It is very grateful to have a companionship with our family. We can have meal together, and spend our leisure times together for making warmly interaction, interchanging ideas, playing game, telling stories, watching or going out for recreation. It a great life we should have.
Unfortunately, the life is changing and it forces everyone to drown into his own business-and so our companionship will sink with it.
However, we must believe that we are not alone in this world. God is always with us. Let give thanks to our lord, he is good and his love is eternal. He gave us power of gratitude; the power that makes us have abundance heart. Therefore, we could accept that our parents or other member of families leave us alone and work hard because they love us very much.
We should thank God and accept his power of gratitude for:
It turns loneliness into companionship
It turns what we have into enough and more
It turns deniel into acceptance
It turns confusion into clarity
The power of gratitude makes sense of our past, brings peace for today and creates a vision for tomorrow
Kamis, 22 April 2010
Kamis, 08 April 2010
BUILD UP YOURSELF
THE POWER OF CHRIST
THE POWER IN YOU
I have the strength to face all conditions by the power that Christ gives me (Philippians 4:13)
By Leonardus Nana
Note: This writing is still in process
The verse “I have the strength to face all conditions by the power that Christ gave me (Philippians 4:13)”is constructed by the following phrases or articles:
1.The power of Christ (Phil 4:13b)
2.Christ gave me his power (Phil 4: 13c)
3.I have the strength to face all conditions (Phil 4:13a)
“I have the strength to face all conditions by the power that Christ gives me” is not a plain phrase or ordinary sentence. It is holy! Everyone who learns it, is obligated:
1.to accept it as a “Mandate from God,
2.to take it as a Motive for building himself based on God’s mandate
3.so that he has competence and capacity to receive God’s Goal for his life.”
MANDATE
Main Idea : The power of God
God made us to worship and to serve him in the whole our life. We worship and serve God by fearing and loving him with all our strength, mind and hearts. We fear and love God through the means of our prayer and activities.
We worship and serve God does not aim at increasing the glory, the mighty and the holiness of God. God does not need our worship. However, we worship and serve God aiming at making us right to stay under God’s holy presence and to receive his plan for us. It is the plans to bring us prosperity and not disaster. The plans to bring about the future we hope for.
God gave us chance to make his plan comes true, but there is nothing in us that allows us to claim that we are capable of doing this work. The capacity we have comes from God (2Cor 3:5) and so he gave us power, strength, capability and capacity. We are mortal man, there is nothing in us we should use to make God’s plan comes true. Therefore God made us to be like himself or resemble him and gave us his own strength (Gen 1:26b&27; Sirack 17: 4).
This means God’s mandate is an obligation, and in that obligation, we have authority or right.
Obligation:
1.We are assigned to take charge of the Earth and its content (Gen 1: 28b)
2.We are assigned to bring them under our control (Gen 1: 28a) by the power God gave us (Gen 1: 26b)
Authority or Right:
By the power of God, we have authority to control the Universe and its content by exploring, exploiting and preserving the nature for our welfare
MOTIVE
God made human being to be like himself or resemble him and gave them his own strength to worship and to serve him.
As human being, we could worship and serve God by taking charge and controlling the Earth and its content. In addition, by exploring, exploiting and preserving the nature by the power he gave.
The power of God is holy and mighty, but we are mortal man. We are too weak or not good enough to deserve God’s power. Therefore, it fades away gradually due to our disobedience against God’s love. However, let us give thanks to the Lord, because he is good and his love is eternal (Psalm 136:1). He restored his power in us by the power of Christ Jesus, his only beloved son (Philippians 4:13b). He send Holy Spirit to teach us everything and make us remember all that Christ has told us (John 14:25). By the guidance of Holy Spirit, we could be able to do the following so that we are made right to accept God’s Obligation and Authority:
1.We confessed that Jesus Christ is our Lord and God, we should bow down to worship and serve him only.
2.We recognized that all of us are like sheep that were lost, each of us going his own way (Isaiah 53:6a)
3.We could examine our ways and turn back to the Lord (Lamentations 3:40)
4.We recognized that there is nothing in us that allows us to claim that we are capable of doing this work. The capacity we have comes from God (2Cor 3:5)
5.We recognized that we are content with weakness, insults, hardships, persecutions and difficulties (2Cor 12:10a)
GOAL
Goal of God
We as human being are the latest but the most valuable creation that God ever created. God made us to be like himself or resemble him and he gave us his own strength (Gen 1:26b&27; Sirack 17: 4). God gave his own strength to worship him and the strength to work; to work for God and to work for ourselves. We worship God and work for him aim at keeping our existence in his presence. When we are in God’s presence, God’s glory will shine on us so that we will be capable of doing even greater things.
The above description means that we, human being is the most valuable target of God’s creation so that before we were created, God had made his plan/method of how to created us and what the purpose of creating us as the following:
1.Target : God made us to be like himself or resemble him and gave us his own strength.
2.Plan : God made his plans for us; the plans to bring us prosperity and not disaster. The plans to bring about the future we hope for. Therefore, God created universe and its content first and then he crated human beings.
3.Purpose : God created us to worship and to serve God by taking charge and controlling the Earth and its content. In addition, God created us to take the universe under our control by exploring, exploiting and preserving the nature for our welfare by the power he gave.
Goal of Human Beings
Everybody has dreams and he would like to bring them to life. Make simple, reasonable and realistic dreams as your goals, but please do stretching them for they will energize and push you to work harder at meeting more difficulties targets. The result is you can achieve more than, if you had set an easier goal as it was written, “hard worker will get everything he wants and will have more.” (proverb 13:4b&11c)
Your goals are “the power of Christ can unlock the fullness life of yours,” and the other one is “the power of Christ is the power of you as believer.” Challenging yourself by stretching those goals for they can broad your capacity. When you set a stretch goal for yourself, you know that you may not meet it 100%, but by coming close you will likely achieve extra ordinary results. Say if you set the goal to 125, essentially asking an extra 25% of yourself. When you achieve 120 means, you have managed 20% more than you had set an easier goal, as it was written, “Hard work will give you power (proverb 12:24a ) to get what you are after or to give you a fortune (proverb 12:27b) and that power gives you strength to face all conditions.” (Phil 4:13a)
A. The power of Christ unlock the fullness of life
We live a life that measure up to the worldly standard, which should be a reflection of world greed instead of a vote of confidence from us as believers that our lives is under God’s care. We always worry to be run out of our needs; therefore, we would do whatever we can to become rich with sinfully chasing after money because:
1.We are content with weakness, insults, hardships, persecutions and difficulties (2Cor 12:10a).
2.We live a life that full of arguing and complaining (cfr. Phil 2:4) and conflict (cfr. Rome 7:15)
3.We live a life that full of impatient and doubt (cfr. James 1:6b & 1:7-8)
Weakness, insults, hardships, persecutions and difficulties. Arguing, complaining and conflict. Impatient and doubt are known as the fullness of life. Our potencies, capabilities and capacities are required for their fulfillments. They robed all things found in our hearts that deserve praise; the things that are true, noble, right, pure, lovely and honorable. Therefore, we must be very weak.
However, in the weakness, my dear brothers, kindly come to Christ and pray. Please appeal to his mighty love and believe that we will have this answer:
“My grace is all you need, for my power is greatest when you are weak” (2Cor 12:9a)
All we need about is Christ grace! When we are weak; when we are in heavy load, Christ will invite us to come to him for he will give us rest. Christ will replace our burden with his own load (encouragement) so that we will be joyful always, pray at all times. Be thankful in all circumstances. This is what God wants from us in our lives in union with Jesus Christ (1Thessalonians 5:16-18).
Now we know that what God wants from us in our lives is be joyful, pray at all times and be thankful in all circumstances. When we succeed in doing this, we will receive Christ’s power that called power of Gratitude. Melody Beattie found that the power of gratitude unlocks the fullness of life:
1.It turns what we have into enough and more.
2.It turns denial into acceptance, chaos into order and confusion into clarity
3.It turns a meal into a feast, a house into a home and a stranger into a friend
4.It makes sense of our past, brings peace for today and create a vision for tomorrow
B. The power of Christ is the Authority for Believers
Nobody wants to be an ordinary one; he would like to become someone and/or to achieve something at some point in the future.
To become someone and/or to achieve something at some point in the future is the goal we should set up for our lives. This must not an easy work, therefore, we would love to keep on building ourselves to be more proficient in pursuing and achieving our goals. Thomas Watson, the IBM founder pointed out this formula:
1.Target : Formulating the target you should achieve in your life (to become someone and/or to achieve something at some point in the future)
2.Method : Activate your mind to formulate and to set up the proper method applied to achieve your target
3.Action : do a proper action in a proper time base on the proper formulated method
It is written, “All things in this World begin in Mind.” (Sirach 37:18b) means setting up the Target, formulating the Method and doing the Action begin in our mind, but when? Human’s Mind has power of Imagination and power of Visualization. Before we translated our target, method and action into written form that makes concrete our view of the direction and purpose, we should take a few minutes to achieve our targets in our mind. We imagine a target (life) that is exactly as we want it, imagine what we would do, with whom we would do and how we should do it. All imagined targets put us in a state of excitement and enthusiasm. The next step is, visualizing the imagined targets and bringing them to life. Make them a reality; if we can see ourselves having such benefits like happiness, successful, healthy and loving life from our targets, then we can make them happen.
Achieve the Target
Do you already know what you truly want to achieve and what you truly want to become? Steve Jobs, co-founder of Apple Computer advised: The most important, have the courage to follow your heart and intuition. They somehow already know what you truly want to achieve and to become. Therefore, do not waste your time living someone else’s life. Do not be trapped by dogma, which is living with the results of other people’s thinking. Do not let the noise of other opinions down out your inner voice. Prepare yourself and stride forward on to achieve your target “to have something and/or to become someone at some point in the future.”
Concerning to Target, Saint Paul advised, “Don’t think of yourself more highly than you should. Instead be modest in your thinking and judge yourself according to the amount of faith that God gave you.” (Rome 12:3b&3c). This means do not set a target higher than your capability and capacity, but your target must be specific, reasonable, and realistic. In addition, the target must be measurable, attainable, relevant, and time-scale, but the most of all, the target is good and is pleasing to God
Judge yourself according to the amount of faith that God gave you means recognize the capability and capacity that God gave you because they are the powers that enable you to do greater things or achieving bigger target. Therefore, you should learn to enlarge them by keeping on building ourselves up on our most sacred faith (Jude 1:20a). This means, although we only have simple target, we should stretch it for stretching targets energize and push us to work harder at meeting more difficulties targets. The result is we can achieve more than, if we had set an easier objective as it was written, “Hard worker will get everything he wants and will have more.” (proverb 13:4b&11c)
Achieving Riches:
What is it the thing that human being wish to achieve for his life? As human, we certainly would love to achieve Riches.
Jesus, our Lord said, “Man can not live on bread alone, but needs every word that God speaks.” (Mathew 4:4b). The words that God speaks are “Faith, Hope and Love”
1.Faith produces: Belief, Trust, integrity and confidence
2.Hope produces: Vision, Passion, Optimism, self-control, Patient and Endurance
3.Love Produces: Responsibility, Forgiveness, Respect for others, Happiness, generosity and Gratitude.
