In Partnership With God

Gary Ringer was a successful Christian businessman who wanted to operate his business in a way that was honoring to the Lord. One area, though, where Gary says he had not yet fully surrendered himself to God was in how he thought about financial giving from the business. Our giving was limited to a post-tax tithe, so that was our thought process. And I do feel like the way we treated people, the way we did business, we wanted to be God-honoring.

But as far as our giving, it was our business, and we would, if you will, tip God as it increased. This is Family Life Today. Our hosts are Dave and Anne Wilson.

I'm Bob Lapine. You'll find us online at FamilyLifeToday.com. We talk today to Gary and Marla Ringer about how God got a hold of their hearts first and then got a hold of their business and transformed both. Stay with us. And welcome to Family Life Today.

Thanks for joining us. I have to tell you, when I came across what we're going to talk about today, I thought, Dave's going to like this. Really? Why?

Because I know how fired up you get when people start to get radical about their faith. Oh, definitely. You're right.

I think that's true about Dave. I thought you were talking about, you know, scooping up pig feed. I didn't know how that came into the thing.

Like, why am I excited about that? Well, and some of our listeners are going, what's the relationship between pig feed and being radical about your faith? But that's what we're going to learn today. That's where it started.

That's right. Gary Ringer and his wife, Marla, are joining us. Guys, welcome to Family Life Today. Thank you.

Good to be here. Gary and Marla are from central Illinois, and the story we're going to hear today is a story, Gary, that you wrote down in a book called Radical Business. And most guys who live through what you live through and have got a great story to tell don't take time to write a book. What was the prompting that caused you to say, I'm going to write a book about our story and about our life? What actually happened was Andy, who works with me, was wanting me to do it, and it just seemed overwhelming.

So it wasn't getting done. And then one night, Marla woke up in the middle of the night, and if you look at the back cover, she wrote that word for word. She wrote it as if it was me. The next morning, she showed it to me, and I thought, oh, I like that. So it became this kind of sweet journey. I would write a chapter very poorly, and then Marla would edit it. Then my oldest daughter, Megan, would edit it.

Then we'd get together at Panera, and we'd edit it together and read it together. It became this walk down memory lane that was a real great journey together. Well, and what it became for you guys was an opportunity to really celebrate the goodness of God in a long journey that is a pretty remarkable journey. Marla, what prompted you? Did you wake up in the night and start writing?

What was that? We had actually talked about writing the book. And when we would share stories with some of our friends, they would say, you need to write a book.

Every time we'd tell them another God story, they'd say, you need to write a book. Is that how they said it? I like that. Well, that's how one of my friends said it. She did.

Yes, she did. So then, I just had it on my mind, and a lot of times, that's how I process at night. Your best thoughts come at night.

Or I lay there thinking about it. I just started thinking, how should we introduce this book? And those words came, so I do think it was the Lord. Well, let's go back to the beginning of the God story, and that really starts when you got into the family business. Tell us about the family business. Yeah, so the family business was a little feed business. We sold pig feed to local farmers. I have to say, I was a lazy kid, wondered if I would ever make it in business, and so I went to work for Dad out of college because I didn't know what else to do.

But Dad bought and sold pig feed to area farmers. You were a business major and then studied economics while you were in college. Didn't know what you wanted to do. You wanted to play piano, right? I wanted to play piano.

I told Dad right after I got out of college that, I'll work for you, but let me take six months off to learn to play the piano a little better. And he was a German worker, and he thought, who have I raised? Marla, when did you come into the journey? Where did you and Gary meet? We met at college, although our church has had some interaction together. We both are from the same denomination. Actually, there's kind of a cute story of how we first met. We invited Gridley Sunday School to visit us for a Sunday, and he came as a senior.

I was a sophomore. You were in the Gridley Church. He was in the Gridley Church, and they came to Cissna.

Boy, these are some names right here. He brought a girlfriend that wasn't really from our church. And so, you know, we're like, these cute guys, they're bringing their girlfriends.

That's no fair, you know. But I do remember the pastor had a special service just for the Sunday School kids who were visiting, and he knew Gary's older brother, lived with him in college. And so he pointed him out, and he said, oh, I know Gary Ringer, because I roomed with his brother, Earl. And so everybody was looking at Gary. Well, wait, were you looking at him? I was looking at him. He's pretty cute. Oh, my daughter's really cute.

