God's Lily Training

Embarkation dimension

This includes how to set off on the journey towards building ministries and businesses. There are all sorts of practicalities that can be covered here including things like how to set up an appropriate legal structure for what you want to do. In the UK this would include setting up a charity or a limited company and looking at which of these legal structures suits what you are doing best. It also means helping people set up an embryo organisation that will grow into the type of organisation they want it to become.

Community shares

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There are ways of setting up projects where you can use some of the innovative laws of past generations. One such way is to set up a co-operative.  these ideas are about sharing risks while doing something that will improve the whole community.  They are like a business as it is investing in something that could make a profit but might not do. Yet it is not a business as we know it or a charity as we know them either.

This website will explain more about the idea of how you can use community shares to raise the capital need to get a large community project off the ground.

https://wales.coop/helping-people-invest-in-their-community/

Will your social business work?

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A social business is set up primarily to serve the community rather than to make money. One of the problems with such a business is that as serving people is the primary motive it is easy to forget about the fact that it needs to work as a business in order to survive.

This link will take you to a series of webpages from the Welsh Government that will help you work out if your idea of a social business will actually work from a financial standpoint.

The majority of this information will be applicable to anyone in the UK. However, if you live outside the UK or in a part of the UK that has developed a different legal system to the rest of the UK you will need to check if everything is appropriate to your own situation.

Website for those starting a business

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The Welsh government has set up some useful websites. This link will take you to the start of a series of pages of starting your own business. There is a lot of good advice here. Obviously, most of it general but it is worth reading.  The links on this site will give you a  good grounding. in topics like preparing a  business plan, market research,  marketing and finance.

You can make a start by going  to https://businesswales.gov.wales/zones/starting-up

There are very few differences between the legal requirements in Wales and those in England. There are a few more between Wales and Northern Ireland and Scotland. However, most of this is basic business advice and is helpful for anyone looking for the basics.

What is the right legal structure for a social business?

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There are a number of possible legal structures can be used for a social business. Some of them are seen as primarily charitable. Others are seen as .a primarily business structures. There are the number of options that you could use. This link will take you to a pdf on the Welsh Government website that will help you make up your mind.

https://businesswales.gov.wales/socialbusinesswales/sites/socialbusiness/files/Legal%20Forms%20vSBW.pdf

The best laid plans

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It is so easy to get distracted by things that seem worthwhile. The challenge is to get everything in balance. That is why planning is so essential. One problem with planning though is that it takes time. That has been my problem this week.

It started with such a simple task. It was time to update an old website so that it worked as I intended it to work. The first question though was given all the changes in recent months what was that website supposed to be doing.

Remember how little children play the why game with you? Why do we do this? It is like this. But why is it like this? Well, it is because of that? But why is that important? Remember the exasperation and the deep thought that sometimes went into those answers. It must have been someone who had looked after a child that did this that developed that concept into a method for looking at all the various layers of a situation.

I asked the why question on a few layers of that website. It was not just the website that needed updating. The whole concept behind what the business that was showcased by that website needed updating.

Tuning into God’s desires to create an effective plan

Experience has shown me that the best way of doing things is God’s way. He is able to assess all the factors that go into a decision far better than we ever can. Being all-knowing makes it so much easier for Him to come up with the right series of options.

The problem is tuning into what God wants us to do. One way I have done this is to ask a question and then allow God to find a way to give me an answer. That answer could come via journalling or a dream. This time this was not enough. I was desperate to get this right.

There is a saying that is used outside the church that I have found is true within it as well. It goes that when the student is ready the teacher turns up. I was ready to learn a new technique i.e. a new way to approach God to ask for help.

I did not know it but the answer to that idea came as a result of something I had done a week or two earlier. I had bought online access to a conference but my internet connection had not worked very well so I had to wait for online access to the recordings. One thing about having a limited time to watch a video is that it is an encouragement to watch it hence I tried watching them while trying to work out what to do with that website.

The speaker on the first talk is known for their teaching on the Courts of Heaven. If you do a search for You videos by Robert Henderson on the Courts of Heaven you will find at least 2 series of videos on the topic.