Man can not live on bread alone, but needs every word that God speaks means, Man needs something to eat, to wear and to stay in that called material riches; yet, they are not the only riches that support our life. There are spiritual riches like kindheartedness, happiness, passion and love that should be concerned above those material riches.
Spiritual Riches is the priority
Jesus, our Lord said “Be concerned above everything else with the Kingdom of God – and with he requires of you – and he will provide you with all these other things” (Mathew 6:33). This verse teaches us about the following lessons and priorities for our life:
1.Kingdom of God means we must live holy, perfect and righteous because the Kingdom of God is mighty and eternal.
2.What God requires of us means we must like be the light to shine before people so that they will see the good deed we do (Mathew 5:16). My brothers, Saint Paul advised us not to forget to do good and help one another (Hebrew 13:16a) for God gives us chance and authority to do good deed like:
a.Give generously to the needy (2Cor 9:9a)
b.Be generous and share your food with the poor. You will be blessed for it (Proverb 22:9)
c.Be an example for the believers in you speech, conduct, love, faith and purity (1Timoty 4:12b)
3.He will provide you with all these other things means:
a.God will bless you for your generosity to share your food with the poor (Proverb 22:9)
b.God will supply you with all the seeds you need and will make it grow and produce a rich harvest from your generosity (2Cor 9:10b)
Our hearts and intuitions somehow already know what we truly want to achieve, therefore, have the courage to follow your heart and intuition that seek for the spiritual riches. When you have reason to collect the above expressed spiritual riches, the motivation to get material riches will follow naturally. This motivation to get material will give a reason that so strong to overpower any obstacle standing in the way. A reason that drove you past your fear and on to success.
However, when we don not concern with the spiritual riches above the material ones, then we will spend almost all our time and energy adjusting the external world, and trying to make them conform our wishes. Therefore, we will feel exhausted and spare no adequate capacities for storing up the spiritual riches where our hearts will always be there (Mathew 6:19-21&33). For material riches will give us an attachment. According to Anthony de Mello, Attachment is an emotional state of clinging caused by the belief that without some particular things or some person, we cannot be happy. Again and again we need to let go.
Becoming Perfect
Perfect or wise is the spiritual riches or values we most admire and wish to incorporate into our hearts, for they can make us feel comfortable, secure or stimulated.
Not everything in the world is perfect for perfect is immortal and belongs to God, whereas human being is mortal and worldly. Becoming perfect must be difficult because we live in a world of corrupt and sinful people (Phil 2:15b). In addition, we content of are content with weakness, insults, hardships, persecutions and difficulties (2Cor 12:10a) instead of things that are good and that deserve praise: things that are true, noble, right, pure, lovely and honorable. (Philippians 4:8). They are the yoke and load offered by the world and so whoever takes them must be very tired.
To become perfect is a mandate from God and we are urged to accomplish it in all aspects of our life as it was written “in the same way, you must be perfect-just as your Father in heaven is perfect (Mathew 5:48)”. This mandate is very hard and heavy, however, God would not let us carry them alone. He will help to take over our loads and replace them with ones of his own. He will give us relief and so kindly listen to his calling “come to me all of you who are tired from carrying heavy loads and I will give you rest. Take my yoke for the yoke I will give you is easy and the load I will put on you is light. Mathew 11:28,29a&30) ”
This means to become Perfect is not an impossible mission because God will take over our yoke and load and replace them with ones that belong to him. They are the standards that he set up when he called us. The standards of God are the excellence guidelines that shape our attitude and behavior if we willingly “be always humble, gentle, and patient. Showing our love by being tolerant with one another (Ephesians 4:1b-2).”
When we have great reason to live a life that measure up to the standard of God, the motivation to become perfect will follow naturally. When we are perfect, we have strong reason to fill ourselves with things that are good and that deserve praise: things that are true, noble, right, pure, lovely and honorable. They are the things that drove us past our fears and on to success as a perfect person.
We must be perfect because we are the people of God; he loved and chose us as his own. When we are perfect, we will grow as a wise person who can be able to clothe ourselves with compassion, kindness, humility, gentleness and patient. In addition, as a wise person, we know how to be tolerant with one another, and forgive one another. To all these qualities, as a wise person, we will add love, which binds all things together in perfect unity; then we will show ourselves as a wise perfect person who is full of good reputation. (cfr. Colossians 3:12-14).
Now we can learn that when we are perfect, we will become wise; and when we are wise, we will show ourselves as ones who have good reputation. In addition, a wise perfect person is not stingy, selfish and greedy. So if he wants to choose between a good reputation and great wealth, he chooses good reputation (Proverb 22:1). Good reputation has spiritual riches like integrity, trust, respect for others, tolerance, humble, gentle, and patient, passion and love that lead to pure and lasting happiness.
Therefore, obey God mandate to become perfect and wise, then regard wisdom more highly than any other things in the world as it was written I regard wisdom more highly than any throne or crown. Wealth was nothing compared to her. I Valued wisdom more than good health and good look, when wisdom come to you, all good things come with her. She brought me untold riches (Wisdom of Solomon 7:8, 10a&11).
A wise perfect person will never conform himself to the standard of this world, but he will let God transform him inwardly by complete change of his mind. Because he knows The Lord search the minds and test the hearts of men. The Lord treat each one according to the way he lives, according to what he does (cfr. Jeremiah 17:10). As the reward, he will be able to know the will of God - what is good and pleasing to God and is perfect. (cfr Rome 12:2a); It is the reward as a leader who can shine with the brightness of the sky to teach many people to do what is right. (cfr. Daniel 12:3 & Mathew 5:16)
Method
Method is likened a way or a bridge on which we walk step by step in order to come closer to our target.
A method is a formula that consists of technique and strategy of how to work or how to accomplish the target or goal.
The target we set may be simple and easy, but we need method to help how execute the target and to make us sure if we have capability as it was written, “don’t be too sure of yourself, even when they way looks easy – Sirach 32:21. It means before we touch everything with our hand (action), we should touch it first with our thought as it was written, “Never do everything without thinking it through” Sirach 32:19a.
Thinking everything through before we do it means, we need formula, strategy, or plan that help us to recognize if there is easiness or the difficulties, the advantages or the disadvantages, and if we are capable enough to execute the target.
By the method, we learn what we should do, how we should do and whom we should work with and we can learn the following benefits:
1.Method helps us to make a planning first and then the action will follow to execute target base on what we have thought as it was written “Planning and thought lie behind everything that is done” (Sirach 37:16)
2.Method makes us think to empower the potencies, capabilities and capacities that God gave.
3.Method activates our mind to acquire knowledge, competences and experiences that enhance our capability to be more proficient. Therefore, we will become a sensible person who will see trouble coming and avoid it. We will never walk right into trouble and regret it later like unthinking person (Proverb 22:3)
4.Method sets up a way to walk on step by step in order to get closer to our target as it was written, “whatever you do, be careful –Sirach 32:23.
Doing the Action
Proper action
What good is it for someone to say that he has a big target but he does it without thinking it through (formulating a method)? In the same way, he has formulated good method, but if his method is alone without action, then it is useless. It is a proper action, you should take in order to execute your target base on the formulated method. The question is how to have a proper action?
A proper action is gained by learning and learning. Learning to enlarging our capacities, learning to empowering and sharpening our capabilities and competences, then we will act properly. Bigger capacity can energize and push us not to work harder only but also to love what we do and so “whatever we do, we will work at it with all our hearts as though we were working for the Lord and not for men” (Colossians 3: 23).
BENEFIT OF PROPER ACTION (HARD WORKING)
God created human beings to work, but what is it a working? Working is an action that deliberately undertaken frequently for a certain purpose.
Doing our work (proper action) does not aim at accomplishing our targets only, but also giving us several benefits such as:
1.Making US excellence
2.Tacit Knowledge
3.Passion
1. Proper action makes you excellence
To become excellence is not an easy work! We live in a world of corrupt and sinful people (Phil 2:15b). However, do not worry! Your spirit of growing excellence will never be corrupted if you, my friends, can do the following actions:
1.Keep on building yourselves up on your most sacred faith- Jude 1:20a
2.Pray in the power of Holy Spirit (Jude 1:20b) and
3.You keep yourself in the love of God (Jude 1:21a)
Keep on building yourself means:
Building yourself is not an accidental action but a well-settled practice that is deliberately undertaken for self-empowering during your whole life.
Up on your most sacred faith and Pray in the power of Holy Spirit means:
The action of self-empowering is executed with passion by the power of Holy Spirit (Jude 1:20b) instead of Lust or Evil Desire that produces Temptation (James 1:13)
You keep yourself in the love of God means:
By love, the power of Christ will transform the action of building yourself into a well-settled practice (habit) of self-empowering that tends to make you excellence.
Therefore, you now may understand that your greatest action will never make you an excellence one but your habit will as Aristotle said “The excellence is not an action only, but habitual”
Are you an excellence person? I appeal to you to give sincere response to the following questions:
1.How to become excellence? Keep on building yourselves up on your most sacred faith (Jude 1:20a)
2.How to keep on building yourselves? Pray in the power of Holy Spirit (Jude 1:20b) to allow you to use the power that Christ gave you (Phil 4: 13c)
3.What are the functions of the power of Christ?
a.To give you the strength to face all conditions (Phil 4:13a)
b.To give you the capability of doing something (2Cor 3:5b)
c.To give you the capacity of God (2Cor 3:5c) then by that capacity, you will be able to do greater things. You are excellence.
This means when you have the power of Christ, you will have commitment to work at your job with all your hearts as it was written, “Whatever you do, work at it with all your hearts as though you were working for the Lord and not for men. Colossians 3: 23.” Therefore, when you are doing your work extremely well, The Lord, our master will say: Well done, you good and faithful servant! You have been faithful in managing small amounts, so I will put you in charge of larger amounts. Come on in and share my happiness. Mathew 25: 20-21.
In addition, the power of Christ will turn you, the enemy of God, to his friends and children because only God’s children are capable of doing their works without complaining or arguing (Phil 2:4)
2. Proper action gives Tacit knowledge: The power of Practice
Stenberg, a psychologist from Yale University, found that a sequence of our daily practices give us tacit knowledge; a knowledge that enlarges our competences to master the work we are currently doing.
Prof Steinberg added that a driver would be very expert in driving and mastering the road not because of his intelligence when joining the mechanic courses, but because of practice and practice that he has. He certainly does not do the practice just as a daily routine but he does do it as a process, which is enriched with new idea, creativity and innovation. In addition, Ted Williams ever said ‘most of the people always said that the talent and the competence of me becoming the reason of successfulness of me. They have never said about practice, practice and practice, which I run.
Practice enhance my capability of recollecting the knowledge and skill that I ever learned and those knowledge and skill function to improve my capacity to work efficiency and effectively.
