Dave Hataj (Owner of Edgerton Gear, Inc.)

Today's episode will begin in three minutes. But first I want to tell you about something crazy I'm doing for my new book, five Mere Christians. I've never seen an author do this before, but I'm giving a money back guarantee on this book. I'm so confident you're gonna love this book that if I'm wrong, if you pre order the book, you don't love it, I'm gonna send you a $20Amazon gift card as a money back guarantee. Why? Two reasons. One, this is a different book for me, Right. I know this is a very different biography is what is Jordan Rayner doing? And I know it's risky, so I'm going to de risk it for you. Because, listen, in my other books, Redeeming youg Time, the Sacredness of Secular Work, Master of One, et cetera, et cetera, I am telling you and me how we can glorify God in our work. But in five Mere Christians, I'm doing something very different. I'm showing you what that looks like practically through these unforgettable life stories of five Mere Christians from history. These are the top men and women that I would love to have on this podcast today if, you know, they weren't dead, right? So that's the first reason this is a risk and I'm gonna de risk this book for you. Here's the second reason. I'm just confident you're gonna love this book. My friend Mark Batterson said, quote, five Mere Christians proves that biographies can be extremely entertaining, profoundly helpful, and mercifully short. If you're looking for a book that combines the punch of a great sermon with the pace of a great thriller, this is it. Highly recommended. End quote. But here's the thing. In order to qualify for this money back guarantee, you got to do two things. Step one, pre order five Mere Christians in any format, hardback, ebook, audiobook, whatever. And then step two, go to 5merechristians.com and fill out the form on that page. And that's it. But you got to do it by midnight Eastern Time on May 9 by filling out that form. You'll also get all of the pre order bonuses listed on 5 mereChristians. Calm and be entered to win this crazy, epic trip for two to Europe. So visit 5meerchristians.com right now to sign up. Now. Please enjoy today's episode. Hey, friend. Welcome to the Mere Christians podcast. I'm Jordan Raynor. How does the Gospel influence the work of mere Christians? Those of us who aren't pastors or religious professionals but who work as hotel managers, brick masons and psychiatrists. That's the question we explore every week. And today I'm posing it to my good friend Dave Haytack. He's the owner of Edgerton Gear, a large gear manufacturer in Wisconsin and one of the deepest thinkers I've ever met about how the gospel is shaping his work day in, day out. Dave and I recently sat down to talk about this extraordinary program he's built that is now being adopted by the United States Navy to edify blue collar work in the lives of 20 somethings and quite literally save their lives. We talked about why our definition of kingdom work must expand beyond simply saving souls. And we talked about how we can plant a desire for good, goodness and truth in our co workers that ultimately leads them to a relationship with Jesus Christ. Trust me, you are not going to want to miss this great episode with my friend Dave Hatek. Dave Haytag, welcome back to the Mere Christians Podcast.

Thanks for having me Jordan. Pretty excited to be here with you.

Very rare repeat guests, so expectations are sky high. No pressure whatsoever.

Okay, that's funny.

Hey, it's been almost four years since you were last on the show. I don't want to assume that everyone listening today has listened to that episode or remembers what the heck either of us talked about. So spend a few minutes retracing some ground here and let's start here. What does Edon Gear do?

Well, I can't believe it's been four years since we've met.

So I know, isn't that crazy?

And I'm honored to be with you and our friendship has grown and deepened and I'm just so excited first of all about what you're about and that we can just continue to grow together. So Edgerton Gear is a custom gear shop or 40 person company. We make gears. I often say that modern civilization would not exist without gears, without blue collar folks doing their thing. And our gears go in anything from making aluminum cans to bottles to making computer equipment to making clothes, any kind of packaging, cardboard boxes. I mean when you look around a room and everything that you see in your room, everything you're wearing on your body was made with the assistance of gears. We're not a big product auction shop are very custom. We've got 40 people. Most of them are journeyman machinists who have been through lots of training and they're just really, really good at their job.

It's pretty wild. I'm sure for you to be able to like look around a room and be like man, all of these products that these gears help make. Our gears are, are literally a vehicle through which God is answering the prayers of people for clothing, for food. Right?

Yeah.

Do you ever sit back? Has that grown? Have you kind of gotten over that? Or do you sit and just like really dwell with that truth from time to time?

I am in awe of it. I think the older I get, I just turned 61 this year and I can go to literally any grocery store or any store in the world and I can walk up and down aisle and I can identify products that our gears help manufacture. And it is amazing. And considering that I grew up in the business, swore I'd never come back to it, couldn't understand how blue collar worked. Gear manufacturing has anything to do with the kingdom of God. To get to a place now to going, wow, this is my form of worship and service to a way that us and the small group of people can make a really significant difference in this world.

Yeah, I told you this before. Lots of books now by God's grace. Thank God. In this faith and workspace. One of my all time favorites is your book, Good work. And you tell the story of how. Yeah. You came to faith in Christ. How old were you? 19.

19, correct. Good memory.

And you believe this lie that many young and sadly old Christians believe that this work isn't worship. Right. That if you wanted to follow Jesus fully, you needed to go into full time ministry. How did you get to the place where you realized that taking over your dad's gear shop was ministry?

A lot of kicking and screaming. Yeah, because I follow that. As you know, I followed that career path of when you get zealous for the Lord, what do you do? You become a youth worker, maybe you go into a church, you get job as a pastor.

You went down that path for a while, right?

I did, I did. And I had a tremendous burnout experience in the large mega church. And it kind of woke me up and going, you know, lord, I don't want to do this. Everybody's saying I should be a pastor, but this doesn't fit. And I had two phenomenal mentors that really were early pioneers of the faith and work movement that said, you know what, maybe you got to go back to the family business. And the funny part is I went up to Regent College because everybody said I had to be a pastor. So I thought, oh, got to get theological degree. And while I was there, I took one of those classes that examines your gifts, your history, your calling. And at that time, Jordan, I said, lord, I'll go anywhere in the world. I did short term work and mission work and in Mexico and inner city LA and youth work, et cetera. And I said, lord, I'll go anywhere but just don't send me back to Edgerton Gear in that dirty, dark, dangerous machine shop. And it was my first semester at Regent College. I got a paper back and it's examining what your calling is and it said, quote, you are ideally suited to run a small manufacturing, family run business.

