When Influence Creates Wealth: The Responsibility of a Thriving Business

By Dr. Trudy Beerman, DSL — Published October 28, 2026

After the 2008 recession, I went from having the IRS tax us on a six-figure income to worrying that we might lose our home and personal car. We did not lose either, but I remember what it felt like to wonder whether the business that had helped provide for us could continue to sustain us. Financial uncertainty becomes very personal when you are looking at what your family could lose.

During the years when we rebuilt financially, I established Stewardship 101, my nonprofit organization. My goal was to encourage entrepreneurs, including myself, to become what I call community conscious corporations: businesses that intentionally support a worthy local cause or several causes. I wanted founders and organizational leaders to consider how the success of their operations could help strengthen the communities around them.

I still believe in that vision. It also explains why my work in financial stewardship belongs in the same conversation as my work in influential reach. When influence creates wealth, stewardship gives that wealth a purpose.

When more of the right people discover your business, understand its value, and trust its leadership, opportunities can follow. A thriving operation may generate greater revenue, stronger profits, and eventually personal wealth for its owners. That possibility deserves a conversation about responsibility, especially among people who struggle with the idea that accumulating wealth can be consistent with their faith.

The Question Monopoly Raises

A LinkedIn post about the history of Monopoly recently brought this issue back to my attention. Elizabeth Magie’s earlier creation, The Landlord’s Game, was intended to illustrate economic concerns about land ownership and concentrated wealth. Its history included competing rules that allowed players to experience different outcomes, including one in which prosperity benefited participants more broadly. Smithsonian Magazine explores this history in its account of the game’s origins.

The familiar Monopoly game rewards acquiring property, collecting rent, and eventually bankrupting the other players. That makes it a useful starting point for discussing greed, although a game cannot capture every way wealth is created or every motive of the person accumulating it. A business owner can become wealthier while customers receive something valuable, employees earn a living, and suppliers gain dependable business.

The LinkedIn post concludes, “Instead, generations of players discovered how much they enjoyed being that person,” referring to someone becoming wealthy at everyone else’s expense. I challenge the assumption that enjoying accumulating property necessarily reveals greed. Enjoying a competitive game does not establish someone’s motives in business, and accumulating resources can serve a responsible purpose. People prepare because they understand that seasons of plenty can be followed by seasons of scarcity. In Genesis 41:33–36, Joseph recommended storing grain during the abundant years to prepare for the coming famine. That example helps explain why I see accumulation as a potential expression of stewardship: a thriving operation can build reserves that protect its future obligations while increasing its capacity to serve the community.

The question I carried away from that post was this: When an operation thrives, and wealth follows, what should its leaders do with the increased capacity they now have? For me, that is a stewardship question with direct implications for influential reach.

Influential Reach Has Economic Consequences

An entrepreneur can have an excellent service and still struggle because too few people know it exists. An organizational leader can have a worthwhile mission and lack the visibility needed to attract customers, supporters, or strategic relationships. Influential reach helps connect valuable work with the people who need to encounter it.

When that connection produces business growth, financial reward may follow. There is nothing inherently greedy about receiving compensation for useful work or owning an operation that becomes profitable. The moral questions concern how that success was achieved, how people were treated along the way, and how the resulting resources are managed.

Greater influence also increases the opportunity to misuse trust. A leader may begin recommending whatever pays the most, making promises the organization cannot keep, or treating an audience primarily as a source of revenue. Greed can influence those decisions long before anyone would describe that leader as wealthy.

That is why influential reach needs convictions strong enough to govern the opportunities it creates. The people who trust us should benefit from our commitment to serve them well, even when a less responsible choice would be more profitable.

Scripture Gives Wealthy People Responsibilities

First Timothy 6:17–19 speaks directly to people who possess wealth. Paul instructs them to avoid arrogance, place their hope in God rather than uncertain riches, and become generous people whose lives produce good works. Verse 18 calls them to be “rich in good deeds” and “generous and willing to share” (NIV).

