How to Really Make a Difference

Pulling Back the Shades on Fifty Shad... Random Thoughts, Respect, and Reading!

How to Really Make a Difference

…and then the Ultimate Christian Living Bundle Sale will be over!

We’re in the middle of the Ultimate Christian Living Bundle Sale! And it will all be over Monday at midnight EST. Today I want to focus on how to expand our influence in the world.

A few years ago I was absolutely obsessed with politics. I read the news voraciously, I devoured blogs, and I complained nonstop about the country’s direction and the political system.

There was just one problem. I wasn’t actually changing anything. I could see what needed changing, but I was putting all sorts of emotional energy into worrying about something that I couldn’t actually do much about.

I came to the conclusion that the world wasn’t going to get better until people understood that family mattered and that morals mattered. We needed to take responsibility for ourselves and act right. Reading the news constantly reinforced my views and made me sure I was right (which is a very heady and great feeling–to be right), but it didn’t do anything about the essential problem–that people were ignoring their families.

And so after one election I quit cold turkey. I decided no more blogs, no more news, I would just write this blog. By writing this blog I might be able to actually help a family or two. I decided to put my energy into the places where I might actually have influence.

My mother shared with me this concept about influence, and I thought it was brilliant. I’m going to adapt it slightly here, but essentially we live in a world that can be divided up into three circles: the things you can control; the things you can influence; and the things that you cannot influence or control.

Things I Can Control

Basically, this circle is very small. It contains only one person: yourself. You can control what you do, how you react, how you spend your time, etc.

Things I Can Influence

You can influence those closest to you: your family, your friends, your coworkers. And you have a higher degree of influence on those closest to you.

Things I Can’t Influence or Control

You can’t change the weather, the economy, what your boss decides to do with your company, what ISIS terrorists do, what happens with Ebola, etc. etc etc. Most things are out of our control, and God does not ask us to spend time in areas that are out of our control. He asks us to do what we can–in the areas we can control.

But where do we spend most of our emotional energy? Worrying about things that we can’t control or influence.

Yet here’s something interesting: the more time we spend in the circles we can control and influence, the more influence we will have. And as we do that, often our sphere of influence grows. We’re actually more effective. And there’s a side benefit: people who spend most of their emotional energy in these two circles tend to be more joyful and peaceful. They aren’t worrying about things they can do nothing about; they’re pouring their energy into things they can influence, and often they’re seeing real changes.

Let me give you two examples of how this plays out. In marriage, we often spend most of the time wondering how we can get our husbands to change: how to make them more romantic; how to get them to spend more time with the family; how to get them to want to talk to us. But you can’t change him. If you spend more time in the circle you can control, though–yourself–you will likely see your marriage changing. You can change how you react to him. You can find ways to insert joy into your life. You can change how you react to the kids and change the tone of the house. And as you do that, you’ll find your marriage, and your attitude about marriage, improving.

Here’s another one: when I was pregnant with my second child, we find out that he had a serious heart defect that would likely end his life early. I spent a lot of time in that outer circle, worrying about him and fretting and crying. But I couldn’t do anything about his heart defect. When I decided to spend time in the circle I could control–my own reactions–I started looking for little things to be grateful for everyday. I started learning to savour every moment I had with him. And when Christopher did pass away, I was much more peaceful about it because I had leaned on God rather than given over to worry.

If you want to read more about this story, my book How Big Is Your Umbrella is part of the Ultimate Christian Living Bundle Sale this week! I talk about the things that we yell at God when life is lousy, and what God whispers back.

When we spend time with our kids and their friends, we can change this little bit of our culture, and that can have an effect on the wider society. When we help out a single mom in our neighbourhood, we can give her kids hope that marriage can work and show them good role models of strong, responsible men. When we choose to act in our circle of influence, we can end up changing, albeit in a small way, the culture that so upsets us.

This week I’ve been reading through some of the books in the Ultimate Christian Living Bundle sale, and there was one in particular that stood out to me: They Call Me Dad. It reads like a novel–almost an action thriller–and it’s the story of how an American pastor ended up rescuing kids from the Romanian orphanages in the early 1990s. It will bring tears to your eyes and cover you in goosebumps.

But what really struck me was how the whole story started. The pastor was happy in his life at his home, speaking and raising his kids and loving his wife. And then his dad in Scotland, who was suffering from cancer, called and started pestering him. “Babies are dying!” Camera crews had gone into Romania and were sending back pictures on the news of these horrible conditions, and this poor old man was overcome. He pestered and pestered his son until finally he flew over to Scotland to take his dad to Romania.

Meanwhile, his dad had been on the phone constantly, drumming up donations of diapers and formula and clothing and medicine. By the time he got there, the guy had a tractor trailer worth of stuff. And soon, after getting on the phone some more, they found a tractor trailer to haul the stuff, too. So off they went.

The story doesn’t end there, it only starts there. But that old man saw a picture on the news and he didn’t just cry about it or worry about it or lament about it. He did something about it. He thought of all the people that he knew that he could influence, and then he began calling in favours. And it wasn’t through that old man that God rescued those orphans; it was through his son Philip. But that man started the chain of events by spending time in his circle of influence.

I don’t know how many of us are called to do big things like Philip Cameron was, but his story is still amazing and I hope all of you read it. Yet the principle, I think, is a sound one: if you want to have influence, don’t just worry and fret and complain. Actually do something in your circle of influence. That’s the way we change our marriages, our communities, and the world–and that’s the way we find true joy, true purpose, and true effectiveness in this life.

They Call Me Dad is a great book. And best of all, it’s part of the Ultimate Christian Living Bundle, available until Monday at midnight!

But it’s only 1 of the books. There are 84 others, plus ecourses, mp3s of Scripture memory songs to sing with your kids, downloads of workout videos, bonuses of card packs and free books, and more! There’s even a personality test you can take.

Here are my favourite books from the bundle: