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DEDICATION
This book is dedicated to those who are struggling through all kinds of challenges. And to those who are considering giving up: Please Just Dont Give Up.
ACKNOWLEDGMENT
All who have encouraged, inspired and helped me in one way or the other, I thank you and appreciate your labor of love and personal commitment to the progress of this work.
TABLE OF CONTENTS
Dedication ................................................................................... 2 Acknowledgment ........................................................................ 3 Introduction ................................................................................. 6 Chapter 1 Strength, Failure and Weakness .................................................. 7 Chapter 2 The Double-Cross Game........................................................... 13
INTRODUCTION
In life there are challenges, options and solutions. Our daily decision-making on when we deal with those inevitable challenges should be influenced by knowledge, insight, and personal understanding. Options in a situation are ways open to us, with which we can obtain desired solutions. The option to take a chance, the option to keep fighting our way through, the option to seek out a solution, and the option to give up are all subject to our knowledge, insight and understanding. The choices we make determine the outcomes of each of our lives. But we should not be willing to choose to give up on effort or on ourselves, because of normal life challenges that may have unfavorable outcomes. All we need to know are those truths that will get us going toward our goals, dreams and pursuits, with vigor and motivation. The purpose of this book is to help you get back on track and fired up toward your goals, and to help you achieve them, because they are achievable.
Strength
During Mike Tysons heyday in the boxing ring, most opponents probably thought they stood a chance in the fight before stepping into the ring with him because they also trained to do their best. Mike soon knocked them down, and they were unable to carry on because they did not have sufficient strength to get up and continue the fight. They were hit too hard and their strength failed, so they gave up. Even Mike Tysons strength proved smaller when he was knocked down and counted out during an encounter with a man who proved to have more strength. So, winning is about having the adequate strength to carry on in a challenge, while lacking strength causes the desire to give up.
Failure
Derek Redmond, a British athletic record holder, prepared for the 1992 Olympic Games in Barcelona, with great prospects. But soon after the start of the race, tragedy struckhe fell and tore his hamstring. Failure in his mission to win stared him in the face, as he hobbled through the track. Redmond braced against the failure and completed the race, receiving a standing ovation from the spectators, who admired his courage to continue in so much pain. Derek, failed to win a medal in the Olympics, and to deepen his dilemma, he was told by a surgeon he would never run again or represent his country in sport. Derek had to quit running, but he didnt quit sports after the incident; he improved on his passion for sports by working hard at other endeavors with great
successes and achievements. He secured a place in Great Britain Mens Basketball Team and sent a signed photo of the team to the surgeon that had assured him he would never represent his country in sports again. Derek did not allow failure or human opinion about his potential stop him, even when disappointment had knocked him hard. Failure can become a road block to many, or it can be a motivation to do more and do better.
Weakness
The weakness of the ants: their size, their lack of brain, and their position in the food chain has never stopped them from being able to provide food in winter, or left them with excuses for going hungry. They can carry 10 to 50 times their body weight. The conies, a species of mountain mouse, are but a feeble folk, yet make their houses in the rocks (Proverbs 30:24-28). In life we will always have weaknesses, but we need only to know how to transform such weaknesses to strength. Failures and weaknesses have always been major challenges against success and victory over lifes circumstances. But it is gladdening to know that we can overcome challenges and succeed over any circumstance with our small strength, our failures, and our weaknesses.
Your small strength, failures and weaknesses are a requirement for victory
Giving up is about letting go of courage, and inevitably, effort. This happens when we start belittling ourselves, measuring against whatever confronts us. The good news is that the requirement for victory is your weaknesses, small strength or failures. Gods strength is made perfect in us when we have come to the end of our human abilities. The greatest book of courage and strengththe Biblesays: And he said unto me, My grace is sufficient for thee: for my strength is made perfect in weakness. Most gladly therefore will I rather glory in my infirmities, that the power of Christ may rest upon me (2 Corinthians 12:9). We must be able to recognize and admit our weaknesses and inadequacies before God, so that He can reach out and help us with His own abilities.
They depended on their king, Saul. They forsook God, denying His kingship over them. They opted instead to be ruled by a human king and were now threatened. Their only hope and expectation for victory rested on a man of great strength. But God was not interested in using Saul to defeat Goliath. He was looking for one, regardless of strength, size or background, who would trust Him to defeat the Philistine giant. God used David, the man after Gods heart and full of faith, the youngest at the battle field. David had just stumbled into the scene, unprepared, with no war experience, and very unskilled. He only came looking for his brothers to deliver their lunch. He confronted the much-feared giant, Goliath, with no armor and only a sling and stones for a weapon. David made himself available for battle and killed Goliath because he trusted God to defeat the giant. (1 Samuel 17:1-58). Your smallness, weaknesses and inadequacies are all needed to succeed, if you only hand them over to God to use and make your battle. It is too early to give up. Determine to look away from your human failings; learn to use all of the strength availableGods strength. When you put your failures, weaknesses and inadequacies in Gods hands, it means youve put on Gods strength for your challenges. Gods avail ability is superior to your human ability, and when you make yourself available to Him, God will give you His ability.
It is unbelievable that a harlot was used by God for a great work, that she was given a spot in the Bible, and that the Savior even came from her lineage (Matthew 1:5). No matter the weaknesses or inadequacies we may have, we can still win when we rely on God. This is Gods strategy: But God hath chosen the foolish things of the world to confound the wise; and God hath chosen the weak things of the world to confound the things which are mighty; And base things of the world, and things which are despised, hath God chosen, yea, and things which are not, to bring to nought things that are. (1 Corinthians 1:27-28)
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