John Beck, a Long Island native and Oswego State University graduate, began his career with a Disney World College Program internship. He spent 25 years at Ford Motor Company in sales and marketing before embarking on a passion project—Virtual Bible Study—in 2018. For 18 months, he wrote daily Bible lessons, completing the New Testament multiple times to refine the content.

In 2021, he joined Jaguar Land Rover North America, continuing to improve Virtual Bible Study while gaining valuable leadership experience. In March 2024, he enrolled in the Founder Institute Accelerator Program, which provided crucial mentorship and tools to advance his vision.

Currently, John is leading a Seed round for Virtual Bible Study while developing an interactive video lesson titled “How to Get to Heaven,” based on the most popular content from his 260 lessons. His next step is to create an app with premium features for faith-based collaboration after gathering focus group feedback.

Throughout his journey, John has maintained his commitment to sharing biblical teachings while building a sustainable business model.

Key Moments

[05:57] Production moved to Vancouver with female host.

[08:33] Creating inspirational lessons on kindness and connection.

[11:01] Interactive lessons with actors and gamified engagement.

[13:54] Understanding suffering, faith, and perseverance in adversity.

[17:11] Man in Africa used sermon from online.

[20:17] Global team encouraging collaborative biblical practice.

Find John Online

https://virtualbiblestudy.com

https://www.facebook.com/GROWOURFAITHTOGETHER

https://www.instagram.com/virtual_bible_study

https://www.linkedin.com/in/virtualbiblestudy

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Transcript Provided By Castmagic.io

Seth [00:00:00]:
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Intro Voice Guy [00:01:40]:
You’re listening to Entrepreneur’s Enigma, a podcast about the ups and downs of the entrepreneurial journey. Every week, your host, Seth Goldstein, interviews entrepreneurs from all walks of life about their entrepreneurial journeys. From store owners to fortune 500 CEOs, we all have stories to tell. So sit back and join us for the next 20 or so minutes while we explore the entrepreneurial world.

Seth [00:02:15]:
Hey, everyone. Welcome to another edition of the Entrepreneur’s Enigma podcast. I am, as always, your host, Seth. Today, I have a good buddy of mine, John Beck. I met John in the founders institute. Founder Institute, not founders, not plural. Founder Institute, Keystone Group. It’s a accelerator that’s it’s global, but my our little Philadelphia, Pittsburgh, Princeton chapter, I don’t know how we’re all it’s kind of a conglomeration of Pennsylvania and Jersey.

Seth [00:02:45]:
He graduated last last cohort, and he’s doing a great job on his startup virtual Bible study. Now it’s like, wow. You know, no, actually he’s just right now. He’s just doing the new test, and it was just like nothing to laugh at. I mean, that’s like huge because it’s like, that’s enough books right there. But I was just joshing with him beforehand. So he said through the old Testament, he’s like, yeah, we’ll get there. We’ll get there.

Seth [00:03:11]:
That’s even more complex. But John was born and raised in Long Island. He, graduated from Oswego, where Oswego. Pretty close. Oswego State University. And he was a marketing major and minor in in psychology. So he kinda has idea how the brain works and that kind of stuff. He was put in the basal team.

Seth [00:03:32]:
He, went it was actually, he went to the what was it in the per prestigious, not prestigious, prestigious. I can’t talk today. Walt Disney World College Program. And that was kinda cool. So you got to put with Mickey and see how the sausage is made, which is I’m sure is kinda a little more disturbing than this saying, oh, there’s Mickey. You know? Now you know who Mickey is kind of thing.

John Beck [00:03:51]:
For sure. We could do another whole podcast on that stuff.

Seth [00:03:54]:
Exactly. Exactly. And as you’re graduating, you became your you began your professional journey at Ford Motor Company. Did that for 25 years. You left Ford and started with, virtual Bible study, which was inspired by your mommy, which is awesome. Right. I know that that it’s really sweet. I mean, I love it.

Seth [00:04:11]:
I mean, I know that story because I, you know, I I coached him a little bit during the cohort and it’s really sweet. In 2021, John went back and joined into the corporate world and joined Jaguar Land Rover North America. And he’s just rocking and rolling it. And he’s, currently leading a seed round to propel virtual Bible study to its next phase of growth. And what’s really neat is that he he found out via Google Analytics that how to get to heaven is one of the most popular I mean, it’s kinda makes sense.

John Beck [00:04:45]:
Making a lot of sense. The most popular by far as far as Yeah.

