We’ve since updated the article to reflect the version Kelly intended to share, and we’re pleased to republish it here as it was meant to be read.

Whether you’re reading it for the first time or revisiting it today, we hope you enjoy the article, are inspired by its message, and are encouraged to see Young Washington in theaters.

The Believe! Journal Editorial Team

A few years ago, we watched High School Musical for the first time. I won’t pretend it’s a masterpiece, but High School Musical does one thing exceptionally well. It makes you love what’s happening on screen.

Before the credits rolled, basketball was all my kids could talk about. They had to play. They had to learn. That movie never explained why basketball is worth loving. It just made them love it. To this day, they play.

That is the real power of a great story. It doesn’t inform. It transforms. It changes what you believe is possible, and then it moves you to act.

So here’s the question I keep coming back to: where is the story that does that for the next generation’s love of America?

Not a lecture. Not a curriculum. A story that cracks a kid’s heart open and leaves them thinking: the principles this country was built on are worth something. I could live by them. I could be part of carrying them forward.

That’s why we made Young Washington, a feature film now playing in theaters nationwide.

George Washington in this film is not the man on the dollar bill. He’s a young soldier — ambitious, sometimes self-serving, capable of serious error. He grows up having lost his father, wanting nothing more than to earn his place among the British military elite. His model of greatness comes from classical heroes celebrated for conquest, personal glory, and the accumulation of rank. In that world, status was the measure of a man.

But life keeps telling him no. His early military career is defined by setbacks — decisions made under pressure, commands lost, failures he can’t rationalize away. And it is in that reckoning, not in his victories, that something begins to shift. He stops chasing recognition and starts to understand that real greatness is defined by what you give, not what you gain.

That shift — quiet, hard-won, deeply human — is where the leader we know begins to emerge. And it’s where the country we know began to become possible.

Because the founding principles of America didn’t come from perfect men. They came from real ones who chose, again and again, to lead for something greater than themselves. Integrity tested under pressure. Resilience built on failure honestly faced. Service as the highest form of leadership. These aren’t abstractions in a textbook. They are choices, made by people, that produced one of the most free and prosperous nations in history.

There’s a line in the film that has stayed with me: even a pawn can take a king. That idea — that your birth doesn’t determine your worth, that character and courage matter more than position — is as radical and as necessary now as it was in 1776. It is, in many ways, the American idea itself.

The best stories follow you home.

I took my eight-year-old to see Sarah’s Oil this past fall — our film about Sarah Rector, a young African American girl who became one of the nation’s first female millionaires at age eleven after fighting to keep land she’d inherited. On the drive home, my daughter had questions I wasn’t expecting. Why did people try to take Sarah’s land? Why did she have to fight so hard just to keep what was hers? How do oil rigs work? We talked about civil rights, about courage, about science and entrepreneurship, and the long, ongoing work of putting our founding principles into fuller practice.

I didn’t plan that conversation. The film opened the door, and we walked through it together. She was the one leaning forward, asking the questions, wanting to understand.

That’s what great stories do. They don’t hand you conclusions. They put you in the room with someone whose life looks nothing like yours, and they make you care about what happens to them. When you walk out, you see your own world a little differently. Things that were invisible before are not anymore.

On this 250th anniversary of our nation’s founding, what I’m most hopeful for is more entertainment like this. A human being on screen, making hard choices, getting things wrong, and finding his way toward something worth standing for. That’s what stays with people. That’s what shapes how the next generation sees themselves — and how they see the country they’ve inherited.

Last month we held a screening in Grand Rapids, inviting leaders from business, faith, and philanthropy and asking each of them to help put students in seats who might not otherwise get there. It’s a small picture of something bigger we’re trying to build: a generation that doesn’t just learn American history but feels it.

Through our Pay It Forward initiative, anyone can sponsor a student ticket. More than five million middle and high school students study U.S. history every year. Help make sure they don’t just read about it — help them experience it on the big screen by visiting https://www.angel.com/pay-it-forward/young-washington.

This summer, see Young Washington in theaters, and give the next generation a story they’ll carry with them. Not because we told them who George Washington was. But because they saw themselves in who he was becoming.

Kelly Merryman Hoogstraten is CEO of the Wonder Project.

Sponsor a student ticket for Young Washington through the Pay It Forward initiative.

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What follows is a transcript of “Selling America” by Rich DeVos. Originally delivered in the 1960s, this landmark speech has since been reproduced and delivered thousands of times, earning the Alexander Hamilton Award for Economic Education and cementing Rich’s reputation as an in-demand speaker. As we enter America’s 250th year, we’re taking time to reflect on how the lessons of “Selling America” can apply to the present day; where they hold up, and where they can be modified or improved upon. This will be the theme of our Believe! Journal contributors’ new pieces in our upcoming issue: Selling America 250.

Fellow Achievers and fellow Americans, Canadian friends from the north, it’s an honor to be with you tonight to share a few thoughts about the great system that makes both of these countries the most prosperous on earth. Before, however, I build you up too much, because you see, you are the tops in Junior Achievement, you’re here because of what you’ve done, you’re proven achievers and performers, I would like to give you a little quiz. It goes like this: What I want to know is, before you go out to rebuild the world, have you learned how to clean up your bedroom? Is that a bad question? I don’t know.

We live in an age where the Junior Achievement organization and those of you who are gathered here stand contrary to what many people in this country believe. And as I wander, and as you wander, you find people who don’t believe that people should be rewarded in direct proportion to the effort they put forth. They think that all people should be treated equally, like in the socialistic or the communistic government. And that means that everybody should be equal. What they really mean to say, is that everybody should be equally poor, because that’s about where they stand.

But something happens in the minds of people, those who are not here, those who are roaming the streets tonight saying that America and the free enterprise system shared in this country and Canada is not available to them. They claim the American dream passed them by. But something happened in their attitude, that they were never exposed to find out how great this system really is.

And, so, it is exciting to be here. I have a couple of little one-liners, we call them, from people who have applied for welfare. And you’ve got to understand something of their attitude. So here’s a gal, and she writes to the welfare department, and she’s writing for her neighbor. She says, “Mrs. Jones has not had any clothes for a year and has been visited regularly by the clergy.” Now, the next lady writes, she says, “I cannot get sick pay. I have six children. Can you tell why?” And the next lady says, “This is my eighth child. What are you going to do about it?” Now, here’s a state of mind which says, “What are you going to do about my problem? What are you going to do to help me?” Implying here that there’s nothing she can do to help herself. And another lady says, “Unless I get my husband’s money, pretty soon I will be forced to lead an immortal life.” And apparently that’s her only out. Another one says, “You have changed my little boy to a girl. Will this make a difference?” I hope so. I really do.

Now this is an attitude, isn’t it, on the part of people blaming somebody else for their plight? I appreciate the efforts of government to solve people’s poverty problem, but I cannot tolerate their constant complaint that it’s somebody else’s problem that put them there. I believe enough in our system that I maintain anybody who wants to and is willing to put forth the effort can solve their own poverty problem. I think being poor is something many people do. It sort of has to do with being poor by choice. But you see, that doesn’t solve the problem, does it? Because somebody, somewhere, has got to reach that person or those persons, millions of them, because they don’t know. They don’t realize that it can change their life if they’ll but look at the opportunity in a new perspective.

But you see the thing we project, the attitude we show, has as much to do with it as anything. So, I want to talk to you about selling America, and I include the Canadians, because I maintain you are Americans because we all live on the North American continent and we share a common system. I, of course, welcome you and I recognize you’re Canadians and that we’ve taken words and say, “We’re Americans and you’re Canadians.” But we all work under the same concept, and that’s why the border goes unguarded, and that’s why we go back and forth so freely, because we have so much in common.

But when I ask you to sell America, I maintain it’s a part of a greater job. I want you to go out from this place to be successful. I want you to achieve. I want you to use the talents God has given, so you can make a contribution. I want you to assume roles of leadership, so you can take those people who don’t know that the opportunities are available to them and make them see the light. And maybe all they’re waiting for is a word from you. And sometimes that word is so simple. It goes like this, “Hey John, you can do it.” Maybe nobody’s ever told him that. You better think about that. My dad used to say that to me. I used to say, “Oh, I can’t do this. I can’t do that.” And he’d say, “You say can’t once more, and I’ll knock your block right through that wall.”

So, somebody kept saying to me, as somebody has said to you, “You can do it. You can do it. It does pay. You can get ahead.” But you see, those people never had it. Let me give you an example. In your school right now is some girl or some boy who doesn’t dress quite as well as you think he ought to. But you’ve got your own little clique going over there in the corner, haven’t you? So, this poor soul who maybe is dressing as best they can walks by, and somebody says, “Look at that.” You don’t have to say any more than that. They feel a little bad anyway that they can’t afford something better. But you see, in that moment, you help to destroy that person. Because you see, that little snicker might just have been the whole thing that broke that girl’s heart or that boy’s heart. But a friendly word from you could have changed that whole situation.

Some of you are decrying the fact that some kids in your school haven’t gone on and they’re dropping out and you haven’t stopped to wonder about the effect you had on the reason they dropped out. See, you’re the bright ones. You’re the leaders. You can afford some slop. So you skipped a day. But the problem was, when you skipped, you didn’t do it alone. You said, “Come on, John. Go with us for a day. We’re going to this lake to go swimming. Oh, we’ll skip today.” Well, when you came back, it was all right. You caught up in a hurry. So you took a grade down that day, it was all right. It didn’t matter to you.

