The One Secret Behind Answered Prayers (1)

People have many different reasons to pray - to thank God for his mercies, to ask for protection, forgiveness for sins, a child, good health, a job, for loved ones, friends, etc. Very many people ALWAYS pray for wealth, especially financial.

There are those whose lifestyles show that they are very devoted to serving God; however, their prayers for the good things of life, especially financial, do not get answered. Those who know them are at a loss and wonder why with all the devotion their prayers are not answered.

There are even those who would mock them and say “they carry on as if they are the holiest people, yet they have very little to show for it. Maybe they are paying for their sins they commit when no one sees them and they then pretend in the public to be devoted.”

The situation could get so frustrating that the people in the midst of such challenges keep begging God to forgive their sins and at a time, they would start believing someone has likely cast a negative spell on them.

At times when they look around, they see people who have very little devotion to the things of God doing very well financially, and that further baffles them. They cannot understand why blessings go to such people who are less committed to the things of God and not to them who have spent years and years serving God faithfully.

Eventually, some resign themselves to fate and believe their situation cannot change. They accept their current situation as final, keep struggling financially and never hesitate to pour out their sorrow to anyone who cares to listen.

So what really is the problem with such people? What “sin” have they committed that makes it look like they are under a curse in spite of their open devotion to God? Before I proceed, I want to state that if your situation is as one I just described above, please do not lose hope.

If in the past you have been devoted to God without getting your prayers answered, please continue to remain devoted because that is what God wants.

I also want you to know that no situation that is irredeemable. This particular post on the wealth secrets blog, the earlier ones and the ones to come provide all the details you need to achieve genuine wealth in life. It is just information you need that would make the difference for you.

Pay particular attention to this post and read every other post here because it would open you to things that may baffle you initially, but as you read and apply the message, you would get your desired results. It may baffle you because what we humans need to do to achieve in life is simple, but most of the time we expend ourselves chasing things that take us in the wrong direction.

Ok, enough said. I guess the message is clear as crystal. Hebrews 11 verse 6 of the Good News Bible says, “No one can please God without faith, for whoever comes to God MUST have faith that God exists and REWARDS those who seek Him.” From this revelation, you can see why I said earlier that if you have been devoted to God in the past, please continue to remain so.

However, notice also that the word ‘faith’ is used. That is precisely the key word that makes all the difference between answered prayers and unanswered prayers. God’s word says no one can please God without faith! I’m sure many who read the preceding sentence would claim to have faith and then insist that their prayers are still not being answered!

If that is your case as you read, do not be in a hurry please. It is very easy to get emotional about the issue and then miss the valuable point here. I therefore advise and plead with you to leave whatever notions you have in mind and keep your mind open to get the message here. As soon as you fully understand it, nothing and no one except God Almighty can stop you from becoming an achiever.

Let’s look at what faith means. Legendary author Napoleon Hill gives several meanings to the word faith, and I quote:

(1) “Faith is a state of mind that may be induced by self-suggestion.”

(2) “Faith is the ‘external elixir’ which gives life, power and action to the impulse of thought!”

(3) “Faith is the starting point of all accumulation of riches!”

(4) “Faith is the basis of all ‘miracles,’ and all mysteries, which cannot be analyzed by the rules of science!”

(5) “Faith is the only known antidote for failure!”

(6) “Faith is the element, the ‘chemical’ which, when mixed with prayer, gives one direct communication with Infinite Intelligence.”

(7) “Faith is the element, which transforms the ordinary vibration of thought, created by the finite mind of man, into the spiritual equivalent.”

(8) “Faith is the only agency through which the cosmic force of Infinite Intelligence can be harnessed and used by man.”

Do not be intimidated by the big words used by Napoleon Hill in his explanation of the word faith. The meanings contained in (4) and especially (6) buttress the point I want to explain in this blog post on the one secret behind answered prayers.

