Ideas Have Consequences

Entrepreneurship that Echoes the Ethics of Eternity with Tamra Andress

• Disciple Nations Alliance • Season 2 • Episode 46

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Entrepreneur and best-selling author Tamra Andress joins us to share her journey of merging faith and business. From her early vision for a maternity boutique to inspiring others to break through the secular-sacred divide, Tamra illustrates how faith can transform our work and lead to true fulfillment.

Together, we explore how Christians can bring biblical principles into the workplace that foster cultures of integrity and innovation. Discover how living out your faith authentically can shape your career, deepen your community, and unlock purpose. Learn new ways to define success in the workspace that go beyond monetary growth and promotions. We hope that this conversation will play a part in helping you see your work and calling through the same lens that Christ does.

Tamra Andress:

I would say that that would be the complete opposite of what Christ's will and desire is. He wants to be in tandem with us every hour of every day. There's no place that I go that Christ isn't with me. And so the secular-sacred divide, it was never something that Christ operated in. He actually went to where the people worked in the marketplace. He spoke through parable to each of the people as they worked, because he knew that was what was going to meet them, because that's what their hands and their heart were doing every single day.

Luke Allen:

Hi friends, welcome to Ideas have Consequences. The podcast of the Disciple Nations Alliance. Here on this show we examine how our mission as Christians is to not only spread the gospel around the world, to all the nations, but our mission also includes to be the hands and feet of God, to transform the nations to increasingly reflect the truth, goodness and beauty of God's kingdom. Tragically, the church has largely neglected this second part of her mission and today most Christians have little influence on their surrounding cultures. Join us on this podcast as we rediscover what it means for each of us to disciple the nations and to create Christ-honoring cultures that reflect the character of the living God.

Scott Allen:

Welcome again, everyone, to another episode of Ideas have Consequences. This is the podcast of the Disciple Nations Alliance. I'm Scott Allen, I'm the president of the DNA and just so happy to be back with you again on another episode with my co-workers and friends, luke Allen, dwight Vogt, and today our very special guest is Tamara Andres, or is it? Forgive me if I'm mispronouncing your name, tamara? How do you say your last name?

Tamra Andress:

You had it, andres.

Scott Allen:

Andres, great. Let me introduce you, tamara, briefly so people know a little bit about you. You have an amazing bio. Tamara is a best-selling author and she is an entrepreneur, a keynote speaker and a podcaster with a large audience. She has two podcasts the Messenger Movement podcast and the Girls Gone Holy is the other podcast. She's a serial entrepreneur. She works with high-capacity Christian leaders turning their messages into movements to share the other podcast. She's a serial entrepreneur. She works with high-capacity Christian leaders turning their messages into movements to share the good news. She's joining us from Virginia Beach today. It's great to have you, tamara. Thanks for coming on the podcast.

Tamra Andress:

Yeah, totally my pleasure. I love the work you guys are doing in the world. And the Girls Gone Holy podcast is one of your fellow previous guests, jessica Shakira. So it's a very fun group of women, similar to how you all gather and just having real life conversations, but it's a very fun. Podcasting is such a way to be able to bless so many with just the click of a button, as long as tech agrees with us, yeah we had a few glitches here before getting on today, but we're so glad that we're underway now and thanks for joining us, tamara.

Scott Allen:

Yeah, it's been great to get to know Jessica. For those of you who've listened to our podcast, you know about Jessica Shakir, and so she was our connection here with Tamara today. But, tamara, your bio is amazing. I'd love to just have you go into a little bit more detail on that. Tell us just a little bit more of your background and maybe a little bit of how you came to faith in Christ. How did you get into what you're doing right now?

Tamra Andress:

I always tell people that, even though my mom kept a really tidy house, I was bit by an entrepreneurial bug when I was little, and so were my siblings, so all three of us are entrepreneurs, and I went into business school having really no idea what I was going to do.

Tamra Andress:

Other than that the tests that I took told me I was going to be a really good manager one day, and I didn't even know what that meant until my junior year at James Madison University, we were asked to do a full experience of a business plan, which was done alongside six other students, and so there was a group of seven of us, all representing different fields of business myself in management, marketing, accounting, econ. All of us came together and we devised a business plan that had about a $2 million budget and we got accepted into a business plan competition and the concept was around maternity and infant boutique. That was basically this one-stop mom shop, and we didn't win the competition, but we were runners up and the investors came up and said I don't know where or who wants to do this, but this is a phenomenal idea. Someone should run with it.

Tamra Andress:

And I quickly raised my hand because it was my mom's original idea and, of course, the three guys in the group wanted nothing to do with pregnant women or babies at this stage in their life, and the other gals that were in the group were very like Wall Street finance driven, and so I ended up never applying to go to a job fair, never filled out a resume, never did any of that and hit the ground running upon graduation and started about nine different businesses in my 20s, which you can say that's amazing, or she failed a lot, yes, and those things, but two of them really took root. One was that college project which I later sold to my mom and she has later sold and it's still up and running here in our local area and it's tripled in size since we sold it, which is, you know, sometimes you've got to start and plant the seed and watch what the?

Tamra Andress:

Lord will do with it in the hands of someone else. And the other one was a nursing bra line that I got to redesign for the American, united Kingdom and Canadian markets. That was the number one nursing bra in Australia, and so that was a really awesome project to be able to bring to life. And in the midst of that I got married. I had two babies under the age of two when that nursing bra line and my business were both full throttle and I wasn't doing any of those roles really well, as I'm sure you could imagine the idea of a work-life balance, which I don't really believe in we can talk about that later but there was no balance in my life and I was not chasing after the Lord, but he was surely chasing after me, and I was not chasing after the Lord, but he was surely chasing after me.

Tamra Andress:

And I ended up having this radical encounter with the Lord in my living room after experiencing this vision of a tombstone in my kitchen less than 24 hours before. And I saw this tombstone and on the tombstone all it says was entrepreneur. And I remember my immediate self was like prideful being, like yeah, that's right, like a girl with a tombstone of entrepreneur. That sounds awesome, but then I realized very quickly that it was missing mom, it was missing daughter, it was missing wife, and I went to bed really void that night and ended up having this cataclysmic experience with my husband while I was sleeping, woke up and pretty much my whole life got changed and shifted in about a 12-hour time period, ultimately, because I was not living a life of integrity and that led me to a place of what people would say their rock bottom, and I call it my rock foundation, because I found Christ and he found me and everything shifted.

