MISTAKES THE YOUNG MAKE (8)

He is a key person in the church. He walked to my office and said to me, “Pastor, I am sorry I did not say this earlier. I will leave service to speak somewhere”.

I responded, “You can go but when you return, we have a discussion”.

Friends, platforms and invitations are exciting. They always seem like an affirmation that you are doing something great.

But the irony is that they are always sweet traps. If you are not careful, your self-esteem will be tied to the number of invitations you get to “perform” or speak.

Invitations can become your opium- you are high when invites come and low when it is not available.

Fight to be trained rather than hustle for platforms. Platforms can be taken from you. Training remains with you forever.

Knowledge is probably one thing that you give away but yet never leave you.

There is a time you must say NO to invitations:

If it clashes with your learning moments, especially in your local church. Every service is a learning moment. It is your time to refresh.

Do not trample on your local assembly because you got an invitation. It is like abusing your mother because you have party jollof rice! Mum feeds you regularly.

Instrumentalists and vocalists may be a huge part of this. Do not be in a hurry. Sit down and learn. By the time your world is hearing your voice, your inner strength would have been built.

Please, do not insult your base because you want to build a brand. Your brand integrity will always be traceable to the base that you are a part of.

Let me tell you a major secret- trained people surrender their platforms to trained people and not necessarily gifted people.

You may be gifted all you can but if men who are trained notice you are untrained, they will never surrender their platforms to you.

The biggest platforms of life respond to training and not giftedness. Focus on being trained.

Some of the finest gifts to the body of Christ today and some of the lasting voices in business, governance, politics and other sectors are not just gifted but they are trained people.

Your gifting can become your recessional hymn at a burial service just before internment.

If you are to choose between platform and training, what will you choose?

temilOluwa Ola, Eruwa.