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Archive for Mixing Faith & Business
In Business? Why You Need a Mailing List
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Lately I’ve had several people ask me WHY they need a mailing list. It’s true that in the marketplace today, we hear many things about newsletters and mailing lists. Most experts will tell you that if you’re in business – whether it be direct sales, writing, selling your own product or service – you NEED a mailing list. I agree and here’s why:
Your Mailing List Is One The Best Ways To Communicate With Your Audience
One of the reasons I began a newsletter over a decade ago was to simply remind people – on a regular basis – that CWAHM exists. I didn’t start out with big plans for my newsletter (or quite honestly with ANY idea of what I was doing), I just knew that I needed constant reminders from websites I loved, so I assumed others were the same.
The Choice
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Recently my business-sense was thrown for a loop. I had a discussion with a colleague about marketing efforts and how frustrated she was that she wasn’t seeing the increase in sales that she desired. A day or so later I had a conversation with a woman that I mentor about how great her 
business was growing, but how she still felt like she couldn’t reach the level of success that she was seeking. And then I talked with a wonderful Christian businessman who told me all about the success he was seeing in his business – he has been given awards by his company, all kinds of accolades and even an expensive car. And yet he was still straining toward the ever-moving target of success.
Those conversations left me wondering if I should be more focused on money making. Was I doing myself and my business a disservice by not climbing the so-called corporate ladder? I began to doubt myself and my decisions. I began to make a list of all the marketing efforts that I needed to begin to ramp up sales and make things happen.
But then, as I sat reading my Bible one morning, I felt God nudging me to take a good hard look at the real issue going on. I felt Him – in that still small voice of the Holy Spirit – asking me if I was going to choose to pursue money or choose Him.
Ouch. Read More→
Jill Hart Receives Blogging Award!
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Thank you, Vonda Skelton, for nominating me and CWAHM for the Beautiful Blogger Award. Vonda is a wonderful voice and leader in the Christian writing world. Her blog, the Christian Writer’s Den, endues readers with value, relevance and quality content post after post. It’s no wonder she recently recently received the Beautiful Blogger Award!
I’d like to pass this award on to these two bloggers: Read More→
Balancing Work And Family – 5 Tips To Keep You Sane
Posted by: | CommentsThe balancing act – every mother’s nightmare. Many days we feel like circus jugglers with more plates in the air than we can possibly handle. Over the years, however, I’ve learned a few secrets that help me keep things in perspective: 
Keep God First
In Matthew 6:33 we’re told to seek God’s kingdom above all else. Like the apostle Peter who saw Jesus walking on water and asked to join him – as soon as we take our eyes off of Christ and begin to doubt, we sink.
In order to keep our eyes on Him, we need to be in relationship with Him. Schedule time in your day to read God’s Word and to talk with Him in prayer. Surround yourself with friends who love the Lord and who will point you back to Him when you struggle.
Don’t Be Afraid To Choose Family Over Business! Read More→
CWAHM Success Story: Donna Runion
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Name: Donna Runion
Company Name: Independent Thirty-One Gifts Senior Executive Director
Website Address: www.mythirtyone.com/donna
CWAHM: How did you get started working from home? How long have you been working from home?
Donna: I became an Independent Thirty-One Consultant, working from home 4 years ago.
CWAHM: Tell us a little about your business.
Donna: Thirty-One offers an awesome line of gifts! They offer purses, bags, totes, and stationery. They specialize in organization for our busy lives and for living “life on the go!” They are a home-based party plan business.
CWAHM: Name the one thing you love best about your business.
Donna: I love that I earn a great income on a very flexible schedule, but I’m also able to meet my family’s needs and spend time with them.
Living as a Light
Posted by: | Comments“You are the light of the world. A town built on a hill cannot be hidden. Neither do people light a lamp and put it under a bowl. Instead they put it on its stand, and it gives light to everyone in the house. In the same way, let your light shine before others, that they may see your good deeds and glorify your Father in heaven.”
