Week 3 of The Story - Trading in Your Dreams for Another’s

We are three weeks into our incredible journey through The Story.  Max Lucado and Randy Frazee have provided some additional insights for us for each week. Here is what they had to say about Joseph.People nearing mid-life often crash into some startling and unexpected observations. For instance, we all dreamed big dreams when we were younger. But as we move at a break-neck pace through our twenties, thirties, and forties, we eventually slam head on into the realization that some of our dreams will never be realized.

That observation throws some people into a mid-life crisis. Some don’t make it that far with their aspirations, having already given them up somewhere along the way. Some run into conflict that makes them weary and they settle for less. Still others make bold decisions to trade one dream in for another.

That’s what Joseph did. Talk about dreams! He had some big ones. At seventeen he dreamed his ten

older brothers would bow down to him. It’s enough he dreamed that dream. What makes it worse is that he told his brothers about it.

The older brothers already had issues with the younger son. Their father favored Joseph. He had even given him a valuable, multi-colored coat. That’s the modern-day equivalent of a parent of four teenagers giving one an iPhone and the other three a stack of quarters each for a pay phone (assuming they could find one on their travels). The brothers banded together and tossed the dreamer in a ditch, eventually selling him into slavery at the first opportunity. The next thing Joseph knew he was waking up in Egypt.

From there his life was a rollercoaster thrill ride. One minute a slave. The next in charge of an Egyptian official’s house. The next in prison. The next in charge of the prison. Then he found himself in front of Pharaoh, called upon to interpret the leader’s dreams. With God’s help he was able to warn Pharaoh he would have seven years of abundant crops that he should be put in storehouses in anticipation of seven years of famine. Recognizing his wisdom, Pharaoh put Joseph second in command of all of Egypt.

And because of God’s personal involvement in his life, he was was able to save his family. The same family that God was building into a nation. Joseph was in position to bring his family to Egypt and give them the most fertile land to work. And it was definitely fertile. In the time they were there they were “fruitful and increased greatly” (Exodus 1:7).

Joseph could have lost his life getting caught up in the details of his life, chasing his dreams and desires.

Instead, he chose a better story. God’s story.

You can do the same. If your life’s dream has stalled, look to God. If your dream now realized is not all you thought it would be, look to God. He can give you another dream. A better one, not according to the world’s standard but God’s criterion. Just like Joseph’s. Then you’ll have a story to tell.

 

Things don't always go as we think they should and sometimes we have very little if any fault in those circumstances.  Things just don't seem to be working out.  But could it be that God is working things out, even when things don't seem to be working out.  - Romans 8:28

 

Read Chapter Four about Moses.  You actually have a couple of weeks.  We will talk about it on July 14th.

 

Keep on Reaching,

Dave

God Was Not Caught Off Guard

My day Friday was busy and hectic.  My morning started with a drive to Frankfort for breakfast at Cracker Barrel with my parents, my aunt and uncle, and my son.  When we returned to town traffic was all rerouted because a truck had careened into three parked cars.  Then as we prepared to head to Louisville to do some Christmas shopping I stopped for gas close to our church and watched in shock as a vehicle ran through the corner stop sign, across the major thoroughfare, through a yard and into the front of the house across the street.  I yelled for help and ran across the street to help the man and to make sure no one was in the house. It was a pretty bizarre morning for our little town, but I hadn't had a radio or television on since 7:30 in the morning. So I had no idea what was going on in a little town in Connecticut.  Suddenly my day seemed like a mundane fog. I wanted to find my grandchildren and hug them tight.  I want to find my daughter, and suggest a career change.  I thanked God for the unbelievable change in my son's life.  After all that we have been through, I still have them all.  I couldn't then and still can not imagine what the families in Sandy Hook were feeling.  

But it is not just Sandy Hook.  We can't lose sight of twenty two children slashed and stabbed in China on Friday as well.  We can't lost sight of families who lost family members who were innocently shopping in malls in Denver and Portland.  We can't lose sight of planes flying into buildings and our world being changed forever.  One of my first childhood memories was the unrest of my parents following the assassination of John F Kennedy.  Then five years later the assassinations of Bobby Kennedy and Martin Luther King.  I remember as a high school student trying to make sense of a preacher named Jim Jones and something unbelievable in Jamestown.   I still can't make any sense of what is being done to children in Kenya and Uganda that are being stolen and made slaves of blood diamond gangs. 

