It’s a cool, breezy night in the Central American country of Honduras. A group of high school students relax on the rooftop of a five-star hotel. As they look out across the city, the sun slowly sinks below the mountainous terrain. Lights begin to dot the countryside and the breathtaking view betrays the fact that they are sitting in a third-world country. However, after a few minutes of small-talk and picture-taking, a team member begins to share a series of true stories with the students. As she speaks, a solemn silence falls on the group like the darkness that has settled around them.
She tells of Andrea, a 9-year-old girl who was sexually abused by her stepfather. Instead of helping Andrea, her drug-addicted mother just lay there and watched. She tells of Anderson, an 8-year-old boy who spent his days roaming a cemetery instead of going to school. He tried to perform odd jobs to earn money to buy food. One day a homosexual man took advantage of his desperate hunger and the innocent boy was sexually abused, all for a plate of food. She shares 12 more stories similar to these.
Students’ reactions to the stories vary, but one face stands out among the group. One man quietly sits listening, with little expression on his face. A closer glance reveals a small stream of tears trickling down his cheeks. This man is no stranger to Honduras, nor is he unfamiliar with the stories shared. This is a man who has devoted his time, energy and finances to impact lives like the ones in these stories. In fact, because of him, Andrea, Anderson and 12 other children now have a safe place to call home, away from abuse, starvation and loneliness.
David Hamilton is the founder and CEO of Impact Logistics, a company located in Memphis, Tenn. He lives in a big home in the suburbs of Memphis. He drives a nice car, owns the latest version of the iPad, occasionally visits his lake house, complete with a speedboat and Jet Ski, and sends his daughters to private colleges. However, Hamilton leads a starkly different life than the average American CEO.
David, along with his wife, Ruth, and two daughters, Leah and Hannah, founded a ministry in Tegucigalpa, Honduras, called Point of Impact. More than 70 percent of people in Honduras live in a state of poverty. Stories like the ones about Andrea and Anderson exist all across the country. David’s purpose in founding POI was to provide essential physical needs like food, clean water, medical attention and education in order to open a door to share the gospel.
POI consists of four churches in neighborhoods across the city that seek to meet the physical and spiritual needs of the people. The ministry also supports three programs through the churches that offer after-school tutoring, medical attention and daily nutrition to more than 350 children. In the summer of 2008, POI opened an orphanage to accommodate the children who were wandering the streets with no hope of a bed, a meal or the love of a family.
That night on the rooftop, as David again heard about the darkness from which these children had come, he looked as though someone had physically harmed his own kids. And in a sense, that’s exactly how he felt. David and Ruth have legal custody of all 14 children, and though the kids do not live with them, they view them as their own.
Unlike many ministries that operate primarily from foundational gifts or individual donations, the Hamiltons fund more than 80 percent of the ministry with the business David runs. Brett Veach, executive vice president and chief operations officer for Impact Logistics, said David never intended to start a company.
“He just had some buddies unloading trailers in a warehouse,” Veach said. “David wasn’t one of these guys that had a master plan. He was just faithful in God’s leading.”
What began as a job right out of high school turned into a nationwide company with more than 800 employees. David established guiding principles in his business, one of which is to return to the community a share of the company’s success.
Wayne Vandersteeg, executive vice president and chief financial officer for Impact Logistics, has worked with David since 1998.
“As we work for and with David, we all feel that we are working for the Lord,” Vandersteeg said. “The ministries that we’re in are supported by the finances of the company. The leadership that is in place here at Impact understands David’s heart and the mission. We work with the recognition that what we’re doing, we’re doing for the Lord.”
David said it all started on a mission trip to Brazil in 1990 with his home church. “Ruth and I came home from that trip and just went, ‘OK, there’s gotta be more to life than this,’” he said.
Ruth chimed in that, “the ‘this’ he’s referring to is just the average American life. Work, make money, buy things…”
“Boats, trains, planes, bigger businesses, all that kind of stuff,” David finished her thought.
At one point they considered selling the company and becoming missionaries, but after the trip, he realized there was a purpose for God giving him the business. While their hearts were burdened for the poverty and despair they saw outside the United States, they could not act yet.
“Ruth and I got pregnant so we didn’t really go anywhere or do anything for several years,” David joked.
In 1999, when the girls were a little older, the Hamiltons traveled to Honduras for the first time. Through that trip, they met Armando Meza, who self-funded a ministry to reach out to gangs through soccer leagues.
“One day, I said, ‘Let’s help Pastor Armando financially,’” David said. “We just felt led to do it. … I made out a check to (him) and put a note on it that said ‘For the next 12 months, we’re going to give you $200 a month.’”
From that point on, they continued getting more involved until they were visiting every six months. In 2004 the Hamiltons bought an apartment in Tegucigalpa so they could visit whenever they wanted. Two years later, Pastor Armando took a government-appointed job with a prison ministry and the Hamiltons started their own ministry called Christian Youth Movement, under Armando’s model of rehabilitating gang members. They soon changed the model from intervention to prevention and called it Point of Impact.
“We realized that more and more kids were getting involved with gangs at an early age and so we focused more on the prevention aspect,” Ruth said.
Their plan was to make everything an outreach of the church so they launched the first church in a gang-infested, violent neighborhood in 2006. The pastor held services on Wednesday and Saturday nights and an after-school tutoring program was offered to the children every day. The following year, another church was established using the same model. A third one opened in 2008, followed by the orphanage in 2009, and a fourth church location in 2010.
“Mine and Ruth’s goal was to have a POI ministry on every continent,” David said.
They took a step toward accomplishing this goal in 2010 when they began funding two feeding stations in the slums of Nairobi, Kenya.
“God had already told me to do it,” David recalled. “I just needed confirmation. I got there and it was just like, ‘Duh, POI No. 2.’”
An average of 225 children receive schooling and food at each of the sites.
Mike Curry, president and founder of Light Ministries, works closely with many feeding stations across Africa. He introduced David to the stations POI now supports, and the two men have been friends for years. Curry listened to Hamilton tell the story of how POI started. When he finished, Curry had a few words of his own to add.
“You’ve gotta tell the ugly too,” Curry said. “In my ministry experience, for every one ministry like POI that succeeds, there’s a thousand that don’t make it six months. You’ll find the shells of buildings, you’ll find a sign, but that’s all you’ll find.”
He explained that many people have an emotional response to the poverty and needs they see but provide no follow-through.
“The difference with people like David and Ruth is, yeah they gave, but they’re investing,” Curry said.
Not only does Hamilton invest in the people of Honduras, and now Kenya, but he invests in the homeless in Memphis, and in his own employees, said Keny Hatley, vice president of business development at Impact.
“There are a lot of people that say, ‘Hey, I’m going to give,’ but there are very few people that say, ‘Come with me as I give and see how you can give too,’” Hatley said. “I haven’t felt pressured to give because David thinks I should be a giver, but I’ve been inspired to give because I’ve seen a guy live totally different than the culture, completely different than what the world says.”