The word of God in Hebrews 11 verse 1 states, “To have faith is to be sure of the things we hope for, to be certain of things we cannot see.” This statement gives a clue to the reason why even those who are not devoted to God still achieve in life! Recall Hebrews 11 verse 6 says, “No one can please God without faith, for whoever comes to God MUST have faith that God exists and REWARDS those who seek Him.”

How do you come to God? Through prayer! Nevertheless, for the prayer to answered, you MUST have faith that God exists and rewards those who seek Him. Again Hebrews 11 verse 1 states, “To have faith is to be sure of the things we hope for, to be certain of things we cannot see.”

This simply means any thing, and absolutely anything one wants in life and is convinced in his or her mind of getting, he will surely get it whether he or she prays for it or not! Notice that the emphasis is on the word ‘convinced.’

The reason for this is quite simple: God our Father created man us out of His infinite love and mercy. God made man like Himself in image and likeness. That is why man’s spirit is said to be immortal (cannot perish), but physically in his body, man can die.

When God was to create the world, He used words (Genesis 1). As stated in the last post on this blog, another of man’s share in God’s image and likeness is in man’s ability to use words and then action to create anything he wants.

Our Lord and Saviour Jesus Christ confirms this point when he says in the gospel of St. Mark 11 verse 23, “I assure you that whoever tells this hill to get up and throw itself in the sea and does not doubt in his heart, but believes that what he says will happen, it will be done for him.”

With all I’ve said so far, do you think it is important to pray since you can get whatever you want life even if you do not pray but have faith (conviction) in what you want to achieve? It seems logical not to bother praying since there are obvious cases of those who achieve and never bother about prayer.

Our Lord Jesus Christ says further in Mark 11 verse 24, “For this reason I tell you: When you pray and ask for something, believe that you have received it, and you will be given WHATEVER you ask for.” Why does Jesus still ask us to pray when just in verse 23 he said, say what you want to achieve, believe it will be done and you will surely get it?

Jesus said it because in prayer you communicate with God in your own words when making your request. He also said this because a hidden secret most people hardly ever use when praying is the word of God. Praying with faith using the word of God makes the results come faster. Again, I say your prayers are answered faster when you pray with faith using the word of God and not just your own words!

………………………..To be continued

(c) copyright Gabriel Ama

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About the Author:

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How Do You Perceive Failure? (2)

The irony of life is that failure represents a process whereby one learns valuable lessons in trying to achieve whatever he or she sets out to attain in life. I’m not saying one should continually makes mistakes in life. 

Making the same mistakes and expecting a different result in what you set out to achieve is a wrong approach.

The way you respond to the mistakes in your mind and your actions in making corrections is what is important. When you make corrections to the mistake, you are not expected to make the same mistake again. 

Nevertheless, you should not rule out completely the fact that you are not to make other mistakes.

If you make the same mistake again, it simply shows you never really learned the lesson the first time. But you should not crucify yourself for that! Learn the lesson and move ahead and focus on what you want to achieve. 

When you make new mistakes and make necessary corrections, you are simply gaining experience.

That is why we have the very popular saying, “experience is the best teacher.” It should be more aptly stated, “Mistakes are the best teachers”. 

All said, it is usually better to learn from the mistakes of others since nobody likes to get bad news or an unpleasant result from his or her efforts.

Microsoft Chairman Bill Gates addressed the issue when he said, “Bad news can be really disheartening. When you get news of a product failure, there’s a real temptation to think, Oh, that’s as much as I want to know about that! I think I’ll go home now. I think I’ll work on something else.”

It is indeed correct that bad news can be devastating. For example, Mary Kay Ash of Mary Kay Cosmetics lost her spouse about a month to the start of her business, coupled with the fact that her banker and lawyer earlier told her to forget her idea. 

Ordinarily, the death of her husband would have signaled the end of her dreams. However, she never gave up and today Mary Kay cosmetics are a household name.

You should and must find a way of overcoming bad news or an unpleasant and unexpected event for the simple fact that the pain would eventually go away with time. 