But you know, to John, it might’ve just knocked the edge off it. Then he slipped just a little behind that day and he never quite caught up. And when the end of the semester came, he flunked the course. Not because he wasn’t the greatest, because he wasn’t that smart, but he was making it until you taught him a habit or took him away. He couldn’t afford that day. You could, but you undermined his whole future because you taught him a bad habit that day.

You see, the little things you do, folks, affect the lives of people every day. There’s no escaping the impact you have on others. And certainly, as the leaders in your community, you’re just not one of the gang. You’re one they point to, they look to, and every word of encouragement can change the lives of the others with whom you live. I gave a talk one day in a high school and I talked about smoking. I’d made some comments about the fact that it’s an interesting thing that when you’re your age, it’s real big shot stuff to smoke. And when you’re my age, you’re a big shot if you can quit. Now, that’s an interesting thing. But I made some implications that I didn’t approve of smoking. One young gal came up to me afterwards and she says, “I’ll have you know, I smoke.” I says, “You’re kidding.” She was a high schooler. She says, “No, I do.” I said, “I don’t believe you.” She says, “Really, I smoke.” “No,” I said, “You don’t smoke, honey. The cigarette smokes. You’re just the sucker. You got to remember that.”

I mentioned the fact that you’re the leader, you’re the comer, you’re the goer, you’re the achiever. And as such, others will follow you. But as you progress, and as you assume your roles of leadership and as you excel, I want you to remember something: One of the greatest problems we’ve got in America today, outside of the racial strife that’s going on and we all deplore, is the equal respect for each other. One of the things any minority group is seeking is, “Just respect me for what I am. Don’t give me any favors. I’m not asking for that.” Most of them aren’t asking for that. They’re just asking for equal respect and equal opportunity, and it’s all of us that are going to change that. That won’t happen by accident.

I see it happening between groups of people, between classes of people, as well as groups, and racial groups. And so the man said, “Well, I went to college.” Well, that’s all right. I hope you all go to college. I hope you all graduate. But you know, about half the kids coming out of school aren’t going to go to college. And although you may have a greater responsibility because you have greater talent, as a man or a woman, you’re not necessarily better than the one who didn’t. I want you to remember that. I want you to remember that the next time that fellow comes by who picks up the garbage at your house. He’s a fellow American who’s using his talent to do what he can do. He, too, is a part of the great mainstream of American life.

I had an interesting experience because I like garbagemen. You wouldn’t believe that, but I went up for four weeks in a row because I wanted to meet him. I said, “Hi, how are you this morning? Just came out to tell you, I appreciate your coming.” He looked at me and he says, “Are you just getting up or are you just coming in?” He wasn’t sure. I said, “No, really, I just came out to say, ‘Hello.’” I said, “I appreciate you coming by.” Now, if you don’t think you appreciate his coming by, you just let him skip you a couple of times, and you’ll find out how important he is in your life. About the fourth time I went out there, I said, “I’m just coming out to say, ‘Hello,’ again.” I said, “I really mean it. I appreciate your coming. Do you realize how important the work is that you do, what it does for the sanitation of this community, how it protects the health and welfare of all the people?” He says, “Well, I’ll be damned.”

Now, I don’t like to use that language, but I portrayed to you his attitude. He said, “I’ve been picking up garbage for years, man. Nobody ever told me that.” And I say to you, isn’t it too bad that a fellow American, who’s doing what he’s able to do, has had no one tell him how important his work is? He says, “You know, you’re one in a million.” Well, I don’t want to be one in a million. And I ask you, as you go on to positions of leadership, to join me in a crusade of respectability for all your fellow Americans. And I hope you go on to college and get a PhD or whatever it is you’re seeking. But I hope you’ll always remember that that doesn’t make you better than the next guy. It gives you greater responsibility.

I marvel at the PhD who works for us, and he’s a wonderful man. I look at the chemists we have, and I notice how helpless they are when it comes to emptying the waste basket. And then I look at the people who come to work and work on the line. And I look at the school bus drivers. We say, “Why, he’s just a bus driver.” And the other people say, “Well, he’s just a businessman. He’s just a salesman.” Will you eradicate the word “just” from your vocabulary? Nobody is just anything. He’s a man or a woman doing what he knows how to do best. That’s the real sign. So if a guy fixes your car, remember to greet him. Remember to thank him. If all of us will begin to do this, we can change America. We can break down the barriers between, “I’m better than you.” There’s too much of it. So let’s join me in the crusade. Let’s remember that the little things make a difference.

There was a time I went in a gas station. Young chap comes up to me. He says, “How do you feel?” I said, “I feel wonderful.” He says, “You look sick.” I said, “Well, I never felt better in my life.” And he said, “Well, I don’t know. Your color’s bad. You look yellow.” Well, I got up, I walked out, went down the street in my car, drove a block, stopped to look at my rear view mirror to see how I felt. I wasn’t so sure. When I got home, I checked both bathrooms, fluorescent lights, regular lights, looked in the mirror. I said, “I think my color’s all right.” Next morning, I’m still peering in my eyeballs. I wonder if I got yellow jaundice, if my liver’s quit. Suddenly, not too sure. I thought I looked all right, but still felt a little funny.

Got back to that gas station that day, discovered something. They’d just painted the place, a sick, yellow color. Anybody in there looked sick. But you see, somebody who I didn’t even know, who wasn’t skilled in the arts of medicine or anything else, makes an observation. For 24 hours, I’m flipped. And any of you girls wears a new dress to school next fall when you go back to school, and nobody says anything, you’re flipped just because nobody’s said anything. You might’ve seen 500 kids that day, but if only two or three say, “Hey, that’s a good looking dress,” then all of a sudden you wear it proudly.

I had a sport coat like that. I bought it, nobody said “Boo.” I began to think it was an ugly thing. One day, I met one gal. She said, “Hey, that’s a good looking sport coat.” You know what I said every time I put my sport coat on after that? “Hey, that’s a good looking coat, man.” All because one person told me so, and that’s how you can change the lives of people. And that’s why I wasn’t kidding you when I said those few words to your friends and school and elsewhere, of “You can do it,” can change their whole life, from a kid who was about to quit, from somebody who’s struggling and trying to get along. You see, you’re the epitome of respectability. He looks to you. You’re on the upper side of the class. So when you say it to him, it’s a helping hand going down to lift him up, and you can change his life and revolutionize him.

I’m concerned when I see people in union organizations get up and say, “Why, management, that rotten bunch. They’re taking all the money and we’re doing all the work. And the salesman he rides around on company expense account, boy, living off the fat of the land. We do all the work and those salesmen are getting all the money. And the stockholder, why he’s the worst of all. He gets paid and he doesn’t even punch in.” What you see in that are the seeds of destruction. Just as surely when management says, “You can’t trust the people in the back end anymore. You let them get away with this, and they’ll do the rest. You let them come in five minutes late today, and they’ll be 10 minutes late tomorrow.” I want you to remember that that’s not a true statement. And the next time somebody tells it to you, you stand up and challenge him and say, “I don’t believe it,” because that’s not the way it is.

I marvel when I look at the school bus drivers. You’re riding with them every morning across America and across Canada. They get in their cars and their buses and they drive and they pick you up and they haul you to school and they take you home, whether it’s raining or snowing, no matter what it’s doing. You can say, “Well, he’s just the bus driver.” No, he’s not just a bus driver. He’s a typical American who can be depended upon, who’s trustworthy, who’s honest and who carries out his responsibilities. That’s the true American that I know.

Well, the other day you were a little concerned about that policeman. Remember the one who shined his light in your car when you were parking? Remember that one? That’s the same one that you yelled for when you heard some noise in the backyard two nights later. And then you couldn’t wait to see that light from that same policeman, because he was there to help you again. You never know what they’ll get you out of, I’ll tell you that.

You know last time you sat around you got to kibitzing a little bit, and you said, “Why that cop stopped me only doing 30 in a 25 mile an hour zone.” And somebody says, “Yeah, I had the same experience.” And somebody else says, “Do you realize what he did to me?” And all I want to do is hear one of you say, “Yes, he stopped us from committing murder. He stopped us from more lawlessness. That’s what he did.” Because you see, every time you sit around in a bull session and somebody condemns the policeman, and somebody else says, “Yeah, he stopped me, too,” all you do is begin to undermine the basic forces of this country. You just keep eroding away at them. You just keep undermining the system, don’t you? Because you join in the old pastime of running down groups of people.

To the adults, I always talk to them about PTAs. You know you sit in the PTA meeting, somebody says, “Why, do you know that that teacher hit my little Johnny on the knuckles with a ruler?” I say, “Well, if I know the teacher and I know your Johnny, she should’ve hit him over the head with a baseball bat.”

How many of you took a little time after school was out this year to write a note to your teacher and thank him? Well, if you knew how to spell anyway, that might have been a problem. Didn’t think of it, did you? You should have. They spent a lot of time working with you. They never once turned you down when you asked for a little extra help. No, they didn’t, not if you really wanted it. But you see, this is what built this country. Labor didn’t build it. Management didn’t build it. Republicans didn’t build it. The Democrats didn’t build it. No, all the people built it, each one respecting the other one and giving them their day in court and offering them their praise and saying, “Thanks for the help you gave me,” whether it was to the garbageman, the teacher or the policemen. And together, we built it.

