Winning With Your Influence

Greeting

Good morning Lighthouse.

Hey real quick, we’ve been moving again on our construction. If you didn’t already notice, we put the roof on the pergola right at our entrance, we also poured concrete at the ADU ramp into our LKids building, and what you can’t see, but we also mounted our HVAC units inside. So those kids will be warm and cool when needed. Thank you for making that happen.

I have one more quick announcement I want to personally make. That is on Saturday, November 1, we will have Heart & Soul, right here on our campus. Heart & Soul is a night to celebrate all the amazing things that God has done throughout the year, as we look ahead to what we believe He has for us in 2026.

The night begins with some refreshments and connection, before we get into a moment of worship, and into our meeting where we talk impact, budget, outreach, partnerships, and more. It is a bit of a business meeting, and for that reason, this is a night just for adults. I would recommend Heart & Soul for college age, and up from there.

So, make plans to join us and we look forward to am incredible evening of celebration.

Reading

Luke 18:18–25 NIV

A certain ruler asked him, “Good teacher, what must I do to inherit eternal life?” “Why do you call me good?” Jesus answered. “No one is good—except God alone. You know the commandments: ‘You shall not commit adultery, you shall not murder, you shall not steal, you shall not give false testimony, honor your father and mother.’” “All these I have kept since I was a boy,” he said. When Jesus heard this, he said to him, “You still lack one thing. Sell everything you have and give to the poor, and you will have treasure in heaven. Then come, follow me.” When he heard this, he became very sad, because he was very wealthy. Jesus looked at him and said, “How hard it is for the rich to enter the kingdom of God! Indeed, it is easier for a camel to go through the eye of a needle than for someone who is rich to enter the kingdom of God.”

Introduction

Church, I don’t know how aware you are to this, but we are in a moment in our country where we can see faith, and the curiosity about faith rising.

Last year there was revival that broke out on several college campuses beginning at Asbury, and then continuing to many others like Ohio State University, Auburn and several others through the UniteUS movement.

And we’ve also seen influential people like Joe Rogan and Elon Musk show openness to faith.

Something is stirring in our nation.

We may be on the edge of another spiritual awakening in our country.

Transition

But here is a question that I want to process together this morning: What happens when a person with influence comes face-to-face with Jesus? That’s what happens here in the story of the Rich Young Ruler.

I think we can learn from this moment and then make the application to our lives and the influence that we have.

The title of my message this morning is Winning With Your Influence.

We All Have Influence

Let me start by saying that we all have influence.

I understand that when you think of someone with influence your mind goes to someone with a platform or a following, but that’s just one way at looking at influence.

Each of you has influence over someone or some things in your life.

Here’s a few examples of someone that you might have influence over:

Spouse

Children

Coworkers

Team mates

Employees

Family

Social media

That list can go on and on, but if you really think about it, you have more influence than you think. I think some of you would be amazed at how much influence you have.

[Pause]

I know that I am not the Pastor who assigns you homework, but I will give you a brief exercise.

Take inventory this week - who do you influence, and who in that circle needs you to be more intentional with your influence?

Influencers are Influenced

Our influence is being shaped by the things that are influencing us.

This is a great starting point… everything that you are taking in is influencing you. Things you watch, things you read, things you listen to, and the people you surround yourself with are influencing you in some kind of way.

I’ll go further and say that some of these things are more than influencing us, but they are leaving an impression on us. I mean that in the sense that it is like an imprint on our lives.

Let me give you an example, because I’m a 90’s kid….

If I start to sing or rap to a song, many of you are going to be able to finish what I start because those things deeply influenced you…

Want to test it?

“In West Philadelphia born and raised, on a playground is where I spent most of my days…”

What is that? That’s the Fresh Prince of Bel Air.

Here’s another 90’s banger…

“I wish I was a little bit taller, I wish I was a baller, I wish I had a girl who looked good I would call her.”

That was a song called I Wish by a rapper named Too Short.

OK. That’s enough of that…

See how easily those lyrics came back? That’s the power of influence — it imprints on us.

And then, if I take that one step further, the word influence has the same linguistic root as the word fluid - the latin word influere.

And here is the spiritual application.

Influence is something that flows into you and flows out of you.

Stewarding our influence begins by being aware of the things that are influencing us and then ensuring that these things are in alignment with the way of Jesus and the Kingdom of God.

[Transition]

I want to flip it back to the rich young ruler now to observe what influenced him.

Influenced by the Others

What I see in the text about this young man is that he clearly had the attention of the people.

You see, sometimes the things that are influencing you most is what other people think about you.

There is something rooted deeply inside of us that we wants to be liked, we want to be appreciated. Those things aren’t inherently bad things, but they do run the danger of leading us down the wrong path when we are addicted to them.