I find that instruction significant because it gives people with resources something purposeful to do with them. Their wealth creates an opportunity for service, while their attitude toward it requires continued examination. Having resources does not remove their dependence on God or their responsibility toward other people.

My own experience makes the warning about uncertain riches especially meaningful. A business can experience substantial income and later face circumstances that threaten its stability. I would never encourage a founder to confuse a productive season with a guarantee that every season ahead will look the same.

What Financial Vulnerability Taught Me

When we were concerned about keeping our home and car, the need for financial reserves became much more than a principle to discuss. A business has obligations, and so does the family depending on it. Resources set aside during a productive season can help meet those responsibilities when income changes.

That experience also helped shape the vision behind Stewardship 101. As we rebuilt, I wanted to encourage entrepreneurs to think about what a healthy business could make possible beyond the owner’s immediate household. I included myself in that challenge because stewardship must govern my decisions before I recommend it to someone else.

A founder who builds a sustainable operation may gain the capacity to support a local organization, help fund needed services, or respond when a community faces hardship. That capacity is worth developing. It gives business growth a purpose that extends beyond increasing the owner’s standard of living.

Becoming a Community Conscious Corporation

By community conscious corporation, I mean a business whose leadership intentionally considers its responsibility to the community and acts on that concern. A small company can begin with a modest commitment to one worthy cause. A larger organization may be able to sustain several partnerships or contribute money, expertise, products, and employee time.

For example, a business might support an organization serving children, help a local program care for elderly residents, or contribute to services for people with disabilities. Another might provide training or tools that help someone become employable. These are examples of what the approach could look like, with each company choosing commitments appropriate to its capacity and the needs it understands.

Those decisions should accompany responsible business management. A company must consider payroll, obligations, reserves, and its ability to continue operating. Sustainable generosity requires leaders to understand what the business can responsibly commit and then honor that commitment.

Community consciousness also belongs in everyday operations. Fair treatment of employees, honest dealings with customers, and dependable payment of suppliers are part of stewardship. A charitable contribution carries greater credibility when the organization’s ordinary conduct reflects the same concern for people.

Compassion and Contribution Both Matter

I believe capable adults should be expected to contribute to their own provision. I do not support the assumption that someone is entitled to another person’s accumulated resources simply because that person has more. Effort, responsibility, and participation matter to me.

At the same time, children need provision, elderly people may need support, and people living with disabilities, illness, or other limitations may be unable to meet their needs independently. A community conscious business should be willing to recognize those circumstances and consider how it can help.

Second Thessalonians 3:10 addresses the person “unwilling to work” (NIV). That wording matters because unwillingness and inability call for different responses. Applying it responsibly requires care, particularly when someone is seeking employment, recovering from illness, or facing limitations we cannot readily see.

For people able to participate, generosity can help create a path toward contribution. Training, equipment, employment opportunities, or temporary assistance may help someone regain stability. For those who cannot provide for themselves, care remains a meaningful responsibility without requiring a financial return.

Give the Increase a Purpose

The connection between my earlier financial stewardship work and my work in influential reach is clear to me. Greater reach can help a valuable operation thrive, and a thriving operation can create wealth. Founders and organizational leaders then have decisions to make about the resources, trust, and opportunities they manage.

I want those leaders to consider becoming community conscious corporations. Choose a worthy cause, learn what it needs, determine what your organization can responsibly contribute, and make stewardship part of how you lead. Growth can then support both the health of the business and a meaningful commitment to others.

I know what it is to experience business success and what it is to worry about financial survival. Both experiences inform my belief that resources should be managed with humility, preparation, and purpose. Wealth can provide capacity for good, and leaders have a responsibility to decide how they will use that capacity.

If your influential reach helped your business thrive, whose life could improve because you stewarded that success well? When influence creates wealth, stewardship gives that wealth a purpose.