Your Place In God's Plans

 

Bible Reference: Deut 10:12-13,

God has always depends on man in the execution of his plans on the earth. Right after the creation and in the garden of Eden, it was man that He put in charge of every of His creation. Adam was asked to give names to all that God has created and was also put in control of everything.

When it was time for God to establish the state of Israel, He beckon to Abraham, called him out of his kindred and set him apart for His work on earth.

Same goes for when God plan for redemption of mankind after the fall in the garden of Eden, He has to send His only begotten son, in a form of man to die for the sin of whole world.

God cannot do anything on earth, except through human vessel, except on rear cases when He has to send His angel to deliver some specific message. In the case of Angel Gabriel when he was sent to announce the birth of Jesus Christ to Virgin Mary, and the announcement to the shepherds of the birth of Jesus.

But it should be noted that God does not use just any vessel, He has a specific requirement for choosing His messengers on earth.     

 

KEY REQUIREMENTS

1.    OBEDIENCE: God requires obedience from us and will not compromise that. This is number one perquisite for God to use any man for His work on earth.

2.     CONSECRATION: For God to use us, He requires that we are consecrated unto him. This means we must be set apart for His use and glory.

3.    FAITHFULNESS: To be faithful means, we are totally loyal and honest to God and His calling in our lives. Faithfulness enables us to be honest to ourselves in doing what God has committed into our hands.

4.    FOCUS: Our focus and attention must be on Him and nothing else should deserve our attention. God is the number one priority and all other thing should become insignificant.

5.    COMMITMENT: You can do God’s work unless you are committed to God and the work He has committed into your hands. Without commitment, you will be distracted by other issues of life. Money, women, power could be hindrances to you if you do have a committed spirit.

ADDRESSING SOME MISGIVING ABOUT HIS CALLING

 

There are some people who believed that when God called them, it means they have to leave whatever they are doing for some other things. I have news for you. It is possible to fulfil God’s purpose for you and the rest of mankind even within your chosen profession.

A Doctor may be a vessel unto God and still fulfil God’s calling without dropping his stethoscope for the pulpit, same for a lawyer, teacher, banker, journalist etc. All it takes for you is to keep His purpose for your life in view at every point in your profession.  

As a teacher, you impact knowledge with the sense of “ministering” to the need of your students vise a visa in other profession you find yourself.

In whatever you do, be a man God can depend on, be a man God can trust always.

 

GOD’S AGENDA ON EARTH

It may surprise you that God has no other agenda on the earth except soul winning. Reconciling the world back to Him remain the main reason He has kept many of us alive today, other the day we were born again, He would have recall us back to heaven to join the innumerable angels praising Him day and night.

Reaching lost soul can only be done by man, neither God Himself nor His angel cannot carry out the assignment. Remember when God attempted to speak directly with the children of Israel in the wilderness on mount Morah, it was fearful to the extent that the Israelites could not cope with listen to His voice and they have to ask that God should speak to them through Moses.

For every child of God, you are duty bound to preach the gospel. Today, the flame of God’s word is dying because churches have turned to god of money and neglected the real purpose which they were called. It is God’s will that we help rekindle the fire and warn this generation of the impending danger of neglecting God and His word.

 

GOD’S EXPECTATIONS

1.    Your primary responsibility is to preach the gospel to the lost souls. Speak about God to the people around you, let the whole world know that Jesus is coming back soon and that it will be disastrous if they are not reconciled with God before the second coming.

2.    You must henceforth allow your life to speak about God. Many are Christians by mouth, but their hearts are far from God. Put on the attitude that will reflect your profession and confession of Christ.

3.    You are expected to support the work of God on earth with the 3Ts – Time, Treasure and Talent. Many have excluded God from their finance simply because they see it as too much to give for God. Paying of tithe to some is burdensome.

4.    Be an ambassador of the truth in your profession, community, among your friends and neighbours. Let your entire cycle of influence see Christ radiate through you in all you do.

5.    Defend the weak and the poor among you. God is interested in justice, especially to the poor and the weak. Never use your position to oppress them, rather help them in whatever way you can and within the resources provided for you by God.

 

When you do all these, then you can boldly say you have fulfilled His will in your life.    