There are many sources of bad news or unpleasant situations – death of a loved one, failed marriage, abandonment by a lover over a pregnancy, examination failure, rape, torture, armed robbery attack, business failure, eviction from home, loss of a job, rejection by people (e.g. music producers, publishers) from whom you seek professional help, etc.

Some of these incidents leave deep scars on one’s mind. However, if you continue to hold on to the experience it would only deepen the scar on your mind. 

And if you’ve followed the posts on this blog, you should by now know the importance of avoiding negative thoughts from reaching your mind.

One way of letting go is when you understand and acknowledge the fact that the world has not ended for you; that the situation or event has happened and the pain is only temporary and will eventually go away. 

In addition, you then begin to make a conscious effort at rising above the pain and moving on with your life by blocking out the associated pains of the experience and focusing on a solution.

For business people, Microsoft boss Bill Gates said further, “Once you embrace unpleasant news not as a negative but as evidence of a need for change, you aren’t defeated by it. You’re learning from it.” 

He said this because as he also revealed in his book Business @ the speed of thought Microsoft has had its own share of product failures and the valuable lessons learnt were used to produce other outstanding products!

Gates further advises business people when he says, “Listen to your customers and take their bad news as an opportunity to turn your failures into the concrete improvements they want.” 

It is when you understand the value of making honest mistakes and learning from them that the word failure takes a completely new meaning; not as something bad but as something that one encounters on the way to success. 

When we talk of someone having experience or becoming an expert in a field, it is important to note that it cannot be positive events alone that made the person an expert.

Exposure to negative events and learning and making the necessary corrections is what makes the person become an expert to be able to proffer solutions to similar or related problems in the future. 

That is precisely how Consultants emerge in any industry. They have been able to learn from their mistakes and those of others and applied the lessons to solve problems for others who encounter them.

Kyle Rote Jr., a soccer player, once said “There is no doubt in my mind that there are many ways to be a winner, but there is really one way to be a loser and that is to fail and not look beyond the failure.”

The lessons to learn from this post on failure are obvious. You need and have to change your perception of failure from now on if you want to achieve in whatever endeavor you undertake in life. 

Change the wrong thinking on failure, as something to be avoided at all costs, which you were exposed to at formal school and by any other person you have ever encountered.

Embrace failure as a process or processes you learn lessons from to give you the needed experience to become an achiever in life. 

Remember that there is one thing you must do when you encounter events labeled as failures on your way to achieving and beyond: never let them defeat you because you need the lessons they contain. 

What should be of importance to you to focus on, always, is a solution to the problem.

I tell you in all honesty, there is ALWAYS a solution to the problem if you would look beyond the failure and apply yourself to finding a solution. 

And please begin today to teach others what you’ve just learnt about failure so that you can contribute to reversing the wrong perceptions most people have about it.

I will end with an acronym on the word MISTAKES created by leadership expert and motivational speaker John Maxwell. John said mistakes are:

Messages that give us feedback about life.

Interruptions that should cause us to reflect and think.

Signposts that direct us to the right path.

Tests that push us toward greater maturity.

Awakenings that keep us in the game mentally.

Keys that we can use to unlock the next door of opportunity.

Explorations that let us journey where we’ve never been before.

Statements about our development and progress.

More wealth secrets next week.

(c) copyright Gabriel Ama.

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About the Author:

Click http://www.ObtainWealthOnline.com/sogr.html to get information

on the FREE  E-book that catapulted Gabriel Ama to immense success in

all aspects of his life including his fortunes!

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How Do You Perceive Failure? (1)

To many people, the above title question seems rather odd. The next logical reaction from such people would be “how on earth could I ask how one perceives failure when right from our earliest school days, we were taught to abhor failure? We heard it from teachers, parents, friends, friends’ parents, and so on and so forth.

Some of such statements were probably as follows:

(1)“you cannot afford to fail.”

(2)“ If you fail in school, you cannot get a good job!”

(3)“anyone who fails cannot amount to anything good in life”

(4) “you must get good grades in school so that you can get a good job!”

