Do you ever wonder whether or not you can really make a difference?

Paul Tudor Jones is the founder of the Robin Hood Foundation. It has channeled 1.45 billion dollars into noble causes. One of Jones’s passions is helping students at under-privileged, inner-city schools.

He tells a story about when he was four. He was at an outdoor market and got separated from his mother. He writes: “When you’re four years old, your mother is everything. And this extraordinarily kind, very old, very tall black man came over and said, ‘Don’t worry. We’re going to find your momma. Don’t cry, we’re going to find her. You’re going to be happy in a minute.’ You never forget stuff like that. God’s every action, those little actions become so much bigger, and then they become multiplicative. We forget how important the smallest action can be. For me, I think, it kind of spawned a lifetime of trying to always repay that kindness.’”*

What was that stranger’s name? Jones doesn’t remember. He’s long dead. But a part of his legacy is Paul Tudor Jones, the Robin Hood Foundation, and 1.45 billion dollars of good poured into countless lives blessed.

It reminds me of a story from John 6. Thousands of people had come to Jesus and the disciples were wondering how they were going to feed them all. Andrew said: “Here is a boy with five small barley loaves and two small fish, but how far will they go among so many?” (verse 9) 

The boy is never named. But at some point he would have had to make a choice: Do I keep my family’s lunch to myself, or do I hand it over to Jesus? He handed it over. As a result, thousands were blessed.

Mark Batterson writes: “When you add God to the equation, His output always exceeds your input.”*

You can make a difference. You may not make it into a history book, but that’s not the point.

Give what you’ve got to Jesus—perhaps some time, energy, money, or a talent, no matter how “small” you think it is—and he’ll take it from there.

“When you add God to the equation, His output always exceeds your input.”

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Notes:

–Mark Batterson, Chase the Lion (New York: Multnomah, 2016), 19-20, 141.

–Bible quotes are from the NIV.