That's amazing.

And I screamed. My wife was excited and I was able to do a master's project to come back and say how do kingdom values relate into a family business and how does it not only change the business but how does it change the family? And so that embarked a multi year journey of trying to turn around a very dark dysfunctional culture to does Jesus's kingdom. Is it relevant even to a blue collar manufacturing company? And you know, it wasn't overnight two years. I often say the first two years were hell. And then it got worse because when you're dealing with broken, dysfunctional people that are major addiction issues and ego issues and just worldly issues that people can't buy into all the critical values of excellence and truth and having a mission to make the world a better place, even in a manufacturing environment, people rebelled and they sabotaged it. So it was about the 10 year mark that we really started seeing change. And a big part of that is I decided I'm going to stop hiring for skills. Am I going to hire for character? And that became the game changer. And so, you know, that was 31 years ago that I came back and hoping I'd be out of here in five. And it went from over the decades it's moved from my prison because it felt like I'm just in prison here. This is a really tough place. I don't get a lot of affirmation from the Christian community that what I'm doing is important to now. It is my happy place because I've just seen God do so much amazing things through even the small business.

You make this shift from hiring for skill to hiring for character. What you're not saying is I only hire people who are professing Christians. Right. Talk more about that.

Well, if they're professing Christians in the interview, I get worried. And I'll be honest, that's a red flag.

Man. That's so sad.

Yeah, and we, and we did, we hired, we hired a few folks that they were some of the worst employees I've ever had because they thought their number one job was to proselytize, evangelize and judge people and convert people. While the quality of their work was not good, their work ethic was to a point where other people were judging them. Like, what are these people doing here? So it really came to me as to the point of do they have a work ethic, are they humble, are they teachable, do they have those characters and those virtues that we all need to be successful? And it really, I guess over the last few years, 10 years or so, it really helped me understand that that's kind of the dividing line for the kingdom, right, Jesus, we often want to say, well, we don't earn our salvation by works. No, but there's there, there sure should be some evidence of our faith, right? And that should come through our actions, through how we treat each other, the quality of our work, how we honor our employers and our co workers. And so that's, that's a big deal. The kingdom isn't about words. It's. And, and Jesus even said it's about power and how we live it out day by day. How do we walk it?

Yeah, you mentioned a few minutes ago, you see the view, you see the work that you guys do at Edgerton Gear's kingdom work. But ma', am, in order to understand that, we gotta get clear on how Jesus talked about the kingdom of God. Because man, when you, you and I've talked about this a lot before. When Christians today say kingdom work, nine times out of 10, maybe 99 out of a hundred times, they are referring exclusively to saving souls, right? But as you pointed out before, human souls are only one aspect of God's eternal kingdom. And that matters for our work. Can you talk a little bit about that?

Well, if we go all the way back to the creation mandate, going all the way back to Genesis, we're instructed to help the world thrive, build up a civilization, and that includes agriculture, mining, manufacturing, building communities. And that entails literally every job that we have today. I mean, it's incredible, all the things that it entails. And so when we relegate kingdom work to just church work, I often tell pastors, nothing in your church here would even exist without us manufacturers, without us blue collar people, electricians and plumbers and so on. So we have to have this message mentality that every job matters, everything is important. You can't just care for people's souls. It's much more holistic than that. And even getting to the point where you look at Matthew 28 when it says go forth and make disciples. What does that mean? Right. Does that just mean we're just supposed to, like you said, save people. Well, to really make a disciple or to serve someone, you have to look at them, like I said, holistically, and help them realize they have a personal calling. They're not here by accident. Where do they fit? How do they live out their calling, their giftedness, through how God created them to be in whatever area of work that they might fit in with this broad thing that we call civilization. And so Jesus, and throughout the gospels, throughout the New Testament, there's this emphasis on doing good work. Right. And that takes so many different aspects of that that we really limit ourselves and we try to narrow it and pigeonhole it down to church work. Yeah.

How would you define what is kingdom work or the good works that Christ called us to?

Well, I always come back to, first of all, who am I as a human being? And we look at every person around us. If every person is created in the image of God, then we have to look at what is special about them, that they can make a contribution to our community and to the world. So kingdom work, to me, is having a realistic view that there is good and evil, there's good and bad. There's a spiritual battle going on in a cosmic level that comes down to the very personal level every day and how we treat each other. So it's not this big grand, these big grand gestures. Kingdom work, to me is meeting that server at your coffee shop, looking them in the eye and thanking them, and then affirming them and blessing them. It's making a really quality product versus a crappy product that fails. It's this commitment to excellence that exudes God's goodness. I really believe God's superpower is his goodness. And when you start digging into what good means, it's crazy. I mean, just not only how we treat each other, but goodness could reflect hygiene. It could reflect physical fitness. It could reflect how we treat our. And raise our kids and treat our spouses, how we work. I mean, goodness is such a crazy deep thing that we overlook. But the kingdom of God, I mean, you go back to Exodus when Moses actually asked God, I'm overwhelmed. I'm dealing with all these people. They're both built. You're throwing all this gold into a fire. Moses was fed up, so he went back to God and he goes, lord, help me understand that who I am in your perspective. And he begs God to say, show me. Let your glory pass before me. Show me your glory. And God's Response was, I will indeed allow my goodness to pass before you. And that to me is the crux of kingdom work. Do we exude God's goodness in every aspect of our lives?

As you were talking, I. You reminded me of one of my favorite quotes from your book, Good work that I pulled up. Here's what you wrote. Isn't it weird when people quote you to you, such as this Arctic as an author. Here we go. I'm gonna quote you to you.

Okay?

Jesus makes it clear that we're a key component in ushering in God's kingdom. God invites us to be his ambassadors, his princes and princesses, to usher in the goodness of his kingdom. End quote. Right.

Well, that's a good quote.

That's good, man. Somebody should write that down. Somebody should write that down. Put it in the Update edition. What does that look like? Practically Edgerton Gear. You talked about coming in and you took over this family business. It was dysfunctional. What did it look like to usher in the goodness of God's kingdom into a gear manufacturing shop?

