God is good (All the time)! All the time (God is good)! Such a sweet call and response! Every time I say it, I feel all churchy and hip in a Jesus kind of way. Like I'm a part of something bigger than myself, like I belong. But I've been doing Beth Moore's Bible Study 'Stepping Up' recently, and she's reminded me that we say (and sing) a lot of things without really thinking about them. So think about that lovely call and response that we often say so flippantly. Either you believe it or not. Is God really good ALL the time?
A few weeks ago my youth pastor was preaching a great word when he suddenly stopped and said my name. Jessica. I jerked my head up and listened as he told me that I'd been dreaming too small, that I'd been expecting too little. He said that I was a planner and that I needed to stop planning things that I could do on my own. Weeping, I tried to write down all he was saying. He stood on a chair and asked if I was hearing him. I was listening, all right... God had my undivided attention. What my pastor didn't know at the time was that I'd started believing that nothing in my life was going to work out. I'd begun making detailed back-up plans for all my life-long dreams, and back-ups for those back-ups. That very morning I had calculated to the $/hour what I would need to make it from month to month, since I was pretty sure I'd never get a job in my chosen field. Strangely, I didn't realize how miserable I was. I figured that was all good enough for me, and I was fairly content with my lot. Suddenly, with that public word from the Lord (accountability is so good!) that came from a speaker who I trusted much more than myself (after all, it's easy to trick yourself into thinking that your wishful thinking is the voice of the Lord), I found myself seeing the world in a completely different way. It's like seeing "white" socks you've had for a few years, then holding them up to brand-new, for-real-white socks. You don't know how skewed your perspective is till it's corrected.
I've started dreaming bigger. When the creator of the universe hands you a signed blank check, that's a pretty easy task. At first, I was a little scared. What if I dream too big and then I'm disappointed? But I know I have to trust God. I remember my 21st birthday and the phone call my parents made to me that day. I was in England, and my parents had already come to visit me, and had already given me my birthday presents. I think I got a couple of DVDs. Anyway, they called me and asked me what I wanted more than anything in the world. I laughed it off and said that I wanted a pony. When they told me that I was getting a car for my birthday, I was completely floored. A CAR?! (Insert long moments of flipping outness here.)
What if the scene had played out differently? What if I'd said that I wanted a car more than anything and they had responded "oh, that's nice! I hope you get one someday. We just wanted to let you know that we're buying you a new shirt. Won't that be nice?" No loving parent would do that, build up the mood and then drop you off a cliff. Well, God describes himself as my father. He would never tell me to dream big so that I can live small. He's telling me to dream big because he has a big life planned for me. I wake up every day now and go to sleep every night excited about my life and my future. I have never felt that way. Ever. I'm not saying that I'm having a super-happy smiley life's all peachy kind of summer. Uh, no. But even when my circumstances are the pits, it's just a pit stop on the way to an incredible destiny that's already laid out for me.
Here's the seriously awesome part. I needed to hear about God's big plans for me in the way that I did for a lot of different reasons. But your not hearing it the way I did does not negate the fact that God's word to me is a word for everyone who loves him! He has big plans for all of us, and we need to start believing that our lives have purpose, that every day is another step toward a better understanding of our destinies in Christ. God has so much in mind for you! He's not a dream-killer... he's a dream-maker and a dream-fulfiller. I mean, he's like the perfect gardener. Would you call a really skilled gardener a plant-killer or a plant-grower? Duh, we'd say a plant-grower. But don't gardeners have to weed? Don't they have to kill some plants and trim some back to mold the garden into their vision?
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