Dr. Jerry Haag (CEO of One More Child)

The episode you're about to listen to was released back when the Mere Christians podcast was called the Call to Mastery. Now, if you love Mere Christians, you're still going to love these older episodes because the majority of each conversation focuses on how the gospel influences the work of our guests. With that disclaimer out of the way, please enjoy the episode. Hey, everybody. Welcome to the Call to Mastery. I'm Jordan Raynor. This is a podcast for Christians who want to do their most exceptional work for the glory of God and the good of others. Every week, I host a conversation with a Christian who's pursuing world class mastery of their vocation. We talk about their path to mastery, their daily habits, and how the gospel of Jesus Christ influences their work. Today's guest is the brilliant Dr. Jerry Hague. He's a world class leader currently leading One More Child, a nonprofit that just last year served more than 300,000 kids in the foster care system and those living in poverty. Dr. Haig and I recently sat down to talk about how leaders can leave loudly at the end of the day and disable email notifications as a means of blessing their teams. We talked about the difference between valuing people and making people feel valued. And finally, towards the end of this conversation, we announced a super exciting new partnership between myself and Dr. Haig and his team at One More Child. I think you guys are going to love this episode with my friend, Dr. Jerry Hague. Doctor Haig, welcome to the podcast.

Hey, Jordan. Glad to be with you today. Yeah.

Hey, are you sitting in Lakeland, Florida today?

I am. I'm looking outside. It's sunny and beautiful and enjoying being Florida.

I know, right? We're like right down the road from each other. It's a little silly that we're not doing this in person, but welcome to the world of podcasting. By the way, you're right down the road from Publix headquarters, correct?

Absolutely. And they are an incredible partner for us to be able to help kids and families as well as offer expertise to us.

All right, so I gotta ask you this because you have not always lived near Publix grocery stores. You spent some time in Texas with H E B. Are you willing to go on the record and calling Publix the greatest grocery store chain in America?

Hey, I am willing to go on that record because our headquarters is named after Joe K. Blanton, the former president of Publix and their families. Just been invaluable to us and helping our ministries.

I love it. Well, if you're listening here and you live in The Southeast. You know that the love of Publix Supermarkets is very, very strong. All right, so, Dr. Hague, for our listeners who don't know, tell us a little bit about One More Child and the work you all do.

Oh, I'm just delighted to do it because it is the passion of my life outside of my family and relationship with Christ of being able to help vulnerable children and struggling families and doing it through Christ Centered Services. And so, Jordan, we focus all of our resources in our areas on that name of being able to help one more child. And those children we're helping have been sex trafficked children, foster children, children that are hungry out there, single moms and their kids that are struggling to be able to keep them together. And also coming alongside families and communities and being able to give them tangible resources and doing it all at the same time as being able to share with them the good news of Jesus Christ. So today we're doing that across 15 different countries. And just praise God, you know, last year we were able to impact over 320,000 children and adults and provide over 18 million meals.

Wow, that's a crazy scale. It is. So you've been in this chair as president and CEO of the organization since 2007. What were you doing before that? What's the quick story of how God led you to one more child?

Man, I tell you what, there are so many pieces woven together. It's not just one story, but just called the ministry. As a young person in high school, my wife Christy grew up at a children's home. And so that's where I first got exposed to that work. Her dad worked in a children's home. We went into business, had success in business, and that was God's calling on my life at the time. But Christy and I really just had a burning desire to make a difference in the lives of kids. Tangible resources, but also make that eternal impact. And so, Jordan, that's been our plumb line for 20 plus years is how can we meet those tangible needs of kids but make an eternal difference? It's what we measure every ministry, every work, every one of our efforts about.

Yeah, there's something to be said. I was talking to my pastor about this the other day. Right. The work you and other organizations like One More Child do in feeding the hungry and serving kids in the foster care system, etcetera, Is good and valuable to God in and of itself. Right. Period. But I think what we find is when we're meeting those material needs, it often opens up doors to go a level deeper and really do some of the more quote unquote, spiritual work of sharing the gospel more explicitly with these struggling people. Is that what you found has been the experience of the organization?