Tamra Andress:

And so when that happened, I decided to release both of those businesses completely, which one was a nine figure contract. So that was a big leap of faith for our family as well. But I knew that at my end of my days I wanted wife and mother and daughter and specifically what was the newest title I had ever really owned Child of God to be. What I laid my head on, I guess, is what you could say if I was going to sleep for eternity. And so I got to bring back to life all these things that you said in my bio. It's all really fun and glamorous, but it had a rocky start and I'm so grateful for it.

Scott Allen:

Wow, thanks for sharing all of that. It's so encouraging to hear how God changes a life and just the miracle that that is. Did you have a Christian background? I was raised in a home that believed in God.

Tamra Andress:

Just the miracle that that is. Did you have a Christian background? I was raised in a home that believed in God. I knew the Lord's prayer. We very rarely we were called priesters. You know those Christmas and Easter Christians. That was us. And so we would go on occasion and I would get dressed up and in middle school I went to my first overnight youth camp and I really started feeling the tug of God. And then in high school I went to my first overnight youth camp and I really started feeling the tug of God. And then in high school I started going to Young Life and I got very heavily invested in the Young Life organization. I was a youth leader.

Tamra Andress:

But, similar to how most people experience church hurt at some point in their life I really don't like that phrase because it's really not church hurt, it's the people. People hurt people. Church doesn't hurt people. But I had that first encounter where I just really felt let down by my leadership and I went very prodigal at that point when I went to college because I just felt like if they weren't going to come after me and the people who were receiving me were the people who were sitting in the shadows like welcoming me back then. This is more family. It's kind of like not to the same extent, but when people say if they've been a part of gangs they felt more a part of a community there than they did with a church. That's really how I felt until I didn't anymore because of what was actually transpiring in the shadows.

Scott Allen:

You mentioned that you. You know that gravestone image that had entrepreneur on it. You know, and that was, I take it a big part of your identity. And then, as you said, after the Lord got a hold of your life, you recognize there's other things that are more important, or you know, than that. I want to invest my life in those other things. God was leading you to those other things and yet obviously the entrepreneur piece didn't go away. Could you tell us a little bit about how you navigated that? You know how. How did how did that continue to be a part of your, your journey?

Tamra Andress:

Well, honestly, because I had laid it down, I really I had fully surrendered it. I had no idea what the next steps were going to look like and I went into a year long worship school. It was the first time I really felt like the call of God.

Tamra Andress:

It was an organization called burn 24. Seven Um people like Sean bolts were in it. Uh, incredible teachers and I was the only person in the school and there was about 600 of us in this particular cohort that didn't play an instrument or sing, and so everyone was kind of like cocking their head like why are you here? Where was the call? And you know, it was the most special time. I'm such a worshiper at heart, I love music through and through, but to be able to realize that some elements of my life that I had seen as worldly or secular, which we totally have to chat about, that secular sacred divide in regards to dancing, came back to life in the way in which I worship, and so I love to dance on the shoreline you mentioned.

Tamra Andress:

I'm here at Virginia Beach and I can tell you, I've seen some insane, insane encounters with the Lord, so much so that, like whales have breached right in front of me and we don't see whale breaches in Virginia Beach the dolphins always come out to play, and so I just really feel like the Lord and I have this special place that's like my quiet place to go and just dance before the Lord. A year after that I went in and pursued my ordination and minister's licensing for two years and really at this point I was full-time with my kiddos and I was just waiting on the Lord in many ways. But I think a lot of times people think waiting on the Lord is this like quiet, somber. I'm going to sit in, you know, my Bible chair with my coffee and wait until he tells me to activate. You know my Bible chair with my coffee and wait until he tells me to activate. But, as you can tell, I have a lot of energy and so activation and my Sabbath rest with the Lord look very different. I'm usually knee deep in something exciting and he's always providing, and so those two years of just really amplifying what leadership meant through servant stewardship rather than traditional leadership, allowed me to start going to coffee with friends and in those coffee conversations, most of them had some sort of ministerial background and or passion and I started just like pulling out the gold in them in different ways.

Tamra Andress:

And one day one of the gals said, tamara, you should do this. And I'm like, do what? And she's like you should just like coach people in this. And I'm like I don't even know the first thing what that looks like. And so she said, there's, there's people called business coaches. Now you would have thought with all my businesses, I would have known that in my twenties, but social media really wasn't popular. I wasn't really spending my time where I could be targeted by any coaches that were not in my local area. And so I started and ultimately it was the first time I ever preached to a room. I brought 30 women to this incognito space they had never been to as my husband's warehouse and invited them to on an adventure. And a hundred percent of them showed up in the room, which I only had a table of 10, but 30 women. And I opened up to Proverbs 31 and I talked about being a woman of noble character. And.

Tamra Andress:

I knew that if I wanted to step into entrepreneurship again, which I really felt the Lord calling me to do- that it was going to be different this time and that my family would always be a part of that nucleus, that foundation and the rock in which I would stand. And so my husband and I are both entrepreneurs and it's been a fun ride ever since then, when you finally released to the Lord His will is perfect and his plans are so much better than ours.

Scott Allen:

So are you a coach, then Is that primarily what you're doing now Coaching is how I started, but now I'm primarily speaking and writing.

Tamra Andress:

I host a lot of retreats that you would consider. I'm coaching, says I help people bring their podcast to life, I help them bring their books to life and I help them start their speaking careers.

Scott Allen:

I see Okay, so it's. It's people that uh aren't necessarily starting new businesses um broadly, but but are specifically focusing on those, those areas of writing and speaking. Is that correct?

Tamra Andress:

Well, ultimately, I think, a messenger, regardless of who you are, there has to be an element behind them, right? So? What's the business ecosystem that holds said message. And so that's really where I dwell. Yes, we build out frameworks and we build out funnels and we build out ways to bring people in for a community experience. So there is a lot of business building in the background, but it's so that the person can be in the forefront to be able to teach and go and spread the good news.

