‘The LORD God planted a garden…and there He put the man whom He had formed.’
Genesis 2:8
First God made the garden, then He made man and woman and placed them in the garden. This is called ‘the law of location’. Understand this: you will succeed when you are where God wants you to be. Have you ever experienced the pain of a dislocated joint? It’s miserable. So is trying to ‘do your own thing’ instead of doing God’s will. You can go the easy way or the hard way; God gives you that option. Jonah is an example of this – he decided not to go to Nineveh and preach because he didn’t like the people who lived there. Helping them was the last thing he wanted to do, so he decided to run from his God-given assignment in Nineveh. As a result, he ran into a storm, caused misery and loss for everyone on board, and hit bottom before he finally got to where God wanted him to go. Learn from Jonah. Don’t repeat his foolish, costly, and unnecessary mistake. God told Adam to ‘be fruitful and multiply’ (Genesis 1:28). Then He told him, ‘You have to work at it.’ When you get to the right place, don’t expect your assignment to be easy or think you'll become successful overnight. American clergyman and author Phillips Brooks prayed, ‘Lord, we ask You not for lighter burdens, but for stronger backs.’ When Paul prayed for relief, God told him, ‘My grace is sufficient for thee’ (2 Corinthians 12:9). When you’re in the right place, doing what God wants, you’ll thrive in conditions others crumble under because you’ll be ‘graced’ to handle it.
‘God has put a dream inside you. It’s yours and no one else responsibility to birth it. It declares your uniqueness and holds your potential. Only you can give birth to it. Only you can live it. Not to discover it, take responsibility for it and act upon it is to negatively affect yourself as well as all those who would benefit from your dream.’
In your twilight years, will you look back and feel like you’ve spent your life struggling to fulfil other people’s expectations? Or know that you lived it to the fullest by striving to fulfil your God-given dream?
Bro Ritchie
