While working on a sermon the other day, I stumbled across some of my old writing in my computer. This was written only last august, but it seems like forever ago... I guess while I was reading it I just realized so much about where I have come from, and why I dream so big, and how faithful God is towards what I dream and pray for. Some really key people have spoken so much life into me about dreaming the impossible and pushing me towards the things I am passionate about. I owe them some huge "thank you's" for believing in me and speaking so much life into me. God has really blessed me over the last year, in so many unique and twisted ways. But I am humbly reminded that my ways are not His, and He will always work for my good...
I encourage us all to dream the impossible. It's never too late, and your idea of "good" is probably very different from God's idea of good for you. There will always be more to press on towards... So don't settle for anything less.
The more and more I think on it, the more and more I realize how much other people hold back our own potential. We let other people’s opinions, words, actions, and reservations, dictate our dreams. Without even realizing it… we quickly cap each others ‘impossible’ dreams, with our limited vision. But it’s the impossible dream Jesus wants. The one’s where He gets to show off and be the hero of your life. And I think we all have dreamed like this before… but somewhere down the road, we stop. Over the last few weeks, I have been stuck on this thought of living and dreaming and all these ideas of the year ahead. Jesus has planted some pretty large dreams in me, ones that I see no end to, and hardly even a beginning. But someone once told me to dream the impossible, and I have remembered it every shifting moment of my life since…
I am about to have my first apartment. Its moments like this that I realize where I have come from and how much I have grown. This isn’t some college town. This isn’t planned for me, or handed to me. This is real life. I look in the mirror sometimes and see myself in a light I never have before. I’m a good person.
We all are… even when we aren’t. There’s just this seed of good that was planted in us from the beginning of time. It’s just our choice to water it and take care of it and learn about it. and share it.
I think about sitting in Jeanne Mayo’s living room and looking around at the people I will be doing life with for the next year. How honored I am, to be in the midst of some of the greatest leaders, friends and hero’s in the world. God really got a hold of me in that regard today. It hit me like that moment when you’re driving in your favorite part of the day, and the perfect song is playing, and no matter how your day is thus far, no matter what comes next, everything is just, perfect.
I often find myself just wanting to look into the eyes of so many people, people that don’t even know me, people I even hardly know, and I just want to tell them they can do it! To dream the impossible! That Jesus is all that matters and everything is going to be okay! I want to use what Jesus has put in me to teach how to love the ones that seem impossible to love. I want to stand in the gap for people who don’t think anyone believes in them, or that just need authentic encouragement, or that need someone to listen to their heart not just the words they are saying. I want to lead leaders. I want to believe in leaders. I want to encourage, inspire, and train the leaders of today and of tomorrow. I know in so many ways it sounds so cheesy and unfinished and just whatever. .. I know.
And I am only 20. What can I really do?
Sometimes I wonder why I can believe in others so much, and why I neglect to believe in myself enough to break good ‘ideas’ and ‘dreams’ into the reality I am living right now.
Written August 11, 2011