Scott Allen:

Gotcha. Okay, wow, all right. Well, I had this image of you dancing on the beach and seeing whales breach and I thought I think I've got to give that a try. I might go to the Oregon coast here and see if I can.

Tamra Andress:

Good luck, Please do Ask and you'll receive Knock and you shall find.

Scott Allen:

It's really beautiful actually. It's amazing.

Scott Allen:

Yeah, well, you know I'd like to Dwight and Luke I don't mean to dominate, so jump in here with your questions too, I'm just thinking of things as we go along here. But yeah, so you became, you really committed your life to Christ and then, you know, you came back into that gifting of entrepreneurship. We love that, by the way, at the DNA, because our ministry is about helping the church to disciple the nation, to really bless the nation, and central to that, of course, is the gospel and seeing people be saved. But it's much bigger than that, and I think the bigger piece is what a lot of Christians have forgotten today of kind of our original purpose here on earth, back in Genesis, chapter 1 and chapter 2, to take dominion, to use this image of God that we have, which is a creative image, and to make this world a better place. And it's an amazing thing that God has allowed us to do us to do this incredible creative gift that he's given us to take, you know, sand and make silicon chips and build businesses.

Scott Allen:

And yet you know a lot of churches they don't have a theology that really supports that. I know many of the churches that I've gone to over the years. When they talk about the purpose of the church or the purpose of our Christian faith, what people do kind of Monday through Friday in their work life doesn't really factor in. I mean, obviously you need to work and earn an income and be able to tithe, but there's this strong sense that God's really interested in the work that happens in the church and seeing souls saved and kind of outside of that there's just not a ton of value. The sacred-secular divide that we were mentioning did you run into that.

Tamra Andress:

I did, I did and I think when I went to that two-year experience where I was just understanding what it meant to be a minister of the gospel, my pastor was very apostolic and so he was very much a forward thinker, a visionary entire shopping center to replant the church and then all of those facilities would be paying our rent. So we would be we were already debt-free, but to watch someone of that nature actually speak like that in church was definitely lost on me because it was not something that ever happened previously. But those were the type of people that were in this new kind of space that I had found and, I think, overarching, recognizing that the people who are in the seats, in the pews, whatever you want to call it, they do live a mass majority of their life outside of that facility. And so if we are to make disciples, which are ultimately to make teachers, what are they teaching when they go into all these other places? And so I think about the corporate arena.

Tamra Andress:

And if we forget about the place where these people are punching a clock nine to five, or they're entrepreneurs and developing their own, you know creative nature and being, we're missing a mass majority of their activation on a daily basis. So does that mean that it's only their prayer life? Does that mean that it's only their Sunday morning? Does that mean that it's only their Sunday morning? Does that mean that it's only when they gather around the kitchen table with their family? I would say that that would be the complete opposite of what Christ's will and desire is. He wants to be in tandem with us every hour of every day. If Holy Spirit is literally the breath in which we exist, the rock right, that breath of life, then there's no place that I go that christ isn't with me. And so the secular sacred divide was something that was man-made. It was never something that christ operated in. He actually went to where the people worked in the marketplace. He was a carpenter, so that entrepreneurial element was there.

Tamra Andress:

He spoke in through parable to each of the people as they worked, because he knew that was what was going to meet them, because that's what their hands and their heart were doing every single day. And so, if we talk about worship and that school that I went to, I really believe that work is our worship that it could look like sound and it could look like dance and it could look like song, but I think we all sing a song and dance every single day.

Tamra Andress:

Your step might look a little different, and the building in which you attend might look a little different. Your wardrobe might be different but, we're worshiping sunup to sundown.

Tamra Andress:

It just is a matter of what are we worshiping? And a lot of people will worship their work and that title, which was my problem, my issue, that element of pride. Honestly, I think the American dream does a real. I love me, america, don't get me wrong, but we can push that forward as this is the success. This is the element of you have checked that box and now look what she's done, or look what he's done, because what's the first question everybody asks when they meet? You is not are you?

Tamra Andress:

Christian. They say what do you do? And they immediately categorize you. But what if we were? What if? What did you do? And the answer is I follow Jesus is the primary and the secondary and the tertiary and all of those things to follow are the things in which take up the other portions of our life. I'm very passionate about marketplace ministry.

Dwight Vogt:

I want some practical examples of what that looks like.

Tamra Andress:

Yeah, from the perspective of the person who walks it out every day.

Dwight Vogt:

Yeah, you talk about somebody going into the workplace and the Holy Spirit is working through them. What do you see that? You don't see next door in another person.

Tamra Andress:

Oh my gosh, I see the prophetic at work. I see hearts change. You know, when people come into work they're carrying everything that they just left, whether it's from their home, whether it's from their personal life. Maybe it is like I was experiencing that people hurt right Problem, and when you go into most corporate settings, they're expecting you to take off that hat and play your role, Like this is what you're here for. Do this thing. But if leadership, especially servant stewardship of someone's soul and I was, let's say, the HR manager and I was walking around not asking people how they are, but actually seeing how they are and then giving and utilizing my prophetic mantle to speak life, you're changing hearts, You're changing perspectives. There's transformation happening inside of the workplace. You will see baptisms come to life. You will see eternal salvations happen. That's one example. I see the prophetic all the time. I think prayer is powerful. We know this to be true. I'll give an example on praying when you have a conference, or praying when you have a corporate gathering over the chairs, over the space.

Tamra Andress:

I think what happens is most people are only looking to their life with their flesh, their natural eye, and they're forgetting the spiritual warfare of what's transpiring, no matter what the arena or the place or the location looks like. And so when there are ministers of their gospel, when there are disciples going into these spheres and they have eyes to see the spiritual, demonic experiences that are happening, that's where we get to draw the line, that's where we get to pull out the sword of the spirit and the gospel itself and speak truth, ultimately, knowing that any business has biblical principle foundations at their core. If they're succeeding, they just might not know it, and so we get the ability of saying, hey, this is working because it's a foundational biblical principle.

