How God Uses “Ordinary People” to Change the World Sýnishorn

Unleashed to Influence

Every organization has a desire for their message or product to influere, virally flow into the market. In fact, “going viral” is a modern term used in social media to describe a video or post that is digitally shared across the population at a rapid, unchecked pace. This is what “influence” is all about.

However, the opposite of influence is another Latin term, involvere, which means “to roll up” or “to participate.” This is the root word for the English word involve.

Many times in nonprofit organizations, we ask volunteers to “get involved” in some way, shape, or form in our programs. We are seeking to “roll them up” into our programs and processes to help meet the needs of the organization. This is the direct opposite of influere, which seeks to “flow into” the population.

Over the years of my work with volunteers, I began to wrestle with my understanding and approach to leading volunteers. It eventually became evident that this was something I had been missing.

The volunteers I worked with weren’t just people to be rolled up and involved in our programs in order to meet our organizational needs. They were people who needed to be released to flow out and influence a dark culture in desperate need of the light found only in Jesus Christ. They were people who collectively influenced untold thousands in their daily lives beyond any program or event I could conjure up.

This slight shift in mindset had a profound effect on my philosophy of ministry.

I started looking for ways to place more value on our volunteers. I wanted to create more movement, not more management. I wasn’t sure exactly how to do that, but I knew it wasn’t just throwing a volunteer appreciation party featuring thank-you certificates, a punch bowl, and a sheet cake. If we wanted to unleash influence, we had to adjust our approach. 

One of my first encounters with this principle was in my third year as the senior high youth pastor at one of the largest Southern Baptist churches in the country at that time, First Southern Baptist Church of Del City, Oklahoma. Our youth program had students attending our church from thirty-six different schools in the area. Our church was planning for our annual high-attendance Sunday. This consisted of all the various ministry departments planning something special for Sunday school.  

So I decided to try something different this time to get the teachers more engaged in the planning of high-attendance Sunday. 

I engaged my teachers by challenging them to figure out creative ways to get the kids in their class to attend. Their buy-in was critical. My expectation of them was not just to invite their class and hope for the best. This had been the norm, which usually resulted in most of them dutifully filling the need they were asked to meet. This time I challenged them to own whatever way they determined to get their kids there. I told them what their mission was, not how to do it. 

These small adjustments to our regular strategy unleashed a flurry of innovation and energy from our teachers. All of them changed up their normal routine. They were not being rolled up; they were freed up to flow into the lives of their students as they saw fit. 

When high-attendance Sunday was over, we not only met our goal; we crushed it, and we were the only department to do so. 

I took note of the principles I had stumbled upon. The first was this: if you want people to own their part, give them a compelling reason to do so. The second principle is this: if you want to bestow increased value on volunteers, place heightened responsibility and expectations on them. 

I like to think of elevating responsibility to the point that the overall success or failure of an initiative would rest squarely on their shoulders. In this space, volunteers know they are trusted to be more than a cog in a machine.

This is the amazing opportunity organizations have for their volunteers and employees. It is the opportunity to create the conditions for their people to release the hero that lies within each one of them.