This is a great building we’re in. Some architect designed it. Some engineer put some work into it. And they should have their credits, but somebody else got down there in a hole and laid those foundations. Somebody else poured that concrete one bucketful at a time. Somebody else put those fixtures in one fixture at a time. And this is the structure that built our country. And you and I, every time we fail to recognize the part other people play in making it what it is, help to undermine it.

They tell me the American people and our free enterprise system, and this is what you’re going to hear, especially the fact that you’re a Junior Achiever, they say, “Why, this is a rotten society today, folks.” Did you know that? “That dog-eat-dog free enterprise system, why, that’s out of date. This is the age of socialism. This is a new age, where we’re concerned for our fellow man. This dog-eat-dog, trying to outdo the other guy and make a better product and outsell him, that’s not anymore.” That’s what millions are saying in this country, aren’t they?

But you see, what disproves all that is that, despite this so-called selfish attitude we’re supposed to have, last year the American people reached in their pockets and gave $10 billion away to help somebody else. Through the United Community Funds, or whatever else they happen to believe in, to support it and to their churches. And I never heard anybody yet complain, if it really helped somebody else to see a new day, if it helped somebody else make some progress. No, you see, the average American that I know is concerned for the welfare of his fellow Americans, and he works towards that end and he gives to the causes that will help them. So the next time somebody tells you our system is not conscious of the welfare of others, then you remind them that it’s more conscious of it than any other group of people on Earth. I don’t find any Red Cross or United Community Fund campaigns going on behind the Iron Curtain these days. I don’t see them enjoying the things we have. And neither do you.

Don’t tell me our system’s out of date. It was never more in date. When they talked to you about the great things of this land, I couldn’t help but think. The other night when I was in Los Angeles waiting for a flight back to Chicago, I watched people coming in and going. They’re coming in from Hawaii. I like to watch the flights from Hawaii because those are always champagne flights, and the people sort of roll in off the ramp when they come in all off those deals. But you know there wasn’t a policeman around saying, “Hey Mac, where are you going?” “I’m going to Honolulu.” “Well,” he says, “Who says you can go?” He says, “I say, I can go.” That’s all you have to have. “I said I wanted to go,” and so you go. It’s not that way in most parts of the world.

They talk a great deal about when the first jet started to travel, you know what the problem was? They were worried about filling all the seats. And you know the problem is today? They can’t get the airplanes in the air fast enough. All the plane manufacturers are two years behind. A couple of our pilots were talking the other day about executive aircraft, and they were telling me that if we wanted to buy a new jet airplane today, it would take us two years before we could get delivery on the models that we’re seeking. This is the rewards of our system.

Look at the highways. Look at the factories. People told us, you could never start a business of your own, but we started one in our basement. I don’t want to give a commercial, but you see, there are people who ride by our plant in Ada, Michigan, every day. You know what they say? “You can’t start a business anymore, today. Why, you know the red tape and the government interference and all the problems of labor and management, you just can’t do it.” Well, we did it and we sold free enterprise. It’s in our name, and we built it in because we believed then, and we believe more so now, that the average person in this country would far rather put forth some extra effort to get ahead than to sit home and wait for somebody from the government to hand them a handout. And we’ve proven it.

I thank you, but with all that, I’ve lost my place. I’ll start over, and then we can pick the threads out from there. You see, it’s not what we’ve done. But we believed in people and all they’ve said is, “Give me a chance to get ahead, and I’ll do it.” So, for those people who you will meet and who will be telling you that opportunity doesn’t exist, I want you to stand up and say, “I don’t believe it,” because I happen to know that opportunity is greater today in this country than ever. And believe me, friends, there’s more opportunity in business than any or all of you will ever be able to take advantage of.

The challenges in industry are great. I keep reading about the fact that the kids in college today go into the social fields. They want to work for the welfare of others. Well, if you’ve got any guts, you’ll get in business because we provide more welfare than anybody else. We provide employment for 72 million people, that’s what we do. You see, all these people who are talking about trying to help somebody else are only doing it because they don’t have the guts to face the real challenge, which is taking on somebody else. So they run around playing patty cake. They say, “Well, I’ll hold your hand. I’ll help you.” Help you, nothing. Give him a job. That’s what’ll help him the most.

I like people to go to college, and I’ve got a couple of friends who go. I’m all for it, but I get tired of these boys and their two-bit theories sitting over there always telling me how important it is to help people, and telling these kids, it’s all just the love of somebody else. Well, you better love them or you won’t help them. But I’ll tell you, you can help a lot more people our way than you can their way. You talk about saying a simple thing with an idea. You say, “I’ll tell you what, lady. I’m going to bring the soap to you instead of making you go to the store and get it.” And that’s all we did. And that’s the great thing of our two countries, that it allows people to still apply such technique. And that’s why we have the greatest standard of living the world has ever known.

Let me give you a few comparisons between Russia and the United States, because I hear more and more people tell me that our way is out of date. It’s an interesting thing. If we’re going to enjoy what they have in Soviet Russia, you know what we’re going to have to do? If we’re going to enjoy what they have, the first thing we’re going to have to do is abandon three-fifths of our steel capacity and two-thirds of our petroleum output. Then, we’ll have to get rid of 95% of our electric motor capacity. And then, we’ve got to destroy two of every three of our hydroelectric plants and we’ll get along on a tenth of our present volume of natural gas. Then, we’ll rip up 14 of every 15 miles of our paved highways and two of every three miles of our railroad tracks. Then we’ll sink eight of every nine oceangoing ships that we have and we’ll scrap 19 out of every 20 automobiles and trucks. Now, you know the problem don’t you? You see, what bothers the people in Russia is that they’ve got all the parking places and we’ve got all the automobiles. Now, that’s a real problem there.

Now, the next thing we’re going to do is we’re going to cut our living standard by three-fourths. We’re going to destroy 40 million television sets, nine out of every 10 telephones. Some of you are going to have to learn to write and spell again, and that gets pretty tough, you see? After we got rid of nine out of every 10 telephones, we’re going to get rid of seven out of every 10 houses. Yeah, and some of you would discover that you can’t spend so much time in the bathroom. Now, I tell you, one john down at the end of the hall shared with seven families. You see, we sit and we laugh, and they tell me our system isn’t worth preserving. Isn’t it marvelous, that wall they built around Berlin, to keep all of us out? Did you ever notice that we don’t have any “out-igration” quota in this country? Yeah. Anybody is free to leave, but they don’t want to.

Well, after we get rid of those houses and telephones, then, to keep up with them, we’ll put 60 million people back on the farm, on the farm to try and grow enough food. Most of you wouldn’t be wondering about what you’re going to do when you get out of school. That would have already been predetermined by the government. And most of you would already be back on the farm, and they still can’t raise enough food to feed their own people. And yet I read about these boys, and they’re telling me that that system’s a wonderful one. And somebody says, “Your theories are all wrong.” And all I can say to the boys with the theories is, “Friend, I’m not talking theory.”

I had the privilege of having dinner this evening with Mr. Moseler and Mr. Hardenbrook. And Mr. Moseler was telling me some boys in college challenge him and say, “Mr. Moseler, you’re out of date. What you’re telling me is theory.” Mr. Moseler said, “I’m not telling you a theory, friend. I’m telling you performance figures from a businessman. Those boys who are writing those books over in college, they got the theory. I got the facts, and what I’ve been giving you is facts.”

The United States of America, and I don’t have the figures on Canada or I’d share them, but they apply equally because we’ve checked the map and the performance of the Canadian people is just the same as it is here, but the figures for this country show that the United States has 6% of the world’s population. We occupy 7% of its land surface. However, we own 71% of the world’s automobiles, 56% of its telephones, 50% of the radios, 29% of the railroads and 83% of all the television sets. You might like to know that the people of the United States own 90% of the world’s bathtubs, too. This country produces 59% of the world’s steel, 46% of its electric power, 50% of the oil, 56% of the corn, 42% of the cotton, 33% of the coal, 31% of the copper, 38% of the iron and 44% of all the manufactured goods in the world is made by 6% of the world’s population.

And these boys with their theories are telling you it doesn’t work. Well, young friends, it’s up to those of us who know better to stand up and challenge those... well, I can’t think of a favorable word at the moment. But you see, if we don’t challenge them, they’ll take the day. I was in a barber shop a while back. A fella came in, he obviously worked on a railroad, sat down, and the first thing he did, he started grumbling. He grumbled about the railroad. He grumbled about his working conditions and said, “Why, it’s too bad they make me work overtime. They pay me too much.” And they don’t do this. And they don’t do that. Oh, he went on and on. Oh yeah, they paid him too much because, you see, he didn’t want to work that hard. He couldn’t stand the overtime. He wanted to go home. And so everything was wrong. Finally, he says, “The government ought to take over the railroad.”

