From Marketing Strategies to Morning Devotions
How the Gospel Connected Two Leaders 600 Miles Apart
In the fall of 2024, I (David) purchased The Power of the Gospel: A Year in Romans by R.C. Sproul. My plan was simple, I would walk through Romans during 2025. But before the new year arrived, my boss and Head of School at Hebron Christian Academy, Dr. Taylor, gifted me a copy of My Utmost for His Highest. Dr. Taylor consistently challenges our team to be in the Word every single day. He often says, “Don’t let your head hit the pillow before you open God’s Word.”
I decided that 2025 would be the year I stopped admiring that discipline in others and started practicing it myself. I made a commitment: I would spend time in God’s Word every day before leaving the house.
That commitment changed my rhythm.
My alarm began going off at 4:45 a.m. By 5 a.m., I was sitting at the kitchen table with a cup of coffee, Bible open, devotional beside it. For 45 minutes, before my wife and I woke up our kids for breakfast, before emails started coming in, before the noise of the day, I prayed and read God’s Word.
What started as a New Year’s resolution slowly turned into a habit.
Three hundred sixty-five days later, what had once required determination now just felt normal. The Word wasn’t something I tried to squeeze into my day, it was the foundation under it.
As 2025 came to a close and I prepared to transition into studying Romans in 2026, I began reflecting on how much that daily time had shaped me, not only as a husband and father, but as a leader in Christian education. Dr. Taylor’s encouragement had changed my year. I began asking the Lord a simple question: Who could I encourage the same way?
How It Started
On October 6, 2025, I celebrated my 40th birthday in a place that feels like a second home to many leaders in Christian education, the CESA Symposium, that year taking place in Charlotte, North Carolina.
During the previous two years, a professional connection with Levi Miller at Little Rock Christian Academy had steadily grown. What began as conversations about marketing plans, social media strategy, and magazine storytelling slowly deepened. At the symposium, those conversations extended late into the night, not about branding or enrollment, but about faith, family, adoption and leadership pressures.
There’s something about gathering with like-minded leaders that creates space for honesty. In that hotel lobby in Charlotte, our friendship shifted. It was no longer just professional collaboration; it was spiritual brotherhood.
A couple of months later, as I was packing up my office for Christmas break, the Lord laid Levi on my heart. I remembered the impact of daily time in the Word on my own life, and I felt prompted to invite him into that same journey.
I ordered him a copy of The Power of the Gospel: A Year in Romans, wrote him a note, and asked if he would join me in waking up at the crack of dawn in 2026 to spend time in God’s Word, 600 miles apart.
When the Book Arrived
When I (Levi) received the book and handwritten note from David, I was immediately taken back to our conversation in Charlotte and our shared desire to grow more faithfully in our walk with Christ. Personally for me at the time, my family had just navigated an especially demanding season—welcoming two adopted children through foster care alongside our three biological children, while balancing the responsibilities of work, church, and home. In the midst of it all, I felt spiritually stalled, unable to establish consistent and healthy rhythms in God’s Word.
The invitation from David itself was disarmingly simple: wake up early, pray, and spend time in Scripture. Yet that simplicity was precisely what made it so meaningful. It communicated intentionality and care. David’s willingness to invest in my spiritual growth, by sending the book and inviting me to journey alongside him, was deeply encouraging. Rising early during this season, marked by exhaustion and full days, was no small commitment. But knowing that he is praying for me and my family as I prayed for him created a steady source of strength and accountability.
Our Rhythm
When the calendar flipped to January 1, 2026, we began.
We don’t meet in person. We don’t sit across from each other at a coffee shop. We live in different states and serve at different schools.
But every morning, we study Romans.
Some days it’s a simple text about a takeaway from the scripture that day, other weeks we exchange longer reflections or voice memos. We ask questions. We share prayer requests. We remind each other what’s true.
Our rhythm isn’t complicated, but it’s consistent.
The accountability has been quiet but powerful. There’s something about knowing someone else is waking up early, opening the same Scripture, wrestling with the same theological truths, and applying them to leadership, marriage, parenting, and school culture.
Romans is stretching us, challenging our understanding of grace, sharpening our view of sin, and deepening our awe of the Gospel.
And in the middle of busy school calendars, enrollment goals, marketing deadlines, and strategic plans, the Word has anchored us.
What It’s Meant to Us
Christian education leadership can be isolating. We are often the ones casting vision, solving problems, and encouraging others. But leaders need encouragement too.
This time has reminded us that we are first disciples before we are directors. We are brothers in Christ before we are branding strategists.
It has strengthened our walk with Christ by reinforcing that spiritual discipline isn’t a solo pursuit. Even from a distance, fellowship matters.
It has shaped our perspective as leaders. When the Gospel becomes central in your own heart every morning, it changes how you approach conflict, communication, and culture.
Connection and Leadership
The beauty of Christian education is that our work is rooted in something eternal. But if we’re not careful, even ministry can become mechanical.
Fellowship like this guards against that drift.
When leaders intentionally pursue Christ together, even across state lines, it strengthens not only their personal faith but their institutions. The Gospel becomes more than a tagline on a website, it becomes the driving force behind decisions, relationships, and culture.
If you’re longing for this kind of connection, take the first step.
Send the text. Buy the book. Ask the question. Extend the invitation.
You don’t need a perfect plan. You don’t need a formal structure. You just need willingness.
For us, what began as conversations about marketing has grown into intentional spiritual accountability. We still talk strategy and storytelling, but now we also talk about conviction, growth, and becoming the men and leaders God is calling us to be.
Six hundred miles apart, two alarms go off before sunrise. Two cups of coffee are poured. Two Bibles are opened. And in the quiet of early morning kitchens, the same Spirit is at work.
Through it all, the power of the Gospel continues to do what it has always done, transform hearts, shape leaders, and unite believers for His glory.
David Beall is in his fifth year as Director of Marketing and Communications at Hebron Christian Academy, where he leads all marketing, messaging, branding, social media, digital media, website strategy, and the school store. He oversees the school’s communications team and directs storytelling efforts that promote Hebron’s mission.
Prior to Hebron, he spent 15 years in collegiate athletics communications, including leadership roles at the University of Arkansas and Kennesaw State University. He also served at Mercer, USC Upstate, and his alma mater, the University of North Georgia, where he earned a degree in Business Administration.
David and his wife, Katie, have been married since 2014 and have two daughters at Hebron: Parker Grace (second grade) and Maddie Beth (kindergarten).
Levi Miller is in his fifth year as the Director of Marketing and Communications at Little Rock Christian Academy in Little Rock, Arkansas. He oversees storytelling, communication strategy, content creation, and more. His deep hope is that by communicating with truth, love, and excellence he will reflect the mission and core values of LRCA and lead those around him to glorify our loving, creative God.
He brings over fifteen years of experience in the private school setting in the areas of school administration, graphic design, digital filmmaking, photography, teaching, and coaching. He earned both his BS in Education and MS in School Administration from the University of Central Arkansas. He is passionate about education, creativity, and storytelling to serve the students, families, and faculty of the school.
Levi and his wife, Natalie, have been married since 2010 and have five children together.