The BiVo Minister Blog

Too Busy?

We are all busy! Running from one meeting to the other or from one task to the other. Being busy does not necessarily mean that you are making the most of your time!

The question I have for you today is this! Are you too busy to spend time with God? Or are you too busy to spend time with the people of God who are lost? If the answer to any of these questions is yes, then you are TOO BUSY!

All creations of God should always have time or make time for God! If we think our projects, children’s programs, business meetings, educational activities or religious activities are so much that we can’t make time to connect with the people that Jesus died for! Then we have to think again! No one should ever be too busy to stop for the one who is lost. Remember the good Samaritan and all the other neighbors (Luke 10:25-37). Go and do likewise!

What are your best tips for being available for God and your neighbors? Pls share in the comments section below.

Ask this question!

There is a question that I believe you must ask anyone you truly love! How they answer should not change how much you love them but it might change how they react to you for a short time! Only for a short time if you have shown that you truly love them!

The Question is: When you die? Where would you go? I have received all manner of answers to this question. Now that I think about it, I will start recording the answers I get from now on.

We would all die someday! As a disciple of Jesus you know where you are going to. You know also why you are going to be with Jesus! So when your friend responds, you can take the time to present the gospel to them!

Make sure you ask this question before presenting the gospel! It will help you know how to explain to them about the Kingdom of God and Jesus Christ starting from where they are!

After presenting the gospel, don’t be in a hurry to pray. Make sure they understand and don’t leave without giving them an opportunity to pray! If they are not ready to make a decision for Jesus, let them go and continue the friendship! God who loves them more than you do will give you another opportunity to pray with them.

Please pray a lot before asking this question! It is the Holy Spirit that does the work of conviction. However don’t pray for so long that you never ask the question. Click here for the steps to make a disciple

Have you asked this question lately? Please share your experience in the comments section below! Thanks!

All that is Mine is Yours

How rich are you? Are you rich because you have a positive net worth? A lot of money in the bank? Does God see you as rich? Does that even matter? What do these words from Luke 15:31 mean?

I’m always happy when I read the parable of the lost son in Luke 15. There are 3 thing that make me happy but today I will only explain one. I will list the other 2.

I am happy because I sense the heart of God the Father! He loves us all and wants to have a relationship with us.

I am happy because I have been lost but now I am home. I have a very joyful and intimate relationship with God

The third thing that makes me happy is that I have access to all the resources of God our heavenly Farther! I am rich! Very rich and in fact I can never be poor! (Luke 15:31).

My brother, my sister it is impossible for you to be poor! You are from the family of the owner of the universe! He owns everything including the people! We lack only because we are still trying to have our own riches instead of joining with God and accessing all His resources! What we should be doing is meeting needs with our skills and making disciples of the people whose needs we meet.

So stop trying to get rich or pursuing wealth! You are only moving money from one of your accounts to the other. If you operate from the truth, the money you need will always be available (Luke 15:31?).

What I have noticed in this scripture is that if your chase wealth, importance, approval from people or even God by acting right, you only get some of the resources! And like the elder brother you will always feel as if you don’t have enough. Luke (15:29).

God has committed all His resources to one major project! What Project? Finding His lost Children. That is what would make our Heavenly Father rejoice! That is what Jesus our elder brother came to do! To seek and save the lost.

Today as you go about your daily activities, remember to use them to help in this project of finding the lost children of God!

If any good parent discovers that their child is gone. That he or she left home without warning! They would commit all their resources to find that child.

All our Heavenly Father’s resources are ours as long as we are committed to the project of making disciples! Seeking and finding the lost children of the Father. So we are rich! We are not looking for money! We are looking for people!

If you want a jump start on your journey to seek and save the lost! You can start with the Free BiVo Minister Course!

Talk to me: How rich are you? What are your thoughts?

BiVo Or Market Place Ministry Discussion with Cynthia Egbunonu.

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My guest on the BiVo Podcast this month Cynthia Egbunonu is a busy Project Manager at her place of work. She shares how God has helped her work full-time at work, pastor with her husband, be a mom to three children and a wife to her husband.

Listen and discover her secret.

Do you know your Super Power?

What sets you apart? What is it that you have that will make people say I want to know her secret? What did Jesus have on earth? What was His Super Power?

Jesus had all powers and still has all powers! But the summary of it all is Love! Yes that is it! Unconditional Love and Faith in God! Everyone wants to be loved! Respected for who they are. They want to be judged by their intentions and valued!