And about that time, I was going right through the roof. I says, “Friend, I know a place in the world they do it your way. And there’s nothing keeping you here. In fact, I got enough money in my pocket to buy you a ticket, one way. And you can go, because you don’t have to stay here and do it our way.” But he got kind of mad and he left, and I left. But you see, that wasn’t the clue. What I’m trying to say to you is this, that every time he comes in the barbershop now, he does it differently. See, before this, always when he came in, he grumbled about how rotten our society was and our system was. But now, they tell me when he comes in, he sits down and he looks around. He’s afraid I might be there again.

But the core of this and the problem is that he’d been coming to the barbershop for years, and nobody challenged him. You see, he kept downgrading America every time he came in and he got away with it. And if you say something long enough, pretty soon you begin to believe it. And pretty soon you think everybody believes it. And pretty soon you’ve dug your own grave only because a few of us didn’t stand up and say, “Hey, Mac, it’s not that way. Let me tell you about how great it is in America. Let me tell you how great it is to be a Canadian.” Until we start to do that, we too will contribute to our own demise.

A fellow by the name of Robert Murphy, a former diplomat, former under secretary of state, said this, “Only by fostering private enterprise can the United States truly capitalize on its most basic advantage over communism.” And another fellow from England by the name of Winston Churchill, said this, “Socialism is a philosophy of failure, the creed of ignorance, and the gospel of envy. Its inherent virtue is the equal sharing of misery.”

And I would close with these words: To me, the strength of our system doesn’t necessarily lie in the free enterprise system, but it lies in the fact that we have always had mutual respect for each other and we will be no greater than that respect. And at the bottom of that respect lies a faith that most of us believe that we are placed on this earth by God with a responsibility to use the talents we have been given. And certainly, the prayer that we had at the opening of this session said the same, that this is our real responsibility today. When this country was founded and the pilgrims came here, they had a Thanksgiving Day and they gave thanks. And they pioneered and they went forth, and they used their talents. I find today in Washington an effort to get rid of the words “In God We Trust” on our money. And in my opinion, when they get rid of the words, you better get ready to throw the money away, because it won’t be worth anything either.

Just as surely as I stand up for our system, I stand up for my religious beliefs. And too many people are always backing off, because someplace, somebody said, “Well, don’t discuss religion and politics, because all it leads to is an argument.” Well, young people, it’s time we took on the argument and it’s time we debated every issue and it’s time when everybody else started telling us what’s wrong, we stood up and said, “Hey man, let me tell you what’s right.” And you watch the other crowd. They’ll wilt, because they don’t have the performance figures to back them up. They just got theory.

When somebody tells me our system’s out of date, I ask them how many people from the free world were shot climbing into Berlin on the other side. And I ask how many tunnels were dug from this side. And what’s happened is that the rest of the world is in one big prison camp, trying to escape to the freedoms that we enjoy. And you and I better shout about it. And whenever anybody will tell you it taint so, you tell them it tis. We believe, and have always believed, in this country, that man was created in the image of God, and that he was given talents and responsibilities, and was instructed to use them, to make this world a better place in which to live. And you see, this is the really great thing of America. And this is where it contrasts with everything that Russia and other godless societies are attempting to do.

Because you see, at heart, we believe that man was created, and that in him is a living spirit. That he’s not just a bunch of dirt and clay put together for a few years until we bury him, but that he has greater depth and greater responsibilities than that. And that’s why we respect each other. And that’s why we care for each other. And that’s why we must stand together and give thanks for the things we enjoy.

And so I’m asking you to sell America, along with whatever business or profession you go into. I want to remind you of your position of responsibility as a leader, because that you are. You’ve proven it by coming here. But remember to extend that greeting and a friendly hand to all your fellow Americans and your fellow Canadians, because they, too, were created in the image of God. And with your respectability, regardless of where they come from or their color or their economic station, we’ll go together as a united people, building a country that can go on and on and on with the blessings of God.

Let me close with these words, and they are taken from Thomas Wolfe. And he said this, “So, then, to every man his chance, to every man, regardless of his birth, his shining golden opportunity, to every man, the right to live, to work, to be himself, and to become whatever thing his manhood and his vision can combine to make him, this, seeker, is the promise of America.”

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Spoiler alert: Here at The Believe! Journal, we love America.

We make no apology for our patriotism. We believe this is the greatest country in human history, and that America’s example has uplifted the world. We also believe that every generation of Americans has done the hard work of better applying our national principles. Our people have continually forged a more perfect union, grounded in freedom, equality, and justice for all.

But our love for America is increasingly uncommon. As our country celebrates its 250^th birthday this summer, a lot of people are wondering if America deserves their love. There are even those who say America is unlovable.

This dangerous trend demands all the attention—and action—we can muster.

A half-century ago, my Dad wrote a stump speech that we still talk about to this day. He called it “Selling America,” and over the course of 40 minutes, that’s exactly what he did. He sold America to his audience—its history, its ideals, its undeniable impact on human happiness and prosperity.

He gave that speech countless times, and everyone who heard it walked away with a deeper appreciation for America. More importantly, they gained an intense belief that they could make America better. They bought into the country’s promise. And they went out to sell America, too.

Today, with the country turning 250 years old, we need to sell America all over again. To each other. To our children. And we should start by selling America to ourselves.

Let’s start by renewing our belief in the incredible power of our country’s principles.

Principles like human dignity. It’s tempting nowadays to think that some Americans are worth less than others. Maybe they don’t share our political views. Maybe they’re stuck on the lower rungs of the economic ladder. But writing people off is always wrong. We all have innate and equal worth—and we all have a gift that we can use to lift up ourselves and the country with us.

Principles like accountability. We’re losing the belief that people should be held responsible for their actions. But if we aren’t held responsible, we can never rise. We need to regain our belief that expectations are essential to life—and the higher the bar, the higher we climb, as individuals and communities.

Principles like family and faith. These fundamental building blocks of society are being eroded before our eyes. But we need strong families to survive as a country. And nothing spurs a person to thrive like belief in the Almighty.

These are just a few American ideals we need to sell. But we also need to ask what version of America we’re buying.

Maybe you think that our country’s problems have become too big for us to solve together. Maybe you think we’ve reached a point in our nation’s history when the government really should call more of the shots. But outsourcing our own agency is never the answer. Instead of expecting more of others, we should always expect more of ourselves.

Maybe you think that injustice is rampant in America. Fair enough. I see plenty of problems, too. But that doesn’t mean we should throw it all out, much less start over. The path forward is the same as ever: Find where our country is violating its principles, then apply those principles to right the wrong. If it was good enough for Abraham Lincoln, it’s good enough for us.

In this issue, our contributors are all selling America, starting with Rich DeVos. His speech Selling America is on the very next page. After that, here’s who and what you can expect:

• My brother, Dan DeVos, pays homage to our Dad, who would have celebrated his 100th birthday this year. Rich DeVos is the animating force behind this whole Journal, and Dan, alongside Kent MacDonald and Timothy Nash, reflects on the deep love for America that shaped his life and legacy.

• Mike Rowe tells the story of getting his shoes shined at the San Francisco Airport–a strange experience that taught him something about the American Dream.

• Kelly Merryman Hoogstraten is CEO of the Wonder Project, which just released the movie Young Washington in theatres nationwide. The nation’s first President proved that “even a pawn can take a king,” and our job today is to inspire our children with that quintessential American spirit.

• Brian Hooks, CEO of Stand Together, says that America’s problems are more solvable than you think. In the same way that previous generations united to tackle challenges from the bottom-up, we can fix everything from education to poverty–no socialism or protectionism needed.

• Gonzalo Schwarz, head of the Archbridge Institute, argues that the American Dream is both real and resilient. He has the polling to prove it–and it disproves the popular negative narrative that you hear in much of the media.

• Kevin Gentry, founder of TenX Strategies, argues that “America is about big ideas.” But there’s a twist: The biggest ideas could start with you. What are you doing to Go Big?

• John Tillman, founder of the Hall of Giants museum about entrepreneurs, has a head-turning claim: Toxic masculinity met its match in America. Our nation, more than any other, has channeled men’s natural tendencies into entrepreneurship–which is why America has become the economic envy of the entire world.

• Nate Fischer, who invests through New Founding, is making a bet on America in the digital age. He’s bullish on technology–and Americans’ ability to harness it for the benefit of our families, communities, and international leadership.

• Aaron Renn, from the Manhattan Institute, says America needs to sell itself to the American people. Namely, we need our leaders to prove they’re serious about solving the problems our country faces and delivering a new era of affordability and prosperity.

• Noah C. Gould, of the Acton Institute, gives a modern spin on Benjamin Franklin’s famous phrase: “A Republic, if you can keep it.” He says we have a community that we need to keep, because voluntary association is key to overcoming our national challenges.

• Caleb Whitmer, of the Acton Institute, argues that we can still forge a cohesive national identity out of the many different threads that now exist in America. E Pluribus Unum is more than just a phrase–it’s a call to action for every generation, including ours.

• John C. Pinheiro, also of the Acton Institute, tells about the time he met George W. Bush… and how he told the President that he liked the first GW (George Washington) better. His explanation is worth a read.

• Alan Smolinisky, co-owner of the Los Angeles Dodgers, gave us permission to reprint his 2019 Time Magazine piece explaining his purchase of his favorite baseball team. Spoiler alert: It had everything to do with his Dad, who came to the country with nothing and learned to love America by watching the Dodgers.

