Two months ago almost from today, I was at the Dare 2 Dream conference held by the British Isles North and British Isles South districts. The weekend conference was dedicated to helping pastors and lay people alike to listen for God's dreams for their communities and nations, and then to embrace those dreams. By necessity, those dreams would be far bigger than ours, and also, in many ways, unthinkable to our limited, human minds.
Today, I am with our church leaders of the South Asia Field, and in the afternoon session we are being challenged to listen for God's dreams for South Asia and beyond. The group was asked to try to identify the unthinkable, the impossible, that God might want to do.
This stretching exercise asks believers to realize that God's mind, and also His divine resources, are more than "we can ask or imagine".
I was reminded of the story of Jesus and the feeding of the 5,000 in Mark 6. It started when Jesus and the disciples were faced with a crowd of 5,000 men, and an uncounted number of women and children, who had been listening to Jesus teach all day, and they were hungry. Jesus told the disciples: I want you to feed these people.
This was Jesus' impossible dream.
37 They said to him, “That would take more than half a year’s wages[e]! Are we to go and spend that much on bread and give it to them to eat?”
38 “How many loaves do you have?” he asked. “Go and see.”
When they found out, they said, “Five—and two fish.”
The disciples had nothing. But a child had two small loaves of bread and some fish. The fact is that the resource they brought to Jesus wasn't even theirs. And it was far too small to accomplish Jesus' dream. Yet they brought it anyway. Whether their motive was to prove their point to him, or if it was a step of faith, we don't know. Either way, this small resource, offered to solve an impossible problem, was blessed and multiplied by the divine power of the Creator of the whole universe, and not only were the 5,000 and the women and children fed, but they were fed lavishly. There were 12 whole baskets left after each person had eaten their fill.
This story is a model to us for the fact that God's dreams are not dependent on our resources. When we stare in dismay at our material lack and decide we can't do more than what we have in our hands, we are limiting God. God only asks us to dream His dream, and to participate in the ways He asks, knowing He has His own resources in mind which He plans to bring to the table.
When we dream dreams that we can accomplish in our own power, we may not be dreaming God's dream, but our own.
I am moved by how both the Nazarenes in the UK as well as the Nazarene across South Asia are spending time dedicated to asking God what His dreams are for their world, and how He wants them to participate in that, without being held back by their own limited resources.
What dream is God asking you to dream with Him for your family, your community, your local church, your workplace, your nation, your people group?
Today, I am with our church leaders of the South Asia Field, and in the afternoon session we are being challenged to listen for God's dreams for South Asia and beyond. The group was asked to try to identify the unthinkable, the impossible, that God might want to do.
This stretching exercise asks believers to realize that God's mind, and also His divine resources, are more than "we can ask or imagine".
I was reminded of the story of Jesus and the feeding of the 5,000 in Mark 6. It started when Jesus and the disciples were faced with a crowd of 5,000 men, and an uncounted number of women and children, who had been listening to Jesus teach all day, and they were hungry. Jesus told the disciples: I want you to feed these people.
This was Jesus' impossible dream.
37 They said to him, “That would take more than half a year’s wages[e]! Are we to go and spend that much on bread and give it to them to eat?”
38 “How many loaves do you have?” he asked. “Go and see.”
When they found out, they said, “Five—and two fish.”
The disciples had nothing. But a child had two small loaves of bread and some fish. The fact is that the resource they brought to Jesus wasn't even theirs. And it was far too small to accomplish Jesus' dream. Yet they brought it anyway. Whether their motive was to prove their point to him, or if it was a step of faith, we don't know. Either way, this small resource, offered to solve an impossible problem, was blessed and multiplied by the divine power of the Creator of the whole universe, and not only were the 5,000 and the women and children fed, but they were fed lavishly. There were 12 whole baskets left after each person had eaten their fill.
This story is a model to us for the fact that God's dreams are not dependent on our resources. When we stare in dismay at our material lack and decide we can't do more than what we have in our hands, we are limiting God. God only asks us to dream His dream, and to participate in the ways He asks, knowing He has His own resources in mind which He plans to bring to the table.
When we dream dreams that we can accomplish in our own power, we may not be dreaming God's dream, but our own.
I am moved by how both the Nazarenes in the UK as well as the Nazarene across South Asia are spending time dedicated to asking God what His dreams are for their world, and how He wants them to participate in that, without being held back by their own limited resources.
What dream is God asking you to dream with Him for your family, your community, your local church, your workplace, your nation, your people group?
"20 Now to him who is able to do immeasurably more than all we ask or imagine, according to his power that is at work within us, 21 to him be glory in the church and in Christ Jesus throughout all generations, for ever and ever! Amen." -- Ephesians 3:20-21 (NIV)
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