Episode 130 - Discovering True Riches at Harvard Business School with John Cortines
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John Cortines had a plan to become a millionaire by age 30 and retire by age 40. He had all the spreadsheets and the “Big Oil” job to prove it. But while pursuing his MBA at Harvard Business School, John took the class “God and Money,” where he ended up writing a term paper that became a book—and it changed his life forever. He began studying God’s Word to answer the question “How much do we need to give?” John ended his exploration with the question flipped to “How much do we really need to keep?” In this Faith Driven Entrepreneur Podcast episode, we talk to John about the book that he co-authored, entitled, ‘God and Money: How We Discovered True Riches at Harvard Business School.’ Listen in as John shares practical tools for how Christ-following business leaders can give biblically and responsibly.
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 investment 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 Investor podcast and indeed welcome back. Today we've got a special guest that John and I have on the program, John Cortines. John has written a couple of books now, the one that you may already know about. If you're listening to Faith Driven Investor podcast, it's preaching to the choir here a little bit. God and Money. How he discovered true riches at Harvard Business School is a formative work in the space of an ambitious marketplace investor that's wrestling with Where does God have them? As we before we get back and we get to the regularly scheduled program here, I wanted to set this up because the work that John has done and through the organization, he's spent a tremendous amount of time with generous giving. And then the Maclellan Foundation has had such an impact in my life. At age 28, I came to faith. It changed everything. I had a career on Wall Street. I pursued all the things that an investor might pursue on Wall Street that does not yet know God. And then at age 38, as bandwidth was becoming more successful, I met Daryl Heald at the Maclellan Foundation and the co-founder of Generous Giving, the organization that John has spent a lot of time working with. And he asked me this simple question and I alluded to this a little bit in the outset when we talked about may we do this out of gratitude, of gratitude for the gift given us? Daryl asked me, Henry, why do you give? And I had no frame to think about the answer there. I probably mumbled through something theologically [...]. I think at the time Kimberley and I were probably giving away 20% because God had really blessed bandwith and we thought we should do it. I may have even answered something like, I don't know, I want to pay it forward. I hope it wasn't something as corny as that, but it might have been. But through the next six months and God's Word, God and Jesus and the and the teachings of the Bible helped me to see that so much of the Bible has something to do with money. In fact, it felt that every single one of those six months, every single one of the days in the six months, had something to do with money. And it changed my completely changed my walk with God. I credit Daryl and that time in Scripture with my born again again moment, I credit the whole season one in going from black and white Christianity to Technicolor. And John's here to talk about that. John, thank you very much for being with us.
John Cortines: Thanks so much for having me on, Henry. It's great to see you and John as well.
Henry Kaestner: So as we get started, give us a foundation. And I think this is really important and that is we have some certain assumptions that we make as a foundation in thinking about how we invest, investing for the glory of God. How do we think about that across different asset classes, stocks, bonds, real estate? We've recently had some folks in talking about investing in cinema and in culture, but there's this underlying premise and belief that we as Christ followers, have a different way that we might think about money, but we really haven't gotten into that that much on the podcast. So there's the formative experience that each of us has that we can go through that then leads us to how do we invest our assets for the glory of God? John, speak to us a bit about your work. As we do with every guest, we like to start off with an autobiographical flyover. So do that, but then bring us right up to the work that you're doing right now and help us to understand how you came, to understand how you might answer this question. They're all asking, like, why do we give? Why do we invest?
