Wendy Rogers was one of the presenters at our recent event for Faith Driven Investors, and she was gracious enough to share a copy of her talk with us. Below is a transcript of her presentation about utilizing investment advisory firms and building alignment inter-generationally.

by Wendy Rogers

In Ted Style Talks, the experts say in order to drive your point home, you must divide your talk into three parts to be inspiring. Make your talk:

– Emotional

– Novel

– Memorable

Well, I must say the emotional part was the thought of me, a true southern woman, trying to bring home an effective point in under 5 minutes. In all seriousness, the topic of wealth management can get pretty emotional when families are not intentional around the vision of the wealth and the positive or negative disruption it can stir through the generations.

This is important stuff and it is not for the faint at heart. There is an expression from a Hermes Family Descendent that says, You do not inherit a family business, You borrow it from your grandchildren. And when I mention family business I am not just thinking about operating companies.

The Novel aspects of what I would like to share today would be the visual picture of what my grandmother taught me years ago. I grew up learning how to care for pecan groves and many times when we lost a tree due to disease, we had to be strategic in where we would plant a new tree. Ecologists taught us that a young tree grows better when planted in an area adjacent to the older, stronger trees. The roots of the young tree may actually graft themselves to one another creating an intricate, interdependent foundation. Let me provoke you a little—when you think in wealth and specifically in transferring any kind of wealth, what do you think is a healthy balance of independence and interdependence within a family or a family enterprise? 

Now to the memorable part. This picture here: I am a third generation family business owner stewarding wealth from a business my sweet grandfather started, my very determined father significantly grew, and then as a family we made a decision to sell to a Fortune 100 company. Here is a fun fact: I am one of three girls and we each have three girls, so there are, or will be, 13 women running the show.

The day after selling our operating company we knew we were in the family office business and we knew we had a great deal to learn about the preservation aspects of wealth, but we then had to get real focused on the growth aspects of those assets.   

We learned a lot about ourselves and also about our future need for surrounding ourselves with great strategic investment advisory partners.  

The transition from family business to business family is more about a mindset change. We, as family members, had to switch our mindset over to owners or stewards. We needed to learn a new industry…strategic investment management. 

In order to create, sustain and adapt family culture and values over generations, the family must be aligned, make fast and effective business decisions, and implement them. This just doesn’t happen overnight. Even to families who all love Jesus! 

The process by which the family owners collectively organize themselves to develop resilience in dealing with both the internal family affairs and the external business challenges is what many would call GOVERNANCE.

We had to learn to balance the many voices, then to translate this input into effective operations, clear decision practices and adaptive responses to new challenges.

Here again, we come back to independence and interdependence concept. I wish I would have understood those two words better 15 years ago.  

But before we could do all this, we had to revisit/collectively declare what we knew to be true about our family. How we were raised, what values defined us and held us together and the passions that pricked our hearts in making sure we clearly defined both our philanthropic and our investment vision and mission together. What was the purpose of this liquidity event and what did it mean to each of us? We sat around and discussed this at length. 

 We knew that inside our operating company we had values and an operating philosophy, a mission and guiding principles to guide how we worked and now as we set up new ownership structures we were going to need the same thing.

Family Enterprise Governance is the structure by which elements of the generative family alliance become aligned and integrated into practice. They need to listen to and balance the voices and perspectives of each group of stakeholders: Matriarch/Patriarch owners, young family owners to be, married in spouses and outside advisors. We knew we needed to work to create this framework and practice it and model it because we are now in the process and transition of on boarding new owners and the next generation, which as I mentioned are all female. 

We had to work hard to build this intergenerational alignment in investing, spending, giving and in living. This was not done overnight and we can never rest that it is complete. We instituted governance structures, shareholder agreements, management companies, estate plans and a family council. These were the fierce conversations to formalize and now we are living out our continuity plans. Picking partners and guiding these partners was a huge part of the process. The search, onboarding, and alignment of these partners is the role of family leadership.

