It took me a year to muster up the courage to speak certain dreams aloud to myself…with no one around to hear me. It felt too presumptuous…too audacious…too impossible…questionable at best, possibly even wrong. But I said it…out loud…for only my ears to hear. A dream that had been growing inside was finally released into the atmosphere. Emotions flooded me in that moment…tears of joy and laughter. It felt like Him. His presence was so real that day!
That was several years ago. I didn’t feel those same emotions the day those dreams died.
I’d been contemplating writing them down on a piece of paper and lighting it on fire so I could watch them go up in smoke in a matter of seconds….or writing it on a balloon and releasing it, watching it drift away in a few moments. That’s so much faster than watching it occur over a period of years. But, I felt His caution about that….like it would be a prophetic act in which I would be declaring death over my dreams. So I waited.
“Take courage, my heart. Stay steadfast, my soul. He’s in the waiting.”
“Papa, I feel like You’ve played a cruel joke. I believed it was You who placed that dream in my heart…and it seemed You started putting things into motion…only to hit a brick wall going 60mph. Everything inside of me shifted and is out of order…I can’t find my equilibrium. I don’t know what to do, what to say, how to function.”
But, He’s not that kind of Father. He doesn’t play those kind of jokes on His kids. He doesn’t promise us something and go back on that promise. He doesn’t encourage us to jump only to let us fall on our faces. He’s not that kind of a Dad. I know that. He wasn’t playing a joke on me. He wasn’t up there sitting on His throne laughing that I had actually believed He would say such a thing.
“I must have heard You wrong. I can’t believe I was so mistaken. I’ll just forget about it and be content with other things You’ve given that are just as exciting. Maybe that’s what You intended all along.”
With that prayer, I contemplated a prophetic act that might bring finality and quiet my emotions. But His Spirit restrained me. We had quite the argument one morning during worship. This had been going on intermittently for 6 months. I cannot handle such fluctuation of raw emotions for long before I divert them into anger and cynicism…and I told Him that! I told Him I was on the edge of doing that! (He already knew it). I don’t know that we ever really settled it but I did come to a moment of surrender. I’m not sure if it was a necessary surrendering to Him….or a hopeless giving up.
I didn’t ignite any paper declaration…or release a balloon with any declaration or dream. But it’s gone anyway. Quieted. I don’t know that it’s fully dead yet. But, almost. Sometime between that argument and today…it seems to have died. The death of it wasn’t accompanied by the flooding emotions its conception was…but a relief and sadness came over me. After the roller coaster of emotions of these past 6 months, it feels pretty good. Now to focus on other things that need my full attention.
“Sing praise my soul.Find strength in joy…let His words lead you on.Do not forget His great faithfulness…He’ll finish all He’s begun.”
He may resurrect those dreams, I don’t know. It feels dead…but that’s how surrender feels sometimes. But…I know He’s the kind of Dad who wants to breathe life into our dreams rather than allow them to die.
“Hold on to your hope as your triumph unfolds. He’s never failing.”