The Audacity of God's Grace: 10 Strategies To Living Your Best Life Now (14 page)

If you have ever wondered until now, why User-friendly people always lack great things in their lives, I believe that you already have discovered that they were never the opposite: Givers, who never lacked. Every lack may not be material lack. When we lack the capacity to bring joy and peace to others and put smile on their faces by lifting them up, we are destroyers. Learning the art of giving love and happiness to others and watch God perform the impossible in in every area of our lives is noble. Giving is living. When you sincerely give unstintingly in time, in lifting others up, not to push them down; in finance, in encouragement or supporting others, in love, in prayer, in praise, and in thanksgiving, you will never lack. Rosa Parks’ giving up to stand up for mediocrity when it was the most convenient thing to do has caused a number of millions of other people to stand for greatness and reach their fullest abilities today. What will you give to this generation? You can avoid being a User-friendly person. Give and live.

“When we cannot build and sustain integrity, our Christianity and moral values will be frequently questioned.”

We will make caricature of the movement of God’s love we profess to be part of in Jesus. The Apostle Paul in 2 Corinthians 3:2 noted that as Christians: The only letter of recommendation we need is ourselves (i.e. our lifestyles). Our lives therefore, are like letters written in our hearts; everyone can read it and recognize our good work among you. The beauty of life lies in the golden rule by treating and distributing justice to others as we will have them treat us (Matthew 7:12) and in trusting that when we need things, we will get them. For everyone, there is a sense of joy and satisfaction we attain when we have good health, hope, strength, love, finance, new jobs, securing that business contract; passing an exam, or living a fulfilled life empowered by the grace of God. The good news is that we have a great God whose specialty is to supply all our needs according to his riches by Christ Jesus.

De-program Your Insulated Past Mindset

God is willing to transform us and help us break the barriers of our past. He wants us to de-program our past mindset. This is why the Christian Scriptures in (Romans 12:2 NLT) warned: Do not be conformed to this world, but be transformed by the renewal of your mind, that by testing you may discern what is the will of God, what is good and acceptable and the perfect will of God. Our loving God has not abandoned us to sojourn alone. If you have reasons based on what I have discussed above to believe that somehow, you have become a User-friendly person lately, what I want you to know is this: I love you, and God loves you even more. This is why God sent Jesus to come and die in our place, to give us the great salvation that is so rich and free (John 3:16). What God wouldn’t want for our lives is for us to remain the way we have been for so long. You can receive breakthrough and be a freed person from the psychological imprisonment the enemy have subjected you to for far too long by the special grace of God. When we continue to be identified in the group of User-friendly individuals, we will be negatively influenced and our lives will not be beautiful. We will lack the capacity to live our best life now and even next. We will continue in defensive avoidance, make excuses for our wrong doing in life, and make other people uncomfortable and not able to live with intense joy and peace.

The good news is that you don’t have to remain this way. You can change and the reason is this: You are a person of power. You are actually very power-full person. You can touch so many lives with the goodness of God. The Christian Scriptures challenges us in (Hebrews 12:1-2 NLT) that: “Therefore, since we are surrounded by such a huge crowd of witnesses to the life of faith, let us strip off every weight (retrace every step) that slows us down, especially the sin that so easily trips us up (that is every negative attitude, every mindset, and bad behaviors we so tight-fistedly cling to). And let us run with endurance the race God has set before us. We do this by keeping our eyes on Jesus, the champion who initiates and perfects our faith. Because of the joy awaiting him, Jesus endured the cross, disregarding its shame. Now he is seated in the place of honor beside God’s throne.

Therefore, throughout your life journey, what I declare to you is that you will do well. God will unleash extraordinary strength and the power to prosper your life. This strength will give you the ability to overcome sequestrative behaviors which has kept you in bondage and banish you from continuing to be a User-friendly individual. Now, what we may need to remember is this: Our liberation process must begin in our minds. Someone once said that “the eyes cannot see when the mind is blind.” This is true, for our ability to live our best life now and be fruitful all begins with the status of our mindset. It was for this reason that the Christian Scriptures in the Gospel according to the sixth chapter states (Luke 6:44-45 NLT) that: “A tree is identified by its fruit. Figs are never gathered from thorn bushes, and grapes are not picked from bramble bushes. A good person produces good things from the treasury of a good heart, and an evil person produces evil things from the treasury of an evil heart. What you say (or do is the product of your thoughts and mindset) for out of the abundance of the heart (your mind), the mouth speaks. My declaration for your life is God’s favor which when received will cause supernatural increase and fruitfulness to characterize everything that defines our lives. If you can believe this in your mind right now, decide to change from your past way of living and sincerely ask God for forgiveness and to grant you the ability to overcome, you are already liberated.

