David Phillips' Intro

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Today on the servant leadership podcast, we hear from David Phillips, founder and president of Children's Hunger Fund. For

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over 30 years, Children's Hunger Fund has delivered food and the hope of the gospel to children in need, serving

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thousands of churches and distributing hundreds of millions of meals around the world. In this conversation, you'll hear

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how Children's Hunger Fund grew from a garage-based startup in Los Angeles to a global ministry meeting physical and

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spiritual needs in some of the world's most vulnerable places. If you want to see what faithful, lifelong servant

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leadership really looks like, this one's for you. Dave, thank you for being on the Servant Leadership Podcast. Chris,

Welcome David Phillips

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I'm glad I'm here. This is going to be fun. I I'm so excited. We've known each other for a long time, and I'm excited

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for our audience to get to know you. the story of what you've done here. We're sitting at Children's Hunger Fund in

Children's Hunger Fund and Dave's Background

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California. The story is just unbelievable. Tell us a little bit of the background of how this all came to be and what you do. Sure. First of all,

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my role, I'm president and founder of Children's Hunger Fund. We're in our 34th year uh based in Los Angeles, but

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we're truly global in our scope of distribution. And our primary goal is to

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uh resource gospel- centered churches uh across America and around the world with food packs that are mandated to be handd

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delivered to the homes of children that live in poverty for the purpose of building a trust relationship and

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sharing Christ and drawing them into the church. And so, uh a little bit of my

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background, uh I never thought that God would lead me into ministry. Um, I was

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actually kind of the opposite. I was really blessed. I grew up in Southern California in a Christian home that was

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very missionsminded. Uh, had parents that were actually uh, their first year

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of of marriage, they were the first two staff members for World Vision in Korea and intended to be full-time

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missionaries, but uh, things in their life changed. And, uh, my dad ran a

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missionary support organization for 40 years. So, I grew up in a home filled with missionaries all the time. Kind of

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felt like a missionary kid myself and wasn't sure I wanted that life for for

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me and my family. Had a great life, but uh uh was maybe a little bit more materialistic coming out of high school

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and so not knowing any better, I figured, man, I'm going to go to college and pursue international banking. Why

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international banking? That's where all the money is. And I just figured, man, I wanted to be that guy that wrote the big

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checks for the kingdom, not necessarily do the work of the kingdom. And uh that

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all changed uh really my last semester of college. I had planned to uh go to

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Europe on a a Europe semester on international banking and that door closed. And uh very rapidly um God

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opened a door for me to get involved in starting a local feeding program in

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South Central Los Angeles. And South Central Los Angeles is known for the gangs and the riots and a lot of poverty

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and really had a chance to launch a feeding program that was targeting uh

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families that lived in the low-income projects and had a chance to bring in the church and to see a bridge built

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between the church and children in poverty and and really felt like, man, food can be a powerful tool to um share

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the gospel if it's used in the right way. So, uh that's in my background. But also during my stay there, um about

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three years out of college, I had a chance to go overseas. I went to Honduras and Guatemala and I was tasked

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to go visit a program in Honduras that needed resourcing. And so what I saw in

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Honduras, I went to the capital city and uh in in Honduras, there's one pediatric

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hospital that serves the whole country. And so if any kid in Honduras needs

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chemo or radiation, they're brought to the the capital city and they're treated there. So, at the time that I visited,

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there was a missionary couple that was taking children that had been deemed terminal by the hospital and they were

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brought into this little modest home. And this couple just kind of loved on them for the last few days they had left

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to live. And so, I was tasked to go see them, see what their needs were and how how they could be helped. And quite

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honestly, God just wrecked me on that trip. Um the day I visited there were

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about 60 children there that all had um been treated with chemo. So they were

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thin, frail, lost their hair, all under 6 years old. And this couple didn't have

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enough resources to to feed them all. Didn't even have basic painkillers to

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make them comfortable. And their sole focus was love these kids, share Christ

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with them before they pass. And so I came back to Los Angeles after visiting them convinced I was going to move down

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to Honduras and I was going to be an advocate for this facility. I was in my mid20s. I was single. I didn't have any

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real ties and um met with my pastor and a lot of Christian men that I respected

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and they're all kind of like, "Man, maybe stay in the States and see what God does with this vision." And maybe

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you're being reactive or emotional, but people that know me, I'm an emotional flatliner, you know, and uh but I was

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just convinced that um more could be done to care for children in this type

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of type of situation. So I stayed I continued to develop that feeding program in South Central Los Angeles.

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And three years go by. I get married about halfway through that time frame. And we're in our first or second year of

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marriage. And I came home. I remember it was Friday before Fourth of July weekend

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and I told my wife Lyn, I go, "I'm going to quit my job. I got to do something different." And uh she goes, "Well, what

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are you going to do?" And I said, "I don't know." Never a good answer, by the way. Um we were, you know, young

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married, just about to buy our first home, start a family, do all the things that young couples do. And I said, "I

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need to do something different." And Lynn said, "Well, what's driving that?" And I said, I I can't get these image of these kids in Honduras out of my head.