We also have a few entries from our editors: Finding America in the Ruins of Atlantis, What Should Be in America’s Ruin Garden, and America’s Lost Civilization–And How To Rediscover It. Don’t let the titles fool you: They’re all more uplifting than they sound!

My hope is that you find inspiration in the pages ahead, reminding yourself why America deserves your love. But most of all, I hope that you put your patriotism into action. As the country celebrates its 250^th birthday, we need more Americans to step up and tackle the challenges we face. Ultimately, selling America is about buying the promise that you can make a difference—and achieve the unimaginable.

Oh, and since we’re selling America in this issue, the first piece you’ll read is Dad’s speech. Even a half-century later, it’s a call to action for the ages.

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This summer, I had the privilege of speaking at Acton University to a global audience who believes, as I do, that faith and free enterprise are the best formula for human flourishing. As America approaches its 250th birthday, I wanted to reflect on the ideas that set our nation on its course: that our rights come from God, not from kings or central planners; that we are citizens, not subjects; and that these self-evident truths, as powerful as they are, are not self-perpetuating. Drawing again from my father’s wisdom, I returned to a simple framework that he called Atmosphere, Attitude, and Action. Atmosphere is the people and ideas you surround yourself with. Attitude is the emotional toolkit for making the best of any situation. And Action is how we make use of our innate talents to shape the world around us. These I believe were key to taking America from the promise of Plymouth Rock to the superpower it is today, and will be key in holding back the rising tide of socialism, communism, and all the other -isms that threaten to lock away its untapped potential forever. You can listen to the full talk—or read the complete transcript—below.

Believe! Acton University 2026 Plenary with Doug DeVos - Full Transcript

It’s a tremendous honor to be here with this incredible group. To the entire Acton team — thank you for giving me this opportunity. I looked at your schedule and I’m not sure how I made the cut. When I listen to Fernando speak, I think, what am I doing up here? He did a lovely job articulating the things that we all care about so deeply. I want to talk about the ideas of faith and the unlimited potential that people have, and how free markets and free enterprise intersect to help people realize that potential. We have an issue that faces all of us: will we be able to continue? The future is unknown. What sort of future is going to be created as we move forward together? We’re here because we have a particular point of view and there’s a future that we would like to see created. So I want to walk through how we might think about the things we need to do as we go forward.

As a host to so many from around the world, I have to do a little red, white, and blue. We’re celebrating 250 years of our country since our founding. So I have to start with the Declaration. The ideas that were part of it — earthshaking ideas, founded on biblical principles given to us by God — came together in a document that crystallized a course for a new nation.

The ideas that come through so clearly: these self-evident truths, that we were created equal and that we have these unalienable rights. The whole idea is to take these rights and these opportunities — life, liberty, and the pursuit of happiness — to not just feel good, but to be good, to live a life of virtue, and to find our way forward. When I spent time at the Constitution Center, there was what they called the drafting table — a chance to go behind the scenes of all the work done before the Declaration was finalized. What was in? What was out? What was changed along the way? And in that process, there’s one part where you see a word that’s a little different, smudged, more boldly written. There’s always been a question about what the change was. The original word was “subjects.” They changed it to “citizens.”

Think of the difference one word can make. Think of the difference one thought, one idea expressed, can make — the difference between being a citizen or being a subject. What that says about our rights coming from God and not from kings. Each and every one of us in this room, each and every one of us in this world, can be viewed in this way. It’s a powerful change.

We’re going to be celebrating the 4th of July at 250 years. But a number of Fourth of Julys ago, Frederick Douglass gave his speech, “What to the Slave Is the 4th of July?” He spoke about the fact that he wasn’t included in that declaration at that time. But he saw in it the promise and the hope, and he articulated this powerful phrase: the principles contained within it are our saving principles. Stand by those principles. Be true to them on all occasions, in all places, against all foes, at whatever cost. What a great challenge for each and every one of us.

Now, let’s take these principles and think about how they were put together in the declaration and in our country. We were fortunate — it was a point in time when so many of these ideas were being formed around the world, and we were able as a country to put them in one place, to create an experiment, a startup if you will. As a business person, I love the idea of startups. Maybe the United States had that benefit. And in fact, that’s the same idea my father and his business partner Jay Van Andel put into Amway — the idea that anyone from anywhere could achieve anything. They named it Amway: the American way.

We’ve been building the business for nearly 70 years. But there’s an interesting piece here. Once the business started, there were a lot of people from Canada saying, “Hey, this could work up there.” And so Dad and Jay had a dilemma: do we call the business Amway in Canada? Maybe we should call it Canway. They actually had that discussion. As you heard, we’re now in 100 countries and territories around the world. It would have been very confusing had they gone down that track.

But they had an idea. They said, “It’s really not confined to our country. We believe that people all over the world share these ideas. These ideas really resonate and connect with people globally.”

I’ll take you to 1979 in Malaysia. I had a chance to grow up in the Amway business and I made this trip while I was in high school. We’d been in Malaysia for about three years at that time and were having a convention. Business had started very successfully with a few thousand people coming. And when Dad visited, he was able to get a meeting with the prime minister of Malaysia — a really big deal. As he reflected and told us about it, he said the prime minister congratulated him and then said, “It’s interesting that things are going well for you, because our country is struggling right now. The greatest natural resources of Malaysia are copper, tin, and oil, and all their prices are depressed on the global market. But here you are with thousands of people at this event. You’ve been growing for three years. What’s your secret?”

He said, “Well, Mr. Prime Minister, you may believe the greatest natural resources of Malaysia are copper, tin, and oil. But in Amway, we believe the greatest natural resources of Malaysia are the people of Malaysia. And in our business, we invest in People.”

What a powerful thought. We invest in people — just like Fernando, just like each and every one of you. So what do you get when you combine the principles that we should fight for at any cost with that connection to people? What can happen when you start to apply those things at scale?

What happens is the hockey stick of human history — total GDP throughout history. It seems pretty bad there for the first 1,800 years. No matter your station, life was pretty miserable in virtually every way. You may have been royalty, but you still died young, your children died, you were living in difficult conditions. But something happened. These ideas came together — not just in the United States, but in places around the world. And these ideas continue to generate wealth and opportunity and prosperity and human flourishing.

It was those principles and our founders that enabled people to go to work and create the things that they created. We talk about this at our headquarters. We have a display that was in the World’s Fair in 1964 in New York — the Ten Pillars of Economic Wisdom, which you would walk through to reach the Hall of Free Enterprise. Dad and Jay loved the display and brought it to Amway headquarters. It’s still there today. The tenth pillar articulates this idea amazingly well: “The productivity of the tools — that is, the efficiency of the human energy applied in connection with their use — has always been highest in a competitive society in which the economic decisions are made by millions of progress-seeking individuals, rather than an estate-planned society in which those decisions are made by a handful of all-powerful people, regardless of how well- meaning, unselfish, sincere, or intelligent those people may be.” Nobody can make the right decision for you better than you.

Now, it’s easy to look at that hockey stick and say, “Wow, it’s just going to continue.” But as Benjamin Franklin said when asked after leaving the constitutional convention, “What have you given us?” His answer: “A republic, if you can keep it.” And that’s our Challenge.

These principles — and I know not all of us are from America, this is a global audience — but we share together the principles and ideas that have created an environment of human flourishing like the world has never seen. We have to keep these ideas going forward, because we know there are examples of empires that have gone away and failed: the Romans, the Mayans, the Incas, the Greeks, the Egyptians. Hundreds, sometimes thousands of years — but for some reason, they didn’t continue. There’s no promise that things will continue like this for us or for our world either.

Is the glass half empty or half full? We know the risks are coming back around. Secularism wants to come. There’s a large group of people that want to remove God from our society, that think God is too limiting. And if our rights come from God, then obviously the rights of humans don’t matter much to them. It’s nothing new. Some of you have seen that in Europe in World War II. The movie about Dietrich Bonhoeffer — how he stood up to those elements where leaders want to create themselves as gods and replace God. There are elements of that that continue today. When there’s no God, there’s no hope. We know that in our lives.

And then you have socialism and communism back again. Round two. Like the sequel, right? Comes back. New players, new actors, new things. Same old script. No innovation. No creativity, no free enterprise, no wealth creation. New ways to say it, new ways to sell it. New customers every year, new generations coming through. As we talked about earlier, in the declaration these truths are self-evident. But that doesn’t mean they’re self-perpetuating. It doesn’t just go on unless we — and others with us — help it go on. That’s what we have to do. Sometimes common sense isn’t so common. Sometimes those selling socialist ideas seem pretty attractive to people. We have to continue expressing our beliefs. And that’s what my father did when he wrote Believe about 50 years ago — an expression of what he believed, lived every day. So what I want to talk about in the time I have left is how we are going to live it every day. What do we do to take this forward? How do we make sure our beliefs drive our behavior? How do we ensure that we feel strongly enough about what we believe that we’re willing to take the risks necessary to think and act differently? What innovation, what creativity are we putting into making sure these ideas connect with more people? How do we connect the dots better? How do we continue to reflect our belief that God has granted us incredible love and gifts and potential — and express that to other people? Because God loves us, we can love others in the same way.

So I want to put forward a framework of three A’s: atmosphere, attitude, and action.

