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reverberate of hope, joy and confidence in God. His has affected the lives of almost everybody he has ever encountered. You could say Nick is has a perfect life. You would almost envy him until you saw him. Despite his large, joyful heart and strong convincing voice, Nick strikes a rather unusual stature: HE HAS NO ARMS OR LEGS!
Nick Vujicic is a preacher and motivational speaker of repute. He is in a class all by himself. His passion and energy is experienced when you encounter him. Whether it is a 500 or 5,000man crowd, the feel is the same. He conveys his message with such vibrancy that you have no other choice but to be moved to decision and action. His joy is almost palpable. He is a walking fireworks exhibition. You could call him mischievous and sarcastic. He is known to be naughty and full of pranks. In a nutshell, there is no dull moment with Nick.
Nick Vujicic was born on the 4th of December 1982 to a Serbian family. He was born with a rare disorder: Tetra-amelia, characterized by the absence of all four limbs. In early childhood, he contemplated suicide, but later became grateful for his condition when he realized his life and accomplishments would inspire others to strive for an even better excellent life. In 2005, he was nominated for the "Young Australian of the Year" Award. In 2010, he published his first book, Life Without Limits:
From the Americas to Asia and down to Africa, the voice and testimony of Nick has resonated with distinct tonality. His words 2
NO ARMS, NO LEGS...GREAT SMILE, GREAT HEART.
Inspiration for a Ridiculously Good Life. Vujicic also has a motivational DVD (Life's Greater Purpose) amongst other media, and a short documentary filmed in 2005 highlighting his home life and regular activities. He won the award for Best Actor in a Short Film for “The Butterfly Circus” which won the Doorpost Film Project's top prize of 2009 and the Best Short Film award at the Method Fest Film Festival. Butterfly Circus also just won the Best Short Film at the Feel Good Film Festival in Hollywood in 2010. In all, despite his limitations, he has lived a full life characterized by joy, laughter and impact.
Someone once said that the problems we have are not really problems in themselves, rather it is our perception of difficulties and strains that constitutes our greatest challenge. We tend to focus more on what we don‟t have and hereby, loose focus of what we have. Due to our selfish nature—a nature that always aims to acquire and hoard—we look out our windows for more things to acquire rather than keeping our sights locked on what we have and the possibilities they hold within them. At the beginning of this present economic recession, I heard a rather disturbing story. A billionaire that committed suicide because he went to bed a billionaire and woke up a
You can read more about him and his work at “www.lifewithoutlimbs.org”.
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millionaire. He was so upset, he took his life. That, to me, was one of the most pathetic twists I had ever of. This man had hundreds of millions of dollars stacked up in bank or locked up in assets, and just because he lost a few millions, life had no meaning for him. Talk about focusing on what you do not have. Some have everything, but one thing and will work themselves to a halt wishing they had that one thing.
I canâ€&#x;t recall exactly when I developed my speech impediment, but I attribute it to a bad habit of imitating my dear friend who was an established stutterer. For as long as I can recall, after my string of bad jokes and pranks, I have had to stammer my way through words. It has come with the almost usual anger management issues probably because of the difficulty of expression associated with the disorder. The flip side was a life of characterized by fewer words and more actions—fewer words because I chose which of the two options took the less time to accomplish. I would rather than hit someone that annoyed me than explain how they had upset me. I was an angry teenager, withdrawn,
I challenge you to REPENT, and by that I mean this: Change your thought pattern. Take your mind off your inadequacies and focus on what you have within and around you, and work them until they bring out the best in and for you.
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because I didn‟t want to suffer through many words, and edgy, because I chose action over words. It was a dark season of my life, but there was light at the end of the tunnel.
At the edge of my ponder, I encountered this text: My grace (My favor and loving-kindness and mercy) is enough for you…for My strength and power are made perfect (fulfilled and completed) and show themselves most effective in [your] weakness. Therefore, I will all the more gladly glory in my weaknesses and infirmities, that the strength and power of Christ (the Messiah) may rest (yes, may pitch a tent over and dwell) upon me!1
It took years for me to shift my focus off my speech limitations and unto other strong areas of my life. I was almost forced to repent when I had to answer my call to ministry. I was asked to be the Pastor of my church on campus. Being a Pastor meant having to speak publicly at least twice every week. How was I going to transition from hardly ever engaging in long discussions to joggling leadership training meetings, counseling sessions and sermons? Those were too many words—too fast, too soon! There had to be a radical change in my mentality if I was going to pull this off! God sent me the much needed help.