One thing I have discovered about Christian teaching is that there is a limit to how many beads or pearls there are in the bible. However, there is no limit to the way people put together those beads or pearls. I have listened to Robert Henderson and recognised many familiar pearls from scripture yet the way he has put them together adds a new dimension to Christian teaching.

If you have not guessed from the term Courts of Heaven he has developed a whole series of teachings that describe how we can use the idea of the Courts of Heaven to deal with the accuser of the brethren. The idea is to deal with the legal rights of the enemy to hold us in captivity so that we can be free to do what God wants us to do.

The main way that we do that is to repent of the things that the enemy says disqualifies us from having what God wants us to have.  Once we have recognised our errors and dealt with them the adversary has no right to stop us. In fact, once we have done that, God can then give a verdict that stops the enemy in his tracks so we are set free.

One of the aspects of that teaching is that God has written down everything that we are supposed to be doing in the books of heaven. Revelation says that those books are sealed until they are opened by the intercession of the saints.

The talk I was listening to as I was trying to sort out this website was about the importance of reminding God the judge in the Courts of Heaven that we wanted to serve His purposes and build His reputation on earth. Another aspect of this was to ask God to open the books in heaven. You see once the books are opened the contents can be read by the spirits of men and repeated in prophecies, dreams and journalling.

For someone like me who sees things in concepts and images, this teaching makes a lot of sense. OK, It might not to you because I have just given an outline of 5 or 6 hours of detailed teaching.

The outcome

It started as trying to think through how to remodel a website. It ended up trying to get God’s help to remodel an entire business. OK, many things had changed since that business had been set up. The changes included:

  • a geographical shift that meant this business was operating in a different micro-culture with different people
  • a technology shift that came about after realising that there was were better software solutions than the software that was being used in the early stages
  • a legal shift that meant that new rules relating to taxation had been introduced that made things that once were relatively easy to set up into very difficult to do if they were going to comply with the law

The one thing that had not changed was the vision. The way to bring that vision to reality had changed but the vision itself had not. The vision had been received after the documentation describing the purposes of the business had been filed with the regulators. The added complication to this remodelling is that it is a social enterprise and as such has to have a community interest statement.

The original advice was to make this legally binding document as broad as possible. I am not sure if that was good advice as it has made it hard to focus. All that fuzziness made it so much harder to achieve very much and to persuade anyone else of the value of what the business was doing.

Having a broad target made it hard to write the annual report that explained to the regulators how the business had met the aims listed in the community interest statement. Whatever was written, it looked as though little had been done in comparison to the aims.

Lesson learnt. Time to rewrite the community interest statement. This time it will be more detailed and based on what has been learnt on the journey so far. It is not just the regulator who uses that statement to reflect on the effectiveness of the social enterprise but God the judge and our adversary do this as well. All the more reason to make every effort to get it right this time.

Thankfully it is not that difficult to change. It does not cost much either. It is just a question of getting on with it and getting it done. Once that is done it will be so much easier to work out what the website is supposed to do. Once that becomes obvious it will then be possible to set up a website that helps this social enterprise go where God wants it to go.

Strange how chain reactions work isn’t it.

 

Does our experience shape our theology or should our theology shape our experience?

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I have heard people on both sides of this argument say the other approach is wrong. The issue becomes what shapes our expectations. We will only see what we expect to see. What we expect will colour our expectations of what we take in via our senses. I will explain what I mean by using one of the less contentious discussions that have arisen as a result.

What do we mean by a carpenter?

A strange question. We are told that Jesus was brought up by a carpenter so it is a question that links in with his early life experience.

One obvious answer is that a carpenter is someone who makes something out of wood. What things? Furniture, windows and door frames for houses, decorative woodwork in a house of worship. Those are not the only things made of wood that a carpenter might create but it gives a flavour of the possibilities.

The Greek word tekton is often translated as carpenter. Some say it could be translated as builder, as a tekton also worked in stone. Some describe such a person as an artisan others as a craftsman. So although he may well have made his own furniture the main way that money came to Joseph as that he used his skills on building projects.

What did Joseph help build?

I have heard it suggested that Joseph did some work on the temple in Jerusalem. For the pious Jew, this would be the job of all jobs. There again it would really depend on who wanted building work done and was willing to pay people to do it.

