Daily Devotionals

The best way to get started with your work is to take a look at the calendar, and pick a date. A specific date you will get started. A date you will go public with your work. It can be a date in the future. However, if it is too far out in the future, you want to be sure you are not stalling. It is always easy to hide your fears by postponing your commencement date into the far future. With no intention of ever making the date. You must decide on the simplest form of your idea and commit to get started within three to six months.

As it is written, “For everything there is a season, and a time for every matter under heaven”. There is a time to pray, study and clarify your plans. And there is another season of life where you must move on from planning to implementation. Matters of life and destiny come with a sense of complexity. The scale of the changes you want to bring to your world can be intimidating. Half of the time, you doubt yourself. The other half of the time, you cannot even agree upon the exact course of action. The solution is to look for simplest and easiest thing you can commit to doing right now. Then do it.

You must act with faith and get started. Everything changes the moment you get started. You will gain velocity. Momentum will build up around your work. As you keep things going, refusing to stop under any condition. You will discover that your mission is underway in full effect. As long as you have some clarity around the exact changes you want. You can start something around your mission. At the very least, you should write and publish essays around the things that interest you. Follow-up with live events. The writings and events will attract like minded people to you. You can then move on to larger projects.

You have to start with a seed. The seed version of the future you are steering your world towards. We fail when we try to design and build out the entire vision at once. A lot of people make the mistake of attempting to build up complicated structures and programs. This approach does not work. You will never be able to plan for every situation and circumstances. There have been no plans that will not change when confronted with reality. It does not matter how talented you are. If you want a tree, plant a seed. Let the seed grow into the tree you want over time.

John Gall, a systems theorist wrote, “A complex system that works is invariably found to have evolved from a simple system that worked. The inverse proposition also appears to be true: a complex system designed from scratch never works and cannot be made to work. You have to start over, beginning with a simple system”. When you think about the biggest forces shaping your world, you would agree that they evolved from something more simple. They acquired their might over time. Today’s complex world evolved from very simple ideas that compounded over time.

Every ambitious person likes to think that they can prove an exception to this principle. However, reality humbles them every single time. The key is to start off with the smallest project that your faith can handle. Then you continue to push yourself to do more. Build a simple system with no more than three major features. Your best ideas will need to change the moment you publish them into the real world. Do not waste your time with a complicated plan that will never work. Simplify your ideas into their simplest forms and get started with it. You will then be able to get feedback. The feedback will guide you towards the next steps to take.

You do not need a special vision from heaven to see that God is not pleased with economic inequality. It is a recurring theme in the Holy Bible. From the laws of Moses to the Psalms. From the Gospels to the Epistles. You cannot ignore the idea that God wants a society defined by righteousness, justice and mercy. This is the kind of society where the weak and the poor can get a chance at a better life. You can align your economic vision with what would please your Father in heaven. You can create economic opportunities in your world.

God is on the lookout for people that are willing to keep a watch over their world. A watchman that understands heaven’s perspective on these matters. And will not shrink back from doing justice. It is the mindset that counts, not your current station. If you align your economic goals with the goals of heaven. The enablement to perform will come upon you from heaven. You start by understanding that “whoever is generous to the poor lends to the Lord, and he will repay him for his deed” (Proverbs 19:17 ESV). When you join the crusade against economic inequality by empowering the poor, God will empower you.

There is a difference between poverty and not having money at the moment. Poverty is a spirit. A poor person is not just about not having money. It is about lacking the ideas and motivation to create wealth. So, you might not have paper money to give to the poor. Yet, you can enrich their lives by shining the light of heaven in your soul to their own darkened souls. If you take responsibility for empowering others and creating jobs for them. Heaven will bring the resources required to you. Don’t worry about your own condition. You cannot remain poor if heaven uses you to create jobs and make others rich.

Your intelligence is a gift to solve problems on behalf of the people God has called you to serve. Your intelligence is the machine God gave you to create a world of abundance for others. You will struggle to maximise your potential if you are more interested in showing off your talents, than getting the job done. It seems smart people are obsessed with looking for new ideas that nobody else has thought about. They want to win a medal for their brilliant ideas. You will tap into your creative power if you focus on your mission. And you go all out to find proven ideas you can use to achieve results.

History is littered with tales of smart people that spent their lives pushing ideas that never worked. At the same time, you see not-so-smart people lighting up their world with simple ideas that work. They start with a simple idea, and over time, their ideas evolve into something special. If you want to watch over your world and steer it towards a better future, you can begin right away. With simple ideas that work. If your goal is to do something cool, you will never begin. Ecclesiastes 7:29 (GNT) says, “this is all that I have learned: God made us plain and simple, but we have made ourselves very complicated”.

