Johan du Preez SAAD Investments Tree of Life Foundation Impact Investor Faith Driven Finish Line Podcast
Finish Line Podcast Episode 146

Johan du Preez, Impact Investor, on Blending Giving and Investments to Tackle Poverty

You may want your investments and generosity to serve the same Kingdom purpose, yet still wonder whether impact and financial return have to compete.

How do you discern when capital should be invested, when it should be given away, and what it looks like to let God shape both decisions?


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Meet your guide

Johan du Preez is a South African entrepreneur and investor, founder of SAAD Investment Holdings and the Tree of Life Foundation, where he has spent years exploring how financial services, private equity, donor-advised funds, and grantmaking can be directed toward Kingdom impact. After beginning as a pharmacist, leading corporate turnarounds, and serving as a CEO in healthcare and investments, Johan eventually structured SAAD so its ownership sat inside a charitable foundation, forcing a deeper question: what changes when God is treated as the true shareholder?

In this conversation, Johan offers a practical framework for separating “return first” and “impact first” investments, explains how charitable capital can be invested through donor-advised funds, and shows how the end beneficiary’s ability to pay can help distinguish an investment opportunity from a grant-making one. He also reflects on risk, control, discernment, collaboration, and the difference between working for God, working with God, and allowing God to work through you.

By the end, you may see more clearly how your money, relationships, expertise, and willingness to take faithful risks can work together in service of God’s Kingdom.

What you’ll gain

  • How to discern when impact calls for investing or giving
  • Why faithful stewardship may require taking meaningful Kingdom risks
  • What changes when you treat God as the true owner
  • How return-first and impact-first investing serve different purposes
  • Why donor-advised funds can expand the reach of charitable capital
  • How your relationships and expertise can multiply financial generosity

Inspired? Take your next step

Try the Game of Life Simulator

Step into a four-minute interactive experience and see what unfolds as you decide how to manage your resources.

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Game of Life Simulator Mobile Screenshot

Inspired? Learn how to partner with ministries well.

A compelling ministry story can inspire you to respond. But wise partnership often begins with better questions.

Applied Generosity Intervention Partnership Focus

What is the ministry really seeking to restore?

Learn to look beyond visible needs toward people, context, relationships, and flourishing.

Applied Generosity Intervention Partnership Fruitfulness

How do you recognize meaningful impact?

Consider how ministries learn, evaluate their work, and pursue lasting change.

Applied Generosity Intervention Partnership Faithfulness

What does genuine ministry partnership look like?

Explore how to foster trust, alignment, and shared mission in your giving.

In our Intervention Series on the Applied Generosity Podcast, we’ll help you become a more thoughtful, discerning, and faithful partner.

Start the Series

Quotes to Remember

  • “There’s only one way to be strategic, that is to operate in the spiritual realm. Otherwise, you are just reactive and tactical.”
  • “The eternal perspective is ultimately the one that saves you.”
  • “For God to work through you, you have to be dead.”
  • “When you involve God in your business and make it His business and say, ‘I’m just here to work for You,’ then you actually complicate it to a large extent because you had better make sure that you know what the Shareholder wants.”
  • “God is more interested in the character of the individuals that are involved in the company than about the results at the end of the day.”
  • “We are called to take risks for the Kingdom.”
  • “The best decisions I’ve ever made were based on what I did not know.”
  • “Collaboration is everyone exchanging their personal dreams for one larger dream.”

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Use Our
Free Guide

Have you considered the ways you are uniquely called into generosity? We’re not all called into the same adventure.
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Enter your information below and we’ll send you our free PDF guide to explore the specific adventure you were called into.
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