If Joseph had done some work on the temple was Jesus was old enough to go with him as an apprentice? Strange thought, did Jesus actually help build the temple and spend time there early in life? If he did would he have got to know the religious leaders? Was this why as a twelve year old he was so at home talking to these religious leaders?

We don’t know the answers to these questions but we can make some educated guesses. We do this by looking at the biblical account plus non-biblical evidence plus our experience of life.

Did Joseph the carpenter run his own business?

I am not sure that there is any conclusive evidence either way. What I have noticed is that people with jobs tend to see him has having a job. On the other hand, those who have businesses see Joseph as a small businessman.

It is that expectation thing again. If you live in a society where there are lots of small independent family run businesses then that is what you would expect. If your experience is that most people with these kinds of skills work for other people then that is what you would expect.

How do we deal with this situation?

You could say that it is a good thing that we don’t know for sure. If we were told for certain Joseph was a small businessman then those with jobs would feel less attached to the biblical account. If we were told for certain that Joseph had a job and was employed by others then those with a small business would feel less attached to the story.

The sad thing is that it is too easy to argue over something that in fact we do not really have the evidence to say what was the truth the whole truth and nothing but the truth. Does it really matter?

Whatever your interpretation you need to use it wisely? If you see Joseph as a self-employed craftsman then you can use it to encourage more people to start their own business. What you cannot do is to blast people for having a job rather than building up their own business. If you see Joseph as someone employed by others then you cannot use it to blast those who have a calling to set up a business.

The problem comes when the way we interpret things according to ungodly experience. In the example, I have used it would be an extreme position to take if someone said that either running a small business or a having a job was unbiblical.

Interpretation or excuses?

There are other situations where how we interpret things leads us to finding excuses to do things that are unbiblical. Then there are situations where people so blast those who find excuses that those who really should do something dare not do it.

For example, some people who give up on marriage and get a divorce rather than look for help. Then there are other people who are in seriously abusive marriages who say divorce is wrong. They say that marriage is until death shall part and end up staying in that marriage until they are murdered. They kept their marriage vows but lost their life. For them, the idea that divorce is wrong is an excuse to stay in a situation where they could be harmed.

There are people who moan about those who have an experience that they don’t really understand and then say that their experience can be explained from the Bible. Those who have had the experience are accused of interpreting the Bible in a certain way to show that their experience is acceptable.

It is tough knowing just how much impact our interpretation has for good or ill. I suspect the majority of people would override the idea that divorce is wrong if the alternative was the death of one of the partners.

Does iron sharpen iron?

It is strange how the comments that others make force you to examine the way that you do things. They help you see your situation from another perspective. You then moderate your approach and do things that answer their criticisms.

Oh crumbs do you realise what I have just done. I have all but come full circle. Our experience of being criticised can change what we think and what we do. I think that is what it is supposed to be like as this leads to constant improvement.

This is a concentration of this idea. Don’t forget to look at our other posts to find other posts on a similar theme.

What not to do when organising an event?

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They were disappointed. virtually no one turned up at their event. The team, some of whom had come from overseas, outnumbered those who came to join them.

What happened?

Well it was not the quality of the event. It was brilliant. Those who did attend benefited greatly from it. The problem was that the attempts to get the word out about it had not worked as well as they could have done. The thing is that publicity is a lot harder than most people believe it is.

I am going to look at what I saw from the perspective of an attender at this event to see what can be learnt from this experience. These are the challenges I faced  when I looked at the announcements.

I did not know the organisers

They had suddenly popped up on a Facebook page I read regularly saying they were doing something near me. I had no idea who they were and when I asked my friends they did not either. OK that is not that surprising as I don’t live on their doorstep. There was nothing I saw that would encourage me to trust them.

Of course there were people there who did know them and did trust them and came along. However, those were relationships built up over time. That is the problem. We expect people to see what we are doing and jump at the opportunity but people are not like that.

They are cautious they take their time getting to know people. That is why web sites, and social media communities even newsletters are so important. They give people the opportunity to look around and get a better handle on who you are and what to expect before going to an event.

OK you get the brave or just plain reckless people like me turning up, but thankfully there are not many people like me.

