Leadership

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PUBLISHING GOD'S WISDOM AND PROCLAIMING HIS KINGDOM
Extract from “Wisdom for handling Mistakes”
Generations of nations, organisations and families are placed in a serious limitation because of past mistakes made by some set of people or leaders. The days of promotion of many had been re-scheduled into far away distant future from now because of some mistakes made just once or incessantly.

“Mistake” is a common word explaining a wrong action or event someone ignorantly or willfully plunged into. All men are liable to making mistakes, mostly in the medium of ignorance and bad habits. Mistakes are either minor or major and there are certain laws that govern or guide our activities and actions on earth. A violation of any of these cannot but be without their repercussions.

The “past” and “present” in the history of the world are loaded with stories of one thing or the other done wrongly by an individual or group of people. If these happenings had had no ill effect, it would have been considered a delight but their effects had made many slaves in places they should have been kings. Fortunes had slipped off hands of many because of one mistake or the other. Territories have been conquered and kingdoms overthrown, because of one or two decisions acted wrongly.

Our decisions at various times in the past have direct or indirect relationship to our present and future hope.

The regret, pains and sorrow that often succeed wrong or wrong actions are often serious. There are things we do in life that may throw generations of many of our descendants into long living problems.

The volume of the population, roughness of the road, the activities and the reward and benefits that the journey stands to give and the culture predominant in the land of our endeavour determine the degree of risk in any journey.


He that breaks the hedge, the snake will bite him. Ecc.10: 8

Although, men are not so perfect, wrong acts of incessant actions will have cumulative effect of regrets and sorrows. An entire life of an individual is like plain pages all together, and those things or right things done wrongly are canceling. So many of these on your pages in life make your life uninspiring, unattractive and full of regrets.

The pre and post actions of an individual after making mistakes tell so much on the magnitude of pains they cause. The pre-actions are responsible for the causes and effects while the post actions determine the duration and multiplication of their effects.

In life, we may have to learn some important lessons by first experiencing the bad sides, but most experiences are not necessarily gathered in this manner. You have the option of knowing and doing the right things before jumping into wrong. You do not need to experience the bad side of things before you learn; there are enough specimens of stories from the lives of men and women at different ages, stages and places that we can learn from: The Bible is such a wonderful example of these.

If you have to know all the bad side of life before you learn, you will be “late” before those lessons are heaped out; and I know by then they will be irrelevant to your bones in the grave. Others will have to learn from your foolishness displayed while on earth.

The more frequently you make mistakes now as did sometimes ago in a particular area of your life, is a sign that you are not growing; you have not learned lessons so vital in this area. It will be a disaster; if you are entrusted with responsibilities in the area, you have not mastered the obstacles nor have devised means of conquering them. To confront some challenges with this your incompetence will only make you a cheap prey in life, most especially in the area of weakness and ignorance!

It is sometimes not an offense to make minor mistakes (Human error) as you will see latter in this book, but when this had turned to habit, it will give birth to a major one, which definitely is an automatic invitation to pains.

I have personally made some that I wish should not. However, my great consolation has always been in the mercy and love of God. Human errors are inevitable, but many mistakes are sincerely unnecessary if we had considered some simple rules carefully.

Every one do make mistakes and I suppose we should all learn how to minimize, prevent and rectify them. This is the commitment of wisdom and this is the obligation of this little volume.

Although, you may not be responsible for making one, but it is your out most responsibility to correct the one that feast on your fortune in life or those which turn your supposed gains to pains, grace to grass and glory to groaning.

There is nothing as good, rewarding and worthy of commendation than to be a problem solver. You do not need to keep labouring under the pains of your regret, all you need is to change course and follow the enduring mercy of God that has all capability to re-order your life for the better.

To discuss much about these problem of mistakes without solution is like showing the world is the only the way to hell.
Prevention is one best way of handling our wrongs, though mercy makes provision for correction. However, there are some rules to observe to keep mistakes to the minimum in our lives.

Preventing, minimising and rectifying mistakes require much work on your personal life than on any other person. It begins with you first, your ideas about life, your habits, your concept, friends, your mode of relationship, your skill in management of resources and your faith in God.

