Embracing Faith and Entrepreneurial Vision for a Life of Freedom and Fulfillment Troy Bravenboer

Unlock the transformative power of positivity with our engrossing discussion on how faith and imagination can shape your life's path. Troy's incredible journey from working a job to becoming a thriving entrepreneur without the traditional college route showcases the sheer force of a vision backed by belief. His story, which spans from sales to founding a multimillion-dollar trucking company and a tech startup, illustrates the strategic choices that can lead to both prosperity and the freedom to follow one's true calling.

This episode takes a deep dive into the symbiotic relationship between business success and a committed faith life. I open up about the calling that shifted my focus from ministry to growing my trucking business – a move that seemed worldly but was steeped in divine guidance. The leap of faith brought me not only monetary reward but also invaluable skills that now serve my ministry work. As Troy and I discuss, whether you're a budding entrepreneur or someone looking to infuse your career with spirituality, understanding the balance between hustle and heavenly stewardship is key.

Finally, we discuss the delicate dance of leading a fulfilling life at the intersection of business acumen and spiritual practice. From navigating work-life balance to redefining success on our own terms, the conversation is peppered with personal insights – like my admiration for my wife's dual role as an eloquent speaker and astute businesswoman. We challenge hustle culture and redefine what it truly means to be successful, all while ensuring we make time for family and fun. Join us and be part of this enlightening journey as we explore the endless possibilities that await when faith and focus join forces.

Transcript

Steven Pemberton: 0:00

Hey guys, this is Steven Pemberton, the host of Voice Like a Lion podcast, and you're probably curious why you're hearing me here and not on the actual show. So the reason why that is is I was talking to my buddy, troy, who you're going to hear from in just a moment, and the conversation was so good in the pre-interview that I just had the press record. So get ready, buckle up. This conversation is going to change your life. Yeah, I just think, especially with what you're talking about, I think that that's such a crucial piece that people miss is like you're giving the devil too much power, like you're giving him all the shine, all the glory for something that he should get none of the glory for.

Troy Bravenboer: 0:36

Yeah, you know, it's like people are posting like, oh, this satanic thing and that satanic thing, but like all it's doing is bringing attention to the devil, Like maybe people are listening that like aren't Christians? They don't, they don't share faith in Jesus, like no problem, right, yeah, you still know those people that are in business that all they do is they talk about the struggle. And it's almost like them talking about the struggle, whether you're saying, oh, I'm talking about the devil, or you're just talking about the struggle, Basically, what you're doing is you're glorifying the fight and in a way, even if it's subconscious, it's almost like you're validating your authenticity or you're trying to validate the work that you're doing based on the opposition that's out there, and it's like nobody cares about the opposition. Life is like a camera. What you focus on is going to develop, and that's something for me that's really been hitting me lately.

Troy Bravenboer: 1:26

It's like, hey, you know, when you have, when you have struggles, like you don't think about the struggle, like you don't focus on it because you're just going to get more of what you focus on. It's like no man we have the mind of Christ. Colossians talks about us keeping our mind on heavenly things, not on earthly things, and I mean again, even if you want to just focus on, you know, success principles outside of the Bible. It's like thoughts are things you know as a man. Think it right, you know who wrote?

Troy Bravenboer: 1:51

that book? Do you know that book?

Steven Pemberton: 1:53

I know exactly what you're talking about. I think I have that book somewhere.

Troy Bravenboer: 1:57

It's like as a man think it, and it talks about how the mind is a guarded and whatever thought, James Allen, you know, and that's like oh Jesus, success, stuff. And you know it's like, added the abundance of the heart. The mouth speaks so you can tell. You can tell what's going on in somebody's life based on what they're talking about out of their mouth.

Steven Pemberton: 2:15

Yeah, for me, what I had to realize excuse me, but in my own life is exactly that. I mean, it talks about the power of death and life is in the tongue. So it's what you're speaking. The same thing you're saying is what you're focusing on is where it's going to grow in your life. I mean, we're talking he gives seed to the sower, it's like. But if you sit there and you're just sewing discourse and you're sitting there and you're sewing, you're sewing unbelief into the atmosphere, into the ground that is around you. You're going to get that.

Troy Bravenboer: 2:41

Yeah, Dude, you know, it's like so many different levels, right? Like I remember being in high school and like being in a relationship with a girl she's out at a party and I'm not at the party. Like I remember my mind would just go reeling with all of, and like the anxiety and the stress and I mean there's no proof of it in the natural right People can be like, oh well, I don't believe in faith. Dude, like everybody has a measure of faith. They are believed If you're an entrepreneur, if you're a business person, even if you're not, you have a balance of faith or unbelief, because you have thoughts about the future, and those thoughts about the future are unfounded. They might be a good speculation based on where things are today, or they might be a bad speculation based on where on things are today, but the fact is is that none of them are a reality at this moment. So you're believing something that hasn't happened yet or doesn't exist.