So you have to understand where we started. So when I come in, there's pornography everywhere. There's a quarter barrel of beer in the lunchroom fridge. There's parties every day after work. And even during noon hour, guys are often going down to the bars and having a few beers. They are mistreating each other, they're judging each other, there's factions that are fighting each other. Everybody's just out for themselves. You had to come to work every day and just be on your guard. What's going to happen next versus to me now, it's do we come in and we greet each other with a smile, with a good morning, we respect each other, we appreciate each other. We have company meetings that we share pretty much all of our numbers and all the good, the bad, the ugly that's going on every, every week. My role as an owner now is morphed into I'm the chief blesser. I need to go around, just affirm people, bless people, appreciate people, empower people, encourage them in our mission to serve the world. And constantly reiterate and talk about our values, quality value and service, you know, what we're about. But our mission is really to serve the greater good of the world. We're not just in the gear business, we're in the people business. So I think the simplest example I often have is, you know, if you're in a bad mood and you walk into a room, everybody picks that up. Especially if you're a leader and I'VE tried to hide my bad moods and people, I'll walk in like, oh my gosh, Dave's in a bad mood.

Yeah, they can tell.

People can pick it up right away. Well, we can pick that up from each other. So here in our company, it's this awareness and understanding. We're all human, we're all on the journey together. How can we encourage and just move together with love, respect and appreciation? So it's just a lot of the simple things. But I've had a lot of customers come in the last year and say, you know, when you walk into this company, it just feels different. And they're amazed at how clean the shop floor is. Well, I didn't go out and sweep all the floors. Every person is kind of responsible for their own department. And there's this incredible sense of pride and community about who we are and, and how we just care. And we all have our good days and bad days, of course, but the bigger picture, we're all committed to a vision and a sense of mission much greater than ourselves. And that just has a very different feel to it.

Yeah, it's really good. I use this analogy as, you know, in the sacredness of secular work, of scratching off glimpses of the kingdom. Kind of like a, like a black, not gambling scratch off, but one of those artistic scratch offs. Right. And when we understand that the kingdom is more than just God and his subjects, the people and his king, the kingdom is also marked by beauty.

Yes.

See Revelation 21. And order. See First Corinthians 14. And humility. See Matthew 19. Right. When you shape the culture of a business like Edgerton Gear, to reveal those things, you're scratching off glimpses. You're yanking pieces of the goodness of the kingdom and into the present. But I can hear some listeners saying, well, why does that matter if you don't explicitly get to share the gospel.

With all those employees?

Can you address that million dollar question, Dave Haytig?

Well, first of all, you just nailed what we're about. Humility, beauty and order. When you come through our shop, our gears are literally beautiful. Our guys look at their creation of what they make as beautiful. And in order to do that, you have to have a lot of order. And so some of them, you walk through the workbenches and guys are just organized. And the number one thing when we interview people we look for is humility. Because we all have to be on this journey together. So why don't we just care about souls? Is that kind of your question?

Yeah, that's it.

Well, we live in a physical world, and Scripture is really clear that this all isn't just going to burn up and go away. God's going to redeem much of what we do today. And so when we look at a holistic person and all that they are, and in all that they're creating, that's just God's stuff. And how can you discount the physical and the mental, the emotional and all this that entails what it means to be human and just cast it away and say, well, none of this matters. That's just silly. I don't know.

Here's how it's it. If Jesus blood paid the price to redeem my soul, your soul, and this material world.

Right.

Then I should care deeply about the quality of what I do with this material world because Jesus blood paid redeem that as well. Amen.

Amen. Absolutely amen. And I think we do it a tremendous disservice when we don't get involved in environmental movements, when we don't care about our cities and our communities and we just focus on the spiritual. Because I'm dealing a lot with kids, which I know I'll get into in a minute, but when I look at them, their physical, emotional, mental needs are so great. They're not even close at a point to hear the gospel or to focus on the soul. They're. They have real needs. And you look at how Jesus cared for the poor and cared for that holistic person, the kingdom is much greater than just salvation. So amen, all that.

Yes. And when we treat it as only salvation of souls, we inadvertently diminish the power of Christ's death and resurrection. Yes, and certainly diminish the importance and eternal significance of our work. All right, so once we break down this false hierarchy of sacred and secular work, kingdom work and non kingdom work, there still remains these other false hierarchies, though, such as work we do with our minds and work we do with our hands. Something I know is near and dear to your heart as the owner of a gear manufacturer. You know, in First Thessalonians 4, Paul says, hey, we urge you to make it your ambition to lead a quiet life and to work with your hands. But that's the opposite of the ambition of so many people today. You got a front row seat to this trend.

Oh, my gosh. Yeah, yeah.

I'm sure you thought a lot about this. What do you think is the root of our lack of ambition to do hard work with our hands?

Well, a lot of it can be traced all the way back to Greek thought, the sense that the only thing that matters is the spiritual, the mental, et cetera. In fact, the Greeks were known, work was viewed as negative, terrible, bad. You hire servants to do the menial labor. But I think it even goes further back to that. And not to be too simple, but it's just sin. We want to set ourselves above other people. We all want to feel super important. We have this ego that we're always comparing and judging, and we put on the pedestal of the values of power and sex and recognition, fame, all of that. That's from the world. And so how does that translate in. We focus on being influencers. We just want to be somebody and get recognition and fame and all of that. But the deeper part of who we are as people is as we work with our hands, as we find when it says, live a quiet life and do the work of your hands. There's a tremendous amount of fulfillment that comes from not chasing all those things, but just settling down and saying, what was I made to be? And how can I make a contribution to whatever it is God puts before me today? Contentment, peace, selflessness. It's the upside down kingdom. If you want to find your life, you lose it. And so that's why so amazing that Jesus came. And as a stonemason, he's a craftsman. He demonstrates for us that there is such a simplicity and beauty of working with the material world and making things better for people and making things with beauty and order. Like you said, that's the human spirit. That's the way God created us to be. But the distorted part of that chases all these other things that tries to fill that void that only God can, can, can fill.

Yeah. I've always loved that in Genesis 1 and 2, we see God calling Adam and Eve to both what we would call white collar and blue collar work.

