Recently, I ran into yet another bend in the road regarding my job, or at least one of them. It made me do some reevaluating of my future and my goals. In the process of that, I decided to reorganize my office, so I took everything out of the room, evaluated it, and either disposed of it or categorized it. The biggest issue was the closet, which was filled floor to ceiling with paper in various forms. I discovered years of notes from the Southern Christian Writer’s Conference, pieces of finished works that had not been published, unfinished writing projects, and lots writing ideas. It reminded me of projects I had forgotten, but I also found printed copies of email conversations about projects that had potential but were rejected for various reasons. Many times I had received praise within the rejection, but I recall only the sting of rejection. Each time I had started down the road of making my dream a reality I would allow a few rejections to squash my dream and my will to try. It was a definite pattern.
In April, the ladies in our church completed a Bible study called Godly Grit from the website Grow which stands for God Reveals Our Way. Godly Grit is another way of saying Godly patience. The study came at just the right time to prepare me for what I found in that closet. The study focused on the life of Joseph who had a dream from God that he would one day rule over the people. I, too, had a dream, but my dream was to be a writer. However, receiving a dream from God and knowing what to do with that dream can be two very different dilemmas.
Joseph encountered a lot of roadblocks and side roads on his way to seeing his dream become a reality. He was sold into slavery, falsely imprisoned, and forgotten; however, all of these experiences helped mold him into the kind of man and the kind of leader that would be needed for the trials to come. As I went through my closet, I could see the roadblocks and side roads that I have been down in my journey as a writer, and I remember Joseph. Only time will tell exactly what I learned in each experience or how I will use what I know, but as people like to say: “It is not the destination; it is the journey.” Like the stack of writing in my closet, I need some revision, and sometimes it takes a side trip down the road not taken to get me where I need to be.
The important thing is to remember the dream God gave you and to continue to work toward it even when circumstances don’t make sense because if it is from God, He will bring the dream to a reality. He is the author and finisher of my faith, so He has the right to make revisions along the way. In the meantime, I will do what I can do to reach my dream and leave the rest to God.
Awesome reminder…