Atmosphere

We are here in this place and this has been curated. This event, this university has been thought through. The Acton team has put together this program so that when you get here, you know you’re in a place to move forward. You know you’ve found the right spot. That’s why churches look the way they do around the world. When you go into a place of worship, you stop in awe and feel the presence of God in a new way. Put yourself in a place where the atmosphere just rolls over you — whether it’s La Sagrada Familia in Barcelona or St. Peter’s Basilica in Rome. Places that take your breath away, that put you in a different position. There’s a culture. There’s a family. There’s an Expectation.

In business, we work to create culture every day. At Amway, we talk about freedom, family, hope, and reward. These were the things my father and Jay Van Andel put into the business. When we would hire executives and they’d walk into our headquarters building — we have those words written there — we’d say, “If you walked in and said, ‘I’m home,’ well then, let’s keep talking. If you walked in and said, ‘These people are nuts,’ it’s been nice to know you. Move on.”

What are the things you can do to create a place, create a culture, create a sense of feeling, a sense of family, a chemistry that’s necessary to bring people together as a team? Whether it’s Brazil or Scotland or any other team, you can have great individuals, but if they don’t play together as a team, it’s not going to work. It takes work. I want to encourage you to think about the atmosphere you place yourself in. Are you in a place that helps you grow, where the culture helps you thrive? Or are you in a place that holds you back?

We always found in the Amway business that people would get excited at the meeting and then go home, and their brother-in-law would say they were crazy. They had a decision to make: either keep listening to their brother-in-law, or come back to the meeting and do something different. We have to make those decisions for ourselves. And we can create environments for others. We can create the place of where we want to go.

Attitude

Atmosphere is where you are, but attitude is what you think. What’s in your mind? You’re talking about dreamers and doers — people that are thinking of new things all the time, who won’t let no stop them, who see the opportunities and not just the barriers. The impact that people like this have on our lives is immeasurable. My father had heart disease for many, many years. He had bypass surgery, a heart attack, and ultimately got to a place where he was in need of a heart transplant. Nobody would take him in the US. He was too old, too sick, had too many challenges. There was one doctor in London who would consider him. The chances were slim, but he went anyway. He and Mom did. And every morning in their devotions, they started with Philippians 4: “Rejoice in the Lord always. I say it again, rejoice.” Their attitude was always positive. “Here’s what we’re going to do when we get out of here. Here’s where we’re going to go. I’m going to see my children, my grandchildren. I want to see them get married. I want to see them graduate. I’ve got something to live for.” The doctor said, “You’ve got to have something to live for because it’s going to be hard.” And that’s what he chose.

How do we think about things? What does that passage end with? “Whatever is true, whatever is noble, whatever is right, whatever is pure, lovely, admirable, excellent, praiseworthy — think about such things.” We all know people that gripe all the time and can find the half-empty side of the world. You need that sometimes, to have somebody give you a dose of reality. But when you’re always thinking negatively, it’s going to continue to hold you back.

I had an experience when I was in third or fourth grade — I didn’t think I could make friends, struggling at school. My father would not accept that. So he took me to school one day and gave me a pep talk the whole way: I was capable of making friends, I was a good kid, I could go out, introduce myself, say something, go meet somebody. As he let me out of the car and I was walking up the sidewalk to the school, he had the window down, looking at me: “Go get him, Mr. Happy.” I still remember it. I can still see him. So I gave it a shot. Think positively. Think about the right side. Manage your thoughts well.

Action

How do we take all these things and do something? In the Amway business, it’s a simple business opportunity. But Rich and Jay just believed that if you gave somebody an opportunity, they’d do something with it. More and more people around the world complain, “I don’t have an opportunity, I don’t have a chance.” Well, here you go. There are a lot of people who reject it and a lot who think our business is crazy, but a lot of people who saw it as an opportunity for them and did something with it. They’ve done great things. They’ve built big businesses. They’ve helped a lot of people — because they saw an opportunity and they took action.

At the end of the day, that’s what we need to do. We’ve been here, talking, thinking, communicating, building relationships, doing so many wonderful things. But at some point you’ve got to do something. You’ve got to take that step. Take that risk. Risk failure. Make a mistake. Learn. Try again. Chris talked about some of the sailing I’ve done. I have no business sailing at the level I’m trying to do it. Sometimes I have no clue. But I tried it anyway. I lost a lot. But work hard enough, learn enough, meet enough good people — I’ve won a few times, too. And that was a great journey.

Whether you’re walking onto the field, or standing up in front of an orchestra, or like my youngest daughter who is a dancer — on a big stage, dressed up, all alone, waiting for her music to start. Scared the daylights out of me. I wouldn’t have done that. But there she is, getting in the game, taking the risk, taking that step, taking the action to move Forward.

My father used to talk about a quote: “A great tradition can be inherited, but greatness itself must be won by each of us.” Whether that’s as an individual, as a team, as a country, or as a generation — the future has to be won by each of us. We have to get in the game, take steps, take risks, be willing to fail, learn, get back up, do it again, keep moving forward.

So I’d ask you: can we do this? Of course we can. And I want to share a quick story about an example, because you’re sitting in this hall and in this city where we went through this process about 50 years ago.

President Ford was running for re-election — our favorite son, an amazing person. Never elected vice president, never elected president, but served at one of the more difficult times in our nation’s history. Served with dignity and honor and integrity, did what was right for the nation, held us together, ran a tough race, and lost. In Grand Rapids, after it was done, we wanted to give him a parade, celebrate all that he’d done. And the Secret Service said no. The parade route was too risky. All the buildings were vacant. Nobody was there. There was only one building on the parade route that was occupied. Shooters, risks everywhere. What a blow.

Well, Grand Rapids rallied. Volunteers came together, and we found a way to do that parade. We found a way to celebrate him as best we could. But the message was clearly delivered: we’ve got a problem. Our city’s in trouble. What are we going to do about it?

A few people got together. They didn’t like the feeling that we were behind. They said, “We’re going to do something about it. We’re going to take action.” People like Peter Seia, my Dad, Jay — the Cooks, the Kennedys, the Heisings — all these names in our community that came together, building on the legacy of the generations that had gone before, said we’re going to do something different. And I had a front row seat. I was young. I had a chance to watch this happen in Grand Rapids, in our city.

I remember being at home seeing the plans of the hotel that was going to be built. And we got involved with a project — it wasn’t something Amway did, but we had helped find a developer to build a building right down the road. And the developer didn’t quite have the same value system as the rest of Grand Rapids. Kind of did it on the cheap. Didn’t work so well. The plumbing — I don’t know if you know about big buildings, but plumbing is pretty important for tenants. And he used a different type of material on the exterior that was cheaper, that should have worked, but it was falling off. So when you walked by it, the bricks could literally fall on you. Not a good building.

Well, he left town and Dad and Jay were kind of holding the bag. And there was a decision to make. I happened to be in the room listening. A lot of finance people came in. Two paths: collect the insurance, take it down, pretend it never happened and minimize your loss. Or you can rebuild it, but that’s going to cost a lot more. I remember that some of us in my generation thought, you know, taking the building down could be kind of good. There were all these disaster movies being made at the time. We could put Grand Rapids on the map. We’ll call Bruce Willis. We thought that was a great idea. Until Jay Van Andel just sat at the end of the table shaking his head, looking at us like we were idiots. And as we noticed that, my father said, “Well, Jay, what do you think?” And Jay just sucked in his breath and said, “No, no, no. We don’t blow things up. We build things up. We’re going to rebuild it. We’re going to make it what it was supposed to be in the first place. We’re going to take that risk and move forward.”

What a great lesson. I had a chance to hear that, and then to see what happened as a result — what Grand Rapids is today. You get a chance to see it. I got a chance to live it. Because the generations before me took action. They took the steps necessary. They took the risks. They made mistakes and learned from them. But they didn’t stop. They kept going. And they created a place for us, for our generation, for visitors from around the world to come and be here. It’s a small example on the global scale. And we still have work to do — it’s not done. Now it’s up to our generation and to future generations to take it further, to stay true to these values and principles, to make it even better as we move forward.

Grand Rapids today is an incredible example of what happens when you have a group of people that put themselves in the right atmosphere, had the right attitude, and were willing to take action. They changed our city for the better.

Just one closing story. A number of years ago, my father was at a graduation ceremony — around 2008, 2009, that wonderful economic time, the great recession. As you can imagine, the graduates were a little nervous. And all the speakers that had gone before my dad were in that vein: “It’s a tough time out there. Hard to find a job. Good luck.” Complete doom and gloom. At a graduation.

Finally, my father got up and he couldn’t take it. He said, “Don’t listen to them. Forget about getting a job. Start a business. Do something on your own. Take a risk. Go out into an adventure. You don’t have to wait for somebody to give you a job. Make a job of your own. You can do it.” He got into this whole flurry. He said, “I don’t care if it’s a good time or if it’s a bad time. Now is the only time you have.”

And that’s where we are right now. Now is the only time we have. A great tradition can be inherited, but greatness itself must be won. I am so honored to be here tonight with a group of people who share our faith in God, our belief in these principles, and are willing to apply them in every situation — but are also willing to do the work necessary to win in the generations to come. Thank you for your time. Thanks for this opportunity. Enjoy the night.

Johann Kurtz recently sat down with Doug DeVos on the Believe! The American Stream podcast to discuss what it means to build a legacy—not just on the level of family, but up to the level of culture and civilization.

