Welcome to the August 28th 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.
Like this?
Pay it forward by sharing it with someone that could benefit from it. They will thank you for it.
The Story of My Week
I was attending a training made up of mainly Nigerians.
The facilitator while trying to make a point, asked "what is the first thing that comes to your mind when you talk about a Nigerian?"
Two people responded almost simultaneously.
I was one of them.
The other person said "corruption". I said "confidence."
The facilitator took up corruption and explained away "confidence" saying that when Nigerians travel out of the country they excel.
But that is missing out on the fundamentals.
Nigerians home and abroad have a high sense of confidence which is why they still try out the unusual despite the difficult environment.
When they move out of the country, the same confidence is what they leverage to excel ahead of other nationalities in any area of enterprise.
This has its upside and downside.
The downside is when they bring that confidence into non-positive endeavours.
But I refuse to build my house on that.
I build it on the foundation of the confidence that most Nigerians carry everywhere they go.
It's that sense of confidence that caused Nigerians to be dubbed "the world's most optimistic people"
Confidence is the seed that God has given us as a people - how we use it is up to us.
And this applies to every country.
There are other nationalities on my list.
Our job is to call out the seed that God has given our respective nations and not focus on the negative fruits that others may use the seed to produce.
We are difference makers in the countries we live in.
Things I Learnt
1-When God Calls Your Attention: I am a person who never believes that things just happen to me. My life is too precious to God for Him to leave the events of my life to chance.
This is why I understood a memo I got from God - it just took me some time to do that.
Members of my family had been falling ill for a couple of weeks.
We made a couple of trips to the hospital, and got medication but with little or no changes.
It was then I realised what was happening.
God had been trying to get my attention to something that had been left undone as a family.
This was the way He could make me listen.
I guess He had tried other methods but I was too deaf to the message He was sending.
By the way, I am a guy who hears God speak so it's not a case of "he needs to learn how to listen to God."
But I am not too proud to say "I missed it this time."
He speaks in dreams, in visions of the night, when deep sleep falls on people as they lie in their beds. He whispers in their ears and terrifies them with warnings. He makes them turn from doing wrong; he keeps them from pride. He protects them from the grave,from crossing over the river of death. Job 33:15-18
2-Keep Serving People: There are two reasons for what I do here. The first reason is it provides me with another opportunity to honour God. The second is the opportunity to serve people differently.
I have something else I do focused on Christian Professionals. A few months back, I make an offer for free clarity calls for anyone trying to identify the core skills they bring to their workplace.
These skills provide a platform for accelerated growth and development at work.
Three people took me up on the offer.
Recently, I noticed that one of them posted an update on LinkedIn about getting a new job.
I took notes during the calls.
I sent the highlights of the notes I took to her.
It turned out - she had been looking for the info.
Now she has it.
And I am sure she will make a huge success in her career because she has better knowledge.
I keep serving.
Postscript
May your life inspire the people around you to live a life that honours Jesus. Amen
Like this? Pay it forward by sharing it with your friends.
Was this forwarded to you? Sign up so you don't miss any edition. Click here
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.
0 comments