Right.

So like, yeah, naming the animals was quote, unquote, knowledge work, right?

Yep.

But tending the garden was blue collar work and work with our hands. And then, of course, when we see Christ come, he spends the majority of his time working with his hands. I love this. So you read like V1, the earliest draft of my new book, the Sacredness of Secular Work. You generously wrote one of the most over the top endorsements. But you did call me out on something that I ended up changing. I'm sure you know where I'm going with this.

Yeah.

And it was my exposition of this Greek word tecton, that we translate to Carpenter to describe Jesus vocation, and you and many theologians far more experienced than Both of us argue that carpenter is not the best translation of this word. What is? And more importantly, why does it matter? I'd love to hear you talk about this for a little bit.

Well, it was funny because Christianity had that great article about it, what tecton was or is. And the reason we all focus on a carpenter is that when they're translating one of the early translators, when they took the, you know, the gospel in the Greek and Aramaic and translated into English, they didn't have a word for stonemason or craftsman, this tecton, they didn't know what to do with it. So the only thing they could come up with that would vaguely resemble it, the true meaning of it was carpenter. And we've lived with that ever since. But the reality is there weren't a lot of trees in Galilee. When you look at all of Jesus parables, there's a lot of them that deal with stone, the cornerstone that the builders rejected, and many other parables. There weren't a lot of trees. So he probably wasn't a carpenter, but he was a craftsman, a stonemason that worked with all kinds of materials. And I think that's important because I've often had carpenter friends as well. You know, Jesus was a carpenter or like. No, he was way more than that. And to me, it's important that we don't pigeonhole not only Jesus and his ministry, you know, his work, because it opens up a whole much broader story, a conversation that all of us that are working with our hands, and it's not just working with our hands, it's knowledge work, it's connecting. And I think when we work with our hands, it connects our brains and our hands to our heart. And. And those are really critical. So it's just so much more encouraging when you can help people understand that we have this holistic approach to work that models our Savior, models what God created us to be. And Jordan, I was speaking in a church, I think it was two years ago, and I started off asking. It was kind of. I asked the pastor, I said, I want to try something kind of crazy if you'll allow me to do this. He goes, yeah, sure, go ahead. So he was interviewing me and I got up and I said, you know, folks, I want to get to know my audience a little bit. So how many of you here are called to full time ministry? And it was a setup, I gotta admit, it was a setup. And my wife stood up with four other people out of this room of 400. I went, oh, that's great. God bless you, you full time ministers. Well, then I said, next, I said, stay standing, please. I want to just affirm you. And I said, now, how many plumbers do we have in the house? And everybody's looking at me like, you're what plumber? And I had one old guy in the third row kind of look at me. His hand kind of started to come off up. And I said, sir, Stan, please, Stan. Any other plumbers. I said, God bless you. Your whole life work was plumbing, and where would we be without plumbing? And I proceeded to go through every vocation that I could think of. Truck drivers and machinists, electricians and so on. By the end of the time, I had the entire room standing and we're all having fun with it. And then I got real serious and I asked this question. I said, so why didn't you all stand when I asked the very first question of who in this room is called to full time ministry? And it was like a bomb going off in, in people. They're like. And then, then the rest of the conversation was, we are all called to full time ministry. We got to stop regulating it to just church work.

How do you define ministry service?

I think it's simplest terms. It's serving, you know, serving each other in whatever capacity, in whatever way you can.

It's so good. I forgot to tell you, I stole this from you this past summer.

You did?

Yeah. I keynoted this big youth conference and I took, I took a slightly different approach. I asked them to stand up if they felt God calling them business. I called them to stand up if they felt called to healthcare. And then this is great. I like tricked all these youth pastors and this, I was like, all right, hey, youth pastors, stand up, lay hands on these kids and commission them to the work that God has called them to do.

Nice.

And I asked, and I asked, hey, if you feel called to be a pastor or a full time missionary, which God knows, we need those, you stand too. And it was an amazing, amazing moment. These high schoolers, a lot of them coming up to me afterwards with tears in their eyes back, nobody's ever like, encouraged me me that this thing could be from God. Hey, speaking of young people, this is maybe the main reason why I wanted you to come back onto the show to talk about craftsmen with character. So last time you were on the podcast, you were talking to us about this course that you, I think at the time were just teaching in Wisconsin. And since then you've been contracted by the United States Navy, no big deal, to scale this course nationwide, man, I want to learn about how this happened. But first, what is craftsman with character and why did you create it?

I'm like many employers throughout the country that we've got this aging demographic. And the demographics are real. We have the baby boomer population is aging out, they're retiring, you know, they're moving on. And we don't have enough young people coming into a lot of our jobs, especially in the blue collar world. Because our schools and our universities, everybody's stressing you got to get a four year university degree, which is appropriate for some jobs, but definitely not needed for all jobs. And so everybody's struggling. Where are we going to get workers? And so we've been working on this for 15 plus years in our little machine shop. And I realized we're just poaching from each other. We're offering each other better wages to get somebody for a dollar at 50 cents more an hour or whatever. And I'm like, we just don't have enough people. So I was up at our local high school one day and they asked. And the other thing you have to realize is that, and I think people resonate with this, back in the 1990s, some brilliant professor somewhere actually from Wisconsin got a lot of national recognition and said tech ed of the future is not going to be welding shop class, auto mechanics, wood shop, et cetera. It's going to be lab coats and computers. You're wasting your money and time trying to teach these kids tech ed the old way. And so schools across the country actually greatly reduced or shuttered their tech ed departments. Well, we lost an entire generation of kids that are tacit learners. 50% or more of the population learn by working with your hands. And I think if any of you have boys, you'll understand that. And a lot of girls do too. But our educational system is geared primarily towards theoretical learners. And that's why kids are tasked learners. They just go crazy sitting in their seat when they just have to memorize and just rote memory stuff, et cetera. So when I was up to high school one day our tech ed teacher asked to come in and kind of resurrect the tech ed department. I'm looking at the equipment that I ran back in the late 1970s and early 80s. Oh my gosh, this has all been mothballed. So I'm helping them resurrect and bring it all back up to speed. And while I was there, I just felt the Lord talk to me and said, take a look at these kids. You were one of these kids 40 years ago. No sense of purpose, no sense of direction. Nobody's investing in you. You didn't do well in most of your traditional classes, but you excelled in your shop classes. Think about your tech ed teachers. And back then I had five and I could name every one of them. Even right now, they're that impactful. And that just kind of sparked a thought that going, wow, how do we get these kids exposure to the broader world, exposure to all the career opportunities in our community. But the other part of it is how do you give them that sense of purpose and calling and affirmation that they belong, that the world needs them in some way? So I actually went back to graduate school, Bakke Graduate University. And I spent three years kind of studying all this. And I came up with this curriculum called Craftsman with Character that four days a week we get the kids job shadowing in different businesses throughout the community. And one day a week we get them in the A classroom. We deconstruct their worldview, expose their flaws and reconstruct it with basically a biblical kingdom perspective without using religious language because we're in the public schools. But the focus is on character development. Eugene Peterson has a phenomenal quote that he contends that the primary location for spiritual development is the workplace. I twist that a little bit. I say I think the workplace is the primary location for character development. And so we have to hook the kids up with mentors, people who are living out these character qualities that we all need and want and what God called us to. And they go from the character qualities, go from words to actually virtues that they can and skills that they can live out. And so we kind of hit magic by God's grace. That and it's an old model. You're putting younger people together with older people. You know, that's all it is. And we just saw this radical transformation with these kids. And it's a semester long course in a high school. And it's just been amazing the impact not only on the kids, but on our own businesses as well. Because it's that sense of legacy. As older people, we can pass on something to the next generation.