We took the time to thoughtfully create and design an outside board of directors just like we did inside our operating company. This board is the core instrument for the family to build and sustain its distinctive culture and exercise faith -based oversight. This board upholds the legacy and values and defines the relationships among owners and across generations and is also open to anticipating and initiating change to take advantage of new possibilities  and respond to the expansion of the family. Mindset development is huge here as family members need to be tutored in ownership mindset. 

If we believe God owns it all, how do we live that out in our decisions about investing? In our decisions about spending? Bob Goff has said that all the rules change when you are flying under the banner of Jesus Christ. It changes everything…or it changes nothing.  It can’t just change a couple of things.” 

Many of these years proved to be like the old college science class of Lecture and Lab. We spent time and resources in the lecture section of this life -long class and we had to get clear as to the formal education we needed…we needed to invest in ourselves, but also trust our internal “knower” around who to align ourselves with. How to lead and yet learn from these partners. This is the lab part. We are doing this each day, each quarter as we listen to their advice and yet also find other outside, non -family  board members, partners in new private equity ventures and bring in thought -leaders to work with our family.  

Are we efficiently and intelligently using the resources God has granted us to generate returns but also generate human flourishing? This a recurring question we keep asking ourselves…the scorecard so to speak.

If we see ourselves as stewards and our Lord as the owner then we better get about the business of stewarding that well and that should never mean compromising or resting on our laurels to not cultivate growth and returns. We also had to act like geese and honk from behind in those leading us to stir bravery in each other, to live in faith and to continue to ignite purpose in our own lives but also in the lives of those around us. 

This article was originally published here.

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by Mark Regier

The phrase “What would Jesus do?” or “WWJD” emerged in American consciousness during the 1990s as motto for many Christians seeking to regularly reflect on how the moral teachings of Jesus could be reflected in their daily lives. As is the way of our modern culture, the reflective purpose of this cue soon became obscured by our collective passion for marketing and merchandise in all its many forms.

Whether one participates in organized religion or not, the idea of finding a mechanism that calls us to step outside of our personal situation to view things from a different, morally-grounded perspective can have many benefits. This was the original intention of WWJD.

This also appears to be the intention of many of the parables shared by Jesus throughout the New Testament. He is frequently presented responding to critical—even tricky—questions with stories that cause reflection, rather than answers that reflect or refine the religio-political rules of the day, as most expected. These parables were all the more disruptive by their inclusion of persons—women, children, tax collectors, slaves, etc.—in roles and situations that challenged the status quo and current thinking on what was “good” and “right.” The parables seemed designed to pull listeners out of their presuppositions and self-assuredness.

So what does all of this have to do with how we, as people of faith or good will, approach investing? And more importantly, how do we do this when we may not all agree on how it is to be done?

Both less and more than you might think!

Less, because the Parables and many similar religious teachings are not necessarily about “how to do” something, but more often about “how to be” in a situation. These stories challenge certainty about rules, righteous action, and our place in the world with a focus on right relationships–between people, classes, ethnic/racial groups, genders and with Creation itself. And it is this centrality of relationships that makes such teachings more relevant to the increasingly contentious and conflicted environment in which many values-based investors find themselves.

One parable that seems particularly relevant to the current SRI investment arena is that of the Good Samaritan. What is both ironic and even more timely is that this parable was offered in response to a question posed to Jesus asking, “And who is my neighbor”? It is a question of inclusion and value that echoes with importance through the centuries to America’s reality today.

Found in Luke 10:25-37 [1], this story—at least in its simplest form—has practically become baked into American culture. In short, the Samaritan (from an ethnic group often looked down upon by the dominant culture Jesus was a part of) stopped to help a man wounded by robbers while two religious leaders (a priest and a Levite) passed him by, presumably not stopping because touching the wounded man would have made them unclean according to the religious rules of the day.

When Jesus flipped the question to questioner, asking “Which of these three…was a neighbor to the man who fell into the hands of the robbers?”, the answer was “The one who showed him mercy.” One can easily replace any of these characters with modern stand-ins (and people have!) and get a similar reflective opportunity. The point is to step out of what we think we know and ask how our “answers” fit in a broader, moral frame—particularly when that challenges our current world view and objectives.