Deal wisely with your past.
You are human; you must have made one mistake or the other. If you carry pains from other peoples’ mistakes; please forgive them and do likewise to yourself. Ask yourself “What lessons have I learned from these?” if you have none, then you have a long way to go in the sorrow your wrong or that of others may import into your life. But, if like Thomas Edison, at least, you have learned that doing things that way is wrong and may be dangerous- that is a great lesson, keep it and do not repeat the wrong.
The second thing to do is “what are your testimonies and hope?” I guess I did not hear you say “none” there are many friends. You are alive that is a testimony. You have God, who is merciful, willing to forgive as you come to Him; that is another one. You have opportunity of time to make amendment; that is wonderful. You have at least one or two people who still love you, understand your situation and have confidence in you. Count many of these, they are blessings, search for them, they are enough for you to form a tomorrow. I am sure, God cannot be lying and lastly start taking right steps into the future with focused mind. Subsequent rules will show you these.

Take inventory of your past habits.
You will need to be sincere; if you must change the bad ones. Which among these are good and have won you precious rewards or which among these had driven many great men, opportunities and blessing away from you? Which of these have caused you great regrets in life? You have to be sincere with yourself. Get a catalogue of these bad habits and begin to work on them. Bad habits can be very difficult to handle most especially those which have sins as their root. You will need God’s grace to deal with them. Present yourself in that bad form to God; He is never ashamed of you.
God is not ashamed of you in such dirty appearance, while you are retuning home like the prodigal son, He will embrace you, change and give you a new garment of grace to overcome those bad habits. Just throw yourself before Him and confess all wrongs. Sins inclusive; He is not ashamed of you! Take inventory of the bad habits and present them for a change.
Habits are like solidified candle wax, they can be very difficult to melt. You will need heat of certain degree to melt these ones that they won’t prevent the shining of God’s glory and the effective utilisation of your potential.

Make cross-examination of your habits constantly.
What are those things lately so frequently done? What are their effects? Do they add value to your life or reduce your worth?
Do they lead to wasting of resources of time, money materials and people? Do they generate friction in your relationship with others? Please consider proper adjustment before they take hold on you. Examine yourself and your habits always II cor.13:5. Cross-examine your most recent and frequent action and activities, a bad habit may be building up.

Be a Lover of Quality
This will reduce your propensity for impatience. Let everything that portray you show quality. We should not confuse quality with extravagance. Extravagance is a product of indiscipline, foolishness and self-centredness. Quality is a product of purposefulness and prudence.

To obtain quality may be costly but the correction of mistakes often cost more than cost of quality.
First in your life, conceive a quality dream and vision that worth spending your life for.

Men who seek to work in another vision different from that which God created them for are always “Quantity men”.
I had the story of a potter who made it a duty to inspect pots made in his company. He is never at sympathy with substandard job. He breaks without considering the effort that is put into any substandard job. Concentrate your effort on quality job. Learn how to use little efforts to produce quality performance. You may apply so much effort without the love for quality; you will just produce a substandard job.

Your consciousness is your focus. The test of where you are going is the test of your consciousness. Be an ardent lover of quality.

Love quality and possess quality dreams. Give a quality service and counsel. Pray quality prayers, read quality books and learn from men of quality. Spend time, money and resources on quality things. How do you recognise quality men? They have quality use of their time. They are not busy bodies; you cannot see them soaked in alcohol. Quality men are self-controlled. Quality men do not get angry easily neither do they waste resources.
Why do you need to possess this concept of quality?
The love for quality will save you some embarrassment; help you in effective and judicious use of resources. The world we are is full of critics. Your high standard life, job, work, services and dream will be spoken against. You cannot want this on this little sphere but you will always be justified, if all you do is based on quality. Only you should not see your quality work as quality, every right thinking human being should admire this wonder.

It cost little to produce quality than parch up a substandard job. It is very easy to do it right the first time than correct it latter. Quality life and job will win you enviable recognition, reputation, respect and outstanding result.

Set Gauge on your Sad and Happy Moments
Watch what goes on within your mind and environment when you are sad or happy. These situations accommodate mistakes. Your displeasure and excitement are peaks where mistakes are

liable to occur. Decisions of most leaders at these peaks are always a funnel of problems. Parents, guidance and Decision-makers should be careful at these moments. Your sad and happy moments have the potential of accommodating anger, pride, self-centredness, extravagance and impulsive decision. Set a gauge on your sad and happy moments. Watch over your decisions out of provocation. II Sam. 24;1-3

Test Motive: discourage flattering and accommodate sincere comments.
Test motive and validity behind every comment, suggestion and counsel before action, or adoption. Two major extremes of people cannot but attend your success, actions and dreams. You cannot want flatterers and critics in your success.