I love this. And you started this really to solve a problem with Edgerton Gear. Right. You guys couldn't hire.

Yeah.

But here's the situation to be like you are expanding well past that now. Like you are scaling this curriculum nationwide. You're not just solving Edgerton Gere's problems, you're really blessing your industry. How did you get to that point where you're like, man, this is. This is bigger than Edger de Gear. I just want to bless this industry and bless these kids.

Just the weird way God works. It was kind of funny. We were, we were part of a manufacturing alliance for our county, and they wanted me to, on that committee to figure out how do we solve this workforce development issue issue. I've tried job fairs, I've tried tours, I've tried all sorts of youth, apprenticeship, adult, and we do all this stuff. But it wasn't getting to the heart of the issue. And I finally told the committee, I said, look, I know craftsman with character works, and if you want to try that, fine, but otherwise, I just, I'm not a meeting person. So we held a little function here, and about 70 people showed up. And a representative from Frito Lay was there, and one of the local larger schools, that's. That's a multi ethnic kind of a struggling community. And another large company called Scott forged and said, we want it. Scott Forge their forging house. We want to do this. So they did it, and they saw the magic happen. Because part of the criticism I often got was, well, you're in Edgerton. It's a little white community. It's special. It can't expand well out of that. That program was just. It blew everybody away. You know, we had, I think, three African American students, a young Hispanic man, and the Caucasian kids and the transfer, they experienced the same thing, the transformation with the kids and the businesses. So while we were at that graduation, I was invited to a meeting on workforce development. And there's a representative of the Navy there. And so everybody's talking about our course and how exciting they were. And she looked at me and she says, I have one question. What do you need to take this national? And I'm babbling. What? Huh? What are you talking about? And she explained that our submarine industrial base, all of the thousands of suppliers that are out there to help build submarines, she also explained that they're all late, and our nuclear submarines are the only competitive advantage we have against our enemies. And she said, if we don't get our nuclear subs up to speed, we will have World War three. China's going to take over Taiwan, and Russia's got other plans. So she said, it's become a top priority in the Pentagon. And so they went out and talked to all their suppliers and said, why are you late? Why are we not getting our submarines on time? And it was the same answer from everybody. Workforce development. We don't have enough young people coming into the in our industries and in our trades. So they said, can you help us and expand this? And within six weeks we had three year contract. Wow. Yeah. We're dealing with the government and within six weeks we have a three year contract. And now I'm speaking a lot and helping other communities. But what's blowing me away, Jordan, is the number of business owners, Christian business owners, and not even Christian, that just have a heart for this next generation. And it's just not about their business. They're realizing that their businesses are. The future of their businesses are at stake for one, because you don't replace your workforce, you know, you don't have a business. But the heart, and I think this is where God's really moving among the blue collar world, just the regular working class folks, is that we have this heart to serve and to help this generation to find its way. And that's what's absolutely beautiful to me of what God's doing. And so if I can help another business or another community, take in these kids that are often, you know, the at risk kids, they're not doing well academically, but they're brilliant working with their hands and just helping them find their way. It's powerful. And that's where I'm really excited is I think that's what God's original plan was drawing us back here 30 some years ago.

Yeah, I mean it's such a good example, example of what we know to be true based on Genesis 1 and 2 and Revelation 21 and 22, that God's vision of human flourishing includes good work. Right. And so by providing these kids with a path to a job that will provide for their needs and contribute to society and provide some level of joy for their, for themselves, you're helping them be fully alone, alive and more in line with who God created them to be. Right. And oh, by the way, it's interesting to me that man, there's a growing mental health crisis and the data skews if you're not finding a job. I you cited some statistic or maybe I read this in a different book this morning. If you don't graduate college with a four year degree, I got to look up the statistic. I'm going to look it up right now. I want to see. You're like twice as likely to commit suicide in the United States. It's something crazy to me. So talk about the impact a little bit more that this is having on these kids. Maybe talk through a case study of what you've seen in the lives of these young people.

I have dozens of them. The common theme often are these kids are C, D, F students, right? They don't fit into, like I said, the traditional classes. Some of the statistics are only 30 some percent, 32% of our population has a college degree. And if you look at a sophomore right now or a class of 100 sophomores, 60 some percent of them will not graduate with a college degree. So what happens to them? Right? And I often say that our educational system right now is akin to foster care. We kind of bring you along until you're 18, but then if you don't go to college, we're done with you, you're out. We have no contact, we have no support for you. And that's staggering. I mean, if you got 60, some kids, often from very broken homes, that have no support, no encouragement. Bill Cosby always used to joke, which is true, that our brains aren't fully developed, especially with boys, until they're 25. There's this incredibly critical period from 18 to 25, 16 to 25, when these kids are developing, that we're not supporting them, guiding them, encouraging them, blessing them. We're just leaving them to find their own way. And where do they end up? I mean, my gosh. I mean, it's. We can go down that route.