Oh, we see it every day, Jordan. And I mean, it is vivid. I mean, one, there's a whole biblical piece to it. And we know that if you see your brother or sister in need and say, go and be well, but do nothing to meet those physical needs, I mean, that's just wrong. And the Bible spells that out. And so we have that responsibility. To me, it's easy. And I think it's what Jesus did. You got to see the whole person, see every part of that person. And if you love a person and you see that they're hungry, you're going to feed them. If you love a person, you see that they need a safe place to be able to sleep at night and they need a parent to be able to care for them and love them, then you're going to provide that for that child and you're going to come alongside a single mom. And at the same time, we're not going to separate communicating the love of Jesus Christ and the gospel in that way. The two don't have to be separate. The two should never be separated. It's just as we go. We love people. And it's what I see an example what Jesus did. And Jordan, I mean, just when you see kids that have come from backgrounds of abuse and neglect, and I could tell you just awful stories that just make my wife and I would weep of what's happened in the victimization of children. But when those children are brought into a home and brought into a situation where they can be loved in an appropriate way, where they're safe, where nobody's yelling at them, where they're being treated with gentle hands, man, they don't know what it is. But whatever it is that you have is what they want. Because we are being the aroma of Christ in that.

Yeah, that's exactly right. I think a lot of times the mistake we make in the church is thinking that the only thing that is kingdom work is explicitly sharing the gospel. And of course that's kingdom work. But I was talking with a friend yesterday, we were talking about this issue and he said, listen, very simple, very concrete question. Ask this of your work. If Jesus were king of your neighborhood, of your city, of your state, of your country, what would be different? And that is kingdom work, right? And, man, I'll tell you what, that certainly includes feeding hungry kids and caring for orphans and caring for Single moms. That's kingdom work right in and of itself, which is beautiful. You know, Dr. Haig, you're one of those guests where it's super obvious how your faith influences what you do. And I think why you do it. You're quoting James 2 to us, right? But I'm curious how the Gospel shapes how you do the work day in, day out. Like, what makes your leadership at this organization, how you lead it, different. Different because of your relationship with Christ, man.

I think, you know, as we look at that, Jordan, that's an awesome thing to consider because I really believe my faith and my faith in Christ drives the goal. Because I think we set way too many low bars and way too many low goals out there. And our prayer has been simple. My wife and I began praying a prayer 14 years ago when we got here. Was, God give us the world for children. Not let us grow by 2 or 10, or let us expand or add a new location, but God give us the whole world out there. And because I believe God is a big God and we can pray big. And I can pray that prayer with all genuineness because I know it's at the heart of God. And we know that if we ask anything according to his will, he hears us. It is God's will that we take care of his children, no matter what the age they are that are out there. And so one man faith just drives that goal of being able to help One More Child. Wait, hang on one second.

I want to park a second. I love this. I love the big prayer that is 100% in Jesus's name. We know this is the will of God and we're going to pray really big prayers. And yet the name of the organization is One More Child. So it's this wildly audacious vision, but also there's a really concrete, singular focus on one kid at a time. I don't have a question here. I just think that's really interesting.

Well, it is what drives us and every decision every day is how we can help one more. But when we look at that faith, it drives the goal. But here's the other thing that's really cool, and it almost seems like it's intention or antithesis to it, that faith drives the peace. And so, you know, as I've grown in my relationship with Christ, what I know is God's work is going to be done. His outcome is going to happen. I can't manipulate it, I can't control it. I can't bring it about. But I've got a work and responsibility that I'm supposed to do in order to bring it about. But it's his blessing to give, it's his blessing to protect and it's his blessing to offer that favor. And so I've got to be super diligent and I'm going to do everything I can. But at the same time I can rest in knowing God's will and God's favor is going to be done.

