How to Live for an “Audience of One”

I’m not sure how many of you have heard this before, but a few months ago, I learned about the phrase “AO1”, which means “Audience of One”. The idea behind AO1 is that you are always performing for an audience of One, and that audience is God. It doesn’t matter if you are doing chores, working on an assignment for school, or in the biggest sports game of your season: your goal should be to perform for God, and not your teacher, coach, peers, or anyone around you. I heard this right before I started my most recent volleyball season, and it completely changed my entire outlook on the sport! However, AO1 isn’t confined to sports. You can be a track runner, dancer, a thespian, a band member, or a wrestler, or anything else and you can still glorify God through your talents. In this blog post, I want to explain what the Bible says about performing for God, what “Audience of One” means to me in my past experiences, and practical ways you can practice this idea of AO1 (and I will be referring to “Audience of One” as AO1 for most of this blog).

What does the Bible say?

Naturally, whenever we as Christians hear something, our instinct should be to see if it is backed by Scripture. Even if it sounds legit, we must be careful to not just follow the words of others blindly. So obviously, I want to show you guys some of my favorite verses that show why AO1 is so important!

In a letter of Paul to the Galatians, he says this: “For am I now seeking the approval of man, or of God? Or am I trying to please man? If I were still trying to please man, I would not be a servant of Christ” (Galatians 1:10). You cannot be pleasing both God and man at the same time…not even Jesus could do that! While he was doing his missions on this Earth, performing miracles and spreading the Gospel, he was doing God’s work, and gained lots of enemies because of his faithful dedication to God. “No servant can serve two masters, for either he will hate the one and love the other, or he will be devoted to the one and despise the other. You cannot serve God and money” (Luke 16:13). If you are on the court, stage, mat, or any other performing area, you can’t be focused on glorifying God and impressing other people. It’s one or the other!

This is the same in other areas of life, because if you are dedicating your life to spreading the Gospel, you cannot also stay focused on getting the world to like you and looking popular, and vice versa. God is not of this world, so you cannot choose both God and the world!

Another great example of this from Scripture is Colossians 3:23-24, which says that “whatever you do, work heartily, as for the Lord and not for men, knowing that from the Lord you will receive the inheritance as your rewards. You are serving the Lord Christ”. One important thing to gather from this verse is that it never says to win, or to be better than somebody else, because all it says is to “work heartily”. This means that living for an audience of one is not at all connected to success, which is such a crazy concept to me! God isn’t glorified when we win, but he is glorified when our heart attitude is focused on him. I love this so much, because even though some people are naturally gifted at a certain thing, other people have to work really hard to even be considered okay at something. To the Lord, natural talent is not an indicator of how much we love him. So, we don’t need to perform good for God, we need to perform our best for God.

This looks very different for each person. If you are the star player on your team, or have the lead in the school play, no matter how much talent you have, you will never succeed in glorifying God if you are making fun of those who are still learning, or skipping practice because you didn’t feel like going. In the end, the people that work hard and are an encouragement to others will be what ends up showing the world the love of Jesus Christ.

For this, I think that I can be a good example, because this was the first week of my tennis practice with the team, and before this, I have only played tennis a few times in my entire existence. At the start of practice, me and the other girls who have little to no experience went on a separate court from the rest of the team and learned our forehand, backhand, and serves. Now, it was not perfect: we all had hits that went way off, and a lot of the time we didn’t even hit the tennis ball with our racket. The coaches were laughing with us as we made total fools of ourselves while trying to learn how to play tennis, and we knew we looked super silly!

However, we weren’t going to let that stop us! Me and the five other girls on my court were working great with each other, even though not all of us knew each other. After a good hit, everybody would congratulate the girl, and if somebody had a spectacularly awful swing, we would just laugh it off and practice our swings together. By the end of the day, none of us were close to being tennis masters, but our heart attitudes were great! I could feel God around me during practice, which sounds weird but was very encouraging. By working hard and doing my best, I feel as if I made a real impact on the team and on the kingdom of God. By the time the season is over, I feel confident that my tennis abilities will improve, and that I will be able to better communicate encouragement to my teammates and myself.

What it looks like to perform for an Audience of One

Personally, whenever I read a blog, or listen to a podcast or sermon, I always want to hear about practical ways to apply what I’ve learned. Even though the message was really great, I get stuck because I don’t know what to do with this information. So, I figured if any of you guys think like me, you would appreciate some practical tips on how to focus on living for an Audience of One.

• Work hard every day. It doesn’t matter whether it is a quick practice, crazy rehearsal, or the biggest game of the season, you need to be putting in your very best effort every time you step onto the court, stage, or whatever other platform you are on. The only way you get better at anything is by working hard, and showing real work ethic is a great way of showing the world dedication and patience that God gives us. Every day counts!

• Don’t try to show off or impress others with your talent. If you are really great at something, a lot of people will notice it, I promise. But the reason God gave you that talent wasn’t so that you could show it off to everybody else! By using your talents and practicing to get better, your goal should be to show how God can use your talents to be a witness to other people.

• Encourage others! Whatever sport or activity you are in, I can pretty much guarantee that there are other people that do it with you. If you are someone who has been part of the team for a long time, encourage the people who have less experience and help guide them through things that make them better and more comfortable. No matter what your skill level is, high fives are a great way to let somebody know that they are doing a great job, and that you admire their hard work. Trust me, a single high five can go a long way!

• Pray! This last one is the biggest one, and it has been a great way for me to keep my mind focused on God in the heat of a volleyball game. At the beginning of every game, as I got ready to start the first volley, I prayed a short prayer to God to thank him for letting me be there, and to ask for strength as I do my best to glorify him. Then, whenever it was my turn to go up and serve the ball, I would close my eyes and take a deep breath before starting my serve routine. I would whisper the words “audience of one” to myself, to remind me of why I am doing what I am doing. I found that whenever I did this and stayed focused on God, my performance actually increased! My serves were more accurate, my hits had a greater force, and I had a much better hustle that allowed me to play better. To me, it was just proof that playing for God really does bring glory to him. Now, please do not go around thinking that if you play your game, or devote your performance to God, that you will do the best you have ever done, but I can guarantee you that it changes your heart attitude. This, in turn, will help you to play better, and to have a much better perspective on your performance, as well as the performance of others.

Well, I hope this was an encouragement to you guys, and that it taught you why “AO1” is so important! As you go along your week, make sure that you stay focused on using your talents to display God’s goodness and kindness, instead of trying to show off for others. I love you guys so much!