TAKING STEPS: Things You Must Know to Achieve Your Goals

Life's First Steps

Intense pleasure perfumes the robust mother’s face as she eagerly encourages her son with her beckoning hands. The 100cm-space between the mother and her son was premeditated; just enough for the kid to bridge in the first real assignment for his feet.

‘Will he, will he not?’ the question pounds the mother’s heart.

A minute and a half of beckoning, and plenty ‘Come to mummy,’ then it happens. With outstretched arms like a tightrope walker, the son takes his first shaky step. In the recent past, he had taken such first steps only to return to the lotus position on the ground. The second stride is what counts.

‘Will he weather the storm this time around?’ the Mama looks on with the keenest of interest.

Presently, he struggles with balance and after a while he finds his feet. His right leg rises in the air and lands, the second step. The mother’s heart pumps blood in pints. She unconsciously etches the finish line by an inch or two in exultant restlessness. The other steps follow in quick succession and then he falls but into his mother’s waiting arms.

The overjoyed Mama instantly lifts her baby high into the air in a motherly pride. The victorious son, on top of the world, must be feeling in his little brain:

‘Yes, I made it.’

Really, how many of us do often give our heavenly Father cause for such joy and pride? It is not just about great leaps but goal-getting strides.

Introduction

Goals, long or short-termed, are achieved only when the goal-setter becomes a goal-getter. And the distance between goal-setting and goal-getting can be covered in steps - movement. Not just movement, but appropriate, timely and goal-driven movement. Such movement must have the following characteristics:

Precision

Importunity

Purposefulness

God-factor

Precision

Hear the Living Bible rendition of the eleventh verse of chapter nine of the book of Ecclesiastes,

Again I looked throughout the earth and saw that the swiftest person does not always win the race, nor the strongest man the battle, and that wise men are often poor, and skilful men are not necessarily famous; but it is all by chance, by happening to be at the right glace at the right time.

Whaoh! That is a powerful revelation. You must happen to be at the right place at the right time. Some blessings are just on time bomb; you miss the timing, you miss the blessing. Have you ever heard remarks like,

‘Oh! Sorry, if you had been here five minutes earlier you would have gotten it. I just gave it to that man that just left when you entered now.’

Meanwhile you remembered you stopped somewhere along the way to exchange pleasantries with someone for about ten minutes. How would you feel? Terrible! The time bomb had exploded and the blessing is gone, an event overtaken by time. Just because you stopped to greet elaborately!

Brethren, there are some times we will not need to greet in the pursuit of our goal for it might constitute a distraction,

 ...and salute no man by the way Luke 10:4

This is Jesus giving instruction to his disciples. What a deep sense of urgency this depicts. Time is life. I read an article many years ago and it says, ‘Time is life and you can’t waste one without wasting the other.’

Importunity

Keep moving. Yes? Don’t stop moving. Martin Luther King Jnr, said, ‘Fly if you can, but if you can’t fly, run. If you can’t run, walk. And if you can’t walk, crawl. Whatever it is, just make sure you are moving.’ There is an adage in my language: the snail insisted on climbing a tree and it did, because its tongue was stuck to it.

A popular songwriter said: if you are going through hell, don’t stop. He is very correct. There is no bus stop in hell. If you stop there you are stopping at obstruction; you may get hit, charged or kidnapped. Yes, get help if you need to, but never stop. Keep making headway.

A man of God wanted to quit ministry out of frustration. That same night he slept and had a dream. He saw himself attempting to break down a rock with a sledge hammer. After several attempts with no single sign of a crack in the rock, he wanted to quit. Just then a strange fellow appeared to him and told him to try one more time. He reluctantly heeded and hit the rock one more time. Voilà! The rock came crumbling down. He would have missed it at the nick of breakthrough. Remember the cliché: winners never quit, and quitters never win.

I heard of a notable global businessman who said every failure edges them closer to success by helping them discover another way they ought not to do it. Learn from failure to forge ahead, don’t lean on it to hang your head.

Purposefulness

Keep moving I say, but make every step meaningful. Let every stride be a move in the positive direction. No beating about the bush. Remember you are not going to be here all day long. As your hairs are numbered so are your days. Therefore make every step count. Do what you can do while you can still do it but ensure you are doing it right.

And Jesus answered and said unto her, Martha, thou art careful and troubled about many things: but one thing is needful: and Mary hath chosen that good part, which shall not be taken away from her. Luke10v41,42

God-Factor

That brings us to the most salient point here, the God-factor. This journey through life is so complex and everything looks so muddled up that it takes God to separate the right from the good and the needful from the useful.

All things are lawful for me, but all things are not expedient; all things are lawful for me, but all things edify not. I Cor. 10:23

So, what is the way out of the world-sized maze then?

The steps of a good man are ordered by the Lord: and he delighteth in his way. Ps. 37:23

That is it! Allowing God to lead the way is the way to go. Like David (I Sam.23:1-14), you must be an ardent inquisitor from the Lord, taking direction from Him on “per-second” billing. If He orders the steps, he will take delight in the way the steps are leading. And this is the ultimate result:

When a man's ways please the Lord, he maketh even his enemies to be at peace with him. Prov.16:7

The enemy is easily taken out of the way for one’s efforts to be abundantly fruitful and one’s goal to the easily achieved. In short, all your brilliant steps and wonderful efforts can go down the drain in a moment of opposition, if this God-factor is taken for granted. Have your forgotten the cliché: man proposes, but God disposes. So, I submit, we must put God first, else we stand the risk of losing all.