Absolutely. I did. And then I babysat for this pastor's kids, and so when he asked a question, he said, I can pick on Marla because she babysits for our kids. And they all looked back at me, and he looked back at me, and our eyes met. Oh. But he did have his arm around his girlfriend. Oh, wait.

Your eyes locked, but he still had his arm around his – That's right. Yeah, but that was the first. You stole his heart, and that was the first. And I remember that. Oh, yeah. And you remember it, too. I remember it, too. And I have to say, when I got married in Marla, that was when Dad started having hope for me. Is that right? That's not true.

Well, he partially is. Partially, but, yeah, he thought you were pretty great. In college or out of college when you got married? Out of college.

I quit college my sophomore year, worked a year, then got married. By this time, you are fully immersed in the pig feed business. Yeah, I'm going in the pig feed business, and Dad really wanted me to learn it from ground up, so I went to work in the dusty feed mill that we had, and I remember one of my friends saying, what are you doing doing this? But I met a gentleman that was a nutritionist, and he taught me how to mix the feed from ground up. We, before, were buying like two ingredients and mixing them together. And he taught me how to take 10, 15 ingredients and mix the feed. And when that happened, our prices went down so much that we could sell the product at a lower price to our customers, so it was a better value for them.

But we made twice as much. And when that happened, that was like, this is pretty cool. I bet your dad was pretty proud at that point. Yeah. He was. Again, you weren't sure what you wanted to do, so you're kind of in the pig feed business by default.

That's right. Did you like what you were doing? I really got to know dad in the business, and we got along good, and so it was a real blessing.

I had Aunt Vi and Aunt Lil worked in the business, and so it was a family deal, and I loved the people. And I started, he had me going out selling, which he knew that I'm kind of a timid guy, and if I have too much rejection, that I'd be in trouble. So what dad did is he wouldn't let me go out too much, but he would help me get my feet wet a little bit and that, and then he'd pull me back in. And sometimes I felt he was almost too restrictive, but it was really good for me. He was nudging you. He was nudging me and holding me back so I didn't burn out.

He was a great mentor, my greatest mentor in life. When you came across this formula for twice the profits at a lower price for the customer, business took off. Did you start to see this can be much bigger than our pig feed business has ever been? Yes, because the margins were good, we started making money, and then we started hiring other salesmen because we could afford to pay a salesman. And then as time went on, I transformed from this scared kid to somebody that was really, business is really great.

I loved it. If I'm your dad, I have just discovered an incredible gift and insight in my son. I mean, is that right? I mean, you found something he had never found and brought a profitability to the company that was unheard of at the time, right? Yeah, it was like a totally different business. So was it like, hey, lead this thing?

Oh, yeah. Dad was very involved. He was a lay pastor in our church, and he was like the lead pastor. At that point in time, I was wanting more of his input, and he basically said, Gary, you may want more of me now, but a lot of your friends that have a dad for their business partner, as time goes on, their dads hold on, and you're going to be glad that I'm not holding on. So he was just handed to me, and he was busy.

He didn't have an office at work. He just would come in, and he didn't make the circles, and he was a real positive guy, and the most positive guy I've ever met. He would come in. We'd be immersed in problems, and he would come in.

It's a great day to be alive, he would say. And we were like, uh, OK, Dad. And what were your spiritual lives like at that point? Christ has always been front and center. And so we were raising our kids to know Him, and it was a very important part of our lives. Was that true in the business, Gary?

Because I read in the book, you said my goal was to be a millionaire by 40 or whatever, to retire at 40. That's right. It sounded to me like early on, it was like, yeah, I'm following Jesus, but when it comes to business, I've got other priorities here. We would say that our business belonged to the Lord.

Right. We would say that, but our giving was limited to a post-tax tithe. That was our thought process. And I do feel like the way we treated people, the way we did business, we wanted to be God honoring. But as far as our giving, it was our business, and we would, if you will, tip God as it increased. Did you feel good about that? You were fine with that as a way of thinking.