These two ministries are destructive if they are handled without wisdom. Take wise consideration, the greater harm you can do yourself is to act impulsively.
There will always be “Yes men” around your success. When you encourage flatterers, you dig your grave and eventually will be buried therein. Ahab, king of Israel gathered 400 “Yes men” prophets to tell him what he wanted to hear and he failed in the battle they pronounced victory. Always discourage flatterers but acknowledge sincere comments. They may not be gentle as expected to your hearing but learn to accommodate right and sincere comments they will improve your quality. Nevertheless, if you gather “yes men” to sing the song you want to hear, you are setting limitation at your door.
The world is filled with critics. The cruel critics who are aroused by envy and jealousy will desire your fall. Your failure is their consolation. They cause distraction, give false awareness and tend to provoke you to wrong. Envious critics seek to waste your time and resources by replying them. We should learn how to handle critics with wisdom, as Jesus Christ handled them. They were unable to legitimately trap Him.

Do not be surprise, there will be so many accusations, and envy will always throw stone of destruction at your glass of fame. Give critics 1% of your spare time and let the bulk of your time be spent on developing yourself and others, rendering valuable and quality services to God and others.

Avoid Impulsive Decisions
Avoid impulsive decisions. It wastes time and resources. Buying unplanned items waste our financial resources. Take the bulk of your decisions when you are calm. The more peaceful you are while you take your decisions the more reliable they are. Fear and impatience fire impulsive actions. The sense of this insecurity is a product of fear; they accommodate wrong decisions and actions.
Consider while taking decision;
(1) What did God’s words have to say about the issue?
(ii) What are the likely consequences of the various options of decisions that cross your mind; outline the advantages and disadvantages of each.
(iii) How do you feel in your heart? We should not misplace fear for confusion. You may have arrived at the right decision and still be afraid but such should not be executed with fear or else good works will be spoilt. not all ideas that cross your mind are inspired be careful. II Sam. 7:1-10, 8:5-8.

Acquire Relevant Information and Counsel before Attempting any Endeavour.

“Where no counsel is, the people falls, but in the multitude of counselor there is safety” Pro. 11:14
You can never be through with half or falsified information about a journey you are willing to commence. Before you begin any journey into any endeavour seek to know the basis of each stage, get your heart and understanding adequately prepared; where most people had failed, you will succeed if you heed this instruction. Seek Biblical counsels, consult experienced people who had passed this journey, read books of relevance, sit down and count the cost of commencing and completing a journey. All these add strength to the foundation of the structures you intend to raise.

Be in the right place doing the right thing at the right time.
II Sam 11:1. In appropriateness on Job schedule and assignment can cause problem. The right time for every work must not be longer than it should. Learn to read time and use the resources of
time adequately. Select the right person for the right job, intelligible delegations will safe you a lot of heartache. Have time for every thing and anything you give your time to must be worthy of it and relevant to God’s will. Desire your purpose in life your goals and vision.

Those who understand the ethics of time management are always chiefs among their brethren and colleagues. I chro. 12; 32.


Watch Over the Visitors in Your Heart. So many ideas pay visit to our mind. Some ideas carry greatness while some are just distractions. Do not permit strange ideas to your vision; strange ideas carry danger that bug your vision and give you temporary or permanent set back. Watch over the state of your heart. Banish all seeds of envy, hatred, inferiority complex, bitterness and sorrow from past mistakes. Please debug all these in your life because they will contaminate your vision and dream.

Avoid Covering Mistakes, Correct them Promptly. Deal with your mistakes quickly, your pride may consider your reputation but please do not breed mistakes, they have ability to multiply. Wrong produces wrong. Your quick ability to recognise and readiness to correct will save you a lot of embarrassment here on earth and in eternity. One best way is to learn how to avoid them, but those ones made, expose them for correction. If you bury it, you have planted a seed of wrong that must germinate and bring out multiple seeds of wrong. Do apologise when necessary or neglect when necessary or else the Devil sees your mistakes as opportunity to fault your good works. King David wanted to cover up his sin but the Devil took an advantage of it to put him in more trouble.

Do not access possibilities, abilities and activities by sole comment of some people. Every one talk based on their understanding and state of the heart: envy, hatred and desire for praise, gain and position. It does not cost people to destroy others but it is a costly venture because much greatness had been destroyed this way. I once lived with guidance during my secondary school days. He always expected me to hate those things or people he hates or sometime quarrel with them, this I found very difficult. I found out that most comments about these ones are not true so I did applied wisdom by God’s grace in not offending these ones but following his desire, I may have destroyed relationship possibly God is building for a purpose I was of a great assistance to these ones when it was necessary.

