Do You Have A Dream?

God can do anything, you know—far more than you could ever imagine or guess or request in your wildest dreams! Ephesians 3:20 (MSG)

Photo: seyed mostafa zamani via photopin cc | Design: Wendy van Eyck

“Careful if you dream for God because nothing is impossible. If he wants you there, he’ll take you there and you will never, ever, be the same again.” 

My youth was spent singing these lyrics, believing these lyrics, waiting to see the impossible. 

As a young teen I had crazy big dreams with God.

I thought I was going to be own a huge media empire. 

Then my life took some twists and turns and this dream seemed stupid, naïve, adolescent. 

A decade or so later I went to an interview and God reminded me of my media dream. It had revolved around a warehouse where young people and teenagers could hang out and discover that Jesus not only loved, but liked, them.

During the interview, I was told that the set for the TV show, which I would be working on, would be a warehouse. 

This was the blooming of my teenage dream into something I could never have imagined.  

On the drive home, I kept saying thanks to God and laughing. 

I think God was laughing too. 

My dream would have reached two or three hundred kids; God’s dream reaches millions across the entire African continent. 

My dreams were too small; God’s dreams were beyond my wildest imaginings.

That was the day I learnt God isn't limited by our small dreams. (tweet this)

I’ve been working there for 6 years now. It’s been hard and it hasn’t always felt like I’m living a dream. Often it has felt like hard work and sweat and tears but it’s been amazing to live a dream.

Some of the best dreams you can live are the ones you can't even imagine right now. (tweet this)

I don’t know about you but as I’ve grown older I find that I dream less. 

I’m not talking about the kind of dreaming that interrupts you sleep but the kind of dreaming that hopes for the future, that wonders what God has in store, the kind of imaginings that wonder what big things God wants to do with my life. 

I’ve been wondering if my lack of dreaming about the future somehow holds God back from “WOW”-ing me. 

Of course, God doesn’t need my dreams to do amazing things but he does need my heart to be available to him. 

Somehow I think dreaming for God is part of that. It’s part of making ourselves available to him and saying, “I’m in God, no matter what crazy plan you have up your sleeve.”

I don’t know about you but I’m daring to dream for God again, won’t you join me? (tweet this)

Are you currently dreaming some big dreams for God? If so, why not write them down and share with a close friend? If you haven’t dreamt for God for a while why not pray this prayer with me?

Photo: seyed mostafa zamani via photopin cc | Design: Wendy van Eyck

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Dear God, They Say It’s Cancer!

{Guest Devotional by Aldyth Thomson} 

For I am the Lord, your God, who takes hold of your right hand and says to you, do not fear; I will help you. Isaiah 41:13 (NIV)

Photo: Nina Matthews Photography via photopin cc | Design: Wendy van Eyck

In December 2004 I went for a mammogram.

To my horror, I found out that I had stage 2 breast cancer and was facing surgery, chemotherapy and radiation.

I would love to tell you that I was very brave and ‘just knew’ that God was going to come through for me, but I can’t. (Tweet this)

When I sat in the oncologist’s office after the surgery, and she started listing the possible chemo side effects, I started to cry, and cried on and off for two days.  

I couldn’t believe this was happening to me! 

I couldn’t sleep. It was like a huge, black cloud pressing down on me. I don’t think I’ve ever felt so isolated before. 

I have a very caring family and wonderful friends, but the more they tried to encourage me and say that it would all be okay, the more desperate I felt, because how did they know I was going to be okay? They weren’t the ones facing chemo! And what did any of them know about cancer anyway?  

Sometimes, I’ve found, you just have to hear from God for yourself, as nothing else can bring you peace…the kind described in Philippians 4:7 where it says, “And the peace of God, which transcends all understanding, will guard (garrison) your hearts and minds in Christ Jesus” (NIV).

I was desperately afraid of the actual chemotherapy. 

I wondered anxiously exactly how sick I would be. The night before my first chemo, I went into my bedroom and asked God to speak to me and help me deal with my fear. 