There's this John Piper quote I think about almost every day, definitely every week. He says our job is faithfulness. God's job is fruitfulness.

That's exactly right.

That's it. Like we're just gotta be faithful. The results are at our hands. And here's the deal. At the end of the day, God doesn't need Jerry Haig or Jordan Raider to do his work, right? If I die tomorrow and he wants this work to continue, he's going to find somebody else to do it. And I'll tell you what, it took me a long time to get that, but I think you're right. I think once you do get it or start to get it at least it does lead to this uncommon level of rest.

It does.

And peace. Right. I'm curious, do you think you rest in a literal, practical Sabbath like way more than maybe your non Christian counterparts in this world? Have you seen that?

Wow, that's a hard one, Jordan one. I think I have that ultimate rest but at the same time, you know, some of it is a little bit of a pall of I'm already being poured out like a drink offering because it is, there's that urgency, there's that press that we have to do this, you know, and I do, I believe it's a joy and a responsibility that we have because we have been so blessed that we got to turn around and be able to help kids and families that are out there now. I tell you where I do find that rest in that relationship with Christ through the renewing of our minds, you know, as it says in God's word. And also through my sweet family, I got an awesome, amazing wife that we get to do ministry together. She's an unpaid full time volunteer advocate in the work that we get to do. And so we enjoy doing that together. And then my boys and their wife and soon to be wife and we're on eight different chats together and we just enjoy and encourage each other. And I do, I think that's where God really blesses us, get to be through family and these awesome people, we get to work with on a day to day basis.

You strike me as somebody who's super joyful as he's doing the work. And I think, I think that's hard for some people.

Right?

I think we can get so stuck in this mindset of I'm doing my work for God and I just got to grind it away that we neglect the joy of the work and really communing with the father and experience being his children. Like, am I reading this right? You seem like a pretty joyful guy. And if so, like, how are you cultivating that joy and not just doing your work for God, but with him?

Oh, man. I tell you what, Jordan. I mean, there's a major emphasis in our own lives and also in the life of one more child. Our whole culture is permeated with that of man. We got the greatest calling in the world. We get to come alongside and help children and families that are in crisis. I mean, what an incredible call. It's the best to us. It's the best call out there. And then to be able to be that witness to Christ throughout that. But at the same time, man, our teams, our staff, we work hard, you know, because there's an urgency to that. But then we also have a lot of fun together and we get to enjoy that and also have that freedom of knowing it's okay to make a mistake, it's okay to try new things, it's okay to press that envelope out there because we've got to keep reinventing, we've got to keep being. And of course, this registers with your work. We've got to be creative. That's one of our core values, is we're going to provide creative services because we have to constantly reinvent how we can help kids and families.

Yeah, totally. And you've got the creator God dwelling inside of you.

Absolutely. That's it.

That's it. You know, it's clear from your bio, Dr. Hay, you're a masterful leader. You know, under your leadership, one more child's gone from serving something like 3,000 kids and individuals in 2007 to more than 300,000 last year. That's crazy. Growth of impact. How did you guys do it?

Well, you know what it began with, Jordan, is it began with that prayer, just simply praying for God to give us the world for children. And then as you talked about that, and you've talked about so much, is that creativity. And that's one thing that I've learned and really solidified my mind from hearing you and reading some of what you've written out there that God makes us all to be creative. And some of our creativity is not in music or in song or art, but it's in new programs, it's in expansion, it's in growth out there. And so the way God has gifted us to be creative, then we offer that creative service back to God. But I do think, you know, one of those pieces that we talked about, that urgency and that driving force, it's I wake up every morning and our teams do, our staff do, and we're waking up every day saying, how can we help one more child? We celebrate those numbers, Jordan. Those are awesome, incredible numbers. But you know, the ones that burden me, the ones that really strike me and drives me every day is I know there's one more that's still out there that needs our help and so we can celebrate. And that's part of that tension of celebrating all the good that's happening. What God's provided, man, we can't rest, we can't stop, we can't grow weary until we've helped that one more out there.

