“I returned, and saw under the sun, that the race is not to the swift, nor the battle to the strong… but time and chance happen to all” Ecclesiastes 9:11

“And it came to pass that night, that the angel of the LORD went out, and struck in the camp of the Assyrians a hundred fourscore and five thousand: and when they arose early in the morning, behold, these were all dead bodies.” 2 Kings 19:35

Jerusalem was surrounded by an undefeated army. Inside they were weakened unto death through starvation. Certainly the battle would go to the strong as it had so many times before. But there’s a game changer here… Time and chance.

I am talking about being in the right place at the right time or as was the case for the Assyrians, in the wrong place at the wrong time. Time and chance are under God’s domain. He chooses if and when He will upset the apple cart or fill it with apples. All of our efforts can be undone in an instant or multiplied favorably beyond our comprehension. Remember the great catch of fish the disciples caught when they threw their nets on the other side?  Time and chance is where God works anonymously.

In the case of the Assyrians, Hezekiah, king of Judah, took the letter from the king of Assyria with all its vile threats to the house of the Lord where he spread it before the Lord and prayed - fervently. God heard and introduced a game changer. That night 185,000 Assyrians died in their sleep. Here is what likely happened…

Jeremiah, a contemporary of Isaiah, prophesied how the Lord would raise up a destroying wind against those who would stand up against the Lord. (Jer 51:1) Though not specifically referring to the Assyrians, they certainly fell into that class. What you might not know is that there is a hot, dry wind called a Simoon that can raise the temperature and drop the humidity to such extremes that the body cannot release its heat.

It is called a “poison wind” because of its suffocating clouds of dust and sand. One of these actually hit Santa Barbara, CA in 1859 bringing the local morning temperature from a comfortable 77 degrees to 133 degrees within about two hours. The temperature stayed in around 130 degrees for the majority of the day and left as quickly as it came leaving many animals dead and people fearing the end of the world had come.  What would you think if it happened to you, especially as you saw the temperature climb past the eighties into the nineties, then past 110, 120, 130… in just 120 minutes and still climbing?

Here is what I believe… The Angel of the Lord raised up a destroying wind and it wiped out 185,000 Assyrians. Those who had put their trust in God knew the destroying wind was the unseen hand of God. Those that didn’t believe were destroyed. The great game changer, God Almighty cloaking Himself in “time and chance” to the unbelieving revealed Himself as a mighty deliverer to the people of God. The battle is not always to the strong, because time and chance do HAPPEN! If you need a game changer in your situation, you may want to follow Hezekiah’s example.

“I returned, and saw under the sun, that the race is not to the swift, nor the battle to the strong, neither yet bread to the wise, nor yet riches to men of understanding, nor yet favor to men of skill; but time and chance happens to them all.” Ecclesiastes 9:11

I have been writing to you about the first of the seven factors Solomon talks about that contribute greatly to success. It’s about speed or decisiveness. Solomon is making the point that as important as speed and decisiveness is, there are two “game changers” at the end of his list that can make speed a non-factor.

They are time and chance. Time has to do with timing or a set, appointed time and chance is just another way of saying an unplanned occurrence which we all experience daily, like the phone ringing or getting a flat tire. Those two work together and can absolutely change everything for you.

I am going to develop those two thoughts for you in the weeks ahead, but today I want you to understand a little about timing. There are certain things that only come around once in your life and if you pass them by, they are gone for good. There are other things that present themselves more than once, but the circumstances will always be different and thus the outcome.

A simple example would be our upcoming rainforest trip to Panama, June 26 - 30. We are taking a group of folks who are strongly considering what it would be like to become a certified rainforest business coach using one of God’s most amazing creations, the rainforest as a business model. For some of you, this is one of those timing things… you know that it is coming at the right season in your life and that it resonates, but you haven’t secured your reservation.

Our group size is limited and we only have four spots left. Many of you have indicated your desire to come on this trip and we are happy to welcome those of you who qualify. (A suitable business background and resonance with our vision and business model is required) If you wish to be considered for this trip, please email us at admin@rainforeststrategy.com or call Cheryl at 941-377-9384 today.  We leave in less than 30 days and we have inquiries from Asia, Europe, Central and North America this time.  If this is your time, I don’t want you to miss it.

“I returned, and saw under the sun, that the race is not to the swift…” Ecc 9:11

“…let us run with patience the race that is set before us” Heb 12:1

The way I see it, we are all in a race. We didn’t sign up for a race, but we are in one. You may not feel like being in one and you may drop out or not care about how you finish or if you finish. In fact, if you haven’t felt like that at some point in your life, you haven’t lived long enough.