It was a challenge getting there

I am not a city person. I visit occasionally because I have to. Cities are busy and offer too many choices too quickly when you are driving.

I have not bothered setting up the navigation capabilities on my phone and boy did I regret on my first attempt to find them. I simply never got there! I drove round for about 5 hours to do a journey that should have taken an hour each way. Oops

I did look online and get some directions but I printed them on 2 sheets and then got them muddled and by the time I asked for help I was many miles away from where I needed to be. That city was a lot bigger than I thought that it was. OK I was able to have a good look around and saw of a lot of the city so gained a better impression of what it was like.

It was hard to work out what was going to happen at the event

I had never heard of the speakers. I did not know the reputation of the place where they had come from. OK the organisers did but they did nothing to help me by reminding people about this. This did not help develop the trust factor for me either.

The thing is once we know something and have it firmly stuck in our mind we think everyone else has. But they don’t There are always new people coming along like me who need to be told for the first time. There are also people who have been around for while who need to be reminded as well. It is so easy to take things like this for granted and then get into a muddle

It was hard to work out where to go to and when

There was a Facebook event page that listed the whole as a single event. Oops it was a single event but it was divided into a number of separate parts. It would have been so much easier if they had each been listed as separate events on one Facebook page.

Nearly two weeks of events were concentrated on one Facebook post. I could not just say I was going to one event it had to be all of them.  That made it hard for them to judge the response to their publicity attempts.

Once I saw how good it was I went back to the Facebook page to see if there were more opportunities to attend an event. Oh there were dates and a place but no times. Oh no, now what do I do? OK leave a comment asked for clarification of course but that is something that only those who are really keen to know more will bother to do.

What could be done better?

You will already have gathered some ideas on what not to do but here are some more tips on improving the publicity for your event.

Work out who you want to attract to you event

For anyone involved in marketing this is really basic stuff but it is surprising how few people outside the marketing world understand this basic concept. The idea is to sit down and think about who you want to attract. Are they young or old? Male or female? Do they live in your city or some miles away? How much do they know or understand about what you have to offer already?

Some say that one way to do this is to sit down and visualise who they are. Others in the business world dress up dolls to remind them who their customers are and leave the doll where they can see them. It does not really matter how you do it but somehow you have to work out who these people are. Once you do that it you can move to the next step.

Think about the needs of who you are inviting

You can probably tell that although they were pleased to see me I arrived without my needs being met. So what were my needs.

I wanted to be sure that it was worth travelling many miles to join in. What would I gain from this event? How would it help me?

Of course you will always get people who have motives that you might not expect. One of mine was to get to know people in the wider community who might be interested in what I was doing and whom at a later date would be willing to work with me.

Once I had made that decision I needed to know details like when does the event start? What about things like food and drinks so that I can plan ahead and work out what to take with me if anything. What about car parking?

Work out how you are going to communicate with them

Once you know who you want to communicate to you can work out how you are going to do it. Are you going to use Facebook or twitter or another social media website? Are you going to use primarily images or primarily text?

What about where you share your message? Have you already joined relevant Facebook groups and participated in them so that people can get to know you better? Have you set up groups or pages to help you spread the word in good time? Have you got an email list or another list of contacts you can send things to? Have been putting some effort into doing the research needed to make the contacts you need to make your event a success?

It is so easy and yet it is so hard to get absolutely right

I have been around the block a few times in terms of publicising events and it is really hard to get right. I have had my fair share of failures as well.

Good publicity is like fine wine it takes time to mature. It does not just happen

Working towards Kingdom solutions

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13_17-300x300What on earth is the difference between a messenger and an envoy? An envoy is a messenger but the word is also used for a diplomat who ranks next below an ambassador. Diplomats are people sent to foreign parts to represent the interests of the government that sent them. A messenger is someone who just communicates a message and runs errands.

We all know about unreliable people. You know, the the ones who have proved themselves to be like shifting sand. When you have reached out to them for support they have moved and you have struggled as a result. They move, they shift and simply cannot be trusted.

An example of this principle in action

The idea of falling into rouble is an interesting phrase and maybe it is better explained with an example. Suppose someone was asked to pass a message onto to you but they did not really understand the situation that they were supposed to tell you about.

