Deserving Our Dreams

What’s your dream?

This question can be difficult to answer. Sometimes, the roar of the world dulls the whisper of the dream God has given us.

I want to assure you of something.

God has placed a dream in your heart. It might be dim right now, but if we ask God to fame the flame of the desire He wants us to fulfill, He will.

It’s in the fanning of this flame where God shows up in our lives. He is our Creator. He knows us better than we know ourselves. Psalm 139:13-14 (NLT) states, “You made all the delicate, inner parts of my body and knit me together in my mother’s womb. Thank you for making me so wonderfully complex! Your workmanship is marvelous—how well I know it.”

We are loved so intimately by God because He blessed us into being. Think about how a piece of art is created. This doesn’t only include paintings or graphic design.

I’m talking about how God sees everything we do as art. He created us to be wonderfully complex and no one is exactly like the other. He built us for a unique purpose which only we can fulfill in His kingdom.

Our art is in response to His call, whether we know it or not. There are times when we have a longing to create. This longing is part of our need to have a relationship with God.

Our dreams are serving God.

Is there any higher mission than to do what God has called us to do? I would argue that working towards our dreams is putting God first in our lives. Now I want to create a caveat with this. I’m not endorsing letting our families go hungry or allowing all thoughts of cleanliness disappear.

No, I’m talking about pursuing God alongside the other blessings He’s put in our lives. Sometimes those little blessings won’t stop saying, “Mom, Mom, Mom, Moooooom” or our blessings could be family coming to visit and we need to madly clean the house while hoping the closet doesn’t pop open while our guests are in our home. Or is that just me? I can feel my husband cringing as I write this. (His life was incredibly neat and orderly until the typhoon of my life hit him.)

We deserve the dreams God has placed in our hearts. Problems may arise when we pursue our dream, then people come along and whisper doubt into our hearts.

They say, “Get a real job. No one is going to pay you for doing (fill in the blank here with your dream.) Or they say, “Isn’t it selfish of you to pursue your dream when your family needs you?” Or another nugget of unsolicited wisdom is, “Why can’t you just be content with what you have? Doesn’t God call you to be content?”

I’ve heard that pursuing our dreams is selfish. How could we spend time away from friends, family or opportunities at church to start working on our dream? Isn’t this exactly what God doesn’t want us to do? Are we supposed to be part of our community and push aside what isn’t serving others?

I call these people the dream stealers. They want to keep us in the box they have created for us, rather than encourage us to embrace the dream God has knit into our soul. Listen to God, not the doubters.

We honor God through working our dreams. He gave them to us in the first place.

Are you honoring God with your dream? How do you handle the dream stealers in your life? Share it in the comments below to encourage others.