#4 Lobbying and its Dignified Alternatives
Exposing Counterfeits access to Favour and how to recover from them
Welcome to the Series on Divine Favour and the Exposure of Counterfeit access to Favour. If you’re just joining us, here’s where we are:
Divine Favour: The dignified alternative to Begging, Bootlicking, Seduction and Lobbying
#4 Lobbying and its Dignified Alternatives ←This post
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In this post, I’ll expose the fourth and final counterfeit access — Lobbying. Let’s dive in.
LOBBYING — obtain Favour by persuading someone in authority, to create, amend or support laws, regulations, rules or policies that give you an unfair advantage at the detriment of others.
Authority may include persons with some degree of power within an organisation or in government (mostly in the executive or legislative arms).
In government, some have argued that the intricacies of the legislative process need lobbying; particularly when the elected officials and their teams lack the required expertise on every issue of concern to the people.
These lobbyists (also called consultants in some circles) are expected to educate, contribute to drafting bills, curry positive votes on the bill, and ensure the president signs the bill into law.
Generally, individuals in authority are expected to act on behalf of others for the public good. When they succumb to lobbyists’ pressure, they circumvent the mandate of public good, thereby endorsing or promulgating laws that serve the interests of a very small and often inconsequential subset of the public.
The root cause of lobbying is Greed!
Lobbyists are paid advocates. A source revealed that lobbyists’ spending was over $3 billion in 2011, which is triple what was obtainable over a decade earlier. It is speculated that this kind of spending can only mean that lobbying involves, to a large degree, elements of illegality and unethical practices.
Lobbyists usually are not concerned with the effect of their lobbying on others, the environment, or the future —the sustainability concerns of the lobbyists are zero.
The news and literature are awash with the effect of lobbyists’ agenda on the environment, public health, economy, etc.
For example:
Exposing current tobacco industry lobbying, contributions, meals, and gifts
The Gambling lobbyists give big to political parties
Where the dollars go: Lobbying a big business for large food and beverage Consumer packaged goods
The marijuana industry spent millions lobbying for legalization in 2021
Transgender lobby group, Mermaids, urges puberty‑blockers for 12‑year‑olds
The Pharmaceuticals and Health Products Industry spent about $92 million on lobbying in the first quarter of the year, more than any other industry.
Although lobbying is legal in some countries, the discussion on its ethics or morality is still ongoing — and should be, because the dividing line is almost non-existent. Some use bribes, gifts, and pretence to donate to worthy causes that present or represent these groups in a favourable light before those in authority.
Lobbying and Seduction
If Seduction is the most dangerous counterfeit access, I consider Lobbying as the “kingpin” of the counterfeit access to favour. Lobbying is the most monumental or consequential use case of Seduction.
Lobbying goes beyond a one-time getting of Favour but can influence policies over the long-term, changing the status quo in a big way.
Let me illustrate this with an example:
Assuming a school’s pass grade is 45%.
With Seduction, a minority female student who scored 40% in a course may bribe the lecturer for higher grades; with Lobbying, that student could bribe an influential member of the school board to formulate a policy that reduces the pass grade to 30% in favour of minority female students.
Both scenarios use the same Seduction tool — bribery, but the magnitude of effects varies. One affects only an individual case, but the other affects every possible case in perpetuity, thereby changing the status quo.
Now depending on which side you are, this type of change can undermine other ethnic or racial groups or the overall academic excellence objective of the school.
At the organizational level, you find some persons lobbying HR to formulate a policy that exempts married women from certain official duties during festive seasons, increases the leave allowance for a certain category of senior staff, or determines the out-of-station posting to favour persons from a particular age bracket or tribe.
I have seen people take advantage of their proximity to power or the decision table to influence policies or decisions that would favour them ultimately. They call it being at the right place at the right time.
Recently some leaders were asked to distribute gifts of books to their colleagues. The books were donated by a prominent author for the edification of the collective. I saw that some of these leaders were concerned about hoarding their preferred title over the task of distribution. “Let’s keep some for ourselves before it finishes“, they said.
Don’t desire positions or get close to power or sit at the decision table for self-benefit. Doing that undermines the weak among us.
Lobbying takes advantage of the Weak — the poor and helpless with no one to speak or stand for them. In this regard, Lobbying comes with plenty of consequences:
1 Thessalonians 4:6 — and no one should ever violate or exploit his brother in this regard because the Lord will avenge all such acts, as we have already told you and solemnly warned you.
Proverbs 14:31 — Whoever oppresses the poor taunts their Maker, but whoever is kind to the needy honours Him.
Proverbs 22:22 — Do not rob a poor man because he is poor, and do not crush the afflicted at the gate.
Leviticus 25:17 — Do not take advantage of each other, but fear your God; for I am the LORD your God.
The Zebedee’s Lobbyist Agenda
The sons of Zebedee — James and John, are very close to Jesus. Together with Peter, they were with Jesus at Gethsemane, a garden at the foot of the Mount of Olives in Jerusalem where Jesus underwent agony and was arrested before his crucifixion.
