Opportunity within the Present Economic Downturn

Opportunity within the Present Economic Downturn

[My Offline Bible] Ezra 9
7 Since the days of our fathers have we been in a great trespass unto this day; and for our iniquities have we, our kings, and our priests, been delivered into the hand of the kings of the lands, to the sword, to captivity, and to a spoil, and to confusion of face, as it is this day.

8 And now for a little space grace hath been shewed from the LORD our God, to leave us a remnant to escape, and to give us a nail in his holy place, that our God may lighten our eyes, and give us a little reviving in our bondage.

9 For we were bondmen; yet our God hath not forsaken us in our bondage, but hath extended mercy unto us in the sight of the kings of Persia, to give us a reviving, to set up the house of our God, and to repair the desolations thereof, and to give us a wall in Judah and in Jerusalem.

Adversities are not always the results of sin. But many are. The economic crisis Nigeria is going through right now is one that came as a result of iniquity, injustice, greed, laziness, corruption, leadership irresponsibility, uncaring and unloving attitude, wickedness and so many other such behaviours we have developed and indulged in over time.

Nigeria is one of the most blessed nations in the world, we are like the city of Jericho that called upon Elisha with the complaint that the situation of the city was good but the water was bad...

[My Offline Bible] 2 Kings 2
19 And the men of the city said unto Elisha, Behold, I pray thee, the situation of this city is pleasant, as my lord seeth: but the water is naught, and the ground barren.

We are well situated and abundantly endowed. Whatever resource you want to judge us with, we'll come tops. We are behind in nothing. We have great potentials.

But potentials alone do not bring success, if they aren't properly managed. Instead of learning to manage what we want, greed took over and we began to consume foolishly until the back is broken for the umpteenth time without learning any lessons or without putting whatever lesson we have learnt to any use not having enough leadership gut to do so.

Well, here we are.

But in our present situation, we need not lose hope. I'm sure what we have now is an open door, an opportunity for us individually and collectively get better.

There is a window of opportunity as it was in the days of Ezra, the scribe and Nehemiah. Though we need to recognise our errors and stop defending them. We need to identify where we went wrong and correct them.

Having done that we need to put despair behind us and begin to see what can be done.

One thing we need to understand is that every national economic crisis primarily changes people's spending pattern and so creates new demands for new products and those at the receiving end of that spending gets the money being spent.

And there lies the way. We need to find out where the shift is heading to and to position there to supply needs at that end.

I can tell that luxury goods and entertainment may suffer during economic downturn and so those in such industries must reposition. I realize that products and programs on premium bouquets of some digital cable television programs providers are being shared to lower bouquets to keep customers otherwise the first to go would be such expensive bouquets on people's scales of preference.

But people will always eat and will deprive other industries to fund the food industry.

With the awareness of people being raised to buy home made things, we have an opportunity to make the most of such consumer preferences.

With the fight against corruption in high gear cutting corners will lose taste even if slowly and those who deals righteously would compete favorably in the market place.

We need to see hope and position adequately. Many who have enjoyed the status quo who may not change may  go down with the crisis while many who today have nothing may become new millionaires out of the crisis by proper position...

I pray God grants us understanding and wisdom.

A Pastor's widow's mite...

Good afternoon!