When we forget about our old strategies which has never gotten us anywhere in life and rely on God’s strategy, we can sure move mountains. When we allow God to take us step by step in our journey, even when we are in the dark about its details, God by his special grace and power can perform the impossible in our life. This is why the Lord says:” Cursed are those who put their trust in mere humans, who rely on human strength and turn their hearts away from the Lord. They are like stunted shrubs in the desert, with no hope for the future. They will live in the barren wilderness, in an uninhabited land. BUT BLESSED are those who trust in the Lord and have made the Lord their hope and confidence. They are like trees planted along a riverbank, with roots that reach deep into the water. Such trees are not bothered by the heat or worried by long months of drought. Their leaves stay green and they never stop producing fruit. (Jeremiah 17:5-8 NLT).

Be Dependent on God’s Audacious Grace

As we explored above, most people may not live at their best today because they live a life where they think that the shortest way to their success is through shred measures or solely by their own abilities. When we carefully examine ourselves, we can see that: Everything that we are; and everything that we ever owned was not because of our own might or strength alone, they came to us through our actions powered by the grace of Jesus which is ever sufficient. Many a lives in our societies that are unguided by the principles of God’s grace, are experiencing multiplication and complications. Such lives are full of fragmentation and compartmentalization that leaves and dump people in the pool of confusion and obscurity. But I’ve got you good news: Your life does not have to be that way.

God has invested all in you. Ever wondered why the psalmist declared in the Christian scriptures that we are [carefully] fearfully, and wonderfully made, marvelous are your works, and that my soul knows very well? (Psalm 129:14 NJLV). In order words, we are not here by accident. We are not where we are by random chance; God took out his time to design us as those created in his image. The implication is this: We belong to God, and therefore we are God’s own. Afterwards, the same scripture announces in (Ephesians 2:10 NIV) that “we are God’s workmanship, created in Christ Jesus to do great works, which God prepared in advance for us to do.” God has given us everything there is to make us live our best life now and perform at our fullest abilities even today.

In the second part of this book, I will offer and explain 10 specific strategies for you to use as powerful success tool kits or blueprints to guard your mind against the strategies of the enemy and failure. This book may not just be read, you could use it for group study until the 10 strategies are fully understood and become powerful mental-attitudinal weapons against the enemy and every negative influence that limits your ability to live your best life now. By following this simple, and yet, powerful strategies, you will discover happiness as you become victorious against every strategy of the enemy to keep you down. By prayerfully studying this book and releasing the power of success and positive words into your life and situation, it is my hope that you will gain new heights every day and a continuous victory over the enemy and the battlefield of mediocrity and the spirit of poverty he has set in your life. I tell you the truth; most of what you will discover in this book has personally transformed my own life, my finances, my marriage, my ministry, and my businesses. I trust that they will do the same in your case. As you read on, I will encourage you to get a journal or make a list of key action words that you can lock up in your mind.

For easy grasping of the key concepts, I will use the acronym of 10 SLYBLNP here to mean the 10 Strategies to Living Your Best Life Now Program. Read purposefully with prayer, meditation and with an open mind, and remember that: God has not given us the spirit of fear; but of power, and of love, and of a sound mind (2 Timothy 1:7 NKJV).

PART II
10 STRATEGIES TO LIVING YOUR
BEST LIFE NOW PROGRAM

“Your happiness in life and your ability to reach success begins with your mental-attitude and outlook and your ability to take advantage of opportunities and the leadership of your own future by how you manage your now.”

—John Nwankwo

IT’S ABOUT TIME

THE 10 STRATEGIES TO LIVING YOUR BEST LIFE NOW PROGRAM (SLYBLNP)

The 10 strategies to living your best life now you are about to read or study can work wonders and transform your life completely only with an open mind. Each of these strategies is based on practical day-to-day strategies that guarantees success based on God’s audacious words of grace and power. They are strategies that I have personally experienced their transformational ability in every area of my life and have reaped a harvest of God’s unlimited favor and miraculous breakthrough from. I guarantee you that they worked for me. Many people who knew me personally can testify that everything about my life and finances have changed forever. I will never ever struggle through life again by the special grace of God; neither will my wife suffer poverty, or any of my children and unborn grand and great grandchildren. If you have wondered how I got this far, well here is the secret: the transformative power of God’s audacious grace is limitless from where it can take ordinary people to making them extraordinary. Many of these teachings, I have learned from the word of God and through the years in my journey for success, as well as in my exposures, network and connectivity, and through my weekly teachings to my audiences.