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Christians Shouldn’t Avoid Tech. We Should Dominate It.

Joel Chakra argues that Christians must engage and help shape the future of technology, warning that if people of faith retreat from AI and innovation, others will define its values and direction…

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a month ago · Joel Chakra

The classic book that taught us how to Believe!

Believe! is a timeless expression of American principles, reintroduced in this 50th anniversary edition for a new generation. As we approach America’s 250th, its message speaks to both personal renewal and the opportunity for a broader national comeback.

If the book has resonated with you, we’d be grateful if you’d consider leaving a review on Amazon.

Reflect with The Believe! Concierge:

Want to go deeper? Try The Believe! Concierge—an interactive way to put these principles into practice in your work and daily life. For a more natural conversation, use voice mode. Try it now.

I’ve seen the tech industry up close. I spent nearly 15 years helping build venture-backed companies. Along the way, I had the privilege of working closely with many of the leading investors and builders in the space. I got a front-row seat to where technology was headed—what it could do, and who was shaping it.

And as a Christian, that vantage point left me deeply concerned.

I worked in a world that was almost entirely divorced from faith. Silicon Valley is the beating heart of secularism in America, and it shows. There’s little-to-no concern for human flourishing, individual dignity, and people’s innate need for community and mission in life. As for salvation? Hardly anyone in tech has ever thought about using their work to reflect and spread the Gospel. How could they, when they’ve never heard the Gospel themselves?

This lack of faith has given rise to deeply concerning platforms and products. TikTok is famously a vehicle for Chinese communist spying and manipulation. FTX—the bankrupt cryptocurrency exchange—was predicated on massive fraud. A particularly heartbreaking example is Roblox, where child exploitation is rampant.

Clearly, tech needs the purifying message of Jesus Christ. But hardly any Christians want to deliver that message. They don’t want to be involved in tech’s development. They assume the industry is too stained, too sinful, just too far gone. Better to steer clear.

This lack of Christian courage is far more terrifying than anything I saw coming out of Silicon Valley.

As Christians, we are called to witness in every sphere of human activity. That includes the world of innovation, and throughout history, Christians have frequently played the decisive role. Johannes Gutenberg developed the printing press because of his faith. Isaac Newton’s love for God led him to numerous breakthroughs in physics, mathematics, and astronomy. In America in particular, Christians have a long and proud history of founding businesses and transforming society for the better.

Tech should not be any different. Yet Christians largely view it differently. Artificial intelligence is a case in point. Barely 28% of Christians say it can do positive things in the world. But that’s only true if Christians aren’t deeply involved in AI’s development. Artificial intelligence, like every technology going back to the wheel, is morally neutral. But it can be directed in morally right or wrong ways. Someone will direct it. If it’s not a Christian, it will be a non-Christian. Or an anti-Christian.

Biblical principles make the best business principles. The tech industry urgently needs a lot more Biblically minded people both working and investing in it. Right now, it’s estimated that secular venture firms manage about $1.25 trillion worth of assets in tech while faith-driven venture capitalists only manage about $1.5 billion. That’s a potential 83,233% difference. Closing that gap is a moral imperative.

Far from leaving the industry, I’m working with other Christians to shape tech through the Tebow Group and the WaterStone Impact Fund. We find and fund faith-led founders, helping them compete with the biggest secular brands. We want these founders to succeed by building products and services that reflect the faith, lift up the vulnerable, and defend the defenseless. We want their success to inspire the rest of the industry to follow their lead—and do what’s right and just.

We envision a tech industry that’s dominated by Christians and a Christian worldview. To be clear, that vision is nowhere close to being achieved. But it can be achieved—and it must be achieved. It will happen as more Christians step up as founders, developers, and funders. It will happen as more Christians come out of the shadows and say: I’m unapologetic about my faith—and I’m equally unapologetic about building tech that reflects my faith.

We know that Christians can drive this kind of systemic change. The Bible proves it.

In Acts, the Apostles confronted a world that had never heard of Jesus Christ. They knew that spreading the Gospel would define the rest of their lives. They knew it would likely cost their lives. But they did it anyway, fanning out across the Roman Empire and the wider world. They put their trust in the Holy Spirit, who guided their steps—and the faith to victory.

This is our “Acts Moment” in technology. Now it’s up to Christians to meet this moment, Romans 8:11 says the same Spirit that rose Jesus from the dead now lives in us. In that same confidence we know the Holy Spirit still works through those who believe and lead.

Joel Chakra is COO of the Tebow Group and Managing Partner at the WaterStone Impact Fund.

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Dear Subscribers,

I recently had the opportunity to join Charles and Chase Koch for the unveiling of their new book, Becoming a Principle-Driven Leader: 41 Principles to Build an Enduring Business.

Hearing them share the stories behind these principles, tested and refined across six decades of building one of the most enduring businesses in the world, was genuinely inspiring.

At the heart of what they’ve written is a conviction our family has long held: that principles aren’t bound to any particular era. They’re unchanging truths that help you navigate changing times.

That’s exactly what Believe! is about. My father, Rich DeVos built his life around a core set of principles: belief in free enterprise, in human dignity, in accountability, and in the potential of every person to achieve something extraordinary. What Charles and Chase have written carries that same spirit. Their 41 principles aren’t a corporate checklist. They are a framework for how to live, lead, and build something that endures, in business and beyond.

Watching Charles and Chase together was a reminder of the power of generational legacy, and of what my own father passed on. I hope you'll pick up a copy. These are principles worth sitting with, and I think you'll find them as applicable to your life as they have been to mine.

The book launch was recorded and is available on podcast platforms and YouTube.

Artificial intelligence is certainly new. But predictions about its impact are actually quite old.

In 1977, the first true book on Artificial Intelligence was published by British polymath Margaret Boden. In it she raised questions that feel startlingly current today; self-driving cars, medical chatbots, major disruptions in labor and education, and the impending boom in leisure were all in her crosshairs. What she saw 49 years ago is the perfect example of futurist Roy Amara’s famous dictum: “We tend to overestimate the effect of a technology in the short run and underestimate the effect in the long run.” Likewise, C.S. Lewis, in his masterful book The Abolition of Man, foresaw the present crisis with uncomfortable precision, warning that “what appears to be humanity’s power over nature is in reality, the power of some men over other men, with nature as the instrument.”

The central question confronting Christians today is not whether artificial intelligence will eliminate certain jobs (it will). It is whether the civilization being built around technological innovation will retain any coherent account of why human beings matter, and what labor really means.

The answer to that question is not primarily economic. It is theological. Martin Luther’s doctrine of vocation and Abraham Kuyper’s concepts of sphere sovereignty and common grace, offer compelling resources for meeting this moment with both historical seriousness and religious wisdom.

The starting point is the nature of the human person. Created in the image of God, humans are individually unique, rational, the subject of moral agency, and co-creators, who accordingly possess intrinsic value and dignity, implying certain rights and duties for both them and other persons. This is not a marginal theological footnote to economic theory. It is the foundation on which all legitimate economic life must be built. Once it is abandoned, the worker simply becomes a cost variable to be optimized, and the question of whether a machine can do the job more cheaply becomes the only question worth asking.

Against this reduction, the Lutheran doctrine of vocation insists that work is not primarily an economic transaction but a sacred calling. God himself, Luther taught, works through the ordinary labor of farmers, craftsmen, teachers, and tradespeople to care for his creation. The neighbor is fed, clothed, healed, and educated not through miraculous intervention but through the daily callings of men and women who are, in their work, instruments of divine love. This means that the worth of the person who works is never merely derived from productivity. It is prior to productivity, grounded in the image of God and confirmed by the calling of God, neither of which can be automated away or rendered obsolete by a more efficient algorithm.

This is precisely the crisis that technological acceleration now poses. What historian David Nye called America’s civil religion of technological progress has, in the present generation, achieved a kind of certainty that resists challenge. The fourth industrial revolution, with its fusion of physical, digital, and biological systems, is reshaping economic life with a velocity and scope that previous industrial transformations did not possess. The core spiritual danger of this “technological spirit” is confusing the vast possibilities of technology with divine power itself, elevating mechanical production above all other forms of human activity and measuring human worth by the criterion of efficiency alone. A civilization that worships its own tools will eventually sacrifice its people on that altar.

Abraham Kuyper’s doctrine of sphere sovereignty provides a structural theological response to this danger. For Kuyper, the created order is a rich plurality of distinct spheres, each with its own God-ordained dignity and authority. The family, the church, the state, the world of commerce, the academy, the arts: each sphere has its own inner logic and proper boundaries, and no one may claim sovereignty over the others. His famous declaration that “there is not a square inch in the whole domain of our human existence over which Christ, who is Sovereign over all, does not cry: ‘Mine!’” is not a call for ecclesiastical dominance over economic life. It is a claim against the idolatry of any single sphere. When the logic of technological efficiency colonizes the family, reducing parenthood to optimization, or when it colonizes education, reducing learning to job preparation, or when it reduces the human worker to a unit of measurable output, sphere sovereignty has been violated. One domain has claimed an authority it was never given.