The common Greek word for race is “stadion” which is where we get the word stadium. It is also a distance of 600 feet and thus most races were sprints. But Paul uses a different word for “race”. He uses the Greek word “agon” from which we get the word “pleasure”. OK… I was just seeing if you were paying attention. It is where we get the word “agony”.

Paul is telling us that life is not a sprint (stadion). It’s a marathon, an agony to run, but run we must and the secret to running an agonizing marathon is patience and as the next verse reveals, it will help a great deal to be looking unto Jesus, the author and finisher of our faith.

What I want you to take home today is the realization that we are in a marathon of a race. It will last until we die. While there is great joy along the way, there is also considerable agony. The agony is proof that you are still in the race and there is a great cloud of witnesses both in this life and among those who have gone on before us, who are rooting for you and cheering you on. I am among those cheering for you.

“I returned, and saw under the sun, that the race is not to the swift, nor the battle to the strong, neither yet bread to the wise, nor yet riches to men of understanding, nor yet favor to men of skill; but time and chance happens to them all.” (Ecc 9:11)

In the last two blogs I addressed the idea of SPEED. The importance of being decisive and how important it is to quit putting into the future what belongs in the present. God will let you postpone your blessings and even your destiny for as long as you are willing to postpone them. It takes faith to bring the future into the present and it will take faith to maintain them. If you have the faith to bring the future into the present you have the strength of faith to sustain it.

Things speed up dramatically for you when you pull the future into the present. Quit waiting for God to bless you and recognize that He has already blessed you with more than you can put your arms around now! His favor has already been released in your direction. As I have previously written, it is raining favors every day so quit praying for favors and start asking Him to show you where they are and how to step into them.

One way quite frankly is to get mad. I know that doesn’t seem very spiritual, but it can be. Have you had enough yet? At the end of Isaac’s life he blessed Esau by saying… “By your sword you shall live and serve your brother, but the time will come when you will grow restive and break loose and take dominion, and tear his yoke off from your neck.”  Have you grown restive yet? Are you mad yet? Have you had enough of barely making it?

The other day a man told me about a friend of his who said, “I’m always going broke, but I never quite get there.” Sadly, too many of us can relate to that, but it’s time TODAY to put a stop to that. It’s time to go to battle for your destiny. (1 Tim 1:18) Allow me to borrow from a famous quote… Aye, fight and you may lose. Run, and you’ll survive… at least a while longer. But dying in your beds, many years from now, would you be willing to trade ALL the days, from this day to that, for one chance, just one chance to come back here and confront your fears and step into the battle and actually live out what you say you believe and put it all on the line?

You might lose your money, but you will never lose your reward. You might lose a battle here and there, but you will never again lose heart and more importantly, you will have found courage and honor and valor and love. Fear may have taken your past, but it will never again rob you of your future! It’s time to move into your destiny. Just don’t expect it to come without a battle and a few scars to show for it.

“Say not, There are yet four months, and then comes harvest? behold, I say unto you, Lift up your eyes, and look on the fields; for they are white already to harvest.” (John 4:35)

Flipping through the gospel channels this morning, I heard a fiery preacher telling people that a Big Door of Opportunity was about to open up for them. My instant reaction was to agree with that. I want a big door to open for me just like you do. As soon as I had agreed with that statement, I believe the Lord allowed me to see the fallacy of that kind of thinking.

How many times have you heard statements like, “the harvest is coming” or “your breakthrough is just around the next corner” or “bring the harvest Lord”? And now we can add to that, “The Lord is going to open up a big door for you.” But what He helped me understand today is that the door has already been opened! The breakthrough occurred when Jesus destroyed the works of the devil, conquered death and Hell and sat down at the right hand of God. The harvest is rotting in the field while we pray for revival. Jesus is telling us to open our eyes and see!

Listen closely. This morning as my wife and I went for our daily walk, I held my walking stick out in front of me so the end was about 3 - 4 feet in front of me. As I walked, I kept trying to reach the end of the stick but it stayed just a little in front of me, never quite coming into my grasp. As long as you are believing something good is going to happen, be that a harvest, a breakthrough, an open door, etc but you never bring that expectation into the present, it will always remain just beyond your grasp.

The devil doesn’t care what you believe about tomorrow as long as it remains in the future. He only gets scared when you bring that promise, that expectation into the “now” and see it materialized and come to fruition. We’ve got to stop hoping for a brighter tomorrow and start believing for a better today. And that means acting accordingly. Act as though the door has been opened. Act as though the breakthrough has already been accomplished. Act as though the harvest field is truly ripe and ready to be picked. Yes, we will still have to go to work and gather the harvest, but we need to do that today and not always be putting it off to tomorrow.