They're not finding their way. By the way, I just found the statistic. Let me interject real quick, and then you pick it back up, please. It says, authority named Robert Putnam in a book called Our Kids says that, quote, you're more than twice as likely to die of suicide if you have a high school degree compared to a college degree. End quote. That's mindboggling.

Yeah.

And God's using you guys to help give these kids purpose and good work.

Well, and what I often say, the two things God did in us, the need he created in us for good reasons besides food, shelter and clothing, is to have a sense of purpose and have a connectedness to other people and to him. Right? Purpose and relationships. A lot of these kids have neither. And so our course really focuses on that. And we dig deep into their lives and we limit the class size to 8 to 10 students. We can have those small group dynamics of being very personable and vulnerable with each other and share our struggles and finding our way as adults and how we can help these kids and. And modeling to them by being on our job sites, shop floors with other adults and facilitating healthy relationships. These kids find that. Right. That's the discipleship model, the mentoring model that's been around for Thousands of years. And so when the kids can connect to a healthy adult while helping them expand and explore their gifts, talents and who God created them to be, it literally feels like magic. I mean the case studies that we have, and I've told this story because this was, was repeatedly just recently because this last semester. My middle son, by the way, is our tech ed teacher here in Edgerton now, which is another miracle. He swore he'd never come back too, that we joke about.

But he warned me, careful what you square against.

Exactly. He warned me about two kids, one in particular that we're going to have in this next semester. And I won't mention the young man's name, but he said, dad, this kid's a problem. He has 70 some detentions from last year. He got it down to 30 something detentions this year. He's just a loose cannon. He can't sit still. He's just so. He's a fart in a windstorm. I mean, I mean it's as my dad will often say. I mean it's the classic squirrel. And off he'd go in a different direction. He could not focus. So he joined our class. He was exactly what my son explained. And for the first 12 weeks it's like, oh my gosh, this kid's driving us crazy, Nathan. My son's telling me stories in the welding shop or in the machine shop. The kid will just grab stuff and use it, not put it away and just, just chaos wherever he went. So it was at week 13, he shows up in our class that morning and he's just smiling. There's something different about him, like what's going on? And he said, and he took over the whole conversation for the next 45 minutes. And he proceeded to tell us that most of his life he has been a bad person. Person. He's been trouble with the law, he hated his parents, he's constantly running away. He's lived, he's just lived this life of chaos. And he said, you know what? I've been a bad person. And when you're a bad person, there's bad consequences. Bad consequences. And he said, I'm learning to be a good person. And he goes, guess what? Being good has good consequences. And for 45 minutes he just rambled on about this. And he goes, you know, you should showed me these character qualities. But you didn't shove them down our throat. You gave us a choice. And I said, you mean we didn't teach it, but you could catch it? And he goes, exactly. That's what I'm trying to say. And he showed up the next week and he rambled on again. And he said, my life is completely different because I want to live a life of being a good person, working hard, being someone that people could trust and respect, and on and on and on. We just got a text from him. You know, this was last semester, going back last spring. We got a text from. From him about a month ago, Nathan and I did. And he just. He said, you know, this course saved my life. And I decided not to finish high school. I got my ged, but I'm now working as a diesel mechanic, living my dream of where I never thought I could fit anywhere. And I just want to thank you so much. Please pass it on to your dad. And then I also joke, and he's probably making more as a diesel mechanic than most high school teachers.

Yeah, that's exactly right. That's exactly right.

Right?

No, I love that testimony so much. And let's be clear. You're teaching this in the public schools. You can't explicitly preach the gospel, but you are discipling. Maybe we could call it pre discipleship. Like, I'm on Craftsman with Characters website right now. The Craftsman code. Number one, I am not the center of the universe. Right.

Isn't that fun? Yeah.

Number three, there's dignity and purpose in knowing my trade. These are biblical principles, and you're using them to help these kids. Number one, I. I would argue l literally save their lives. But talk to the listener again. I know we talked about this a few minutes ago, but let's go there again. The listener is like, oh, cool. But did that kid get saved?

Right.

Was there spiritual redemption? And sometimes you might not know. Hopefully, that does happen. We do pray for that kid, that he would come to follow Jesus Christ. But how can you be at peace not knowing whether or not there's been a spiritual redemption in his life?

Dave. So several things. One, it's not my job to save them. Them that God's more concerned about these kids than I am. Okay, but number two, one of my good friends, a professor from Nigeria, has a saying. His name is dot reju. And he said, dave, do you realize that salvation, when Jesus had the disciples, salvation was not a prerequisite for discipleship. I went, what? And he says, think about that. The disciples had no idea what they were getting into. They didn't understand what Jesus was doing, what his salvation was, but he was mentoring and discipling them along the process, along the road to get there. And that was a real wake up call for me realizing that, you know, we are all on these spiritual life journeys. And I look at these kids and I needed to understand that there was good and evil before I could choose good. Right. I needed to understand that there was some order to the universe that I did fit somewhere before. I knew I was lost. I knew I was a mess, but I needed to know if there's something, something there that. That made sense. And being a child of an alcoholic with going back several generations, a lot of chaos in my life, I need to know that someone cares. I need to know that their words were more than words. I needed to know that there was even truth to pursue. So I call this, like you said, pre discipleship, pre apprenticeship, whatever you want to call it. We get them on that path to hunger and long for truth because it makes so much sense once they start living it and what the end result was. And my contention is you give kids a hunger for truth, you know where they're eventually going to end up. Right? And so our role is simply to put them on that path, to affirm, bless them, remind them that they were meant to be princes and princesses and wake and bring that alive in them. Like, wow, this world is fascinating and I belong here and the world needs me. I have no doubt. And we're also in Christian schools, too, private Christian, Christian schools where they can be much more. More open about it. But in the public schools, I love it. I want the problem kids because we can put them on that path that's just going to really bring them alive and hopefully lead to where they're meant to be.