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And I feel like God has something more for us. And one of the things that I had

Founding of Children's Hunger Fund

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learned in the years prior to that is that there was a lot of corporate wealth in America, particularly in the food

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industry. There's a lot of surplus. And I wanted to use my business background

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to access the wealth of corporate America and some of the surplus and

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channel that to churches and um ministries that are on the ground that

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are doing things to care for children like these kids in Honduras. And so we went away that weekend and we literally

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came back from the weekend with the name and the mission statement for Children's Hunger Fund. And Lynn was great. She

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said, "We'll put our family plans on hold." She was a school teacher and she said, "Man, you I'll keep teaching and

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if I I'll support you in this. If God's in it, we'll give it a few years and see what God does." And so that's how we

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started out. And um what I love about God is that when you take a step of

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faith, God just doesn't chop you off at the knees, right? He comes alongside you

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and often undergurs you in that step of faith. And that's what he did for us. And uh the best way to explain that um

Miraculous Provision Of Cancer Drug For Children

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we had just gone through the incorporation uh process. So this is 3 4 months later and I get a call from that

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uh missionary down in Honduras and he calls me up and he says, "Hey Dave, we just got these seven kids in at the

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hospital and if we don't get this one particular cancer drug, these children

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don't have a chance to live." And I said, "Well, I don't know anything about cancer drugs, but you know, give me the

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name and I'll try to find it." And I remember the name was like 20 letters long, a word I couldn't even pronounce.

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And I remember writing it down on a scratch little scratch paper. And uh we

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talked a little bit more. We prayed together and I said, "Hey, I'm going to I'll try to find the drug." So I hang up

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the phone. And this was back in 1991, so you had to hang up the phone back then.

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And so I hung up the phone and the receiver is still on my hand and the phone rings again and I pick it up and

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it's this guy back east that says, "Hey, I have this really unusual donation. I don't know if you can use it, but it's a

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cancer drug for kids." And I'm like like, "What's the name of the drug?" And it matched identically what was on this
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piece of paper. And and I I was just floored. I was completely overwhelmed.

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And this guy went on to say, "Dave, you know, this is a huge donation. We have um 48,000 vials of this drug. Street

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value, it's worth about $8 million and we'll airlift it anywhere around the world if you can get it into children's

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hospitals or clinics that can use it. And so I took the next 48 hours and I I

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found about 20 different medical uh clinics that could use this drug. And

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God just placed that in in 20 different countries. And after after that phone

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call, I there's no way to put into words what that call did for for me and Landon

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in our faith journey. You know, I it was it just floored us that that God would do that. And there were so many lessons

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that he taught us, but I think the biggest lesson that he taught me in that very moment was

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um that God had a much bigger vision for Children's Hunger Fund than I did. and that if I would just stay out of his way

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and let him lead that he had a global vision for CHF. Cuz when we started, I just envisioned being from Southern

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California that we would resource some some churches locally and and get them

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involved in food programs for the purpose of building relationships and maybe help a handful of projects every

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year like these kids in Honduras. And uh Chris, it's staggering as you know. Um

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this year, um we just finished out our year and we received $165 million in

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corporate gifts. Uh most of that is food. Uh we're able to put that into our

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food packs and convert that to over $70 million meals. Uh that goes out to

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thousands of churches across the United States and another thousand churches in 33 developing countries. And that wasn't

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the initial vision, you know, but that's what God has done over 34 years. And um

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in in many ways, it's just been like strap on the seat belt and and watch

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what God has done. And what I love about God is um he's been so faithful. I I I

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think if you could say, "What's the name of Chilling's Hunger Fund?" It's really been God's story. It hasn't been our

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story. And it's been a story of his faithfulness and his provision. It's almost always in the 11th hour. Um

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there's been so many times over 34 years where we've never known where payroll is going to come from in two weeks, but

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we've never missed a payroll period. Um we've just seen God bless and open doors

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and do things that only God can accomplish. And uh so that that's been

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our journey in a nutshell. And it's been just a joy to be a part of it. It is such a crazy journey because it goes

The Northridge Earthquake Story

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from not even thinking about getting into this full-time to then doing something small in your garage to then

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going full-time and now doing over 70 million meals uh in a year is just

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crazy. Uh yeah, that's a good point. I didn't mention that we started in our garage and uh you know there there's

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another story I'd love to tell real quickly. Um, a lot of people won't remember this, but if you go back to

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January of 1994, uh, there was a big earthquake in Los Angeles County. It was called the

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Northridge earthquake. And, um, we had shifted from working out

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of our garage to a little small, um, rented facility in the center of the San

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Frernando Valley. It It wasn't much larger than a threecar garage. Uh but we were doing our distributions there and

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we were serving about eight churches a week that were feeding about 300 families with food and and that was our

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program and we did distributions on Friday, one day a week. Um and then this

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earthquake hits, right? And um I remember when the earthquake hit, just to tell you what a small mom and pop we

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were, we had less than $400 in our business checking account. So we're we're living week to week. uh still

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living mostly on Lynn's salary and I've got one employee uh that helps with on

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the warehouse on Fridays. You know, that's the extent of our payroll. And we're just kind of limping along. This

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earthquake hits and FEMA calls me. Uh the director for the state of for

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California FEMA program um and says, "Hey, uh the federal

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government wants to bring in a 100 truckloads of food and we want to do it through Children's Hunger Fund." And I

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said, "Why?" And he said, "Well, Children's Hunger Fund has the largest surviving charitable warehouse in the

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San Frernando Valley." I mean, this is an area of 10 million people and there were really no charities even to this

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day. There's no food bank in the valley. It's it's all the resources are going to South Central and downtown Los Angeles.