Yeah, that was just what I was taught. And my mindset was, that was the tithe was, that was what it was about. And so you get to a point, though, it's pretty interesting in your story, in the book, where you write out a contract to God. So something was going on.

Tell us what happened there. By the time I was in my early 30s, and I'm thinking I'm quite the business guy, and I visited a craft food plant. And I remember walking room to room, and I saw all these processes and different foods being made, and I thought, this is a lot bigger than any feed business I've ever seen. And I told Marla, we're going to get into the food business. And I didn't know what I was going to do, but I'm fairly creative, and sometimes too creative, and so I started talking to people, and before long I had met a lady that wanted to find somebody to blend donut sugar for her. And I figured we knew how to blend feed, we can blend donut sugar. And so we started Ringer Foods. So then we start Ringer Foods, and that's when I'm telling Marla, hey, babe, we're going to get rich, and we're going to retire at 40, we're going to live the American dream.

And I would have thought that we're going to tithe on this like that. But what happened is, as I started that journey, thinking very highly of myself, we were losing money, so that was hurting my pride. I had to kind of repent to dad because I felt like I had not put as much emphasis on the foundation he had given.

I came in when there was a foundation, and starting a business, Ringer Foods was a lot different. But the big thing was I never had thought about it too much, except now we were making food. And if you mess up a batch of pig feed, you maybe heard a pig.

What happens if you mess up some food and we're making this donut sugar that's not going to be cooked? And so I just started freaking out, and I got into this pattern. It was just over a three to five month period where night after night, one, two in the morning, it was pretty much like clockwork. I'd wake up, and I was sweating, my heart beating in my head, and I would just lay there thinking all kinds of dark thoughts like, God forbid, we're going to kill somebody with bacteria-tainted foods. And it just started freaking me out. And then, because it happened night after night, I got sleep-deprived.

And you know what happens then? Then I got into depression and desperation, and then I just wanted out. Marla, what was going on in your mind as you watched Gary and the stress and the depression? Yeah, I remember one night in particular, he woke up and he was a mess. He said, Marla, you've got to pray for me. And so we knelt down by our beds, and I prayed for him.

And I mean, that probably happened twice where I really noticed it in the middle of the night. On a day-to-day basis, I was busy with three little girls. He went to work, and he'd come home every night. But I was not living that responsibility, and I was preoccupied with the girls.

And I honestly didn't feel it like he did. I mean, I knew that he was struggling, but he didn't really talk about it a lot at home, other than a few times at night when it would wake him up. Was the company in financial risk? Yeah, that's getting back to being sleep-deprived, and also God was breaking me. So that was the good news. But Ringer Feeds was doing great, and Ringer Foods was borrowing money from Ringer Feeds.

So it wasn't like we were in trouble. All we had to do was quit and focus on Ringer Feeds, and everything's cool. And that's frankly what I wanted to do. I'm just getting to the point where I'm tired of this.

I just want my life back. I don't care about the American Dream retiring at 40. So that was my thought, as I just wanted to quit. But I didn't have a piece about that. And God was not giving me a piece about that. And going to your question, that's what led to the contract. So what was the contract?

So the contract was written on an eight-and-a-half-by-eleven piece of paper with a pen. And it basically said that, God, if you take this failing business, which it was, and if we ever make it successful and we ever sell it, that we'll pay ourself back what we invested, plus eight percent interest, and anything over and above that we'll use for ministry, not having any idea what that ministry might be, but just saying, you know, it's yours. And then that gave me purpose. I remember, as you tell that story, because I know the rest of the story.

I know what happened in your case. But I remember a guy who came to Family Life, and God had placed it on his heart that they should give to Family Life that particular year. And he said, I set aside a month, and our profits from that month are what we're going to donate to Family Life.

And we thanked him. He later told us that he picked what he knew had historically been the lowest month of the year for their sales. So he was hedging his bets a little bit. But he's given a whole month's profits to Family Life, right? And it's because he believed in the mission and what we were doing.

