Be the Wind: How David Vander Bloomen Stopped Fighting for Control and Started Leading by Faith

The Voice in the Wind

It was a blustery November day in 2020, the kind of day deer hunters know to stay home. But David Vander Bloomen wasn't out there to hunt. He needed the woods. The country had just come through a bruising election, friendships were fracturing, families were dividing, and David was sitting with a question he couldn't shake: What do you want from me in this world?

Perched in a wooden box blind, watching trees bend nearly sideways in the wind, he prayed. And then, clear as anything, a male voice spoke in his right ear: Be the wind.

He didn't know what to do with it. Not then, anyway. But the words stayed with him — quietly, patiently — like a seed waiting for the right season.

That season arrived in October 2023, in the middle of a panic attack that sent him to the emergency room. His heart was racing, his left arm had gone warm, and a brand-new doctor looked at his chart and delivered a blunt verdict: find a new job, or you will kill yourself. David had been burning out at a marketing agency, grinding through the motions of a career that had stopped fitting him long ago.

"That's when I finally surrendered. I said, you put me where you need me. I am tired of trying to make this decision myself. This is bigger than me."

That surrender led him to a role he didn't see coming — and a mission that has been expanding ever since.

The Day Job That Became a Calling

Today, David Vander Bloomen serves as President and CEO of the De Pere Area Chamber of Commerce, a 300+ member organization just outside Green Bay, Wisconsin. On paper, it's a networking and advocacy organization. In David's hands, it has become something more — a platform for integrating faith into the everyday rhythms of business and community life.

The chamber launched a "Business with Christ" gathering that started with seven people, quickly outgrew its space, and has become the organization's most vibrant program. It didn't happen without hesitation. David wrestled with whether a chamber of commerce should be doing something like this. Was it allowed? Would members push back?

"As far as I know, there are no other chambers of commerce that are doing this and leading something with faith. But I'm not forcing it on anybody. And society might not like that — but it worked. And there's a reason for that. As a group, we decided we're tired of being quiet."

Two people raised objections over a year and a half. The program kept growing. Faith, it turns out, had been waiting in the marketplace all along — it just needed someone willing to make room for it.

The Discipline of Surrender

Alongside his chamber work, David has launched Center Valley Baseball, a youth program built on the simple conviction that more kids need time on the diamond learning leadership and accountability. He recently launched Bay Valley Memorial Care, a gravestone cleaning and restoration service born out of a need he spotted in his community. And he is building the Green Bay chapter of C Suite for Christ, a national organization bringing biblical worldview into executive leadership.

That is a lot of plates to spin. And David is the first to admit that the hardest discipline in all of it is learning to stop spinning them through sheer will.

He has drawn deep inspiration from Brother Lawrence, a 17th-century monk who made it his practice to talk with God all day long — through kitchen work, through tedium, through everything. That image of a continuous, conversational faith reshaped how David approaches his own days.

"It's not always going to be audible words. But if you're having that conversation all the time, it becomes natural. Now it's more like talking to a friend. And when I'm having a bad day or struggling with a tough decision, I literally lean back in my chair, say a quick prayer, and it's like — all right, we can do this now. You're not alone."

That posture of dependence — which runs directly against the grain of every leadership culture that prizes self-sufficiency — has made David a calmer, more decisive leader. People around him have noticed. When they ask why he seems more at peace, he doesn't hedge: My faith is better.

When God Sends Three Signs

David is the kind of leader who asks God for signs and then pays close attention. When facing a difficult staffing decision at the chamber, he kept asking for clarity. The answer came in a rapid-fire sequence that still makes him smile.

A chamber member, unprompted, told him: "Sometimes you need to slow down to let God speed up." The next day, a board member looked him in the eye over drinks and said, "Sometimes you just need to shut up and listen to God." That evening, sitting by a backyard fire, the third message arrived via a meme from a friend: Just * do it. We're only here a short time.

"That was three. I have three things right away saying: yes, shrink to get bigger, listen to God, and let go. And since then, it's been nothing but a blessing."

The lesson David draws isn't that God arranges convenient coincidences. It's that when we stop drowning out the signal with our own noise, we find that guidance has been available all along.

Saying No So You Can Say Yes to What Matters

One of the most practical disciplines David has embraced is a three-question filter for his time and energy. Before saying yes to anything — a board seat, a speaking invitation, a new initiative — he runs it through three checks: Will this benefit my family? Will this benefit my community? Does it carry real significance and impact?

He stepped away from a town board position he had enjoyed, once he recognized that the impact had stalled and every meeting was hitting a wall. He replaced that Monday night slot with a gathering of men sharing faith, fellowship, and honest conversation.

"If you're not making a difference, if you're not having an impact, if you don't feel good about it — don't do it. Life's too short. Stop spending time on things that aren't meaningful and do something that is."

That kind of clarity is rare. It requires the courage to disappoint people who want your involvement — and the conviction that stewardship of your time is itself a spiritual act.

Be Loud

When asked how he would encourage other Christian business leaders to live their faith more openly, David doesn't reach for a complicated framework. His answer is two words.

Be loud.

Walk into David's office and you will see a crucifix by the door and a cross on the wall behind him. He doesn't always announce his faith — he displays it. And those visible markers have opened more conversations than any speech ever could.

"Don't be afraid of sharing your faith with your team and your clients. You can be loud in so many different ways. It truly comes down to how you treat people, how you respond to adversity, how you make decisions. When people see a more grounded, steady way of operating — and they find out it's faith-driven — that's when it counts."

He also keeps the Word accessible in a disarmingly simple way: when he doesn't know where to start, he lets his Bible fall open and reads whatever page it lands on. The results, he says, are consistently uncanny.

Now David is exploring a path toward the permanent diaconate in the Catholic Church — a calling that came into focus on a Sunday when he pulled out of a church parking lot and found his priest standing at a stop sign, his habit billowing in the wind. The same wind, perhaps, that first whispered to him in a deer blind five years ago.

He is also writing a book. And one daily prayer has become a kind of anchor for everything he does: Let me be an answer to somebody's prayer today. If you need to use me, I am here. I'm yours. Let's go be the wind together.

For any leader wondering whether faith belongs in the boardroom, in the chamber, or on the baseball diamond — David Vander Bloomen's answer is clear. It doesn't just belong there. It's the only foundation worth building on.