Lessons from 'Starting Over' by Bob Gass (1)

Three Life-Changing Principles

1. The answer to old relationships – new ones

We talk only of the past, because we stopped living at a certain point years ago.

Anytime you discuss the past as though it was the present, it’s because you’ve allowed the past to steal the present right out of our hands.

2. The answer to pain is purpose

When the focus changes from you to others, your life will to take an up swing.

3. The answer to resentment is a commitment to walk in live and forgiveness

Forgiveness is not for the benefit of others – it’s for your benefit. Until you can forgive the offense and release the person who hurt you, you can’t move on.

The Rearview Mirror

There’s no way to go forward, if you’re looking at what’s behind. If you do, you’ll end up in a ditch for sure.

Lessons from my Mother

I don’t have to do anything to earn his love; he gives freely to us. But I do have to do certain things if I want to enjoy his blessings.

Three Things about Giving:

The seed you sow will never leave your life
It simply moves from where you are today, to where you’ll be tomorrow; but when you get there, it will no longer be the seed you planted, but the harvest you need.

God will never ask for something you don’t have, but he’ll always ask you something you’d like to keep
Giving proves that you’ve conquered greed. It also proves you’ve conquered the fear of lack .

You always have enough to create what you need
When what I have is not enough, I just make it a seed. The moment I put that seed into God’s hand, my next harvest begins.

Don’t Limit your Potential

Instead of waiting for life to happen, go out and make it happen.
He (God) can’t be your peace until he is first your focus (Ish26:3).
At that moment God gives you an idea or speaks with definite direction, you either make a commitment or make an excuse. You act in faith or react in fear; but right then you’re deciding your future.
Fear usually comes dressed up as an excuse.
You can’t control the wind, but by his grace, you can adjust your sails to take you where you want to go.
Opportunity is a visitor; don’t assume it will be back again tomorrow. Move while the door is open.

What’s your Achilles’ heel?

If you’re unwilling to acknowledge that you’ve got a problem, you wont protect yourself in that area or work on it, and as a result you’ll keep getting into trouble.
We fail because we love things more than people.

People don’t care how much you know until they first know how much you care.

AGONY OF CHOICE

by J.O Adenuga

Principles can be easily made
But it can also hurt to abide by
How painful it feels to let go
To let go of one for another
Just for the sake of principle
The grief can be like that of a departed soul

How easy it is to make a choice
But the price of our choice lingers
Much longer after the choice have been made
Along with our choices
Comes the immediate pain
The pain of loosing fringe benefits from other alternatives

And the pain of uncertainty of the chosen

The choice once made opens the eyes
Opens the eyes to the benefits of other alternatives
Reveals & counts the loss of not choosing other alternatives
Our choices are like seeds
The result or benefits are the harvest thereof

Each time we make a choice
Especially the right one,
We plant a see in the ground
We suffer the pain of not eating the seed
We suffer the pain of parting away with the seed
It enters the soil & leaves us with no proof of harvest
It rather decays & decomposes
Leaving us with the grief of loss
With the uncertainty of choice

But certainly time will tell
Time, the revealer of secrets will prove
How worthy the choice is
Right or wrong we cannot tell
But time will tell

God give me a heart to endure through this time
Through the time a farmer waits to endure the loss of his seeds
The time that reveals the fruitfulness of the choice
That reveals the certainty in the uncertainty
I have made this choice, Lord
Help me to wait

Being Carried?

by J.O Adenuga 08/08/2006

Acts 3:1-7
Now Peter and John went up together into the temple at the hour of prayer, being the ninth hour. 2 And a certain man lame from his mother’s womb was carried, whom they laid daily at the gate of the temple which is called Beautiful, to ask alms of them that entered into the temple; 3 Who, seeing Peter and John about to go into the temple asked an alms. 4 And Peter, fastening his eyes upon him with John, said, Look on us. 5 And he gave heed unto them, expecting to receive something of them. 6 Then Peter said, Silver and gold have I none; but such as I have give I thee: In the name of Jesus Christ of Nazareth rise up and walk. 7 And he took him by the right hand, lifted him up: and immediately his feet and ankle received strength.


2 And a certain man LAME from his mother’s womb WAS CARRIED, whom they laid DAILY at the gate of the temple which is called Beautiful, to ask alms of them that entered the temple…

…LAME
This man was in a circumstance – he was lame. Same as most of us, we are lame. Ours may not be physical lameness, but we are incapacitated in one way or the other. We are lame in our minds, our vision is 'lame', and we don't seem to be making progress. Many are lame financially and cannot satisfy themselves due to financial disability. We are all like this man in a way. It may not even be our fault that we are lame, it may be an inherited predicament like this man, it could be as a result of our background, our parents, our environment might have made us lame.

