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DREAM BIG DREAMS

So, how can we do this? If God has created us with just be plain hard to trust God when you think you have
minds to think and given us a calling worth pursuing, a better idea in mind. God may ask you to start doing
how can we know what it is? First of all, a sure-fire way some things and stop doing others. God may lead you
to not find it is to look at what everyone else is doing into places that are not always the most comfortable or
and imitate it. There is only one we are to imitate and situations that are not the most logical to your own
that is Christ. Jesus came to do the will of God and Jesus mind. Even Jesus prayed that His suffering be taken
is our example. In John chapter 4, Jesus is with His away just before His death: “He went on a little farther
disciples when He talks about a kind of food they knew and bowed with his face to the ground, praying, "My
nothing about: “My nourishment comes from doing the Father! If it is possible, let this cup of suffering be taken
will of God.” Jesus was fully satisfied knowing that He away from me. Yet I want your will to be done, not
was doing all that His Father asked Him to do during His mine" (Luke 22:42). Can we end our prayers to God in
time on Earth. We, too, can know this kind of fulfillment the same way? Not my will, but yours be done…
and peace. There’s no greater feeling than knowing you
are exactly where God wants you to be. By looking to Now, I’m not saying that all Christians need to sell
Jesus as our example, we see that Jesus frequently everything and move abroad to begin a ministry. We
became quiet before God to listen and to commune can’t all be Katie Davis, nor should we want to be. Just
with Him. In Mark 1:35, we read “very early in the like there is only one Katie Davis called to Africa to
morning, while it was still dark, Jesus got up and left the parent orphans who needed a home, there is only one
house and went off to a solitary place, where He you called by God for great things. God doesn’t want
prayed.” In Matthew 14 and Luke 6, Jesus went up on a you to live your life half-satisfied, afraid to dream and
mountainside by Himself to pray. Jesus had faith that live large. We’re made to be dreamers by a God who
God had a plan for Him and desired to be obedient to it. made us for an ultimate purpose. We can begin to
understand God’s plan for our lives by looking to Jesus
Secondly, it is through the surrender of your own plans as our example, surrendering the plans we have made
and ambitions that you can find out what God has in for ourselves, and trusting God to follow through even
store. While it may seem contradictory to give up your when it isn’t easy. Os Guinness defined calling as “the
dreams to gain the best life possible, you can trust that truth that God calls us to himself so decisively that
God knows what He’s doing here. Matthew 10:39 says everything we are, everything we do, and everything we
“If you cling to your life, you will lose it; but if you give have is invested with a special devotion and dynamism
3
up your life for me, you will find it.” As long as your lived out as a response to his summons and service.”
agenda is still full of your own hopes and dreams, it Now that’s a life of big dreams. My hope for you, and
leaves God little room to guide you towards something for me, is that we settle for absolutely nothing less.
great and for His kingdom. I learned this firsthand.
God’s plans are even better than our good plans. And
He loves us enough not to force His purposes on us.
Instead, He invites us into a life of dreaming and living
for Him and alongside Him. Place your dreams on the
proverbial table before God for Him to give and take as
He pleases, and you might be surprised at what you
see happen.

Third, be aware that it will not be easy. Because God’s
ways are above our ways (Isaiah 55:8), the decisions we
make to follow God and His plan will not always make
sense to the people around us.
And sometimes, it can

1
Calling’s Way, Pete Richardson, page 8
2
The Call, Os Guinness, page 1
3
The Call, Os Guiness, page 4