Tag: dreams

Unhindered

So, what’s holding you back? From taking that next step? From moving forward. I’m sure if you are like me, you kinda know the answer already. The minute you read the question, you could picture just what it is. The big thing that holds you back. Is it fear? Is it doubt? Is it because you lack faith?

For me it has always been fear. The fear of rejection, and the fear of failing, of not measuring up to others, not fitting in. I always have this same recurring fear of not fitting in and people not approving of what I do. When we let fear control us, we get held back from our progress forward. I have written previous blogs on facing fear before, and like I always say, I am a work in progress. I write about what to do, but even for myself, those steps forward in facing fears, have never been easy. I think it is that way for all of us. We let ourselves and our fears hold us back. It isn’t really anyone else, but US.

We have dreams and goals and maybe even callings, but we can feel hindered from pursuing them. These dreams, goals and callings, are like small seeds when we first sense them. If we nurture them, they grow and produce fruit. If we leave them alone, they can become stagnant and lifeless. When we let fear, or whatever else that we know is OUR hindrances become larger than our dreams, the dreams will wither. It’s like the parable of the sower that Jesus taught. We can let the worries and cares- like the fear of rejection- steal the seeds and prevent them from growing. If you would like to read the entire parable it is from Matthew chapter 13, Luke chapter 8 and Mark chapter 4. Jesus is of course explaining how those that hear the Gospel can hear it, but not everyone will accept the message of the Gospel, and still others will fall away from faith and not grow. It takes nurturing and good soil. The principle is the same, however,

We need to continue to nurture and grow our dreams and callings. To press past the worries, pray about every step we need to take, make time in our schedules to pursue those dreams and believe that God has uniquely qualified us and hard- wired us with certain skills and talents for those dreams and callings.

We can also ask others to pray for us. I know I need prayer warriors, praying for me. I also find that I need to spend time reading the Bible and reading books that others have written who have gone before me in this faith journey. It renews my thoughts and renewing my thoughts, renews my mind. And my mind is my biggest hindrance to stepping out into my dreams. The fears I have tend to roll around in my mind, unless I decide to believe what the Bible says, over what I might be feeling, others are saying about me, or what the devil tries to tell me about myself. I have to choose to free my thoughts, to unhinder them from fears and move forward in faith. It is a journey, not a dash, but I am moving forward and so can you. God Bless- Nancy

Real (estate)

It was the perfect time of day. The day time sky had not quite given in to the blackness and darkness of the night sky, but was holding on for just a bit to its reflection of blue. It was a soft blue, almost purple, but you could tell it had been a brilliant blue in the brightness of daytime. The sun had set and was casting a loving glow upon the wispy clouds. The clouds were not big and puffy, but just small and wispy, like the contrails of a jet. They as well seemed to be trying to hold on to the last bit of day as they shown in a soft pink color. Some call this time the golden hour.

The sky view was blocked slightly by the house. But the house itself did not seem dwarfed by the sky as it was larger and grander than most. Someone had turned the lights on inside already anticipating the coming nightfall. In fact, each room had the glow of a soft yellow light and because the curtains had not yet been closed, you could see a hint of the room inside. Each window was symmetrical with the large door in the center. I had studied some architecture in college so I knew this would fall into the category of Georgian style. It looked so amazing at this perfect time of night. Almost magical and surreal. So perfect. Almost unbelievable.

And it was. You see it was a real estate listing I was staring at on my phone this morning. No, I’m not looking for a house, it just was one of those social media pop ups, probably because of a word suggestion made earlier by one of my sons. You see both my sons are photographers and videographers who work in real estate. So I am very familiar with how real estate photo shoots are done. When someone is ready to sell their home they typically call an agent to list their home. The agent calls my son and a time slot is given to shoot the home. My son edits the photos to some degree and then they are sent to another editor to finalize the pictures. I have heard from them just how far some home owners want them to edit the photos. Thankfully, my sons will not edit out something that would misrepresent the home- such as a door or window. But gaining in popularity with home sellers is the twilight shot. I have to give my sons quite a bit of credit here as they actually will go out at the golden hour and photograph a home. However some home sellers want an ideal picture with the purplish sky and pink clouds that are not real. The colorization is so intense that it is like a dream sequence, not reality. I’m not sure what people think who actually see the homes in person, but at least it gets them to visit the home.

