Good morning Friends,
I trust you had an exciting weekend.
By God’s Grace today, we will briefly consider what I have titled “Sticktoitiveness”. Sounds funny right? This is perhaps the most important virtue for anyone on the track of success.
Over 90% of small scale businesses and ideas die in the first three years of existence, and another 70% of the remaining 10% will go into atrophy in another two years. Time is designed to test resolves and push convictions to the thresholds of their limits. It is easy to be super excited about a vision in the first few weeks of conception and hold on to it so dearly within the first 6 months with every ounce of perseverance within you, but what happens after 5 years? Will you still be dancing to the same rhythm? Will you still be nodding to the same muse? Will you still be on the same frequency of passion, excitement and commitment? These are hard questions that you mustn’t be too quick to answer.
Perseverance and Consistency is the ability to stick to a conviction with a total disregard for time, it is what I call “Sticktoitiveness”. Consistency is easy when there are results to show for your pursuits within a short period of time. Who will not be consistent after making 1Million Naira within the first 2 months of starting a business? Who will not magnify his office in ministry after garnering 500 members in the first 3 months of inauguration? If results come so quickly after conception, the results become the motives for consistency and not convictions. But because results may not always show up so early and so often, there is a need to be committed to an ideal that transcends what eyes can see. The reward that consistency promises is not designed to be redeemable in piecemeals… but in floodgates! I’ll explain. The harvest of consistency comes only after a prolonged period of sticktoitiveness, and then it comes with a bang! People must be seeing you accidentally when they do not need you, for them to seek you out deliberately when they do. Those months you thought counted for nothing because you didn’t make any sales counted for showing up… Those that will seek you out in the 9th month after starting out, saw you for the first 9 months without saying a word… they were just watching and you kept showing up.
Showing up counts for something!
David kept showing up with the few ewes in the wilderness every single day, when there were no accolades from home nor incentives from without. He simply kept showing up and God kept taking notes… No wonder He was called up as candidate for the palace.
Galatians 6:9 (NKJV)
And let us not grow weary while doing good, for in due season we shall reap if we do not lose heart.
Whatever good you’re doing in your family, business, ministry, career, etc is susceptible to discouragement, but the Bible admonishes us not to be weary in doing this good, because the harvest of this good, is often deferred to a later date. If you faint, you won’t be there when the harvest comes around… That the harvest will come is non-negotiable, but the big question is “Can you stick to this till then”? Why do you think the devil plagues believers with discouragement? Because he knows the super amazing and glorious things that can come out if you just keep showing up. If you wouldn’t stop praying for that spouse, if you wouldn’t stop believing in that protege, if you wouldn’t stop developing your skills, if you wouldn’t stop fellowshipping with the brethren… he knows what he stands to lose if you simply wouldn’t stop! So guess what… never stop. Show up one more day, pray one more hour, stay up one more night, give one more time… In the morning, sow your seeds, in the evening, do not restrain your hands, for God is not trying to gamble with your resources, He simply wants to know how much you desire and deserve the harvest coming your way.
Tim Robbins in the movie, Shawshank Redemption knew that a tiny little hand mallet had the capacity to break him out of the fierce Shawshank Prison, as long as he was willing to show up every day and do some digging. However little an effect each day’s worth of digging had, it created a tunnel out of the prison 19 years down the line. That little thing you’re doing right now has the capacity to turn into a global phenomenon if only you would keep showing up and digging at your craft.
We need a huge doze of Sticktoitiveness in our generation and here is a clarion call for such virtues to be awakened in our hearts. Everything will come against your resolve, but if it is something you are strongly convinced about, stick to it and never give in… you reward is on the way. He only rewards those who diligently seek him!
I hope this blessed you. Kindly share with friends.
God bless your heart.