“I returned, and saw under the sun, that the race is not to the swift, nor the battle to the strong, neither yet bread to the wise, nor yet riches to men of understanding, nor yet favor to men of skill; but time and chance happens to them all.” (Ecc 9:11)

In reading this passage, it seems there are seven things that greatly affect the success you achieve in life. (1) Speed (2) Strength (3) Wisdom (4) Understanding (5) Skill (6) Time (Timing) (7) Chance (Circumstances we neither control nor have foreknowledge of)

Time and Chance are what I want to talk about in detail but first, let’s cover the first five we are most familiar with… Speed has a lot to do with the ability to move forward, to take action, to not hesitate. It has a lot to do with decisiveness. Not that we should be too quick to decide on things, but those who can rightly decide quickest usually win the prize. Remember the game show, Jeopardy? The person who could decide they knew the answer quickest was given first shot to claim the prize. If their decision was wrong and they had the wrong information, they lost money but if they were both decisive and correct, they won.

Years ago I asked the Lord to give me Proverbs like Solomon of old. The very first one He gave me was about decision making. “In the valley of indecision lay the skeletal remains of many a worthy plan.” He helped me understand that a lot of folks have great plans, great insights, great inventions, innovations and strategies. Their problem is they have no speed. They are not decisive. They are stuck in the paralysis of analysis. They are so afraid of making a mistake; they make the biggest mistake by never stepping out and trying.

Winning in business is often about speed, but speed also kills. (He that makes haste to be rich shall not go unpunished. Pr 28:20) There is a difference between reckless speed for the sake of speed and prudent decisiveness. If you want to succeed in life, it may be time to add some velocity to your decision making process. It may be time to add some velocity to your actions. Why are you so hesitant? What are you waiting for? Put some speed in your seed! (your idea, your dream)

Many of you are distracted and worried about many things. You are guarding your finances, your job, your marriage, your kids, your property and much more. It all sounds good, but Scripture tells us to guard our hearts. Every issue in life is affected by that.

Our hearts are moved by what we think about. Our thoughts are activated largely by what we see and what we hear. So to guard our hearts, we must control what we watch and what we listen to. I for one, have recently decided to shut the flow of news coming to me down to an occasional drip, from what was a steady flow. It’s amazing how much clutter that removed from my mind and how I was able to receive so much from the Lord during the day because I wasn’t distracted with the state of the economy, etc. And what I received is actually helping me succeed despite being in a bad economy.

But there’s more. We have two sets of eyes and two sets of ears but most of us only consider the natural, physical ones. We have eyes of understanding and an inner hearing that we must also control. What do we imagine and visualize when we daydream? What inner conversation are you having in silence that is raising your blood pressure? The inner vision and inner listening are just as potentially destructive and perhaps more so, because we tend to not acknowledge that realm, but Paul tells us to bring every thought, every imagination into captivity to the obedience of Christ.

Since I’ve been aware of this, the pollution is leaving my mind and my heart is filling up with very good things. May it be so for you today as well.

Note: Yesterday, we did a webinar to give details for our upcoming trip to the Panamanian rainforest June 26 - 30. Many of you could not make the live event and have requested a replay option so you could hear it this weekend. Here it is. If you are interested in joining us there, I would like to speak with you first. Be sure to email me at admin@rainforeststrategy.com so we can set up a time to discuss this.

I just heard that Guy Kawasaki recently said something like “every business oriented person needs to pour hot wax in their ears so they will stop hearing the continuous stream of bad news”. I think he’s right. We not only need to remove the clutter of bad news, but we also need to fill our mind with good information.

Deep in the Amazon during the hot, dry season, scientists were surprised to discover that the dry season is actually the “good season” for tree and plant growth.  That’s right, the Amazon actually goes through an annual period of “recession” (shortage of water) lasting several months and yet those same regions actually “green up” during that time. This was not true of cleared areas where cattle grazed and grass grew, but in the rainforest, the dry season is a time of rapid growth.

Here’s how it works… The forest soil retains much of the moisture from the rainy season down as far as 30 feet where the roots can still access all the water they need.  When the sun is shining, it provides the power to fuel the production process of wood, leaves, fruit, nuts, etc. Water is information (Isaiah 11:9 / Eph 5:26) and light enables vision which drives production (work). What you have is a picture of a person or a company who stores up information or resource (see Prov 10:14) to be used when everyone else is in recession.

J.D. Rockefeller and Andrew Carnegie made their moves during the great depression of the 1870’s. Conrad Hilton and J. Paul Getty made their moves during the Great Depression of the 1930’s. They advanced when everyone else was retreating. Which way are you headed? Care to advance with me?

Folks, if you will shut off the spigot of bad news and fill your mind with good information you can enter the best time of growth you’ve ever experienced despite what everyone else is experiencing.  When most people are retreating, it’s the best time to be advancing. There is less competition for that market space. I am not sure how long our current recession will last, but I do know that it is the best window of opportunity I’ve ever lived in!