Yeah, I love that. I love how broadly you understand the term creativity because that's how I think about creativity too. It's not just art, it's not just creating businesses, it's creating a new process at work that makes things easier for people. It's creating a new program. Right. So in your 14ish year tenure here at One More Child, what have been some of those concrete examples of creativity that have really moved the needle?

Oh man, I can think of two different people that I can use as example. Dr. Pam Whitaker, senior vice president of Program development. And so we have those five focus areas I talked to you about, about working with children that have been sex trafficked, of foster children, of feeding hungry children, of our single moms programs and coming alongside really community development, struggling families. She developed four of those five programs. And so, man, that's just God given creativity of policies, procedures, best practices, of metrics, of outcomes that we're building to make sure that we're really providing transformative help. Not just a one time, not a pass out pencils to kids and pat them on the head and say, how many of you prayed to receive Jesus? It's how did we move that child out of poverty? How did we improve their safety and security and living condition? And how did that child grow in that relationship with Christ too? So, Dr. Pam Whitaker, in that way, the other, I'd tell you, Steven Robert, our executive vice president, he is gifted and super creative in building systems and Processes. Right. And the world looks at that and says, how boring. What is creative about a system?

But not to Stephen.

Oh, no.

Yeah.

And it's just incredible because God uses that creativity, you know, as you talked about, that passion, that vision. But built into that and that peace built into that is also accountability. And so how do we hold ourselves accountable to make sure that we are doing the very best with donor funds that come in, to be able to make sure that we can utilize those to their utmost to help that one more and one more and one more man. He's responsible for that. And God is just painting a masterpiece of a picture through his systems and processes to be able to help us in that way.

I love it. Yeah. I love looking at Genesis 1 and realizing yet some of what God created is what we would traditionally define as creativity. It's the beauty and the diversity of the animal kingdom, for example. But it's also creating order out of chaos. Right. It is separating light and dark and putting systems in place so that humanity could flourish. So all of that is creative work. Dr. Hank, I'm curious. I love asking this question of guests. You're masterful leader. What's the delta between good and great leaders in general? Like, what have you found really distinguishes the best leaders in this world, in the nonprofit space, however you want to define that.

Yeah. And I think you got to go first, Jordan, to what is great. And I think sometimes we pigeonhole that with just our economy of what's great. And there are some great leaders out there. They're not growing, they're not expanding. But, man, they are super at maintaining. They're super at administering. They're super at being able to shepherd what God has given them. And so I do, first, I want to recognize God's giftedness to different people. And so we don't go well, you know, growth and expansion, that's the greatest gift out there. Because God gifts everybody with different gifts. And in God's economy, if we're doing greatness with the gift he's given us, then we're, you know, I think we're achieving all that God's asked us to do.

Yeah. This is the parable of the talents. Right. Success is stewardship.

That's right. And I think the key that difference, then that delta is not settling, you know, And I think that's what a lot of people do. It's a lot easier to settle. You don't have to keep pushing. You know, to keep pushing, you gotta keep adding tension out there. And so I'd go back to gosh, when I was with AT&T, you know, one of the trainings they did when they were talking about negotiating with clients and all that was stay in the tension. And that's registered with me for decades. And isn't life a little bit like that of staying in that tension? And so I use the illustration with our team and our staff and leadership of a rubber band. And you've got to stretch that rubber band. And so we have to stretch each other. We have to stretch what we can do. And you can go to a stretch that breaks, and that's a dysfunctional stretch, or you can go to a very functional stretch that allows you to keep pulling your team with you, to keep pulling the organization up. But if you don't keep that tension, then we just go backwards and we relieve the tension. It's easier, but we're not going to move ahead.

Yeah, this is really good. And I've experienced this leading organizations before. You don't want to put too much pressure on the bar, too much weight on the rubber band to wear rips. Right. So how do you figure out what the right level of tension is within your organization? How do you know how much to stretch your people and the nonprofit?

