Welcome to the December 25th edition of Faith & Life Lessons.
You will see this email full of tidbits from my week. My goal is simple. I hope that from how I live my life, you can find a thing or two that helps you as you try to live a life that matters. I am always trying to do one thing - make Christ-focused decisions in love, work, and life. And this was my week.
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The Story of My Year
If there was a movie genre to describe my 2022, it would be "ADVENTURE"
That would be the main genre and added with a dash of family, action, and comedy rolled up into one.
My family made a huge transition moving from Spain to Senegal during the year.
But before that, we had to fight with a promise that God gave us.
It came with emotional highs and lows. As adventure movies go, you take a turn and think you have found the missing treasure only to realise that you just got another clue for the next step to take.
We didn't see the promise come to happen during the year. And there were times I wondered if I heard correctly.
Well, God decided to throw a curveball into the mix to show me that I heard him correctly.
At one point, I was making a trip from Senegal to Spain. I have two travel documents - an expired one and an up-to-date one.
I had travelled a couple of times before and they always ask for both.
For this trip, I just felt the urge not to bring out the up-to-date one.
This trip was a first of its kind when it came to immigration checks. I had to pass through 5 checkpoints - 3 in Senegal and 2 in Spain.
One of the ones in Senegal was manned by Spanish immigration police.
Can you believe that all 5 checkpoints looked at the expired travel document and passed me on?
As I passed the last immigration point in Spain to go and pick up my baggage, God spoke to me "if I can make these eyes pass on this, I can bring the promise I have spoken to pass."
I realised that my job was to let the word I had heard try me and find me faithful doing everything required at every moment, it was God's role to fulfil His Word.
I just don't understand how or when.
God used that to remind me He is faithful to His promises.
And I will continue rolling with that
Things I Learnt in 2022
1 - God Prepares A Table: So the family moved from Spain to Senegal and God went ahead of us to make sure everything went better than we imagined.
Getting a new apartment is not a straight line in Africa especially when you have to consider all the supporting activities you need to have around you.
As it turned out, we got an apartment that came with everything we needed. It was just about 2 minutes from where I was staying so it was easy for us to move from the smaller apartment I stayed in before the family joined me to the new apartment.
We found a great creche 3 minutes from the house where the owner spoke English. As a bonus, she had also been a pediatric nurse. This made the kids' drop a lot simpler. I dropped off the older kid on my way to work and the Mrs just walked down to road to drop off the little kiddo at the creche.
We still wanted our son to continue his Spanish - he had taken a lot of effort to learn the language and we didn't want him to forget.
How did God solve that?
Well, the first piano teacher I contacted turned out to be a Spaniard. She only taught in English or Spanish. So, she teaches his classes in Spanish. She even connected us to a Spanish family with a kid that my son can play with. We'll start the play date of things in the new year.
And the Mrs?
She found a community of Christian mothers where she found friendship and support.
Did I tell you that we also found a church family?
Yes, we found a place where everyone can rest, find friendship and be able to serve.
God prepared a table for us.
And it made the transition better than we could have imagined.
2-Never Backdown From a Promise: When I moved to Senegal, God gave with promises to live and work by.
At a point this year, I was not seeing the sort of progress I wanted in the business I lead.
One of the excuses I gave myself not to venture out as much as I would want is the language gap. I am still learning french and my skills are still not up to full throttle for full-on conversation.
Two things changed the direction of how things ran for me.
In late Q3 2022, I was praying for God to give me a couple of relationships that would "push or kick" me in the rear. God did not give me new relationships. He answered my prayers by using the existing reporting structure I have at my head office to push me into challenging positions.
The second was that for a couple of weeks from September, I was praying over my 2023 plans and 10-year vision.
At some point, a word kept coming for me during the prayers. The was "courage".
And that was what I did.
I stepped out with courage and decided to knock on doors even if the language gap was still there.
I bridged the gap by surrounding myself with people in my team who could serve as interpreters when I went to those meetings.
And I am seeing results.
We are not where we want to be as a business but we are better positioned to ramp up our business in 2023.
And it started when I stepped out in courage
Postscript
May the lessons, highs and lows of last year inspire you to live higher and better in the new year. Amen
Ps: I didn’t forget Christmas. Merry Christmas to you and your family. I recorded a special Christmas video message wrapped up in a quiz below. Click here to watch it.
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Tola - The Everyday Disciple
I help Christians like you who want to live intentional lives incorporate their faith into everyday life so they can make Christ focused decisions in all areas of life and truly live to make an impact and make God happy.
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