As you go through the 10 SLYBLNP, you will see that they are scriptural-based. I encourage you to pause, think, meditate, and write out what you want for your life now and begin to decree and make declarations about them to come forth by the power of God’s word and audacious grace.

As you read and practice these exercises, you will discover that it is a process of transformation that will completely turn your life upside down over time if you believe God. I would equally suggest that you read and repeat as much as you can loudly and speak them into your own life where they speak directly to your situation or that of someone that you know or represent. These 10 SLYBLNP are designed to automate your mind to work success for you and set your “brain on fire” for God-driven actions and a purpose driven lifestyle that will bring out those hidden potentials in your life. If you have the time on your hand, you can make these strategies a 10-week or 10 day program plan for your breakthrough. It is up to you. First, I will encourage you to read part one, part two, and part three of the book to leave nothing behind as they will each prepare your mind for actions to activate the grace of God go to work in every area of your life. As you read on, you will notice that some of what you are learning are the things that have kept you from maximizing your fullest abilities and to live your best life now. You will discover that your thoughts are very powerful. They are the product of your mindset. They can keep you down or lift you up. They can accelerate your success in life or drag you backward through life. Remember, you don’t have to drag through life.

Therefore, as you read, take notes. Get a journal, think of things you can implement in your daily life based on what you have learnt. The things you may need to unlearn, adjust, change, and what actions you need to take to facilitate your success. It was Pastor Norman Vincent Peale who said that when you: “Change your thoughts, you change your world.” Pastor Norman Vincent Peale could not be far from the truth because I have personally experienced this in my life. What you need to experience an exponential success may not be the physical change.

I sincerely believe that the greatest change we need to live our best life now is the change that happens on the inside of us. I hereby dedicate the rest of this book to you or your group so that you will each experience success in your finances, your health, your marriage, your ministry or redemptive capital, and your business, just as I have experienced them. I want you to become successful. That is my ultimate purpose for writing this book. I believe that by the special grace of God, you will succeed.

STRATEGY NUMBER 1
AUTOMATE YOUR MIND TO
WORK FOR SUCCESS

Watch your thoughts, for they become words.

Watch your words, for they become actions.

Watch your actions, for they become habits.

Watch your habits, for they become character.

Watch your character, for it becomes your destiny.

Character is a victory, not a gift.

—Anonymous

DEVELOP YOUR MIND FOR GREATNESS

It was Malcolm X who was known for saying that: “education is the passport to the future, for tomorrow belongs to those who prepare for it today.” While I sincerely believe that Malcolm meant well for formal education, I perceived that the two outstanding things he tried to communicate here was about mind educational-liberation and time management that enhances our success. Your mind is the engine room of your success. How you manage your time is the denominator. No wonder, the Olympic gold medalist Scott Hamilton once said that: “the only disability in life is attitude.”

“A person with a bad mental-attitude to life is like a car with a flat tire. It will keep you in the middle of nowhere in life.”

It will make you miserable, and fail short of taking you to greater and exciting destinations of life. The implication is this: every person with bad mental-attitude—a poor mindset will be stuck to defensive avoidance or simply put—excuses that make them unable to live their best life now. So, it’s about time to change every bad mental-tire to your success by changing those bad mental tires-attitudes and automate your thought or thinking system to act properly to your general outlook for life and success. I have encountered people whose ability to live a prosperous life is being withheld because of a bad mental attitude. If you want to live and perform at your best everyday life, maintain love and relationships, retain mentors and people that I call destiny shapers, I will encourage you to automate your mind to work for success for you and for others. When you do this and live every other thing that determines your life to hang on the grace of God, God will take you out for a trip. In that trip, you will go to all the beautiful and exciting places of life; with meaning, purpose, positive influence, significance for this gospel of the kingdom, and wealth creation. You will become a person of honor which is what the Christian Scriptures meant in (2 Timothy 2:20-21 NLT) where it is recorded that: In a wealthy home some utensils are made of gold and silver, and some are made of wood and clay. The expensive utensils are used for special occasions, and the cheap ones are for everyday use. If you keep yourself pure, you will be a special utensil for honorable use. Your life will be clean, and you will be ready for the Master to use you for every good work.

