Let me ask you something. What’s your gut reaction when you hear the word “marketing?”
If you felt a little knot in your stomach of discomfort, you’re in good company.
So many of the women I talk to (coaches, authors, artists, designers, service providers) feel conflicted and torn about it. They believe in what they do. They know they have something real to offer the world. But the moment it comes time to actually tell people about it, something in them recoils.
And honestly? I get it. We’ve all been on the receiving end of the gross kind.
- The fake countdown timers.
- The breathless emails manufacturing urgency out of thin air.
- The social posts designed to make you feel like your life is lacking without this one product.
- Outreach based on some “flaw” in your life that they really pour some salt into to make you desperate enough for their solution.
We’ve been on the receiving end of enough manipulation that the word “marketing” itself has felt a little yucky.
But here’s what I want you to sit with: marketing is just getting the word out. That’s it. The problem was never marketing itself. It’s the spirit in which it gets done. And that, my friend, is something we as Christians actually have a framework for.
There’s a Name for Marketing in the Flesh
Before we talk about what good marketing looks like, it helps to name what we’re trying to avoid. Paul does this for us in Galatians 5, when he lists the works of the flesh. Read through them with your marketing hat on and see if anything looks familiar. Here are a few that stood out to me.
Sorcery (pharmakeia in Greek) refers to manufactured emotional states designed to bypass your rational mind. This was used in occult practices, and the Greek root word is where we get our word “pharmacy”. But when marketing in the flesh, it can mean getting someone worked up emotionally so they’ll act before they think. Sound like any sales tactics you’ve encountered?
Selfish ambition is a business that exists primarily to enrich the owner, not genuinely serve anyone. It’s not wrong to make money, of course. But Jesus looks at our hearts first.
Envy looks like copying what everyone else is doing, not to learn, but because you’re jealous and want what they have.
And carousing (sometimes translated “Wild parties” or “drunkenness”) the Greek word actually implies extreme living, or living without an off switch, and for business owners that’s a temptation too. We might not be carousing as the verse says, but we often live without an off switch, no guardrails. That’s hustle culture dressed up in productivity language.
None of this is new. Paul was writing to people in a marketplace culture not entirely unlike our own. The temptations were the same. And so is the antidote.
The Golden Rule As a Marketing Strategy
Jesus said it plainly in Matthew 7:12:
“Do to others whatever you would like them to do to you. This is the essence of all that is taught in the law and the prophets.”
We learned this in Sunday school. But have we ever really applied it to our businesses? Because if we did — genuinely, practically, before every post and email and sales conversation — I think it would change everything.
I’ve started running my marketing through three simple questions. I call it the Do Unto Others Marketing Test:
Before I send this, post this, or say this, would I want to receive it? Just pause and imagine yourself on the other end. Would this email feel helpful or harassing? Would this offer feel like a gift or a grab?
Does this treat my potential customer the way I would want to be treated? Picture the actual person you’re trying to serve. Does this respect her intelligence, her time, her budget, her season of life? Or is it designed to pressure her before she’s ready?
Am I primarily serving others, or serving my bank account with this offer? This one requires honest self-examination. Making money isn’t wrong. God Himself says He gives us the power to create wealth (Deuteronomy 8:18). But there’s a difference between solving a real problem and dressing up a cash grab in helpful-sounding language. Your motivation matters. And your audience can usually feel the difference.
Repair, Don’t Tear
There’s a concept in Jewish thought called tikkun olam, aka “repair of the world”. The idea is that we are called to be restorers and rebuilders.
Isaiah 58:12 says it beautifully:
“…And you shall be called Repairer of the Breach, Restorer of Streets to Dwell In.”
(Isaiah 58:12 AMPC)
I ask this question more and more when I look at a piece of marketing: is this repairing or tearing? Is it building trust or eroding it? Is it honoring the dignity of the person on the other end, or treating her as a means to an end?
Because we have a choice in how we show up. Every post, every email, every sales conversation is either adding to the noise and manipulation in the world, or quietly pushing back against it.
What Spirit-Led Marketing Actually Looks Like
Back to Galatians 5, this time the other list. The fruit of the Spirit. Love, joy, peace, patience, kindness, goodness, faithfulness, gentleness, self-control. We tend to think of these as personal character qualities. But what happens when we apply them directly to how we market?
Love asks “what does she actually need?” before “what can I sell her?”
Joy brings genuine enthusiasm instead of manufactured hype.
Peace means you’re selling from a settled, grounded place rather than stirring up anxiety to close a sale.
Patience means showing up consistently for months (or years!) without demanding immediate results.
Kindness meets people exactly where they are.
Goodness has the backbone to say “honestly, my services aren’t the right fit for you right now,” even when it costs you the sale.
Faithfulness means under-promising and over-delivering, being the same person at 50 followers as at 50,000.
Gentleness holds your expertise in service of others rather than wielding it to impress.
And self-control, in a culture that glorifies the hustle, looks like closing the laptop, letting the weekend email go unanswered, and choosing rest.
Here’s the thing about fruit: it isn’t forced. You can’t manufacture it through a better content calendar or a more optimized posting schedule. It grows when you tend the right things in the garden of your heart. Which means the most important work you can do for your marketing might actually be the work you do on your knees.
You Can Get the Word Out and Keep Your Integrity
Marketing that honors God is not timid or invisible. It still shows up. It still makes offers. It still asks for the sale. But it does all of that from a place of genuine service, honest communication, and deep respect for the person on the other end.
You have a calling. You have gifts the world genuinely needs. Getting the word out about them is not a necessary evil — it’s part of the work. Do it in a way that treats people the way you’d want to be treated, and you’ll build something that lasts.
That’s not just good ethics. It turns out it’s also just good business.
P.S.: I’m super excited to be teaching a breakout on this topic, with lots of hands on tips for marketing, at the 2026 Well Conference in Zeeland Michigan.
