Welcome to the January 2nd 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 Year
Happy New Year.
As you can guess, this week's section has been renamed just in time for this episode.
It will return to the normal heading at the end of this week.
Over the last couple of years, I have been having keywords that have defined the direction in which my year would run by.
As I walked into 2021, the word I felt in my heart (which had a God-moment basis) was ENLARGEMENT.
I saw this lived out in how my capacity to serve the relationships most important to me outgrew anything I had in years past.
I served my wife and kids better.
I am glad to see that the staff I lead are fulfilling their personal dreams through the way I am serving them.
I have had to enlarge my zone of comfort in how I lead the business so that it can serve more people better.
I have also had to push myself more in how I teach online - I started Saturday Night Conversations, ran a 30-day Live training online, and released my first paid training.
Enlargement was expansion in my capacity to serve in the life areas that matter.
I have my 2022 word. This is something that has been making its way to the forefront of my mind since Q4 2021.
There is something that will rock my world.
TRIBE
This is my word for 2022.
Things I Learnt in 2021
1 - Prophecies Interpret themselves not us: I don't claim to be a prophet.
I am just a guy who has had the privilege of hearing and seeing some of the things God plans before they happen.
And these have been in my life, other people, and even in national matters.
There are 2 foundations that people who experience prophecy must pursue.
First, the ability to hear and see correctly.
Second, the ability to interpret correctly.
There are even times when the ability to interpret does not come with a prophecy.
During the year, I have seen prophecies that I could not have interpreted their fulfillment when I got them.
The true interpretation comes when we see their fulfillment.
Those are prophecies that interpret themselves and not us interpreting them.
When we try to force our perspectives into prophecies to create the interpretations we like, we end up with pie in the face.
Sometimes, prophecies take their time and no interpretation is worth its weight in gold until the time is right.
2 - Sounds Good but not Good: Once upon a time, stuff from the other side of the world took a long time to get to our side of the world.
Sometimes, such stuff never made the air miles to get to our side.
End the age of the internet. Now, we have the good, the bad, and the unexpected coming in droves.
Everyone with something to say shares it.
Nothing wrong with that.
You are reading this because of the wonderful power of the internet.
The grief I have had this past year is to hear stuff that sounds good but not good.
Not good because they painted a diminished image of God. All in the hopes of getting us to believe we as humans can do more.
My pain is when I hear Christians jumping on the soapbox and mouthing the same things.
My joy in all this is that there is still a remnant out there sharing the good stuff.
And I hear the remnant now and again. They don’t diminish God to make us more important. They exalt God so that we see our importance to Him because of the gifts He has put in us.
We are gifted so we can do more because God is more than we imagine Him to be.
No matter how much "sounds good but not good" is out there, there is still so much "good stuff" out there.
The Saints are still standing.
Postscript
May you welcome the New Year with courage and conviction. May your heart be full of wonder to see the miracles that God opens up each day with. Amen
Tata,
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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