Be certain God rewards those who diligently serve Him, He is not a man that He will used and dump you. He specifically told Israel, that He does not ask them to seek Him in vain. You reward is certain with God.

 

The Dangerous Gamble

 

1King 19:19, Mark 10:17-30, Gene 12:1-6

This was the story of Prophet Elijah and how he anointed Elisha as his servant and the one that will take over from him at the end of his ministry.

The high point of the consecration service was when Elisha decided to kill his oxen and cooked it as a send-off meal for his friends and relatives. In our understanding, it would seem Elisha did not do the right thing or take the right decision. The question that might agitate the mind of many people is, was Elisha right to have destroyed his means of livelihood in order to follow an uncertain future? It was like giving up the known to pursue the unknown.

What was going on in his mind when he chose to follow Elijah and forsake all?

Before we can answer these questions, we should flip back and read the earlier encounter of Elijah with God when he was commanded to anoint Elisha as a prophet to replace him. This again will raise another question; was Elisha privy to this encounter? What really motivated Elisha to have took such giant leap toward realising his God giving ministry?

Let take a short journey back to the ancient Japan. History has it that whenever Japanese soldiers go to battle, one thing they do after conquering a territory was to burn down the bridge behind them and move on the next victory. The import of such, we were told was to foreclose any chances of running back from the war front in the event that the battle become so intense.

In my understanding, what Elisha did was to kill the two oxen that represent his tool for survival as a farmer so that when the going become tough, he won’t be tempted to run back to his old trade and abandon his God giving vision.

Many of us are still holding on to our old ways of life, we still oscillate between our present and past indecisive of which way we should sway to.

In the world where alternatives abound, where we have many options to resort to, we have remain unstable to the extent of compromising our faith and lack the required commitment and zeal to pursue our God given vision with all vigour.

Until we are able to burn the bridge and hold on to the calling of the one who created us for a purpose, we may continue to wallow in the darkness of life without being able to fulfil destiny.

Just like Abraham, we must be ready to follow God’s instruction, even at the risk of leaving behind the certainty for uncertainty. Abraham became the father of faith simply because he was willing to trust God against the reality of his situation. “He hope against hope” and refused to stagger in faith, knowing that he that promised is capable of bringing His promise to pass in his life.

Welcome to my world. A world that has been shaped by my close to two decades of financial journalism, about three decades of working closely in God's vine yard and and one and half decade of blissful marital life. All these will come to play in my writing and post and as we rise on in this new train, I pray we enjoy every bit of it. My philosophy of life is largely guided by honesty and fair play. so, once again, I say welcome on board.

CONNECTING WITH PEOPLE

Getting involved with strangers sometimes could be tedious and sometimes rewarding depending on one’s disposition with life. From experience, some relationships that started casually have ended up bringing the parties involved into fortunes that have transformed their lives. Let’s look at the story of a friend, Adetoun (not real name) who had a chance meeting with a state governor in company of his friend and in the course of interaction, the governor was able to link Adetoun with a life changing job opportunity in a bank and years after, became the better for it.

The Governor of Lagos State, Babatunde Raji Fashola, is said to be a living example of how to connect with people. According to his story, it was a chance meeting with the ex-governor of the state, Bola Ahmed Tinubu, and his decision to stay connected with the man eventually paid up when in the later years, Tinubu became the Governor of Lagos and chose Fashola as his Chief of Staff thereby opening an opportunity to become the state governor years later.

There was another story I read in a national newspaper, about a boy who came from his village in search of greener pasture in Lagos and on arrival, he met a total stranger who posed as a Good Samaritan offering a helping hand. By the time he could realise it, the village boy was introduced to an armed robbery gang, which changed the course of his life and eventually he got killed in a gun battle with the Police during a robbery operation.

Relationship has a way of leading one to either prosperity or poverty, depending on what side of the divide you find yourself.

So the act of building a relationship or connecting with people should be seen as critical to one’s survival in life. Admittedly, that you do not have a choice of who is your father, mother or siblings. You cannot determine which country you will be born either, but definitely, you have the prerogative to choose who your friends are, who becomes your close ally in life and even the kind of neighbourhood to live in. You also have the right to determine who you will love to live the rest of your life with.