You know, I think a big part of it is one biggest thing is valuing people, not making them feel valuable, which is a lot of our leadership books toward people ought to feel valued. They're going to buy in all that other. But if we truly value people, it's kind of like what we were talking about with the way Jesus looked at people. You're looking at them in their entirety. And as Paul said, so then we no longer regard anyone from a worldly point of view. So that worldly point of view is just simply, what can I get from you? How can you help me achieve what I want to do? And so if we truly look at a person, we go, man, I value this person. We're going to hold each other accountable. We're going to stretch. And stretching is uncomfortable. Stretching means tension. Stretching means we've got to get out of our. What our boundaries are and what we think we can do. And it takes a lot more energy. But you know, what I found is, man, with our staff and who we're recruiting to be a part of this culture, if we don't stretch, we're going to lose that team member because they want to stretch, they want to grow, they want to do more, they want to change the world for children. That's why they joined us. And so if we can't provide that, they're going to go somewhere else.

Totally. A players want to work in environments that are going to stretch them. They want to work with teams that are going to stretch them and make them grow. Speaking of. You mentioned it. So let's go there. I mean, everybody's struggling recruiting right now. Everybody's struggling hiring right now.

Man, it's rough.

It's rough. What's working and what's not working right now for you guys, real practically as you're trying to build your team?

Yeah. I mean, in fact, I was talking to a retired HR executive director over HR. I mean, he oversaw it for a major Fortune 100 company, and he said he's never seen this kind of environment. So it is a tough recruiting environment out there. And, you know, the challenges are being able to get your word out so that people can see it and they can know it. You know, what you've asked about is what's working for us? What's working for us Is that really that vision and the calling and the mission of what we do, because nonprofits can't compete in money out there, but what we can super compete in. And I think people ought to be paid a fair wage and our people ought to be paid a fair wage for the great work that they do. But, man, there is so much intrinsic value that we're seeing all kinds of staff members come alongside and say, I want to be a part of that and I'm willing to give up other pieces over here to be able to feel that fulfillment of the calling of what God has placed on my life. And so that's what we're seeing work now. We've got a tremendous number of open positions. We're constantly recruiting out there because we place a high value on that culture piece of making sure they're a culture fit. And so, I mean, we've got real simply a criteria for our culture. Jordan of and we borrowed it. It's Patrick Lencioni. But we adapted a little bit and he said, you can. So we take on staff and team members that are hungry, they're humble, they're wise, and they're called. And we can unpack all of that and just make sure that not only are we hiring the right people, but we're also retaining and motivating and rewarding people according to that criteria, too.

And the culture fit is really the key for retention.

Yes, it is.

Right. Because I've had this conversation with some other leaders and organizations who have said, yeah, listen, I would take a B player over an A player. If the B player is a slam dunk culture fit and the A player isn't. Because I know that the A player who's not a culture fit and is not there for the mission is going to leave the second they get offered more money. Right. Which I thought was an interesting perspective. Now, I want both. I want the A player and I want the culture fit. And I'm probably going to hold out until I find that person. But it's easier said than done sometimes. Right? But you guys are prioritizing that and screening for that in your interviews. I love it.

Absolutely. I mean, you don't get in the door unless you fit those four criteria. And you're not eligible for bonus advancement or raises unless you perform well in all four of those criteria. So it's not A, we'll take three of the four or anything else. We want all four of those pieces. And then we want the A player, too.

Jordan, I love the distinction you made a few minutes ago between valuing people and making people feel valued. I think that's a really important distinction. I want you to go a level deeper here. Explain a little bit more what you mean by this.