Seth [00:04:48]:
And and it’s not all crusty guys wanting to know that. It’s young Gen Z’s and millennials. And I see that as an old millennial, slightly crusty guys. I’m allowed to say that. And mostly female, which is interesting. So that’s always very cool. So, John, welcome to the program. Let’s let you talk a little bit than me.

John Beck [00:05:06]:
Okay. Thanks, Seth. It’s great to be here. I’ve been thinking about this for a long while admiring what to do. Thinking about the day I met you, you were kinda eating a slice of pizza down at the corner when we went into the room over there, and we’ve been friends ever since.

Seth [00:05:19]:
Yeah. We met I think we first met at the Philly Startup Leaders, Welcome Wagon.

John Beck [00:05:25]:
Exactly right.

Seth [00:05:25]:
This whole pizza, and he’s talking about the bible. And I’m like, I’m showing pizza, buddy.

John Beck [00:05:30]:
And look at us now.

Seth [00:05:30]:
This guy has a wing smile, big friendly guy. He’s like, hey. I’m doing this idea. Oh, I’m gonna be your cohort. I mean, from I’m from the ground up, he’s like, let’s talk. I’m like, holy crap. I mean, let me finish chewing.

John Beck [00:05:42]:
No doubt. I knew I was in a new space, and I just wanted to absorb as much as I can and, learn from people that have been there before. I’m gonna apply it and iterate as we knew more. So it’s it’s been a great ride, and, I’m so appreciative. Thank you, Seth, and I’m so happy with where we’re at.

Seth [00:05:57]:
I know. I mean, like, literally from going from con like, you kind of were more slightly building stuff out when you first joined in. I mean, slightly mean because, you know, you pull it back, you re you redefine it, you rejigger it around a little bit during the cohort. But now it’s like you you have, you said before the show that you have the production going up in Hollywood, north up in Vancouver, you have a you have a hostess or host that is to someone to be a woman. So I guess hostess, but we don’t like to put gender on stuff now. So you have a host with an an an amazing, woman who’s gonna kind of host and, like, emcee the whole thing, which is kinda cool.

John Beck [00:06:37]:
Yeah. It’s very, very exciting. You know, part of the Founder Institute, we had to dig deep into who our customer is. And in the case Yeah. Yeah. In the case of virtual bible study, it was really easy because we’ve never advertised, and we had 400,000 people come to the site that were highly engaged. And we said, well, who are they? And and I really

Seth [00:06:56]:
Who are you? Why why why are you here? Yeah. I’m ready for you.

John Beck [00:06:59]:
Exactly. And I’m 54. And when I go to church, I see a lot of people my age and older, so that’s what I expected our audience to be. And to my surprise, the analytics said they are 2 thirds female, 2 thirds millennial, and Gen z. And there’s 2 things after a month of study and focus groups and getting together with Christian universities and speaking with college kids. Two things they want that we weren’t delivering. If you go on virtual bible study.com today, you will see great lessons that took 6 years to make for all 260 chapters of the New Testament with great pictures. But that’s it.

Seth [00:07:33]:
And I’m I’m pushing him to do the Old Testament. I mean, like, 260 lesson. I

John Beck [00:07:38]:
Probably feel like

Seth [00:07:39]:
that. Outright just right there. I mean, come on now.

John Beck [00:07:41]:
It it it sure was. But we finally got that right, but it is just traditional text. They see that as a little boring and outdated. What they wanna do is be highly collaborative and break out into study groups and be able to ask each other questions in a mode, which is what I always envisioned, but I never quite saw it this way. So we are working on potentially having 100 of millions of people and with the ability to break them into groups of demographics they wanna be a part of. So that’s the first thing to put them in groups. And the second thing is my literally favorite part about virtual bible study. We’re gonna put together a library of good deeds.

John Beck [00:08:16]:
And, I work with Jaguar Land Rover right now as a marketing manager, and we use Range Rover products and say our mission is to go above and beyond and take your new vehicle out and show us something awesome that you’re doing. And, oh, by the way, can we share it? Can you send us a picture or video?

Seth [00:08:30]:
You say, yeah, user generated content. Yeah.

