Advance ( 1)
THERE is always a time for a man to advance from the period he is born till when he dies. And while some of these advancements are made consciously and are as results of our responses to nature, most of them are conscious and must be done with some effort. For example, a man does not remain a baby all his life. He advances from being an unfertilised egg to a fertilised one, to a fetus, to a baby, toddler, teenager, youth and so on. He advances from being carried all day to crawling, standing, taking few steps until his strides become stronger. All these phases of advancements listed above all come as a result of nature and even though some effort is put into it, they will surely happen at the required time.
There are other advancements that will not come until a man takes a decision and works to see it happen, especially if he wants to be a force to be reckoned with and a story to be told when he is still alive and even after he dies. If, for example, a man decides to become a doctor, he must pass the required exams to get into medical school, go through the training in medical school, pass the necessary exams, graduate and continue gaining knowledge to be the best. He must decide to advance from being just an existence to a person who has succeeded in carving out a niche for himself on earth.
While there are different definitions and interpretations of the word advance; “cause to make progress, a forward movement, a development or improvement,” we shall, for the purpose of this study dwell on the definition given by the English Oxford Living Dictionary; “Move forward in a purposeful way.”
For attainments to be made and heights to be achieved, we must decide to move forward in a purposeful way. We must decide to move forward in a focused, determined, decisive, resolute, firm, fixed and persistent way. No man decides to build a house without having a mental image of the kind of house he wants to build. Then he decides if he has enough funds to build what he has conjured in his mind or if he wants to build a smaller one now and the bigger one later. Then, he talks to do the architect, engineer and anybody who will bring a reality to the dream in his heart. He has counted his cost, has decided he will do it no matter what and will now take purposeful and determined steps to bring it to pass.
A popular quote says, “if you fail to plan, you plan to fail.” If you are lackadaisical about your life, you will not advance. If you don’t step out, you will not encounter your Goliaths and you will not know how to defeat them. You will just remain with the bears and lions. And if you advance without a plan; in an unfocused and unstable way, you will most likely be defeated by the first Goliath you meet.
Victory Life Bible Church Intl. Km. 9, Olabisi Onabanjo Way, Opp. OGTV, Ajebo Abeokuta. P. O. Box 1537, Sapon, Abeokuta 110001, Ogun State Nigeria, W/ Africa www. vlbcinternational. org