They tell you part of the message but leave out some important details. You ask them about those details but they cannot answer your questions because they do not understand the situation very well. You then decide not to act on the message until you have found the answers that you need. Despite your best efforts you cannot find the answers to your questions until it is too late to act on the message.

This example is based on a real story. In that situation the person carrying the message got into trouble but so did I. I got into trouble for not trusting the person who sent the message and ignoring the way that it was delivered to me.

What a difference it would have made in that situation to have had a message that was accurate and true (that is what faithful means in this situation). What a difference it would have made if there had been an envoy who knew and understood the situation well enough to have truly represented the interests of the person sending the message.

How does this principle work in the online world?

Many centuries ago there was a wise man called Daniel who said that there would come a time when there would be so much information available that the result would be that people ended up totally confused. They would go here and there, backwards and forwards looking for a truthful message that would bring healing.

Strange thing is, that today that seems to be happening. Want to know how to change the battery on your car look on YouTube. Well, that is how I found out how to do it.  Want to know more about the medical condition the doctor suggests that you have. There will be all sorts of information about it online.

How does this apply to what you eat?

Just look at the advice online about what you should eat.

  • Some people say that gluten is public enemy number one. Others say we should never eat any grains so no wheat, no barley no oats no rice or anything made from those things including bread, pasta, porridge and most baked goods.
  • Others say that sugar is public enemy number one. For them, it is not just sweets, chocolates, cake and desserts that you should avoid at all costs but you also need to cut other things out of your diet like carrots, peas, sweetcorn, parsnips and fruit. They also suggest that you should not eat any processed food as this often contains hidden sugars.
  • There are also advocates for the plant strong diet where you do not eat any animal products at all.

To be honest, if you excluded all that things that someone online advises you not to eat there would be nothing left to eat, well maybe a lettuce leaf or two.

There are three groups of people who are involved in this situation.

  1. People whose health has improved because they have followed a particular diet.
  2. People who have health problems who are willing to try changing their diet in an attempt to improve their health. They want to learn from those who have found a solution to that problem
  3. People who are encouraging others to set up coaching businesses or write books or set up online courses to share the solutions that they have found.

Now of course not everyone involved in this has motives that are untainted by the lure of making money from this kind of activity. Some are more about helping others solve their problems while others are more about solving their own money related problems.

It is not just the arena of diet and eating where you find these three groups of people. It is just about every area of life.  There are people selling information on parenting, dating, married life, divorce recovery, dating again in later life i.e. just about every stage of life. There are people who prepare and sell knitting patterns, model railway designs, or guides and instructions for just about every hobby you can think of off. Then there are guides and helps for business owners and prospective business owners not forgetting people selling tools and products that explain various tactics and strategies to businesses.

The online world and ancient wisdom

Daniel did not have clue about the online world. Even the idea of having electrical devices in the home was beyond his comprehension. Yet 25 centuries ago he suggested a time would come when people would be looking for answers and not be able to find an answer based on ancient wisdom.

Few days now pass without me hearing of yet another person who is encouraging other people to get online and share their message. With all those people encouraging others to get on and share their solution to a problem you can see why there are so many different solutions to the same problem.

How do you know what is the right solution for you? In other words, how do you know who is the reliable messenger? The problem is that it seems an unequal struggle.

All the solution providers have their own stories and stories from satisfied customers. They spend time learning persuasion and visibility techniques so that they can attract people to what they offer. They are taught ways of overcoming objections that people might have to using their methods of solving their problems. They learn strategies and tactics to get people over to their way of doing things.

See what I mean by it being a struggle to know what is the right answer for you. It is also why so many people try many different possible solutions until they find the right one for them. Those offering things are so clever and have such well-developed persuasion tactics that some of the less well-prepared seekers are little more than victims for them.

What should the response of those in the Kingdom be to this situation?

There is one an old saying that applies here i.e. if you cannot beat them join them. One reason why it is so hard for people to find Kingdom solutions is that there are so few people out there who offer them. The few that there are are so well hidden that they are hard to find. Seriously there are cook books and eating plans that are based on ancient wisdom.

This is one that I discovered a while ago (yes I have included a referral link to Amazon UK with this link). It is not always easy to spot them. In some ways that is a good thing as they then go under the radar and are not instantly rejected because they are associated with ancient wisdom.