That month turned out to be the biggest month in his company's history. And at the end of that October, when he's sitting looking at the books, he's going, now, is there a way to renegotiate my deal with God? But he pulled back and said, isn't it interesting how when you turn things over to the Lord and say, OK, this belongs to you now, and as you said, we're going to pay off our debts and we'll pay the interest back, but anything else becomes the Lord's. Somebody, I forget who it was that said it, but somebody has said that the world has not seen what God will do through the man who doesn't allow money to stick to his fingers, right? The person who is focused on giving, all of a sudden God says, I can use this person and I can advance kingdom purposes and bring joy to you in the process. Yeah, and you'll notice that I didn't give ringer feeds.

That's right. I gave ringer foods that had no value. Which was the most intriguing part of this book to me, Gary, is because you said the business no longer belonged to me. It belonged to God. And you started having discussions with God about your business, like he was in it with you. And I love it. I want to hear what you say to that, but you prayed where I pray. I pray in the hot tub.

Oh, really? You're like, so do I. Somebody else said, I just sit out there and I look at the heavens and it's a beautiful place. I tell people if they're serious about their spiritual life, they need to get hot. I agree. Marianne, are you listening, sweetheart?

Okay, because I believe my prayer life would really get on fire. Yeah, that's right. Yeah, but seriously, what Anne's asking is that in that moment when you're getting alone now, probably daily, because your anxiety was daily, so now it's a different spin.

That's right. So with me, and even today, when I first wake up in the morning, things look overwhelming. That's just kind of my nature. So at that point, I have a failing business. I'm still in depression.

You don't get into depression right away. You don't get out of it right away. So I wake up right outside our bedroom door, outside, and we live along a river, is this hot tub.

And so I stumble out to the hot tub. And the other thing that was really cool at that point is as I'm looking into prayer, I read these excerpts of some early Christians. And these guys were early Christians right after Christ that had been martyred for their faith. But what I noticed about they wrote was concerning the Lord's Prayer.

And I had memorized that as a kid. But what I took from these essays is that's how they prayed. So I got into a pattern the same way I pray today. I'd go out into the hot tub, even if it was in the afternoon, and then I would think about who God is.

And Bill Bright is one of my heroes, and I read his 13 attributes, and I memorized those so I would go through those. And he's all powerful, all knowing, why am I so shook? And then when I would get to, Thy kingdom come, Thy will be done, I would think about, to me, I don't know that for sure that's what Christ meant, but to me it was like submitting whatever your will is.

Who cares about what I want? And then when I would get to give us the day our day of bread, then I would start, I'd have this prayer list about, okay, what about this? And I would start asking him questions about business because I was in this tangible partnership. Before that, prayer was this discipline that I knew was important and I was a believer. But it was just like five minutes a day, a really focused time that I had to focus. And if my mind would wander, it would be like I'd slap my hand. But now this became up to an hour a day just out there, falling asleep part of the time, just relaxing with my father. And then I started to experience him in ways I'd never had before. You must have had some real wrinkled skin.

I mean, an hour hot tub. Yeah, and through the years it gets worse. I mean, we're laughing about it, but if you're doing that daily, it transforms your anxiety, I'm guessing. And again, not in one day, but what happened to that, the worry, the things waking you up at night, the stress? I have to say I'm this strange mix of very optimistic and a worrier. Dad is the most optimistic person I've ever known, and Mom would worry about anything. And so I have that.

And so still today, there's things that will bother me in the morning, but this morning I had to be down here so I couldn't do that, so I'm a little more anxious. Right. But in general, if I hit that hot tub and I spend that time, it is life transforming for me. You know, you can pray in other places.

It's not as fun, but it is. I don't think he knows that. When you signed a contract and said, okay, God, this business belongs to you, and we're going to hear more this week about what God's done and about the ministry that has come out of that. But God started to do a work in your business. The bigger work God started to do was in you.

That's right. And I'm just wondering what you would say, I don't know how many folks who are listening run their own business, a lot of folks work for other people, how does this principle apply to folks who are listening? This whole idea of surrender and stewardship and say, really, I'm a steward of God's stuff, I'm not an owner. How would that transform somebody's daily life? From a business perspective, I feel like the contract made it tangible.