What then might we learn, applying reflection from the story of the Good Samaritan, to our collective work in faith-based, SRI/ESG investing? Here are my takeaways:

Relationships matter—For me, this is the overarching message of this Parable (and many others). Understanding the human component, motivations, objectives and needs in any situation—especially one of conflict—is critical. How can we first see what we share, not where contrast? No strategy, marketing opportunity, or clever taking of the intellectual high-ground is worth sacrificing community and collaboration in your wake. Being “right” (often a less certain thing than we think at the time anyway) should not preclude being in right relationships with those around us—even those we think are in opposition to us.

Remember the shared goal—One reason why relationships should and do matter, is that we often have shared goals, whether we choose to focus on them or not. It is unlikely the religious leaders thought the wounded man should die. Rather they chose to place their own rules and priorities above the shared goal—mandated by religious teachings–of caring for those in need. In the end, we all need to decide if it is the path or the goal that is more important.

The work is often messy—The issue of “purity” or remaining “clean” runs deep in the Good Samaritan Parable. This theme seems to echo within both the faith-based and SRI investment world as well today. While an important—and potentially valid–point of values reflection, avoidance rarely brings the solutions we want and need. Getting to our shared goal demands the ability to engage, understand, challenge, and compromise (practically a four-letter word in our current culture) with those of a different perspective. Whether corporation, investor or activist (or combinations thereof), achieving justice and sustainability has nearly always been messy.

There may be a cost—The Samaritan invested his own time and resources in caring for the wounded man, in both the short and long term. The Holy Grail of SRI—and particularly ESG—has been to prove that one can do demonstrable good for the world and deliver competition-topping performance. Incredible strides have been made, materiality demonstrated, and successful claims put forward. Yet in many cases there remain a number of asterisks, requiring a fuller look at the details to understand the complete picture. Perhaps the more important point to consider—whether approaching the investment task on behalf of the environment or a set of faith-driven values—is how much cost is too much and is the cost worth it in the end.

Being “wise” (or smart or clever or right) doesn’t trump mercy—In a culture and communication environment dominated by selective information, passion-driven marketing campaigns, and the need to find enemies/opponents, the question our community (really any community) increasingly faces is whether or not to engage in the popular “wisdom” of the marketplace or stick to the values that unite us. It is a hard choice to make with friends and competitors alike chanting “fight fire with fire.” And it is one we must all choose for ourselves.

In the end, the value of a moral reflective cue—like “What would the Good Samaritan do?”—is to cause us to stop and think about how our situation and related actions look from a different perspective, or in the context of diverse values that we claim to support. It wouldn’t surprise me if no two people respond to my own reflections in exactly the same way. I think that’s the point of parables anyway. All I can do is repeat Jesus’ suggestion—“Go and do likewise.”

Article by Mark A. Regier, Vice President of Stewardship Investing for Praxis Mutual Funds and Everence Financial (https://www.praxismutualfunds.com), a leading provider of faith-based financial products in the United States and a ministry of Mennonite Church USA. Mark has been involved in the field of ethical and socially responsible investing at Everence for more than 20 years. He oversees the company’s work in socially responsible investing (including investment screening, ESG integration, proxy voting, corporate engagement and community investing). In addition, Mark works with products and programs throughout Everence to strengthen their creative integration of faith and finances. In 2015, Mark assumed leadership of the sales and marketing efforts for the Praxis Mutual Funds.

Mark has served as a member of the Board of Directors for the US Social Investment Forum, the Interfaith Center on Corporate Responsibility, Partners for the Common Good, the International Working Group (USSIF), The Isaiah Fund for Disaster Recovery Investing, and the Highland-Good Steward SRI hedge fund. In 2006, Mark received the SRI Service Award, the US social investment industry’s highest honor.

With over 25 years of service to the church and a background in ethics and theological studies, Mark is often a resource to national and international media and organizations on faith-based and community investing issues.

This article was originally published here.

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by Kristin Brown

Is wealth creation godly or greedy?

The Bible teaches that the creation of wealth is both a godly gift and a command. Unfortunately, the biblical role of wealth creation is misunderstood in many churches today.

