TheCable

Sometime during the mid-90s, I stumbled on a book titled Understanding Your Potential. I read every page. It changed my life.

For the very first time I began to realise, in a profound way,  that God has indeed blessed every living person with gifts, talents, abilities and dispositions capable of being used to impact the lives of others and accomplish amazing things despite any kind of limitation.

I would later learn about sequels to the book. I gobbled up Releasing Your Potential, In Pursuit of Purpose and Maximizing Your Potential as fast as I possibly could. Suddenly, I started seeing everyone I came across as carriers of divine gifts, talents and potentials capable of changing the world. I reached the conclusion that every human being deserves respect and the opportunity to unlock his or her hidden treasures. My self-image and the way I related with people had been irrevocably changed.

The books served as my introduction to its author – Dr. Myles Munroe – a diminutive yet giant of a teacher, one with inimitable insight and redoubtable delivery. Dr. Munroe, along with his charming wife, Ruth Munroe, and seven other passengers were involved in a fatal plane crash late afternoon on Sunday, November 9. They were on their way to Freeport, Grand Bahama to host his annual leadership conference, Global Leadership Summit, which was to start early on November 10.

But Myles Munroe didn’t really die. I mean, apart from physically, you don’t really die when you are the author of 69 books—with millions of copies in print and read by people of all nationalities, age groups and socio-economic stations in life.

Do you really die—having impacted the thinking of governments, corporations, institutions and churches; and having spent your life preaching the Gospel of Jesus Christ to people around the world?  I think not.

There are countless authors who will never write a single book that will influence many lives across continents but Myles Munroe wrote many of such. Apart from the earlier mentioned books, other classics followed. The Spirit of Leadership, Becoming a Leader, The Principles of Leadership, The Principles and Power of Vision, Purpose and Power of Love and Marriage, Understanding the Purpose and Power of Men, Understanding the Purpose and Power of Woman, Rediscovering the Kingdom, are just a few of the books he wrote that remain influential around the world.

Purpose, potential, God’s kingdom and leadership were Dr Munroe’s subjects and he mastered them. But at his core and deeply etched was the subject of leadership. In The Spirit of Leadership, he penned the following gem: “Trapped in every follower is a hidden leader.” He understood that there is leadership potential in every man and that God’s purpose is for such latent quality to be manifested. His message was that discovering, understanding and maximizing your potential will ultimately set loose the leadership that is latent in you. He taught that the message of God’s kingdom was never about building physical structures called churches but about getting each person to become who God originally planned him to be in terms of character, spirituality, relationships and functionality.

I cannot help but relate the above observation to the mindless killings going on presently in Nigeria’s North East region. As Dr Munroe famously quipped, “where Purpose is not known, abuse is inevitable.” A stark lack of understanding of man’s purpose, potential and value is a primary reason for the wastage of human life by Boko Haram terrorists. The underwhelming response of the Government of Nigeria to the attacks of the terrorists also hinges on the same lack of understanding of the true purpose, potential and value of human life. The poor attention to development in that region prior to the incursion of Boko Haram also hinged on this lack of understanding. Invariably, what Nigeria has ended up with is mind-blowing wastage of leadership potential, talents, and ultimately, human life. Indeed, Munroe’s messages on leadership, potential and purpose are applicable at individual, corporate, national and international levels.

Describing his life’s purpose during an interview on Christian Broadcasting Network (CBN), Dr Munroe declared: “I was born to transform followers into leaders and leaders into agents of change. I was born to help followers discover that trapped inside each of them is a great leader.” Elsewhere, he said: “The passion of my life is: to help as many people as possible, of every nation, race, creed, or social status, to discover their true leadership potential”. Many in every corner of our world will testify to the fact that he achieved just that.

As a 13 year-old boy, it was a white teacher who called him and his Africa-origin friends in class “monkeys and retards” that got him miserable and wondering about his capacity to think and learn. It was his mother who shook him up, ordering him to never believe such lies told by any teacher, that charged his heart with impetus to take on the world. And it was a verse in the Bible—Ephesians 3:20—that convinced him that God had placed in him everything he needed to succeed in life.

Myles Munroe was in some ways a civil rights leader. He had a passion for spurring Africans and peoples of the Third World to shake off the shackles of poverty, inferiority complex and backwardness. One book in particular, The Burden of Freedom, was written to change the thinking of readers in the Third World – especially in Africa – and it did just that. He also used his role as Chief Executive Officer and Chairman of the Board of the International Third World Leaders Association (ITWLA), to accomplish the same.

But he was primarily regarded as an Evangelical Christian evangelist, teacher and ordained Pentecostal minister whose main platform was the Bahamas Faith Ministry International (BFMI). Yet he was determined to position himself outside of the four walls of church buildings and firmly in the marketplace of the broader society while maintaining his calling. That can be a tough thing for ministers to do because the lines between compromise and ministerial ethics can easily become blurred.

Dr Munroe seemed comfortable toeing that line and he believed it was the responsibility of every Christian Believer to engage society rather than staying isolated away from it as religion often demands. Consequently, as much as he mingled with kings, queens, presidents and prime ministers the world over, he never seemed to lose his message while adapting it to suit, not soothe, his audience.

Perhaps that was what made him one of the most respected preachers of the late 20th century and the early 21st century. He was often invited to teach in corporate organisations and government circles almost as much as he was within the Christian community. This is expressed most eloquently in the words of the Prime Minister of his native Bahamas, Mr. Perry Christie, in a tribute to Munroe shortly after the plane tragedy: “It is utterly impossible to measure the magnitude of Dr. Munroe’s loss to The Bahamas and to the world. He was indisputably one of the most globally recognizable religious figures our nation has ever produced. His fame as an ambassador for the Christian ministry preceded him wherever in the world he travelled, whether in the Caribbean, North America, Asia, Europe, or Africa…He was a towering force who earned the respect and admiration not only of Christian adherents but of secular leaders both here at home and around the world.”

Myles Munroe will be readily remembered for his powerful Scripture-based ideas and wisdom encapsulated in exquisitely rich quotes. Consider the following sampling:

“The tragedy of life is not death but life without a purpose.”

“The wealthiest place in the world is not the gold mine, oilfield, diamond mine or bank. The wealthiest place in the world is the cemetery. For there lies companies that were never started, masterpieces that were never painted, books that were never written, songs that were never sung…In the cemetery, there is buried the greatest treasure of untapped potential. There is a treasure within you that must come out. Don’t go to the grave with your treasure still within you.”

“Everywhere is a school, every experience a lesson and every man a teacher.”

“Don’t die old; die empty. That is the goal of life. Go to the cemetery and disappoint the graveyard.”

Such were the words of wisdom that oozed out of the man who taught that life, as intended, is all about purpose and not about age.

Maybe he fulfilled his purpose before he passed on. Only the Lord can tell but there is very little doubt that he blessed  literally many millions over many decades with the same keen sense of purpose – people in whose hearts Myles Munroe’s ageless words will bristle still to keep him alive till the end of time itself.

Olakunle Kasumu is a writer and book connoisseur. He is the presenter and co-producer of the Channels Book Club, Nigeria’s premier TV book show.  @olakunlekas. www.kunlekasumu.com