...Discovering Purpose, Fulfilling Destiny

Hello Friends,

Sorry for being absent for months. Taking on professional photography was actually much more than I bargained for. It simply left me with little or no time for anything else. During this period I started many articles which I never finished. I would share one of them with you if you promise not to laugh… You wouldn’t?! Okay then. Here goes…

One virtue I have tried to imbibe in all my dealings is honesty. My personal policy is “If you don’t want people to know you did it then don”t do it. This policy makes me very deliberate in anything I do. As a result of this, I noticed that I find it very difficult tooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooo ooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooo ooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooo ooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooo  ooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooo ooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooo

 Now do I need to explain further? Well you guessed right… I fell asleep. As a matter of fact I had to reduce the number of o’s.It actually filled one and one half pages. I hope I get to complete this post someday. For now I would like to blog on a topic I titled Scars of Gold. I hope it blesses your life. Enjoy…

 For a couple of days now a certain school mate of mine had been on my mind (for the purpose of this article I would call her Laura). So I decided to call her up. In the past when I get such impression and don’t call, such people eventually call me after a while. When I tell them I was planning to call them, it always look like I am lying. So I decided to call Laura. After exchanging pleasantries I asked the key question

“How is your faith?”

“Hmmmmm….”

She exhaled.

“Deji it has not been easy. I have been through a lot. Several things happened that made me question the love of God for me. There was a time that despite the fact that I kept paying my tithe, the devourer had a field day in my life. I had accidents with my two cars; my family house got burnt down during a religious riot and we lost everything, I mean eveything; My father’s health began to fail. I had rush to him to the hospital on several occasions in the middle of the night; the person I was to marry shows up one day and tells me he is marrying someone else - a date had been fixed for their wedding while preparations for ours were ongoing; just about that period promotions in the office were announced and my name was omitted from the list. When it was rectified six months later, instead of backdating it, it was pushed forward. So I lost a year. Sexual pressures from my superiors, customers and others outside the bank also increased. I kept getting all kind of ridiculous offers. But giving away my virtue at this stage of my life would not make sense having kept myself for so many years. It would be like breaking a 3 day dry fast an hour before the fast is over because I could not resist a juicy apple in fruit basket.”

“Hmmmm…”

I sighed deeply. In times like this I simply take off my “Mr. Fix” it cape and helmet and listen to learn. What counsel would I offer someone who is consistent in her walk with God, who chose not to compromise in the face of very juicy, temptations, one who God has chosen to train personally? If I was going to give any counsel it had better be from the Throne of Grace.

She went on…

“After sometime, I just kept tithing and serving God just to show him that I faithful even though he was not. I sought Christians to discuss with who could encourage me; who could tell me my situation was not abnormal but I find none. All they gave was general counsel. No one could tell me anything from a position of experience. The worst thing anyone could do to me then was to use scriptures to encourage me. I always had a counter scripture to justify my case. What do you want to teach a teacher? But what was I going to do? I knew that I had no option but to go back to God and confront him. Backsliding was not an option. Just like in the case of Job, God began to respond gradually…”

“A couple of months after the peak of the crisis and contrary to the practice in my organization I was promoted the next year. Not once but twice!!! For those of you who are conversant with promotions within the Nigerian banking system you would know that it is not an annual event, particularly for staff in operations, what more having it twice in a year. It had to be God. Today, I am the youngest Head of Operations (HOp) in our region. Of course, a lot of tongues wag saying I most have sold my body to rise so fast particularly because I am single. But it is not for me to defend myself.”

“My dad’s health has improved greatly! All the things that were lost during the fire incidence have been restored and even more. Anyone looking at our family today would call us a lucky family that has everything going for them and me, as a single banker that has it all. But not so my brother… Not so!!! People only see your beautiful clothing. They never see the scars that are under them. They see you drop from your brand new car and they desire to be like you. They come to your beautiful house and see it tastefully furnished with quality appliances and furniture and they want to be like you. All they see are the externals. They never get to know the internal working which brought about these externalities.”

“I was asked to speak in church for 30 minutes last week. I noticed that people had their eyes fixed on me for the whole time. They didn’t attempt to write so that they miss a word of what I was saying. There were no distractions, no movements! If a pin had dropped you would have heard it. At the end of the talk, I received several notes thanking me for addressing specific issues which they thought they were the only ones going through.