3. Proper action gives Passion: The power of loving the work
Loving the work energize us to work harder, working harder requires competence. Competence demand knowledge and knowledge empower us to be more proficient (become excellence) in pursuing our targets. When we are excellence, we will work properly and we will have plenty or enough. Because all we do are based on a careful plan, we will never act too quickly (cfr. Proverb 21:5).
When we love our work, we will work harder at meeting more difficulties targets. The result is we can achieve more than, if we do not love our work as it was written, “Hard worker will get everything he wants and will have more” (Proverb 13:4b&11c). Therefore, I assure that everyone who loves what he does will have God’s grace so that everything he works is not really his own doing but God’s grace working with him. Therefore, he will obtain the following advantages:
1.Conqueror. Hard work will give you power (Proverb 12:24a) to get what you are after or to give you fortune (Proverb 12: 27b). By the power you will become a conqueror for the power will give you strength to face all conditions (Phil 4:13a).
2.Reward. A hard worker will never dies in starving for he will get everything he wants (Proverb 13:4b) and will have more (Proverb 13:11c)
3.Responsibility. A hard worker is not a looser, he will never accept anyone’s support without any paying for it (2Thes 3:8a). He will work and toil; keep working day and night so as not to be an expense to anyone else (2Thes. 3: 8b). He works to earn his own living (2Thes. 3:12c)
4.Example. A hard worker will keep on working to be example for the others to follow (2Thes 3:9b).
5.Hope. A hard worker has not to become tired of doing good; he will struggle and work hard, because he has placed his hope in the living God (1Timothy 4:10a).
Obstacle
We have set up the Target, formulating the Method and executed the proper Action, but it is normal if there are still some problems or difficulties as the test we should experience. God is good, he keeps his promises and he will not allow us to be tested beyond our power to remain firm; at the time we are put to the test, he will give us strength to endure it, and so provide us with the way out (1Cor 10:13).
God gives us strength to endure and so provide us with way out means in the Obstacle or Test, God gives us a power to focus on or to think of solution instead of problems. For when we think of a good solution, we will attract more solutions and opportunities. But when we think of problems, we will attract more problems. It is impossible to have no problem, but kindly approach the problem with the expectant attitude that there is an innovative practical solution just waiting to be found. Be patient, relaxed, confident and clear in our mind and then we will have the way out through the following riches:
1.Knowledge:
Knowledge is the cognitive capabilities measured by the capacity of acquiring intelligences such as Linguistic, Math, Logic and Reasoning. Knowledge is acquired by studying, practice, or being taught. Knowledge give you internal motivation to work in a well organized manner, applying superior systems and procedures and detailed job descriptions, so that you will get easy to accomplish your jobs. However, your internal motivation must be complemented with enthusiasm and passion so that you may give to your work a touch of feeling, hearth and love; you then will be protected and prevented from doing everything that is too mechanical, too formal, and too protective.
Knowledge must be complemented by Enthusiasm and/or as the reverse as it was written: “Enthusiasm without knowledge is not good; impatient will get you into trouble (Proverb 19:2). Therefore, God sends knowledge and understanding like the rain, and increase the honor of those who receive her (Sirach 1:19). In addition, “God gives knowledge to human being so that we would praise him for the miracles he performs (Sirach 38:6).
This means your enthusiasm is useless if you do not have knowledge and your knowledge contributes nothing if you are impatient; for impatient makes you unable to make up your minds and undecided in all you do; therefore, you never think that you will receive anything from the Lord. (James 1:6b,7-8). When you are impatient; you are unable to make up your minds and undecided in all you do; so that you are spending all your time for looking for nothing; you will feel very poor. Therefore, all you gain is the knowledge that you are rich, Ecclesiastes 5: 11b, means that knowledge make us full in desire (aspiration), belief (principle, trust, confidence) and acceptance (recognition, approval). Therefore, when we receiver her, she will increase the honor of ours.
2.Planning
We have knowledge of or skill in executing our target base on the formulated method, however, the execution must lie before a good planning and a wise thought as it was written “Planning and thought lie behind everything that is done” (Sirach 37:16).
A good planning can make us become a sensible person who will see trouble coming and avoid it. We will never walk right into trouble and regret it later like unthinking person (Proverb 22:3).
Good planning is believed to make our capability, experience and capacity function to skip out impatient and inconsistency as it was written: Plan carefully and you will have plenty; if you act too quickly, you will never have enough (Proverb 21:5).
God gives us authority to know his plans he has for us; the plans to bring us prosperity and not disaster. The plans to bring about the future we hope for (Jeremiah 29: 11). By the authority of God, we will make our plan carefully and we will have plenty; because we know that act too quickly, we will never have enough (Proverb 21:5).
In addition, by God’s authority, we are put right to ask God to bless our plans and we will be successfully in carrying them out (Proverb 16: 3). And finally by the blessing that God gave to our plan, we have capacity in order to be capable of doing our work (2Cor 3:5 and we have strength to face all conditions by the power that Christ gives us (Philippians 4:13)
3.Wisdom:
Wisdom is capabilities measured by the heart’s capacity of producing justice, courage, patient, self-control, insight, passion and gratitude (wisdom of Solomon 8:7b) and the other things that are good. Wisdom is the capacity to recognize your own feelings and those of others, for motivating yourself and for managing emotions well in yourself and in your relationship.
How wisdom work in your hearts? At first wisdom will lead you along difficult path. She will make you so afraid that you will think you can not go on (Sirach 4:17). Therefore, Nothing will stand in your way if you walk wisely, and you will not stumble when you run (Proverb 4:12).
When wisdom is in you, you will succeed in your work for it will give you patient and the capability of controlling yourself as it was written: “It is better to be patient than powerful; it is better to win control over yourself than over the whole country.” (Proverb 16:32).
Wisdom gives you patient to have success and so Benjamin Franklyn, the former USA president said: “A professional is genius in his field for he has a distinct talent that called the talent of patient. His talent of patient gives him endurance to face trials that come to his learning, patient to deal with problems calmly and patient to wait for the result without haste.
Wisdom gives you qualities of doing the right things (effectiveness), but not doing the things right (efficiency) only because she provides you with insight and understanding to protect and prevent you from doing wrong things (Proverb 2:11-12). Therefore, please get up early and find her for she will give you the following benefits:
1.Wisdom: Wisdom takes care of those who look for her; she raises them to greatness-Sirach 4:11
2.Anyone who obtains wisdom will be greatly honored – Sirach 4:13
3.Wisdom can make your life pleasant and lead you safely through it – Proverb 3:17
4.Wisdom offers you long life, as well as wealth and honor – Proverb 3:16
5.So do not worry about tomorrow, it will have enough worries of its own. There is no need to add to the troubles each day brings”.– Mathew 6: 34 leo
C. The power of Christ is put in our Mind
There is nothing in us that allows us to claim that we are capable of doing this work. The capacity we have comes from God (2Corinthians 3:5). This holy word is the foundation for Donah Zohar and Ian Marshal to find a Spot in our mind, called God Spot. It is a holy Spot or Holy Power which God put our Mind. Base on the Spot, we learn that our Mind has Power by the Spot that God put in our mind.
All things in this World begin in Mind (Sirach 37:18b), but before we begin something, we should find how the mind commence everything. The Mind must have power.
A tough work is done for finding and mining out Gold from a hard rock; in the same way, a hard effort is needed in order to explore and to find out the power of mind as it was written in the scripture “a person’s thoughts are like water in deep well, but someone with insight can draw them out – Proverb 20:5.”
Learning
C1. Learning to know the power of Christ in our Mind
Learning is an effort made in order to know the power that God has put in our Mind. By learning, we know what powers in our mind, how to enhance, to manage and to synergize them for beneficial purposes. Many scientific studies and researches have been conducted to explore Human Mind and the Proverb 20:5 is the foundation where the experts found the following Powers owned by Human’s Mind:
1.Intellectual Quotient (IQ) is the power of Mind to word, logic, analysis and reason
2.Emotional Quotient (EQ) is the power of Mind to relationship, understanding and sympathy
3.Spiritual Quotient (SQ) is the power of Mind to unquestioning confidence.
C2. Learning to do a good Deed by the power of Mind
The powers of mind make all things begin in this world, but people should learn in advance in order to manage, to synergy the power of mind and to know what benefits we should have from them. Through learning, we know how to manage the power of mind to be more proficient in pursuing and achieving the following benefits:
1.The powers of mind will lead us to always do a good deed (Sirach 12:1a)
2.The powers of mind give us insight to know what and who is benefiting from the good done we do (Sirach 12:1b)
3.The powers of mind are helpful to make the good deed we do will not be wasted (Sirach 12:1c).
The Master Gardener Of Our Mind
Base on the above benefits produces by our mind, we also learn that t we must become the master gardener of our mind.
James Allen said that A man’s mind may be likened to a garden, which may be intelligently cultivated or allowed to run wild; but whether cultivated or neglected, it must, and will bring forth.
Just as a gardener cultivates his plot, keeping it free from weeds and growing the flowers and fruits, which he requires, so may a man tend to a gardener of his mind, weeding out all the wrong, useless and impure thoughts, and cultivating toward perfection the flowers and fruits of right, useful and pure thoughts. By pursuing this process, a man sooner or later discover that he is the master gardener of his soul, the director of his life. He also reveals, within himself, the laws of thought and understands, with ever-increasing accuracy, how the thought-forces and the mind-elements operate in shaping his character, circumstances and destiny.
The master gardener of mind knew well of how to use his mind optimally, so that he will be careful how he thinks; his life is shaped by his thoughts – Proverb 4:25
C3. The God’s power in our Mind
There is a Spot in our mind, called God Spot. It is a Holy Spot or Holy Power/Spirit because God himself put it in our mind.
Holy Spirit will teach us everything and make us remember all that Christ has told us (John 14:25).
C4. Holy Spirit can lead us to empower our Mind
Learning is an effort of gaining knowledge of or skill in by study, practice, or being taught. Everyone would love to learn at any chances and from any sources as shown below for the advancement of life:
1.Learning from God (Mathew 2:29b)
2.Learning from experience (Proverb 19:8b)
3.Learning from others (Proverb 27:17)
4.Learning from environment/nature (Baruch 3:14)
Learning from God, Experience, Others, and Environment tend to make us be open to new facts, ideas, insights and revelations that can lead to better ways to accomplishing goals.
C5. The power of Christ works through the power of Holy Spirit in our Mind
The power of Holy Spirit (Jude 1:20b) is the most important power which enables us to energize our mind works more proficient as shown below:
1.Christ gave us his power (Phil 4: 13c) - Intellectual Quotient
The power of Christ enables us to know and to excel our capability of Linguistic, Math, Logic and Reasoning. By the power of Christ we are able to work base on logical thinking and good planning as written: Planning and thought lie behind everything that is done” – Sirach 37:16. This means by working in a well organized manner, applying superior systems and procedures and detailed job descriptions, we will get easy to accomplish our jobs. The IQ leads us to grow as an expert who has capacity of doing something (2Cor 3:5b) like the others do too.