Steven Pemberton: 3:32

So, whether you believe that a negative outcome is in the future, whether you believe a positive outcome is in the future, you're using faith both ways, because there's no proof right now of either one yeah, and it's crazy that you just said that, because my wife and I, a little less than an hour ago, we did a live stream and we talked about it. She was just saying how, back in 2018, when she started growing Amazon, I never once thought that it was going to happen. I was just against her the whole time. I was super unsupportive. But then once I watched it go from one sale to 10 sales and then from 10 sales to 100 sales and then from 100 sales to 100 sales a day and then she was doing 100K a month. Now, all of a sudden, she said then I had evidence. I mean, there was.

Steven Pemberton: 4:16

You could not refute the evidence, and that's brought up Hebrews 11-1 in the NLT. It talks about that faith is the evidence of things we can't see. So when you have, like, that is evidence that you have, faith is when you actually believe that something better is coming, when you believe that the event, the situation that you're in, is going to work all together for your good. And I just think that word gets missed because, like, I actually have evidence that this thing is real. Well, what evidence you have? Well, you could. I can show you my life Before I found the Bible before I found Christ, before I actually saw miracle signs and wonders, and I can tell you what my evidence that he will do it again, no matter what my situation is.

Troy Bravenboer: 4:52

Yeah, yeah, and it's like you know, any entrepreneur again, regardless of what their, what their quote unquote religious background is, is like anybody that's in the business space is exercising some type of faith, because you're seeing a future that includes or excludes your product or service and you're saying that the world is a better place with my product or service.

Troy Bravenboer: 5:17

And you believe in what you're doing, where you're willing to go, penetrate that market, despite what the economy is saying, despite what your parents might have been saying or your friends might have been saying or whatever the opposition is, is that you are exercising a level of faith to be able to penetrate into the market.

Troy Bravenboer: 5:36

And it's like there was a book called the Secret all those years ago, which is still out there, which really just basically takes the power of the Holy Spirit in Jesus out of all biblical principles.

Troy Bravenboer: 5:48

The idea of like speaking things into existence, like our imagination is actually a tool that God has given us and I think a lot of people don't understand this is that you can actually use your imagination as a tool of faith.

Troy Bravenboer: 6:01

Let me say this I believe that a lot of Christians don't understand this, but a lot of sales people get this, because I remember reading Brian Tracy had a book called Advanced Selling Strategies and he would say go ahead, close your eyes and picture the sale like, picture everything going through, and they've done scientific studies to find out that whether you in real life experience the sale or whether you just imagine the sale in your body, that the same hormones were released and the same chemicals were released in your body, that it doesn't really notice the difference.

Troy Bravenboer: 6:35

So this whole concept of using your imagination to be able to see the things that are in the future, it's actually a very powerful tool that so even just think right now, like if you're watching this, wherever you're watching, just feel free to hit pause and think about some areas in your life and really spend time imagining what the desired results are that you want, and make a practice out of thinking about those desired outcomes that you want, and you'll start to see how life leads you in that way to start seeing those desired outcomes.

Steven Pemberton: 7:13

That's something that I've realized. I mean, I remember back when we were living in a trashy place and we used to do that every day. We would just take time and put on this music in the background and we would just envision it and it changed a lot for me. It took a long time for me to quit my job from that point, but still it just gave me the belief that I could. I remember I'm sitting there starting a business while I'm still working a job and I'm like working the business at my job because I was the manager so I could do it, and at night there was no one else there.

Steven Pemberton: 7:44

But I just had this belief that there was more for me than what I was experiencing out of this life, and that's even something that you just brought up and I loved it. So I guess my question, and I guess probably a question that people listening are having, is Troy, you're talking about stretching your faith. You're talking about stepping and walking in faith and doing all this stuff and envisioning it. But who are you? Who are you to tell me how to actually live a better life?

Troy Bravenboer: 8:09

Sure, yeah that's a good question. There's always like the sense of humility that wants to come in. But at the end of the day like just to kind of bullet point some of the successes that I've had I dropped out of college before. It was cool to drop out of college, so I dropped out of college in 2006. I was probably one of the first people to like preach the drop out of college gospel, if you will. Before it was cool and now it's become cool.

Troy Bravenboer: 8:31

And don't misunderstand me If you're in college for like a career, specific education, I fully support that doctor, lawyer, nurse, stuff like that but if you're just going to school because you don't know what else to do, there's a lot of better things to do with your time and money to go to school. And that's what I was saying back in 2005, 2006,. The writing was on the wall. So dropped out of college, started getting in sales.

