What if the choices have been made for me? This is the day to serve as bodgas with and any family member. Let me say, from the very beginning, this is precisely the victim's mentality. Not the victim's mindset, the victim's mentality.
Come on, if someone chose for you, that's their decision, not yours. They just exercised their option. As you are now in the position to exercise yours. What you decide with your decision is up to you.
That is your choice. Someone once reminded me, as a parent, how you entered this world is your parents' fault. But if you choose to stay there, that's your fault. We know of Nelson Mandela.
Almost three decades, imprisoned, unjustly. It wasn't his choice to be imprisoned. That was the state. But his choice was how he viewed his condition and circumstance.
And I quote, when a deep injury is done to us, we never heal until we forgive. And another one, as I walked out the door, Mandela said, toward the gate, that would lead to my freedom. I knew if I didn't leave my bitterness and hatred behind, I'd still be in prison. Wow.
At the age of 12, Chinkitan, a speaker, financial management consultant in the Philippines, at the age of 12, he decided he chose that he would not allow his children to grow up in the same kind of poverty. He was born in poverty, even in difficulty for Chinkit. And for the original author of this verse, Paul, Colossians 3, 17, one can choose. And I quote, whatever you do in word or deed, do everything in the name of the Lord Jesus, giving thanks to God the Father through him end quote.
If you believe in darkness, sometimes it isn't enough to avoid it, or to simply live through it. Sometimes you must cast it out with full authority. James 4 7, submit yourselves therefore to God. Resist the devil, not coexist, but resist.
And he will flee from you. People ask me where I get the energy to speak, to thousands of people, pre-pondemic, and even now online, each month as a business consultant, as a host, as a motivational speaker, in this case as a podcaster. You know, it's not just what I arm myself with. It's what I choose to cast out, what I choose to do away with, negative ideas, destructive thoughts, and yes, yes, oppressive spirits.
The question here is, what if the choices have been made for me, against me, to me? You still have the choice to respond. It's not what happens to you, Dr. John Maxwell reminds us, it's what happens in you.
And if I may add, yes, it's what happens in you, and how you steward what is poured into you. So what if the choices were made for you? Well, why does that have to be taken negatively? All of us were born into, raised in, and in a sense, subjected to conditions outside our areas of control.
A number of years ago, I was surprised to learn that 200 of the world's leaders then were raised in poverty, abused as children, and were handicapped. 200, world's leaders at the presidential, ministerial level, look at those three conditions, raised in poverty, abused as children, handicapped. And so I realized more and more that the conditions we find ourselves in, especially the negative ones outside of our own doing, are perhaps not just situations to overcome or to put up with. They possibly are the very platforms provided by divine orchestration to allow us not just to survive, but to thrive.
Not just to whine over, but to shine through. They are clouds, not so much to keep the light from coming in, but to lift us up and to get us raining. R-E-I-G-N-I-N-G. In the heavenly realms, so we can participate in his kingdom down on earth, you know that prayer, as it is in heaven.
As for you, Joseph told his brothers in Genesis 5020, you meant evil against me, right? It was their choice. But God meant it for good to bring it about that many people should be kept alive as they are today. So again, what are the choices that have been made for me?
Well, I look at them as givens. I invite you to look at them as givens, my friend. Givens, as they were provided, when we had to solve math problems in school, remember them? Givens do not take away from your ability to provide solutions.
They are part of the canvas, awaiting your choices as you create your masterpieces.