John Cortines: Absolutely. Thanks, Henry. Well, you know, the quick flyover would be I grew up in North Dallas, grew up in a wonderful Christian home, so thankful for my parents. And I'm going to focus on the money element of this because this was transformative. I love how you called it Born Again Again. And I really point to that in my own journey. So I love Jesus from an early age, wanted to follow him with my whole life. And I also had imbibed this, you know, Christian money formula, which is something like work really hard, live frugally, save a lot, don't have debt, and by the way, give 10%. Like there's this obedience thing. And I thought, Hey, that's cool. And I really started loving accumulating money, starting with mowing lawns in high school, socked away $10,000. I went to engineering school and had scholarships, and before I ever stepped foot into my first full time job, I had $100,000, you know, internships and scholarships and all of this. And so my plan was to be a millionaire by age 30 or retire by age 40. And I had all the spreadsheets to prove it. And giving for me was actually that annoying cell in my spreadsheets that I could toggle lower and I'd be able to retire sooner. But I knew that I had to keep a certain level of giving to be an obedient Christian. And I was kind of the way I thought about it. I even enjoyed some of the giving I was doing, but I just it wasn't a source of life for me. And so fast forward in my journey, I was working in Big Oil. I wanted to pursue a career track with them and I ended up at Harvard Business School after having launched my career with Chevron, and I was going to go back as an expat after my MBA. And that's a very lucrative opportunity for those who know about, you know, that kind of a deal. So very, very excited about that. My classmate and I, who are in the business school, found a class at the divinity school called God and Money, and it just piqued our interest. We said, this is so cool, you know, a theology class on money and God and we love God and we love money. So how can we not take this class? And long story short, the next few months we went Genesis to Revelation. We were digging into Scripture and we were meeting all kinds of extremely generous Christians who had been impacted and were living their lives in radical ways, ways that we'd never heard about, even growing up in the church in terms of the ambition and percentages and commas and zeros in their giving. And we thought, this is unbelievable. The most striking thing was that it wasn't an act of obedience. It was an act of joy and gratitude, as you were just alluding to. And so that led us to write a term paper that became the book, God and money and really changed our lives forever. And so for the last seven years I've been working post MBA was called by God out of Big Oil. I let Chevron know, hey, I'm going to work for a small nonprofit in Florida called Generous Giving. And they didn't even try to talk me out of it. I think they thought I'd lost my mind. You know, this guy's a lost cause. So 60 to 70% lower pay than what I had thought I was going to be going into. But it's been this rich adventure with the Lord and so on. My coauthor, Greg and I have had both sides of the adventure. He's been in the corporate world and has been living and giving in a radical way. And now I've had the privilege of being on the ministry side of this and meeting hundreds, if not thousands of givers and talking to people about their journeys and getting to spread the joy, the message that this is a source of joy and intimacy with Christ rather than the way I used to view it. Right. Just obedience.
Henry Kaestner: The highest education I ever had was the University of Delaware. Some people call it the University of South Jersey. We did not have a class on God and money. It comes as a bit of a surprise to me that HBS had a class called God and Money, but maybe it shouldn't have, because I know that much of John's formation is through some really great Christ following men also at Harvard Business School. John, did you take the God and Money class?
John Coleman: Well, to be clear, I think it was at the divinity school, right, John? So I actually was aware of it while I was there. But I would say, you know, HBS was a much better Christian community than I had anticipated. And John, I don't know if you had this experience, but there was a very active Christian fellowship on campus with small groups in the different sections. And so I found that my faith was actually able to grow during that time in groups with others. And John, I don't know if you experienced the same thing, but it sounds like you you did, at least to some extent. What was that like for you?
John Cortines: Yeah, I'm really thankful for the Christian Fellowship. It's such an awesome community, you know, it's a small minority, but it's very vibrant. And yeah, it was a Tuesday morning men's Bible study that formed actually what has become lifelong community. So there's a a text chain and some annual get togethers in this group that I'm a part of from my time there. And these guys have been a real catalyst for spiritual growth in my journey. So I really praise God for that.
John Coleman: That's awesome. Now, you did make a very different decision than most HBS students do or HBS graduates do. First, I'd love to hear just what the reactions were when you came to this decision. First, when you gain this insight about giving and then came to the decision to enter the nonprofit world first, how did that conversation go with your wife? I know you were probably married at the time. And then secondly, how did your classmates react?