The good news is that there’s a global movement of Christians that are seeking to resurrect this topic in the church around the world.

We interviewed Mats Tunehag, a writer and consultant based in Sweden, who has served for many years as a senior leader in developing the concepts of Business as Mission in both the Lausanne Movement and World Evangelical Alliance.

Most recently, Tunehag served as the convener of the “Global Consultation on the Role of Wealth Creation for Holistic Transformation” in 2017. Out of this gathering of 30 business, missions, and academic leaders from 20 nations around the world came the “The Wealth Creation Manifesto.” Below is our discussion with Tunehag about the purpose of the Manifesto and what kind of response it is receiving:

IFWE: What is the Wealth Creation Manifesto and why was it developed?

Mats Tunehag (MT): The issue of wealth creation is often overlooked. The idea of wealth sharing sounds more “Christian” and generous—and we talk about that more in the church.

But there is no wealth to be shared unless it has been created. Thus, we wanted to explore and discuss wealth creation from biblical, historical, global, and practical perspectives.

The Wealth Creation Manifesto is a summary of the Global Consultation on the Role of Wealth Creation for Holistic Transformation of People and Societies. Out of the gathering, seven papers were peer-produced and peer-reviewed, looking at various aspects of wealth creation. We also produced an educational video with study guides.

A major focus for the Consultation was wealth creation and the poor. What really helps the poor, and what does history teach us? As we wrote in Christianity Today,

It is a fact that aid—wealth distribution—does not lift people and nations out of poverty. Wealth creation does. The biggest lift out of poverty in the history of mankind has happened in our generation. This has been achieved not through aid but by trade; wealth creation through business. As is demonstrated by the escape of hundreds of millions from dire poverty in both India and China since the 1980s, one cannot tackle poverty without a determined pursuit of wealth creation.

We often ask what causes poverty. But the real question is, how do people create prosperity for themselves, their family, and their community? Instead of asking what causes poverty, we need to ask, what causes wealth?

IFWE: What kind of conversations have been started around the Manifesto?

MT: The Wealth Creation Manifesto was quickly translated and is now available in 14 languages. That is one indication of the keen interest in the issue around the globe.

It is also important to point out that this was not the first time that the biblical call to wealth creation, especially through business, has been addressed. The Consultation was built upon similar consultations and documents, like the BAM Manifesto 2004, the Wheaton Declaration 2009, and the Atabaia Statement 2014.

IFWE: What biblical principles have been the most effective in helping people understand God’s call to wealth creation?  

MT: The first three statements of the Wealth Creation Manifesto assert the following:

1. Wealth creation is rooted in God the Creator, who created a world that flourishes with abundance and diversity.

2. We are created in God’s image, to co-create with Him and for Him, to create products and services for the common good.

3. Wealth creation is a holy calling, and a God-given gift, which is commended in the Bible.

We also produced a Wealth Creation Manifesto with Bible References document. The Manifesto is based on, among other things, lessons learned from the Bible. So, we listed some initial scripture references regarding issues dealt with by the Consultation and expressed in the Manifesto.

IFWE: Where have some people had trouble understanding the Wealth Creation Manifesto? Has there been pushback?

MT: Some people mistakenly assume that wealth creation is about making some people rich or that the Manifesto teaches the prosperity gospel. However, the full title of the Consultation indicates a wider understanding of the purpose of wealth creation: “The Role of Wealth Creation for Holistic Transformation of People and Societies.” The prosperity gospel is not only heretical, but it also cannot achieve the goal of personal and societal transformation.

Pope Francis has also spoken to the worthy goal of wealth creation:

Business is a noble vocation, directed to producing wealth and improving the world. It can be a fruitful source of prosperity for the area in which it operates, especially if it sees the creation of jobs as an essential part of its service to the common good.

Others who have struggled with the Manifesto wrongly embrace the Malthusian idea of fixed and limited resources which must be divided into smaller and smaller pieces because of a growing world population. Thus, some call for a universal renunciation of wealth or for all Christians to pursue “simplicity” as a response to wealth hoarding. The Wealth Creation Manifesto takes a more nuanced approach:

Wealth hoarding is wrong, and wealth sharing should be encouraged, but there is no wealth to be shared unless it has been created. …There is a universal call to generosity, and contentment is a virtue, but material simplicity is a personal choice, and involuntary poverty should be alleviated.