…WAS CARRIED
Most times there is little we can do when we are lame, we are at the mercy of people. If you are lame financially, you wouldn’t have a choice as to how much people will give you; even if it’s your wage – in other words you are carried. Some may have been carried by the moral decadence in the society due to their lameness in making up their minds; some may have been carried by the storms of doubt and fear due to their ignorance of the promises of God for their lives.

…DAILY
This passage reveals to us that this carrying is done daily. I can understand if I were carried once maybe twice but daily! No way! He is so helpless that he has to be carried daily; the carrying of just one day can’t solve his problem so he needs it daily. Sounds to me like addiction. How many times have we thought and wished in our hearts that this would be the last ‘carrying’ in our lives only to discover we would still need to be carried the day after and the next? We have longed so much to walk on our own but, we find ourselves in a terrible situation that would require a daily ‘carrying’. It also sound to me like salary. The 'carrying' of one month salary can't just be enough for the financially disabled - you need financial freedom!

If you ask me, I would tell you it is good to be carried, it only depends on who is carrying you. This verse indicated that people carried this man to anywhere he is located. Many times you discover some inadequacies in your life, some levels of disability, whom do you run to? Who do you seek comfort from? Who do you seek advise from? The best that men can do for us is what people did for this man in this scripture – they laid him at the gate called beautiful.

Men don’t have answers to your problems, men don’t have the blueprint of your life, the best they can do is carrying you and lay you down to beg. To be fair on these men that carried him, they did what seem best to them. In their minds carrying him to a place where he would be able to get some thing of his own was a great idea and helpful one too. The unfortunate thing is that this solution for the man won’t last long. You would have to come another day and another just like this man. He was laid daily. No matter the amount of money he received in a day, he would still have to be carried the next day.

How long will you be carried? How long will you have to go home happy only to still be helpless the following day? The truth is that many of us are carried away by what we get at the beautiful gate. Let me tell you, what you get at the beautiful gate is a speck compared to what God has for you. Besides, note this that any help from man does not terminate your need for help; it only brings you to a point where you will need multiple of help – like the beautiful gate. Each time we get to the beautiful gate, we thank them for taking us thus far to ‘achieve’ yet another volatile and nascent achievement in life. Whereas ignorantly we are there to seek greater amount of help from people – begging for alms.

For you the solution to your problem may be the last days of the month when you collect your salary (alms) at the 'beautiful gate'. But then you will still have to look out for another month; this is because you are only being carried and laid down at the beautiful gate.

God has a better plan dear, an end has to come to your being carried, and you would have to start walking to your God designed destiny. I see you fulfilling just that in Jesus name.


3 Who, seeing Peter and John about to go into the temple, asked an ALMS. 4 And Peter, fastening his eyes upon him with John, said, look on us. 5 And he GAVE heed unto them, EXPECTING to RECEIVE SOMETHING of them.

Asking for help, support and all sort is what he has adapted to. But then it is a big surprise to know that this man gave something. This is someone whose way of life is hinged around receiving and we now see him giving something. Isn’t it surprising to hear that someone who is carried daily, who can’t do anything without the support of someone, who has no other business but seek assistance, gave something?

If the story had ended in the fact he gave then it would have been a plus to him; better still if the bible had not mentioned his motive for giving. The bible tells us that he gave expecting to receive something. He has become so use to receiving that even when he gives he is expecting to receive. Definitely he would be offended or hurt whenever he gives and does not receive anything especially when he does not receive what he is expecting – alms.
This looks like the picture of many Christians today in church, they are simply giving expecting to receive. They wouldn’t have any problem with expectation if their expectation were in line with God’s will. But their expectation is just as that of the lame man – alms.

Sometimes our lameness begins to define our expectation. We might have been in that disability struggle, poverty, immorality, luke warmness, strife and all sorts of lameness so much and for a long time that our expectation has been redefine by our circumstances. We no longer see the problem as solvable, we no longer see our feet walking, we no longer see our life getting better and all we look out for is just the survival of today. How can God fulfill is glorious plan in our lives and make us whole when all we do is giving with the expectation of receiving alms?

Peter in accordance to God’s will didn’t give this man what he expected, instead, they gave the questions of his life answers, weakness in his body strength, ashes in his life beauty.

…and immediately his feet and ankle received strength. Act 3:7.

You might miss the answer to your prayer if you expect Him to work how you want Him to. I see God moving pass our circumstance-defined expectation and giving answers to our questions, healing our minds, mending our relationships, giving us back our vision and restoring us back to where we belong.
You will get there on your feet.