John Beck [00:08:33]:
Yes. And so that was my thought process and said, how cool would that be is we’re gonna do one lesson. So how do I get to heaven will be the first lesson. We’re gonna do a series of 10, which will be a module. And then at the very end, we’re gonna say, now that you’ve been through 10 lessons, was there any one thing that inspired you? Any one idea that you had where you could go out and do a random act of kindness or a good deed? And will you be willing to share it with us to inspire others? And I envision, Seth, 100 of millions of people where we tag it by AI. How old was the person that tagged it? What type of good deed is it? What part of the world? And then if people are looking to draw inspiration that I wanna go out and do something, I don’t know what to do. And I’m in Singapore, and I am 18 years old. And boom, I can hook up with someone my age in my I

Seth [00:09:18]:
love this. I I’m I’m I’m not gonna keep pushing you for the old testament because, I mean, the whole idea of mitzvah, which is a good deed. Like, I know but I also see a lot of this as, like, you know, you say you see a lot of 50 plus year olds in church. Yeah. I mean, a lot of young millennials and, you know, Gen Z’s don’t go to church because it’s they’re busy. You don’t have time. The millennials have kids trying to get a kid to go to church. Come on now.

Seth [00:09:44]:
Let’s be honest. I mean, I’m trying, I gave up on trying to get my kid to go to synagogue. I mean, it’s just like, it’s tough, but if you can still want to be somewhat religious or want to at least be spiritual and kind of know what the heck’s going on with everything or have some kind of guidance of good deeds, it’s nice to have a virtual option. Because, I mean, the pandemic, I mean, it’s all go virtual. So why not continue that whole thread kind of thing?

John Beck [00:10:06]:
Yeah. It’s an issue that comes up. I do a lot of traveling both, personally and professionally. And when I attend a different congregation than my home congregation, I see the same thing I see at my home. They are losing the younger generation. They’re not exactly sure why. They don’t like it, and they’re trying to figure out, you know, if we broadcast a live sermon, is that getting in touch with the millennials? But they want so much more. They’ve got 4 screens open.

John Beck [00:10:29]:
They’re on their iPad, their phone. So they wanna be engaged.

Seth [00:10:32]:
Young Kipper, I watched, you know, the the Jewish route here. I went I watched some, a service up in New York at the 92nd Street Y. It was great, but I was seeing on my computer. Yeah. I’m on their screen. So my half paying attention, but if there’s a way to watch it, watch it and take notes and engage and say, I like tag this, this moment and say, hey. This spoke to me. I think it’s I think you’re onto something, buddy.

Seth [00:10:57]:
We’re gonna take a quick break, hear from our sponsors, and get right back to the show.

John Beck [00:11:01]:
Well, thanks, Seth. We’re we’re super excited about it. And right now, the vision is to have them go through the lesson with our professional actors taking them through it and then reflect on it and say, what did it mean to me? Did I agree with everything? What questions did I have for your group? And then finally, after they’ve gone ahead and they reflected on it, they’ve answered a few questions to reinforce the lesson. They have a personal e journal, and it can be, am I inspired to go out and do anything? Not yet. I’ll wait for the you know, I got 10 lessons to figure out what this thing is. But all along, we’re gonna dress it up with bells and whistles. We’re going to follow, do a lingo where they get streaks and how many days in a row have you studied, and people will be on that thing for 6 years because they don’t wanna hop off. So gamify it, ways to make it super engaging, allowing them to connect, and then allowing them to act on their faith.

John Beck [00:11:48]:
And, it’s really gonna be as simple as that times 260 lessons.

Seth [00:11:52]:
Need it. We need that now. Amen. We need to highlight right now that, like, faith can make be good. That, you know, being spiritual can be good, that you can do good deeds with your faith. It’s not all fire and brimstone. That’s exactly right. The Old Testament.

Seth [00:12:08]:
I mean, you think there’s fire and brimstone in the New Testament. I mean, I I assume there’s far and brimstone in the new Testament. I mean, I never read that. I never read that far, but I read the whole testament in college. Whew. That’s a long read.

John Beck [00:12:19]:
But,

Seth [00:12:19]:
it took me about no, it took me about 4 months to get through it and a lot of back pacing because it’s like reading it’s literally like reading Shakespeare. I mean, it really is. It’s like you kinda have to decipher, like, what was actually said here because it’s not exactly the best English. Like, I’m on now. Let’s be honest here.

John Beck [00:12:35]:
Getting the right translation is so important too. Right? Because they didn’t talk

Seth [00:12:38]:
about idea. But, I mean, talk about fire and brimstone. I mean, whoo.

John Beck [00:12:42]:
Old Testament. Yikes. For sure.

Seth [00:12:44]:
That’s the thing. You say you wanted them to say, well, that’s fire and brimstone, but how can we see the positive thing? Yeah. You know? Because you don’t want the negative in religion. You want the positive. You wanna wanna come back. You wanna be part of some a group. You wanna be part of people, you know, that kind of thing.