The insanity of our current world is nothing new.  It took no more than three chapters of scripture for insanity to enter the world in the form of a serpent who introduced sin into our world.   Evil was here and it will remain until Christ returns.  We live in a very broken world and when there is brokenness, things are shattered.  Lives have been shattered from sin since the garden of Eden and they are still shattered around the world today.  This season of the year reminds us of the only possible answer to the brokenness of our world.  Jesus came to be the only answer.  He is the only hope!  

Many are asking, so where was God on Friday? On June 25^th, 1962 we took prayer out of the public schools in America.  On June 17^th, 1963 we took the Bible out of schools in America.  Then on November 17^th, 1980 we were told to take the Ten Commandments off the wall because if the children read them they might follow them.  We live in a time when we have systematically legislated God out of our schools.  But when Columbine, Heath, or Sandy Hook happens people why He wasn't there.  What I wish people could see is that was neither surprised or caught off guard by any of these tragedies.  The nature of an omniscient God is that He is always aware of what we are going through.

That same God was not caught off guard when the doctor told you it was cancer.  He was not caught off guard when your spouse told you that there was someone else.  He was not caught off guard when the employer told you your services were no longer needed.  He was not caught off guard when your child went through a difficult period in their life that broke your heart.  He is omniscient, so He knows, but He is also omnipotent and so He has the power to see you through anything. But why doesn't He stop it?

We will never know what He has stopped.  I don't want to imagine what our world would be like it not for a loving God.  But we deal with the consequences of fallen, broken, shattered world!  Those poor innocent children were not being punished for the sins of the world and Pharisees like those from Westboro Baptist Church will pay a heavy price when they stand before a loving God for claiming that he was punishing these children for the sins of the world.

That is why Jesus came in the first place. But why do little children die?  Because of evil in this world.  Moses was the survivor of a violent mass murder of children to prohibit boys growing into men who could fight against an Egyptian army.  Jesus was the survivor of a evil violent mass murder plot by Herod to eliminate any child that might be the king who would rescue the Jews.  People have been killing innocent children since evil entered this world.  Before we cast all of our anger upon school shooters, gangs who kidnap children, and the Pharoah's and Herod's of history who have destroyed thousands of innocent lives, we must examine the blood on our own hands.  When Pilot could not presude the people not to kill Jesus he washed his hands to symbolically try to remove his guilt in his murder.  We need to realize as long as the elected officials allow the insane murder of innocent children while they are still in their mothers womb, their blood is just as much on our hands.

There is clamouring for gun control and many other laws to stop things like school shootings.  People talk of how desperately these shooters needed medication and psychologist.  Those things would most definitely have helped some, but what they all need is Jesus.  He is is the only hope that can ever heal a broken world.  In 2 Chronicles 7:14 we read telling words.  It is an IF - THEN scenario that can change our world.  God said, "IF my people will humble themselves and pray and seek my face and turn from their wicked ways, THEN (and only THEN) will I hear from heaven and heal their land."

THE Great I AM is a good shepherd that truly cares for His sheep.  God truly cares for you!  He always has, He always will!

I have also included links to blogs from two wonderful friends who have shared hope, much more eloquently than I could.  Ben Cacharias, is the pastor of Mountain Christian Church in Joppa, Maryland.  Here is his blog.  http://outofmymind.cc/    Bob Russell is the retired minister of the SOutheast Christian Church in Lousiville, Kentucky, please read his blog  http://www.bobrussell.org/2012/12/16/where-was-god-during-the-connecticut-massacre/

Great New Book - Get a Copy

I am proud of my friend Dean Burk for publishing this important book that details the eroding values of a society that has removed God from their decision making.  I have known Dean for many years before he and his family started worshiping on the Hill.  I have had the privilege of watching Dean grow and mature over the last few years and I am thrilled that he pressed forward with this book.  I read the manuscript a couple of years ago and was impressed with the clarity and the preciseness of the documentation that Dean shares. 

The beauty this book is that it is brief and to the point.  It can easily be read in an evening and then kept as reference or shared with a friend.  It is being distributed exclusively through Amazon and amazon.com .  When you log on www.amazon.com  search for Dean Burk and the book titled Removing God from the One Nation Under God.  The cost is only $5.99.  I know Dean's heart and his goal is not to profit from this book, but to share firm researched truth that might possibly change the heart and mind of readers to do what they can to help bring God back into the fabric of this great country where He has been removed and to keep Him as a part of where He has not been removed.