Tamra Andress:

Now, you might not have access to have that conversation, but I know a lot of people in the marketplace who operate under that sneaky Jesus anointing and that literally changes atmospheres. Like as kingdom cultural people, we are literally able to go in under the power and authority of Christ to shift identities and to shift culture based on what we see. And so every spiritual gift is meant to be in the marketplace, even pastoral right. The pastoral anointing has to be in the marketplace or you have no sense of community inside of your corporate arena, inside of the school, inside of whatever you know political sphere where you've been talking about. So that's why my call inside of entrepreneurship is not this exclusive experience. It's so dynamic for all of us to be able to operate in the multiple spheres we're called.

Luke Allen:

Hmm, you just, uh, you just said like a truth bomb right there that I need you to unpack a little bit more Okay. Any business, any business that's that's thriving is has biblical values, and truth at its base, biblical principles at its base. Could you unpack that for us? Yeah?

Tamra Andress:

Yeah. So Scott alluded to it a little bit in the Genesis revelation of, like the B do have the multiplication factor Right, and so I often see when there is integral business happening, you will see growth financially. And they just understand stewardship. They understand the talents right, they understand what not to bury and what to invest, and so they're literally taking parables and they're putting them into action. And that's a biblical foundation that if you steward well, if you invest well, it will reap and be multiplied right that 30X, 60x, 100x fold. You'll see this transpire.

Tamra Andress:

What is hard on some people, especially us as Christians. We might see a practicing company thriving and we can have a little bit of friction about that because they don't have God's covering, but we see some element of flesh or spirit coming to be and there's tension there. However, I believe if we as Christians didn't draw away from them, but we instead went in after that to serve and to showcase how this is working and what that truth element is, we can shift leaders' hearts. And that's why, you see, sometimes things explode in the wrong way, because the leaders at the top are not having that spiritual support that they need, they're not being discipled and that's why you'll see people taking their lives. This can happen pastorally as well. This is why you see experiences after someone loses an identity factor. If money is what we're speaking to and that goes away, they have no sense of persona, they don't know who they are and so they get lost in that.

Tamra Andress:

Other biblical principles that are played outside of finances are the element of influence. Right, we are all called to be influencers, and influence can be bought. We know this. Sadly, this is what people are. A lot of people are doing on social media or in media and entertainment sector. They're buying this, this fame, if you will, and that fame cannot be bought ultimately, because whatever you have from a character perspective will just be amplified when there's so many lights on you, and so you'll see again some of those things not to come to fruition the way that they're meant to be.

Tamra Andress:

Ultimately, I believe that God will always have God's way. Even if, in the natural eye, we believe that things are happening that look like someone else is in control, they're not. It looks like somebody else is winning Ultimately, they're not. It looks like somebody else is winning Ultimately. They're not Because if you go deeper into the human again not the secular, sacred divide, but finding out. What is this leader doing, sunup to sundown, or not doing? You are seeing that they've had multiple divorces. You're seeing that they have lost and bankrupt and come back to life, and there's been all of these heartaches and hardships that have happened. And we're only looking from one lens and so I think, ultimately, it's us actually taking that step back and then invading with kingdom culture what is happening? Because most of the time, these highlight reels that we see are such a facade to the truth of what's going on.

Dwight Vogt:

So if you're talking to a person who's going into business studies in the university, what do you tell them? How do you train? How do you train? Them to be this person.

Tamra Andress:

Well, I think that there are some business oriented supporting schools I won't name drop over here that are teaching spiritual development connected to biblical wisdom and business development. However, I went to a school that did not do that, and so I was very much taught, like I had mentioned before, you know when at all costs, like I had mentioned before you know, win at all costs, and that is something before you ever even get into the school. Let's assume that you're going into a Christian oriented business development school. That's where we want you to be, but you have to be mindful that there is, there are liberal agendas coming into all of those places, no matter what they put their stamp seal on as well. So, ultimately, what do you have to do? You have to stay rooted in the word. You have to stay rooted there are. Every single time you open any book of the Bible, you will learn business. I have learned so much.

Tamra Andress:

One of my favorite business teachers is obviously King Solomon, and understanding that his biggest pursuit was asking for wisdom and watching what happened, based on the legacy of his father, allowed Solomon to have the what you would perceive as success, but it was generationally passed and ultimately, it was his trust in the Lord that allowed these things to happen. But one of the biggest elements which is why I love being a brother and sister in Christ and operating as the body of Christ was the relational dynamic that he was able to pull to part and play in order for the actual temple to get built. He did not do any of it alone and if I was to say, scott, based on your question before of like, well, how did you do this? And now you're back in entrepreneurship and watching what God did, I was so singularly focused on myself that first decade and I have recognized that I cannot do anything alone and I don't want to do anything alone.

Tamra Andress:

I don't have that ability. And so if you look to biblical examples, you see so often that those who tried to have their own might, their own fame, their own name, their own anything, it crumbled versus Solomon didn't do it alone. And.

Tamra Andress:

I love. Just simply, that's a biblical concept. Right there is, what's the relationships like around you and how are you utilizing? I would say, like what's in your hands? We all have abundant resources in our hands and so often we have this limiting belief that that's not true. But I might have abundant connections in my hand and that is worth more to some people than abundant riches when it comes to finances. And so, really, us being able to understand that and put anything. I read a business book and the Bible hand in hand, every day, 10 pages of that, and in order for me to apply said knowledge, because people are smart but people are not wise. And so how do I take the smart concepts of business and parallel them to the wise wisdom of the word and then apply that? I kind of feel like I have a cheat code over here.

Scott Allen:

Yeah, Boy, you're saying so much I mean there's so many principles that you're just kind of it's like a fire hose listening to you here, Tamara, Sorry. I feel like I got to pause and go back and just kind of say, here's what I'm hearing, you know because I do want our listeners to catch this.