Well, when we make people feel valued, we're manipulating them, one thing, and we're rolling out programs, you know, and so then we create programs, too. This is the creative part. But we create incentive programs and leadership development programs for the sole purpose of trying to retain staff because they feel valued, because they feel like they're heard. And then, man, that's really missing the boat because there is so much richness of insight, of diversity of thought as well as diversity of everything that we do speaking into that, of when we really value people for what they bring to the table. But that means what we've got to do is sometimes let go of some of our preconceived ideas of who is the ideal person for that position. And also, Jordan, I think a huge piece of it is the humility of recognizing that I don't have the one sole right way of doing everything, and I am not the absolutely best person to do it.

Yeah, that's good. That's really good. I think another piece of this, too, is valuing people beyond their productivity. So valuing them as human beings that have families and have lives outside of work. Actually, you wrote this story, really great piece for Forbes at the end of 2021 talking about this very issue, talking about how to create these workplace cultures that actually value people that are actually family friendly. Everyone says their workplace culture is family friendly. Most of Them are not. How have you guys done this at one more time?

It's hard, Jordan, and it's not perfect, but you know, right off the bat, I lead it by example. So I've seen way too many ministry leaders out there that lost their families because there's always something compelling, always something urgent in the mission of an organization and especially in the work that we do. And so what you'll see is if my wife calls or my boys call, I'm typically most all the time, I'm stepping out of a meeting to take that call. And they are priority meeting and staff know that too. And so what that drives to is then I've got a leader and their wife calls her going, hey, this is my wife. I'm going to step out and take this call down to, you know, just, I mean, some little mundane things and whether they fit everybody else or not, but they fit us. So turn off the email notifications off your phone. You can have them on there. But I mean 90% of the emails we get are junk email where they're not urgent. You don't want that thing buzzing while you're having dinner with your family and you're trying to, oh my gosh, I wonder if I'm needed or I wonder if something's critical, being able to go, you know what, I'm enjoying dinner with my family right now. And one way we implement that is we use text or phone call for urgent things. So we can email and you can email any time of the night you want. If you get an epiphany or an idea, email away. But that doesn't create an urgency for someone. But if something's urgent, you know, we have life changing services we provide and sometimes there's an urgency. Many times with services that we're providing kids and families, if we need you, we'll get you, you know, we'll get you by phone call or by text. And it's just, it's the model that we've implemented to be able to say, hey, make sure you can, you can split that time and recognizing too. And you know this, Jordan, there are seasons and sometimes there are seasons of intensity where you're deeply needed. And then like you said, creating that Sabbath of hey, this is just a season. You can't keep a constant season of that piece out there, of everything is crisis.

That, yeah, that's not a season, that's your life.

Yeah. And that becomes dysfunctional and it hurts you and it hurts your family.

Man, I love what you just mentioned about emails. It may not seem like a huge deal to you, but I think this is a massive deal. I talked about this in my most recent book, Redeeming youg Time. There was a study that nearly 50% of employees believe that their boss expects them to respond immediately to emails, even though that expectation has never been communicated explicitly. Right.

Wow. Yeah.

If your leader listen is and you want to serve your team well and dramatically increase productivity, let them off the hook, send them an email, say, listen if I need you or do what Dr. Hay does, if I need you urgently, I'll call you. Right. But emails, man, just assume that, hey, you got 24 hours to respond to that thing and in the meantime, you be with your family. Right. And I want to bless you because, you know, by the way, it also makes them the best team members when they're the best parents and the best spouses at home. Right?

That's exactly right. I mean, we had devotional Monday with all of our, our staff and we're talking about family and the person who led it was talking about family and how we need to be there and value and have that ultimate responsibility. And Jordan, I followed it up too, that, you know, one more child. We are a family. And one thing you'll never hear is you'll never hear me talking badly about my wife Christy, or my two boys or my daughter in laws because I love them. There's plenty of people that run them down out there in the world and no one's ever going to hear me say a bad word about them. And I have that expectation of our teams. It doesn't mean we won't disagree. It doesn't mean we don't challenge each other. There's a richness in that. But we're always going to do it in a great way. And externally, I am always going to speak well of our staff and our teams and we're going to speak well of each other. We don't have time for piddly drama to take place and run each other down because we've got important work and the best people to do it with.

