GOD'S PROJECT

Right now, you could be toiling away unseen and unnoticed, waiting for your big break. You might be discouraged because nothing is paying off, or you feel you’re constantly catching up to a version of someone you’ve yet to be. You could be compensating for a failure behind you or trying to prove your merit to the people around you. No one likes this part, because we see everyone else’s highlights and we presume they’ve got it together and we’re relegated to second-rate status. We might even feel that our current work is beneath our true potential. We want to be doing “great things,” but we’re stuck in limbo, in that icky middle. The truth is that you can prosper right where you are. You can still be teachable in your season behind-the-scenes, even if that season is for life. God’s greatness is available to you so long as you remain available. No one needs to climb the throne to get there. You only need to be present and presently engaged.

I know how hard it is to talk about Jesus. It’s the most awkward conversation you’ll ever have. If you even say the whole Gospel out loud right now, it sounds like the craziest thing you’ve ever heard. But the Gospel isn’t some ‘speech’ you unload on people and then ‘leave it in God’s hands.’ Blasting people with theology is like serving icing for dessert. Evangelism is your whole life, it’s sharing your home, it’s enduring patiently, it’s being a human being, it’s availability, it’s sharing Jesus through who you are; not perfectly, but passionately. Yes, invite them to church and to that revival and talk about your faith and your testimony, but once you dare to go there, just know you might be rejected immediately, a lot, and aggressively. Except secretly they can’t deny there must be something to it, because you’re not just a billboard: you’re an overflow of a barely containable supernatural miracle.

Trust that God is working something in you now, something you can’t imagine, a miracle beyond proportion. Look beyond circumstances, long nights, broken trophies, mental arguments, the swirl of gossip, the false self-talk that you’ve rehearsed over and over. Leave yesterday where it belongs. Don’t cave in to what has happened to you. God says you are more than that – because you are His. As hard as it sounds: you are loved, you are treasured, you are written on the heart and mind of your Creator. Rejoice and revel in what He has done, is doing, will do.

Find someone who wants to invest in you, learn from you, see you win, support your visions and fall in love with you daily.

The same voice that brought the stars into existence, speaks your name with love and truth. Will you not love that voice more than the beauty of the night sky? Will you not gaze upon the Creator as you would the very heavens He made? Will you not answer His call?

I’ve been waiting for the greatest leap of faith that I will encounter, until I met You.

The fault-finder will find faults even in paradise. Love your life, poor as it is. You may perhaps have some pleasant, thrilling, glorious hours, even in a poor-house. The setting sun is reflected from the windows of the alms-house as brightly as from the rich man’s abode; the snow melts before its door as early in the spring. I do not see but a quiet mind may live as contentedly there, and have as cheering thoughts, as in a palace.

It still fascinates me how people leave, how we expect it, how quickly we clean the houses empty and hide ghosts under our fingernails. How names become names but without the burning. How the poems don’t hurt anymore. What I am saying is the songs that remind me of you probably remind you of someone else. What I am saying is we have prepared for this our whole lives. What I am saying is we are too good at stuffing suitcases with memories and drowning the people that we used to be. What I am saying is I’m sorry. What I am saying is that in the dark, ephemeral looks a lot like eternal. What I am saying is your legs must hurt from walking in and out of people’s houses / of people’s lives / of people’s hearts. Your feet must be sore. What I am saying is I am sorry. What I am saying is I am still home if you want me to be. I’m sorry.

Being kind isn’t so bad, your focus becomes a mission; less to spend on self-defeat, kindness makes us complete.