This was God speaking directly to me! My weakness was going to showcase the strength of God. That meant that despite my inadequacies, I was still going to make an impact so long as I kept my eyes off my short-comings. This was a great encouragement to me. It spurred me on. I 5
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chose to harness my strengths as best I could, while I trusted God to show up for me, filling my inadequacies and shining my strengths. He did just that! And by the way, I went on to deliver some of the most profound sermons ever! I remember one particular sermon that had me running between cities preaching and repreaching it. People gave testimonies of how my messages had moved them into new realms in their lives. It was not my power, but God acting through my weakness to bring about life change. I also recalled the story of Moses. He had a speech impediment like me, but was called to speak to the greatest ruler in all the earth, and he did that marvelously well and with all the power necessary to do so.
The Midianites had terrorized the Israelites for many years and now there was need for a deliverance. God needed a man to champion this cause and He saw that man in Gideon. In God‟s sight, Gideon was a mighty man of valor—a superhero, in our terminology—but take a look at Gideon‟s perspective of himself. Gideon said to him, "Me, my master? How and with what could I ever save Israel? Look at me. My clan's the weakest in Manasseh and I'm the runt of the litter."2 In other words, Gideon saw himself as the lowest man in the lowest family in the community. There was nothing lower than this. His sight was fixed
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on what he was not. He didn‟t share the perspective of the one who had created him. This shows that our minds can be so taken by thoughts of our deficiencies that even God could not change our thinking if care was not taken.
attacking player in a defensive position. The player will never operate to his optimum. The player has been asked to work from his area of weakness. In this place of weakness, there is no strength.
In my book, BECOMING THE ORIGINAL YOU, I make it exceedingly clear that without a healthy esteem of ourselves, we could never attain all that we have been designed to. One of the oldest tricks of the devil is robbing you of your confidence and hence your sense of authority. If you don‟t think you deserve something because of a limitation you have, you will never be able to drum up the confidence necessary to get it. It‟s plain and simple: you must learn to attack the world and your opportunities from your area of strength. The worst thing a coach could do is place an
We must look beyond what we do not have and process what we do have until it can fetch us what we want. We can‟t afford to waste our lives in covetousness, jealousy and envy. We can‟t waste our time depressed about what we lack when we have not maximized what we have in our hands. In 1 Kings 21, a King lost his life, his wife and his posterity all because he wanted a vineyard that belonged to one of his subjects. 7
NO ARMS, NO LEGS...GREAT SMILE, GREAT HEART.
The King had seen this vineyard which happened to be close to his palace and wanted it. He wanted it so bad he couldn‟t sleep or eat. He was rich and had the wealth of the nation at his disposal, but his focus was on a little vineyard he couldn‟t have. His wife, Jezebel, went on to frame and kill Naboth, the owner of the vineyard so that her husband could get his peace back. It is what you focus on that has the most value before you. And in the sight of King Ahab, nothing was as valuable as that piece of land. Absolutely nothing! He lost everything (including what he had) and everyone because of it!
Moses had spent the most of the preceding text listing out the limitations that would stop him from achieving his assignment, and what does God say? „Don‟t list out what you do not have, tell me what you have.‟ In Mark 6, we see Jesus moved with compassion for the crowd that had been following him for days now. He thought they needed food. When the question of feeding arose, the disciples were more concerned with what they didn‟t have and what they couldn‟t do rather than what they did have. In the end, Jesus teaches the value of the power in what you have. He blessed the five loaves of bread and two fishes, and when five thousand men, asides children, were done eating, there were twelve baskets of food left. What you have now is more than you need to impact the world.
When God was ready to use Moses, He asked him one question.
What is that in your hand?
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Our greatest victories and conquests lie within our abilities to discover, develop and deploy our potentials. You are about to start that business and you have spent weeks and even months listing out what you do not have. I challenge you to draw a similar list, but this time outline what it is you have. It could be relationships or resources. It could be your capacity to analyze in ways nobody can. It could even be your voice ( I am drawn to the voice behind CNN‟s “This is CNN.”). Whatever it is it, bring it to focus.
songs, but also for his piano-playing style. He is respected for his strengths and we all barely remember that his is only 5-foot, 4-inches tall! I challenge you to develop a mindset for your positives and watch as you rise to a place of prominence.
I have one more challenge for you. It is a double-edged challenge. I want to challenge you to joy and gratitude. This is the key to this new mindset I speak of.