We all know about air brushed photos of models on magazine covers, but have you ever thought that we too airbrush and edit our lives to look good for others? Let me be even more specific, have you ever thought about the church doing this? If you haven’t then let me assure you it does. I know because I am the church. We all are. If you call yourself a Christian than you are part of the body, the church. And I have been so guilty of this at times. But what if we could just be real with each other and stop showing up on Sunday mornings all edited and air bushed to perfection. Please I am not talking about showing up in our pajamas and without makeup. Makeup is okay as is hair coloring, and tattoos and piercings. Just be yourself and be transparent. Don’t try to hide your struggles and imperfections from each other. If you were perfect than you wouldn’t need God or a Savior.

And for all who read this who think they can’t visit church until their life is all cleaned up and edited, please come as you are. Believe me the church is full of many hurting people with problems that are willing to help you tackle yours. I know some church people are really judgemental, I get that and I have fallen for the lie that I have to act and or dress a certain way to be accepted. We all want acceptance and affirmation. But, we can’t really get that completely from people, we will only find that in God. And not in any god or religion, but THE God, who doesn’t ask us to clean up and edit ourselves first to look good on the outside, but the God who came down to earth as a lowly human, felt pain and hurt and rejection by others. He wants the real us so He can heal us. Not in a superficial way that only looks good on the outside, but in a real and personal way. he knows you and your struggles. If you do visit a church this week or seek out a pastor for help and you get the judgemental, air brushed version of church, keep looking, we are not all bad. we are just imperfect so keep looking and visiting until you find the one that welcomes you without the editing.

Looking For Good

The young girl ran purposely across the wet sand of the beach. Her hair blew across her face, making it difficult to see where she was running to. Her smile was big and every so often she would laugh with happiness. Every once in while she would look back over her shoulder to see if the thin blue piece of plastic was sharing in her enthusiasm. She held tightly to a small thread in one hand and kept running. Soon the blue plastic rose up from the wet sand and lifted higher and higher. The girl kept running for a bit until she realized her kite was now actually in the air. She stopped and watched it dance across the sky over the beach. She held tightly to her little string, listening to the advice of her dad and mom ‘To not let go” Her joy was evident to all by her huge smile. She pointed upward, to make sure no one missed this glorious event that had just happened. Then. Just as quickly as the blue plastic had risen from the sand, it crashed downward in an uncontrollable death spiral. The wind had shifted. The kite crashed to the sand. The girl was heartbroken. She had gone from excited anticipation, to joy, to devastation in the span of a few minutes.

If you’ve ever flown kites at the beach, you’ve probably been through this many times. You know what to expect. You know you need wind and updrafts to make things fly. But, when we are young we expect flying a kite to be easy. We just run really, really fast and it will soar. We are heartbroken when our kite crashes. It’s worse if it gets broken when it crashes. The few dollars our parents spent on the bright piece of plastic- or if they were really ingenious- the time they took to make a kite- was all gone. It was now a pile of string and plastic. Sometimes broken kites can be repaired, but usually they can’t.

I thought about this today as God challenged me to “look for the good” in things of life. Life can seem like flying a kite at the beach. We can get excited with a new plan in our lives. We want it to succeed, just like the soaring kite. We pursue it like the running child on the beach. We want our plans and dreams to follow us and then catch the wind and fly. For a while they might seem to be working with us and soon they are making forward progress. But, suddenly, there’s no wind, or a downdraft, that sends our dreams falling down. We wonder how can we recover the flight? Will our dreams crash like the kite? Can we find a good updraft to help them soar once again?

Unlike crashed kites that usually cannot be repaired, life can be repaired. Yes, sometimes God might want us to let go of some plans and dreams because He has something better in mind. Other times, though, He wants us to keep trying and not be discouraged when we feel broken and our dreams seem far from flight. Hold on to the string and don’t let go. God can use broken dreams and plans. He can use the broken us.

And I believe He wants to use the broken us, because when we are broken is when we call out to Him for help. We need Him to fix our kites sometimes. To heal our broken hearts and help us with our dreams. We might not see His hand at work in our lives and we might get discouraged when our dreams look like a kite spiraling down from the sky. It is in those times we need to stop and look for the good. When you find it, you will find it is from God.  In Jeremiah 29: 13-14, God reminds Jeremiah and us,  “You will seek me and find me when you seek me with all your heart. I will be found by you” (NIV).