Matthew 5:14-16 NIV 
How are you a light to those you work with? Do friends, colleagues and clients know that you’re a Christian? Can they tell simply by the way you live your life; the way you treat them?
I love this quote from the book (Work Matters) from sociologist James Hunter regarding the fact that Christ is faithfully present to us. “Faithful presence in the world means that Christians are fully present and committed in their spheres of influence, whatever they may be: their families, neighborhoods, voluntary activities and places of work.”
The question we must ask ourselves then is, “Am I fully present?” Am I engaged in my community, my church, my life? Or am I simply letting life pass me by as I muddle through each day with an attitude of defeat?
As my wonderful assistant, Pebbles Jacobo would say, “Be where you are.” Read More→
Work vs. Relationship
Posted by: | Comments“Hard work, however noble, without a relationship with the Father proves empty, meaningless and despairing.” – Tom Nelson
In his book, Work Matters, Nelson talks about the prodigal son. Now, I know this is a story that many of us have heard over and over throughout the years, but I caught something different when Nelson wrote about the story through the lens of work.
Nelson talks about the elder son in the story – the one who stayed home and continued to work diligently; the one who is angered when his father rejoicing over the returning of the “bad son,” the good for nothing son.
He points out that while the oldest son had worked hard, “his work was not connected to a loving relationship with his father.” Read More→
Seeing Our Work (No Matter What) As a God-honoring Calling
Posted by: | CommentsWe all want our work to have meaning.
It’s pretty much as simple as that … and has been since time began. Way back in the time when the book of Ecclesiastes was written (many scholars believe it was written in the 3rd century B.C.), the author’s main frustration was that he wanted his work to be meaningful.
So I hated life, because the work that is done under the sun was grievous to me. All of it is meaningless, a chasing after the wind. I hated all the things I had toiled for under the sun, because I must leave them to the one who comes after me. What do people get for all the toil and anxious striving with which they labor under the sun? All their days their work is grief and pain; even at night their minds do not rest. This too is meaningless.
Ecclesiastes 3:17-18, 22-23
Pretty uplifting stuff, huh? Read More→
Why Is Work So HARD?
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To Adam he said, “Because you listened to your wife and ate fruit from the tree about which I commanded you, ‘You must not eat from it,’
“Cursed is the ground because of you;
through painful toil you will eat food from it
all the days of your life.
It will produce thorns and thistles for you,
and you will eat the plants of the field.
By the sweat of your brow 
you will eat your food
until you return to the ground,
since from it you were taken;
for dust you are
and to dust you will return.”
Genesis 3:17-19 NIV
By chapter 3 of Genesis Adam and Eve make a choice to sin and therefore sin enters the world. As an extension of this, our work is now cursed to be hard, to make us sweat, to be painful. Read More→
Work as Worship
Posted by: | CommentsIs your Monday different than your Sunday? Or, in other words, are you worshiping God through the week the same way you do at church on Sunday morning?
It can be hard at times to see our work as a form of worship, but Dorothy Sayers, in her Essay “Why Work,” says just that:
“Let the church remember this: that every maker and every worker is called to serve God in his profession on trade – not outside it … The only Christian work is good work well done.”
Isn’t that freeing? It isn’t supposed to be God OR work. We are called to worship God through our work. Every beautiful thing we create, every item we sell, every customer we interact with … it’s all meant to be well done – to the best of our abilities as an offer to God.
For many years I struggled with the pressure I felt running CWAHM. I felt that it was somehow “not good enough” no matter where I looked. In the eyes of the business world, I’m certainly small potatoes – not to mention that I have a Biblical Counseling degree, not a business degree. And in the eyes of the Christian world I wasn’t “Christian enough” because I talk about selling and marketing and business.
But, God has brought me to a place where I can see that by living out my calling – the calling that HE has given me – I am glorifying Him. I may never be “enough” in anyone else’s eyes, but I’m working for an audience of One and He is the only opinion that counts. Read More→
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