Yeah, I love it. Hey, I want you to talk about one more thing from that Forbes piece you talked about leaving loudly at the end of the day. Tell everyone what you mean by this because I love this as it pertains to work, life balance and workplace culture.

And it is. And when you go to leave and you go to leave the office, you know, people need to see that you're there. I know leaders that will intentionally leave a light on in their office so that staff will think they're there all hours of the night, you know, and that is dysfunctional. I mean, and part of it is that accountability. Part of it is the motivation to the mission. But our people, man, we all work really hard. And so there is a time just to walk away and to leave it. And by doing so, the other thing you're doing is you're trusting your staff, you're trusting the leaders that you built. And I think it's a vanity, I think it's a false humility and really the antithesis of humility that says, I have to do this. I am the only one. It all is going to come down to me. And if I don't do this, it's not going to happen or it's not going to fall apart. If you've built that kind of environment, you're not a good leader.

No, that's exactly right. When I was running this large team at this company called Threshold, I would get to the office at 5:15 in the morning because that's what worked for me and my family at the time. But I would leave every day at 3:30pm right crazy early to beat the traffic, whatever. And I made a big deal out of it. I would go office to office, tell people by, make sure everyone knew I was leaving. And of course they stayed later because they got in later. But the point was, I want everyone to understand there's a hard line in the sand here. And there were some days where that wasn't true, of course, but for the most part that was the case. And I think that sent a powerful message to the team of you have lives outside of this office that I, as the leader of this organization, value because I value you, right? I'm not just trying to make you feel valued. I actually value you as a human being. So.

Well. And Jordan valuing family too. So I had a staff member that's starting vacation today and I told him yesterday, hey, turn it off. Turn on your auto replies, put on your auto voicemail, go enjoy your family. If we need you, we'll get you, but just leave it behind. I was talking to a staff member this morning. She's about to go on maternity leave. I said, you've built the team. You've got an awesome team to be able to lead. You've equipped them. If we need you, we'll get you. But I want you to go enjoy this time with your new little one. So it's giving permission too, because it's hard for people to leave one. We want to know that we're invaluable and that we're needed, but it's hard to leave. And so we have to give permission for that too.

Yeah, that's exactly right. Dr. Haig, three questions I love wrapping up every conversation with. Number one, which books do you tend to recommend or gift most frequently to others?

Oh, man, I have given away the Whole Inner Gospel by Rich Stearns. I've given that one away like crazy. Good to great. Either the non profit, you know, the social one or the for profit I think are awesome. The one I'm giving away right now that I am just, I don't know, in love with or just so deeply convicted about is Dane Ortland's book Gentle and Lowly. Yeah, yeah.

This is sitting on my pastor's desk right now. I need to read it.

All you gotta do is read the title. I mean, Jordan, it's deeply convicting. You know, you go back to all these leadership principles, you know, those books, Jesus CEO and all the. This is a paradigm shift. And I think it's the right shift that Jesus was gentle and lowly and shouldn't we be too?

I love it. Hey, are you ready to announce the book that One More Child is going to be gifting the most frequently here in a few weeks?

Absolutely. And I'm so excited about it and getting to partner with you, Jordan, but the Creator in you can't wait.

So I've been telling my audience about this for a few weeks. So here's the deal, guys. One More Child has agreed to distribute copies of my new children's book, the Creator in you to 15,000 kids living in poverty, living in the foster care system, all the things Dr. Haig has been talking about. And I, I'm super excited that you guys are the partner on this. But here's the deal, listeners. We need your help to do this right. We got a big financial goal we're trying to hit to raise this money and distribute these books. So you can donate right now@jordanrayner.com donate. And of course, for the record, I'm not making a dime from these donated books. I want to make that crystal clear. But Dr. Hank, thank you again for being willing to distribute these things. It's so cool that we're getting to work together on this.