God Bless -Nancy

 

Don’t Abandon The Ship

Doubt has a way of sneaking up on you. You might be pressing on into the future with a great amount of hopes, ideas, and dreams. You’ve worked hard for several years towards those goals and kept hope alive. But, over time, your energy seems to wane a little bit. You’re finding the daily grind monotonous. Your dreams, hopes, goals and ideas seem to be moving farther away from you as each day passes. So, you find yourself doubting whether or not these dreams will ever happen. They always seem just out of reach. You begin to doubt yourself.

This might seem like too much for a Tuesday morning to tackle, but I just wanted to be real with all of you. When I began this blog my intention was not to tell you I have a five step plan for you that will make your life perfect, but rather that as we all move forward in life,  we can look to faith together for this journey. Faith in God is the only thing that can ever make sense of the crazy world in which we live. Faith brings hope. Hope is anchored in Christ and nothing else. God’s word, the Bible, encourages us and instructs us in our faith in Christ and I always want to share God’s word with you so that you might be encouraged.

So, if you are like me, and are honest with yourself, you doubt sometimes. You might even doubt your faith or doubt God.  You are not a skeptic, like those who do not profess faith in Christ, but just sometimes, you find yourself doubting. Like I mentioned at the beginning of this blog, it sneaks up on you. It has snuck up on me.

It has been over ten years ago that I first received a call of God to full-time ministry while listening to my pastor at the time give his own testimony of his call from God into full-time pastoral ministry. I have been on the journey to discover what ministry God has called me to. I have spent several years completing my education and have seen many doors and opportunities present themselves and then disappear.

One of the most difficult challenges during this time has been the opportunities I have seen others get that I have not. It has grown me in many ways and I believe this has been God’s intention. It is still difficult though.

I have also experienced disappointment from churches and denominations who hold to the archaic notion that women must stay in the nurseries and not stand in behind  podiums to teach, encourage, and share the Gospel to everyone no matter the gender. I have been overlooked as a ministry partner with my husband and been the uninvited to small group planning sessions, where gender was the only prerequisite, not Bachelor of Science degree in religion, which I hold. My ideas have been shot down on more than one occasion to help military members with their marriages, as well as those in the civilian community. Mission trips, for which I was so excited to be a part of, have been cancelled overnight.  Disappointment and discouragement  has become the norm for me rather than the exception, yet I still press on.

But, I’ll be real all, some days I wish I had been called to be a nurse, or dental hygienist. Or something normal. Maybe it wouldn’t be so disappointing. And I question myself, whether or not I heard God correctly and I begin to doubt.

But, let me stop for a minute and share this thought with you. If you are finding yourself in this season of doubt, do not ignore it before you deal with it properly. Too often people think the key to defeating doubt is to get busy and wait for the feeling to pass. It isn’t always easy to stop and take time to face your feelings, but it is the best thing to do in the long run. Ignoring feelings of doubt, or any feelings without dealing with them, only let’s them intensify on the inside. They do not disappear, they just grow stronger until you have an adult meltdown. – That was your 30 second counseling session- I also have a minor in Christian counseling and membership in the AACC (American Association of Christian Counselors).

Whenever, I find myself self-doubting, I realize that I have been busy keeping busy. I have not been spending time reading the Bible or in personal prayer time- the time when no one is home and I can just open up out loud to God and talk about things. Whenever I feel doubt creep in, I can always be sure it is because I haven’t been listening to God or talking with Him in prayer. Busyness robs us of hearing from God, who wants to encourage us to keep on with our dreams and hopes. He gives us our dreams and our callings. He has created us with the talents we have as well as the temperaments for the journey. And He gives us choices. We can choose to doubt or choose to believe. He’s not mad at us if we doubt and want to give up on our dreams, He just wants us to cry out to Him and seek His answers in the Bible.

I often share passages from the Book of Joshua because they are encouraging for those who, like me, are moving forward into new seasons and chapters of their lives. Here is another for you : “No one will be able to stand against you all the days of your life. As I was with Moses, so I will be with you; I will never leave you nor forsake you” (NIV) Joshua 1:5

I really needed this verse today and it came to mind as I considered what to write today .I pray that you will stop and take time out today from your busy schedule to pick up your Bible and read this passage in your own version. And I also hope you will take time to pray.

Just be honest with God about your doubts. Get real with Him and be honest, after all He knows what’s in your heart and what’s troubling your mind. He wants to keep you encouraged and He will not leave you or forsake you.

Just don’t abandon the ship of your dreams, hopes and goals. The rough seas of doubt might last for a bit, but eventually you will run into calm waters. Storms of doubt will pass, but sometimes you have to go through them as a reminder to call out to God.

-God Bless -Nancy