Ah, I love this so much. You're just planting seeds of goodness and truth.

Yeah.

You are making goodness and truth winsome to these kids who previously loved darkness and lies. Right. Like, there's a story, I think, about a lot of CS Lewis when he was a troubled teenager whose mom had died, whose relationship with his father was totally deteriorating. Now, he wasn't working with his hands. He was starting to be an academic. But he was 17 years old, fully committed to a life of as an atheist. And he's sitting waiting for a train one day and he's bored. So he goes over to the. The little bookstore in the train station and picks up this novel called Fantastic Dusties. And he reads it.

George McDonald. Yeah.

Yeah, George McDonald. And he points back to this moment for the rest of his life as the moment in which he says his imagination was baptized. Because even though this novel never mentioned Jesus name, he said there was something good about it. There was something true about it. There was something beautiful about it that caused this hairline fracture in his atheism and caused him to search for joy and. And goodness and truth that was only ultimately fulfilled in Christ. Right. George McDonald's is former pastor. He knew what he was doing, but he didn't beat Lewis over the head with the Romans road. He didn't have to. He had to simply plant that seed of joy. And that's what you're doing with these kids.

It's amazing what one of the exercises in our curriculum is. I have the kids from all different backgrounds identify character qualities that they think are. Are important to be successful in life. And it's kind of a fun little project that we take them through, but they come up with the list of character qualities, of goodness, of cooperation, of humility, of work ethic, being teachable, the team player. I mean, the list goes on and on. And for 11 years I've been teaching this. And then I compare and I have the kids, and I think it's in session 10 or 11, I compare that to the same. The list that my guys came up with as experienced machinists, it's the same list. And. And these character qualities which can all fall under the banner of goodness, are universal. Doesn't matter. The age, the race, the culture, universally. God has put it in our hearts, and I think Don Richardson once coined it eternity in our hearts. That God put something in us that we recognize. We long for that. There's that whispering of where we were supposed to be that we've lost, right? And when we come can show the kids and help them discover that on their own, like, wow, there's that haunting in my spirit, that that's what I'm meant to be. That's where I'm meant to end up, right? And that's what we just fan that flame and help bring them along.

I'm going to try to make a connection between two things I know to be true about Dave Haytak. And you tell me if I'm wrong in making a connection between the two. One is what we've just been talking about. You're doing this incredible work through Craftsman on with character. You're having this tremendous impact in the lives of these kids. Right. The second is that decades ago, you decided to cap your personal income. And I'm curious if those two things are connected for you. Like, do you think that that pre decision, because. And here. Here's how I'm playing it out in my mind. I'm like, all right, because you could have just kept crap. Selling the character local to serve Edgerton gear if your goal was to make increasing multiples on the business. Right. Is there a connection here for you in capping your income and the impact God's been able to have through your work with Craftsman, with character?

There is, and I'll. I think I can explain it. And I appreciate you bringing this up because it. I've been thinking a lot, a lot about just kind of what the spiritual life means. And the reason we did that is because I. I lived in Southern California for a period in Newport beach, and I saw the extravagances and in the traps of wealth, and I realized, lord, I don't want to be one of those people because I'm not going to be who you want me to be or end up where you want me to be if I just get caught up in this pursuit of money. Jesus says, you know, that you can't love both manna and God. Serve manna and God money. And so it's been a spiritual discipline. And I actually have written and thought a lot about the spiritual disciplines that we need to keep on the path where God leads me to be. So. So by capping our income and striving to live a life of simplicity, I mean, we heat our home with wood. One of my favorite hobbies is cutting and splitting wood. It keeps me in touch with the things of earth. This morning when I got up and I started a fire, I don't know why I knew I was talking to you today, but I was just filled with gratitude. Got out of bed. I'm grateful for running water when I could brush my teeth. I'm grateful that I have socks to put on. I'm grateful. And I was praying through the house as I was walking over the fireplace, thinking that I had shelter and I could build a fire and I could sit in a soft place and I had food and I could prepare today and talk to you. And I think by doing that, it built a life of gratitude, of understanding how blessed we are in so many ways. So there is a strong connection because I think when I'm. And my prayer every day is, lord, help me think as you think and feel as you feel and speak as you would have me speak, and on and on and on. I want God's thoughts, thoughts and his perspective daily in my life. And I think by doing that over the decades, one of the big things I want, his heart and his heart are for these kids, right? And so our, I think, living that life of discipline and Trying to striving for obedience. Even though I fail miserably constantly, I'm still getting a taste of how much I think he loves and appreciates me. And I want that for these kids.

And your freedom to care about those kids more than yourself because you made the pre decision to cut that income. Randy Alcorn. I read Randy Alcorn's great book.

Yeah, I think you're right on. And actually, in the book I've been working on, there's freedom and discipline. And I think that my one kids in jiu jitsu and the MIA fighters and so on, there is freedom and discipline that the more disciplined you are and strive for that you're able to say no to all these distractions, all these things that will suck you down, down. And by focusing on things that God calls us to, there's. There's just a tremendous amount of joy and fulfillment in that.

That's good. When's this new book coming out?

You know, I don't know. I. I've got it mostly done and I don't know what to do with it, so.

So send it to me so I could devour it. That's what you do with it. Geez, I would love to read that.

Well, it's kind of spiritual disciplines for the blue collar guy, and I would. I would love your perspective on it and what. What I should do with it, because I'm not sure.

Send it my way. Hey, speaking of which, we wrap up every episode with the same three questions. Number one, which books do you find yourself recommending most frequently to others?

So I made a list because I was ready for this question. I think you recommended me and turned me on to a God named Josh. Was that you? Yeah.

No, that wasn't me. That wasn't me. But I've heard of this book.