Scott Allen:

There's a way of doing business or being an entrepreneur when you're starting from the standpoint of the scriptures and worshiping the living God, that looks incredibly different. It's, you know, then, if you start from a very secular standpoint, and so the question then becomes how? What specifically? Let me hear, let me just this is what I've heard a couple secular standpoint, and so the question then becomes how? What specifically? Let me hear, let me just this is what I've heard. A couple of things. I'll just tease them out. One is you know, you mentioned, you know, when you went to business school, the primary goal was to win at all costs. Right, it was just very success, driven from a kind of a humanistic standpoint or maybe a material standpoint. You know the bottom line, I guess, just you know money. But when you put God as the bottom line, this idea of honoring him, worshiping him you mentioned avodah the idea that our, you know, our work is our worship you know, then it looks very different, right, and you measure it differently the way you look at your employees you mentioned.

Scott Allen:

They're not just widgets to get the job done, this one-dimensional kind of thing. You know that you would see them maybe in a secular context, but they're human beings with souls and with purpose and with dignity and hurts, and so you have to treat the people in the business differently based on who they are. So, again, you mentioned several of these principles from the Bible that lead to a different approach to doing entrepreneurship and business, but those were a couple that I caught. I think they're just really valuable, yeah, and I think Dwight, when you mentioned like let's do this practically.

Tamra Andress:

I mean I could sit here all day just on this piece. And another idea was coming to mind is just understanding your posture right, and the posture of a leader. Traditionally, when I ask people this, if I'm sharing a keynote or spending space with people is like envision what you would imagine a leader to look like in your mind. If I was saying, draw me a leader, what would they, what would the shape of their body be standing in? And some people, will you know, think of like the power stance of their hands on their hips and their feet are rooted. Some might think of like a warrior in some regard, because they're willing to go in front at all costs. Trailblazers we say founders, innovators and trailblazers at our company with FIT as the acronym, fit in faith, and all of those people for the most part, if you were to do it in the natural, they would be the people up front, strong. Maybe it's a superhero-like person, but ultimately we talked about that idea of servant stewardship. A true leader is someone who is on their knees, right. They're completely surrendered. They're surrendered to God's will. They're willing to let other people go in front of them.

Tamra Andress:

Some will say leadership is leading from the back.

Tamra Andress:

I'm like, not always. There's times it's going to require you to go up front and get dirty, and even then you'll see dirt on my knees because I'm willing to go to those places and realize let me prepare a place for the people in which are about to go here. That's literally what we did with our publishing house Like I was, like I will go and I will pay all the money and I will do all the things and I will be scorned and burned by all the people, all the advertisements, all the marketers, so that I can curate a safe haven for people who want to get their word out and get that that ultimately good news through to people, without having to deal with all of these swords and weapons in the process. And so I just encourage people, regardless of if you're in a corporate arena or not, ultimately to know that it starts in that posture, it finishes in that posture and if you try to take any other stance as a leader, you're unfortunately missing it because you're not relying on God's strength, you're relying on your own.

Dwight Vogt:

Super powerful. I want to ask one more question, then. Camera and Scott remind me of the who's the head of? Uh, the famous businessman in houston led to the fall of huge company oh, and ron.

Scott Allen:

Yeah, what's his name? Um, okay, he kenley kenley okay, he read his bible.

Dwight Vogt:

He was a sunday school teacher, so he had the bible in one hand and he had work in the other. Obviously, obviously. But you're saying if you bring those two together, they actually make a difference. I mean you can read the Bible as the Bible and you can read business as business. What is it that you do with your mind so that, when you're reading your Bible, you see business?

Scott Allen:

He kept those really separate, though, dwight.

Dwight Vogt:

I mean, that came out. He was very much a.

Scott Allen:

Christian in the church, but he didn't really bring that into his business.

Dwight Vogt:

Yeah, my question is what's the? What's the heart, attitude or the mental apparatus that you put yourself in so that you do see business principles?

Tamra Andress:

You know, I think part of it is a gift. Like I, I will spend that time with people and I'll be like, don't you see this? And they're like no, and then I'll say it and they're like, wow, I love, I love words. It's one of the reasons I love your all show so much, as I love to spend time in the words, and all words have variable meanings, right, and so, understanding that and then really scaling it back, it's almost like a song, right? If we were to play a song right now and I say, dwight, what did you hear? Scott, what did you hear? Luke, what did you hear? We're all going to hear something totally different, based on our own experience and because I got that dang entrepreneur bug when I was little, it's all I can see.

Tamra Andress:

I try so hard when I especially those three years where I was like Tamara, your mom, tamara, your wife, stay in this place. Everything I see, I immediately want to build. Everything I see I feel like someone's playing too small with, I think that their vision is so short-sighted and I'm like no, no, no, but there's more. And then to be able to say like, prove it, like in the Bible, there's so much proof of God's ideas for us are so much bigger, they're so much better than we could imagine, and so that's really what I feel like. My gifting as an apostolic leader is to be able to say, like I see the window you're looking through, but let me show you with this telescope what I see, and that's a prophetic gift as well. And so, paralleling all of these elements of my testimony, my pains and my passions, and bringing them to the word, god will do it. God will do it every time. And so I don't know that, if I sat down which now I feel like I need to write a book about this, dwight, it's like how do I parallel this to the words that people can dissect it?

Tamra Andress:

But ultimately, if the sacred secular divide was kept, esther wouldn't be Esther. Solomon wouldn't be Solomon, david wouldn't be David. All of the heroes of the Bible, if you will, they wouldn't have been able to accomplish what it is that they've done. Even people like Ruth right, like Ruth could have gone about her merry way. But she said no, the work of my hands is important and I'm going to do it with all the faith of my mother-in-law that I don't even fully know this God, but I'm willing to be postured on my knees. And what came of that? Literally the lineage of Jesus.

Tamra Andress:

And so there's at no point a moment where sacred, secular worked Never. And so that's where we have to be postured to say, well, what isn't working here and I think that's where so much of our country is at right now, other countries looking at us and being like what's going on over here is there's just this chasm, this massive chasm of oh, we're the Christians over here in the sacred and they're the secular heathens over there, and that's just not true. There's got to be this blending, not of pushing ourselves into a Babylonian type experience, but for us to actually take force, take ground and plunder what is happening in the secular space. It's ours, it's all ours.

Scott Allen:

God's already promised it to us silence processing, yeah, processing exactly well, I mean go ahead luke, yeah, yeah, I I, I'm loving this, tamra.