I mean, how neat to be able to equip children and single moms and families out there to think that, you know what, I am creative. I can't color. I've never been able to color. My handwriting is terrible. And other kids face that out there too, because they go, I don't sing and all these other pieces, but to embrace their God given creativity as it's manifested through their life. I mean, I think that is so cool.

Well, and I've been saying this since the moment we first started talking about the book. The purpose of this book is to help kids view their current work, whether it's homework or chores or art projects around the house and their future careers.

Right.

With God, ordained purpose and joy. Joy. Right. And all of our kids need to hear that message. But kids living below the poverty line. Right. Certainly need to hear that message. And so we are so grateful that you and your team are willing to roll up your sleeves and make sure these books get in the hands of these kids, Dr. Haig. So thank you. Thank you again.

We're excited to partner with you. Jordan and I have followed you for years and I get your weekly emails of your devotion, and I've actively shared them with my boys and daughter in laws and daughter in law to be. Because it is. It's that piece of God's calling of the work that we do. And our calling, whatever it is, is holy as a programmer, it's holy as a lawyer, it's holy as a mom at home, it's holy as a seventh grader. Our calling's holy because God has made us that way.

Yes. Beautifully said. I can't wait for more kids to get this. All right, Dr. Haig, who do you most want to hear on this podcast talking about how the gospel shapes the work they do in the world?

Okay. I want to recommend you to talk to Ed Kobel. He's right there in your neighborhood. He's in Tampa.

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

Have you had Ed on?

You know, I haven't, and it's been years since Ed and I have connected. But that's a great name for those who don't know. Tell them a little bit about Ed.

You bet. Ed is the president of DeBartolo Development. I mean, he's been wildly successful in business and continues to be. I mean, you know, it's just the business he's working and leading is growing. But Ed, he has this call on his life to be able to minister, to be able to disciple young CEOs and other leaders that are out there. He and his wife Becky both do that. Whenever I'm with Ed, I'll tell you this, whenever I'm with Ed, I am constantly challenged and sharpened in my spiritual life. I mean, that's. You'd go Wait a minute. You're going to be constantly challenged and sharpened to go grow the business or all of these other things. But man, there is a kindredness with Ed Coble and just a beauty of God's calling on his life and what he sees. His ministry. And his ministry is equipping these young leaders to really grow in that relationship with Christ and then to be able to in turn, give so that others can.

I love it. Ed's great. I love his work. That's a great suggestion, Dr. Egg. All right, before we sign off, just a reminder of who we're speaking with. We're talking to this audience of Christ followers who are doing a lot of different things vocationally, right? Some of them are CEOs, some of them are marketing managers and stay at home parents and carpenters, whatever. What they share is, number one, a serious love of Jesus and number two, a desire to do great work that glorifies him. What's one thing you want to leave that audience with before we sign off, Dr. Haig?

Hey, I would let you know and just encourage you. You cannot master any vocation alone. You know, you've got to surround yourself with incredible people. People that challenge you, people that are smarter than you, people that you trust completely, though, because they're going to speak truth into your life. And people that are smarter out there, they make us better. And then always remember that humility piece too, because it's not about what you can get and making me better. It's then how can I invest in those people? So I just think it's just a mutual beneficial thing that we can do with each other.

That's well said. Dr. Haig, I want to commend you for the exceptional kingdom work you and your team do every day, for your incredibly high standards of excellence and and just for living out Jesus, call to care for the least of these guys. If you want to learn more about Dr. Haig and One More Child, you can do so@onemorechild.org and again, if you want to donate a copy of my new children's book, the Creator in you to some kids that one more child ministers to, you could do that@jordanraynor.com donate. Dr. Hague, thank you so much for joining us today.

Thank you, Jordan. Just such a privilege.

I hope you guys loved that episode with Dr. Hague. Seriously, if you're looking for a job, they have like, I don't know, 50, 60 positions open right now. Amazing organization. Go check them out. Guys, thank you so much for tuning in to this week's episode. I'll see you next time, Sa.