God opens doors in funny ways.

That shouldn’t be a revelation to me, but after all these years, it still is, no matter how many times I go down this path.

A very good friend of mine, recently moved his family to Kansas City to be closer to IHOP and left a very safe and comfortable cocoon on the east coast. They had every reason to stay where they were, other than the fact, they had a longing in their heart to move to Kansas City.

About three, maybe four years ago, they tried to make the move. Young, kidless at the time, they put their house on the market, found the perfect house to buy in KC and waited for the house to sell.

It didn’t sell. Month after month after month.

While crushed, they were not undaunted. They felt that the Lord wanted them to move to KC, maybe it just wasn’t the time. Or at least God’s time.

Two adopted kids later, they told me in the spring they were going to try and move to KC. Personally, I felt it was a mistake. They had adopted children from overseas, in my humble opinion (which I’m thankful they didn’t seek) it was the wrong move. The kids needed some stability in their life.

Well, I felt vindicated when the house didn’t sell, let alone anyone look at the house. Until one day, he called me saying “We sold our house and have to move in 45 days.”

Two weeks later they returned from KC and bought the cheapest house in the neighborhood for about 35% off the normal retail value. It was a bing, bong, bing God moment.

To make matters even funnier, they were asked to move the closing up, had to scramble to get the move done and get out to KC.

We just spoke today and they are loving it in KC.

I share this with you, because many of you have dreams that you feel God has spoken into your heart. You’ve been told you’ll move millions or billions for the kingdom or touch lives in boardrooms, corporate headquarters or something else grand.

The tendency is to think “Okay God, let’s bust a move, I’m ready.” We move in our own power, only to be pushed off the road and stuck in a holding pattern, while others seem to race by to what we consider our destiny.

I’m here to tell you, don’t worry about it. God will work his plan for you in his time.

Yeah, you’ve heard it from the pulpit or on CD’s or on TV. God has a plan he’ll work it in his time… blah, blah, blah.

But really he will. If you doubt it, just read this story again. My buddy, has had to wait, time and time again for his move, his adopted kids and more. I only wish I could handle it with such grace, and love as he and his wife.

Enjoy the ride,

Matt Gillogly

PS> I wrote this to a small segment of our list, for a promotion, but we’ve received so many comments, we figured it’d be good to post. Here are some comments we’ve received via email.

Frank Gartland wrote:

Matt,

Great note, great message. Needed it. Thanks.

Thanks,

Frank

Matt,

I am thinking this reply may go back to a general mailbox.

Nevertheless, I want to thank you for the messages and the content; they are truly an encouragement and a blessing to me. And I’ll add, they are quite refreshing; we get wrapped in our days trying to drive business and your e-mails come in; it’s kind of like getting a cool drink of water in the middle of a dry and thirsty land. J

Keep ‘em coming!

*/Bob Marino/*

Good morning Matt,

Interesting that you mentioned IHOP as my Ex and our 3-kids moved back to Lee’s Summit about 18-months ago. My sister-in-law is on staff at IHOP and Danya my 18-year old will be on staff starting in September. Great ministry, but not as great of weather that we have here in Southern Calif. ! lol

Chuck

Linda Earley wrote:

Matt, your story is filled with such encouragement…would it be possible for me to share this with my friends on FB, giving due credit?  I know they would be so blessed as am I by this writing.

Have a much-blest day!

Matt,

This is great stuff!  I love your emails, and your product looks really great.

The email today was particularly encouraging.  I quit my government job in May (yes, I know… “crazy”), to start my own career coaching business.  Now I’m helping people get jobs.  www.getnoticedcareers.comhttp://www.getnoticedcareers.com/>

It’s working, I AM helping people get jobs, but… the trickle of new customers is barely enough to keep me going.  Referrals are _only_ coming from happy customers; but NO referrals are coming from netoworking meetings, my (pathetic) web site, advertisements or emails.  And I don’t have any cash or time to do more marketing work, because I’m busy working with clients.
I may not have built a sustainable business plan, but it’s been cool giving it a try.

I just wanted to thank you for your marketing emails and for the obviously useful information you’ve put together.  If I could figure out any way to get some time to do more marketing or admin support on my biz, I would purchase it.

Thanks for “listening”.  Blessings, and I hope you make a milion!

/Adrienne Edwards, MA/ <

Popularity: 98%

It’s Not Black Or White

So often in our personal lives, our businesses, and our faith, we are always seeking out the question, “Who’s Right?” or “What’s Right?”.  This reduces all of life to deciding between 2 colors – black or white.  We refer to everything else as “gray area”.  In my 40 years of living, I believe that 99.9% of life is lived in the gray area.  Very few things can be reduced to 1 of 2 choices.  Last time I checked, God uses an entire color spectrum in his creation, so it’s rarely a black or white decision.

I am very close to a delicate situation occurring right now and I’ve been asked by several to provide some wise counsel on what “I thought was right”.  Every time I have discussed this matter, my answer has not changed – I said both parties are right, and both parties are wrong.  What’s missing from this situation is LOVE.

I said, if party A was showing love, they would be more sensitive to the entire scope of this person’s actions and approach the situation from a perspective of understanding and love versus accusation and forming a postion of being morally “right”.

Party B would understand that personal actions have consequences and ripple effects that are far more reaching than just in their own life, and a position within an organization comes with some written, and unwritten rules.