Luke Allen:

It's really, it's really, uh, a joy to listen to you. I, I I wonder sometimes, though, for people listening to this and they're they're thinking, okay, I need to be a disciple in the workspace. What does that look like? You said, um, you know, businesses have those principles again, biblical principles at the root. They will see success. A lot of times around here we say biblical truth leads to biblical prosperity. But a lot of times when you talk that way, people always are like hold up, you know prosperity, uh-oh, you know. Success, like in the marketplace, like money, like, oh, no, you know success. Like in the marketplace, like money, like, oh, no, you know what.

Luke Allen:

So what is for for someone? I know, in your terms, a disciple in the workspace is a messenger, right? That's kind of the way you go about phrasing that. So so for a messenger in the workspace, what does success look like? What are those KPIs that I should be looking for? If I want to do that? Obviously, money is fine and if that's the indicator of success, amazing, you know. But there's some other ones as well that we should be looking for. What do those look like?

Tamra Andress:

Yeah, I mean, I honestly.

Tamra Andress:

it says to look to people's fruit, right Like that's what we're what we should see and I tell this I've actually done this as a share, it's one of my favorites is like what if we stopped marketing the thing that we think we're supposed to market and we started marketing our fruit? What would that look like to the outside world? Like you want more peace, this is a company that offers more peace. You want more joy this is not a company that offers more joy, because at the bottom of every I guess marketing life cycle, people want the same core principles we want to be seen, we want to be known, we want to be, we wanna be known, we wanna be loved. We want joy, love, peace, kindness, gentleness we want those things. But people instead are marketing beauty, or they're marketing money, or they're marketing these things that are attractive but they're so temporal and so to be able to look to the world and actually say you know what?

Tamra Andress:

this is the fruit of the spirit, this is the thing, that will last forever, and all of the riches of the kingdom are yours, and so the financial piece that comes to that.

Tamra Andress:

If people want to deem prosperity as such, I don't deem it as such. Success to me is a bountiful basket that my family, my friends, anyone that I come in contact with you'll never take. My joy, I can give joy all day, every day, and I have the abundance because I know the source of said joy. But if you came and you're like Tamara, I need a million dollars here, I need a $5 million seed here, I need this, these things which might be a resource that I get to give and I would love to do that for people at some point. That will run dry because it's of the flesh, it's not of the spirit, and so success has to be defined by spiritual autonomy. It also has to be defined as spiritual lucrative, that element that never runs dry, and that's why people, when they go to work, they have to understand what their passion is. If they're going to work for a to work, they have to understand what their passion is.

Luke Allen:

If they're going to work for a financial output, they're never going to find ultimate joy there. Wow, I just think of this whole burnout thing right now and I'm like, well, if you could get this I don't know, I mean, that seems like the cure. Yeah, yes, it does, I mean earlier you said you don't believe in the work-life balance. That makes a little bit more sense when you think about work in this sense. Yes, explain that a little bit more.

Tamra Andress:

Okay, I'll tell you, I was a gymnast for 16 years growing up and Balance Beam was my go-to event and I never one time, even with all of the hours, 20 hours a week when I was like seven years old that's crazy I never got a 10.0. And it took me every effort of every particle in my body to stay on that balance beam and how exhausting that was at the end. And I see people doing that in the natural now, trying to gain this elite element. And it's just not that in the natural now, trying to gain this elite element, and it's just not possible in the rhythms of grace that we're told, that we get to operate in. When we know the Bible right, if his yoke is easy and his burden is light and that's following Jesus, then something here doesn't make sense. Balance isn't possible. And so, just as Jesus himself spoke in seasons, seasons, and he spoke in the way in which every season is going to look a little bit different, the rhythm is going to look different, the sound of the waves is different, the energy of the world, right, the way that the leaves grow, everything seasonally is different Then I need to understand that my season might be different, but my alignment never changes, and so alignment is the foundational element of seeing Jesus as the priority to everything that I do. He's the rock in which I stand and the one who gets all of my attention and the one in which I glorify when I speak. But I am not trying to play this balancing act of because right now my child is sick, I don't also get to be a good wife. Or because right now my husband needs me, I don't also get to be a good wife. Or because right now my husband needs me, I don't also get to operate as an entrepreneur. Or because my business is thriving right now means that I'm not very good at being a mom. Like that would totally be a lie from the enemy for us to think that we have these silo expectations, and that's what balance is. Only one can win on a balancing scale and I don't wanna live that way. I want all of those things to win, because that's what God has called me to. And if I open that, proverbs 31, woman right, that noble character I read that again man she was doing a thousand things.

Tamra Andress:

And when you talk about burnout, luke, the word that everyone says is busy, right, there's this glamorized element of being busy. How are you Busy? And they're smiling and I'm like that just doesn't go together. Busy sounds like balance. I don't think that that actually works. Nothing being busy, first off, you're not a. B is understanding. The intentional element is the similar alignment. So when someone says, oh my gosh, you're so busy, I'm like or I'm so intentional, and I correct them every single time because I think busy is the worst four letter word above all of them.

Tamra Andress:

And so not living like that and allowing yourself to find a grace, allowing yourself to find the rhythm and actually exist have a Sabbath. I did never, ever, ever did that. I was grind hustle go. Have a Sabbath. I never, ever, ever did that. I was grind hustle go, don't stop. And everything and everyone around me, it didn't matter, even though I'm a loving person. I loved people, I loved my kids. I did all those things, but I was not focused on the present, and Christ calls me just as much to my present as he does to my eternity present as he does to my eternity.

Dwight Vogt:

So you're basically just saying live in the present. But how you can have a million interests, like the Proverbs 31 lady, but but when you're focused on this, focus on that. When you're done, rest, just don't try to do all of it with equal intensity, or what are you? What are you saying? I mean?

Tamra Andress:

well, if, if you, if we go to it, let's let. I'm like. I want to open this up right now, because there's no way that she learned how to sew and also buy property at the same time, like that happened in seasons. Right, she wasn't a mom when she first became a wife. That happened in seasons. She wasn't planting a vineyard and wasn't a mom when she first became a wife. That happened in seasons. She wasn't planting a vineyard and wasn't cooking. On the same exact time, on the same exact day, she learned that in seasons.