If you have ever wanted to know how to prosper during down times and if you’ve ever been interested in being used by God to help others survive and prosper when the world is in decline, join me today at 2:00 pm EST for our live call and webinar to explore what it takes to become a rainforest certified business coach whom the world seeks out for answers. You can prosper like the tree planted by the river, regardless of the economic climate and we can help you do that!

Join us Here TODAY at 2:00 pm EST

While touring throughout British Columbia, Canada, on our way to a magnificent temperate rainforest, the Old Country Market in Coombs is a must see destination.  The Market is famous for its “goats on the roof” that are perhaps the most famous animals in the world. Each year millions and millions of people make a point of traveling to this market to see and take pictures of these otherwise ordinary goats.

What draws them there is the fact that the goats are on the roof, which is covered in grass to feed the grazing goats. While there, many of those millions and millions of people stop inside the market where they can buy the freshest local produce, a selection of gifts from the farthest reaches of the world, a variety of international meats and cheeses along with a wide selection of mouth watering burgers, wraps and sandwiches.

In rainforest lingo, this is none other than the Orchid Element. There are seven elements orchids have at their disposal to attract interest in potential clients (pollinators) and one of these is unusual shape or design. This market located on an island in a hard to get to location has literally millions of visitors because of one thing… they attract attention using the principle of unusual shape or design by placing goats on the roof.

Had they placed a traditional billboard, it would eventually go unnoticed. Certainly it would never have attracted tourists, but this one simple concept which has nothing to do with what’s inside their market has generated millions and millions of dollars in revenue. They don’t need to spend money on advertising. They don’t even have to feed the goats. The tourists buy food inside and feed it to the goats for them!

Unusual, eye catching shape. This is just one of the seven constants orchids have at their disposal to attract clients. How you can grow your business by leaps and bounds using unconventional ideas is what the rainforest business strategy is all about. Tomorrow, May 14^th at 2:00 pm EST I will be hosting a webinar discussing some of The Seven Wealth Secrets of the Rainforest where I will be sharing about this incredible opportunity to visit the rainforest and become a certified rainforest coach using the most successful business model on the planet as a teaching tool!

Join Us Here!

“The works of the LORD are great, studied by all who have pleasure in them.” Psalm 111:2

If you want to learn something about someone, study their work. The heavens declare God’s handiwork and all of creation reveals His ways and His power. When you study what God made, you learn the way He does things. If you are wise like Solomon was, you will copy and emulate those ways and you will prosper.

Talk about “built to last”… God knows a little about making things last and we are no fools who have chosen to take pleasure in and to study the things God has made. He has embedded His wisdom there for you and I to find and that wisdom is 100% transferable to business. Consider the rainforest for example… It is the most diverse and abundant ecosystem on the planet and yet has very limited capital (poor topsoil) to work with. The way God gets abundance from relative scarcity is what every entrepreneur, business owner or household manager needs to know!

Let me give you an example of something we call the Brazil Nut Effect. It’s the principle in the rainforest that shows you how to acquire what you need or want with little or no cash. A young man in Canada utilized this principle to trade one red paperclip for a house. It took him a year and several value exchanges but he ended up with a house free and clear, with no cash and no debt.  It’s all about being able to exchange relative value for relative value, with emphasis on the word relative.

When you understand this vital rainforest principle, you can acquire anything you need. I personally have used it to acquire a full page ad priced at $63,000 in one of the worlds’ most successful business magazines. I’ve coached a client with no cash to exchange a concept and an intangible benefit for several substantial real estate properties worth tens of millions of dollars.

It works at any level, but requires a little ingenuity. And in case you’re wondering, this is not barter. I will be sharing this principle in more detail in a webinar this coming Thursday, May 14^th at 2:00 pm EST. To be clear, the purpose of the webinar is not to sell a book or a product, but rather to inform those who might be interested in our upcoming Rainforest Excursion, June 26^th - 30^th in Panama.

This is not a vacation, though it will feel like one because we are staying at a world class, five star hotel. Between rainforest excursions, we will be sharing with about twenty attendees the details of our business coaching opportunity and how the rainforest serves as an incredible model for a successful business regardless of limited resources.  We are looking for a few professional men and women who love adventure, want to change the world and have their own coaching business, making well above average income in the process.

This Thursday, May 14^th at 2:00 pm EST I will be hosting a webinar on The Seven Wealth Secrets of the Rainforest where I will be sharing about this incredible opportunity to visit the rainforest and become a certified rainforest coach using the most successful business model on the planet as a teaching tool!

Join Us Here!