But far more important than determining who is more right in this situation, I’ve given my opinion that while love appears to be the motivation, love is not the motivation – at least for all those affected.  More than that, I told several people that in most situations like this, you can never come to a consensus or acceptable common ground because of the complexity and emotions involved.

I want to refer to a blog post i read today from Steve McVey.  The entire post can be read at http://gracewalkministries.blogspot.com/2010/07/musings-of-middle-aged-man.html

For a long time, I thought life was all about right and wrong. “Do right and teach others to do right.” That was my aim. It was the template through which I reared my children, through which I taught my congregation, through which I evaluated myself and others. But I was wrong – seriously wrong. To live that way is to live from “the tree of the knowledge of good and evil.”
Life isn’t about right behavior. Life is about loving relationships. We came into being out of a loving relationship among the members of the Trinity and we exist for loving relationships with Him and with each other.

By God’s grace, I’m done with judging people. I’ve learned I can’t even change me, let alone somebody else. I want to just love people, no matter who they are, how they live, what they believe or anything else that used to separate me from others created and loved by our Father. Their behavior isn’t my business. That’s up to God. Loving them is my business.

Jesus came to show us the Father’s love. If He thought it worthy to spend His life doing that very thing, then I assume there’s no higher use of my life than to do the same. I still find myself looking at people through the condescending eyes of judgment sometimes, but I’m asking my Father to free me from that and I’m seeing progress.

I want to love my family with agape love. I want to love my friends that way. I want to love strangers that way. I even want to love those who see me as the enemy that way. It’s a God-sized goal and only He can make it happen in me, but I’m trusting that He will do that very thing.

I just thought Steve nailed it, and I always appreciate God’s timing on providing us wisdom from others when we need confirmation.

Matt and I have blogged often that life and business is not about finding a formula, a set of principles, or the secret door.  We all think that we can solve all of our personal and business problems by finding the right answers and following them.  Unfortunately, the Kingdom does not operate that way.   We operate in a place where up is down and left is right.  Answers are not found in books, they are found in a person and unlocked in loving relationships.  This is what makes God sing over his Kingdom.  His relationship with us, and our relationships with others.  He unlocks the mysteries of the universe and life through himself and through those he connects us with in our lifetime.

So let’s not go through life trying to BE RIGHT or FIND THE RIGHT ANSWER. If we miss the love, we miss the answers.  We also miss an opportunity when we choose to seek truth over love, and we might even lose a relationship.

What do you think?

Popularity: 79%

One conspiracy I do believe in….

On Monday at 1pm Eastern, we’re going to be interviewing our good friend and acclaimed author, Perry Marshall.  Perry is well-known in marketing circles for being the definitive guru for Google Adwords marketing (For a Free course in advertising success with Google Adwords, click the link).  Perry is also known (and will soon be wider known) for not only defending, but scientifically proving the existence of intelligent design in creation.  More to come about that in the future….

We wanted to reproduce an article for you that Perry wrote, which Matt and I believe is absolutely critical for Kingdom-minded entrepreneurs and business owners to understand.  It’s your thoughts. In Phillipians 4:8, Paul says, “Summing it all up, friends, I’d say you’ll do best by filling your minds and meditating on things true, noble, reputable, authentic, compelling, gracious—the best, not the worst; the beautiful, not the ugly; things to praise, not things to curse.” (The Message)

Do you believe that your thoughts can affect your outcomes?  Here’s what Perry’s perspective is, and that will be the basis of our discussion on Monday on The Renegade Christian Entrepreneur Radio Show

One conspiracy I do believe in is the conspiracy to suffocate you in paralyzing mental garbage and global negativity.

I don’t generally buy into conspiracy theories… but I do believe in cosmic episodes of stupidity and planned mass mediocrity.

The #1 conspiracy of the modern world is to choke your brain with sewage and kill your spirit with overwhelming feeling that you are small and insignificant and helpless.

I almost *never* watch the news. I figure if there’s something I absolutely have to know about, somebody will call me and tell me about it. That theory has worked pretty well so far.

But on Monday I was in a restaurant and CNN was on. Couldn’t help but gawk at the endless parade of catastrophes.

I know that CNN is “normal” to most “normal” people. But don’t forget, most normal people accomplish fairly little in their 70+ trips around the sun. Those of us who are going somewhere in life have better things to do than listen to relentless droning about 147 tragedies that we have no ability to solve.

Right now, especially with the Gulf oil spill, the world is AWASH in negativity.

You as an entrepreneur MUST fight this. Proactively. Because if you don’t it’ll kill your business, kill your sales, kill your dreams and everything you really care about.

Watching CNN while you eat breakfast is like visiting a cholera epidemic at a refugee camp and letting sick people drool on you. Then changing their bedpans and rubbing your eyes and licking your hands.

Listen up: The mass news media is NOT your friend.

They exist for the purpose of selling you fear, paranoia, and prescription drugs.

Not only must you protect yourself from the constant, incessant paralysis of depression, you need to combat it with your customers.

You need to tell them what’s GOOD. You need to greet them with a smile and with encouragement.

You need to talk about what’s HAPPENING.

You need to celebrate little tiny victories EVERY SINGLE DAY.

And… when you have a major victory in your life, you need to telegraph it to encouraging people who will celebrate it with you. Because GOOD NEWS is NEWS INDEED.

EndRant.

Perry Marshall

Popularity: 43%

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