You have been blessed with something. Don‟t tell me you don‟t even have one gift. Kirk Franklin is not one of the tallest men alive, even by a long shot, but He is one of the most prominent voices in the music industry, and not just for his beautifully written and produced
I challenge you to JOY because I want you to break away from the tendency of allowing your outward circumstances detect how you feel, what you do and thus, what you become. I challenge you to JOY because I want your 9
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the day.”4 and “A miserable heart means a miserable life; a cheerful heart fills the day with song.”5 I challenge you to JOY because “A happy heart is good medicine and a cheerful mind works healing, but a broken spirit dries up the bones.”6
confidence and expression to be the product of your heart and not your senses or acquisitions. I challenge you to JOY because I want you to draw from the strength that comes from being joyful. Joy is unattached to the prevailing circumstances about you. Joy is your Valium® in the storm. It naturally leads to peace. It is what holds your head up when you have had your application denied 10 times; it is what makes you apply for the 11th time. Joy knows that you have been blessed with talents that make you unique and as such generates a level of confidence necessary for sailing through the storm without being beaten down and drowned. Joy says, „Even if I don‟t have 1, 2, 3, I have 4, 5, 6, and that is enough to give me all I need including 1, 2, 3.‟ I Challenge you to JOY because “A cheerful heart brings a smile to your face; a sad heart makes it hard to get through
On the flip side, I challenge you to GRATITUDE because even when you consider your outward circumstances, I want you to do so knowing it could have been worse. You have a job you do not really enjoy, be grateful because there are people without job for years, praying to get a far less-paying, much more stressful job. I challenge you to GRATITUDE because I want you to be thankful for what you have rather than complain about what you do not have. I challenge you to GRATITUDE because it opens doors for you—it grants assess to realms that 10
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complaining could never. I challenge you to GRATITUDE because it says. „I thank God for what I have now and believe He can give me what I need.‟ If you are thankful for what you have, you immediately begin to unlock its potential. Thankfulness focuses you on the giver of gifts rather than on the gifts—this opens the doors to an abundance. I challenge you to GRATITUDE because it multiplies what little you think you have ( Compare five loaves and two fishes to the five thousand plus people who were fed by it).
pushed to the wall by the egoistic mannerisms of his compatriot, and one day, he snapped. If he was going to remain confident and with a healthy self-esteem, he would be forced to see the value of what he had and not worry about what he didn‟t have. His new reality coincided with another bout with his rich friend and it went thus. Rich man: “Why have you chosen to block the road with that your rusty old bicycle? Didn‟t you see me coming? Poor man: “Yes, I did, but I didn‟t know that my rickety bicycle would proof a blockade for your big car.” Rich man: “What do you mean by that?” Poor man: “All I have is a bicycle and yet I am proving a challenge for you. What would happen if I had a motorcycle or even a car? And
Sometime ago, I read a story of a rich man who made it his duty to taunt his poor neighbor. He made a habit of intimidating his underprivileged brother, but one encounter changed this trend. The poor man had been 11
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by the way, if you are so rich, why can‟t you afford a common bicycle?” The poor man walked away with a broad smile on his face. Today, he had finally stood up to his neighbor. Never again would he feel sorry for himself and intimidated by those who had what he didn‟t.
limitations and thus, sabotaged the impact he now has. “Most of us have used our strengths to promote and exalt our weaknesses. With our lips and deeds, we have made obvious our inadequacies and downplayed the vigor of our forte.”
One look at Nick Vujicic and you immediately catch the image of a man who has decided to work with what he has, no matter how little it might seem. Today, he sits amongst the ranks of men who have radically impacted the lives of fellow men and women. Now, what if he had focused so much on his lack of limbs (his weakness) to such extent that his strong voice and energy (his strengths) echoed the fact that he was limbless? He would then have used his God-given strengths to make obvious his
The world is waiting on you to use what you have. The whole earth is waiting on your impact. And remember… Isn't it obvious that God deliberately chose men and women that the culture overlooks and exploits and abuses…to put the wise to shame, and what the world
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calls weak to put the strong to shame.7
References: Nickâ€&#x;s story is from Wikipedia 1 2 Corinthians 12:9 (Amplified Bible) 2 Judges 6:15 (The Message) 3 Exodus 4:2 (Amplified Bible) 4 Proverbs 15:13 (The Message) 5 Proverbs 15:15 (The Message) 6 Proverbs 17:22 (Amplified Bible) 7 1 Corinthians 1:27 (The Message & Amplified Bible)
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