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And so the director says, "Hey, you know, we want to give you all this food." And I'm like, "Okay." Um I said,

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"I'm agreeable to it on one condition." And I he said, 'What's that condition?' I said, 'Well, we want to give the food

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out in the name of the Lord.' And I go, what I mean by that is we won't discriminate. We'll get it all out to

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the earthquake victims and families, but I want to give it out to churches. And I said, are you good with that? And he

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told me off the record, he goes, "Dave, I really don't care what you do with the food. I got so much pressure from

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Washington to get these truckloads in here, and if you can get them out, we'll help you get them out." And so FEMA was

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great. They actually gave us access to a second warehouse. They gave us um walkie-talkies. Back then there were no

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no cell phones so we could communicate to each other. And they gave us access to a forklift. And it was crazy.

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Overnight we went from serving eight churches and 300 families to two weeks

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later uh we had 110 churches. Most of those churches were coming in six days a

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week to get food. and we had to collect signatures from the families that got this the food. Um and our biggest week

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was the second week where we served 48,000 families. So 300 to 48,000

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families in two weeks. So this went on um we kept getting food from the

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government for about 6 months and then we were a week or two into it and then all of a sudden we have we have

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truckloads just showing up at our door and the private sector was hearing about us and we get this truckload of of

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canned food and we'd ask the driver, you know, who where's it from? He goes, I don't know. I was just told to bring it here and just every day truckloads are

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coming in. So, one of the things that FEMA told us is that, hey, just keep all of your receipts uh related to the

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earthquake expenses and we'll reimburse you. So, I didn't know anything back then. So, I said, "Sure." And so, we're

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we're collecting all these receipts and and we're three months into this. And um

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while we're getting all these food donations, we we don't have any money, right? We're I had $400 when we started

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and so 3 months in, I've got about $33,000 of unpaid freight bills. So, we've got trucking companies now billing

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us for the food and I've got no resources. So, I go down to talk to FEMA

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downtown Los Angeles. I meet in their office. I bring my books. I said, "Hey, I've got all these bills to pay." And

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they're like, "Yeah, these are all legit, but the money hasn't come down from from Washington yet. Hang in there

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and you'll get paid." So, I believe them. So, I said, "Great. I'll I'll hang in there." So, three more months go by.

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Now, we're 6 months in. Uh the debt is now $63,000 and that might as well have

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been $6 million cuz you know, you know, our donor base was basically my family and a couple friends, you know, and uh

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so we're 6 months in and now creditors are starting to call and I'm kind of feeling like, you know, this is really

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not just being damaging to Children's Hunger Fund, but we're damaging our witness and uh we just need to shut it

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down. So that weekend I went home and uh I told my wife that I'm going to go down

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to FEMA one more time and if I don't get I'm going to wait there and get it until I get paid. So I went down 8:30 in the

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morning had appointment with FEMA. Same story. Money hasn't come in. We can't help you. I sat there till 6:00 p.m.

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until they locked me out of their office and sent me home. Came home and told them I said I think we're done. And so I

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go we're going to just shut it all down. And and we weren't sad. I mean, it was amazing if if CHF existed just for the

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earthquake. I mean, during that six-month period, 110 churches got engaged with feeding

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and meeting the needs of their community. Over 8,000 individuals came to Christ and churches were growing.

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Great things were happening. Uh it felt almost like what happened at 911 where

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people started going back to church, you know, and and going back to God and and having faith in God again. That was the

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same thing that happened in the valley at that time. So, we're shutting down.

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So, Monday morning comes along. I'm going to go tell my one worker we're going to close shop and go home. And I

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don't know why that Monday morning I stopped by her PO box and just to pick up mail for the week. And that

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particular day, I go open the PO box and there's three envelopes that are in my mailbox. So, I sit in my car in the

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parking lot. I figure I'm going to open them. And and I sit there and the first two envelopes had unsolicited grants

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from two large corporations, household names, you would know them. And the third was a check. And those three

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checks totaled $63,000. I mean, to the penny. And I sat in my

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car and I just cried. And I just said, "God, you are so good. You are so faithful. I don't understand how you

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work or the ways that you work, but you're just faithful." And so, we kept going. And I share that story because 85

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of those churches stayed with us after the crisis was over. Uh we just encouraged all this incredible growth

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and we were able to do it in a way to serve God's church in a large way that

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had lasting impact. And um that that story is another one of many that has

Driving The Mission and Vision of CHF

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just driven the mission and the vision of CHF recognizing that in many ways I

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kind of feel like we sit in God's sweet spot because if you read scripture uh it's so clear that God has a special

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place in his heart for his church and we serve his church and you can't read

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scripture without understanding how much God talks about being the father of the fatherless and the care for children

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that are abused, neglected, abandoned, you name it. He even says, you know, Christ himself said, "Let the little

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children come to me." And and that's who we serve. That's our target audience. And so, I feel like, you know, we we

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have experienced God's favor, but also with that, we have an incredible responsibility to steward what God gives

Stewardship Of Resources

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us really gives us well. And that stewardship element is another thing that makes us unique as far as we've

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traditionally been one of America's most cost-effective charities. Um our overhead this year is less than 2%. And

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that's not by accident. Uh that's that's really by design. Uh we really view

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every dollar that we receive as given like the widows might and we have a responsibility.