“The quality of your life is the quality of your relationships.”
-Anthony Robbins

The basic rule to be adopted here should be how you could ensure that you are in the right relationship at all times. Whether you like it or not, there is a correlation between your success in life and the kind of relationship you keep. So the need to ensure that you explore the right relationship to build enough goodwill for yourself at all time is imperative to your choice of a relationship. The quality of relationship you build could ensure the quality of life you live, so make sure that at every point in your life, you consciously take decisions that will bring you close to the right people. And if per chance you found yourself within a circle that fall below your defined standard, take a quick step to discontinue such and move ahead with your life. 

* This is an except from my forth coming book; Living an Enduring Lifestyle

BREAKAWAY FROM THE UGLY PAST

One of the main sources of anger in relationship often times is the inability of one partner to let go of the past hurts and disappointments, and focus on the present task at hands. A number of people carry on with life with loads of baggage from their past relationship or personal experience which often serves as barrier that could hinder their life’s progression.

A victim of rape, for instance who continue to see her husband or every other man in the same light with the rapist will surely not be able to adjust quickly to the need to satisfy her husband conjugal need and enjoy the full benefits of marriage. Her attitude if not properly control could cost her the joy of the marriage and even lead to its early collapse. Trusting another man enough to commit her life to him would definitely be a difficult task because of the constant intrusion of the bad memory of her unfortunate encounter in the past.

I once listened to a radio programme where a lady who was a victim of sexual abuse was seeking advice on air on how to overcome her phobia for men. According to her story, she has been married for three years, yet each time her husband wants sex, the memory of the past abuse she had suffered in the hands of some men keep intruding and all she feels and sees is her abuser rather than her husband making love to her. “I couldn’t help but cry each time my husband tries to make love to me because my past always rush back and make me feel the same way I used to feel when I was being abused,” the lady told the producer of the radio programme. “My husband never likes this and the situation is getting critical for me because I cannot bring myself to tell him the truth about my past and yet we have never enjoyed sex together as couple because of the way I feel and react to him each time he makes a move.”

This lady’s past has remained the greatest threat to her present and even the future because she has not been able to deal with it and put her experience behind her. Unfortunately, according to her story, the marriage has not been able to produce a child, partly because of her attitude to sex and other undisclosed factor. She said a series of test have been carried out on her and the husband, but nothing was found to be wrong with them medically.

The first major step such person should have taken before entering into any relationship or marriage is to purge herself of any bitterness and let go of the hatred toward her violator. Though, forgiveness can be very difficult, but that is the surest way to go in achieving healing from the past hurts and moving forward toward the next stage of life, otherwise one’s life purpose could be abridged with such deep seated bitterness that is asking for revenge all the time.

Same goes for someone who still holds on to past guilt, offence or mistakes. For us to develop a winning attitude, we need to break away from the past, focus on the future and learn to forgive ourselves where necessary and make amend otherwise, the past could constitute major blockage to our present and the future.

CHECK YOUR IGNORANCE GUAGE

It baffles me sometimes to see many people carry on in life with a wrong approach; believing they have the monopoly of knowledge and the key to open all the locks of wisdom. A lot of people are in such category today, thinking that life can only be view from the prism of their understanding of issues, while any other observation contrary to theirs is warped and out of order.

What will you do if later in life you discover that all your notions and belief about life are nothing but a wind? Life can be better lived and enjoy if only we could be open to learning and take a little patience to seek alternative views to ours.

In my sojourn so far in this life, I have seen a number of close associates behaving as if life experience start and ends with them and there is nothing others could do or say to influence their position on issues. Even when all indications pointed to the fact that they are on the wrong path, yet they are never sway by the truth because the only truth they know is their own judgment or their own version of truth.

I could recall my early experience as a teenager, when a cousin of mine was explaining to us how artists record music in the studio and how the sound engineers manage the mixing to achieve sweet melody. Of course by our reaction, we felt this cousin of mine was just blabbing and have no clue to the operational mode of recording studio. Our conclusion then was merely based on our limited understanding, while his description of a musical recording studio was considered impracticable in our own eyes.