John Cortines: Sure You know, I want to answer on a personal level first, because God did this foundational work in my life and honestly, my coauthor, Greg's life for both of us, where we talk about this and God and money, it flipped the question we were asking. We kind of came into this big project of studying God's word to ask, how much do we need to give? Is that a 10% tithe? Is that something different? Is there another way to think about it? And we left that exploration asking how much do we really need to keep it just flipped it for us and God has abundantly provided for us. We had these educations, these careers, these salaries. And so to the extent we can define what enough looks like and live, you know, not this poverty lifestyle, but just live a nice life and be blessed and put a guardrail in place. The upside and the financial upside of our career gets allocated to God's kingdom in a different way. So there's this really freeing mindset shift. And then when the call to go into nonprofit arrived for me and for my wife, who is, I would say, more sensitive to the Lord and more able to make those pivots than I am. We had already reframed our lifestyle expectations around a finish line, so then it was like, okay, we may not have that upside we were thinking where we can give six figures every year, but we already recalibrated our lifestyle. And so it actually becomes more possible to move into the nonprofit sector and live on those kinds of salaries. That's the personal side to it. And then how did people react? You know, certainly surprise. I mean, that's the big thing, because you just I was surprised. Right. Is like I didn't go to grad school to take on student loans to then go earn less money and work in a nonprofit that it just it's an upside down formula. So all I can say is that God made his calling very clear. And that's what we told people like, you know, I don't know what your faith position is, but this is a call from God situation and all we can do is answer it.
John Coleman: That's awesome and encouraging. Talk to us. I mean, if you don't mind. For listeners who are unfamiliar with the book, talk to us about the thesis of the book and what you offer to people who are trying to consider the role that money plays in their life in God and Money. The book.
John Cortines: Sure. So the book grew out of our term paper. So those who have done business school will appreciate this. You know, we don't really write papers. John, I don't know if it was harder when you were there a few years before me, but not a lot of paper writing going on. And so then we when we were in the divinity school, the professor says, Hey, you have to write a 15 pages paper to conclude the semester. And we said, Wow. So we said, Can we write it together? And he said, Sure, just make it 30 pages. So we're like, Oh, shoot. So we started a research paper. Honestly, we said, I want to investigate Scripture and interview experienced Christian givers. And try to build a framework around how do we think about money and giving and the Christian life. So that's really the foundation of the project. And so it starts, you know, the whole first chapter is just a fly over Genesis to Revelation. What does it say about money? And it was funny, even the publisher saying, you know, people aren't going to hang with you for a chapter one that's just a Bible flyover. And you say, well, we got to anchor it on that. And what we do throughout the course of the book is try and build a framework for a higher income or a more financially successful business leader in the 21st century who's wrestling with what do I do with this money that God has provided and how do I be faithful? And so we propose down to numbers and frameworks around what that looks like.
Henry Kaestner: So John, I want to get into something right off the bat that I think is really applicable to our audience. I think that some number of folks are coming to understand that actually there's a great opportunity to understand that God owns it all and we can worship by giving to God what is already His, participate in the work that He's doing. And there's been a movement of biblical generosity that I think is really picking up steam in the church, which is to be celebrated. It's not as clear that the concept of investing according to faith through this knowledge that God is at all is at the same level yet. I think it's building toward that. But as you come at things from the foundational level, which I think is the most important level about God owning it all, do you have any reflections on how we might think about our investment portfolio in light of God and money?
John Cortines: Thanks, Henry. You know, one of the most compelling things I heard a few years ago, and I know these concepts are familiar for the listeners of this show and the work that you all are doing and advocating for. So I just I'm really thankful for your partnership in this space biblically to advocate for this perspective. But the thing that changed my perspective on this was when someone said, you know, if you think about all the giving that someone will ever do or all the giving that even Christians will ever do, in aggregate, it's a small slice of the overall wealth. And if you think about the investment portfolios, the size is just radically, radically different. And, you know, we could even say in round numbers, you know, the giving is in, I don't know, tens of billions probably. But the investment portfolio is in the multiple, multiple trillions, even the tens of trillions. And so how we allocate our giving dollars and the fact that we do give radically, generously as believers, that's a that's a mandate. That's a call. That's an invitation. But I think you're right. There's less of an awareness to say, hey, what does it look like to invest according to these principles? The one thing I'll say and I love your reaction to this, too, as an expert here, we see this real push around ESG in the secular world. And depending on when people are listening to this podcast, you know, the FCC has even just come out and said they're building frameworks around this for disclosures of publicly traded companies around ESG. And that's coming from our, you know, the postmodern, confused ethical soup that we're all swimming in as a broad society. So I think there's a massive opportunity for believers to be out in front of that, which we honestly haven't been, but to really articulate so many incredible faith driven business leaders who are running their companies by these principles, but probably haven't written that down in a thoughtful way or publicly disclosed it necessarily. So I would love to see us be more forward and articulate in saying, here's how we're running our companies, here's how we're investing our money. Not necessarily in this same exact definition of ESG that the secular culture may create, but in a biblically anchored way, some of which is going to overlap and some of which is going to look a little bit different. I'd love to hear y'all's reactions to that.