The Consultation and its papers and educational video show that we can increase valuable resources—like food—and actually feed more people now than ever before.

We also show that businesses do provide essential solutions to the world’s most pressing issues, including environmental challenges.

The conversation between Professor Ron Sider’s article and BAM Global in Christianity Today is a good example of this discussion on the biblical and economic principles espoused in the Manifesto.

IFWE: What are the next steps for the Wealth Creation Manifesto? What are you working on now?

MT: We are doing more research and writing on wealth creation and creation care, building upon the paper “Wealth Creation and the Stewardship of Creation.” The plan is to present an expanded paper at the BAM Global Congress in 2020.

With the help of faith friends from our gathering of Faith Driven Investors, we’ve begun drafting a set of Unifying Principles. Our hope is that we can begin to come together under these thoughts and ideas to work toward a more full vision of what it means to let our faith drive our investments.

If you have thoughts, questions, concerns, things you’d change or add, please let us know! We’re relying on you, our community, to make this resource the best it can be.

So much of investing is focused on the “how” and “where.” But for the Faith Driven Investor, the biggest question we can ask is “why?”

While it’s the hope of this movement that dozens if not hundreds of new investment vehicles will be created across a wide variety of asset classes, breadth of selection will never be the most important result of our work, nor will the aggregate amount of money invested. Those will be important signposts of progress, but our hope is that every Christ follower sees each investment decision as a chance to hear from God.

The “how” we invest (seeking God) that is more important than the “where” of we invest. Even more important than the “how” and the “where” is the “why” of investing. We believe that when we come to understand the value of the gift of life, both now and eternal through the abundant generosity of God, that the natural response is one of worship and gratitude. Heart posture is the aspect that puts us in the best position to be successful in our investing.

This heart posture stems from a gratitude for the gift we’ve been given and an eagerness to serve God with it. We believe that God cares less about the size and strategy of your investment and more about your heart behind investing at all. So, before we start wondering how and where, we have to first ask why. We have to look in and up before we can go out.

Using Scripture as Our Guide

• Psalm 27:4 One thing I ask from the LORD, this only do I seek: that I may dwell in the house of the LORD all the days of my life, to gaze on the beauty of the LORD and to seek him in his temple.

• Matthew 5:8 Blessed are the pure in heart, for they will see God.

• Colossians 3:17 And whatever you do, whether in word or deed, do it all in the name of the Lord Jesus, giving thanks to God the Father through him.

• Psalm 16:8 I keep my eyes always on the LORD. With him at my right hand, I will not be shaken.

• Matthew 6:21 For where your treasure is, there your heart will be also.

• John 15:5 I am the vine; you are the branches. If you remain in me and I in you, you will bear much fruit; apart from me you can do nothing.

• Proverbs 3:5-6 Trust in the LORD with all your heart, and do not lean on your own understanding. In all your ways acknowledge him, and he will make straight your paths.

This article was originally published here.

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by Hugh Whelchel

Are wealthy people greedier than others?

According to a report in the Los Angeles Times, wealth breeds greed and other vices:

The rich really are different from the rest of us, scientists have found—they are more apt to commit unethical acts because they are more motivated by greed.

Is this reality or a stereotype? Has the media contributed to a perception that wealth and capitalism equal “greed”?

In the 1987 movie Wall Street, Gordon Gekko proclaims that “…greed—for the lack of a better word—is good.” Oliver Stone’s film sent a message that the free market system promotes greed and gives unscrupulous businessmen, like Gekko, a vehicle to line their pockets at the expense of others.

Real life events in the last 30 years have also reinforced this image, from Michel Milken and Enron to the subprime mortgage crisis.

The reality is that we are all susceptible to greed, rich and poor alike. Greed arises from man’s fallen nature. This fallen nature impels man to satisfy his desires with the least possible expenditure of effort, which often requires his satisfaction at the expense of others.