You will be set apart if you allow Jesus to express His super powers through you! I’m always asking the Holy Spirit to manifest Himself through me! And I find that the first step to being used by God is love! When you are filled with the Holy Spirit, you are filled with love! You are filled with compassion! You embody all of Jesus! The world around you would wonder why you have so much peace, hope, joy and love!

I remember reading about Smith Wigglesworth when he was still a plumber! One of the rich people he was working for was convicted by the peace and joy that she could feel around him!

What makes you stand out? It is Christ in you!(Col 1:27) Your super power is Jesus in you! He manifests in many ways but the most basic and universal way is love (John 13:35). It is by love that all the people would know that we are the disciples of Jesus!

Jesus wants to work love in and through you and I . So that every one that knows you would wonder how you and other disciples like you can love like that!

Jesus! Please live freely through me! It’s by obedience! I choose to obey your instructions Lord!

Share your thoughts please in the comments section below.

Steps to Disciple Making

Making disciples is a lifestyle. It is the Jesus lifestyle. There are steps involved in the process. I have discovered that if you take disciple making or outreach as just a program you would greatly reduce your effectiveness!

  • Accept the call to make disciples
  • Pray for people all around you (
  • Meet the needs of the people around you as much as you can. (Matt 10:8)
  • Make friends genuinely
  • Present the gospel to each one as soon as the permit you to and you sense that they are genuinely interested.
  • Continue to build the friendship regardless of their response to the gospel
  • Continue to pray
  • Continue to make new friends
  • Help those that are saved to live like Jesus and love like Jesus
  • Introduce them to your church family along the way
  • Encourage them to make friends and make disciples
  • Continue to meet needs, make friends and make disciples for the rest of your stay on planet earth!

From time to time (many times) our Boss the Holy Spirit would change the script and make things way faster! Go with the flow!

If you want to get better at making disciples, the best place to start is with the BiVo Minister Course.

Have I missed some steps? Join the discussion! Say something in the comments section below!

Just say hello!

Why is it so hard to make friends? Being able to make friends is a great skill to have. I am always intrigued by how easy it is for children to make friends. They meet someone at a game console at the airport and before you know it they are playing together. Making friends shouldn’t be so hard!

I think the reason we find it difficult as adults is because we think too much about it.

How does he see me? Would she think I want something? Are they religious? Would they accept me? Will they want to come to visit me every day?

If you love someone, then it doesn’t matter how they respond at first. When they realize that you love them and want the best for them, they would relax a bit!

Recently one of our neighbors knocked on our door to say hello. She said she was wondering what would happen but she knocked all the same and now we are better friends.

It’s true that a few people don’t want to talk but I find that more people want to be loved than you can imagine.

Say hello! Introduce yourself and give your neighbor a complement. That is where it all starts.

Yes it takes time to develop friendships. We have been spending some time with our neighbors. We feel blessed each time we connect because we are exchanging love.

The time you invest into loving someone is never lost. It’s an investment. This investment is not necessarily returned by the person on whom the love was directed. It is multiplied to you by God just like the earth returns seed sown!

Go out and love someone today, tomorrow and everyday! Say hello! Especially to your neighbors with whom you can build a long term relationship. Jesus loves your neighbors and we are His hands and feet. The only way people around us will believe that Jesus loves them is when they feel His love through His disciples.

Do you have an interesting story about saying hello to a stranger or neighbor? Please share in the comments section below!

What is Joy? Real Joy!

What does it mean to be joyful? How can one have Joy? How do we even know that we want joy? Real Joy?

When I first noticed that there was a difference between happiness and joy was in 1986 after I lost my mom! At that time I didn’t have words to articulate my experience. I just knew that it was possible to be sad and happy at the same time!

I was sad that my mom was gone. I was confused about why she was killed by the robbers that killed her. But I was not sad deep down in my heart. Deep down in my heart, I felt that she was alright and I would see her again.

I’m sure that there are better ways to express what I felt but my conclusion is that the happiness that comes from the spirit (as opposed to the soul) is Joy! Real Joy!

This deep-seated unshakable joy came to me when I received Jesus as my savior and friend! It has stayed with me since then! But I have noticed a few things about this Joy!

  • Joy is a characteristic of the Kingdom of God (Rom 14:17).
  • Joy is a fruit of the Holy Spirit (Gal 5:22)
  • Joy overflows when a new disciple is born
  • Joy is available always. It never goes away. So you never lose access to this Joy (1 Thess 5:16).
  • Joy overflows when I obey an instruction of the Holy in my heart. Or when I successfully resist an attempt of the devil to trip that I was almost falling for! (John 15:11).

