Welcome to the June 5th 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
Sunday was special for me.
The special experience came from what happened in church.
Over the past couple of weeks, the church has been recognizing people that were leaving the country.
This Sunday, we had a couple who had been serving as missionaries in Africa since 1968 - yep you saw that right. They started in Rwanda.
An older lady who had been in Africa since 1988 - teaching at different schools starting from Kenya.
We had a man who had lived with his family in Senegal for over 5 years working for the World bank.
Different people, different reasons why they were in the country and church.
But the Church recognized the value of their fellowship as members of the church.
These simple practices remind me of what the "fellowship of believers" mean.
It's not the special role that we do as part of a local church that makes us special to the church.
It's the relationship we have with Christ which we bring to the local Church that makes us special.
No matter the role we may not occupy.
All these people were not in leadership.
They are saints representing Jesus in His Church.
Things I Learnt
1-Sell to Make Them Better: I was part of Pedro Adao's 3-day Crush It Workshop this past week. With all the settling down that the family is doing, I didn't have the budget for the earlier offers he made.
A bigger consideration was this - most of the stuff he added to the offer was not for me. I had either gained this knowledge previously or they were not relevant to my season of life.
Based on this, I had assumed, I would not be part of this event.
As things would turn out, a week before the event, he made a special offer that was within my budget and current learning requirements.
During the workshop, Bari Baumgardner, founder of SAGE Event Management, during her session shares an interesting story.
The goal was to focus us on learning more about the buyer's story and addressing their most important current need - even if it is not covered by the product we are offering.
During an event some years back, a guy had come to her at the back to find out more about the program on offer.
He said he could not buy it. She responded, "tell me more." Long story short, he was living out of his car at the moment.
She told him, he needed to resolve that part of his life first. The program they were selling would still be there. But he needed to get back on his feet first.
Guess what? The next day of the event, the guy shows up at the back of the event venue with his cheque. He specifically looks for her.
He hands her the cheque and said "if I wait till I resolve my current situation, I will not resolve it. I need to start this."
According to her, she didn't pressure him to buy. She served him by focusing on the current season of his life.
And it got him to make the decision she didn't think he was ready for.
Always serve to make people better first.
2-Adapt Your Whole Life to Your Season: A couple of things have changed as the family is trying to settle down in a new country.
A big one is its impact on some of my routines.
Routines like rest, exercise, thinking-time, and spiritual disciplines have been turned upside down.
But I am creating new routines.
To make up time for some of these, I have been using new time slots during the day.
Afternoons have been leaving the office and going for long walks.
The long walks are thinking time, a bit of exercise and occasional prayer walks.
It's my way of not giving myself an excuse.
I have a vision of the man I want to be in the future - mentally, physically & spiritually.
And that's why I make the effort to keep at that man.
No matter what season of life I find myself in.
Postscript
May everything you do bring new life and hope to the people around you. 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