I see in this young man that he knew what people around him would applaud and he made that his ambition.

He knew the things that would be celebrated by others around him, and he made it his chief goal to go and accomplish those things.

He was influenced by what he would receive from the people.

He was celebrated for what he achieved — but Jesus saw what that applause was doing to his soul.

And this is why Jesus asked him, “Are you willing to give it all away?”

That’s a tough ask, isn’t it? To take everything that you made the object of your ambition and to give it all away…

But can I run that scripture back one more time so that we more accurately see what Jesus asked him?

Luke 18:18–25 NIV

Sell everything you have and give to the poor, and you will have treasure in heaven.

Jesus asks him will you exchange your earthly wealth for heavenly wealth?

Let’s sit with that for a second…

I know at first glance we read that as a “give it all away,” but what if we more closely read that as “will you trade it”?

[Transition]

There is this passage that I read out of Isaiah last week in devotion that gives us insight into the heart of God for us.

Isaiah 1:18 ESV

“Come now, let us reason together, says the Lord: though your sins are like scarlet, they shall be as white as snow; though they are red like crimson, they shall become like wool.

This is God’s heart — not to take, but to trade. To trade guilt for grace, possessions for eternal treasure, applause for identity.

He sees us holding on tightly to something the world has given us, and he says to us, I’ve got something better for you.

I know you like that influence that you are hanging on to, but I have the kind of influence that is eternal. It’s not temporary, it is something with lasting value. Would you trade it?

Influencer in Need

Let’s look once more at what brought this young man to Jesus. We know he is wealthy, we know he is healthy, we know he is a ruler, but what we also know about him is he is completely unsure about what will happen to him in death.

The very reason he comes to Jesus is because his wealth, health and influence make no guarantees about where he will spend eternity.

This is the thing that is keeping him up at night. This is the thing that he’s worried about.

And, this is the thing that Jesus brings him back to.

You came to me asking about eternity, and I’m telling you what you need to do… but it’s all too much for you.

You can’t live for both the applause of people and the approval of God.

At some point these are going to be in conflict and you’re going to have to choose what you will do.

Conclusion/ Surrender

If we were to zoom out a bit and look at this story from a macro level, what I see happening here is Jesus is asking this rich young ruler for the same thing that he is asking of all us today…

Not only that we would make Jesus our Lord and Savior.

Not only that we would align our lives with the word of God.

But would we be willing to give to him our surrender.

There are a lot of Christians who have submitted to the Lordship of Jesus, and they are faithful to gather every weekend, and they are faithful to do the things expected as a follower of Jesus, but it is possible, and it is most common actually, to do all of these things and still not surrender our lives to Jesus.

Still not surrender our dreams to Jesus.

Still not surrender our desires to Jesus.

We follow Jesus, but we hold tightly to the plans that we have for our lives.

And yes, it is possible to follow Him and follow your heart and even dress that up as “God giving you the desires of your heart.”

But there is also a place that we can reach where the desires of my heart are a far, far second to the desires of His heart.

This is the place of surrender. This is the place where we stop asking God to bless what we are doing and we start to ask him How we can give our lives to the things that He is doing.

Listen, if I get to the end of my race, and I know that God blessed everything that I put my hand to do, but I never fully surrendered my life to what He is doing, I have a feeling I’m going to be knowing that there was something more…

Call

When God called us to bring Lighthouse to the City of Vista there was a surrender that needed to happen.

That wasn’t my heart. That wasn’t my dream.

But I know full well that this isn’t my church, so I have no business prioritizing what I want for Lighthouse over what God wants for Lighthouse.

So my dream has to become His dreams.

My heart has to become His heart.

God is working in this City in ways that I do not fully understand, but I am committed to seeing.

Light Up The City is how we are going to see that come to pass…

We are on a two year generosity initiative to finish building this house so that we can reach and serve more people.

We’re not here renovating just for the sake of making this place beautiful, but we’re making room for more people.

When we excavated 180 tons of dirt we did that so we can accomodate more children on Sunday, and create more ministry opportunities during the week.

We are literally creating more space for people to gather and to grow in their faith.

And though we are moving along at a good pace, I feel this hurry in my spirit to move this along faster, and begin looking for a venue that can better accomodate everyone that God is bringing to the church, because every Sunday more and more people are coming.

This is why we are committed to Lighting Up The City. To see more lives healed. To see more marriages restored. To see more children set on fire for Jesus. To improve the overall facilities here at the church so that it is a welcoming environment and so that even the facilties feel “life giving.”

In the weeks to come I will begin to lay out a road map of how we can get there together, but today I am praying for our surrender. I believe there are many of us who have not surrendered to the Lord in the area of our giving. That is between you and God, but please know I am unapologetically praying that you would whole heartedly surrender to the Lord in every area of your life.