2.Keep yourself in the love of God (Jude 1:21a) - Emotional Quotient
The Love of Christ gives you capacity to recognize your own feelings and those of others, for motivating yourself and for managing emotions well in yourself and in your relationship.
The Love of Christ gives you understanding that Emotional intelligence (EQ) describes abilities distinct from, but complementary to academic intelligence, the purely cognitive capabilities measured by Intellectual Quotient (IQ). On the other hand, the Love of Christ will light on your emotion intelligence (EQ) to shine before your cognitive capabilities (IQ) so that it can work not base on logical consideration only but also empathy, self-awareness, self-responsibility, and self-control. This means the Love of Christ makes you excel in emotional intelligence skills so that you have the strength to face all conditions by the power that Christ gave you (Philippians 4:13). Therefore, you will be more proficient in doing things that are difficult for those who are book smart but lack Emotional Intelligence skills (EQ).
3.Pray in the power of Holy Spirit (Jude 1:20b) - Spiritual Quotient
Everybody has intention to become someone and to achieve something at some point in the future or that we called Vision.
At the same time he has a feeling of expectation and desire; feeling of trust and confidence. He does not see what he hopes for (to become someone and to achieve something at some point in the future) so he will wait for it with patient (read Rome 8:25) that we called Hope.
He has a strong enthusiasm in life to realize his vision and hope that we called Passion.
As a scholar, you must be very enthusiasm to realize your vision and hope by enlarging capacity. You can do it by acquiring knowledge, competence and skill, etc through learning and coaching.
However, as a believer, you must pray in the power of Holy Spirit to power your emotion so that it can harmonize and synergize your intellectual’s work with enthusiasm. Because it is written, enthusiasm without knowledge is not good; impatient will get you into trouble (Proverb 19:2).
This means your enthusiasm is useless if you do not have knowledge and your knowledge contributes nothing if you are impatient; for impatient makes you unable to make up your minds and undecided in all you do; therefore, you never think that you will receive anything from the Lord. (James 1:6b,7-8)
In addition, The power of Holy Spirit leads people who are book smart to have and to excel in Emotional Intelligence skills and Spiritual Intelligence skills so that he can keep on building himself up on his most sacred faith (Jude 1:20a). It is the faith that gave him feeling of expectation and desire; feeling of trust and confidence. Therefore, he has power to be sure of things he hopes for and to be certain of things he cannot see (read Hebrew 11:1) that we called Faith. This means, the power of Holy Spirit brings passion to make you more enduring, more patients and more enthusiasm to build up bigger capacity. When you are big in capacity, you will have strong trust or unquestioning confidence to pursue and to achieve the goals that is impossible for others.
Concerning to the above explanations, let us take a brief for the following theories:
1.Intellectual Quotient. Alfred Binet (1857-1911) found that Intellectual Quotient is the intelligence used to measure the capability of Linguistic, Math, Logic and Reasoning. Someone who is good in IQ will grow as an excellent manager. He may be extremely well organized and run a tight ship with superior systems and procedures and detailed job descriptions. But unless they are internally motivated, little gets done because there is no feeling, no hearth; everything is too mechanical, too formal, too protective. He must be poor in leadership.
2.Emotional Quotient. Daniel Golemen (1990s) found that Emotional Quotient works more with emotions and imaginations. EQ deals with intuitive, emotional and creative works. Someone with good EQ would not love so much with an organization which extremely well organized and run a tight ship with superior systems and procedures and detailed job descriptions. However, he may work much better even though he may appear to an outsider observer to be disorganized and confused.
EQ helps you to build good relationship within yourself and the others. By knowing yourself then only can you know other people and influence and share your experience with them. Therefore, you can cooperate well with them for a truly significant accomplishment may result simply because people share a common vision, purpose or sense of mission
BARE (Balance, Awareness, Responsibility and Emphaty) is the pilar of EQ, said Steve Hein. This pilar will support your Intellectual (IQ) to work in balance or harmony and base on high degree of self Awareness, self Control, self Responsibility and Emphaty. Golemen found that EQ is very important because IQ only donates 20% for your succes while the rest 80% is the contribution of the efforts that controlled by Emotion.
3.Spiritual Quotient. Donah Zohar and Ian Marshal found a Spot in our mind called God Spot and Peter Stepherd called it Spiritual Quotient or Heart Intelligence.
God put his spot in our mind because we are his temple and that His Holy Spirit lives in (1Cor 3:16). From this Spot, God’s Holy Spirit works to make us more proficient in proclaiming the things that are good and that deserve praise; things that are true, noble, right, pure, lovely and honorable. (Philippians 4:8).
In addition, on the Spot in our mind, God pour out his Spirit to enhance us set up our hopes and visions; then we can proclaim God’s message (Joel 2:28). Therefore, Donah Zohar and Ian Marshal stated that God Spot is the center of our personality. One who has good personality can live a life that measure up to the standard God set when He called us. The standards of God are being always humble, gentle, and patient. Show your love by being tolerant with one another (read Ephesians 4:1b-2).
4.Multiple Intelligence. Prof Howard Gardner found some other intelligence in us that is called Multiple Intelligence. There are more than 20s intelligences found by Prof Howard Gardner, but some of them are:
a. Linguistic Intelligence: The capability of communication
b.Logical, Reasoning and Math Intelligence: The capability of analyzing
c.Spatial Intelligence: The capability of conception
d.Kinesthetic Intelligence: The capability of managing body for art and sport
e.Musical Intelligence: The capability of music and composing song
f. Intrapersonal Intelligence: The capability of self relationship building
g.Interpersonal Intelligence: The capability of building relationship with others or team building
h.Natural Intelligence: The capability of adapting with nature
i.There are still some other intelligences
COLOSURE
SUCCESS versus FAILURE
God has given us great gifts (godsend) as listed below so that we may live a fortunate life:
4.Giving us Power (Gen 1: 26b) to bring the universe and its contents under our control (Gen 1: 28a)
5.Sending us knowledge and understanding like the rain, and increase the honor of those who receive her-Sirach 1:19.
6.Giving knowledge to us so that we would praise him for the miracles he performs – Sirach 38:6
7.Giving us power of Mind to begin all things in the world (Sirach 37:18b) by obeying the holy word “Planning and thought lie behind everything that is done” – Sirach 37:16
8.Pour out his Holy Spirit on us to help our emotion support our intellect so that we may have a balance life to build our future base on hopes and visions (Joel 2:28).
The above gifts aim to enhance our intelligences or power of mind to improve our performance for a greater achievement. The achievement means the delivery extraordinary results, achieving goals and executing strategy, plan and project through effectiveness, creativity and innovation.
However, some of us are not so lucky, we often fail not of the lack of capacity and knowledge or less of enthusiasm and passion. Mostly, we fail because there is a conflict in our hearts; our spirits cannot be able to put our intellect and emotion in a balance status. Therefore, we sometimes do not understand what we do; for we do not do what we would like to do but instead we do what we hate” (read Rome 7:15).
Base on Rome 7:15, we can learn that the cause our failures are as mentioned below:
1.Lack of faith so that we can not be sure of things we hope for and we are not certain of things we can not see (Hebrew 11:1)
2.The impatient to face troubles, which must produce endurance (Rome 5:3b). Therefore, we cannot wait for results or deal with problems calmly and without haste.
3.The lack of willing to learn and of hope to be sure that endurance will carry us all the way without failing, so that we may be perfect and complete; lacking nothing (James 1:4). Therefore, we cannot work base on our logical thinking, knowledge, and experience.
4.Live a life that does not measure up to the standard of God set like be always humble, gentle, and patient. Show love by being tolerant with one another-Ephesians 4:1b-2.
5.Live in a doubtful heart that makes us unable to make up our minds and undecided in all we do; so that we never thinks that we will receive anything from the Lord.(James 1:6b,7-8). Therefore, we cannot be able to put all things to the test; we cannot keep what is good and cannot avoid every kind of evil.(1Tesalonians 5:21-22)
6.We are selfish to share the gift that God gave with others. Therefore, we failed because the truly significant accomplishment may result simply because people share a common vision, purpose or sense of mission.
APPENDIX
1.to have faith is to be sure of things you hope for and you are certain of things you can not see (read Hebrew 11:1)
2.I have the strength to face all conditions by the power that Christ gives me-Philippians 4:13
3.There is nothing in us that allows us to claim that we are capable of doing this work. The capacity we have comes from God. 2Corinthians 3:5
4.Those who believe in me will be capable of doing even greater things than the ones I myself did. John 14:12
5.“But you my friends, keep on building yourselves up on your most sacred faith. Pray in the power of Holy Spirit (Jude 1:20) and keep yourself in the love of God (Jude 1:21a)
6.A person’s thoughts are like water in deep well, but someone with insight can draw them out – Proverb 20:5
7.….and learn from me because I am gentle and humble in spirit (Mathew 2:29b)
8.“Do ourselves a favor and learn all we can; then remember or do what we learn and we will prosper.” – proverb 19:8
9.“Learn where understanding, strength and insight are to be found. Then you will know where to find a long and full life, light to guide you and peace.”-Baruch 3:14
10.People learn from one another just as iron sharpens iron-Proverb 27:17
11.All things in this world begin in mind (Sirach 37:18b),
12.Planning and thought lie behind everything that is done” – Sirach 37:16.
13.Fill your mind with those things that are good and that deserve praise: things that are true, noble, right, pure, lovely and honorable. (Philippians 4:8)
14.Live a life that measure up to the standard God set when He called him. Be always humble, gentle, and patient. Show your love by being tolerant with one another- Ephesians 4:1b-2
15.Afterward, I will pour out My Spirit on everyone: your sons and daughters will proclaim my message; your old men will have dreams and your young men will see visions- Joel 2:28
16.Surely you know that you are God’s temple and that God’s spirit lives in you (1Cor 3:16)
17.“I do not understand what I do; for I do not do what I would like to do but instead I do what I hate” – Rome 7:15.
18.In the same way, your light must shine before the people so that they will see the good things you do and praise your Father in Heaven.-Mathew 5:16
19.But you must be perfect-just as your Father in heaven is perfect-Mathew 5:48
20.I, the Lord search the minds and test the hearts of men. I treat each one according to the way he lives, according to what he does. Jeremiah 17:10
21. “For God will reward every person according to what he has done. Some people keep on doing good and seek glory, honor and immortal life. To them God will give eternal life.” – Rome 2: 6 – 7
22.Some people keep on doing good and seek glory, honor and immortal life (Rome 2:6b). For them God will give eternal life to people who keep on doing good and seek glory (Rome 2:7)
23.Enthusiasm without knowledge is not good; impatient will get you into trouble-Proverb 19:2
24.Your work will provide for your needs; you will be happy and prosperous – Proverb 128: 2
25.When you do a good deed, make sure you know who is benefiting from it; then what you do will not be wasted – Sirach 12:1
26.Be joyful always, pray at all times. Be thankful in all circumstances. This is what God wants from you in your life in union with Jesus Christ. - 1Thessalonians 5:16-18
27.A person who gets rich without sinfully chasing after money is fortunate. Do you know anyone like that? If so, we will congratulate him for performing a miracle that no one else has ever been able to do. Sirach 31:8-9
28.Sympathy is the capacity for sharing the feelings of others
29.Vision is a short, succinct, and inspiring statement of what the organization intends to become and to achieve at some point in the future, often stated in competitive terms. Vision refers to the category of intentions that are broad, all-intrusive and forward-thinking.