Everything about my life changed when I automated my mind for success and learnt to depend on the grace of God. I entered the victory sanctuary of my life and success story, the day I learnt to act on what God is whispering to my ears and my mind. It works like medicine. What may keep many people from the reach of God’s best for their life is disobedience to God. For every time you see a blessed child of God in the Bible, whether a king, a priest, a Shepard, or people like Abraham, the blessings usually is or dependent on favor through obedience. In Matthew 6:33 Jesus re-emphasized the importance of obedience to God’s word and God’s will which usually leads to prosperity and promotions when he asked us to: Seek the Kingdom of God above all things first, and live righteously, and see how God will give us those things (material resources) that we need (to live our best life now). But then, your ability to do so depends on the state of your mind. If your mind is bitter, it cannot obey the word of God, neither will it yield to the utterances of the Holy Ghost who always whispers words of courage to our conscience and grant us the ability to think successfully. The Christian scriptures remind us in (Proverbs 15:13-14 NLT) that: “A glad heart [joyful mind] makes a cheerful face, but when the heart (mind) is sad, the spirit is broken. A wise person [i.e. a person with an open mind who intelligently seeks understanding], is hungry for knowledge, while the fool feeds on trash”

The very same day that I automated my mind to work success for me is the day that God’s grace healed my brokenness, set me free from every limitations and emotional wounds; and it initiated a process that compensated my losses by restoring every stolen goods in the treasury of my life. I saw that my vision and dreams engorged, and God provided me with intense joy and a unique identity and financial freedom that now enables me to live my best life today. You can experience this too if you believe. What majority of people may not understand is that the grace of God perseveres. By working with it over time, it gives greater freedom that provides direction. The grace of God provides you with clarity and purpose, for it is only the grace of God that liberates the mind and provides such a peace and unending prosperity that changes your story. If you have tried every other thing before now, and they keep you where you are, then I urge you to try the grace of God and see how it can automatically push you over to the finishing life with success.

If for whatever reason you are starting late with surrendering your mind to God’s grace, nothing spoil. The assurance is that you can still start late but finish well and rich by the special grace of God. The reason is this: time waits for no body. It’s about time that you begin to make the most out of every opportunity that God have long positioned on your everyday life. The opportunities are there. They abound. Many people think that there are not many opportunities to translate them into success. My question is what have you done? Have you had to do grace before now? What kind of preparations have you made? Did you rely on your own plans and strategies? Did you go on getting a degree and thinking that that’s all it takes to succeed or did you follow Gods plan for your life? Did your preparations include automating your mind for success? The truth is that only those who have made preparations will reap a bountiful harvest of success.

When we give opportunities a chance, and when these opportunities meet preparations, the result is usually that you will quantifiably do exploits and perform at the top of your fullest potentials. For those whose problem is marriage, I tell you the truth: there are enough spouses to go around. They are there. For those, whose problem is money, there is enough money to go around too. But, remember that money goes to developed people. There is no developed person that I have encountered anyway, who did not give opportunities a chance. Period! For in (Deuteronomy 15:4 NLT) God instructed that: There should be no poor among you, for the LORD your God will greatly bless you in the land he is giving you as a special possession. For those whose problem is children, remember that Children are a heritage from the Lord (Psalm 127:3 NLT). No matter where you are coming from or what challenges you are facing now, you too can enjoy your best life today and do better than you have done in your past history, because it’s about time for God to decorate you with success. Don’t forget that you must automate your mind for success in order to benefit from that success you have longed for.

The Only Grace that is Superb.

In God, opportunities are endless and successes abound. The reason is this: the grace of God is superb. The audacious grace of God has the power in transforming lives and has the capability to change everything both on the inside and on the outside. God is gracious. His grace is superbly available to destroy every failure, addiction, and every cankerworm that eat your life’s resources. God has positioned his grace to change your story and past history. The grace that I mean to say is enthusiastically the grace of God that has no boundaries and boarders. This grace is ever willing to change you and your life forever; your thought and your whole thinking system and abilities on the inside. It is the only grace that shares in freedom, and that has no bias. The grace of God has no stereotypes, for it counts no wrongs. The grace of God has no tribe, no nationality, no race, no color, no class and the grace that loses every stronghold of pain, evils, prejudices, differences, stereotypes, and embraces all as one.

