Desperate people do desperate things. Although some degree of hunger for success is needed to sustain and achieve a purpose, one rarely achieves much through desperation. Today I want us to reflect on our past and think about a time when we did something purely out of desperation. What was it about? What did you do? What did you achieve? In hindsight, what should you have done differently? What lesson would you draw from that experience for the next generation? Remember, we want to redeem the time and get the generation next on the highway to achieve in one year what took us 20 years to achieve.
I believe that a major part of the problem of black people everywhere is not just slavery or colonization or poverty in terms of economics but mental slavery, mental colonization and mental poverty that developed over the years of dependency and despondency. Civilization started in Africa, and till this day, Africa has a vast distribution of natural flora, fauna and deposits of precious minerals more than enough to supply the rest of the world with everything needed for man to subdue his environment in the 21st century. But our minds have been conditioned to depend on handouts from elsewhere abroad and the so-called employers and money bags, some of whom are nothing but extensions of the colonial arms and heartless individuals who siphoned public funds into private scoffers and over time the funds became their own. No thanks to these service thieves, and they are in the military, in politics, in civil service, in the academia, in business, in the churches and everywhere. Some of them share the same last names with us, and we probably know them by their first names.
Desperation sets in when one suddenly realizes that time is far spent, and target is not yet achieved. Desperation makes one begin to look for short-cuts, and easy ways to make news headline. Man has a way of comparing himself with others and measuring his success with societal standards. In most of African communities, there are age-groups. The community tends to remind you that your age-mates have graduated from high school, have gone to college, have started working, have bought cars, have built houses, have married, have children, have this, have that. The problem with this mindset is that the life of a man does not constitute in the abundance of what he has. Also, everybody is on a different agenda, different mission, different timing even though they were born within the same period. What tends to happen is that you are reminded of what your age-mates are doing that you are not doing, so the feeling of lagging behind and being left out builds up in you. That feeling is a sucker…it sucks out positive energy, joy, peace, and sometimes sound reasoning. You begin to feel like a failure of some sort. To make it even worse, society rubs it on your face everywhere you turn be it in the church, in the marketplace, in the community; by the way they celebrate those who have those things that you don’t have especially money and what money can buy.
Out of the desperation to be celebrated and validated you do what does not reflect who you are and who you want to be. Some young people end up in jail early in life because of these anomalies. In the American society, similar things happen and once you start raking in those negative and ugly records, your future is becoming mortgaged and beclouded by limitations. First, who told you that you are in competition with anybody? Let’s get this straight, folks, life is individual affair. If you would compete, let it be with yourself so that you can be better than who you were yesterday. This is serious. If you stay in your lane, focus on yourself, mind your business and do what you need to do….only time separates you from those other things that you desire. “Seek yea first the kingdom” is not just about going to church and serving as usher or sanctuary keeper or counselor like most African folks believe. It also means you find out what you can do to make the world a better place for humanity, and all other things will be added to you.
The earth is a colony of the kingdom of heaven and it is the will of God for the earthly kingdom to be a replica of heaven. That is what we say in our Lord’s prayer …thy kingdom come. We are supposed to represent God here and be an extension of his creative hands on earth. God created us in his image after his likeness, right? God created the heaven and the earth and the other things in them, right? But God did not give us cars and airplanes and laptops. Look around you where you are right now and see all the things there that God did not create which we use daily…here now I see fan, bed, clothes, phone, bags, books, shoes, belts, medicine, cosmetics, air conditioner, electric light bulbs and so on. All these things here were created by human beings at one time or the other in response to that same command “Seek ye first the kingdom”. I may not be able to tell you the persons who created all these things I have enumerated above but I can tell you they must have been handsomely rewarded for their innovative thinking and problem solving ideas. Seek you first challenges you to look around you, see a need and proffer a solution and by so doing, advance the kingdom of God on earth. Everything that God made is easy and simple, so much that we take it for granted because of the simplicity. We think that the more complex the more credit worthy…that is not actually true. The problem you solve could be a simple one, but it would get you on your way to where you want to be. Think.