Troy Bravenboer: 8:53

I actually got involved in a network marketing company and I started to realize that if other people grew up average lifestyles and became millionaires, then I could become a millionaire. And you know, millionaires put their pants on, you know, one leg at a time, just like the rest of everybody. And I started to realize that if I was going to spend the next 40, 50 years of my life working, I wanted to go like you know. I wanted to go for it Like like I. If I I knew that the best case scenario, if I continued with my route at school and with a career, I'd be making maybe a quarter, I would have thought back then like $150,000 a year was like crazy money.

Steven Pemberton: 9:32

Yeah.

Troy Bravenboer: 9:33

You know. So, like now, if I put it in relative terms, like I probably would have thought like, hey, the most that I'm going to be able to do is like $200,000 a year, and I'm going to be working a job and I'll retire, you know, and I just remember thinking to myself like if I'm going to be working the next 40 years of my life anyway, why not figure out how to make millions of dollars, you know? So I started getting involved in sales and I moved down to Florida to go to Bible College. I did Bible school in the morning, I did door-to-door sales in the afternoon and evening and we basically slung Fios, which is like phone, internet, television, and I was making I was like 19 years old making like $2,200, $2,500 a week and I was working from like 3pm to like 7, 8pm, you know, door-to-door sales. And then I started doing a different type of sales where you're doing like home automation, home alarms, with a company called Vivint and did real well with that I make.

Troy Bravenboer: 10:27

Like you know them, they're great. I love them. So they changed my life. That company changed my life and my friends there. I have another recommendation for you, a guy named Tim who'd be an amazing on your podcast. But you know, I made 80 grand in 14 weeks, I made 120 grand in 14 weeks and then I made like 150 grand in 18 weeks and whatever it was, I think maybe my first year I made 50 grand in 18 weeks, but either way, making 15 grand in 14 weeks was a great.

Troy Bravenboer: 10:52

So I think it was 50 grand in 14 weeks, 80 grand in 14 weeks and then 120 grand in 18 weeks over the summer, and then like 160 grand in 18 weeks over the summer, and that was all doing door-to-door sales and I basically worked for four months and then would travel and do ministry stuff the other eight months and ended up starting a trucking company after that, because I didn't grow up wanting to be a door-to-door salesman my whole life Like maybe many of you guys listening and started the trucking company in 2013. And then, you know, kind of went through the gauntlet of that startup, ended up hitting our first million dollar a year in 2017. And then in 2019, we started having million dollar months and we broke 10 million in 2019. And then we did three years 19, 20, 21, whatever, the years were, I forget they were all eight figure years.

Troy Bravenboer: 11:43

And then we shut down that company in the beginning of last year and I've had a trucking startup now for the last year and a half a tech company. So we've raised a little over half a million bucks for that and it's been a fun journey and I've done ministry stuff in there and I helped out planning churches and yeah. So that's kind of the run through.

Steven Pemberton: 12:04

So I know that you just said something. What made you decide to shift your business? I mean, it sounds as if everything was rolling. You're doing eight figures a year. Why would you decide to pivot, especially now of all times?

Troy Bravenboer: 12:15

Yeah, yeah, so it's a good question, right? And so basically we had like 170 to 220% growth year over year, all the way up until we hit the time of 10 million, which is insane right, Like people are, most companies are happy with like five, six, seven, eight percent growth, and we were doubling in size and it's very typical for smaller companies like, even though you're talking millions a year, it's still small in the business world, right, yeah, and like our margins were not huge I mean six, seven, eight, nine percent margin, depending on our growth in the year.

Troy Bravenboer: 12:46

And then, once we hit 10 million, we didn't go from 10 to 20 million in a year. You know what I mean. And I started to realize that with that type of service company that we had, that we started to see some bottlenecks of scalability. There's two other things that I saw is one is that we had the value of our contracts was not a strong value of our contracts.

Troy Bravenboer: 13:06

We were working with owner operator truckers and they were on like a 90 day contract but like even that like didn't really have a lot of teeth into it and if we ever wanted to exit the company, that's what they're going to look at. They're going to look at, like what your contract value is and I knew that are basically our customer, if you will. Like they just weren't a high regarded customer. There was a lot of churn in that customer. So, like the like the sellability of that business didn't have strong sellability. And that's when I realized, like man, if I'm going to be building something like I don't want to be building something that is basically going to be golden handcuffs for my whole life and I saw that there was a big opportunity in the market. Trucking is a $900 billion market. You know, most of the trucking companies are less than 20 trucks.

