Stewarding Our Influence

Influence is a gift. But it is also a responsibility.

Every time we write a book, stand behind a microphone, recommend a resource, share a podcast, endorse a teacher, or post something on social media, we are doing more than communicating information.

We are pointing people somewhere.

When people trust our words, we become trusted carriers into their lives. And that should cause every Christian writer, speaker, leader, and influencer to ask a sobering question:

Do I understand the weight of what I am carrying?

I don’t ask that question from a place of having always gotten it right.

I haven’t.

There have been times in my own leadership when I embraced, repeated, or encouraged things I later came to understand were not biblically sound; in fact, they were rooted in the occult or New Age. The realization was painful because it wasn’t only about what I had believed.

I had influence. Other people trusted me. That meant I had pointed people toward things I should not have pointed them toward.

Once I recognized that, I couldn’t simply say, “Well, I didn’t know.” I had to repent. Publicly.

I had to acknowledge where I had been wrong, change course, and become much more careful about what I carried into the lives of people who trusted me.

That experience changed the way I think about influence.

Because we can carry truth—or we can carry something that only sounds like truth.

Today, ideas and practices are moving through Christian spaces at an astonishing rate. Not everything that circulates under a Christian label is rooted in Scripture, and not everyone promoting these things understands their origins or implications. Many sincerely love Jesus.

But sincerity does not remove our responsibility to discern.

If someone trusts me, follows me, reads what I write, or listens when I speak, I need to care deeply about where my recommendation might eventually lead them.

Who am I opening the door to? Who am I introducing my followers to? What worldview is traveling underneath the thing I am promoting?

Paul warned, “A little leaven leavens the whole lump” (Galatians 5:9). Isaiah warned against calling evil good and good evil (Isaiah 5:20).

Those are weighty words.

Stewarding influence means asking more than, Is this popular? Is it helpful? Did it inspire me? Did it make me feel closer to God?

We have to ask:

Is it true?

And when we discover we were wrong, faithful stewardship also means being willing to say so.

Our followers do not need us to be perfect. They need us to be faithful.

Influence is not merely a platform.

It is a stewardship.

And when people trust us enough to follow where we point, we had better make sure we are pointing them toward Jesus.

Question: Who taught you to steward your influence well, and what did they model for you that you still carry today?

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