The federal government offers as a wonderful opportunity to startup companies through a program called SBIR grants, short for Small Business Innovation & Research, a way for small companies to get non-dilutive funding to bring an idea to life. Naturally, JellyCo applied back in fall of 2024 and was ecstatic to find out we were one of the top-rated applications. It was a dream come true because I was graduating in May of 2025 and this grant would pay my salary for a year, fund the startup, and prove to everyone who laughed at the idea of building a business around jellyfish that we were a real company.
Not here for political talk, but with the new administration in 2025 came a pause in almost all new grants. I was so confident that nothing could stop this grant from going through as we were helping rural, coastal communities and making use out of an abundant, super sustainable jellyfish species. A way to bring back American manufacturing jobs to the coast seemed like a perfect grant, right? Or so I thought.
For months, we heard nothing. Complete silence. I was obsessing over getting this grant. I needed a secure income and money for the startup. I ended up checking my email literally every hour, every day, for months waiting for an answer. I was losing sleep running every scenario in my head and convincing myself that if I could just get this one grant, everything would work out the way I imagined. I had no peace. I thought if I could just work harder, connect with the right people, I could change the outcome. In the moment, it seemed harmless. But do you see the problem?
I thought I knew what was best for me. I had my plans laid out, and I believed I could control the external circumstances without realizing how much it was taking a toll on me internally. I had been holding a beach ball underwater1, spending every ounce of energy trying to control things I never could. And one day, God popped that ball for me.
It was September 17, my sister’s birthday of all days, when the news came that our grant was officially being rescinded (taken back). I fell apart. In Greek, the words sphodra lupeo come to mind for an exceedingly deep, emotional grief that overcame me. That’s how badly I had wanted this to work. Everything I had planned for and wanted was, in that moment, uprooted from me and everything we had worked for for over 7 years was seemingly lost. I was totally broken.
It was in that moment, not when things were going well, not when the business was growing but in the middle of what felt like absolute failure and loss, when that beach ball was finally popped, that I realized what it meant to release everything and say: You [Jesus Christ] are enough. Jesus, save me. And it was like the weight of the world was lifted from me that day, and a level of peace that no earthly feeling had ever given me before came over me. I realized what it meant when He took on the sins of the world for us and because of Him and His scars, I am set free. Unfortunately, sometimes it takes being totally lost and broken to get to that point, as it did for me.
Looking back, what I know now that I didn’t know then: if that grant had come through, it would have handicapped us not only by tying us to area that is not economically feasible for our product but by building on the wrong foundation, in the wrong way, and for the wrong reasons. The company was being built on sand that would have crumbled in the next storm, not on solid rock. The roots I had, what I stood for, were so shallow that any storm could have ripped them away. I say I wanted the grant but what I secretly really wanted was money, security, comfort, validation, and to prove something to people who didn’t believe in this company. That is not a vision. That is not a company. That was my fear and doubt wearing a business plan, and God exposed it for me.
The rescission of the grant redirected everything from the vision, the roadmap, and reminded me who we are and why we started JellyCoUSA, which was to positively impact our coast, steward a beautiful creation (jellyfish), create real change, and glorify His name above ALL else.
It was from this event that I truly gave everything to Jesus Christ, and it led me to being baptized on May 17, 2026, on the beach by Eleven22 in Jacksonville, FL. exactly one year after going into the company full-time.
The part that hit me as I was writing this down:
Jellyfish were the reason I moved to Georgia in the first place. I left everything I was building in Florida because I felt called there. I never understood why a Florida Gator would move to Georgia BullDawg country. Looking back, it wasn’t for a degree or the jellyfish but for a deeper reason. It was those jellyfish, harvested in the Atlantic Ocean, which we use to create our collagen that somehow, the very thing that brought me here, led me to Jesus Christ. And it’s in that same water, the Atlantic Ocean, where I was baptized.
I do not share this to preach or force anything on anyone but I share it now because I know how jaded the startup world can feel. How everything becomes about the raise, the valuation, the accolades, the grants. How hollow it gets and how the heart gets lost waiting for things of this world. We commonly say, “once I get this one thing, it will be all okay.” Don’t let this choke you the way it did for me.
Maybe you are not in the startup world but are relating to this because you are in a hard season right now where a deal just fell apart, a partner turned on you, relationship or marital problems persist, a diagnosis came in, your child is ill, you are mourning a loss, you lost your job, you are facing financial troubles, or you are watching your dream seemingly die before your eyes. Whatever it is, I want you to know that even when we cannot see it, God is not absent from our pain and sometimes it is in these seasons we would never choose that He does His deepest work within us.
Ask not, “Why is this happening to me?” but, “What are You [God] trying to show me?”
Let Him guide and direct your path. For He has a plan, and it is far greater than anything we can imagine. That I can promise you. This won’t be everyone’s story, but it’s mine, and I pray it helps you along your journey. I hope it encourages you to reflect and maybe even share your own story.
Stop forcing that beach ball underwater1.
God bless,
Peter G. Chiarelli, PhD
Follower of Jesus Christ
CEO & Co-Founder
1 – Analogy taken from Pastor Joby Martin, Sermon S4E5, at Eleven22, not my own concept. Link to sermon here.
Want to share your testimony? Email us at info@jellycousa.com and we’ll post completely anonymously. Your story may be exactly what someone needs to develop and deepen their relationship with Jesus Christ.
We are here for you.
“Therefore, confess your sins to one another and pray for one another, that you may be healed. The prayer of a righteous person has great power as it is working.” – James 5:16 ESV