30.A mission statement is an organization’s vision translated into written form. It makes concrete the leader’s view of the direction and purpose of the organization.
THE POWER IN YOU
I have the strength to face all conditions by the power that Christ gives me (Philippians 4:13)
By Leonardus Nana
Note: This writing is still in process
The verse “I have the strength to face all conditions by the power that Christ gave me (Philippians 4:13)”is constructed by the following phrases or articles:
1.The power of Christ (Phil 4:13b)
2.Christ gave me his power (Phil 4: 13c)
3.I have the strength to face all conditions (Phil 4:13a)
“I have the strength to face all conditions by the power that Christ gives me” is not a plain phrase or ordinary sentence. It is holy! Everyone who learns it, is obligated:
1.to accept it as a “Mandate from God,
2.to take it as a Motive for building himself based on God’s mandate
3.so that he has competence and capacity to receive God’s Goal for his life.”
MANDATE
Main Idea : The power of God
God made us to worship and to serve him in the whole our life. We worship and serve God by fearing and loving him with all our strength, mind and hearts. We fear and love God through the means of our prayer and activities.
We worship and serve God does not aim at increasing the glory, the mighty and the holiness of God. God does not need our worship. However, we worship and serve God aiming at making us right to stay under God’s holy presence and to receive his plan for us. It is the plans to bring us prosperity and not disaster. The plans to bring about the future we hope for.
God gave us chance to make his plan comes true, but there is nothing in us that allows us to claim that we are capable of doing this work. The capacity we have comes from God (2Cor 3:5) and so he gave us power, strength, capability and capacity. We are mortal man, there is nothing in us we should use to make God’s plan comes true. Therefore God made us to be like himself or resemble him and gave us his own strength (Gen 1:26b&27; Sirack 17: 4).
This means God’s mandate is an obligation, and in that obligation, we have authority or right.
Obligation:
1.We are assigned to take charge of the Earth and its content (Gen 1: 28b)
2.We are assigned to bring them under our control (Gen 1: 28a) by the power God gave us (Gen 1: 26b)
Authority or Right:
By the power of God, we have authority to control the Universe and its content by exploring, exploiting and preserving the nature for our welfare
MOTIVE
God made human being to be like himself or resemble him and gave them his own strength to worship and to serve him.
As human being, we could worship and serve God by taking charge and controlling the Earth and its content. In addition, by exploring, exploiting and preserving the nature by the power he gave.
The power of God is holy and mighty, but we are mortal man. We are too weak or not good enough to deserve God’s power. Therefore, it fades away gradually due to our disobedience against God’s love. However, let us give thanks to the Lord, because he is good and his love is eternal (Psalm 136:1). He restored his power in us by the power of Christ Jesus, his only beloved son (Philippians 4:13b). He send Holy Spirit to teach us everything and make us remember all that Christ has told us (John 14:25). By the guidance of Holy Spirit, we could be able to do the following so that we are made right to accept God’s Obligation and Authority:
1.We confessed that Jesus Christ is our Lord and God, we should bow down to worship and serve him only.
2.We recognized that all of us are like sheep that were lost, each of us going his own way (Isaiah 53:6a)
3.We could examine our ways and turn back to the Lord (Lamentations 3:40)
4.We recognized that there is nothing in us that allows us to claim that we are capable of doing this work. The capacity we have comes from God (2Cor 3:5)
5.We recognized that we are content with weakness, insults, hardships, persecutions and difficulties (2Cor 12:10a)
GOAL
Goal of God
We as human being are the latest but the most valuable creation that God ever created. God made us to be like himself or resemble him and he gave us his own strength (Gen 1:26b&27; Sirack 17: 4). God gave his own strength to worship him and the strength to work; to work for God and to work for ourselves. We worship God and work for him aim at keeping our existence in his presence. When we are in God’s presence, God’s glory will shine on us so that we will be capable of doing even greater things.
The above description means that we, human being is the most valuable target of God’s creation so that before we were created, God had made his plan/method of how to created us and what the purpose of creating us as the following:
1.Target : God made us to be like himself or resemble him and gave us his own strength.
2.Plan : God made his plans for us; the plans to bring us prosperity and not disaster. The plans to bring about the future we hope for. Therefore, God created universe and its content first and then he crated human beings.
3.Purpose : God created us to worship and to serve God by taking charge and controlling the Earth and its content. In addition, God created us to take the universe under our control by exploring, exploiting and preserving the nature for our welfare by the power he gave.
Goal of Human Beings
Everybody has dreams and he would like to bring them to life. Make simple, reasonable and realistic dreams as your goals, but please do stretching them for they will energize and push you to work harder at meeting more difficulties targets. The result is you can achieve more than, if you had set an easier goal as it was written, “hard worker will get everything he wants and will have more.” (proverb 13:4b&11c)
Your goals are “the power of Christ can unlock the fullness life of yours,” and the other one is “the power of Christ is the power of you as believer.” Challenging yourself by stretching those goals for they can broad your capacity. When you set a stretch goal for yourself, you know that you may not meet it 100%, but by coming close you will likely achieve extra ordinary results. Say if you set the goal to 125, essentially asking an extra 25% of yourself. When you achieve 120 means, you have managed 20% more than you had set an easier goal, as it was written, “Hard work will give you power (proverb 12:24a ) to get what you are after or to give you a fortune (proverb 12:27b) and that power gives you strength to face all conditions.” (Phil 4:13a)
A. The power of Christ unlock the fullness of life
We live a life that measure up to the worldly standard, which should be a reflection of world greed instead of a vote of confidence from us as believers that our lives is under God’s care. We always worry to be run out of our needs; therefore, we would do whatever we can to become rich with sinfully chasing after money because:
1.We are content with weakness, insults, hardships, persecutions and difficulties (2Cor 12:10a).
2.We live a life that full of arguing and complaining (cfr. Phil 2:4) and conflict (cfr. Rome 7:15)
3.We live a life that full of impatient and doubt (cfr. James 1:6b & 1:7-8)
Weakness, insults, hardships, persecutions and difficulties. Arguing, complaining and conflict. Impatient and doubt are known as the fullness of life. Our potencies, capabilities and capacities are required for their fulfillments. They robed all things found in our hearts that deserve praise; the things that are true, noble, right, pure, lovely and honorable. Therefore, we must be very weak.
However, in the weakness, my dear brothers, kindly come to Christ and pray. Please appeal to his mighty love and believe that we will have this answer:
“My grace is all you need, for my power is greatest when you are weak” (2Cor 12:9a)
All we need about is Christ grace! When we are weak; when we are in heavy load, Christ will invite us to come to him for he will give us rest. Christ will replace our burden with his own load (encouragement) so that we will be joyful always, pray at all times. Be thankful in all circumstances. This is what God wants from us in our lives in union with Jesus Christ (1Thessalonians 5:16-18).
Now we know that what God wants from us in our lives is be joyful, pray at all times and be thankful in all circumstances. When we succeed in doing this, we will receive Christ’s power that called power of Gratitude. Melody Beattie found that the power of gratitude unlocks the fullness of life:
1.It turns what we have into enough and more.
2.It turns denial into acceptance, chaos into order and confusion into clarity
3.It turns a meal into a feast, a house into a home and a stranger into a friend
4.It makes sense of our past, brings peace for today and create a vision for tomorrow
B. The power of Christ is the Authority for Believers
Nobody wants to be an ordinary one; he would like to become someone and/or to achieve something at some point in the future.
To become someone and/or to achieve something at some point in the future is the goal we should set up for our lives. This must not an easy work, therefore, we would love to keep on building ourselves to be more proficient in pursuing and achieving our goals. Thomas Watson, the IBM founder pointed out this formula:
1.Target : Formulating the target you should achieve in your life (to become someone and/or to achieve something at some point in the future)
2.Method : Activate your mind to formulate and to set up the proper method applied to achieve your target
3.Action : do a proper action in a proper time base on the proper formulated method
It is written, “All things in this World begin in Mind.” (Sirach 37:18b) means setting up the Target, formulating the Method and doing the Action begin in our mind, but when? Human’s Mind has power of Imagination and power of Visualization. Before we translated our target, method and action into written form that makes concrete our view of the direction and purpose, we should take a few minutes to achieve our targets in our mind. We imagine a target (life) that is exactly as we want it, imagine what we would do, with whom we would do and how we should do it. All imagined targets put us in a state of excitement and enthusiasm. The next step is, visualizing the imagined targets and bringing them to life. Make them a reality; if we can see ourselves having such benefits like happiness, successful, healthy and loving life from our targets, then we can make them happen.
Achieve the Target
Do you already know what you truly want to achieve and what you truly want to become? Steve Jobs, co-founder of Apple Computer advised: The most important, have the courage to follow your heart and intuition. They somehow already know what you truly want to achieve and to become. Therefore, do not waste your time living someone else’s life. Do not be trapped by dogma, which is living with the results of other people’s thinking. Do not let the noise of other opinions down out your inner voice. Prepare yourself and stride forward on to achieve your target “to have something and/or to become someone at some point in the future.”
Concerning to Target, Saint Paul advised, “Don’t think of yourself more highly than you should. Instead be modest in your thinking and judge yourself according to the amount of faith that God gave you.” (Rome 12:3b&3c). This means do not set a target higher than your capability and capacity, but your target must be specific, reasonable, and realistic. In addition, the target must be measurable, attainable, relevant, and time-scale, but the most of all, the target is good and is pleasing to God
Judge yourself according to the amount of faith that God gave you means recognize the capability and capacity that God gave you because they are the powers that enable you to do greater things or achieving bigger target. Therefore, you should learn to enlarge them by keeping on building ourselves up on our most sacred faith (Jude 1:20a). This means, although we only have simple target, we should stretch it for stretching targets energize and push us to work harder at meeting more difficulties targets. The result is we can achieve more than, if we had set an easier objective as it was written, “Hard worker will get everything he wants and will have more.” (proverb 13:4b&11c)
Achieving Riches:
What is it the thing that human being wish to achieve for his life? As human, we certainly would love to achieve Riches.
Jesus, our Lord said, “Man can not live on bread alone, but needs every word that God speaks.” (Mathew 4:4b). The words that God speaks are “Faith, Hope and Love”
1.Faith produces: Belief, Trust, integrity and confidence
2.Hope produces: Vision, Passion, Optimism, self-control, Patient and Endurance
3.Love Produces: Responsibility, Forgiveness, Respect for others, Happiness, generosity and Gratitude.
Man can not live on bread alone, but needs every word that God speaks means, Man needs something to eat, to wear and to stay in that called material riches; yet, they are not the only riches that support our life. There are spiritual riches like kindheartedness, happiness, passion and love that should be concerned above those material riches.