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Uh whether it's a child that did a chore to raise a quarter to provide a meal for

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a child through our food packag program or somebody gives us $1,000. It doesn't matter. The same stewarding element

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applies to that gift that we want to stretch it and and use it for maximum impact to fulfill the vision of CHF. I

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love it. Obviously, there's been tons of leading through crisis, uh, tons of

Establishing "The Poverty Encounter" Exhibit For Schools and Churches

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where you've stepped into natural disasters and wars and other areas and just provided tons of relief. Uh, on the

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other side, there's this amazing vision that God keeps putting on your heart and the organization's heart. Uh, something

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that people might not realize unless they're local is about what you've done with the poverty encounter experience.

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Uh, it's interesting because if people look you up, they'll immediately see all the food pack stuff. they'll see the amount of aid you're providing. Where

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did the idea of helping people catch the vision uh come from? That really came

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from personal experience. And as you know, we have four boys. Uh they're all full grown now. But my wife and I

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decided when our oldest son turned 9 years old that um I was doing a lot of international travel back then. back

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then it was my job to really um do the advance work uh to go into a new country

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and establish the relationships and the church network that we were going to work through. So I was doing this a lot

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and we thought man it'd be great if I could take uh one of my boys with me

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each time and we had a purpose in that and it was really twofold. We wanted to

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expose them to global poverty. We wanted to see how 95% of the world lives. They

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don't live like most people in the United States. And we wanted them to see that God is a universal God. That God is

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not just alive and well in our church or in our family or in our neighborhood, but he's global. And so the very first

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trip I took our oldest son Justin down to El Salvador. I figure it's a safe trip and it's uh easy on the jet lag.

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It's only a couple hour time change, 8 hour flight. And we were going down there to to look at five different

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churches that wanted us to bring food packs. And uh these were all in very

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very poor areas. Three of them were in trash dumps. One was a cemetery that was on a hillside where squatters had come

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in and moved in built little shanny homes over the tombstones to to live in this community. So I was thinking, man,

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this is really safe. I'll just take Justin and we'll get some entry level exposure. And um the first home we

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visited, we're in a trash dump and there's a single mom that has about five kids and uh she's holding a a a newborn

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baby boy. And in the conversation, uh she shares that 3 weeks prior to our

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visit, she had given birth to twin boys. And Justin understood that and innocently asked the lady, the mom said,

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you know, where's your other baby? And the mom started to cry. And the mom just looked at us and said,

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"Just before you arrived, I had to sell my baby in order to get food to feed my other five kids."

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And I remember in that moment, Justin looked up at me and said, "Dad, did I hear her correctly?" And I said, "Yes,

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son. That's that's what she said." And and Justin looked at me and said, "Dad, how does a mom situation

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become so desperate? Well, she she'll sell her own son for a bag of beans because that is what she had done." M

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and at that point as a dad I didn't have an answer. You know I said Justin I I don't know what to tell you. We we can't

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change this woman's situation but if God lets CHF come and serve churches here

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maybe we can change the future for other families that they won't have to sell their kids uh because the church can

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help them. And Justin came back from that experience different. You know the the

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second home we went to just real quickly. we a very similar home uh a young mom with four kids and one of her

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kids was about a six or sevenyear-old uh daughter and she was immed immediately

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taken to Justin. So she grabs Justin by the hand and she's all excited to show

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uh him her little home, a little 10x10 shack and said, "You know, over in this corner, this is where my mom sleeps, my

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brother sleeps over here." and she walks outside and outside is this trash dump and there's

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this little river of sludge that runs behind the house and there's some reads that are growing in this sludge. And she

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said, "My mom took some of those reads and knitted this little uh wo this little mat and this is where I sleep

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outside on this mat." And she was all proud to show her show us her bed. And so Justin's taking all this in. And then

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she sees a chicken run by and she runs over and she grabs an egg and she says, "Justin, do you know what this is?" He

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goes, "Yeah, it's an egg." And she goes, "No, you know what this means? This means me and my three siblings, we get

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to eat today." Well, Justin had three little brothers at home, right? And in his mind, his 10-year-old, nine-year-old

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mind, he can't compute. how do you how does one egg feed four kids knowing that

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he goes through a dozen eggs, you know, at home for him and his brothers? And he

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just came back from those trips different. And so I began to realize as the years went on that um there's two

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types of children we want to impact. The obvious child, which is that suffering child that lives in poverty. But what

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about kids like our own? kids that live here in the United States that may never ever leave their own city or state, let

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alone go to a foreign country to see what really extreme poverty looks like.