Do not endorse a thing because it receives favour of the majority neither discourage an inspired anticipation because of the majority’s doubt. Many great ideas have been discarded. Put all things in the scale of quality, worth and necessity and execute them at the right time, if really should.

Do not rush out of God’s presence
Whenever you do this you, expose yourself without defense to the attack of least of devils if he cannot lead you into sin he can use your mistake to fault your labour. Do not rush out of God’s presence.

Learn To Say No or Yes At The Appropriate Time. It is easier to say “Yes” than say” No”, most of us want acceptance. The desire to please everybody will cultivate field of failure, seeds of frustration and harvest fruits of regrets and pains. There is wisdom for your breakthrough in some one. if you ignore such person, you have stepped aside from the route of another exploit. No matter your educational status, age or privileges, you will need some people for another victory, even the one you anticipate just now. However, you need not for this reason get along in wrong with some one. When necessary to say “No” nothing could better than this then. And when to say “yes” be careful, so that the fear of people will not threaten you contrary.

Honest Habit.
Do not put up a wrong attitude of deceit, pretense and lying in order to gain favour and security. Put up sincerity as your attitude; you acquire peoples’ trust by this. Do not consider what you have to gain but what you have to give. Until an organisation is read of greediness and selfishness all effort to advance her will amount to retrogress and frustration. Be honest, selfless, sincere and trustworthy. Trust is a reward that men will be willing to throw on you by this honest attitude. Note trust is earned!

ow to observe rules and regulations;
Learn how to observe rules and regulations in Spiritual, professional or other endeavour. Many opportunities had been lost by overlooking rules that govern some anticipations.; inspite of gifts and intelligence, ignoring basic rules and regulations may earn you regrets and sorrow. Observe rules and regulation as stipulated as long as they do not contradict God’s laws.

learn how To Get Along With others You cannot make it alone. Your gift is not capable of surviving independently. So learn how to get along and work with love and unity with others. It is very important that you learn and cultivate habit of praying for your neighbours and friends because their mistake will affect you directly or indirectly.

your Ignorance The bulk of mistakes made and possibly will be made are due to the level of your ignorance. You are sure to offend in things and areas you do not know quite well. Dear friend, be called the “Most…” and please add any thing to this, your ignorance is the first enemy that will flaw your title and post. Until you step out of ignorance, you cannot escape its frustration. Many leaders are threatened because they have been staying in the same old place they use to stay. Once there is no room for growth there will be room for decay. That is why it is easy for a leader that is not growing, to be threatened by the growth of the follower.

are not growing, you will not be able to withstand the success of others, reduce your ignorance.

Do not hide your identity. Pretense is dangerous. You may want to impress or accept everything; you are sure more likely going to meet disappointment. Let them humbly know you and your faith. Most importantly, a lover of truth: your identity with honesty, truth, diligence and wisdom will repel some people from your life and their temptation will go with them. Although, there are some who are daringly willing to tempt you, they have a point to prove in your life but with God’s wisdom let them fail like Devil did in the case of Job.

Select your associate wisely. There will be some men and women closer to you .A twelve and seventy out of multitude. You will always need some to delegate. Some to give responsibilities, some to represent you and stand in for you when necessary. Irrespective of their sex, to me, they are my beloved friends. They have won my trust to some certain level although they can disappoint me, they are human but they are given opportunity to prove their worth again. I desire and strife to make them grow in all areas of life however not all friends, colleagues, men or relative I know are in this group. I have made some mistakes in this area-trusting stranger with precious gifts. But today not all closer to me are my close associate.
(Read more about how to select generals from the general in the “wisdom of the ant’s series.)
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Ultimately you need God’s Guidance and Sound Wisdom.
The perfect cure to ignorance is sound wisdom from God, which is obtainable in the presence of God. The beginning of wisdom is the fear of God. He lays in store sound wisdom for the righteous. I urge you to consider wisely above the practice of ordinary religious obligation, have keen relationship with God. The roads in life are rough and dangerous. The heart of men you will meet are deep, He is the only one that can read them correctly. There are many places you are sure more to meet with darkness of great effect. There are much confusion clouds along the journey in life, you cannot proceed with so little a knowledge to the realm where giants are killed like grasshopper, and mountains are melted like wax. You will need the abiding wisdom of the ancient of days to go with you. Except with His presence, you cannot walk safely. Ultimately you need Him, His guidance and wisdom- to prevent, minimise and correct mistakes you, your partners, associates, and neighbour parent, leaders, friends and pastor are liable to make or create.

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