Tamra Andress:

And I'm watching my baby girl who's nine and she's in seasons right now she's baking, she's learning how to plan, she's learning how to rock climb I don't know how that's going to come into her Proverbs experience, but it will right.

Tamra Andress:

And so, watching her unfold and become a woman that she will one day get to use all of those gifts and talents and those experiences, I'm not going to hold her back from that because I say, oh nope, now you're just meant to be a wife and a mom. Your life is over. And I think honestly I don't know how you all feel about that from a father's perspective, but a lot of women struggle with that. They struggle with the fact that there is not more to their life when they become a mom, because they think that's the one thing, and I love my children. They get all of my love all the time. However, I know that if I want to leave the legacy that I'm called to, they need to see me being passionate. They need to see me flexing my other muscles. They get so inspired by the things that I love to do and that passion seeps into them to do the things that they love to do too.

Dwight Vogt:

Well said.

Scott Allen:

Yeah, no, I think that I think what you you're saying. There's a lot of truth to that. Uh, tamra, I mean just in my, I'm reflecting on my own experience and I think the word seasons is really helpful here, you know, because there are, even when you're a mother or a father, there are, there are seasons to that.

Tamra Andress:

It's not always the same, it doesn't always look the same right and that's a beautiful thing, actually, you know, know, and so, yeah, yeah, I mean, there was a season where, like my kids needed me every second of every day, I was their life support, literally, and so they needed me. But like my 11 year old is homesick today and like he's okay he was not burning the house down and he could use some snuggles but like we're good Right, and so I get to do all of those things, and you'll hear people say both, and I mean Jesus Christ himself was both Father, Son and Holy Spirit. So why should I only be one version of myself when God has made me so multifaceted? I'm an image bearer, as you said at the beginning.

Tamra Andress:

And so, as a mirror, when I look to the mirror, I see God the Father, I see God the friend, I see God the shelter. I see the provider father, I see god the friend, I see god the shelter, I see the provider, I see all of these things. That's what the proverb 131 woman is. She's wearing all of these roles because she's emulating the one who loves her and made her. Doesn't make me less than if I'm operating in one versus another just based on the season can I?

Scott Allen:

can I go back just a little bit? You, you mentioned the word apostolic. It's a word that you know. I I'd like you to just a little bit. You mentioned the word apostolic. It's a word that you know. I'd like you to explain a little bit. It's not one that I use. When you use that word, what do you mean by that?

Tamra Andress:

Yeah, so I would say that the variable definitions or synonyms would be visionary builder, someone who has a frontline vision, someone who can see into the future but then activate. So a prophetic person is someone who can see but they don't really know what it is that they're seeing and they don't really do anything with it. They drop it at that point because that's what the Lord called them to do, and then they move on to the next prophetic Apostolic is I see this field and I see that it's a vineyard, but I don't have any seeds. I don't own the field yet I have no idea how this plant is going to grow, because I don't even know how to graze olives or grapes. I don't even know how to do that.

Tamra Andress:

And they then take the very next step to make that come to fruition. And so my gifting is helping people not only see what I see and see. Their dream is bigger than the mediocre element that they've oftentimes are limited to because of what they haven't seen in the past or the trust that they haven't yet expressed or the faith that they haven't yet exercised. And then to actually create plan to make that come to fruition, and every plan is different, right?

Tamra Andress:

So like I don't know what God's plan to make that come to fruition and every plan is different, right? So like I don't know what god's plan is for that person's life but we can bring together at least something that allows them to take that next step, because clarity ultimately comes in action. And if they're just sitting there waiting on the lord which I know a lot of people, like I said, well, they'll wait, and the weight and the weight. But I think that there's this fine line that waiting often becomes disobedience, because they actually know what they're meant to do, they just are afraid to act.

Tamra Andress:

And so actually fear is what they're doing. They're standing in fear. They're not waiting on anything.

Scott Allen:

Okay, wow.

Tamra Andress:

Okay, wow, so it doesn't necessarily have any tie to the apostles that you know Jesus's core group of disciples their own sense of building, Like Peter built the church right. Look at what he did with that anointing. So I wouldn't say that any of them lack that apostolic anointing. I think that that's what Jesus saw in them. A part of that was like hey, come follow me, watch how I operate. Jesus was speaking life into a vision that no one could grasp when he was speaking it, even his closest companions.

Scott Allen:

Okay, got it Okay.

Luke Allen:

Yeah, that's helpful, Tamara. We're running a little bit low on time, but just for I'm hoping there's a lot of entrepreneurs out there listening to us today. I know of a few that are for sure. What would you say if they want to start recasting that vision for their work and for their place of worship in their workspace? What's step one for those guys?

Tamra Andress:

Yeah, well, we know that it's the blood of the lamb and the power of our testimony that can break chains and open up the opportunity for people to come into their own eternity. And so I always process through how is your story affecting your every day and how are you living that out? So one of the practices I love to do is just to have somebody make like a t-chart. One side is all of their passions, it's all of the things that they love to do, what most would say, even in the sacred secular divide, there's this third divide. It's like okay, sacred over here, secular over here. And then there's me time. There's the self-care. There's this third divide. It's like okay, sacred over here, secular over here. And then there's me time.

Tamra Andress:

There's the self-care, there's the do what's best for you kind of space Is even the things that happen inside of there. Then, on the other side, it's all of your pains. These are not just traumas, these are not just things that you've walked through that have hurt you or you've hurt others, but it's also the things that agitate you to no end. So it could be something that hasn't necessarily yet affected you, but you just look to it. It could be poverty, it could be homelessness, it could be sex trafficking, it could be any of these elements that you're just like oh, I want to see this change.

Tamra Andress:

You write all of those things down and there's this silver lining space. It's the transformational place of how do the two cross over. Where lining space? It's the transformational place of how do the two cross over. Where are the arrows that point from your pain to your passion? Do you do this passion in order to execute away from said pain? There's going to be this experience that you see as you draw those arrows back and forth. I believe that space is the sacred space in which we are meant to serve other people out of, because without it I wouldn't be who I am.