Included in the dream of Lily’s Place is helping people tap into the riches of ancient wisdom and finding ways of sharing what they have learnt from it. The idea is to help themselves and then prepare them to help others. Some people could do this in such a way that they would provide an income for themselves and their families. Not everyone would be helping people who could pay for the help that they received. They would need to be supported by those that could generate an income so that all those who needed that kind of help could receive it.

There are loads of ideas on how to do this stored up in my head. Even some tools and helps crammed into an overburdened hard drive. It is just waiting to be set free and fly and grow into the system that the king originally wanted it to be. Want to join me on the journey? Get involved in our community. Check out the discussion forums and get on our mailing list so that we can stay in touch.

About Kingdom solutions

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Kingdom solutions are solutions based on ancient wisdom. Writings that encourage people to look to the King of Kings for advice about everything and everything. In fact, it is hard to find any topic, even things that were unheard of when they were written, that you cannot find some kind of good idea about how to make the situation better.

The beauty of this advice is that it is tried and tested. I found where it said it was only stupid people who hired a servant and then struggled to feed themselves. Well, I don’t know many people who employ people as servants these days but I do know people who employ machines as servants. Some of them spend so much on these machines whether they are electronic gadgets or cars that they struggle to buy the things that they really need like food. Crumbs there have been times when I have been guilty of doing something very similar myself.

An example of a Kingdom solution

I was looking around for some ideas what to plant in a new garden and I got lost looking at ideas related to growing food. Ok, I was thinking ahead about the book I started on sowing a business as well so I had something of an excuse. While I was wandering around I came across a website called Foundations for Farming. The more I looked at it the more I realised that this was a kingdom solution.

It was not just the personal story of the founder that demonstrates this, but the way that he discovered this system of farming. On top of that, this system has been used to help many struggling people. In fact, it is a system that has helped a lot of people out of the captivity of poverty.

This method of farming is an adaptation of what happens in creation itself. Rather than man imposing his order on creation and doing things his way. It aims to copy the natural processes. Rather than learning from a textbook or teachers in a college, the classroom is creation itself.

Rather than ploughing the land and then sowing seed. The idea is to leave what they call God’s blanket in place and plant seeds by using an artificial animals foot. Animals make holes and seeds fall into them. The seeds then come into contact with the soil and can start growing.  Rather than an animal deciding where to dig a hole it is man who decides. Man uses a hoe in the same way as the animal uses its foot.

Once this idea had been tested on the farm that he managed and was proved to work. He started with a small trial and then gradually expanded the area that used this system until it was used on the whole farm. It worked so well that that farm made a profit when others around about it were going out of business.

It was tested and tried using a kingdom principle i.e. start small so you learn how to do it well and then expand. Once it was tried and tested on that large farm it was developed into a system that could be used by small farmers. In other words, those with just a little bit of land were taught to how to grow enough food to feed themselves.

The importance of finding Kingdom solutions

The problem that many people in the kingdom have is that they believe that the only thing that they need to do is get people through the door and their job is done. They forget that one way to get people through the door is to meet their actual needs.

The king does not want to see people experiencing any kind of lack or having anything missing or incomplete. In fact, he wants his people to prosper in every area of their lives. He wants lives to change. Think about it, if people are happy and prospering then it benefits the king as well as them.

Remember the old story about the wind and sun. They had a competition as they tried to persuade a man to take his coat off. The wind blew hard and tried to separate the man from his coat by force. The man only held onto his coat tighter and tighter. The sun shone and shone. The warm and kindness soon persuaded the man to take his coat off. It was the kindness of the sun that encouraged the man to take his coat off rather than the force applied by the sun.

If you want people to do things your way then you are more likely to achieve your ends if you are kind to them.  Provide them with benefits and solve their problems then they are more likely to listen to you and do things your way.

Not just that, but those who truly know this king, know that the nickname king of love is really appropriate. A love that is shown in wanting to see people escape from lack of any kind and find a way out of all forms of captivity. A love that wants to see them prospering in every way imaginable (yes not just money but family life).  In other words, kingdom solutions are really the best way of helping people find their dream life.