Spiritual Riches is the priority
Jesus, our Lord said “Be concerned above everything else with the Kingdom of God – and with he requires of you – and he will provide you with all these other things” (Mathew 6:33). This verse teaches us about the following lessons and priorities for our life:
1.Kingdom of God means we must live holy, perfect and righteous because the Kingdom of God is mighty and eternal.
2.What God requires of us means we must like be the light to shine before people so that they will see the good deed we do (Mathew 5:16). My brothers, Saint Paul advised us not to forget to do good and help one another (Hebrew 13:16a) for God gives us chance and authority to do good deed like:
a.Give generously to the needy (2Cor 9:9a)
b.Be generous and share your food with the poor. You will be blessed for it (Proverb 22:9)
c.Be an example for the believers in you speech, conduct, love, faith and purity (1Timoty 4:12b)
3.He will provide you with all these other things means:
a.God will bless you for your generosity to share your food with the poor (Proverb 22:9)
b.God will supply you with all the seeds you need and will make it grow and produce a rich harvest from your generosity (2Cor 9:10b)
Our hearts and intuitions somehow already know what we truly want to achieve, therefore, have the courage to follow your heart and intuition that seek for the spiritual riches. When you have reason to collect the above expressed spiritual riches, the motivation to get material riches will follow naturally. This motivation to get material will give a reason that so strong to overpower any obstacle standing in the way. A reason that drove you past your fear and on to success.
However, when we don not concern with the spiritual riches above the material ones, then we will spend almost all our time and energy adjusting the external world, and trying to make them conform our wishes. Therefore, we will feel exhausted and spare no adequate capacities for storing up the spiritual riches where our hearts will always be there (Mathew 6:19-21&33). For material riches will give us an attachment. According to Anthony de Mello, Attachment is an emotional state of clinging caused by the belief that without some particular things or some person, we cannot be happy. Again and again we need to let go.
Becoming Perfect
Perfect or wise is the spiritual riches or values we most admire and wish to incorporate into our hearts, for they can make us feel comfortable, secure or stimulated.
Not everything in the world is perfect for perfect is immortal and belongs to God, whereas human being is mortal and worldly. Becoming perfect must be difficult because we live in a world of corrupt and sinful people (Phil 2:15b). In addition, we content of are content with weakness, insults, hardships, persecutions and difficulties (2Cor 12:10a) instead of things that are good and that deserve praise: things that are true, noble, right, pure, lovely and honorable. (Philippians 4:8). They are the yoke and load offered by the world and so whoever takes them must be very tired.
To become perfect is a mandate from God and we are urged to accomplish it in all aspects of our life as it was written “in the same way, you must be perfect-just as your Father in heaven is perfect (Mathew 5:48)”. This mandate is very hard and heavy, however, God would not let us carry them alone. He will help to take over our loads and replace them with ones of his own. He will give us relief and so kindly listen to his calling “come to me all of you who are tired from carrying heavy loads and I will give you rest. Take my yoke for the yoke I will give you is easy and the load I will put on you is light. Mathew 11:28,29a&30) ”
This means to become Perfect is not an impossible mission because God will take over our yoke and load and replace them with ones that belong to him. They are the standards that he set up when he called us. The standards of God are the excellence guidelines that shape our attitude and behavior if we willingly “be always humble, gentle, and patient. Showing our love by being tolerant with one another (Ephesians 4:1b-2).”
When we have great reason to live a life that measure up to the standard of God, the motivation to become perfect will follow naturally. When we are perfect, we have strong reason to fill ourselves with things that are good and that deserve praise: things that are true, noble, right, pure, lovely and honorable. They are the things that drove us past our fears and on to success as a perfect person.
We must be perfect because we are the people of God; he loved and chose us as his own. When we are perfect, we will grow as a wise person who can be able to clothe ourselves with compassion, kindness, humility, gentleness and patient. In addition, as a wise person, we know how to be tolerant with one another, and forgive one another. To all these qualities, as a wise person, we will add love, which binds all things together in perfect unity; then we will show ourselves as a wise perfect person who is full of good reputation. (cfr. Colossians 3:12-14).
Now we can learn that when we are perfect, we will become wise; and when we are wise, we will show ourselves as ones who have good reputation. In addition, a wise perfect person is not stingy, selfish and greedy. So if he wants to choose between a good reputation and great wealth, he chooses good reputation (Proverb 22:1). Good reputation has spiritual riches like integrity, trust, respect for others, tolerance, humble, gentle, and patient, passion and love that lead to pure and lasting happiness.
Therefore, obey God mandate to become perfect and wise, then regard wisdom more highly than any other things in the world as it was written I regard wisdom more highly than any throne or crown. Wealth was nothing compared to her. I Valued wisdom more than good health and good look, when wisdom come to you, all good things come with her. She brought me untold riches (Wisdom of Solomon 7:8, 10a&11).
A wise perfect person will never conform himself to the standard of this world, but he will let God transform him inwardly by complete change of his mind. Because he knows The Lord search the minds and test the hearts of men. The Lord treat each one according to the way he lives, according to what he does (cfr. Jeremiah 17:10). As the reward, he will be able to know the will of God - what is good and pleasing to God and is perfect. (cfr Rome 12:2a); It is the reward as a leader who can shine with the brightness of the sky to teach many people to do what is right. (cfr. Daniel 12:3 & Mathew 5:16)
Method
Method is likened a way or a bridge on which we walk step by step in order to come closer to our target.
A method is a formula that consists of technique and strategy of how to work or how to accomplish the target or goal.
The target we set may be simple and easy, but we need method to help how execute the target and to make us sure if we have capability as it was written, “don’t be too sure of yourself, even when they way looks easy – Sirach 32:21. It means before we touch everything with our hand (action), we should touch it first with our thought as it was written, “Never do everything without thinking it through” Sirach 32:19a.
Thinking everything through before we do it means, we need formula, strategy, or plan that help us to recognize if there is easiness or the difficulties, the advantages or the disadvantages, and if we are capable enough to execute the target.
By the method, we learn what we should do, how we should do and whom we should work with and we can learn the following benefits:
1.Method helps us to make a planning first and then the action will follow to execute target base on what we have thought as it was written “Planning and thought lie behind everything that is done” (Sirach 37:16)
2.Method makes us think to empower the potencies, capabilities and capacities that God gave.
3.Method activates our mind to acquire knowledge, competences and experiences that enhance our capability to be more proficient. Therefore, we will become a sensible person who will see trouble coming and avoid it. We will never walk right into trouble and regret it later like unthinking person (Proverb 22:3)
4.Method sets up a way to walk on step by step in order to get closer to our target as it was written, “whatever you do, be careful –Sirach 32:23.
Doing the Action
Proper action
What good is it for someone to say that he has a big target but he does it without thinking it through (formulating a method)? In the same way, he has formulated good method, but if his method is alone without action, then it is useless. It is a proper action, you should take in order to execute your target base on the formulated method. The question is how to have a proper action?
A proper action is gained by learning and learning. Learning to enlarging our capacities, learning to empowering and sharpening our capabilities and competences, then we will act properly. Bigger capacity can energize and push us not to work harder only but also to love what we do and so “whatever we do, we will work at it with all our hearts as though we were working for the Lord and not for men” (Colossians 3: 23).
BENEFIT OF PROPER ACTION (HARD WORKING)
God created human beings to work, but what is it a working? Working is an action that deliberately undertaken frequently for a certain purpose.
Doing our work (proper action) does not aim at accomplishing our targets only, but also giving us several benefits such as:
1.Making US excellence
2.Tacit Knowledge
3.Passion
1. Proper action makes you excellence
To become excellence is not an easy work! We live in a world of corrupt and sinful people (Phil 2:15b). However, do not worry! Your spirit of growing excellence will never be corrupted if you, my friends, can do the following actions:
1.Keep on building yourselves up on your most sacred faith- Jude 1:20a
2.Pray in the power of Holy Spirit (Jude 1:20b) and
3.You keep yourself in the love of God (Jude 1:21a)
Keep on building yourself means:
Building yourself is not an accidental action but a well-settled practice that is deliberately undertaken for self-empowering during your whole life.
Up on your most sacred faith and Pray in the power of Holy Spirit means:
The action of self-empowering is executed with passion by the power of Holy Spirit (Jude 1:20b) instead of Lust or Evil Desire that produces Temptation (James 1:13)
You keep yourself in the love of God means:
By love, the power of Christ will transform the action of building yourself into a well-settled practice (habit) of self-empowering that tends to make you excellence.
Therefore, you now may understand that your greatest action will never make you an excellence one but your habit will as Aristotle said “The excellence is not an action only, but habitual”
Are you an excellence person? I appeal to you to give sincere response to the following questions:
1.How to become excellence? Keep on building yourselves up on your most sacred faith (Jude 1:20a)
2.How to keep on building yourselves? Pray in the power of Holy Spirit (Jude 1:20b) to allow you to use the power that Christ gave you (Phil 4: 13c)
3.What are the functions of the power of Christ?
a.To give you the strength to face all conditions (Phil 4:13a)
b.To give you the capability of doing something (2Cor 3:5b)
c.To give you the capacity of God (2Cor 3:5c) then by that capacity, you will be able to do greater things. You are excellence.
This means when you have the power of Christ, you will have commitment to work at your job with all your hearts as it was written, “Whatever you do, work at it with all your hearts as though you were working for the Lord and not for men. Colossians 3: 23.” Therefore, when you are doing your work extremely well, The Lord, our master will say: Well done, you good and faithful servant! You have been faithful in managing small amounts, so I will put you in charge of larger amounts. Come on in and share my happiness. Mathew 25: 20-21.
In addition, the power of Christ will turn you, the enemy of God, to his friends and children because only God’s children are capable of doing their works without complaining or arguing (Phil 2:4)
2. Proper action gives Tacit knowledge: The power of Practice
Stenberg, a psychologist from Yale University, found that a sequence of our daily practices give us tacit knowledge; a knowledge that enlarges our competences to master the work we are currently doing.
Prof Steinberg added that a driver would be very expert in driving and mastering the road not because of his intelligence when joining the mechanic courses, but because of practice and practice that he has. He certainly does not do the practice just as a daily routine but he does do it as a process, which is enriched with new idea, creativity and innovation. In addition, Ted Williams ever said ‘most of the people always said that the talent and the competence of me becoming the reason of successfulness of me. They have never said about practice, practice and practice, which I run.
Practice enhance my capability of recollecting the knowledge and skill that I ever learned and those knowledge and skill function to improve my capacity to work efficiency and effectively.
3. Proper action gives Passion: The power of loving the work
Loving the work energize us to work harder, working harder requires competence. Competence demand knowledge and knowledge empower us to be more proficient (become excellence) in pursuing our targets. When we are excellence, we will work properly and we will have plenty or enough. Because all we do are based on a careful plan, we will never act too quickly (cfr. Proverb 21:5).