Over the years I have sensed this deep-seated real joy even when things were quite difficult in our lives. Don’t get me wrong. I still felt the pain but deep down there is this warmth and hope that is unshakable. It’s can be called peace or hope!

  • The joy was there when we had no money
  • It was there when the children were ill
  • It was there when I had a stroke in 2017
  • It was there when people said some mean and ignorant things to me or to Olu over the years.
  • It doesn’t leave! I’m grateful to God for this unexplainable Joy!

Here is my conclusion

When Jesus comes to live in us by the Holy Spirit, He comes with His Joy! Whatever makes Him makes us happy too but in our spirit. We are united with Jesus in our spirit (1 Cor 6:17).

If you want your joy to overflow always then invest more time into making disciples! New disciples make Jesus and the angels in heaven happy! (Luke 15:10).

Have you been used by the Holy Spirit to lead anyone to Jesus lately? If no, let show you how you have a lifestyle to makes disciples regularly. Take my free BiVo Ministers Course! The course is designed for you especially if you a busy professional, business person, or expert! You can make disciples for Jesus while you work! Register for the BiVo Minister Course now by clicking the bottom below.

The BiVo Minister Course

Do you have an experience of this Joy? Please share in the comments section below!

The Message

What is our message as disciples of Jesus? What was the central message of Jesus? What was the central message of the apostles and early disciples?

A study of gospels show that Jesus taught mainly about the Kingdom of God. To further highlight this we learn after His resurrection He spent 40 days with the disciples teaching about the Kingdom of God (Acts 1:3).

What about the apostles? What did they teach the most? The Kingdom of God? Yes! They taught about the Kingdom of God and Jesus the way to the Kingdom! (Act 4:2; Acts 5:20, 22; Acts 8:5, 25, 35; Acts 9:20, 22)

So what is your message? It should be the Kingdom of God and Jesus the only way to the Kingdom! In short form our message is Jesus!

But Jesus is a person not a concept or message! Yes! That is why our message should be clear that we are introducing the people to a person who is the Christ! Jesus Is the one who delivers us from our sins (self centered lifestyle).

To those who are lost, we preach Jesus the Saviour! When they receive salvation and forgiveness we teach them to allow Jesus to live in them just like we are learning daily! We also teach that Jesus wants to fill the earth with the glory of God!

How can we fill the earth with the glory of God? By making disciples of all nations! The message of the church is Jesus everywhere!

Remember that the church is the body of Christ. This means that the entire church is Christ Jesus! So when I say what is our message, it also means what is the message of Jesus? It’s is the good news of the Kingdom of God! Jesus is the way!

Priority! Fruit!

What are we really called to do as disciples of Jesus? How do you know that you are doing well as a disciple of Jesus? What is heavens bottom line?

Fruit! Yes Fruit! That’s what Jesus says in John 15. If a branch does not bear fruit it is useless (John 15:2).

“By this my Father is glorified, that you bear much fruit and so prove to be my disciples.”
‭‭John‬ ‭15:8‬ ‭ESV‬‬

What does Jesus mean by fruit? I believe it is Love. The type of love that took Jesus to the cross and brought salvation to humans!

Love that is an outflow of becoming a slave to God who is love. When Jesus lives through us, the outflow of His life is love. This love draws sinners to Him and they are saved!

In other words Fruit is love that produces salvation in people. A good disciple is one that multiplies Jesus every where by making disciples for Jesus.

This love is supernatural. It comes from God. This love is the Fruit of the Holy Spirit.

When was the last time you led someone to Jesus? Are you currently mentoring a disciple of Jesus?

Think about the testimonies we share at church. Think about the prayer points we write or share. What is the priority of the average Christian?

Remember that you can’t impress God with billions of dollars! Nothing you get on earth is worth anything in heaven!

If love that attracts people to Jesus is our priority then how much time do you invest in learning how to love like Jesus! How much time have you invested in loving your neighbors?

As I write this, I am asking God to help me invest more time and resources into what matters most to heaven!

If your life is not attracting other people to Jesus and your are not mentoring any disciples then please do not think that you are doing well. If you have a lot of money and influence and your influence is not attracting people to Jesus then you are building your own kingdom!

What should you do? Change your priority!Make salvation of souls and their discipleship your top priority! Devote time and resources to it! I can help with the first steps! Take the BiVo Minister Course and I will guide you to becoming a regular disciple maker for Jesus! Everyone you meet at work need Jesus! Let me show you how to help them!