Over these last couple of weeks we’ve been looking at what it means to live out our big dreams in life.  But what about your dream? The one that God’s created just for you.  What does that look like?

Good to be with you again today on this Friday, end of another week. These last two weeks we’ve been chatting about living out the big dreams that God lays on our hearts, and I’m always conscious when you talk about dreaming, that, well, we’re all at different places in life. Some people are on top of the world at the moment that might be you. Your life might be going on just wonderfully well.

On the other hand, you may be in the depths of despair. You may be coming out of it, on the way to being on top of the world. Or well maybe you were on top of the world last month and you feel like life is slipping a bit. We’re all at different places on that roller coaster of emotions and life. I heard from the vice president of a large, successful, global organisation recently, it’s based in the U.S.A. And he said this, “Berni, I have ten years left in the job and I’m kind of laying out my priorities. I want to do a bit of dreaming. What should I achieve? What do you think?” He asked me the question. So I gave him an opinion that jolted him, it was something he didn’t expect.

And so it’s Friday. We always like to look at the subject that we’ve been talking about during the week from the perspective of someone who’s asked a question. And today we’re doing that in relation to this man who is the vice-president of international operations in a large, global, very successful organisation.

Now this man is a mature Christian I’ve known him for many years. He’s been walking with the Lord all his life, serving God. And he asked my opinion in the early stages of a process of dreaming. And it’s a good thing to do. He said, “Look, I’ve got ten years before I retire. I’d like to map out what’s my dream for these next ten years. I just don’t want to sit in the chair. I’d like to achieve some stuff. What’s my dream, what are my aims? When I retire what would I like to look back on over these ten years?” A really good thing to do. But as is often the way in the early stages. We don’t have all the pieces. We don’t know how all of the pieces of that dream fit together. We need to deal with the ambiguity and the uncertainty. When I looked at his dream, I read through some of the things he had there. Somehow to me the pieces were too small. They were too operational. They were too much about his organisation rather than the people that he was wanting to help. So this is how I answered his e-mail.

In helping you put some of the pieces of the puzzle in place, I’d first like you to tell me what sort of a dream do you have in mind? I mean, is this a dream of relative safety, bite sized in achievable chunks? Flags outside the office, notches on the belt as it were to help you ride out the last ten years of your job with satisfaction? Or is it a big dream? One that’s so large and so unachievable without the Lord that it lies utterly outside your personal comfort zone? It’s exciting and terrifying all at once. I don’t mean to be unkind in asking the question, but I think that when we’re dreaming it’s an entirely healthy question to ask.

In fact, it’s the question. Psalm 2:8 says:

Ask of me and I will make the nations your heritage and the ends of the earth your possession.

Now for someone in your role, there’s one heck of a dream. Tell me, what sort of a dream do you have in mind? He sent me an e-mail back saying, “I wish you’d stayed in bed this morning.” But he said, “You know something? You’ve asked me exactly the right question.” And so now he’s gone away to think about his dream. Big dreams are always outside our comfort zones. We have a big God. We have a huge God. A God who loves this world so much that He has huge plans to use small, ordinary, fallible people like you and me to touch the world with his love.

What about your dream? Let’s just focus on your dream for a minute. What does that look like? When you look back at the end of your life on the time between this moment and that, what would you like to have achieved? What would you like to have done? That’s an interesting question and it’s a question I believe that we should all ask. But let’s begin with the here and now. First question. Are you satisfied with life right now? The way that life is going, what you’re doing, how you’re spending your time, how the energies are being spent? How satisfied are you with your life right now? The chances are that if you’re living out that one thing that God made you to do, you’ll have a sense of deep satisfaction. But if you have a dream out there somewhere, and you’ve never stepped towards it, you’ve never said, ‘I’m going to live that dream.’ My hunch is that your level of satisfaction is pretty low. The statistics say that 85% of people in this world do not enjoy their jobs. 85%! Are you one of those 85%?

My second question is, are you walking this path with Jesus Christ? Is He your Lord? Is He your Friend? Is He the One who guides everything in your life? Because if He’s not, my hunch is the satisfaction won’t be there for you either. In fact, maybe you’ve been listening to this stuff over the last couple of weeks thinking, “I wouldn’t actually mind having Jesus as my Lord.” I’m going to pray a prayer right now, and you might want to pray that prayer with me to invite Jesus into your heart.

Father, I believe that You sent Your Son, Jesus Christ to walk this earth and to be nailed to a cross and to die for me, to pay for my sins so that I could be forgiven. Father I am sorry for all the things that I have done wrong in my life, and today I make a decision to turn away from those things. Lord I accept you into my heart to be my Lord and my Saviour, and I want to live the rest of my life for you, living out the plan that you have for my life, I want to know you, I want to touch you, I want to experience you. I pray this in Jesus Name.

The third question is: Have you embraced the dream that He’s laid on your heart?

Think back, what’s the one thing that has always burned in your heart that you want to be or want to do? Have you embraced it? Have you said, “Yes I’m going to follow Jesus in that dream?” Do you have the courage to step out of your comfort zone to a big dream, a scary dream? And then lay it down at God’s feet and say “Lord, this is the dream, if you’re in it, if its your dream, if its your will for me I will follow it no matter what the cost to me, but if its not your dream, if I’m on the wrong track, if I haven’t got this right, Lord I lay it down I don’t want to go down that path.” Have you had the courage to do that, and are you prepared to pay the price? Because there’s always a price, there’s always a cost to following a dream.

Jesus said, “take up your cross and follow me.” It’s a picture of sacrifice, satisfaction comes in sacrifice and when you step out and you follow Jesus into this dream are you prepared to walk through a wasteland? Are you prepared to feel lost some days and put all of your faith, put all of your hope in Him and trust Him to bring the dream about?” And when you come across opposition, big bits of opposition that frustrate you, that scare you, will you go and attack them with your faith in God’s word? And when you see people whose God shaped need fits your God shaped dream will you love them, will you touch them with Gods love?

In this entertainment age where we have larger than live celebrities and we see people succeeding and living out the plan that God has for their lives, we look at their success and we conclude, “well that cant possibly be for me, no it cant be for me.” But truly, truly I tell you God is calling you today, God’s plan is to take ordinary old you, just the way you are, just with the one or two gifts or abilities you have, and to mix his love and power with those and to do something extraordinary through you. Is the aim to make you a celebrity? No that’s not Gods aim. But to give you the exquisite and unique pleasure, a pleasure that can only be found in Jesus Christ to live your God shaped dream out in your life, meeting the God shaped need of the people around you with His love. That is awesome, that is so exciting, now will you go?

Will you grab that dream and hang on to Jesus and live that dream no matter what the cost? Its an exciting life, it’s a scary life, and I believe that when you come to the end of this life and look back on that you will look back with great satisfaction.