As a secondary school student, I lived in boarding house and my cohorts and I were big time pranksters. While effecting some hideous practices we made sure we avoided some school prefects and teachers whom we had identified as very strict and law entrenching. But we didn’t avoid those school prefects and teachers whom we identified as weaklings, in fact they covertly or overtly co-operated with us.
As a banker, I know that key marketing calls are not meetings held by mere team members of a unit in the bank and mere team members of a prospects organization. Key marketing calls are meetings with divisional heads of a unit in a bank and top executives of a prospects organization. These people are identified as the decision makers. They decide whether a deal would be brokered or not.
As a leader I’ve learnt that every profitable organization in the world has a team of egg heads (executives) who drive the growth and profitability of the organization in the market place. They have no mean identity. They belong to a special uncommon class. This is because position and the perception of an organization in a market place is a consequence of the identity of its leaders. Nobody would be comfortable identifying with an organization where the leaders are known fraudsters, because he’ll be afraid to be defrauded himself.
As a Christian I’ve learnt that your ability to sell your unique divinity in your vicinity is embedded in your identity. In the market place your prospects become your clients because they buy your identity ahead of your products or services. If you can’t show a good understanding and patronage of your products or services when making a presentation to them they wouldn’t buy. If you give your community a wrong self perception you would run at a loss with respect to soul winning, but if you give your community a right self perception you would gain souls for the kingdom and you would be rewarded by the father.
Jesus could ‘sell’ His unique divinity effectively because he celebrated His peculiar identity (Jhn.5:17, 26-27). Jesus didn’t function outside the will of the Father (Jhn5: 19-20) that was why he was extremely successful with his quest on earth (Jhn.10: 15 -18, Acts 10:38). Christians have been endowed with this same identity (Mark 16:17) because we are one with Jesus (Hebs.2: 10-11) and our bodies belong to God (1Cor.6: 19-20). We are therefore left with no other choice than to work and walk in accordance to God’s will as Jesus did (Eph. 5:15-18).
As Christians our impact on the face of the earth are dependent on the choices we make daily. We could choose to be like the “conniving” school prefects and teachers who aided my mediocrity in secondary school or choose to be like the school prefects and teachers who upheld the principles of love and justice so I could be a better student. We could choose to be men who win souls from the kingdom of darkness like those leaders who drive the growth and profitability of their organization in the market place or we could choose be like mere team members of a unit in the bank and mere team members of a prospects organization who are not relevant in a key marketing call. The choice is all ours. As a Christian your successes and failures are consequences of your identity so make a choice daily to show your true identity. You are God’s property.
– emeka ofia