John Coleman: Yeah, John, I think this is such an important topic. You know, what's ironic is that Christians and other believers, whether they be Muslims or Jews for a thousand years, have been at the forefront of this issue. You know, some of the earliest codes about how you should invest, what you should invest in, what you shouldn't invest in, actually came out of the great monotheistic religions in particular. And yet if you look at the modern ESG movement, as you described, it's largely been a mainstream or secular phenomenon for the last 20 or 30 years. And I think we had gotten to the space for many Christians you mentioned earlier had divided their life in two and said, I'm going to make money and then I'm going to give, which was kind of a false dichotomy. And I think that many business leaders and investors had also said the same thing that, you know, the corporation's only duty is to its shareholders and the investors only duty is to make a profit or to maximize return and had segregated those two areas, living their values in one area and giving, but not really trying to impose those on the way in which they ran companies or gave. In the meantime, I think the mainstream world led by a lot of large international institutions. Decided that it had to enforce its values or they had to live their values through their investing. And so they started to require companies to meet certain criteria on climate or on governance, etc. And that's grown now. I won't go off on too much of a tangent here and to something like a $35-40 trillion segment of investment management is ESG now. And yet if you look at Faith Aligned Investment Management, it's really between $50 and $100 billion right now. It's a tiny sliver of the market. And so what we encourage people to do I think is to not draw a false dichotomy in their lives that if they truly believe in the values of their faith and how those can help people flourish, and how loving God and loving your neighbor can actually transform the world, that they try and exhibit those through their investing strategies and even through the ways that they lead companies, not necessarily as Christian companies, quote unquote, but really embracing the values of their faith and beginning to live those out in every sphere of their lives. And we kind of have a catch phrase for that, which is all investing is impact investing. It's this idea that impact investing isn't 2% of what you do when you're feeling generous. It's really 100% of your portfolio because that whole portfolio is having an impact. The question is whether you're going to control that impact, whether you're going to wield the influence that you have through that portfolio or yield it to others who have their own agenda to pursue. And so I'm seeing and Henry, I think you'd agree with this. I'm seeing a lot more people and institutions waking up to that. But it's interesting to see how the faith aligned or Christian world actually fell behind after starting this whole movement, you know, hundreds of years ago and is only now waking up to what the mainstream world has been living for a couple of decades.
John Cortines: Yeah, and I so appreciate that. And the historical context is fascinating as I reflect on my own personal journey. You know, I'm very analytical and I anticipated building this nest egg. Hey, retire by 40. So what does that look like? And I kind of cut my teeth in the bobble head world, if that's a familiar term. You know, the founder of Vanguard, and it's this idea of index and forget about it and you'll be okay. And even the idea that you'll probably be a head of active investments anyways, net of fees, and even if you're not, you haven't spent any time thinking about it so you can sleep easy at night. You know, I think there are many believers who would fall into that camp. And so the argument needs to be, you know, regardless of what you think about what the return, you know, returns one way or the other. I love what you said, John. All investing is impact investing. So when you buy an index, you're buying a lot of stuff you probably don't want to buy. And so to set it and forget about it and just collect your returns for 30 or 40 years, I think we can start setting that aside in light of a broader picture of the kingdom and the impact that those funds are having.
Henry Kaestner: So, John, we do a segment here toward the end of every podcast called Lightning Round, and we're not there yet. But I just want to prepare you just so you can start getting ready. We can up the tempo a little bit, but I want you to spend as long as you need to answer this question, because I think it's really, really formative. We know from Scripture that God loves a cheerful giver not to give out of reluctance or compulsion. And I think that it's fair for us to take that and extend it towards how we think about faith driven investing as well. He wants to have a joyful investor, one that doesn't feel like they have to go ahead and invest in this fund or that fund, because otherwise they're going to be beaten with many blows. Right. How is it that you are able to find joy in giving and joy in investing? And what are some of the things that you've seen others employ as well?