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And so I recognized that that's going to be a hard audience to reach. And so I

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said, what if we could bring those experience th those experiences and those environments to our headquarters

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and set up kind of a field trip experience for schools and churches and youth groups to come and get exposed to

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global poverty and but from a biblical perspective. How does God want us to respond to the poor? So this goes back

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more than a decade ago. I had a chance to meet with the Imagineers at Walt Disney Studios. I had a friend that

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worked at Disney and I shared kind of my vision and he goes, "Oh, you should talk to the Imagineers." And so over six

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months I got a chance to meet with the Imagineers three times and shared kind of the the brainstorm idea, the big

26:32
picture idea and they they kind of broke up into corners of their creative room

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and just started ideulating, you know, and they came back with all these crazy ideas. And I remember one of their ideas

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was uh the lobby for the tour could start as like a like a plane theater and

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you show a video introducing four children that live in these different environments and the last one lives in a

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disaster area where there's a large earthquake and she says you know this is what my life was like and then this

27:03
earthquake hits and it was really challenging and at that point we can make the lights go off make the room

27:09
shake and then the the lights come back on. It looks like the ceiling's about to fall on you and the sidewall opens up

27:15
and you walk into like Haiti after the earthquake. And I told these imaginers,

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I go, "Guys, we live in Southern California where earthquakes are very real." I go, "The first tour I'm going

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to have kids that won't sleep at night, parents that want to sue us. You know, it's just never going to work." So,

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those are the types of ideas that they had. But by meeting with them, it convinced me that if God was in this, we

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could do this. So, five years ago, we opened a a 75minute uh tour here where

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uh you basically walk in and it's a recreation of an airport terminal in the lobby and you're told you're going to

27:51
take a flight and you're going to meet some kids in parts of the world you probably never seen before. So, we built

27:56
the fuselage of an airplane into our warehouse. You take a little simulated flight and then we take you through

28:02
immersive sets and in every set you meet a child that lives in poverty. You learn

28:07
about the themes that God is a personal God, loves the poor, so should we, and the way he wants us to respond is

28:13
through a heart of compassion and service. And then at the end of the tour, there's a call to action. Uh we

28:20
don't want the kids to leave feeling overwhelmed by the magnitude of poverty because global poverty is overwhelming.

28:26
But we wanted them to feel empowered. And so we asked them to stay for 30 minutes. They go into our volunteer

28:32
center and they either assemble food packs or meal packs that go into our food pack. And we tell those 15 guests

28:39
that just took that tour, hey, in 30 minutes, you just assembled 500 meals

28:45
for children you're never going to meet, but you just made a difference. And those kids then go back to their

28:50
campuses and we challenge them to do something to be an advocate for the poor. I don't care if you do it with

28:56
Children's Hunger Fund, do it with your church, do it with your school. But we've had kids that have just done

29:01
amazing things. Um, this might blow you away, but um, we tell kids when they

29:07
leave that 25 cents provides a meal for a child through our food packs. And so

29:12
we give them little coin banks so if they want to go home and do chores, they can collect quarters and then when they

29:18
come back the next time to volunteer, they can turn their quarters in. And we've been doing this for about 12

29:23
years. And we've had kids in over 4,000 churches across America. And those that

29:29
have come through our facilities, they've collected almost 20 million quarters to to feed kids. So, they get

29:36
it when they come through the exhibit. They get it and they want to be part of the solution. Long story, but it's

29:42
amazing how God's used it. It is absolutely amazing. I mean, part of the fun thing from your role is you get to

Servant Leadership Perspective

29:48
work with thousands of churches. You get to have thousands of stories of people impacted and people who you're helping

29:54
with food and the gospel and then also impacted by being able to help other people. Yeah, absolutely. Uh we talk a

30:00
ton about servant leadership on this podcast. When you hear the word servant leadership, what do you think of and how

30:06
does it relate to you and all the leaders that you're working with around the world? You can't talk about servant leadership without the example of Jesus

30:13
Christ. That is immediately where I go. Um, I think Christ set the bar for what

30:20
servant leadership looks like. I I think in terms of how that plays out in my

30:26
life and how I've seen it played out in the life of Children's Hunger Fund is that um, we have some core values that

30:33
run our organization. And I would I would say servant leadership is a really

30:39
big one where we talk about servantthood all the time and what that looks like and we challenge our top leaders

30:46
director and above um that you've got to you've got to lead by example. Um don't

30:52
ask your people to do things that you wouldn't do as one example. But I I think even um maybe even equal to that

31:00
or more important is the value and the importance of humility.

31:05
And I can't I can't stress enough how much um humble leadership

31:12
impacts the people that you lead. And we have a culture here that um and I've

31:18
seen it played out time and time again with employees that haven't survived here. We kind of challenge them leave

31:25
your ego at home. You know, I if we've had people come here that have been empire builders. We've had people in

31:33
supervisor roles that have tried to build loyalty to themselves versus loyalty to the mission or loyalty to the

31:39
vision. And those are all um indicators

31:45
of a lack of humility and a lack of servantthood. And so um I I can't stress

31:52
enough how important servant leadership is. is I I I remember when we started Children's Hunger Fund, I got some

Advice From Billy Graham and Bill Bright

31:57
really good advice from another leader um said, "Dave, you should try to find

32:04
um two or three guys that are in your industry um that are 25, 30 years ahead

32:11
of you um and ask them if they would meet with you or if they would share

32:16
what they've learned on their leadership journey." And I go, "That's some really great advice." And me being young and

32:23
naive, I I didn't know who to ask. So, I just shot big. And you'll laugh at this, but I wrote a letter to Billy Graham.

