It's a set up

Hey beautiful people, once again am sorry for the delayed blog post. Last week has been BUSY! But I feel awesome at the progress of things.

I have said this before, and will repeat it again. God has a specific path ordained for each one of us, towards His ordained destiny for us. On this path (better known as the school of the Spirit, as mentioned in my previous blogs), there are different phases/stages/classes that we have to go through. You cannot skip any of the stages, (as one stage is the foundation for the next) or like my Pastor says “There’s no shortcut”. That you know your God-given assignment is not enough, you have to find out from Him on how to execute each stage. God backs whatever he has ordained, anything outside His umbrella, He doesn’t. And like I mentioned in my blog “where are you?” once you discover you’ve gone off-track, you need to retrace your steps, through the help of the Holy Spirit.

On the final year of the school of ministry I was in (The Kingdom Academy), the school divides the students into various groups in relation to the area of your God given assignment, around the month of June. In those groups of sometimes 3, 4 or 5 students, you are to carry out a thorough biblical research on your area of your God given assignment from its original state. You are then to carry out a thorough critical and analytical research, of that same area in Kenya, beginning from the post-colonial period to the current state. You are to draw from the biblical research and the research on Kenya, the things that are causing this area not to function as God ordained it to. You are to come up with ways you believe would correct this, stating your conviction
(You really need to have heard God). After that, every team is expected to create, plan, fund, and execute a Kingdom project that will cause maximum Kingdom impact to their area of calling. The team must ensure the project will have posterity in its impact that will far outlive the project (A time period is given in November to execute the project). This means that it must have a ripple effect on the area of calling targeted.  The team must be able to logically defend both the posterity of the project and its ripple effect.

I hope I haven’t lost you so far. There’s a lot more involved but I hope you get the gist of everything. 2012 was my final year of school of ministry (SOM), and I happened to be the team leader of one of the teams. God really stretched me to capacities I never knew I had in me. I learnt a lot on team dynamics, leadership, strategic planning and the place of hearing God accurately. I gave my all, got drained and burnt out, and literally never slept for 3 days straight! We hardly had team work and I didn’t know how to implement it as the leader, hence I ended up doing most of the tasks alone. By the time we were done with the project I’d lost quite a bit of weight and was suffering from ulcers. After the evaluation process (which was then known as defense), we were told we were to redo the project (the school gives a period for redoing immediately after that evaluation, and after 2nd evaluation, you get to know whether you can graduate with the rest or not). I thought it was totally unfair considering all I’d gone through, and all the money we’d spent. I was upset at my team, upset with the school faculty, upset with the defense panel, upset with myself and upset with God. I decided I would NEVER redo that project. Former SOM students tried to talk me into redoing but I was too wounded are weary to listen. I even withdrew from attending Sunday service at my church since that’s where the faculty, defense panel and a majority of the alumni fellowship. In my 3/4 months of wandering in the desert, hoping from one church to another early this year, God was working on my heart as well as sending people unrelated to the school to talk to me. I also spent a lot of time just seeking to find out what God wanted for me as well as ask Him to heal me. I then agreed to have a meeting with the school director sometime in May or June, after which I requested him to allow me to redo the project with the current 2^nd year students; although I still had second thoughts about it. It honestly took God’s grace to go back, and stay on.

I joined the new team armed for war (due to my previous experience) but God reminded me that this was a new season and a new team. It took me a while to put down my defenses but once I did, I experienced a time of refreshing. I now understand what the school means when they say that there’s sufficient grace to execute the project. I truly experienced the peace of God throughout. Compared to my previous experience, I this time learnt what team work really is, because we literally did everything with regards to this project, together! I learnt a lot, and I’m glad God brought me back. We submitted the project report on Tuesday and are now waiting for evaluation, which will go down on the 14^th. Now you know why I have been sooo Busy.

Moses was brought up in the palace, he was a prince. He tried to execute his God-given assignment his own way but in the school of the Spirit, that was not how it was to go down. Moses had to, for a period of time flee Egypt and remain in the wilderness taking care of his father in laws’ flock (where God was working out a few things in him). Quite a demotion huh? From the prince of Egypt to a shepherd boy/man. (Exodus 2, 3)

God gave Joseph dreams on how he’d hold a position of leadership, but he ended up in a pit (from a son to a slave), then to Potiphars’ house where he was the operations manager. But just before he could enjoy his status, he finds himself in jail for something he didn’t do. From an operations manager to a prisoner, another demotion, right? (Gen 37-39)

We know how it ended up for the two men. And if you don’t, you have some reading up to do.

Here’s what I learnt from these two guys’ stories >>> There’s a place that God places you that looks like a major demotion, but it’s a set up for a promotion.

For me it was to quit my job to attend bible school (demotion according to man’s standard), and as if that wasn’t enough, having to go back to redo the project (double demotion). You have no idea what I’ve had to go through for this, and it hasn’t been easy AT ALL. But God’s way of thinking is beyond ours and the bible tells us that He deliberately uses the things the world deems foolish, to shame the wise (1Corinthians 1:27 AMP). I know something good is up ahead, you watch this space, there’s a reason why God’s path for me included these stages amongst others.

Are you walking with God? Where are you at? Does it feel like you’ve been double demoted? Have you become the scorn and laughing stock of your family and friends? Like you’ve been lowered to the lowest level ever by human standards? As long as you are walking in obedience to God, observing all righteousness, then guess what? What feels like a demotion is actually a set up for a promotion, hang in there!