Years later, a number of us discovered that we were merely arguing in ignorance and that our vilification of my cousin’s position was because we refused to listen and ask the salient questions on how he arrived at the conclusion or sources of his information. We had assumed that since we grew up together within the same environment and never been exposed to such technicalities of a recording studio, my cousin must have been speaking from the point of ignorance. How wrong we were, if only we had asked the relevant questions and delve more into his source of information before we condemned him, we would have been better informed and our assessment of him would have been different.

So, it was with many people today, they behave like the fool who thinks he is wise. Our attitude toward life is basically comparable to an ostrich ways of life, ignore all wise counsel and focus rigidly on our perception of truth without giving a thought to the fact that our view of things could be wrong.

Why don’t you pause and ponder regularly on your position on any issue. Carry out a check up on your ignorant level, how often are you right on an issues and how often you are wrong in your judgement of things and men as well. If we constantly do a check on our behaviours, then we may as well get to know how often we act in ignorance and how such attitude has continue to place limitation on the way we are perceived by others.

Our Future, Our Investment

For a very religious man, this heading is simply blasphemy. After all, the Holy Books made us to believe that our lives depend on the creator of heaven and earth, so what the heck am I talking about investment and the future then? Uhmm, well, please hear me out before you cast the first stone.

I must say here that our future, truly depend on our ability to trust in the grace and mercy of the creator. No matter our efforts to better our lots in life, if He does not approve of it, it will all come to nought. So, the first step to greater and brighter future is to follow God’s instruction and live our lives in accordance with his purpose for our existence.

Again, it is very instructive to know that His purpose for our live is to “dress and maintain this beautiful garden call the planet.” And this we can only do if we are willing to invest our time, energy and resources to better the environment. The first man in the garden of Eden was charged with the instruction to “be fruitful and multiply,” but there is no way we can be fruitful or multiply if we are not investing or doing something to replenish what we are consuming.

So, the argument that our future is determined by our investment could therefore be stressed further by saying, if we fail to replenish the earth, sooner or later, the whole of the earth could become empty and the future will be in danger because nothing will be left to sustain whatever life that survives the years of the locust.

Let look at it from this angle, a farmer who eats all of his harvest will have nothing left to plant in the next planting season and that also presupposed that such farmer will definitely be left with nothing to harvest at the next season as well.

Our future can only be guaranteed when we come to the realisation that there is the need for us to constantly provide for the coming generations. Many of us engaged in consumption of almost all that we earned today with the position that what we are earning today is not enough to sustain today’s need. Then, what would become of us if by tomorrow, we are unable to earn any income? Our ability to put aside a portion of our today’s income could provide some form of insurance for our tomorrow needs.

When in my last post I talked about money issue, its sound sacrilegious in the ears of some people that money can buy you happiness, or sleep or peace of mind. Then, when you look at the good things of life, people strive to acquire, they are not for free. A good car, a good accommodation and a pleasant working environment could be a boost to your well being and bring you happiness.

The problem with our thought on money is that, while it was meant to provide us all the basic comfort of life, we have perverted the course of life and pursue money to the detriment of our health, love for the next person and service to God. Because of greed, money has become some people god to the extend that in spite of the provision of the basic good things of life, they are never satisfied; while they keep seeking for more till they are overcome by their greed.

Now back to our discussion on investment, it is important that we cultivate the habit of savings little by little to take care of our future needs, even out of the little earnings of today. Then, from our savings we need to invest wisely as a bulwark for the future.

Our society is today engrossed in large appetite for consumption without a thought for tomorrow. What we have seen in Nigeria today is a country that is not ready to invest in the future, but merely engaging in consuming all its earnings on frivolities.

Those who are in government are busy sharing the national cake, without thinking of how to bake more that can go round the majority of the people and therefore, our future is in danger as a people.

The vast depletion of the nation’s foreign exchange reserves, savings in excess crude accounts and the controversy over the portion of overhead consumed by the National Assembly are indication that the mangers of our economy today careless for the future of this country.

Unless, we change our ways and beginning to invest in the power sector, create more employment opportunities for the millions of our youth, provide basic infrastructure that will support living and ensuring that we diversify the economy in such a way that we are no longer oil dependent nation, surely Nigeria as a nation will soon become extinct.