As we passed from grade school to high school to college, we kept hearing the same talk about failure over and over again that we made conscious efforts to pass our exams in flying colors.

Failure was never an option. Any of our colleagues who was unfortunate to fail was labeled a no good and was taunted in front of the class and told that he or she would never amount to anything in life.

Unfortunately, the emotional and psychological effect of such statements made some of those people taunted and intimidated accept what was told them as the truth and they just wandered through life without any achievement.

However, very few others, who never accepted such statements, tried everything possible to prove their worth. They won. They achieved. Now do you doubt what I’ve just described above?

Okay then, go study the live stories of people like Thomas Edison who contributed immensely to humanity through several inventions; Robert Kiyosaki, real estate multi-millionaire and author of several best-selling books like Rich Dad, Poor Dad; Cash Flow Quadrant; Retire Young, Retire Rich; Henry Ford who made immense wealth through the assembly and mass production of cars in Ford Motors, a company that still exists to date.

Thomas Edison had only 3 (three) months’ of formal schooling and was sent home because he could not pass in school. His mother never lost faith in him. The rest is history.

Some of Robert Kiyosaki’s teachers taunted and labeled him a no good because he could not get good grades like the top students of his class. Read his books and you would see the story of a man of achievement.

Let me make one thing very clear to you my dear friend and reader: whoever abhors failure does not really understand what it means. As master salesman and motivational speaker Zig Ziglar says, “failure is not a person but an event!” Leadership expert and author John Maxwell says, “failure is not an event but a process!”

Both statements are correct if you understand the fact that as Zig Ziglar tried to explain, it is the activity that failed and not the person, and as John Maxwell explains, failure is a part of the learning process that leads to success. Maxwell also emphasized that success is also a process because one may think he has succeeded and then relax.

Successful business people and organizations recognize the importance of viewing success as a continuous process to enable them come up with innovative ideas of growing their business. From their experience, a competitor is always thinking of ways of improving and would soon overtake them if they relax.

It is a lack of understanding of failure that makes many people wander through life in poverty and want. Because of the wrong programming we had from formal school, we see failure as something that should never be a part of us. We only want to be seen as people of achievement.

As a result, whenever failure comes, we wrongly see it as the end of the world. A true story is told of a man who was laid off along with others from his job, and guess what? He committed suicide. To the man unfortunately, the world had come to an end and he took his life as a result.

Thomas Edison said “Many of life’s failures are people who did not realise how close they were to success when they gave up.” Edison’s absolute belief in this comment was responsible for his having tried 1,000 times (yes, one thousand times) before achieving his invention of the incandescent bulb.

Edison believed as author Napoleon Hill said, “there are no limitations to the human mind, only those we acknowledge.” This simply means you are the only one who can label yourself or what you do or did as a failure. Nobody can tell you that you are a failure unless you choose to accept the statement as the truth.

……………………….To be continued next week.

(c) copyright Gabriel Ama

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About the Author:

Click http://www.ObtainWealthOnline.com/sogr.html to get information

on the FREE  E-book that catapulted Gabriel Ama to immense success in

all aspects of his life including his fortunes!

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The Power of Persistence

Most people usually give up at the first sign of defeat or setback in what they're trying to achieve in life. It's a normal thing for them to do. Just give up. And then turn round to complain that things never went the way they expected.

What they don't seem to realise about such attitude is contained in the words of legendary author Napoleon Hill, "Every adversity, every failure and every heartache carries with it the seed of an equivalent or even greater benefit".

There is no one on this earth who made genuine wealth or achieved fame or success in any endeavor that did not encounter difficulties along the way.

The problem with most people again, is that when they see someone who has made it genuinely, it probably never occurs to them the fact that there is a story of persistence behind the person's success.

Leadership expert and author John Maxwell stated, "the difference between average people and achieving people is their perception of and response to failure". John also stated "its not what happens to you that matters but what happens inside you."