Tamra Andress:

And so I'll give you an example. If a passion for me is marriage, it's seeing people operate in the fullness of marriage, the covenant love, understanding what intimacy is, understanding how to communicate with their spouse. And my pain is that we had both experienced adultery on both sides. That's a pain. Here's a passion. What's the experience in between? It's us hosting marriage retreats. It's us having marriage ministry. It's us developing a book and writing and speaking from this lens of development after eight years of healing right, that's the place in which I get to exist, even though I don't do those things per se. When I go into marketplace ministry and the first thing I see is a married couple and they're struggling, their business will never work.

Tamra Andress:

It's a biblical principle for their marriage to be the thing that is the most important at that point, and so those are the things that I'm seeing when I go into entrepreneurial endeavors or corporate arenas, and that's where I want people to thrive is at the nucleus of who they are, their identity piece. And so try that exercise and put something, one thing into action that you may have put off because you just thought, oh, that has nothing to do with anything that I get paid for or that I have a title to and start to operate in this place.

Tamra Andress:

This is how Jesus operated, you guys. Anything that pained him, anything he was passionate about, there was an intersection point that he wanted to apply and he did, and you would see something catalytic happen inside of those experiences, so I challenge you to do the same.

Scott Allen:

Oh, it's really powerful yeah.

Luke Allen:

Sorry. I'm just thinking of examples of people that have done that. Well, you know and it's inspiring and it's. I've always found those stories really inspiring and people can mesh those just just so perfectly into their life. I've. I use his example all the time, cause he's one of my heroes.

Luke Allen:

But Eric little, the famous track athlete from a hundred years ago, has the movie chariots of fire made after him, but he was a fast runner just naturally very fast, and he loved it, and he was also a rugby player and, uh, yet he had a heart for missions and he grew up in china.

Luke Allen:

He always thought that his calling, where he could be the most fruitful, was to be a missionary in china, which eventually he did. But as a young man, he was living in england, he was going to school and he had this passion on one side I want to to be a missionary, I want to preach the good news of the gospel to people, um, and then, the other hand, I'm a runner. And then he realized you know, there's a bunch of people in my country, in England right now, who are very disenfranchised, especially young men during the industrial revolution, who were just working nonstop. And uh, there was, there was. It was a really dark time for England, uh, especially for those people. And he thought I can reach these guys, cause these guys love sports and I'm an athlete and I am going to use my sports, uh, to reach these people and to mission, minister, to them.

Luke Allen:

So, he, he found that that line between the two. Um yeah, thanks for the example, tamara. That's a great step that we can all do. I'm going to do that myself.

Tamra Andress:

Yeah, I'm excited for you yeah.

Scott Allen:

You have so much wisdom, Tamara, in this area. You know, I just feel like we got a few drops of it, but how do people connect? What's the best way for our listeners to connect to more of that?

Tamra Andress:

Yeah, you mentioned the Messenger Movement Podcast, so I extract conversations like this from other leaders doing the same Every week. We drop it, but I also hang out. Instagram is probably the easiest place to connect with me. I love voice memo, so don't just DM me, don't just heart. Like something like actually get in my inbox and let's start a conversation. That's where it changes. So.

Scott Allen:

I'm excited for that. That's quite an invitation. All right, so Instagram, and then give us a couple of the titles of the books, and are you working on one right now? Yes, I'm always working on one.

Tamra Andress:

Yes, we've got one coming out in November called the Joyful Entrepreneur, and it's our third volume of that book, and so we're so excited. It's about being dressed in the full armor of God as an entrepreneur, and what does that actually look like by? Busting the lies of the secular world and understanding the biblical principle connected to that.

Tamra Andress:

So we talked about it here like money is evil, right, that's what a lot of people, even christians, will say, and what that actually looks like in practical element, but also in the biblical element. So tons of lies. Um, you know, money is, is everything, or um, success is winning, like there's so much we talked about on this show, so that that book specifically comes to mind, but there's three volumes of that. My personal story, which I alluded to a little bit, is called always becoming sex shame and love, and I've got my own personal.

Tamra Andress:

It's the second one coming out, my second memoir, because how do you have a memoir published when you're 31? You're like you've got a lot of life to live. So I got more memoirs. We're going to have a lot of memoirs of every decade, I guess, of my life.

Scott Allen:

You and Barack Obama. Right yeah, exactly.

Tamra Andress:

Exactly so. We'll keep writing those. But we just actually launched a book called More Than Enough, and it's a women's devotional that I also did a Bible study curriculum to. So there's churches across America right now where women are coming to learn about their own identity, that they're more than their body, more than their past, more than their job, more than a mom, more than their religion and, missing one, more than a wife, and so having women really hold a book and actually experience the stories inside of it is something I'm really passionate about. So same for entrepreneurs. Thanks for asking.

Scott Allen:

Wow, those, all of those books sound really amazing. What was the tell? The first one you mentioned, the one that's coming up, that one?

Tamra Andress:

Yes, the Joyful Entrepreneur, the Joyful.

Scott Allen:

Entrepreneur. Is there a website or is it off?

Tamra Andress:

Yep, you can go to yep, fitinfaithcom, fitinfaithmediacom. And all of our books, all the things are all there, fitandfaithmediacom.

Scott Allen:

Perfect. Well, listen, tamara, you've been really generous with your time today. It's been just wonderful and super encouraging to listen to you. I'd love to have you back again. I especially was touched by Luke's question about the KPIs and you're going back to the fruit of the Spirit. Those are the deep needs that everyone has. They want love, joy, peace, patience, kindness, and I've often thought we are all about how is it that we see change in the world? How do we see cultures transformed and we don't do it, like Marxists, through power and coercion and censorship? People want those things deeply and this is the power of the Holy Spirit to bring change to our lives and to the world. So thanks for that.

Scott Allen:

I want to reflect more on that.

Tamra Andress:

Yeah, such a gift, thank you.

Scott Allen:

Luke and Dwight. Thank you, too, for being with us today. And again to all of our listeners, we're so grateful for you. Thank you again for tuning in to another episode of Ideas have Consequences. This is the podcast of the Disciple Nations Alliance you.