John Beck [00:12:59]:
I I, you know, I go be very forthcoming that I am not a theologian. I am a marketing guy, career car guy that has preached sermons, taught bible study, always curious about his faith, but someone that has read the bible a chapter a night every single night for 6 years, 9 times mom. With my mom trying to figure out what it meant. And, you know, a couple of things that we are not your father’s bible study, we talk about compassion and not judgment a lot. We we tackle

Seth [00:13:28]:
We need that.

John Beck [00:13:29]:
We need that so much. And and I was at my local church, and someone said, well, is there a place for judgment? And I said, I know there’s a god and I’m not him. I said, as far as I’m concerned personally, as many times as I’ve read through it, there is no place in my life for judgment. No place. Now You

Seth [00:13:44]:
don’t need you don’t need a you don’t need a negative crap coming into your life. I mean, there’s enough outside. If you want your negative judgment, just walk out the door. You don’t need it in your bible.

John Beck [00:13:54]:
Plenty of that. And and then the other big thing was, and I think this was so important to me, why do bad things happen to good people? And I I talk about 2 tragedies that I’ve been through, and I and I had to reflect on that and say, where was god when this happened? How could a loving god let this happen? And if I wasn’t able to answer those questions for myself, my faith would have been greatly hindered if not lost. But I have now. And and dare I say, I don’t think there’s anything that will happen to me in life that I will be shocked by and it will hurt my faith because I’ve answered that question. So that’s my favorite. But Google Analytics, it was further down on the list. But we talk a lot about perseverance. We talk a lot about endurance.

John Beck [00:14:32]:
We talk a little a lot about, being doers of the word and not just readers of the word and things that I think are so important. So, I think I’m one of the luckiest guys in the world, Seth, that I can devote so much time and energy and, lord willing, full time after we get the funding into this project and just be thinking about how to inspire people, how to equip them.

Seth [00:14:52]:
Brilliant. Being an entrepreneur, doing something you wanna do. And that’s kinda what the whole idea of the podcast is. It’s talking about the journey, talking about how you’re kind of in the midst of the journey. This is more of a side hustle. Mean, it’s actually a side main hustle, I would say. It’s not your it’s not your full time thing, but it’s a full time thing on side of a full time thing. Hence, the reason why he has no hair.

Seth [00:15:12]:
No. I’m sure.

John Beck [00:15:13]:
That is correct. And a big bags under my eyes. I I got a face for Rachel.

Seth [00:15:16]:
It is.

John Beck [00:15:17]:
Yeah, man. This is a face for the company.

Seth [00:15:19]:
How’s the hustle hustle?

John Beck [00:15:21]:
For sure. So much respect for the founders that I met on the program. And, yeah, I cannot imagine being able to complete all the work as fast as we got it done and build a team and launch the product if it wasn’t something I was so passionate about. I think it would be too hard. Pivot. Yes. I I agree with that.

Seth [00:15:38]:
Passion, you pivot. Not no passion pivot. That’s that’s what I always say. So so what so in your mind, now this is your this is your main side hustle or your side hustle side me side main hustle, whatever you wanna call it.

John Beck [00:15:49]:
Easy for you to say.

Seth [00:15:50]:
What is the best thing about that you see coming up that you’re excited about being an entrepreneur?

John Beck [00:15:57]:
The ability to impact the world. I I mean, now we are talking I I look on to Google Analytics and I see the 400,000 people, and I see almost every country on the planet lit up as someone that has found virtual bible study. That’s awesome. And, yeah, I think, Seth, for the old days, and thank God for all the missionaries that flew into remote places and and and talked about God and talked about the word. And in today’s world, we can reach millions of people at the click of a button. Exactly. So, you know, what what I’m excited about for

Seth [00:16:26]:
worse, but still. Yeah.

John Beck [00:16:28]:
Right? Right? But this is for better. And, you know, if we’re as successful as we’re projecting that we’re going to be, it’ll give us the chance to not only reach 100 of millions of people, but to give back. And and I have some friends that do philanthropy in Africa, and they build kinda the roads and the latrines and the schools.

Seth [00:16:46]:
Wow. That’s good work. Yeah.

John Beck [00:16:47]:
Yeah. And I would like to piggyback behind them and say, now we’re gonna give you with a digital satellite in the remote places that couldn’t have it. I mean, people are telling me they’re walking 2 hours to get to a site where they can revert to a bible study. And if we can hook them up, it’ll just go

Seth [00:17:01]:
up their

John Beck [00:17:01]:
whole world to faith and, like, you know, world

Seth [00:17:04]:
That’s that’s a testimonial right there that they want 2 hours to get to a signal. Yeah. This actually to get on to your app.