“The sole intention of God’s grace is to save you and facilitate your prosperity and success.”

Many people are in the habit of service by working so hard to achieve success. The problem of majority of us is that we possess a mental attitude which tells us that serving God with our works and righteousness is enough to grant us victory. The other problem is that we want to please God in order to win his favor with our good behavior, work ethic, and to some others, religiosity. Many of us have not dealt with the major problem of our lives: Automating our mind for success by the grace of God can liberate us. Well, if you have not fully automated your mind to believe God, you know it. If you belong to this category, what I say to you is stop— you don’t have to behave that way because there is no monopoly in the grace of God. There is no amount of hard work you can put in to reach success that will actually facilitate you to victory without the grace of God. Most people are working hard to reach their goal. What they lack however, is to trust God’s favor.

“There is no amount of work you can put in to give you prosperity and success that will work without God’s favor.”

Happy and unhappy people, righteous and the unrighteous, successful and the unsuccessful, young and the old, the rich and the poor are all in God’s economy of grace and can begin to experience the audacity of God’s grace and live at their best now if they embrace the grace of God and automate their mind to success. In God’s economy, everyone who is willing to believe God’s favor, automate their mindset for success, and everyone who believes in God’s mighty power to work favor within them, will attain success. Everyone who aspire faithfully and all who will live by the will of God and expose their dreams to God by automating their mind to faith in him will succeed. In God, there are no impossibilities. Everyone can make the most out of God’s grace and begin to rise on top and live their dreams and their best life now by the mercy of God.

Red and Yellow, Black and White, males and females, married and singles, Igbos and Yoruba’s, Hausa’s and the Ijaws, Hutu and Tutsi, young and old, boys and girls are all welcomed to embrace the grace that is audaciously shameless and limitless. You can, right now, and I mean today, begin to enjoy and maximize the potentialities that is on the inside of you by the grace of God. No matter where you are right now, your past experiences, the life you are living now or have lived or the challenges you are facing right today, you can experience the audacity of God’s grace right now because there are opportunities next door. The grace of God works! It’s got power. It’s got potentials. It has the capacity to turn your business life around and your material blessings too. The audacity of God’s grace can change your situation and circumstances. You can begin to enjoy your best life now and have your hopes fulfilled, and be happy once again if you can automate your mind to work success for you and let the audacious grace of God speak into your situations. Our ability to make a difference will begin and end with our thoughts and actions because of our believe systems and the status of our mindset. This is why the Christian scriptures encourage us in (Philippians 4:8 NIV): “Finally, brothers and sisters, whatever is true, whatever is noble, whatever is right, whatever is pure, whatever is lovely, whatever is admirable—if anything is excellent or praiseworthy—think about such things.”

Think About It

For your mind liberation and automation exercise, ask yourself: What in your life do you need to believe the grace of God that you can accomplish and begin to automate your mind into success to do them? First, I want you to write a vision statement and mission statement of your life. A person without a clear goal or vision for living will live miserably. They can hardly live their best life now, and chances are that such people will make the lives of others with a vision not livable.

In the Cooperate or business world, a vision/mission statement is like the concise strategic planning of an organization’s process of defining its strategy, or direction, and making decisions on allocating its resources to pursue this strategy. In order to determine the direction of the organization, it is necessary to understand its current position and the possible avenues through which it can pursue a particular course of action. Now, with this understanding, I want you to think as you go into the mind automation for success exercise for your life. I will encourage you to start by asking that you list or write below,
FIVE
life goals and dreams that are like a do or die affair of your life. Think about it as if your life will not work properly without these five goals. In your five identified life goals, list them in the order of need, hierarchy or priority. I want these to be about your life dreams. If you need to modify them as you read on, feel free to do so. Remember that you have to start small, but think big. Don’t settle for less or what I describe as status quo living. Now, I want you to begin to make declarations about these dreams or goals. I want you to make a list of your short term goals and long term goals. If you want, put todays date by the side of these five life goals you have identified about your life. When finished, sign your signature and put todays date. Remember that these goals must be SMART which is an acronym for:

• Specific

• Measurable

• Attainable

• Realistic and

• Timely.

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