# Mart Green The middle son of [[David Green]] (between brother [[Steve Green]] and sister Darsee Lett) and the **business-leadership** counterpart in the Green family operation — distinct in role from his older brother Steve's religious-cultural-philanthropy emphasis. Mart Green has been the principal leader of Mardel Christian and Education (the Green-family Christian-bookstore retail chain) since the 1990s, has served as a long-time Hobby Lobby board member, and assumed the CEO role at Hobby Lobby in the mid-2020s family-leadership transition. He has been a trustee of Oral Roberts University since 2007 (chairman of the board for several periods) and was the principal financial benefactor of the university's mid-2000s recovery from financial crisis. Mart Green's significance for the [[Christian Nationalism Ecosystem]] is concentrated in two areas. First, the **Hobby Lobby corporate succession** he is now leading is the next institutional chapter of the for-profit-religious-corporation vehicle that produced *[[Burwell v. Hobby Lobby]]* (2014) and the broader Green-family religious-cultural infrastructure. Second, his **Oral Roberts University** trusteeship — and the university's mid-2000s near-bankruptcy and Green-family-led financial rescue (2007–) — links the Hobby Lobby operation into the charismatic-evangelical higher-education infrastructure (ORU is a Pentecostal-affiliated university with a substantial NAR-adjacent student-and-alumni population). For the Right Wing KB, Mart Green is the **Green family business-succession** principal — analytically distinct from David Green (founder) and Steve Green (museum/cultural lead). The intra-family role differentiation is informative about how religious-conservative business families can compound across institutional categories: corporate ([[Hobby Lobby]]), retail ([[Mardel Christian and Education]]), education ([[Oral Roberts University]]), cultural ([[Museum of the Bible]]). The Green family is one of the most strategically-leveraged Funders-layer / cultural-infrastructure entries in the broader CN coalition. ## Biography **Martin S. Green** was born in **1962** in **Oklahoma City, Oklahoma** — the middle child of [[David Green]] and Barbara Green, between older brother [[Steve Green]] and younger sister Darsee Lett. Like his siblings, Mart grew up working in the family's [[Hobby Lobby]] operation from childhood. ## Mardel Christian and Education Mart Green founded **Mardel Christian and Education** — a chain of **Christian bookstores and educational-supply retailers** — as a subsidiary operation within the Green family's privately-held corporate structure. Mardel operates **~35 stores** across the southern United States, selling Christian books, Bibles, homeschool curriculum, church supplies, and educational materials. The chain complements Hobby Lobby's craft-and-décor retail focus with explicitly Christian-education retail. ## Oral Roberts University Rescue (2007–) Mart Green's most consequential institutional intervention. In **2007**, [[Oral Roberts University]] (Tulsa, Oklahoma) — the Pentecostal-charismatic university founded by [[Oral Roberts]] in 1963 — faced a **severe financial and governance crisis**. Allegations of financial mismanagement and personal extravagance against then-president **Richard Roberts** (Oral Roberts's son) led to Richard Roberts's resignation. The university faced approximately **$50 million in debt** and was at risk of institutional failure. Mart Green led a **Green-family financial rescue** estimated at **$70 million or more** in donations and commitments, became **chairman of the ORU Board of Trustees**, and oversaw a governance restructuring that stabilized the institution. The rescue linked the Green family's Assemblies of God / Pentecostal business empire directly to the charismatic-evangelical higher-education infrastructure. ORU's subsequent financial stabilization and enrollment recovery have been substantially attributed to Green-family support. ## Every Tribe Every Nation Mart Green has been a principal supporter of **Every Tribe Every Nation** — a Bible-translation and Bible-access initiative focused on making Scripture available in every language. The project connects the Green family's Bible-accessibility mission (also expressed through [[Steve Green]]'s [[Museum of the Bible]] and the family's Bible-curriculum projects) to global Bible-distribution networks. ## Hobby Lobby CEO Transition In the **mid-2020s**, Mart Green assumed the **CEO role** at [[Hobby Lobby]] as part of the family's generational-succession plan — with father [[David Green]] stepping back from active management and brother [[Steve Green]] focusing on the Museum of the Bible and cultural-philanthropy portfolio. The CEO transition placed Mart as the operational leader of the ~$8 billion, ~1,000-store retail chain. ## KB Significance Mart Green is the **business-succession principal** of the Green family operation — analytically distinct from David Green (founder-patriarch) and Steve Green (museum/cultural-philanthropy lead). His three-domain role differentiation — Mardel (Christian retail), ORU trusteeship (charismatic higher education), and Hobby Lobby CEO succession (corporate leadership) — illustrates how the Green family compounds institutional influence across retail, education, and cultural categories. The ORU rescue in particular links the Green family's Assemblies of God roots to the broader charismatic-evangelical infrastructure, creating a cross-denominational institutional footprint that spans Reformed-evangelical (via Steve Green's TGC-adjacent museum events), Pentecostal-charismatic (via ORU), and mainstream-evangelical (via Hobby Lobby's national retail presence) audiences. ## See Also - [[David Green]] - [[Steve Green]] - [[Hobby Lobby]] - [[Christian Nationalism Ecosystem]]