32:30
And then I wrote a second letter to Bill Brightite, who founded Campus Crusade for Christ. And uh both of those men

32:38
contacted me. I I was blown away. Billy Graham called me and Bill Brightite took

32:43
the time to handwrite about a 12-page letter to me. And uh both of them in

32:51
terms of what they shared um again you know Billy Graham was known for you know

32:58
his commitment to personal purity and he had a standard you know he would never be alone with a woman he wouldn't ride

33:04
in a car with you know he just talked about that importance of personal purity

33:09
and uh protecting and guarding your family and your marriage and making those things first and foremost. and

33:16
Bill Bright said the same thing. But I think some of the takeaways that I got from both of them was the commitment to

33:25
servant leadership. Um to never get caught up in the flattery

33:34
that can come with growth. Um, and I remember when we started Poverty Encounter, one of the things that I told

33:39
our our Poverty Encounter facilitators that most of them are uh college students that come in and it's a guided

33:47
tour and they and they take these um guests through the tour. I said, people

33:52
are going to come in and probably praise you for what's being accomplished here

33:57
that it's, you know, it's a compelling uh exhibit and we've tried to always

34:03
train our staff. It's okay to be complimented, but rather than receiving the compliment, redirect it to the Lord

34:10
and say, "Yes, isn't amazing what God is doing. And doesn't he deserve all the glory?" And Billy Graham and Bill Bright

34:17
taught me that right out of the box. That the day that you start to believe

34:22
uh the good things that people say about you is the beginning of your downfall. And uh the day that you start to believe

34:29
all the bad things that people will want to say about you, the critics, uh that you you've got to develop thick skin as

34:36
as a leader. They talked about how leadership isolates. And boy, I've lived

Avoiding Leadership Isolation

34:41
through that. You know, when when you're when you're the top guy, um you know, I I have a I have a policy where I love

34:48
eating in the lunchroom. And you know, a lot of CEOs maybe don't do that, but I I

34:53
love eating in the lunchroom with our staff. And it always freaks out new staff members. Um, you know, if I sit

35:00
down next to them, they they want to move over four seats, you know, or, oh boy, what is this guy going to say to

35:06
me? But I found that part of servant leadership is making yourself real and

35:12
making yourself accessible to those that you lead. And and I I I want everybody on our staff to feel like I've got an

35:20
open door. I I'm no different than you. I tie my shoes the same way you tie your shoes. And if I can pass anything of

35:27
worth on to you and what leadership has taught me or what the Lord has taught me, I want to I want to share that. And

Hiring Talented/Gifted People

35:34
I think another lesson that Bill Brightite taught me was um don't be

35:39
afraid to hire people that are smarter than you and more skilled and more gifted than you. And I think for a lot

35:44
of young leaders, that's hard to do. And that was definitely something that I had to grow in and recognizing that um as

35:53
CHF was growing, it finally got to the point where I couldn't keep my arms around it. And that was probably the

35:59
best day in our history, you know, when I recognized this has never been about me, you know, and here I'm thinking I've

36:07
got to hold it all in. But the days the day I shifted from this to my hands out

36:13
and saying, God, this is all yours. I I I need to trust you with the leaders

36:18
that you bring us, the board members that you bring us, the the senior staff, the expertise, and um it's so amazing to

36:27
sit here 34 years later and to think that so much of what happens with CHF, I

36:33
don't even know what we all all that we do. Uh because I don't try to hold it all. And you know, we've got so many

36:39
gifted people here and hopefully we give them the runway to really grow and

36:45
mature and to use their creativity and their gifting. And that's a really good place to be as long as they know their

36:51
lane and they know the vision and they know their priorities. Let them run. And

36:57
we've kind of lived that out here and we're starting to see the blessing of that with with that kind of freedom and

Dealing With Hard Times And Missteps

37:03
empowerment. uh people from the outside will look at CHF and think this was

37:08
easy. Um they'll think it's just been successful since day one. And of course because of how big they've grown, it's

37:14
just been what an easy ride. But because of that empowerment you give people because of the vision casting, because

37:19
you really let people own stuff, uh there's been a lot of hard times and things that haven't worked. Um there's

37:25
been things that you've tried tried again and they haven't worked. And then there's been a ton of stuff where it's just opened up other doors uh for future

37:33
opportunities. So, I know for example, you used to be in Chicago and now you're

37:38
reooking at Chicago. You're doing a ton in Dallas. How do how do some of these missteps lead to other opportunities uh

37:45
that then are just amazing stories in and of themselves. Yeah. Yeah. The first thing I want to comment on is your

37:51
statement about how sometimes it can look easy. Um, I don't know that a month goes by where I don't have a high school

38:00
student or an early college student that's either volunteering or walks into our office and says, "Can you can you

38:07
take 15 minutes cuz, you know, I want to do what you want to do." And, you know, I' I'd love to just, you know, have this

38:15
global ministry and and I'm like, "No, you don't." you know, and um they don't

38:22
they don't even know what questions to ask. And you know, my response to that is always, well, just don't go out

38:28
before you start something new, spend a few years in the nonprofit sector, you know, in in the industry that you're

38:34
interested and and just learn the ropes and sit under someone else's leadership and and let God birth that vision and

38:40
that calling in your life. Um, which I hope is helpful. Mhm. But you're right. I, you know, we we've had so many um

38:49
hits and misses. Um I I would say there's a lot of lessons

38:54
that we've learned and one of them is one of our distinctives is um how well

39:02
we vet partners around the world. You know, we we we exclusively almost

39:07
exclusively serve gospel- centered churches. And I think sometimes we can

39:14
be naive that if you're working with a pastor, that means there really doesn't

39:19
need to be a vetting process because that's a man of God and he can be trusted. And I can tell you after 34

