Welcome to the June 27th 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.
The Story of My Week
One of my goals for the year was to learn from a business mentor.
I identified one that I felt had the experience I would like to learn from.
We had met a couple of times and I was picking up a couple of lessons from him.
Most of the meetings were driven by business - i.e., meetings driven by trying to make a deal happen.
The learnings were usually incidental.
I decided it would be great to have a meeting where it was not driven by a deal.
I asked if he would be open to a lunch meeting where I could just learn from him.
Guess what, he ghosted me.
And he has not returned messages or picked my call after that.
I decided to let it go.
I recall something John Maxwell said about when he was starting up in ministry.
He reached out to 10 of the most successful ministry leaders to ask if they would be willing to meet him for about 1 hour and he would pay $100 for the time - a hefty amount for him at that time.
Only 2 out of the 10 agreed to meet with me.
So, I still have at least 9 more people to ask.
Things I Learnt
1-Wisdom for the Aged: God works in wonderful ways. So, after one business leader ghosted me, God gave me the benefit of learning from another leader.
I listen to the Carey Nieuwhof Leadership Podcast and this week, he interviewed Gordon Macdonald.
In case you are not familiar with the name, he wrote books like "Ordering Your Private World" and "Rebuilding Your Broken World" - which come highly recommended.
He is eighty-two years old now and speaks from a wealth of wisdom experienced from highs, lows, moral failures, and personal successes.
Carey has a personal relationship with him and it shows in the quality of the interview. I learned so from that interview and dug into the other 2 previous interviews he had done with him.
All the interviews are pure gold.
It was like sitting down to listen to an older sage train you on lessons from his life so you can live better.
If you want to listen, you can go here - interview one, two & three
If you can make the time, the interviews are worth your time.
2-Following Wherever the Road Leads: I spent Sunday afternoon with a couple who had been missionaries in West Africa for about 11 years.
Our conversation went into how they made the transition to come to West Africa.
According to them, West Africa has all the reasons why they won't want to come.
It's hot, dusty, and humid. Add to that, they had to learn a new language.
But it is the place that God led them to.
They have followed - even in the most difficult circumstances.
I learned lessons just from talking with them.
Following God can come with curveballs, they reminded me that trusting God means following them.
Because He works everything according to the great plan in His heart.
Postscript
May you find the courage to choose for God when you face the difficult crossroads of everyday decision-making. May your choice encourage those that come after you to follow Jesus. Amen
Tata,
Tola
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