A watchman must value the practical over some vain grandiose project. You don’t have to be recognised as the smartest person in the room. Live with a simple mindset that achieving your goals is what counts. Keep it simple. Do not waste your time looking for never-before-seen ideas. The idea does not matter. The most important thing is that the job is done. In a way that satisfies the requirements with as little trade-off as possible. With humility, and an excellent spirit, God will increase you. And your creative instincts will kick in.

There is nothing new under the sun. You do not need something new to make something new. Your goal is not to make something new. Your goal is to steer your world towards where God wants. The goal is to solve problems, influence society, and create wealth. Keep your approach simple and practical. If you are more interested in showing the world your genius, than solving their problems. It does not produce any meaningful results. Find your contentment within the confines of the known. As you apply them with an excellent spirit, you will find good success.

Jesus did not create his own scriptures. He read the ancient sacred writings like anyone else. You would have expected someone as powerful as Jesus to discard the old under the pretext of ushering in the new. He did not. When the devil tempted him, he quoted the scriptures like anyone else. When he was called upon to read in the synagogue, he opened to what we now know as the sixty first chapter of Isaiah, and began to read. He extracted lessons from the existing scriptures and distilled them into his trademark parables. Jesus breathed life into the ancient, sacred writings. He did not resign to some cave for ten years, trying to create new scriptures that were better than the existing.

Stop looking for new ideas and start applying existing ideas to the problems that plague your world. There are no brilliant ideas waiting for discovery. New ideas do not form within a vacuum. As you set out to do some good work with all your might. You will continue to find and apply better ideas in your work. You need to gain clarity around your mission. There must be a clear statement about the result you want to achieve. Once you are clear about that, you must now search for everyone that has ever attempted to do something like that before. Study their works, read their books. Begin to apply whatever you learn. You don’t need something new to get started.

We love to define creativity as an act of developing an idea that is new and useful. This definition puts pressure on the enterprising mind to find something that nobody has ever thought about before. And this complicates things. How can one think up something that nobody else has ever thought about before? If creativity is about possessing original ideas, how do I avoid copying others? You must avoid these lines of thought. Some of your best ideas will be something others have already thought about. You will copy the works of others that have gone before you. The new ideas you want are contained in the old ideas. You have to make old things appear new again.

Nothing is new in the sense that the Universe has been around for a very long time. You can be having an experience for the first time, and so, it feels new to you. However, others have experienced this before. Ecclesiastes 1:9-11 (ESV) says, “What has been is what will be, and what has been done is what will be done, and there is nothing new under the sun. Is there a thing of which it is said, “See, this is new”? It has been already in the ages before us. There is no remembrance of former things, nor will there be any remembrance of later things yet to be among those who come after”. You will fare better in your quest to steer your world towards a better future, if you learn to study the past. New associations can be discovered when you approach the old things with a sense of humility and candour.

Creativity might amount to rehashing old ideas. Creativity is not about coming up with something new, it is about solving problems. The goal is not to impress the gullible with superior knowledge. Your goal is to solve problems and create value. What makes your ideas appear new are the specifics of your own situation. Imitation is not the act of copying others. Imitation is when you copy from others, without any regard for your own unique situation. The first cryptocurrency was invented in 2009 AD. It applied the existing idea of cryptography. Cryptography is an ancient idea that has been around since 1900 BC. Focus on your mission. Think in terms of problem solving. And you will find new uses for old ideas. This is the real way to approach creativity.

The closest people in your life should be the people you are growing together with. As you grow together, you will go together on the mission to shape culture, influence society, and create wealth. An African proverb says that “If you want to go fast, go alone. If you want to go far, go with others”. A future that is aspirational and that people can be genuinely excited about, would require a lot of selfless leaders. You cannot succeed in a vacuum. There is no real success in isolation. You will need to grow up with your peers. And in the passing of time, you can take the mountains together.

There is a place for running after people two to three decades ahead of you. But, you will discover that you need peers and colleagues that you can grow with. You should live with a mindset that in the future, the most influential people in your world will be the people you grew up with. An old adage says, “three children cannot remain relevant to each other over twenty years”. This is not true. Three people can remain friends, and be useful to each other for over fifty years. They just need to grow together, and commit to the same mission.