When we love our work, we will work harder at meeting more difficulties targets. The result is we can achieve more than, if we do not love our work as it was written, “Hard worker will get everything he wants and will have more” (Proverb 13:4b&11c). Therefore, I assure that everyone who loves what he does will have God’s grace so that everything he works is not really his own doing but God’s grace working with him. Therefore, he will obtain the following advantages:
1.Conqueror. Hard work will give you power (Proverb 12:24a) to get what you are after or to give you fortune (Proverb 12: 27b). By the power you will become a conqueror for the power will give you strength to face all conditions (Phil 4:13a).
2.Reward. A hard worker will never dies in starving for he will get everything he wants (Proverb 13:4b) and will have more (Proverb 13:11c)
3.Responsibility. A hard worker is not a looser, he will never accept anyone’s support without any paying for it (2Thes 3:8a). He will work and toil; keep working day and night so as not to be an expense to anyone else (2Thes. 3: 8b). He works to earn his own living (2Thes. 3:12c)
4.Example. A hard worker will keep on working to be example for the others to follow (2Thes 3:9b).
5.Hope. A hard worker has not to become tired of doing good; he will struggle and work hard, because he has placed his hope in the living God (1Timothy 4:10a).
Obstacle
We have set up the Target, formulating the Method and executed the proper Action, but it is normal if there are still some problems or difficulties as the test we should experience. God is good, he keeps his promises and he will not allow us to be tested beyond our power to remain firm; at the time we are put to the test, he will give us strength to endure it, and so provide us with the way out (1Cor 10:13).
God gives us strength to endure and so provide us with way out means in the Obstacle or Test, God gives us a power to focus on or to think of solution instead of problems. For when we think of a good solution, we will attract more solutions and opportunities. But when we think of problems, we will attract more problems. It is impossible to have no problem, but kindly approach the problem with the expectant attitude that there is an innovative practical solution just waiting to be found. Be patient, relaxed, confident and clear in our mind and then we will have the way out through the following riches:
1.Knowledge:
Knowledge is the cognitive capabilities measured by the capacity of acquiring intelligences such as Linguistic, Math, Logic and Reasoning. Knowledge is acquired by studying, practice, or being taught. Knowledge give you internal motivation to work in a well organized manner, applying superior systems and procedures and detailed job descriptions, so that you will get easy to accomplish your jobs. However, your internal motivation must be complemented with enthusiasm and passion so that you may give to your work a touch of feeling, hearth and love; you then will be protected and prevented from doing everything that is too mechanical, too formal, and too protective.
Knowledge must be complemented by Enthusiasm and/or as the reverse as it was written: “Enthusiasm without knowledge is not good; impatient will get you into trouble (Proverb 19:2). Therefore, God sends knowledge and understanding like the rain, and increase the honor of those who receive her (Sirach 1:19). In addition, “God gives knowledge to human being so that we would praise him for the miracles he performs (Sirach 38:6).
This means your enthusiasm is useless if you do not have knowledge and your knowledge contributes nothing if you are impatient; for impatient makes you unable to make up your minds and undecided in all you do; therefore, you never think that you will receive anything from the Lord. (James 1:6b,7-8). When you are impatient; you are unable to make up your minds and undecided in all you do; so that you are spending all your time for looking for nothing; you will feel very poor. Therefore, all you gain is the knowledge that you are rich, Ecclesiastes 5: 11b, means that knowledge make us full in desire (aspiration), belief (principle, trust, confidence) and acceptance (recognition, approval). Therefore, when we receiver her, she will increase the honor of ours.
2.Planning
We have knowledge of or skill in executing our target base on the formulated method, however, the execution must lie before a good planning and a wise thought as it was written “Planning and thought lie behind everything that is done” (Sirach 37:16).
A good planning can make us become a sensible person who will see trouble coming and avoid it. We will never walk right into trouble and regret it later like unthinking person (Proverb 22:3).
Good planning is believed to make our capability, experience and capacity function to skip out impatient and inconsistency as it was written: Plan carefully and you will have plenty; if you act too quickly, you will never have enough (Proverb 21:5).
God gives us authority to know his plans he has for us; the plans to bring us prosperity and not disaster. The plans to bring about the future we hope for (Jeremiah 29: 11). By the authority of God, we will make our plan carefully and we will have plenty; because we know that act too quickly, we will never have enough (Proverb 21:5).
In addition, by God’s authority, we are put right to ask God to bless our plans and we will be successfully in carrying them out (Proverb 16: 3). And finally by the blessing that God gave to our plan, we have capacity in order to be capable of doing our work (2Cor 3:5 and we have strength to face all conditions by the power that Christ gives us (Philippians 4:13)
3.Wisdom:
Wisdom is capabilities measured by the heart’s capacity of producing justice, courage, patient, self-control, insight, passion and gratitude (wisdom of Solomon 8:7b) and the other things that are good. Wisdom is the capacity to recognize your own feelings and those of others, for motivating yourself and for managing emotions well in yourself and in your relationship.
How wisdom work in your hearts? At first wisdom will lead you along difficult path. She will make you so afraid that you will think you can not go on (Sirach 4:17). Therefore, Nothing will stand in your way if you walk wisely, and you will not stumble when you run (Proverb 4:12).
When wisdom is in you, you will succeed in your work for it will give you patient and the capability of controlling yourself as it was written: “It is better to be patient than powerful; it is better to win control over yourself than over the whole country.” (Proverb 16:32).
Wisdom gives you patient to have success and so Benjamin Franklyn, the former USA president said: “A professional is genius in his field for he has a distinct talent that called the talent of patient. His talent of patient gives him endurance to face trials that come to his learning, patient to deal with problems calmly and patient to wait for the result without haste.
Wisdom gives you qualities of doing the right things (effectiveness), but not doing the things right (efficiency) only because she provides you with insight and understanding to protect and prevent you from doing wrong things (Proverb 2:11-12). Therefore, please get up early and find her for she will give you the following benefits:
1.Wisdom: Wisdom takes care of those who look for her; she raises them to greatness-Sirach 4:11
2.Anyone who obtains wisdom will be greatly honored – Sirach 4:13
3.Wisdom can make your life pleasant and lead you safely through it – Proverb 3:17
4.Wisdom offers you long life, as well as wealth and honor – Proverb 3:16
5.So do not worry about tomorrow, it will have enough worries of its own. There is no need to add to the troubles each day brings”.– Mathew 6: 34 leo
C. The power of Christ is put in our Mind
There is nothing in us that allows us to claim that we are capable of doing this work. The capacity we have comes from God (2Corinthians 3:5). This holy word is the foundation for Donah Zohar and Ian Marshal to find a Spot in our mind, called God Spot. It is a holy Spot or Holy Power which God put our Mind. Base on the Spot, we learn that our Mind has Power by the Spot that God put in our mind.
All things in this World begin in Mind (Sirach 37:18b), but before we begin something, we should find how the mind commence everything. The Mind must have power.
A tough work is done for finding and mining out Gold from a hard rock; in the same way, a hard effort is needed in order to explore and to find out the power of mind as it was written in the scripture “a person’s thoughts are like water in deep well, but someone with insight can draw them out – Proverb 20:5.”
Learning
C1. Learning to know the power of Christ in our Mind
Learning is an effort made in order to know the power that God has put in our Mind. By learning, we know what powers in our mind, how to enhance, to manage and to synergize them for beneficial purposes. Many scientific studies and researches have been conducted to explore Human Mind and the Proverb 20:5 is the foundation where the experts found the following Powers owned by Human’s Mind:
1.Intellectual Quotient (IQ) is the power of Mind to word, logic, analysis and reason
2.Emotional Quotient (EQ) is the power of Mind to relationship, understanding and sympathy
3.Spiritual Quotient (SQ) is the power of Mind to unquestioning confidence.
C2. Learning to do a good Deed by the power of Mind
The powers of mind make all things begin in this world, but people should learn in advance in order to manage, to synergy the power of mind and to know what benefits we should have from them. Through learning, we know how to manage the power of mind to be more proficient in pursuing and achieving the following benefits:
1.The powers of mind will lead us to always do a good deed (Sirach 12:1a)
2.The powers of mind give us insight to know what and who is benefiting from the good done we do (Sirach 12:1b)
3.The powers of mind are helpful to make the good deed we do will not be wasted (Sirach 12:1c).
The Master Gardener Of Our Mind
Base on the above benefits produces by our mind, we also learn that t we must become the master gardener of our mind.
James Allen said that A man’s mind may be likened to a garden, which may be intelligently cultivated or allowed to run wild; but whether cultivated or neglected, it must, and will bring forth.
Just as a gardener cultivates his plot, keeping it free from weeds and growing the flowers and fruits, which he requires, so may a man tend to a gardener of his mind, weeding out all the wrong, useless and impure thoughts, and cultivating toward perfection the flowers and fruits of right, useful and pure thoughts. By pursuing this process, a man sooner or later discover that he is the master gardener of his soul, the director of his life. He also reveals, within himself, the laws of thought and understands, with ever-increasing accuracy, how the thought-forces and the mind-elements operate in shaping his character, circumstances and destiny.
The master gardener of mind knew well of how to use his mind optimally, so that he will be careful how he thinks; his life is shaped by his thoughts – Proverb 4:25
C3. The God’s power in our Mind
There is a Spot in our mind, called God Spot. It is a Holy Spot or Holy Power/Spirit because God himself put it in our mind.
Holy Spirit will teach us everything and make us remember all that Christ has told us (John 14:25).
C4. Holy Spirit can lead us to empower our Mind
Learning is an effort of gaining knowledge of or skill in by study, practice, or being taught. Everyone would love to learn at any chances and from any sources as shown below for the advancement of life:
1.Learning from God (Mathew 2:29b)
2.Learning from experience (Proverb 19:8b)
3.Learning from others (Proverb 27:17)
4.Learning from environment/nature (Baruch 3:14)
Learning from God, Experience, Others, and Environment tend to make us be open to new facts, ideas, insights and revelations that can lead to better ways to accomplishing goals.
C5. The power of Christ works through the power of Holy Spirit in our Mind
The power of Holy Spirit (Jude 1:20b) is the most important power which enables us to energize our mind works more proficient as shown below:
1.Christ gave us his power (Phil 4: 13c) - Intellectual Quotient
The power of Christ enables us to know and to excel our capability of Linguistic, Math, Logic and Reasoning. By the power of Christ we are able to work base on logical thinking and good planning as written: Planning and thought lie behind everything that is done” – Sirach 37:16. This means by working in a well organized manner, applying superior systems and procedures and detailed job descriptions, we will get easy to accomplish our jobs. The IQ leads us to grow as an expert who has capacity of doing something (2Cor 3:5b) like the others do too.
2.Keep yourself in the love of God (Jude 1:21a) - Emotional Quotient
The Love of Christ gives you capacity to recognize your own feelings and those of others, for motivating yourself and for managing emotions well in yourself and in your relationship.