The truth about these statements is that to achieve true, lasting and genuine wealth, fame and success, one has to change from the way of thinking that leads to failure to one that leads to success. Learning to develop persistence and applying its power is the key to changing all that!

One thing we humans need to understand is this: there will always be issues and challenges and obstacles to surmount on the road to success and even beyond. No one who has travelled that road successfully would tell you otherwise.

What is important to note however, is the fact that understanding that such challenges will occur and then still going ahead to do what we need to do to get to our life's ambition is a sure sign that we have understood and begun to develop the power of persistence.

Persistence will get you through any situation in life because it is a part of the process of getting to where you want to be. Unfortunately, a lack of understanding of this fact makes very many people give up at the sign of obstacles.

So how does one develop the power of persistence? You have a will-power given to you by God Almighty. You have an ambition of what you want in life. You have a mind you can use to create a clear mental picture using your imagination of what you intend to achieve. You have a mouth to declare into your life every single day what you want to become.

Make use of these things with absolute faith and the journey to wealth, fame and success is nearing completion for you.

Once you've understood the importance of the words in the preceding paragraph and begun applying it, nothing becomes impossible for you. Sacred scripture tells us that we were all created in God's image and likeness (Gen. 1: 26-27) . Sacred scripture also tells us that "for God all things are possible (Matt. 19: 26)."

Now I will ask you two questions, if you believe you were created in God's image and likeness, does it not mean that there are certain characteristics you share with God? One of those is the power to create using words. If that is the case, then why should temporary setbacks and obstacles debar you from achieving?

Dear friend, you have a power given to you by God in His love and infinite mercy. Use it well and it transforms into the power of persistence to achieve whatever you want in life. Now you have another wealth secret!

More wealth secrets next week.

(c) copyright Gabriel Ama.

----------------------------------------------

About the Author:

Click http://www.ObtainWealthOnline.com/sogr.html to get information

on the FREE  E-book that catapulted Gabriel Ama to immense success in

all aspects of his life including his fortunes!

----------------------------------------------

Make A Habit of Doing Things When You Don't Feel Like It

Zig Ziglar gave the advice contained in the title of this post when he said "Discipline yourself to do the things you need to do when you need to do them, and the day will come when you will be able to do the things you want to do when you want to do them"! How true those words are! Come off it, there are times when we just don't feel like doing something important at the time we are supposed to do them. We procrastinate and say it will be done "later" and then it is never done.                                    If you want to become a person of achievement in whatever endeavor you choose, then you must make a habit of doing things when you are supposed to. All it requires is personal discipline on your part. As Ziglar also said "you cannot feel your way into acting but you have to act your way into feeling". What this means is that to achieve in life, you should not wait until anytime you feel like carrying out any of the plans toward achieving your life's dreams, but rather, you should discipline yourself to carry out the plans as soon as the need arises and you will soon find yourself feeling good after every successful step you accomplish, which will spur you to carry on. To develop the discipline required to acquire the habit of doing things when you don't feel like, you need to account for the hours you spend each day of your life. Now ask yourself honestly, how many hours of each day do you spend in pursuit of your current dream in life? I'm not just talking about moving aimlessly in pursuit of your life's ambition. Recall, in one of the earlier posts on this blog, we talked about creating plans and even how to create them. That is where to focus your efforts when moving in the direction of your dreams. Spend valuable time on activities towards achieving your life's ambition that you can reflect on at the end of each day with a sense of accomplishment. And before long, you will forever cherish the discipline you have formed as a habit because any day you did not do something valuable in the direction of your dream, you will feel somehow incomplete. But that feeling will now spur you to action the very next day and every other day thereafter because it has now become a habit.That is one major difference between achievers and non-achievers. There you have another wealth secret! Now get to work.  More wealth secrets next week.  (c) copyright Gabriel Ama. ------------------------------------------------------ About the Author: Click http://www.ObtainWealthOnline.com/sogr.html to get information on the FREE  E-book that catapulted Gabriel Ama to immense success in all aspects of his life including his fortunes! ------------------------------------------------------