The parable of the talent teaches us about the different gifts and talents. God did not create anybody and left him without some decoration. I consider gifts and talents natural decorations, and you may call them endowments. Have you discovered your own or do you think your own doesn’t count? Whose own counts and why does it count more than yours? Often times desperation comes when we refuse to be our authentic selves and become consumed in our desire to be like someone else. When you be like me, the best you can be is my counterfeit…why would anybody settle for counterfeit anybody? I am not saying that you may not act or sound or think like me so long as you are being yourself and doing you, that is all that matters. When you be yourself, discover your endowments, develop your endowments and deploy your endowments, you can use your endowments to make your environment a better place or make life easier for someone. You will not solve the problem of the whole world, and no one has, but you can advance something or some knowledge in line with that with which nature decorated you. So the next time you hear “seek you first the kingdom” I want you to ask yourself, “what problem was I created to solve?” Find it and solve it and wait for all other things to be added for you….money, fame, marriage, children, cars, houses, whatever. My problem with those material things is that our society looks at blessings as only things tangible….what about joy, peace, happiness, sound sleep, good health, sense of accomplishment etc? Those intangible yet far reaching feelings count too.
When you discover yourself and discover your place in God’s agenda for your generation, the joy that follows is much more than any certificate or diploma you may ever get from Harvard or Yale. Sometimes when we run out of ideas we go back to school to get more diplomas so that we can have longer appendages to our names because we expect that more titles will give us fame and edge over the “competition”. Again, I encourage getting more diploma as means to an end, but the end must be clearly understood. Enough of doing what the society claps for, it is time to do what makes you the solution the world has been looking for in the area of your endowment. When would you look beyond how to perpetuate yourself on the job and think about how you can create jobs for the next generation? Regardless of all the excuses we can come up with, the next generation is expecting us to create an enabling environment for them to step up the stage. You are the provision that God has sent ahead of the vision he has given the generation after you. Do not be a wasted and a dormant provision. St Paul advised Timothy to “fan to flame the gifts that have been deposited in you through the laying on of my hands”. It means that Timothy could not sit idly by and say “Whatever will be will be”. Timothy had to fan the gifts to flame or they will never flame. If you don’t sow your seed, it will never germinate and bear fruits. If you don’t discover your talents, they will die with you and you will account for them when you get to the other side of eternity.
I know that God is a businessman and everything he created solves a problem and brings in profit. What profit have you brought to the kingdom with your 30 or 40 or 50 years of life, lots of diplomas and years of experience? Do not wait until the feeling of “no time” comes upon you. Today, if you perceive a nudge in your spirit to do something or explore an idea, go for it. Don’t say it doesn’t count…who counts what counts? Do not just count years make your years count by your own counting. If you look inward deep enough you will discover relics of your natural endowments that have been left abandoned for years….fan them to flame and you will die happy, having achieved the purpose for which you were sent here. We were all sent here for a season, a reason and a purpose, and if you don’t know your purpose, you mess up your journey here and rob the world of the talents wrapped up in that your small body. You have no idea how long or short your season lasts.
Doing things because others are doing it will only lead to desperation and frustration. We have lots of examples but time will not permit us today to go into details. The only result you would expect out of things done by desperation is remorse and regrets. I know people who married out of desperation, people who traveled abroad out of desperation, people who joined a trade out of desperation, people who chose a career out of desperation….most of them are either miserable or frustrated or both. If you find yourself trying to do things out of desperation, you are either out of the plan for your life or out of alignment with the timing for your assignment. Take a break, reevaluate and if need be, today is your day. You can hit the reset button. Speed counts when direction is right.
It is important to stay on your lane and do your thing diligently…”seest thou a man diligent in his business”, he will stand before kings. I see you stand before kings as you look inwards and refuse to be distracted by the noise around you. May God give us understanding
Mezie Okolo @TheRitePlace