Faith is the confidence that what we hope for will actually happen; it gives us assurance about things we cannot see. -Hebrews 11:1

Anyone remember Magic Eye books? You’re supposed to look at the picture below and see an image within the image. Don’t ask me what the image is in this picture, cause I have no idea! I always hated people that could see the image. They could see  in seconds what I could stare at for hours and see nothing! They could see something beautiful, when all I saw was a picture that reminds me of tripping on acid!

I was sitting at a high school lunch yesterday and I brought myself back to the perspective of a high school student. I was sitting with seniors who only have a month left in their high school career. A lot of them have the same perspective I had in high school: life’s about having fun, experience everything you can, I don’t have to work hard, we’ll be friends with the friends we have now forever, etc.

I started thinking of all the advice I would give to students in high school: Enjoy it! Cherish your friendships and recognize that you won’t always be friends with these people, work hard in school, make wise decisions, don’t worry about petty things that you’ll laugh about in a year. . .  I could go on and on. It’s easy to say now in retrospect. Why? My perspective changed. I can see where they’re at and where they’re going.

But I remember people telling me similar things in high school and I just blew them off. They didn’t know what they were talking about! They weren’t in high school! It was a perspective issue. Looking back, I wish I would have listened to them. They could see things I couldn’t see, no matter how hard I would try.

I think that’s how it is when you’re walking with God. Sometimes we look at our lives and it looks like the magic eye picture. We can’t see anything, but God sees something wonderful. We can’t see where the path is taking us, but God can. We see our biggest problems, God sees our biggest opportunity.

When we can’t make sense of what’s going on in our lives, we need to exchange our perspective for God’s perspective.

I think if God shared His perspective right now He’d say: Don’t waste your time worry about that, this may seem tough now, but wait until you see how I’m going to use this situation to bless you. I’ll come through on that, I’ll be there with you for that, you’ll come out of this, you can do that, don’t let what that person said effect you… I could go on and on.

Let’s all Exchange our perspective for Gods perspective!

“If God gives you a dream, and the dream comes to life and God shows up in it, and then the dream died,  it may be that God wants to see what is more important to you – the dream or Him. The impact God has planned for us doesn’t occur when we’re pursuing impact. It occurs when we’re pursuing God. At last after a lifetime of striving, God was enough. Not God and impact or God and ministry. Just God.”

-Phil Vischer

My favorite verse in the Bible is Matthew 6:33 – Seek First the Kingdom of God, and all these things will be added unto you. Putting God first really is the key to experiencing life to the fullest, however, all too often we put ourselves first, in the name of putting Him first. “God if I’ll put you first, I know all my dreams and plans will come true!”

Well, what if God has a different plan and dream for your life than you do? Sure, God will give you the desires of your heart, but only when you desires line up with His desires. We’ll only get to that point when we’re willing to let our dreams and desires die.

God is longing for us to get to a place where we willingly lay down our dreams, desires, wants, and plans in exchange for His dream, His desires, His wants, and His plans. The place where God alone is enough. Only then can we really pursue God’s dream for our lives.

I don’t know about you, but I’m sick of trying to do things in my own strength. I’m laying down my dreams, will you?

Thoughts?

Ever feel like this? I know I have. When I was 18 I started interning at my church. It was an unpaid internship and I had no  idea what to expect out of the behind the scenes work at a church. For almost a year the biggest responsibility I had was washing pitchers of water and organizing bins for youth group. That’s what everyone dreams of when they think of working at a church, right?

“God is more concerned about developing your potential than you are!”

I would sit in meetings and hear my mentor delegate “significant” tasks to the rest of the team only to end with looking at me and saying, “Bubs, organize the bins and wash the pitchers.” After two months of that, I had enough. So when my mentor left for his 8 week sabbatical, I e-mailed him telling him I quit. I didn’t sign up to work for free and wash pitchers.

He got me in contact with another mentor and had him talk to me. He said, “Bubs, have you prayed about this?” Of course I hadn’t. He said, “Give God a chance to speak to your heart, if you come back and still don’t want to, then quit.” God had one chance – if he didn’t speak to me in my devotions, it was over. I opened to Isaiah 49:3.4:

³ He said to me, “You are my servant, Israel, and you will bring me glory.” ⁴ I replied, “But my work seems so useless! I have spent my strength for nothing and to no purpose.Yet I leave it all in the Lord’s hand;I will trust God for my reward.”

This verse changed my life forever. I felt like my work was useless, done for nothing, and for no purpose. YET…I leave it in God’s hands – I trust Him for my reward.  I developed this mentality and decided to stick with the internship.

One Thing Leads to Another

For an entire year, I set up bins faithfully every week. At the end of the year, I got asked to give my first offering. I started getting more responsibility. I interned a second year and at the end of my second year, I got asked to speak for the first time ever. Which led to more speaking engagements, more responsibility, and eventually 4 years after I interned, I got hired on staff at my church.

What Would Have Happened if I Would Have Quit Because I thought Everything I did was Pointless?

I wouldn’t be writing this, I wouldn’t be on staff, I probably wouldn’t be living for God. My Conclusion? God has you where you are for a reason, for your development, and if you’ll learn to trust Him for your reward instead of people, in His timing, He will promote you and allow you to do great things for Him, but first, you have to be faithful in the things that seem absolutely worthless.