39:25
years that um the church is so filled with broken people, myself included, and

39:31
it and the the senior leader is not immune from the temptations of this

39:37
world. So we really vet our pastors really really well around the world. So

39:43
much so that we have we have had so many churches in America that have sent

39:49
containers, you know, to a foreign country and said, "Look, I thought we had a trusted partner, but we've got

39:54
this container stuck in customs or we've got this pastor that is defrauding us of

40:00
all our money. Will you help us? What do we do?" Um, so I I do think we've learned some things, but some of the

40:06
things that you referenced, like being in Chicago for 15 years, um, there was some great learning that came out of our

40:14
Chicago experience, and one of them was, um, the type of food that we were giving

40:22
to recipient families, it it maybe wasn't meeting the best needs of the

40:27
community. And traditionally, our domestic food packs always had rice and

40:33
beans and pasta and uh pasta sauce and some other things, but mainly staple

40:40
items that had to be cooked. And uh many of the churches that we were serving in

40:45
the Chicagoland area were African-American. And I I remember going into a comp uh

40:52
apartment complexes and seeing a bag of RVs being held as a doors stop on a screen

40:58
door, you know, to keep the screen door open in the apartment. And I remember seeing that repeatedly and going into

41:05
the homes of the families that were being served. And the reality is that many cultures in the US uh the poor,

41:13
they no longer cook. you know, it's it's a it's a fast food convenience store

41:18
kind of mindset. Now, that's not good eating, you know, but and many uh people

41:24
in poverty, they're also binge eaters based on the time of month when they get a paycheck. And so, there was some

41:30
education and some relearning that was involved. And so, when we exited Chicago, um one of the things that we

41:37
said, when we come back to Chicago, we're going to come back with a different model. And one of those things

41:43
that changed was a food pack that had more ready to eat foods

41:48
um that would better serve that child. Recognizing that many children that live

41:54
in urban areas in poverty across America, they come home from school, their mom's working two part-time jobs,

42:00
and they're left on their own to fend for themselves for what's for dinner, and the cupboards are bare. Um so having

42:07
some ready to eat food is really helpful to that that child. And so that was one major change. And then I think we've

42:15
always tried to improve our stewardship and to stretch our dollars uh more

42:20
effectively. And um we're just now coming back into the Chicago market, but

42:26
with a different model. uh before we we owned a building and we had about I

42:32
don't know 8 or 10 maybe 12 staff on the ground in that facility and at after 15

42:38
years we were serving maybe 75 churches uh with food packs that were impacting I

42:44
don't know several thousand families maybe bringing in a couple million dollars a year of of food and other resources well that was costing us about

42:51
a million half dollars a year and we're coming back to Chicago now with a model

42:56
of coming alongside like-minded ministry partners that have a shared vision. Um,

43:03
they they're on the ground. They do have access to some churches that want to be trained and resourced, but they also

43:09
have a distribution facility, maybe a small some small warehouse space um

43:15
where they're willing to serve as our distribution arm. If we come in and train and resource the churches, uh

43:21
they'll help us with the distribution end. Well, we can do that model now. We can probably go into Chicago and set up

43:28
shop in three or four different locations around the city. Um, and

43:34
service well over a hundred churches and probably bring in double the amount of food and resources at maybe a cost of

43:42
$350,000 a year. It's very different, you know. So, with this new model, we can we can serve five or six cities for

43:50
the same price of doing one that we did before. So, those are just some of the lessons and um that that all just comes

43:57
by trial and error and um being aware of what's happening on the ground and always asking the right questions about

44:03
your constituents and the communities that you want to serve, what is what is most needed and what's most helpful. As

Expanding Into Dallas

44:10
a leader, you step into some really big challenges and some really big opportunities. talk a little bit about

44:16
how what you're doing in Dallas now came about um and just how the opportunity

44:21
presented itself and how you get even in the right headsp space to tackle something like what you're doing now.

44:28
Yeah. So, as far as uh the Dallas market um got to take you back uh well over a

44:35
decade. Um, we had spent 2 years and we were our next expansion was going to be in Atlanta. And we had spent two years

44:43
trying to develop the Atlanta market. And what we were doing was we were going around talking to all the large churches

44:50
um trying to get some seed money and get them on board and talking to our corporate partners and and after two

44:57
years the doors just weren't opening and we were getting a lot of pats on the back. Yeah, man. When you guys open your

45:03
facility, we're we're we want to come. we want to come serve, our people want to come serve, but nobody wanted to

45:09
invest, you know, uh, in seeding into the vision. And we were just about the end of that that time frame. And, uh,

45:17
Pastor Jack Graham in Dallas, who pastors Prestonwood Baptist Church, I had known him for several years, he

45:23
said, "Next time you come through Dallas, come see me." and we had a conversation and he said, "Dave, um,

45:30
something you said when you were here a year or two ago has really stuck with me." And I'm didn't remember what I

45:35
said, but he said, "You challenged me as a church. What are we doing to serve the

45:41
suburban poor?" And he goes, "I didn't know what that meant." Um, and so I've really been praying about that. I've

45:47
talked to a lot of ministries that you work with. A big partner of ours is Franklin Graham and Samaritan's Purse.

