Faithful Stewardship: John Mark Griggs ’14
2014 graduate John Mark grew up not far from Covenant College. He attended Chattanooga Christian School, where he met his future wife, Hannah, in sixth grade. The couple began dating in high school and married after their sophomore year of college, having navigated long-distance dating while John Mark studied at Covenant and Hannah attended Bryan College. Throughout high school and college, the two volunteered with Chattanooga Sports Ministry, an outreach program focused on building relationships and sharing the gospel with children in urban neighborhoods. The couple’s involvement with this ministry would shape the course of their lives.
An Unexpected Blessing
After graduating and having Mack, their first biological son, John Mark and Hannah were greeted with an unexpected opportunity. A mother of two boys in the ministry asked the couple to take on legal guardianship of her sons, Justin and CJ, who were fifteen and eight at the time. As newlyweds with a one-year-old, they were hesitant and felt the boys should live with family. They declined several times, but later, after realizing the brothers were going to have to be separated, agreed to let them stay temporarily in their home. In John Mark’s words, “The rest was history. From then on, they were family.” Since then, the couple has welcomed three more biological children, Will, Judah, and Gabriel.
Glorifying God
Covenant prepared John Mark for the Christian calling to bless others and glorify God. After studying business with concentrations in finance and accounting, he began his career as an accountant before being approached by some family friends to join their financial planning firm. John Mark saw the job as an opportunity to “work with individual families on planning what's important to them, counseling them on wise financial decisions, helping them save on taxes, make investments work for what they want to do.” The position allowed him to travel less, be with his growing family more, and build personal and meaningful relationships with clients, which John Mark sees as a mission field “to help make this complex world of finance work for them and what God's calling them to do.”
A Call for Kingdom Stewards
The world needs more Christian finance professionals, according to John Mark, who continues, “The anxiety and stress that comes with finances, I think, is founded in a worldview of not realizing that we can trust God with these finances. We're called to be stewards of what's already his and use it as a tool to manage and grow his kingdom. It's not a god in and of itself; that's when money becomes a toxic thing in our lives. Covenant students could bring a great perspective to that industry and I would love to see more Covenant students in our world.”
Covenant College equipped John Mark to faithfully follow his calling through an enriching education and deep theological formation. He was recognized for his commitment to selflessly serving the Lord in his family and through his career by being awarded the 2025 Iron Thistle Award.