John Cortines: Yeah, thanks for that question, Henry. I would say that here's the biggest thing about how to become a joyful and cheerful giver, and we can apply this to investing as well. You know, why do we give let me start from that. We start from the character of God. As Christians, we believe that God is the giver. He gave his only son. We have eternal life. We've received so much. And if we're made in the image of God, we are made to be givers. And so if we start from the character of God and we recognize the priceless gift of the Gospel, then we move into a posture of gratitude. And so that is actually my answer of how do we maintain joy in our giving and in our overall stewardship of money is to wake up every day with a posture of gratitude for what we get to do and for what God has blessed us with. And I would argue we talk about this a little bit in the book. True Riches, that the opposite of gratitude when it comes to stewardship, the opposite of gratitude is pride. And those two words aren't often put together in contrast to one another. But I believe financially it's true, if you think about King Nebuchadnezzar in the Old Testament is the ultimate example of financial pride. He says, look at this, Babylon, the great city that I've built to display my power and my glory. And he's struck down. You know, he's a negative example for us spiritually. But if we start from that posture of gratitude and receiving all that we have. As a gift from God, it becomes so much easier to have open hands and to give or to have the freedom to do our very best in our investments. But know that we're going to miss some. We're not going to be perfect. We're not going to pick the perfect fund, but we're living in the freedom of gratitude for what God has given us. So that'd be my one tip on living with joy in our financial gifts and investments.
John Coleman: That's awesome, John. What a great testimony. I want to pivot to some of your work at Maclellan here shortly, but before we jump off of the topic of God and money and how you started to investigate this, I was really fascinated that you went Genesis to Revelation through the Bible and then part of your term paper was studying people who were good at this or were living this out. I was wondering if you could make it real for us. Who are, you know, one or two or three people that inspired you on this front in the Bible? And then who are a couple of folks that really inspired you out in the world today on this topic of God and money and living generously?
John Cortines: Absolutely. You know, one thing I'll highlight in scripture is this awesome contrast. Luke is the most financially oriented gospel writer. So the gospel of Luke has all these extra money stories we don't get in the other gospels. And there's a contrast between the rich young ruler who actually does appear in multiple gospels, and Zacchaeus who actually appears in the we don't need to get all into biblical theology and interpretation here, but Zacchaeus appears at the apex of the journey into Jerusalem that Jesus is on. It's a key story for Luke in writing his gospel and the rich young ruler comes to Jesus, has a bunch of money, can't get over the hump of realizing that He's called to give in a radical way. And he walks away, sad, and Zacchaeus is met with the grace of Jesus Christ and in his joy, he gives away half of his assets and beyond to do restitution for where he's wronged people. And Jesus says today salvation has come to this house, you know, an acknowledgment of what Zacchaeus has done. So just kind of looking at that contrast like, man, I want to be a Zacchaeus, not a rich young ruler who has the money but walks away from God because of that. Yeah. Making it real in terms of some people. I'll give one example. I'm a saver. I know many people listening that will have that saver mentality as well. And I met this guy. We spoke over the phone. He's a hedge fund guy and shared quite openly, you know, hey I am blessed with like a $5 million plus kind of an income in the last few years. And and he said, but I don't save money. And it was kind of on the phone. It's like, come again, you know, tell me what that looks like. And he said, Well, you know, we have our house. Our house is paid off. We've got some money set aside for college, for the kids. I have really good life insurance and disability insurance. So, you know, my family's covered. But, you know, as far as retirement, I'm not in a hurry. I'm in my forties, you know, why would I save up a big retirement nest egg? And so we make all this money. We live a decent lifestyle, and then we flush the rest. We give it to God's kingdom every year. He said, I think I need maybe 3 million bucks to retire on, but I'm on a glide path to save that. I'm not in a hurry. And we just give whatever we make beyond what we live on, we give away. And I just was so floored. I think I probably hung up the phone and sat down on the floor of my living room, you know, just like I can't believe what I'm hearing, because if I was him, you know, I've saved for six months and then call it quits. And I think just kind of hearing that kind of ambitious generosity was very transformative in my own journey.