45:53
We resourced them with a lot of um toys and other things for their programs. But

45:59
so Pastor Jack said, "Hey, what's it going to take to get you to come to Dallas?" And I said, "Jack, it's not even in the plan." I I go, "We're

46:06
developing Atlanta." And I said, "We're already in San Antonio and uh it's not in the plan." And he

46:13
said, "Well, what do you need, you know, for this to be a priority?" And I said, "Well, you know, here's what it would cost to start up. We we need more help

46:20
with relationships. we need to meet some key Christian business leaders and and

46:26
Jack helped us with all that. So it went from not even in the plan to 6 months

46:32
later we opened a facility in Carolton which is right uh just north of downtown

46:38
Dallas. And those doors opened more than 10 years ago and we have not been able

46:43
to keep up with the growth. It it's just been staggering how God has opened doors

46:48
in that market. And so much so that five years ago, we began praying about maybe

46:56
putting down some permanent roots in the Dallas market. um not just to have a a distribution

47:03
center um to process and assemble food packs, but to really grow our volunteer

47:09
programs, knowing that um some of the mega churches there were coming to us and saying, "Look, we've got 800 kids in

47:16
our youth department and we want to do a serve day on a Saturday morning. I got to find 20 charities to take my to split

47:23
my 800 kids up." And he goes, I said, 'Well, what if we built a facility where 800 kids could come at one time and

47:31
serve and serve in our distribution center? And they're like, man, that'd be an answer to prayer. And so, we started

47:36
to look specifically at the Frisco Prosper market cuz um that's about 25

47:41
miles north of downtown Dallas. And we looked at that area specifically because Frisco now has the third largest

47:48
concentration of corporate headquarters in America, uh behind Manhattan and the Silicone Valley. And

47:55
um the way we get corporations to work with us is we get their employees to come and serve and they volunteer and

48:01
they bring their kids and then it it creates a wellspring that gets up to the decision makers where the question gets

48:08
asked why isn't our company doing more to help children's hunger fund and then good things happen as a result of that.

48:14
So, we wanted to be in that greater Frisco Prosper area and we were able to buy some land last year in Prosper, just

48:21
a complete act of God in an area that we really have no business being in. And

48:27
we're in the process of building our second poverty encounter exhibit and a

48:32
large temperature control volunteer center that can house 800 plus youth at

48:38
a time. And we see it as an opportunity to impact the next generation with the

48:43
gospel and and with a heart of service and compassion. And what's been different about Dallas in Los Angeles,

48:48
and everybody will understand that is what we built in Los Angeles in terms of the poverty encounter, we didn't build

48:56
it for the public schools. Uh we never really thought that public schools would come because we are a gospel focused

49:02
organization. and we're not in your face um with the messaging, but we are very

49:08
transparent about who we are and what we believe and why we believe it. And so, we've had public schools in Los Angeles

49:15
come, but not in mass. Um Dallas has been different. Uh we've met with so

49:21
many of the superintendents of different public school districts and they're all saying the same thing. We want all of

49:27
our kids to come. We want this to be a destination point for kids to go through the tour to come and serve to serve

49:34
their community service hours. And we probably we haven't even built it yet. And we probably have access to 350,000

49:41
public school students. I mean, what an opportunity for the gospel. And and what

49:47
Dallas is recognizing, what the leaders are recognizing is there's been such an influx

49:52
of different populations, a lot from California, that they're fighting for their traditional values, and they don't

49:59
want to lose those traditional values. And we want to be a part of keeping that message of biblical values in front of

50:06
that that population that's coming to North Dallas. Wow. I love this. I I

50:12
could listen to your stories all day. I I want to finish this with 60 seconds

Ten Rapid-Fire Questions

50:17
where I'm going to hit you with 10 rapid fire questions. Oh boy. And you just say the first thing that comes to your mind

50:22
and there's no wrong answer. Okay. Who's the first person you think of when I say servant leadership?

50:28
Still Jesus Christ. All right. Five words that most describe you. Faithful.

50:34
Um expectant. Visionary. Giving.

50:40
Um, did I say humble? You can't say you can't call yourself humble. I just I

50:47
just contradicted myself. All right. Favorite author. I've been called that. So, favorite author or book? I I don't

50:53
have a favorite book. I I grab principles from a lot of books. And if I

50:59
can get a good principle out of a book, it was a good book. Yeah. I like a lot of leadership books, but I could I'm not going to name one guy. All right.

51:05
Favorite movie? Uh, The Hobbit. Uh, what's your favorite thing to do in your free time? Fishing

51:11
and hiking. Time with my wife. Wow. All right. Surprising fact about you. The

51:16
fishing is kind of surprising, but what's another one? Almost got arrested in Israel for throwing a stone into the

51:21
cave where they found the Dead Sea Scrolls. Wow. That is uh that's a that is

51:27
surprising. Uh, all right. Favorite place you've been? Israel. All right. Favorite or

51:34
where's somewhere you want to go that you have not been? New Zealand. All right. And what's the best advice you've ever received? Don't think too highly of

51:41
yourself. Wow. Well, thank you, Dave, for sharing some of your stories, some of what God is doing at CHF, and just

Closing

51:48
all the leadership lessons that hopefully people are encouraged by listening to this. That's been fun, Chris. Thank you. Thank you for

51:54
listening to this episode of the Servant Leadership Podcast. If you enjoyed what you heard, please give it a thumbs up

52:01
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