Troy Bravenboer: 13:54

Over 97% of trucking companies are small and I was very intimately familiar with a lot of the pain since I scaled through that and we had actually built our own software, like our own bespoke solution for our company that basically helped us scale from a million a year to a million in a month without hiring any additional administrators. And I thought, man, I could do that for me. You know this can do it for other people in the industry. And I just saw more long term. You know like, yeah, I might be able to grow a $10 million company, but to grow a $100 million or a billion dollar company in that model was going to be super tough. But on the software side I felt like, hey, it's kind of like I basically had to make the decision to give up the good for the great.

Steven Pemberton: 14:37

I think it's really fascinating, though, because when we shut down our company in 2022, I mean, it was doing 100k, sometimes 200k, a month, so showing that down wasn't like, okay, it's easy, we'll just shut it down, it's fine. And I think that that's such a story and thank you for sharing and like going in depth, and I think that, especially now, I see so many people settling for good instead of settling for God. It's like, if God gives you something, settle for that Instead of just settling for something good. So for you, why did you? Why did you believe? I know you're talking about the software it's like, but not only the belief. Practically, it's like well, you know, this is more scalable, I can have a bigger market share, but what was it innately in your face side that said, hey, this is why I'm gonna shut this down, this is why we're going in this direction?

Troy Bravenboer: 15:21

Yeah, man, I just feel the presence of God right now as we talk about this. But to go into scripture and to see God's plan from the beginning is God's plan for his children was always extravagant abundance. Now some people want to take this the wrong way and they you know there's a lot of pre kids. I already see people rolling their eyes or getting itchy in their skin, like he's going to talk about prosperity. Okay, pause that feeling for just a moment and go back to the Old Testament, which anyone that is a Bible scholar could agree was a lesser covenant than this new covenant that we have under the blood of Jesus and man. I'm like I'm listening to Deuteronomy now.

Troy Bravenboer: 16:07

When the garden was made for Adam and Eve, the garden was there, was so much in the garden that it was designed to last humanity forever. Like it was extravagantly more than what Adam and Eve needed. Like it wasn't even just like just enough or just barely enough or a little bit more than enough. Like it was extravagantly more than everything that they would ever need. It was. It was more than all of humanity would ever need was in the garden at that time. So God had richly supplied for Adam and Eve.

Troy Bravenboer: 16:40

God's plan. Like Deuteronomy 8, it talks about God's overwhelming desire to abundantly bless his children. Like you know, you look at God brought the Israelites out of Egypt. They stripped the Egyptians of their wealth. Which many people and many Bible scholars will agree is that that's a type in the shadow of when, a when, a non, when a person becomes a believer and gets pulled out of the world, that they now have access to the to be able to strip the Egyptians of their wealth, if you will.

Troy Bravenboer: 17:10

But everywhere throughout scripture you can see Old Testament, new Testament that God's plan is that we would have more than enough. Second Corinthians 9 says more than enough for every good work and charitable deed, that we would be more than self sufficient. So it's not just about being self sufficient, but that we would have more than enough. So I knew God's plan was not to take me back. God's plan is always to advance. God's plan is always to grow. God's plan is always to take territory. God's plan is never to shrink back, to get smaller, to become less. It's always to grow. And so I knew that if God was telling me to do this, then I knew that it was because there was a greater expanse ahead, not less.

Steven Pemberton: 17:55

I have a Bible verse. I actually said this the last time that we tried to record and I said this is going to be the first time I actually read a Bible verse. And it's still all true. You're going to be the first one to read a Bible verse, and it's John 1010, because we're talking about New Covenant. But the thief comes only to steal and kill and destroy.

Steven Pemberton: 18:13

I have come that they may have life and have it to the full, and when we read that, that's that those, those words are in red, so that means that Jesus is saying life to the full. That's an NIV version, if anyone wants to look it up. I think that life to the full is not just like, well, you know, I feel the Holy Spirit and I talk to the Lord and I'm sitting here. It's like that's great, but he's also called you to to do something in the world. It's like it is his will to be done on earth as it is in heaven, not to wait until he gets a heaven.

Steven Pemberton: 18:40

So my question is is do you have an abundant life? And if you do have an abundant life, what does abundance mean to you? Does that mean abundance in relationships, abundance in your finances, abundance in your friendships like Abundant. A full life should be full in every regard. I don't think a full life is if, if you and I were talking and I hadn't eaten in weeks, somehow I'm still alive, like I'm doing 40 days of fasting, and you watched me from the last time we talked till now and I'm just. I look like a skeleton.

Troy Bravenboer: 19:06

I know man.

Steven Pemberton: 19:07

You look pretty, you look pretty pay, I did lose some weight. But wait, if I looked as if I was emaciated and you're just like dude, I'm worried about you. It's like don't worry about me, I have life to the full. It's like obviously not. There's nothing about you that is missing. So I just think that is fascinating. Why do you think that people, when they read life to the full and think, well, that's not my finances.