Oh, I love it. I love it. Totally different perspective on. On Jesus as a working person and just from a very human perspective. There's more scripture references in that book than almost anything I've ever read. I mean, it's phenomenal. Yeah, it's really a great book. The other fun one that I'm reading is called Jesus the Master Psychologist. Ooh, Interesting short little book written by a Catholic gentleman. It's one of the most. I'm buying a bunch of them to hand out to people because it's so applicable. It captures so much of what it means to be a craftsman with character, person. Really, really well done for fun. The one author I've really gotten a kick out of is William Kent Kruger. I don't know if you ever heard of him. The series that he writes is Cork o', Connor, which is a former sheriff in northern Minnesota. It's a fiction, kind of a murder mystery thing. But one of his standalone novels, which is just. My mom inhaled it, my wife inhaled it, everybody, they said this is just incredible. And that book is this tender land. Just a beautiful story taking place in the 1930s with these orphans up in northern Minnesota and their journey. Phenomenal. Just what a. Phenomenal. A great read. So those are. Those are the three I would suggest.

Those are great. Hey, who would you want to hear on this podcast talking about how the gospel is influencing the work they're doing in the world?

Okay, I was thinking that too. Charles Martin. Have you ever had Charles Martin on?

I have not.

Phenomenal author. He writes these incredible, incredibly exciting novels. Tons of heart.

Oh, hang on a sec.

It.

So Charles co writes with my friend Joby Martin, who's a pastor in Jacksonville, Florida at 11:22. So I don't know Charles, but I know Joby really well and I've heard Charles's work is amazing.

Yeah, his novels are just out of this world. I mean, he just came up with a new one. I just. I just picked it up. I haven't chance to read it, but he even gets into the sex trafficking. And there's always these heroes of incredible people of faith, but written for the public. So he takes. Again, takes out the religious language, but he is a hardcore believer. If you wanted to get a couple suggestions, I don't know if this one's too far out there, but Oliver, Oliver Anthony, the guy who became an Internet sensation recently by Richmond, north of Richmond.

Oh, yes, I know who you're talking about.

Oh, if you could have him on, I. He was on Joe Rogan's podcast and he shared his testimony.

I think we can get Oliver on.

Oh, he's so earthy, but he is so real. I just love him. And then if you need someone that's kind of much more professional. John. John Kane, who is a CEO of Scott Forge here in Wisconsin and Illinois. Just an incredible Christian man who just lives out. Lives out what he does.

That's good. I love it. Hey, Dave, you're talking to this global audience of mere Christians who are very diverse vocationally. What's one thing from our conversation you want to reiterate to them before we sign off?

I touched on it briefly. I think there's a movement of God happening among working folks, ordinary folks, and the sense of goodness that God wants to bring through us every day and to our sphere of influence. It may not seem incredibly impactful, but I think God is doing something really amazing and networking us together to really care for this next generation. And I would ask the question, first of all, two questions. Who were your heroes growing up? Who are the people that really were impactful for you as a teenager? Right. We all have them. So my question would be, who are you going to be a hero to? Because no matter who you are, you can be a hero to this next generation in ways that you probably can't even comprehend. Because I go back to Ephesians 3:20 and this has been my verse for the last five years. Now. To him who's able to and think about this now. To him who's able to do immeasurably more than we could even ask or imagine. Ponder that for a second. He can do immeasurably more than we could beyond our imaginations. But the other part of his, according to his power at work within us, we can all be firebrands wherever we're at. And I think we just need to believe that and allow God to work in us and through us.

It's good. It's really good. Hey brother, I want to commend you for the extraordinary work you do every day for the glory of God and.

The good of others.

For reminding us of the God given dignity of all work. Work with our minds, work with our hands. Just for reminding us of what it looks like to live a sacrifice artificial life. To seek not to be a hero for our own good and our own glory, but to be a hero that serves other people true greatness as Jesus would describe it. Hey, if people want to learn more about Craftsman with character, where can they do that? Can they like bring this to their schools? Like, how does this work?

Absolutely, if you go on our Website, craftsman with character.org we are in the process of scaling up. I've got a team now that we are trying to launch in different cities literally across the country. So if you're interested, go on our website, get a hold of us. We need champion businesses who really have a heart for this, partnered with local schools who also get the vision of what to do with these kids. We have processes put in place, we have training involved. It's a non profit obviously, so there's no cost to the schools. We're trying to, you know, like I said, scale this up, but yeah, just network with us and we'll, we'll see how we can make it work.

So basically, if you run a school or a part of a school? A teacher in a school or you run a blue collar business.

Yep. Big or small?

Big or small contact Dave. I love it. Dave thanks for hanging out with us today.

You are one of my heroes Jordan so I just thank you so much man. Just love your voice and what you're doing. Thank you so much.

Vice versa. Thank you brother. Every time I get done talking with Dave Hayden, I don't want the conversation end. I just want to sit at his feet and learn all of his ways. Hey I did a bad job of like pitching his book. His book good work is extraordinary. You guys really should check it out. I'm such a fan of it. Hey if you've enjoyed this episode of the podcast, do me a favor and go leave a review of the Mere Christians podcast on Apple or Spotify wherever you listen. Thank you guys so much for tuning in this week. I'll see you next time. Hey friends, this is your last chance to claim all the amazing pre order bonuses for five mere Christians before they go away at 11:59pm Eastern Standard Time on Main 9th. I've never offered this many pre order bonuses on a book before, so when you fill out the form@5merechristians.com Number one, you're going to be entered to win an incredible trip for you and a friend to tour CS Lewis's favorite spots in Oxford, explore Olay Kirk Christiansen's former stomping grounds at Lego headquarters in Denmark, and much more. Number two, you'll be invited to join my first ever interactive read, culminating in a zoom call with me and my co author on this book, Kaylee Cox. Number three, you're going to be getting a money back guarantee to try the book risk free. And number four, you'll also get access to a free course I'm not selling anywhere called how to write a book 10x faster and better with an Affordable co Author. You can claim all these bonuses in just two simple steps. STEP 1 1. Pre order 5 mere Christians in any format you want. It can be hardback, ebook, audiobook, whatever and you can order it from wherever. It doesn't matter to me. STEP 2 Go to 5Mechristians.com and fill out the form of that page and that's it. I'll send you all those bonuses. You'll be entered into the sweepstakes with one simple form submission. But hey, don't wait all of these off. All of these offers, all these bonuses, they're going away at 11:59pm Eastern Standard Time on May 9th so visit 5meerchristians.com right now to claim your bonuses.