I feel like anybody can do that. But for Gary Ringer, before when I had this tithe mentality, it wouldn't have got there because it was still mine. And no matter how big it got, I planned the tithe. And so what I've been taught by other people is the finish line mentality, which means you say how much is enough and then the rest you give away. And so my personal bias is if a business owner makes that type of commitment where he says how much enough and then the rest is yours, Lord, then for me at least, then he becomes more of a tangible partner.

Because no matter how big it gets, I'm a steward and the owner gets the increase, not the steward. Now, did it help to write it down? Because I'm thinking a lot of us have made these foxhole prayers, hey, if you do this, I'll do that, and then, you know, it just goes away. But was there something to put it down on paper like it was real?

Yeah, well, it was definitely that. And we wouldn't be here if I hadn't. So the rest of the story is on that is my dad, my greatest mentor in life.

As time went on and as Ringer Foods started to become successful, and then we got to a point where God opened the doors for us to sell in a very God way. Then dad had forgot about the blood, sweat, and the tears, because he hadn't gone through them. So, and I have a brother and a sister, and he says, you know, Gary, I want to give to your brother and sister. And I said, well, dad, did you forget about the contract?

And, well, yeah. So I, at that point, I brought it out. I showed it to dad. Dad's a man of God. And right away, he doesn't want to go against his word, because he had signed it too.

He was 50 percent on him. And if you know my personality, I'm very forgetful and very absent-minded. And if we wouldn't have wrote it down, I would have thought, well, what did we really do? Yeah, I would say, you know, you don't have to be a business owner. Amen. To struggle with stress and anxiety and fear and worry about your life and about finances and about the future. I would say today's the day to write a contract.

Yeah. You know, whoever you are, just like, what would it be like to sit down and really mean this? God, my life is yours. It really gave him freedom. Whatever you blessed me with. It really gave him freedom, too, because he couldn't pray in good faith. God, help me to get rich so that I can retire at 40. But now he could say, Lord, bless this business, because it's yours. And I'm not going to benefit more than what we've already decided. I've met people like you, some amazing folks, and just heard amazing stories of people who have said, here's what we're going to live with, and they've kind of capped what their life's going to be.

Yeah. And then they've said everything else goes to God. And some of them never dreamed what God would do and find themselves tempted on the other side to go, maybe we should keep more of this for ourselves.

And yet they've found such joy in being vessels, being channels for what God is wanting to do all around the world. We've got copies of the book you've written, Gary, in our Family Life Today Resource Center. It's called Radical Business from Ownership to Stewardship and Anyone Who is in Business. This is a great book.

This will change your perspective on what God has designed for you to do as a business owner. Go to familylifetoday.com to order a copy of Gary Ringer's book, Radical Business from Ownership to Stewardship. You can order online at familylifetoday.com, or you can call 1-800-FL-TODAY to order. Again, our website is familylifetoday.com, or call 1-800-358-6329.

That's 1-800-F as in Family, L as in Life, and then the word TODAY to get a copy of Gary Ringer's book. And we want to say a special thank you today to those of you who have a burden on your heart for marriages and families, those of you who align with our passion and our vision here at Family Life. Our goal is to effectively develop godly marriages and families who change the world one home at a time. And we know there are some of you who pray for us regularly, some of you who are involved in reaching out in your community to help strengthen marriages and families in your neighborhood, in your church where you live.

And there are some of you who make this radio program possible. You help us reach more people more regularly through your financial support of Family Life Today. Thank you for partnering with us in this ministry because we believe that we can change the world one home at a time.

If you've never donated to support Family Life Today, you can do that easily online at familylifetoday.com or call 1-800-FL-TODAY to donate. And we hope to hear from you. Thanks for your support of all that God is doing through this ministry. And we hope you can join us back again tomorrow. Gary and Marla Ringer will be here again to share with us the burden that God put on their heart, the kingdom burden that has blossomed into a pretty significant ministry. We'll hear that story tomorrow.

Hope you can be with us for that. I want to thank our engineer today, Keith Lynch, along with our entire broadcast production team. On behalf of our hosts, Dave and Ann Wilson, I'm Bob Lapine. We'll see you back next time for another edition of Family Life Today. Family Life Today is a production of Family Life of Little Rock, Arkansas. A crew ministry. Help for today. Hope for tomorrow.