Troy Bravenboer: 19:25

Yeah, that's, I think it's a fear to religion. At the end of the day, like they've been. You know, it's like a garbage in, garbage out, right like I think that that's somewhere along the line. People have been fed information and that they've been chosen to believe that information. And you know, you could, you know, like you can find some, definitely find some scriptures in the word about the challenges of money or the dangers of money.

Troy Bravenboer: 19:51

But nowhere is it, nowhere could you establish that it's not God's will for you to be abundantly Supplied for. Right like there's definitely things where, hey, you don't want to be subject to a spirit of man, and like you can't serve God and money, absolutely true, but that doesn't mean you can't have money, right like, even if you look at, you know, david, david gave, like when you look at what he gave to build the temple, he gave billions with a B, billions of dollars of Gold and silver, and that was a part from the treasury of the nation. Right Like billions of personal dollars to be able to do that. And you're talking about, you know, you know the Bible, you know God says that this is a man after my own heart, right, so you're talking about a billionaire, who is a man that was after God's own heart. So I so that.

Troy Bravenboer: 20:40

So number one is I think they believe it because they've been misfed information and, instead of genuinely looking into it, they kind of have like what you would call mental ascent. Like, yeah, that kind of makes sense, that makes sense, that makes sense, right. Or they've seen you know a bad representation of it, right. They've seen a hidden credit in a scam. Remember just seeing a Instagram video of that pastor who, like, launched the NFT thing and basically got oh, yeah, yeah.

Troy Bravenboer: 21:09

I believe that his intention, hopefully, was right to you know what I mean, and maybe he really had intentions to do a successful project but, like you know, they just see people abuse or misuse things and it's like you know it's the same thing with adultery or anything else in the kingdom of God, you know you get a bad taste in your mouth for it because of somebody's misappropriation of a biblical principle and it all goes off the off the handrail, right.

Troy Bravenboer: 21:31

So I think that's it and you know, but it all comes down to. And then the other thing is this maybe it actually comes down to like a personal lack of a lack of Confidence in God in them to be able to keep them righteous and pure at the same time. And it's like seeing it and other people says they basically are saying there's no way I could continue living holy if I was that blessed. So if there's no way that I can live that holy being blessed, there's no way that that person can actually be holy and be that blessed. Surely they're scamming people somehow, like no way could God actually bless somebody that much. They must be scamming somehow, like, like, like.

Troy Bravenboer: 22:12

He's like a T-rex. God like Too short, like does he? Do you really believe he owns a cattle on it? Do you really believe that all the gold is his and all the silver is it? Do you really believe that he owns everything and that at any moment in time he could just move a finger and give you access to anything that you want? Or is God limited? Do you think God's limited because it's not a net zero? It's not. It's not. If this person has, then I can't have, or if I have, then someone else can't have. Like, god is Well able to abundantly supply, and I think that's the other thing I'll say and kind of close it, because I know it dumped a lot, or not. They're not closing the podcast, but this song.

Steven Pemberton: 22:50

Yeah, yeah.

Troy Bravenboer: 22:50

Yeah, it's like people believe that God's limited, because they basically say is like if this person has this much, then they're stealing from the poor or they should be giving to the poor, like like it's a relate or it's like hey, if I have this much that other people can't have, and that's not how God works.

Troy Bravenboer: 23:08

Yeah, it rains diamonds on Saturday, like God, and they melt before they even get to the to the bottom Atmosphere of Saturday and God still rains more diamonds. Like God is completely limitless in his ability. He's boundless, right like yeah, if the Bible says in one of the verses that we can ask anything in the name of Jesus and in the Amphibious, and if it doesn't exist, then God will create it for you. Sorry, they're doing some construction here. You're good.

Troy Bravenboer: 23:35

But um, so it's like yeah, they just believe that God's actually limited, and they don't. They think that for some person to have that means some of someone else has to do without, and that's just totally not the case.

Steven Pemberton: 23:47

See, I love this story that I heard. It was about a year ago, where and for my theologians this is completely not theologically sound, but it's a great story is there was a gentleman who he knew he was gonna die, so he took a suitcase and stuffed it full of gold bars. And when he died he went to heaven and still had the suitcase and he rolls it up to the front gate. And Peter asked him why'd you bring dirt? And so us, we look at gold bars like, oh man, look at that, he's wealthy, he's rich, it's like, but in heaven that's literally dirt.

Steven Pemberton: 24:17

I mean that is they said, the streets are paved with gold, so there's nothing that we can take to him that is better than what he can give to us. So I'm just always baffled at it, especially something that you mentioned. I'm looking at James one, verse three, because it says where you know that when your faith is tested, your endurance has a chance to grow. So litigro, when your faith, when your endurance is fully developed, you'd be perfect and complete, needing nothing. And I think I mean there's so many things when we talk about with money.

