus said, “Whoever can be trusted with very little can also be trusted with much, and whoever is dishonest with very little will also be dishonest with much” (Luke 16:10).

In God’s economy, what matters is being faithful with what we’ve been given, great or small. I think Stan Lee would agree that small power also comes with responsibility. Just because we’re not Spider Man doesn’t mean we can lounge around and do whatever we want. God has a plan for the world that includes you, where you are today. Every day that we humbly submit to God and seek to serve him, he uses us. He’s not too busy to use our “little” acts of kindness, regardless of whether or not others notice. 

The author Mary Ann Evans (pen name was George Eliot) wrote that goodness in the world “is partly dependent on unhistoric acts; and that things are not so ill with you and me as they might have been, is half owing to the number who lived faithfully a hidden life, and rest in unvisited tombs.” 

Living for an Audience of One

I don’t know if anyone will visit my grave, and frankly, I won’t know or care if they do. I will get zero satisfaction for how I’m remembered. But there is an Audience of One for whom I will care in eternity, and I want to play to Him.

God cares no less about what I do now than He did when I was advising the President or when I was talking to Stan Lee over pancakes. In God’s economy, the Oval Office and the back office are equally important. The nineteenth-century Dutch Prime Minister and theologian Abraham Kuyper said, “There is not a square inch in the whole domain of our human existence over which Christ, who is Sovereign over all, does not cry: ‘Mine!’”

Seeing power for what it is requires developing eyes that see the unseen. That’s hard when the seen seems so compelling. But pecking orders don’t impress God. Faithfulness does impress Him. 

Once, while Francis of Assisi was hoeing his garden, he was asked, “What would you do if you suddenly learned that you were to die at sunset today?” He replied, “I would finish hoeing my garden.” God cares about today’s hoeing. Do it well. As God’s children, we all have power. So it’s good to listen to the wise words of Mr. Stan Lee. Let’s rely on God’s great power and use what power we have to advance His kingdom responsibly.