Cultural vs. Biblical Definition of Greed

Webster’s Dictionary defines greed as “a selfish and excessive desire for more of something (as money) than is needed.” Although most people, including many Christians, embrace this definition, where do we draw the line regarding “more of something than is needed” or what do I “deserve”?

Many have slipped into a relativistic definition of greed. Who decides not only what is needed, but when someone has more than enough? Who decides what one needs and deserves? Most of these cultural definitions of greed don’t address these questions.

In the New Testament, the Greek word pleonexia, originating from the Greek πλεονεξια, is the word that is most commonly translated as greed or covetousness (see Colossians 3:1–11; Luke 12:13–21; 1 Thessalonians 2:5; 2 Peter 2:3).

Biblical commentator John Ritenbaugh describes greed as a “ruthless self-seeking and an arrogant assumption that others and things exist for one’s own benefit.”

New Testament Greek scholar William Barclay describes pleonexia as an “accursed love of having,” which “will pursue its own interests with complete disregard for the rights of others, and even for the considerations of common humanity.”

There is an important thread that runs through the biblical definition that further qualifies the typical definitions of greed. It is the idea that greed fosters the taking of something that is not rightfully ours. Our culture’s current relativistic definition of greed does not address this component.

Yet, even with the biblical definition of greed, many still have a problem with the reason many have become wealthy in a free market system: self-interest.

A Biblical View of Self-Interest

There is a very clear difference between greed and self-interest. Self-interest is the willingness to do something of value for others to secure the things that benefit oneself.  In other words, our self-interest, or pursuing and using our own gifts, talents, and resources, informs how we will be useful to others. Without responding to our self-interest, we might wander fruitlessly trying to find a vocation.

The Scottish moral philosopher known as “the father of modern capitalism,” Adam Smith, wrote in The Nature and Causes of the Wealth of Nations that,

It is not from the benevolence of the butcher, the brewer, or the baker that we expect our dinner, but from their regard to their own interest.

This is a very biblical concept.

Yet today, many associate the word “self-interest” with selfishness. Dictionary.com defines self-interest as, “Regard for one’s own interest or advantage, especially with disregard for others.” That second clause is problematic.

“With disregard for others” was not the way Smith understood the term “self-interest,” nor is it true to the biblical definition. Smith’s position, and the Bible’s, is that you serve your self-interest when you serve the self-interest of others. The idea of wanton pursuit of unrestrained desires would have been objectionable to Smith, and should be to us as well.

The Bible does not condemn the pursuit of legitimate self-interest. Philippians 2:4 makes this very clear when Paul says,

Let each of you look not only to his own interests, but also to the interests of others.

Echoing Paul’s admonition, Scott Rae, a professor of Christian ethics, writes that self-interest isn’t unbiblical, but must be balanced by love for others:

…there is a place for legitimate self-interest, to which the bible periodically appeals, only it must be balanced by a compassionate concern for the interest of others.

In his booklet, The Spirit of Democratic Capitalism: Thirty Years Later, the late Michael Novak explains that “self-interest” is not evil in and of itself; it manifests in different ways depending on the heart of the individual:

… “self-interest” is a morally neutral word. Sometimes it stands for something transcendently good: “For what shall it profit a man, if he shall gain the whole world, and lose his own soul?” [Matthew 8:36] It is more in our self-interest to love our neighbor as ourselves and to love God above all. …Some self-interests are evil, some are neutral, and some are very good.

So, while the Bible cautions that self-interest can devolve into the sin of selfishness and greed, biblical self-interest enables us to become well-functioning, contributing members of God’s community.

This is the way God made us, and it is important for us to understand self-interest in the context of our work. The biblical idea of self-interest, rightly understood, allows us to work creatively, using all our God-given gifts in a way that serves our own needs whileserving the needs of others.

This video was originally published here.

Synergy Village started when Loren and Adele Funk invited homeless people to participate in a Christmas celebration. After singing carols and handing out gifts though, they found out that there was something more these people needed—homes.

Watch this video to find out what happened next in their story…