My eye fell on Isaiah 41:13, “For I am the Lord, your God, who takes hold of your right hand and says to you, do not fear; I will help you.”  (Tweet this)

What I didn’t know that night, was that the needle used to administer the chemo would always go into the back of my right hand! The overwhelming feeling of fear and helplessness lifted and for the first time I felt able to cope. 

What is it that’s worrying you? What are you desperately afraid of? What do are you going through that you feel like you need God to hold your hand? However you do it, reach out to God and He will meet you at your point of need.                          

                                

{About Aldyth Thomson: The Author Of This Guest Devotional}

Aldyth Thomson has been an organiser of the Beauty for Ashes Women’s Conference since its inception in 1996. Her passion is to see women encouraged in their faith, absolutely sure of God’s great love for them. In December 2004 she was diagnosed with breast cancer and was herself encouraged by so many wonderful women. She is married with three grown children and one grandson. 

Find out more about the Beauty for Ashes Women's Conference, where Mary DeMuth and Sue Keddy are speaking, from the 24th & 25th of May 2013 in Johannesburg by clicking here. 

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That time I Had A Breakdown & God Was Silent

Let all that I am wait quietly before God, for my hope is in him. Psalm 62:5 (NLT)

Photo: aussiegall via photopin cc | Design: Wendy van Eyck

I’ve wiped the kitchen down. Put dishes in the dishwasher. Started another pile of dishes that still need to be wiped, wet, cleaned and put away. 

My husband has just declared he’d like toasted sandwiches for dinner and I’m snapping at him for little things like not reading my mind and getting a plate when I needed it. 

I’m flipping buttered bread when he yells at me from the next room that he needs his injection. I remember that we’re already two hours past schedule.  

I wonder how I’m supposed to make supper and give injections to help him fight cancer - at the same time. 

I’m wound up tight. I can feel tension in my shoulders. I can feel that I’m ready to blow. 

I give my husband and injection while I smell the sandwiches burning. And I wonder how I’m supposed to do it all. How I’m supposed to hold it all together. 

It’s unraveling. I’m coming undone. I can feel it coming because I don’t want to stop doing stuff. I want to stay busy. I grab my sandwiches and shove them down, barely tasting them. 

I pray. I ask God to speak. To tell me what is going on. Request that he at least whispers something beautiful to me, something that will still my soul.

Nothing. God is quiet. 

I’m having a breakdown and God is silent. (Tweet this)

I wonder back to the kitchen and clean up again. I think about baking choc-chip cookies and that’s when I start speaking to myself. 

Not out loud. Just in my head. 

Slow down. Stop. Think. Why don’t you want to just relax? What is driving you? (Tweet this)

Still. Be still. Be still my soul. 

I start to settle down.  There has been no great revelation, no burning bush, no holy moment where I stand barefoot before a holy God. 

Just a stillness. A settling in my soul. 

I realise my busyness has been driven by a need to control, to feel in charge of my fears and my future which seem so tightly intertwined. 

It’s all tangled: My fears that something will happen to my husband, that chemo won’t work, that I’ll end up alone and my feeling that I can do something about it. My sense that if I just care for my husband well, give him injections at the right time and keep everything together that everything will be alright. My expectation that I can do something to change my world. 

So I still. I wait. I quiet down my soul. 

I murmur to God who is so silent right now in my untangling, words of apology, that I’ve put my expectations in myself and not in him. 

No wonder I’m so tense. I know I can’t rely on myself, I know I’ll let myself down. 

I roll my shoulders, breathing out my attempts to save myself and praying instead that my silent God comes and saves me. 

Breathing in the hope that even when God is silent he is still good, he is still in control and he is still bigger than fear. 

Breathe in. Salvation. Breathe out. Hope. (Tweet this)

Lord Jesus, I need you. I can’t do life without you. I give you my fear, my attempts at controlling my world. I trust you and I put my hope in you. I will wait for you. Amen.

You can share this devotional on twitter by clicking here. I’d also love for you to connect on my facebook and twitter pages or leave a comment here about a time that God has shown you that he cares.

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