John Coleman: And I'll tell you, one of the most encouraging things for me, entering the faith driven investing world about a year ago was just the extraordinary number of examples of that, you know, whether it be people like Alan Barnhart or Casey Crawford or others who are so generous with their financial resources and live so radically differently. I wanted to pivot here quickly, John, to your work today. So you've joined the Maclellan Foundation in a role related to giving. Tell us a little bit more about Maclellan and about what you're doing there.
John Cortines: Absolutely. Well, you know, it's been such an honor to be a part of the Maclellan Foundation, who is the founder of Generous Giving, where I worked for five years, and I've been directly on their team for two years now, and the foundations existed for over 75 years. And so the family and this foundation has been passionate advocates for this perspective on biblical generosity for literally longer than I've been alive on this earth. And so I'm so grateful to benefit from that. And there was this key revelation for them that giving is not just a means to spiritual ends. You know, it's not that we give in order to see people discipled and baptized and all these things. But giving actually is spiritual fruit in the life of a Christian believer. It is a component of our discipleship journey with the Lord. And in recognition of that, they started this organization generous giving that shares that message. Many people will have heard of a journey of generosity, retreat, or their celebration of generosity conference, which are these no pressure environments where people who have, you know, more resources than the average person. Come together with peers and explore the kind of conversation we're having today and hear stories like we're talking about today and just get fired up as givers and in that journey. And so through that, it was really impactful on my journey when I was kind of wrestling through these topics, watching some of their videos online and meeting people who got their start at these conferences. So yeah, it's been a great joy to be a part of it. And I'll just say that for anyone who's thinking about stepping into those kind of environments, the beauty of it is the neutrality. It's just this is not a fundraiser. This is not a conversation with a certain end in mind. This is a non prescriptive but prophetic environment to talk with people and say, Hey, what is God's calling on my life as a giver given that He's entrusted these resources to me? And how do I make the most of the opportunity I have?
Henry Kaestner: All right. That's beautiful. I want to affirm that. I also want to encourage people that might be listening to this is that while traditionally generous giving and the work of Maclellan foundation have tended to help people who are struggling and trying to figure out how do they give well? It's the biblical message of generosity is equally applicable for a college sophomore, somebody who's in India. I remember one of the things that really brought me into the work that you all do out of Maclellan was Daryl going over to India and spending time with the Dalits, the Untouchables, and preaching to them about how rich they were. And that translator like, Dude you know who you're talking to? And Daryl was like, No, no, just translate like that. And of course, he is preaching a second Corinthians 8:9 and just, you know, to that God who was rich, became poor so that we are poor and might become rich. And so they could understand the new view of riches through the biblical message of generosity. And there's a beauty in there that's really about heart transformation. And I think that that has so much overlap with Faith Driven Investor, because Faith Driven Investing at one level is yes, absolutely. How do we steward investment capital across? Yes, it could be patient concession return, but absolutely market based return as well. How do we think about doing that? Well, how do we respond into that? And I hope that listeners will get a good sense for that. But ultimately, all of this is about bringing us back to God and knowing God and how much He loves us. So much. So anybody who's struggling with money at all, the spirit of Mammon, if you will being able to understand that biblical message of generosity that you all have espoused for so long, sets us free regardless of our financial background. And I think that that's an important thing to mention. Okay, we are here at the end of our time together. Just so you know, this is how this is going to end. The question you're going to get at the end. You are not going to get the questions early on because it takes away the fun of it. But the question you're going to get at the end is what is God speaking to you about through his word? And maybe it's today, maybe it's over the course of last week, maybe sort of last month. That's what we can end with. That's when you know this is all going to be over. But John and I have a couple of Rapidfire questions we're going to throw at you first. Okay. You ready?
John Cortines: I'm ready.
Henry Kaestner: Alright good Okay. Number one, we see the exercise equipment in the background. I also know you enough to know that you're really fit. What's your favorite thing to do to stay in shape?