Steven Pemberton: 24:45

Money is neutral. It's literally a piece of paper with dead people's face on it. There's, it has intrinsic value, but it does not actually. I mean, if you take it to a remote island and it's just you on that island and you're a billionaire, it makes no difference If you are stranded there, zero difference. And I just think there's so many people that miss it. And I think that people's character has to be tested to be able to actually sustain wealth. I mean for you, for our buddy Adam, I mean there's actual, real, palpable money, wealth that has come into y'all's lives, that's come into our lives, and when you have to have the character to hold it. Because if you were a scheming and you were just like, hey, I'm gonna run out and sleep with all sorts of women and buy drugs, but you didn't have the resources. And then you get the resources and go out and do it. Did the money make you evil? No, that was the intentions of your heart. It was already there before you got the resources.

Troy Bravenboer: 25:37

And really like the money is. The Bible says is that it's the least valuable treasure, like more valuable is the anointing in the presence of God, like when God visited the Israelites and he visited Moses in Exodus 33, moses was basically God, was telling them some instructions like, hey, this is where you need to go. And Moses was like Lord, if your presence doesn't go with us, I don't wanna go, because it's your presence that makes us distinct from everybody else in all the land. And it's like God's presence, his anointing, god's power, god's ability in us. That's what the true treasure actually is. It says you have to be faithful in the little before we can be faithful much. And it's like when you're become faithful with finances, what it does is it just unlocks the key not to only be faithful with more finances, but also to be in trust.

Troy Bravenboer: 26:35

And man, this is coming as an instruction for somebody I just know this right now is that you're looking for more influence. There's somebody listening to this that's looking for more influence with more people, but you don't have your finances in order. And it's not that you have bad finances, like you're not behind on bills, but you don't really have a solid lock on what you're doing with finances and God wants to increase the level of your influence and he wants to increase the level of what you're doing, but it's actually being held back because you're not stewarding your finances like a millionaire or a billionaire, whatever level you're at and I'm not saying that you're poor by now, like I actually see a person that you actually have. You actually have a strong, solid financial life, but you have no structure around how your finances are and you're believing God for more increase, but it's not gonna come until you organize your finances.

Troy Bravenboer: 27:29

Sorry, I just felt that in my spirit for somebody listening to this, because it's like, because that's actually the key that unlocks the next level of influence. And sometimes people think like I remember this is that when I was in the company, we did like 350,000 our first year for trucking and then 880,000. And the biggest difference at that time was is that somebody gave me a sheet called the Cash Flow Budget and usually, like cash flow, like it's a rear view mirror, like it shows you how you spend your money. But what this tool did it was an Excel sheet and it was week over week, income over expenses, and it took your balance in the bank and, based on your projected income and your projected expenses, it would project what your new bank balance is for better or for worse. It would just show you the future of what your finances are.

Troy Bravenboer: 28:19

And the second that I started using that we started seeing increase in our business within that season because I feel like God was saying look, you're directly stewarding the money that's coming in. And now I can see that you're ready for more increase because you're paying attention. Because here's the thing is that when you start making a million a month, if you have a bolt that has holes in it. You know, it's really easy to not realize that you have a boat with hole in it because the money's just flowing in and flowing out. So yeah, I think that's really important is it's not just about having a lot, but it's about stewarding. It's about stewarding what's coming into your hands.

Steven Pemberton: 28:57

Yeah, so stewardship, I've been on this. What does stewardship mean to you?

Troy Bravenboer: 29:05

This is just coming to me now. What would Jesus do if he was in your shoes? How would Jesus spend money, uses time, because it's not just money, right yeah, it's time and money and influence. These are all things that we steward, right. So it's like, how would Jesus steward that relationship? How would Jesus steward those finances, how and that doesn't mean lack, like again, like there's no limit to God, right? So, like you know, god just might not go out to the liquor store and buy Fireball you know what I mean.

Troy Bravenboer: 29:38

Like God might not just like willy-nilly, spend money on things that you know that aren't within the realm of, like their compat. Like, if you make a hundred thousand dollars a year, like you probably shouldn't buy a sixty thousand dollar vehicle and put 90% of it on debt, right, like I'm not saying there's anything wrong with a 60 or 70 or 80 thousand dollar vehicle, heck, I'd love to get a Portia. You know what are they? The gtsr? It's a quarter million dollar vehicle. Probably not gonna buy it.