You could say that James and John were in Jesus’ inner circle.
One day, accompanied by their mother, Mrs Zebedee, they met Jesus. I guess Jesus must also be close to the family too.
She knelt down (a type of honour or worship or maybe a bribe) and made an outrageous request. She wanted Jesus to put it in writing that, “that in Your kingdom one of these two sons of mine may sit at Your right hand, and the other at Your left”.
Jesus had 12 disciples, and this concerned mother wanted her two sons to sit on Jesus’ flanks in his Kingdom. She was lobbying the Master to evoke a binding policy that will promote her two sons. She didn’t care where the others would sit!
Jesus responded, “You don’t know what you are asking, do you think it is a joke to sit down at my right and left hand? Well, my Father makes such decisions, not me”.
When the others heard it, they were furious, rightfully so.
Jesus went on to outline the sure path to getting the Father’s attention — Faithful Service.
“You know that the rulers of the Gentiles lord it over them, and their superiors exercise authority over them.
It shall not be this way among you. Instead, whoever wants to become great among you must be your servant, and whoever wants to be first among you must be your slave— just as the Son of Man did not come to be served, but to serve, and to give His life as a ransom for many.” #Matt 20:25-28
Dignified Alternative to Lobbying — Faithful Service
Let’s see how faithful service played out in the following stories:
1. Esther, Mordecai and Haman: How a prince became a villain
Haman, the chief minister of King Xerxes, lobbied the King to evoke a decree that will exterminate the Jews throughout the Persian empire.
Haman promised to pay a sum of 10,000 talents of silver into the King’s treasury to execute his plans. This man had so much favour with the King that nothing else could reverse the decree.
However, someone knew how to obtain Favour directly from God, the Father — the Kings of all kings. A higher dimension of Favour obtained from God in a 3-day fast proclaimed by Esther overturned Haman’s favouredness before King Xerxes. Haman became the villain who eventually lost his life.
Later, Esther and Mordecai had the liberty to write the legislation (decree) in a manner that would favour their people. The King gave them his signet ring to seal whatever decree they came up with. Consequently, Mordecai became a prominent man in the Persian Kingdom.
Meanwhile, Mordecai had been faithful in his service to the King — he foiled an assassination attempt on the King’s life. Esther was faithful to Mordecai, Hegai, the custodian of the harem, and later in her marriage to the King.
Their Faithfulness in Service paved the way for Favour for them.
2. Daniel and the day Lions practised Luke 6:38
Daniel’s colleagues were envious of him. Daniel had been set over all other presidents in the realm of King Darius. They looked for any fault they could use against him but found none. Daniel was Faithful to the King and God.
They lobbied the King and came up with a piece of legislation, a royal statute, a firm decree, that nobody should ask any petition from any other God or man for 30 days else face the lions.
This type of decree was made according to the law of the Medes and Persians — it cannot be reversed or repelled.
Remember that Daniel was Faithful to God. What did he do?
Now when Daniel knew that the writing was signed, he went into his house; and his windows being open in his chamber toward Jerusalem, he kneeled upon his knees three times a day, and prayed, and gave thanks before his God, as he did aforetime. #Daniel 6:10
The result? Daniel had new pets to play with in the den of lions. The King couldn’t sleep all night, came up early in the morning and shouted, “Daniel, servant of the living God, did your God who you serve faithfully able to deliver you?”
We all know the end of the story — the conspirators were thrown into the den of lions. The lions gave up Daniel (1 person) to receive a huge harvest.
The King went further to issue a new decree, which mandated the reverence and worship of the God of Daniel. This decree gave complete religious liberty to anyone who wanted to serve the God of Daniel and to do so with the full authority of the state.
Lobbying for Favour will always Backfire. In both cases, the Faithfulness of Esther, Mordecai and Daniel rewrote legislation in their favour.
In Conclusion
As a Christian and a believer in Jesus Christ, no legislation, rule, regulation or policy should make you lobby anybody in authority.
Seek and get Favour directly from God and you will find everything working for your good.
Our responsibility should be:
Ask God directly for any type of Favour you desire. God is the Source; any man can be the ATM. The day one focuses on the ATM as the source, then lack is imminent. The ATM can only dispense as it receives as it is replenished from the source.
Make petitions, prayers, intercessions, and thanksgiving for kings and all those in authority — so that you’ll have the enabling environment and conducive policies to execute your mission with dignity.
Pursue God’s righteous causes and let your passion, bubbling up, speak for itself before those in authority — there is a protocol for engaging authority.
Be diligent in your business — that way you qualify to stand before kings, sitting at the decision table, dictating policies, legislations, rules and regulations that will benefit the public and reward you in return.
Share your Unique Favour Experience in the Comments section below👇
Azubuike ✌️
LORD, by thy Favour thou hast made my mountain to stand strong: thou didst hide thy face, and I was troubled #Psalm 30:7
Thank you sir for sharing these specific keys to walking in God's favour.
The sure path to get the Father's attention,l: Faithful Service...👍