John Beck [00:17:11]:
This is the story, Seth. So I was writing the the sermon that or the lesson the night before like I do every night. I posted it, and I was sitting with my wife in the in the sunroom. And I got a text from a guy or a communication, could have been a text, and he said, brother John, I could not think about what I was going to talk about today in my lesson. I walked these 2 hours. I walked 2 hours to get to the place. So I pulled up your lesson when I got here, and I preached the lesson on. And I forget what the subject was, but I remember looking at my wife and say, this is something that I typed last night that a guy in Africa walked 2 hours to get to and is now sharing with his congregation.

John Beck [00:17:45]:
And and so that to me is the most

Seth [00:17:47]:
exciting wild.

John Beck [00:17:48]:
Yes. I I would like to be impactful. I don’t like to be useless. I wanna be useful in virtual

Seth [00:17:53]:
bible study. Buddy.

John Beck [00:17:54]:
Yes. Virtual bible study is the it’s the most

Seth [00:17:57]:
normal good word, buddy. Exactly. So on the flip side, what keeps you up at night with this?

John Beck [00:18:05]:
It all seems to be happening so fast, and I just wanna make sure I don’t make any crucial mistakes, although I know I will, and and I’ll iterate. Right now, it’s just the funding. You know, I I’ve been I the plan is so ingrained in my mind, what we wanna do to execute, how we’re gonna do it, and we built the team. I just want to get the funding yesterday, and I know that’s not the way that it works. But outside of that, once we have it, I am locked and loaded and ready to go, you know, full speed.

Seth [00:18:32]:
That’s that’s awesome, my friend. And then what is the most important thing to carry with you all the time besides the Bible? I had to throw a little caveat in there because you can save the Bible, and that’s too easy.

John Beck [00:18:42]:
Your integrity.

Seth [00:18:44]:
Oh, I love that.

John Beck [00:18:45]:
Yeah. And if you’re not genuine, if you’re people will see through it if you’re especially if you’re trying to do something impactful. So if you stick to the truth and you speak the truth, you never have to remember what you said. You don’t have to be the smartest person in the room, but, you know, my motto is I will try. And a lot of it is showing up and working hard and and and caring about it. And if you don’t know where you’re going, any road will do. We know exactly what we wanna build. Founders Institute, mentors like yourself, Seth, have refined it.

John Beck [00:19:12]:
You know, you know, when we had our first meeting, I had a big idea, but it was all over the place, and it reeled it in and said, how are you really gonna go to market? Who you really your real clients are? And and now we know all that stuff, so I can’t be more appreciative. And, I think we hit the nail on the head. You know? I I think we’re gonna deliver exactly what a demographic that isn’t being served needs and wants. And when you do that, good things happen.

Seth [00:19:36]:
Absolutely. So, John, people can find it at virtualbiblestudy.com.

John Beck [00:19:42]:
Correct.

Seth [00:19:43]:
And where you’re where do you hang out the most online besides virtual bible study? Or is that where you hang out the most right now?

John Beck [00:19:49]:
Oh, yeah. That’s me. So I’m on virtual bible study.com. You can find me on LinkedIn under virtual bible study.com. We got some pretty pictures on Instagram, but we haven’t done a whole lot with that where we just kinda have the space reserved.

Seth [00:20:02]:
Down right now. Head down.

John Beck [00:20:04]:
Yeah. Head down and working and, and getting there. So if you do go on the site and you have any questions anytime, just leave a message. I personally review everyone. Would love to hear from you.

Seth [00:20:14]:
Now at least because it’s gonna get popular. You know, you have to get a team behind that.

John Beck [00:20:17]:
No doubt about it. The, the team is up to, like, 9 very talented individuals, and and, you know, we got a person in India working for us, a production company in Vancouver, and several here in the States. So it’s, it’s a global a global business trying to trying to tackle the world’s problem here and, just get people thinking about how to follow what the Bible says to do, how to incorporate it into their lives, and then how to go out there and be doers of the word, and hook up with other people so they can do it collaboratively.

Seth [00:20:44]:
I love it, John Beck. I love it, John Beck. I love it, John Beck. Awesome, buddy. You’re rocking and rolling, and we will see everyone next week.

John Beck [00:20:53]:
Thanks, Seth.

Intro Voice Guy [00:21:00]:
That was a great show. If you’re enjoying Entrepreneur’s Enigma, please consider giving us a review in the podcast directory of your choice. Every review helps us reach new listeners. If you like Entrepreneur’s Enigma, consider the other shows on the marketing podcast network at marketingpodcast.net.

Seth [00:21:35]:
Goldstein Media hopes you have enjoyed this episode.