John Cortines: It is lazy exercise, which I would say is fasting.
Henry Kaestner: I was not expecting that
John Cortines: Trick answer Once a week, 24 hour fast spiritual and physical benefits. So that's my lazy exercise.
Henry Kaestner: Wow. Okay, so that's the second podcast cast that we've had on today that's talked about how important fasting is in their spiritual life. And so you're not spending time on that exercise equipment. That's for somebody else behind you. You do fasting.
John Cortines: It's theoretically for me, but I'd be ashamed to tell you how often it's used.
Henry Kaestner: Theoretically. Okay. All right. Number two, we're talking about the biblical message of generosity so I am going to put you on a spot here and maybe you shouldn't have a favorite in this. And no, I'm not asking you about your kids. I'm asking you about a charity, a ministry that you and your wife have given to over time, that there's just something about them that's really inspired you.
John Cortines: Oh, man, I have developed this beautiful relationship over the years with Compassion International. Everything they do is about Christ and children and working through the local church. Those are their three C's and they are so I've known their executive leadership and I've talked to their volunteers through translators in the field, and they all speak the same language, so gospel centered. So I can't say enough about them. They've been our number one allocation as a family.
John Coleman: That's awesome. We love compassion in our house, too. One of the great things you can do if you have kids we found is that for each of the kids, we have a kid overseas who's about their age that they're a pen pal with now that we're supporting. And it's an easy way for any family to get into supporting others overseas. I have a slightly different question for you all. Preface this by saying, you know, John has written two books, God and Money and True Riches. Everyone should pick those up, I think. And we can be certain that any proceeds from those are going to good used, as you've heard today. So buy extra copies for your friends. But John, what are you reading right now or what have you read? Recently that you think would be helpful to people investigating these topics?
John Cortines: You know, I'll give a very unique answer, something people haven't heard of, but especially if somebody has read three or four books I'm giving and they're kind of like, Hey, I wonder what's out there. There is a guy named Saint Basil the Great, and he preached some sermons on money and giving 1600 years ago. He's one of the church fathers. And so you can find a translation of several of his sermons that's called On Social Justice by Basil the Great. Man. It is good stuff. He's a little bit in-your-face. The church fathers were a little bit in-your-face. So if you can get past his aggressive style, it is convicting and inspiring sermons on money and generosity. So in centuries past, the message was the same as it is today.
John Coleman: It's awesome. So maybe we'll close it out. John, what do you think is God's call in your life right now and what are you learning from him?
John Cortines: You know, it's interesting that there's this theme I found in the community of biblically generous people that God has allowed me to be a part of. Whereas you start giving your money away, you start giving your time and your life away. And then very often the call of God emerges to adopt or foster. It kind of comes inside the home. So Isaiah 58, beautiful passage. Bring the homeless poor into your house. The glory of the Lord will be your rear guard. And God has really spoken that into me in my wife's life over the last few years. And so we have foster twins who we received from the NICU 5 pounds each and they've been with us since then. They're now two years old and I'll be in court tomorrow on their case. And we're praying for an adoption this year. So I would just say that there's all this professional stuff and flying around and conferences and that's a great joy. But but the conviction and the challenge and the fellowship with Jesus and trying to live this out every day at home and in my wife, who's a hero, doing that even more intensely than I am day in and day out. That's been the real area of growth for us lately.
Henry Kaestner: That's super motivating, very encouraging. John, I'm grateful for our friendship, our partnership in the movement and just the way that you challenge us all, challenged our listeners. So listeners, thank you for having dialed in. Thank you for the support and encouragement we're getting from emails and suggestions on people we might have on the podcast. Yes, as you might imagine, if you think this might be a podcast that might be an inspiration or encouragement to others, please pass it along. We have a new Faith Driven Investor group study that we've rolled out that you might really enjoy. It's six weeks study. You get together with your peers to talk about how you can process what God is saying about investing. It's some great lessons from Tim Keller, Andy Crouch, Mark Sheard, Finny Kuruvilla, a whole bunch of others. It's just really super motivating, encouraging. I think you enjoy that. Thank you for having tuned in and may God bless you as you endeavor to understand how to invest capital for God's glory. Until next time.