I interrupted…

“This probably explains whey you are being taken through your current route. In old Kung fu movies, have you notice that the training for the leader or the man who must kill the enemy is always different? At first it seems like punishment which in most cases lead to rebellion until the subject understands the enormity of the task ahead. It is only then that he settles down to do them wholeheartedly. It is only then that he is taught the secret ancient technique known only to his aging master. It is only then that he is respected and his words carry weight!”

“I believe your case is the same. Look back at your life. Right from school (since I had known you) the way God has always dealt with you has not been as he does with the regular person. I believe it is because he is grooming you for a specific purpose… to become a general in his army. The scars you get in process of training are like the medals you see hanging on an army general’s uniform. They signify some great victory in the past. Yours are coated with gold and hung on your soul. It is your credential to lead. It is that which gives power and authority to your words.”

“We go through all kinds of tests as Christians at various degrees but how we handle such tests is what determines whether the scars would be coated with gold or with shame. Those who throw in the towel would most definitely have scars of shame but those who stand their ground and refuse to compromise in the face of adversity would have their scars coated by the Commander-in-Chief himself. That is what makes the difference between ministers of the gospel. Some appear to have more authority then others. Take for instance Bishop Oyedepo of Living Faith in Nigeria. He is a prophet over the nations. His organization is flying its third aircraft which is classified as a fortune 500 aircraft. It was purchased debt free! The faculty in their university is the best paid in Nigeria. Their remuneration is bench-marked against Harvard and Yale. But there was a time, over 20 years ago when this man owned nothing to his name. Today, he is one of the most influential figures in body of Christ in Nigeria and the world over.”

“Scars of Gold… The more the Scars of Gold, the more the authority and power. I am glad you treated those opportunities well and came out victorious. You may still be going through stuff now but just like Paul let us focus on the final goal and set her hearts on the things above and know that whatever goes on down here is temporary and a preparatory phase for the things to come. Just like every modern day movie we see. Good always triumph. The bad guy, even though for most of the movie, appears to be succeeding at the end; there is always a sudden turn and good triumphs over evil. One thing is sure… At the end of the day we win!!!”

“Between now and the last year I have flown over 110 times on various local routes. Of course I have experienced all kinds of turbulence in the air but one thing I know that I know is that I would reach my destination safely. I have a covenant with God concerning that. So when the plain in rocking vigorously and making all kinds of funny sounds in the air I keep reading or watching my movie undisturbed and the passenger sitting beside me who is probably saying his last prayers is wondering what is wrong with this guy. Sometimes having successfully gone through the turbulence in the sky, landing is a totally different experience. The airline I use is not particularly gifted in landing. The aircraft first lands, bounces on the tarmac, lands again before it applies the brake. If you are a first timer you would think we are off the tarmac and speeding to our doom. But one thing I know for sure is that we would disembark from the plane safely. We may have had a rough in the air but we win! We may lose an arm or leg in the process but we win! We may be confronted with death but we would not fear for even if we die, the Commander-in-Chief is able to raise us up again to finish our task. If we lose a leg in the process we would hop with the one we have left. If that is lost too we would crawl. And if we lose both hands we would roll. We would give it what it takes until we cross that finish line. For it is written about us “WE WIN!!!”

“We have been called to higher things. We have been asked to come up yonder. To this call we have answered. Like Paul who was stoned and mistaken for dead only for him to regain consciousness and enter into the next city to preach, we would keep at it. Until the Commander-in -Chief, who is also our referee, blows the final whistle. Be encouraged my dear and do not lose heart. One thing is sure we would emerge victorious.”

We spent over an hour on the phone. At the end of the day she was encouraged and her strength renewed. I was challenged, fired up and glad that I made that call.

To those of you out there going through stuff, let’s learn from Laura’s experience. Do not lose heart. Know that “our light and temporary afflictions are working for us an eternal weight of glory” which cannot be compared with anything in this world. We have been called to glory. But remember there can be not glory without victory and no victory without war. It is only from the battle field that we can earn our medals, our scars… our Scars of Gold.

Stay blessed.

Deji Olatunde.