The key idea is to take a long-term view towards the relationships in your life. If you think about relationships lasting decades, you will handle the current moment differently. This works for co-workers, partners, suppliers, customers, friends, etc. Your co-worker today can start their own company in five years time. And working together, you can make it a billion-dollar company. Your childhood friend can become an elected public officer in another twenty-four years time. They will need trusted and competent hands to govern with. Thinking in decades will rid you of bad behavior. Take a long-term view, and commit to growth.

You are not a fully formed adult unless you can comprehend, think about, and plan out ten years into your future. If you consider your day-to-day productivity, you would be disappointed. You cannot do much in a day or a week. Your consistency in the long run is the secret of great achievements. You need to close your eyes for a moment. Then add up ten more years to your current age. You should possess some idea about the direction your life would be headed by that time. What can God make of you in society if you work with a ten-year window?

You cannot succeed in life, business or ministry without understanding how to think, prepare and plan for the long term. The biggest names in politics did not rise into prominence in less than ten years. The biggest names in business did not become popular overnight. Google search was already the best search engine in the world before you heard about it for the first time. Companies that earn billions of dollars in revenue have been around for more than ten years. A short-term mindset will doom your plans. You will become impatient with the results, and you will give up too soon.

Think about what you were able to accomplish over the past two weeks. Compare this with how much progress you have recorded within three years. This should motivate you to elevate your perspective. You will see that despite the highs and lows of life, overall, you kept moving forward. Consider what your life would look like in ten years, if you set a ten-year goal. Come up with a result you can only get if you choose to work with a ten-year window. You break the ten-year goal into three-year parts, and then into single years. So, as you go about your work everyday. You can understand that it will add up to something special.

The future called. They need visionary leaders. There is a lot of room for righteous and just people to watch their world and do work that matters. The future does not only require leaders and seasoned professionals. They also require labourers and slaves. Here is the idea. It is not too hard to figure out the kind of future that is aspirational, and that people can be genuinely excited about. It should not be too hard to figure out the kinds of people that can drive such a future. When you are able to define that future and the personality requirements, then you can take up the responsibility to become that person.

This is a good time to revisit the folktale about belling the cat. All the rats knew their salvation requires one of them to place a bell around the cat. However, none of them was willing to take the responsibility of belling the cat. Even though it promised a better life for the others. Citizens of African countries like Nigeria for example, have been complaining about poor leadership for over three decades. It seems like none of them cares enough to find out what makes a visionary, selfless leader and commit to the process. Compare that with Ezra, the biblical character. Ezra knew that in the future, his nation would need a skilled scribe to teach and enforce the laws of Moses. He worked hard and positioned himself for that. (Ezra 7:1-10)

Tomorrow is nothing more than a stage play with a lot of actors. What role will you play? Here is an idea for you. What if you make it your dream to make it possible for hundreds or thousands of people to sleep well at night; take things easy, because they know you are watching their world. They know that you are creating more jobs for the community. You are creating value in the marketplace. They see how much of a positive influence you are, and they glorify your father in heaven. You need to decide on the role you want to play in the future of your family, community, industry or city. Once you decide, get to work. People are depending on you.

The great thing about the future is that nothing is set. Your future is the cumulative of your thoughts and actions in the present. By the grace of God, and through your act of faith, you can own the future. The worst approach you can adopt for the future is to wait and see. The future will not take care of itself. You will lose. Think about tomorrow, today. What is good about today? And how better can it become tomorrow if you continue to put in the work, while fighting off the demon called “instant gratification”?

The idea that your future will be better, is nothing more than wishful thinking. If you are willing to get off your high horse and investigate root causes and effects, you will see the truth. The biggest companies, organisations and institutions dominating your world today evolved over time from very humbling beginnings. The most visible personalities dominating the conversation today, started working towards it, ten years ago. So, today does not belong to you because yesterday was not maximised. The good news is that you can begin to do something about it now. Someone realised that his country was dependent on imports for everything, and so began to take steps in favour of local production. You can dominate your industry if you think and plan ten years ahead.

In the passing of time, your problems will not disappear. If you owe a bank some money, the money does not disappear just because it has been five years. It is either paid off or not. Time does not solve problems, it is the application of wisdom that will solve your problems and position you for a better future. You must work hard for the future you want, it will not be handed to you on a platter. This is a great time to gather intelligence around your mission. The world cannot steer itself towards a better future. This is something you must take responsibility for. What do you want the economy of your world to look like in twenty years time?