The Love of Christ gives you understanding that Emotional intelligence (EQ) describes abilities distinct from, but complementary to academic intelligence, the purely cognitive capabilities measured by Intellectual Quotient (IQ). On the other hand, the Love of Christ will light on your emotion intelligence (EQ) to shine before your cognitive capabilities (IQ) so that it can work not base on logical consideration only but also empathy, self-awareness, self-responsibility, and self-control. This means the Love of Christ makes you excel in emotional intelligence skills so that you have the strength to face all conditions by the power that Christ gave you (Philippians 4:13). Therefore, you will be more proficient in doing things that are difficult for those who are book smart but lack Emotional Intelligence skills (EQ).
3.Pray in the power of Holy Spirit (Jude 1:20b) - Spiritual Quotient
Everybody has intention to become someone and to achieve something at some point in the future or that we called Vision.
At the same time he has a feeling of expectation and desire; feeling of trust and confidence. He does not see what he hopes for (to become someone and to achieve something at some point in the future) so he will wait for it with patient (read Rome 8:25) that we called Hope.
He has a strong enthusiasm in life to realize his vision and hope that we called Passion.
As a scholar, you must be very enthusiasm to realize your vision and hope by enlarging capacity. You can do it by acquiring knowledge, competence and skill, etc through learning and coaching.
However, as a believer, you must pray in the power of Holy Spirit to power your emotion so that it can harmonize and synergize your intellectual’s work with enthusiasm. Because it is written, enthusiasm without knowledge is not good; impatient will get you into trouble (Proverb 19:2).
This means your enthusiasm is useless if you do not have knowledge and your knowledge contributes nothing if you are impatient; for impatient makes you unable to make up your minds and undecided in all you do; therefore, you never think that you will receive anything from the Lord. (James 1:6b,7-8)
In addition, The power of Holy Spirit leads people who are book smart to have and to excel in Emotional Intelligence skills and Spiritual Intelligence skills so that he can keep on building himself up on his most sacred faith (Jude 1:20a). It is the faith that gave him feeling of expectation and desire; feeling of trust and confidence. Therefore, he has power to be sure of things he hopes for and to be certain of things he cannot see (read Hebrew 11:1) that we called Faith. This means, the power of Holy Spirit brings passion to make you more enduring, more patients and more enthusiasm to build up bigger capacity. When you are big in capacity, you will have strong trust or unquestioning confidence to pursue and to achieve the goals that is impossible for others.
Concerning to the above explanations, let us take a brief for the following theories:
1.Intellectual Quotient. Alfred Binet (1857-1911) found that Intellectual Quotient is the intelligence used to measure the capability of Linguistic, Math, Logic and Reasoning. Someone who is good in IQ will grow as an excellent manager. He may be extremely well organized and run a tight ship with superior systems and procedures and detailed job descriptions. But unless they are internally motivated, little gets done because there is no feeling, no hearth; everything is too mechanical, too formal, too protective. He must be poor in leadership.
2.Emotional Quotient. Daniel Golemen (1990s) found that Emotional Quotient works more with emotions and imaginations. EQ deals with intuitive, emotional and creative works. Someone with good EQ would not love so much with an organization which extremely well organized and run a tight ship with superior systems and procedures and detailed job descriptions. However, he may work much better even though he may appear to an outsider observer to be disorganized and confused.
EQ helps you to build good relationship within yourself and the others. By knowing yourself then only can you know other people and influence and share your experience with them. Therefore, you can cooperate well with them for a truly significant accomplishment may result simply because people share a common vision, purpose or sense of mission
BARE (Balance, Awareness, Responsibility and Emphaty) is the pilar of EQ, said Steve Hein. This pilar will support your Intellectual (IQ) to work in balance or harmony and base on high degree of self Awareness, self Control, self Responsibility and Emphaty. Golemen found that EQ is very important because IQ only donates 20% for your succes while the rest 80% is the contribution of the efforts that controlled by Emotion.
3.Spiritual Quotient. Donah Zohar and Ian Marshal found a Spot in our mind called God Spot and Peter Stepherd called it Spiritual Quotient or Heart Intelligence.
God put his spot in our mind because we are his temple and that His Holy Spirit lives in (1Cor 3:16). From this Spot, God’s Holy Spirit works to make us more proficient in proclaiming the things that are good and that deserve praise; things that are true, noble, right, pure, lovely and honorable. (Philippians 4:8).
In addition, on the Spot in our mind, God pour out his Spirit to enhance us set up our hopes and visions; then we can proclaim God’s message (Joel 2:28). Therefore, Donah Zohar and Ian Marshal stated that God Spot is the center of our personality. One who has good personality can live a life that measure up to the standard God set when He called us. The standards of God are being always humble, gentle, and patient. Show your love by being tolerant with one another (read Ephesians 4:1b-2).
4.Multiple Intelligence. Prof Howard Gardner found some other intelligence in us that is called Multiple Intelligence. There are more than 20s intelligences found by Prof Howard Gardner, but some of them are:
a. Linguistic Intelligence: The capability of communication
b.Logical, Reasoning and Math Intelligence: The capability of analyzing
c.Spatial Intelligence: The capability of conception
d.Kinesthetic Intelligence: The capability of managing body for art and sport
e.Musical Intelligence: The capability of music and composing song
f. Intrapersonal Intelligence: The capability of self relationship building
g.Interpersonal Intelligence: The capability of building relationship with others or team building
h.Natural Intelligence: The capability of adapting with nature
i.There are still some other intelligences
COLOSURE
SUCCESS versus FAILURE
God has given us great gifts (godsend) as listed below so that we may live a fortunate life:
4.Giving us Power (Gen 1: 26b) to bring the universe and its contents under our control (Gen 1: 28a)
5.Sending us knowledge and understanding like the rain, and increase the honor of those who receive her-Sirach 1:19.
6.Giving knowledge to us so that we would praise him for the miracles he performs – Sirach 38:6
7.Giving us power of Mind to begin all things in the world (Sirach 37:18b) by obeying the holy word “Planning and thought lie behind everything that is done” – Sirach 37:16
8.Pour out his Holy Spirit on us to help our emotion support our intellect so that we may have a balance life to build our future base on hopes and visions (Joel 2:28).
The above gifts aim to enhance our intelligences or power of mind to improve our performance for a greater achievement. The achievement means the delivery extraordinary results, achieving goals and executing strategy, plan and project through effectiveness, creativity and innovation.
However, some of us are not so lucky, we often fail not of the lack of capacity and knowledge or less of enthusiasm and passion. Mostly, we fail because there is a conflict in our hearts; our spirits cannot be able to put our intellect and emotion in a balance status. Therefore, we sometimes do not understand what we do; for we do not do what we would like to do but instead we do what we hate” (read Rome 7:15).
Base on Rome 7:15, we can learn that the cause our failures are as mentioned below:
1.Lack of faith so that we can not be sure of things we hope for and we are not certain of things we can not see (Hebrew 11:1)
2.The impatient to face troubles, which must produce endurance (Rome 5:3b). Therefore, we cannot wait for results or deal with problems calmly and without haste.
3.The lack of willing to learn and of hope to be sure that endurance will carry us all the way without failing, so that we may be perfect and complete; lacking nothing (James 1:4). Therefore, we cannot work base on our logical thinking, knowledge, and experience.
4.Live a life that does not measure up to the standard of God set like be always humble, gentle, and patient. Show love by being tolerant with one another-Ephesians 4:1b-2.
5.Live in a doubtful heart that makes us unable to make up our minds and undecided in all we do; so that we never thinks that we will receive anything from the Lord.(James 1:6b,7-8). Therefore, we cannot be able to put all things to the test; we cannot keep what is good and cannot avoid every kind of evil.(1Tesalonians 5:21-22)
6.We are selfish to share the gift that God gave with others. Therefore, we failed because the truly significant accomplishment may result simply because people share a common vision, purpose or sense of mission.
APPENDIX
1.to have faith is to be sure of things you hope for and you are certain of things you can not see (read Hebrew 11:1)
2.I have the strength to face all conditions by the power that Christ gives me-Philippians 4:13
3.There is nothing in us that allows us to claim that we are capable of doing this work. The capacity we have comes from God. 2Corinthians 3:5
4.Those who believe in me will be capable of doing even greater things than the ones I myself did. John 14:12
5.“But you my friends, keep on building yourselves up on your most sacred faith. Pray in the power of Holy Spirit (Jude 1:20) and keep yourself in the love of God (Jude 1:21a)
6.A person’s thoughts are like water in deep well, but someone with insight can draw them out – Proverb 20:5
7.….and learn from me because I am gentle and humble in spirit (Mathew 2:29b)
8.“Do ourselves a favor and learn all we can; then remember or do what we learn and we will prosper.” – proverb 19:8
9.“Learn where understanding, strength and insight are to be found. Then you will know where to find a long and full life, light to guide you and peace.”-Baruch 3:14
10.People learn from one another just as iron sharpens iron-Proverb 27:17
11.All things in this world begin in mind (Sirach 37:18b),
12.Planning and thought lie behind everything that is done” – Sirach 37:16.
13.Fill your mind with those things that are good and that deserve praise: things that are true, noble, right, pure, lovely and honorable. (Philippians 4:8)
14.Live a life that measure up to the standard God set when He called him. Be always humble, gentle, and patient. Show your love by being tolerant with one another- Ephesians 4:1b-2
15.Afterward, I will pour out My Spirit on everyone: your sons and daughters will proclaim my message; your old men will have dreams and your young men will see visions- Joel 2:28
16.Surely you know that you are God’s temple and that God’s spirit lives in you (1Cor 3:16)
17.“I do not understand what I do; for I do not do what I would like to do but instead I do what I hate” – Rome 7:15.
18.In the same way, your light must shine before the people so that they will see the good things you do and praise your Father in Heaven.-Mathew 5:16
19.But you must be perfect-just as your Father in heaven is perfect-Mathew 5:48
20.I, the Lord search the minds and test the hearts of men. I treat each one according to the way he lives, according to what he does. Jeremiah 17:10
21. “For God will reward every person according to what he has done. Some people keep on doing good and seek glory, honor and immortal life. To them God will give eternal life.” – Rome 2: 6 – 7
22.Some people keep on doing good and seek glory, honor and immortal life (Rome 2:6b). For them God will give eternal life to people who keep on doing good and seek glory (Rome 2:7)
23.Enthusiasm without knowledge is not good; impatient will get you into trouble-Proverb 19:2
24.Your work will provide for your needs; you will be happy and prosperous – Proverb 128: 2
25.When you do a good deed, make sure you know who is benefiting from it; then what you do will not be wasted – Sirach 12:1
26.Be joyful always, pray at all times. Be thankful in all circumstances. This is what God wants from you in your life in union with Jesus Christ. - 1Thessalonians 5:16-18
27.A person who gets rich without sinfully chasing after money is fortunate. Do you know anyone like that? If so, we will congratulate him for performing a miracle that no one else has ever been able to do. Sirach 31:8-9
28.Sympathy is the capacity for sharing the feelings of others
29.Vision is a short, succinct, and inspiring statement of what the organization intends to become and to achieve at some point in the future, often stated in competitive terms. Vision refers to the category of intentions that are broad, all-intrusive and forward-thinking.
30.A mission statement is an organization’s vision translated into written form. It makes concrete the leader’s view of the direction and purpose of the organization.
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