of young people who would experience a life-changing relationship with the God who made them, the dozens of children who would find a forever family… and the one who would become my son.
This has been the most exhilarating thing I’ve ever done. One vision has changed my professional and personal life forever. This process has not been pain free or easy, but then again, neither is life. This is a book born of the journey itself— about what can happen in a few short years to transform the biggest problem in your community, the biggest problem in your world.
I have no idea what one step there is for you, but I trust that within these pages, within these stories, that the one thing God wants you to do will grow clearer.
And when He speaks to you, say yes.
Doug
THE ONE FACTOR
How could one man chase a thousand?1
—Moses
Does one vote make a difference?
Can one leader change the course of a nation?
Can one nation influence the history of the planet?
We’ve been taught that the answer is yes, but let’s be honest, when it comes right down to it at election time, don’t you secretly wonder, Will my vote really matter? As I drive to the polling booth, I have the strongest temptation to turn the car around and go home because my one little vote won’t really swing the election, will it?
One has more significance than any of us realize. It has the power to make the small become big, when a seemingly insignificant straw suddenly breaks the camel’s back. Consider the following ones:
One Investment… 1492… Columbus… Discovery
One Action… Rosa Parks… Bus Seat… Justice
One Idea… 2,000 Failures… Thomas Edison… Illumination
One affects thousands.
One also has the power to make the big become small. It can reduce an insurmountable problem to a single face—the face that inspires the solution.
Slavery… Abraham Lincoln… One Nation
Polio Pandemic… Dr. Salk… One Vaccine
Aids in Africa… Bono… One Movement
World Poverty… Sponsorship… One Child
Thousands narrow to one.
A Solvable Problem
Every community has its problems. Think about the biggest problem in your world.
Can it be solved?
Most of us balk at the notion because many problems intimidate us by their sheer enormity. For the sake of this book, we will look at a huge problem that exists in every community.
Orphaned children.
Stop for a minute and review the scale of the problem:
143 million orphans worldwide
514,000 “temporary orphans” in foster care in America
115,000 “legal orphans” waiting to be adopted in America
This is a mind-blowing, heartbreaking reality that many of you might not have been aware of. Unfortunately, if you’re like most of us, statistics like these rarely inspire action. As sobering as they are, they are too overwhelming, too impersonal, too distant. They may produce a twinge of guilt and maybe even provoke further research, but they rarely lead to action. Usually it is the one factor that gets us involved.
In the late 90s it was difficult to pick up a South Florida newspaper and not cringe at the sight of another foster care disaster.
Children sleeping on office floors
Children being sexually abused
Children missing
A state system bound with its own red tape was not equal to the task of caring for its most vulnerable members. There were simply not enough good foster homes for the hundreds of children who needed them. Homes were chronically overcrowded, and some families took children solely for financial gain. The eyes of the state and nation were riveted on this broken system.
The Solution
It starts with one. One is always the catalyst. It could be your neighbor who takes in Max, a foster child. Max plays with your kids. Sometimes he ends up at your house for dinner. He is now more than just an abstract foster care statistic. Max is real. You get to know his story and you see his life being changed. One day something inside of you says,
I could do this! There must be another Max out there.
What happens next can take you on a journey that will inspire others the way your neighbor unknowingly inspired you.
The connection might seem linear. Your neighbor inspires you and then you inspire someone else, who then inspires another. But the affect one has on others is usually more like an exponential web. Your neighbor is actually inspiring many others to get involved. The solution to the problem expands into a network with multiple connection points. An enormous problem is broken down to simple one-on-one relationships. The task is now possible. The mission, achievable.
This principle of the one factor is an empirical reality. Events throughout history have repeatedly proven it out, including what has happened in South Florida during the past ten years. We were a community plagued with an overwhelming foster care problem until one changed everything.
Where Are We Going?
Throughout this book, we will explore the essential elements of the one factor to see how it can empower you to affect the lives of thousands, or even thousands of thousands.
One vision can take a shotgun approach and focus it into a single shot that can take down a charging beast.
One person can inspire another who inspires others, turning addition into exponential power.
One moment can turn the tide at the lowest point, when all seems lost, and inspire the courage to press on to victory.
One idea can create kinetic energy and momentum that turns a small rock into an avalanche.
One investment can lead to a series of returns that would make Wall Street green with envy—yields that will outlive you and your children’s children.
One passion, like a virus, can contagiously inspire those who come in contact with it.
One Source makes it all happen. This power of one is not a product of chance.
If you’ve never really thought about the untapped potential of the power of one, I hope these stories make you reconsider what you’ve considered insignificant.
The
