The Snyder Family: Pursuing Passions Together

Lee: You gave how much to a race car?

Carol: He informed me that he had gave a half a million dollars as seed money for them to get a race car for Young Life, and I kind of thought, man, that could have provided a lot of wells in Honduras.

Lee: I was fired. Carol and the kids were two and four at that time you go, man this is tough. But you look at it, that’s the best thing that ever happened to me, is that the Lord put us in that situation.

And eventually we created this business seeing a need for permeable, breathable membranes for buildings. This is my partner, Phil Johnson, and he and I created VaproShield in 2001. And we saw a niche that we could exploit competing with billion-dollar companies. So it was, it was two cowboys that had an idea. Carol and I were overwhelmed about how much wealth we were creating or being given through the process of this business and wanted to give it away.

Carol: By putting money from the sale of the business into a DAF. We saved money that we didn’t have to pay taxes on, and it increased the amount that we could give away.

Lee: Through the sale of the business and the fact that we could go through a DAF in the process, save a significant amount of taxes, give through our process of a Christian organization that has a bigger vision and sometimes than we do.

Carol: I don’t think God puts a cap on how much you’re going to give. He puts it on your heart, and when he puts something on your heart, you give and you’ll never come up short.

We had a remarkable experience we were able to provide money for a well in Honduras, and so we traveled to the village and met the people who, were benefiting from having clean water and not having to travel, you know, an hour and a half, twice a day to get water. And meeting the community and seeing how their lives had changed was overwhelming.

Lee: I met the Lord through Young Life in high school, and then I was on work crew up at Camp Malibu in British Columbia. Well, Steve and Signatry call me “Hey we have this idea about a race car. How would you like to give some money in this race car?” And they put it out there, and it was a big chunk of change.

And I prayed about it, and I thought about it, and it was like the Lord putting out the lambswool. Right. And, I said, yeah, let’s do it.

Carol: When Lee got back from meeting with the Joe Gibbs Racing team, along with Signatry for them to get a race car for Young Life. And my heart has always been with Honduras and water, and I am thinking that would be a lot of wells that could be provided for people who are having to go to the river and carry water back three times a day.

But since then, Young Life has raised $ million. So, I kind of get that, okay, souls might be saved for Christ through a race car.

Lee: With the ability to grow this fund for millions and millions and millions of dollars. It will self-fund camps so kids can have the ability to go to camp if, if, in fact, they can’t afford it.

Carol: So, I think God always knows the big picture. And sometimes we get a little glimpse of it. And I got to see the big picture of how that impacted Young Life’s donations overall.

Lee: It’s been a joyous thing and it’s been a miracle. I look at The Signatry as an organization that just really, it’s almost divine intervention that we became part of this organization.

Carol: Just doing the work that Christ would do if he was here, he would take care of people. We’re called to take care of people, especially going to Honduras in a third world country. I was so afraid that I’m just going to see all this need. But what I discovered is that what we gave was like giving a loaf or a fish in a basket, and by other people contributing to that our money went a lot further.

Lee: In your prayer process if you come to the Lord every morning with gratitude, thank Him for everything you got… It does change your life. That mindset and Signatry is… The people in that whole organization exude gratitude. I mean, and they give you opportunities, create gratitude and giving.

Carol: You know, we’ve always had a passion to give and love to give, but now that we from Lee selling his business, it’s going to be really fun to give it away.

Lee: We don’t need more money in our pocket and when everybody has that same feeling or joy of generosity, I think it’s I think it’s the Holy Spirit and he’s talking to us. He’s bringing us together. We have a common goal and we all love Jesus.

Carol: I think it’s kind of a peek into heaven.

Lee: It is. Very well said, you know.

Carol: We start getting the community down here and we’re just going to continue.