Troy Bravenboer: 30:07

But Adam, who you had on the previous podcast, he just bought a sick Ferrari, right, like it was within his realm to be able to do that, right? So, and that's not, it's all in relationship to it. Yeah, so I think stewardship is like hey, how would God, how would God, knowing that God doesn't have a limit to power, doesn't have a limit to money, doesn't have a, how would he handle the time and the money if he were in your shoes, right? So, yeah, and it comes out of relationships too. It's like, hey, man, god's given me this relationship. Like God's given me and you this relationship, I would have been a poor steward if I didn't reach back out to you and be like hey, bro, really would like to get on a phone call again, right?

Troy Bravenboer: 30:48

I mean, it's how you, how it's like it's like the wisdom, like God's wisdom and managing the resources Maybe that's how I would say is God's wisdom and managing the resources that you have access to.

Steven Pemberton: 30:58

Even now, as we're coming towards the end of the show, I have one question, but what is one area? Or even in your business, what is something that you're overcoming right now?

Troy Bravenboer: 31:07

Yeah, that's such a good question. So I I've always felt like God has had this dual call on my life for business and ministry, and the old school thought on this is that, like you need to be fully focused on one thing and there's even like a lot of Success principles out there that talk about the power of focus and I've, you know, I did door-to-door sales and I was in Bible college.

Troy Bravenboer: 31:33

I even, while we did door-to-door sales after I got out of Bible college, like we were still holding Sunday services with our sales group young guys were getting born again on the sales team. We were still leading people to the Lord one-on-one and then, and in small groups, and I was still traveling and preaching in the off-season and and then in 2017, god really spoke to my heart to not really be pursuing speaking engagements with the ministry and just focus on the trucking company. And we did it and, sure enough, we ended up hitting a million that year, like I think it was. And then, whatever it was, and really up until Probably like a year ago I really it was about a year, a year and a half ago and I really started feeling like God's stirring some more ministry stuff up in my heart.

Troy Bravenboer: 32:18

And when we stopped doing ministry and we started just focusing on the trucking stuff, like in my natural brain, I'm like that's so heathenistic, that's so worldly. Like you know, christians would want to say, oh, your back slid and or, you know, but no, I mean, like this is what God was having me, do you know? And I felt like at that time God was saying there's things in that you're going to learn in business, that I'm seeding in you for business because you're going to need them in the future for ministry, and so like right now it's like we're you know, we're basically campus Directors, we're like main points of contact for this church plant in Fort Worth and it's it's, it's booming, like for a five-month-old church. We've got three, four hundred people showing up on a Sunday morning, like, which is not the biggest church in the world, but for a five-month-old church plant, that's not.

Troy Bravenboer: 33:09

And like and like you can just taste it. It's just beginning. We got some big things coming up and it's like this this is like alright, lord, like I'm still in business, but I'm still in, but I still have this ministry call and this, really, like you know, they're not separate things right like the like, even again on this podcast. If, if you were an unsafe person, I might change my vernacular a little bit, but you're, you're gonna leave knowing I'm born again, like there's no doubt about it right like you have an encounter with me.

Troy Bravenboer: 33:37

I'm not a fake Christian. I'm not using Christian lingo per se. It's nice. Yeah, you're gonna know that, like I believe in a God his son is Jesus I believe his power is in me to dominate in this wicked world, you know.

Troy Bravenboer: 33:51

So it's like figuring out like this, this mesh, and I can even see it like as we're planning, you know, this church and as we're helping you know Pastor Jonathan shuttles, where, like the business, acumen is a big help project management, team management, leadership development, creating SOPs, like all of like this kind of COO type of stuff of running a ministry.

Troy Bravenboer: 34:11

So I think that's like the thing that I'm just navigating with the Holy Spirit right now, and obviously I have three freaking amazing kids that each one of them, one ounce of my kids, is better than the entire to me on my best day and I have an amazing wife. So it's like, you know, it's just that that that radical balance of like chasing after Success in business, chasing after the call of God on your life and in all areas right, and it's just, it's all inclusive for me, where I think you know, typically people would say, oh well, just focus on just business, or just, yeah, just ministry.

Steven Pemberton: 34:47

Yeah, I think it's really fascinating with that story because I don't know if that's me per se, but I know that that's my wife like. For her she's an incredible businesswoman. I mean, she is just insane and I always just think there's a part of me still working on it that gets just a touch jealous whenever she gets on speaking stuff because she never speaks and she was like, oh, don't really speak very good. And then she gets on and she just crushes it and everyone's like, wow, she's so good. And I just get upset because I do this for a living. And then I just see her. She's especially now there's so many transitions happening in our, in our church that she actually stayed up all night and like listed out this is exactly how you could build this thing to where people stay. This is how you can build this thing to where we go out and we reach people and we make real impacts. And so for her, as I see it and she even said it, whether she knows she said it or not she said she said I'm called to the outreach department at our church. And I just thought interesting, because I know she's called to the business, but I also know that she's called there too. So just having that, that duality but I do appreciate you kind of going into that, because I'm kind of in a similar place.