The Kuyperian tradition frames this concern in terms of the relationship between liberty and virtue. A free market that operates without a virtuous culture to govern it does not serve human flourishing; it eventually consumes it. The purpose of economic life is inseparable from the person who participates in it, and we are made for something higher than economic activity alone. This moral sense and goal must be woven through market transactions. Markets, in other words, display the virtues and vices of the people who inhabit them. Without theology, commercial culture has no answer for why any of it ultimately matters.

Work itself is a good that is part of God’s original design and therefore contributes to human flourishing. We were created to work, just as our Creator works, and that work will be part of the new heaven and the new earth. But the modern age has progressively stripped work of this theological grounding. Christians once understood work as a calling from God, but over time that vision faded and work became simply what you do to earn a living. When automation threatens to take that away, people lose not just income but identity, because nothing has replaced the older, deeper answer to why their work mattered in the first place.

Kuyper’s doctrine of Common Grace makes clear that the human drive to do good work is no accident. God’s grace sustains the human drive to build, create, and contribute even in people who do not acknowledge him. The engineer, the entrepreneur, the artist who has never set foot in a church is still, in Kuyper’s view, participating in God’s design for creation. This matters enormously for how Christians think about economic life. Wealth is not a fixed pie to be divided but something genuinely created when human beings bring their God-given ingenuity to bear on the world. That vision dignifies work across the board and gives Christians a reason for hope rather than panic when technology disrupts the economy.

As Lewis foresaw over 80 years ago, The Fourth industrial revolution concentrates that power in remarkably few hands, and the theological traditions assembled here offer a principled resistance to its worst tendencies. Not a resistance rooted in nostalgia or fear of technology as such, but one rooted in an affirmation that the human person, as image-bearer, co-creator, and neighbor, occupies a dignity that no market logic, no efficiency calculus, and no technological capability can revoke.

The Christian task in this moment is clear: to remind workers that their worth was never in their output, and that no algorithm can touch what God has declared. Christians in business, policy, and education must resist the creeping assumption that economic logic should govern every corner of life. The tradition running from Luther through Kuyper gives us the resources to do exactly that. Markets should serve people. Technology should serve communities. And all of it stands under the claim of the one who looks out over every square inch of creation and declares, ‘Mine.’

Dan Churchwell serves as Director of Programs & Education at the Acton Institute, where he leads conferences and educational initiatives exploring the intersection of faith, economics, and culture.

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There’s a Playbook for College. There Should Be One for Marriage | Aaron M. Renn

The Real and the Unreal | Luke Burgis

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What AI Reveals About Man’s Higher Calling

Larry P. Arnn argues that while AI can assist learning, it cannot replace the work of thinking, warning that outsourcing education to machines diminishes the growth and character education cultivates…

Listen now

a month ago

The classic book that taught us how to Believe!

Believe! is a timeless expression of American principles, reintroduced in this 50th anniversary edition for a new generation. As we approach America’s 250th, its message speaks to both personal renewal and the opportunity for a broader national comeback.

If the book has resonated with you, we’d be grateful if you’d consider leaving a review on Amazon.

Reflect with The Believe! Concierge:

Want to go deeper? Try The Believe! Concierge—an interactive way to put these principles into practice in your work and daily life. For a more natural conversation, use voice mode. Try it now.

Artificial intelligence is promising and threatening to reorder American life. Social media has already been doing that for a decade, mostly by training the attention and habits of its users. AI sharpens this problem, because, for the first time, we have made something that seems terribly like us: AI can talk, and talking is a distinctly human act.

Because AI can talk, it can also write; the two are the same faculty. This begs a tempting question: ought we outsource writing to machines? To do so would be to outsource thinking. What would that mean? What of learning? And what of college?

If students use AI to read their books and write their papers, they will cease to do the work of college. What a tragedy this would be. AI is not enriched by traversing the rhymes of Milton, nor is it strengthened by grappling with the Founders’ ideas of justice. Certainly, it can do those things; it can parse and summarize; it can draft and compose. But it is not made better by them. For us, the learning is in the work. And while the machine can do the work, it cannot learn for us.

Man and AI are different, made by different authors for different ends. We are God’s creatures, made for happiness and heaven. AI, on the other hand, is man’s creature, made to serve our good.

The purpose of education is to cultivate the powers proper to a rational and moral creature. That cannot happen without work. These are not external burdens laid upon education; they are the substance of it. In the course of working through a difficult problem, the student acquires not only knowledge, but discipline. He rises, through toil and weariness, through struggle and suffering, toward self-government. If he chooses the better and the harder over the easier and the worse, he rises. If he does not, he declines. AI does not face this challenge.

If a machine performs these acts in place of a student, then whatever convenience is gained, the student himself is diminished. The thought may appear on the page, but it has not been thought by him. And that is the point.

So, the question is not finally what artificial intelligence can do. The question is what man is. If man is simply a factor of production, then perhaps the machine may improve him by relieving him of his labor. But if man is a being made for higher things, then no machine can relieve him of the necessity of becoming what he is meant to be. That work cannot be delegated.

Therefore, we should use such artificial intelligence carefully, soberly, and always as a subordinate thing. Let the machine remain the servant. Let it never be mistaken for a teacher, much less for a soul.

Larry P. Arnn is the twelfth president of Hillsdale College, holding degrees from Arkansas State University and Claremont Graduate School, and previously leading the Claremont Institute while working with Sir Martin Gilbert, biographer of Winston Churchill. He has been active in public policy and civic leadership, including chairing Donald Trump’s 1776 Commission, serving on several major boards, and receiving multiple national awards.

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The church has always had a unique place in moments of change. But we historically have been slower to the table with modern technology.

When electricity showed up, people feared what they did not understand. Some went to the point and said that electricity was “demons in the walls”.

Electric guitars created tension in worship spaces. And when the internet launched, some believers looked at three W’s and assumed it had to mean something evil because it knew too much and was globally connected.

Here is the pattern. When something shows up that looks powerful and beyond normal human ability, fear kicks in. We know that only God is all knowing and all powerful. But when we see something else operating at scale, moving fast, processing information beyond us, it creates tension. Even so, we quickly adapt. Now we stream services, tithe online, and use the very platforms we once questioned. Electric instruments are used in essentially every worship service!

AI fits that pattern, but the scale is different. It combines electricity, the internet, and advanced computing into one evolving system. In just a few years, it has already reshaped entire industries. This may be the most powerful invention humanity has ever created. That should not make us afraid. But it should wake us up and cause us to be on both offense and defense.

AI presents real threats and real opportunities at the same time. It can displace jobs, concentrate power, distort truth, automate harm, and influence behavior in ways we are only beginning to understand. At the same time, it can accelerate research, improve medicine, expand education, and help us advance the gospel at scale.

That tension is heavy. But like fire… it can burn a house down. Or it can also keep a family alive. The issue is not pretending the fire is harmless. The issue is whether the church is positioning itself to understand, so we can govern it.

AI is quickly becoming general technology just like electricity, the internet, and cell phones. As crazy and out of the box as it may sound,our children and their children will live and work among robots. They will live in a truly AI assisted society.

Like it, love it, Hate it… We have a choice about how we choose to engage now!

We cannot be hypocritical. We cannot use AI when it is convenient and condemn it when it stretches us. If we use streaming platforms, smart assistants, or social media algorithms, we are already interacting with it. So the real decision is not whether AI exists. The real decision is whether it will happen to us or whether we will engage and govern it with clarity. In all of our getting, we have to get understanding.

God has not given us a spirit of fear, but of power, love, and a sound mind. That means we think clearly. We move wisely. We do not panic. And we do not ignore what is in front of us.

As a pastor, an IT engineer, and a business owner, I sit in this tension every day. I am forced to wrestle with this and it feels heavy and lonely. I am not trying to advocate for technology, and I am not trying to stand against it either. I am simply saying the church has always shown up when things were hard. We are positioned to stand for righteousness. In Proverbs it teaches us that righteousness lifts a nation, and when wrong drives a people, it pulls them down over time. AI is becoming part of the systems that shape nations. It influences economies, education, communication, and power structures. If righteousness lifts a nation, then righteousness has to be present in the systems shaping that nation. If the church does not help shape ethical AI, who will?

Barna has released new State of the Church data, and the landscape is shifting. Nearly one in three adults in the U.S. say they would trust spiritual advice from AI as much as advice from a pastor. Among younger generations (Gen Z and Millennials), that number is even higher: two in five. The church has to be informed, develop a plan and implement strategies that put spiritual leaders at the helm in order to shape this for our children’s children.

If we are not at the table, the only guiding principles left will be financial gain and power because that is where humanity naturally drifts without a Christ centered anchor. I have chosen to step into the conversation through partnerships with Gloo AI, which is purpose-built for people of faith. The question my team and I keep asking is simple. How do we safely and ethically use this technology to advance the gospel and human flourishing? There’s no easy answer, but we have to relentlessly and tirelessly seek it out, especially as AI advances.

The urgency is obvious. AI is here. Now pastors, theologians, technologists, and ethical thinkers at the same table. We need to lead from a biblical foundation. And if we fail to engage with clarity and courage, AI will shape our communities without our voice.

Troy Evans works at the intersection of technology and urban ministry, with more than 25 years of experience helping leaders create meaningful change. He is the founder of SimpleNow, a bi-vocational IT engineer and church planter who has launched four urban churches and helped organizations integrate AI and technology in practical ways.

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