Steven Pemberton: 35:56

This is something that my wife was working on me with is, and I actually told her this at lunch today and I said we need to sit down and just talk about what's the vision for this company. I said, because there's there's moments, even for the people listening, that maybe you aren't a Christian, maybe you don't care at all about anything spiritual, maybe this far Congratulations. But there's, there's parts of me where I was like, well, you know, I'm getting all these clients and I'm doing all these, these other things, and she's like, no, you need to sit down and focus. She's like you need to focus on what is the one thing that you know God is calling you to. Yes, you can go do all these other things to get paid, but we're actually going to trust him for this one thing and not just put God on everything that we're doing.

Steven Pemberton: 36:31

And I went okay. So there's this, that area with her that I can tell. If she's like all in on one thing, then that's like okay, we're going to go all in there. If she's all in on going with the church and I know that that's where she's supposed to be in that area. So just you walking me through that. If that's from no one else, you just walk me through that. So I just want to thank you Awesome.

Troy Bravenboer: 36:51

Thanks, man. Yeah, and I think you know everybody can relate to some degree because you know you're not just a work machine. Like hustle culture is the biggest thing of bull crap that has ever been fed to entrepreneurs, and along, I would say. Second to that is this concept of like work-life balance. Like you don't separate the two, like especially if you're listening to this you're something about entrepreneur business wherever you're at, like dude, you're in the shower thinking about your business or your family.

Steven Pemberton: 37:20

You're on the toilet thinking about your business.

Troy Bravenboer: 37:23

Like there's not really a separate. So stop trying to separate. You're actually creating more anxiety in yourself by trying to separate the things. Just like learn how to flow and be you, be who God's created you to be, be present in that moment and just be effective. Right, be focused and be effective, have your you know that's when we have our you know that event in April. You know that mindset, that business mastery class as part of what we're going to be talking about is how we stew steward our time right, our times of resources. We have 24 hours in a day, right. How do we do it?

Troy Bravenboer: 37:59

And I'm up at 435 o'clock in the morning and I'm bed at 10 o'clock at night, 930, 10 o'clock at night and I'm like dude, how can I squeeze the most out of this day? I got a lot going on. I got a and tonight I got a great pizza date with my family. We're going out to this outdoor park clean pizza place and we're rented a movie. I've been gone for the last two days. We're renting a movie and we're having a camp out in the living room.

Troy Bravenboer: 38:22

All my kids are going to be sleeping out there and we're probably going to eat eat ice cream or do something, but we're going to make it a blast, Like we're going to make it fun, and it's like if we're going to have fun, let's have fun. Let's let's do it right. You know and I'm probably going to be thinking about business sometime while we're watching whatever we're watching on Amazon Prime or what Like. It's just part of how it is, but I'm going to appreciate being there with my wife and my family and I'm prioritizing and I'm making the time for it.

Steven Pemberton: 38:47

They're. They're so good we're actually going to cap it right there, cause I mean, that was just gold. The question is where can people actually connect with you? Cause I know that you were talking about impact and being able to connect with people and help people, so how can they connect with you?

Troy Bravenboer: 39:00

Yeah, I think right now like the easiest thing is is Instagram. I don't know if everybody still do an Instagram. Instagram is the place at at Troy brave, like home of the brave at Troy brave, and you know. Yeah, come follow me. I think I'm going to do it. I think I'm going to do a run to like, get 10,000 followers, like real engage followers. It's on my, it's on my new list, so I would love to rally the troops behind that, and so, if you love this and you want to see more content like this, I'm going to be putting out more content in the near future here and I would love to have you come follow me and share it with a friend or two.

Steven Pemberton: 39:34

That's amazing. If you're a kingdom minded entrepreneur, you need to follow this guy. I mean, I love this dude. I barely know him, honestly, but I've known him, for I've known him forever because of the spirit that's inside of me. It's the same spirit inside of you, and that's what it means to be brothers in Christ. But, troy, I just want to thank you again for being here on the show.

Troy Bravenboer: 39:51

Bro. Thank you, man. This stirs me up big time. It really motivates me. So thank you for taking a step of faith out and doing stuff like this without knowing who you'd talk to or who would listen to it. You went out and you did it, man, and it encourages me, bro, so really you're a G.

Steven Pemberton: 40:07

Thanks so much.

Troy Bravenboer: 40:07

Thank you.

Steven Pemberton: 40:08

Hey man, I appreciate that To everyone listening. We'll see you in the next episode.