dreaming for success

Abraham Lincoln ran for public office and lost at least 8 times before he won the general election for president in 1860. He faced daunting obstacles, yet kept pursuing a higher calling and ended up as arguably one of the greatest presidents our nation has ever seen. I find this quote from him extremely inspiring:

"Without Divine assistance, I cannot succeed; with that assistance, I cannot fail."

It was so great to hear Pastor Seth Franco from MAOG speak this weekend at our service - if you didn't get a chance to hear him, you should definitely download the message - just visit the website - atthecrossroads.us. He talked about letting God rob us of our own dreams and give us His dreams. If they are His dreams within His divine plan, God promises to give us that "Divine assistance" for fail-proof success.

What dreams might you need to crucify today? What dreams has He given you and promised to assist you with until they've come into success? Share them here in a comment as a step of faith, confessing His ability to make it come to pass by opening up in vulnerability to others who care for you.

In light of crucifying own dreams, plans, and intentions for those of the Lord, I've decided to take this week and ask God every day to plan out my agenda. Sadly, I don't think I've ever done that before for an entire week (shows how much of a control-freak I am). It seems daunting. There's so much I'd like to accomplish, but I've decided to leave it all up to Him and follow the whim of the Holy Spirit to the best of my ability. I don't know what will happen. There's a great possibility I might come apart at the seams by Saturday, but I trust that God will lead me and that He'll watch out for what's best for me. I'm standing in faith that if I accomplish what He alone sets before me, I'll have the most productive week of my life. I'll let you know how it turns out. Frankly I'm afraid that if this works, God might ask me to do it all the time, for the rest of my life. Frightening!

How do you pursue God's will for your daily life? Share some tips here for those of us who need extra help in this area.

"We can make our plans, but the Lord determines our steps." -Proverbs 16:8 (NLT)

a lost art

I've come to realize that we've lost something in recent generations that was once a very vital piece of life. We've lost the ability to really listen to people. I'm guilty too, so don't take me the wrong way, but sometimes I observe conversations and I balk at how inconsiderate we can be. We don't look each other in the eyes anymore, it's too uncomfortable for some reason. We don't let people express themselves completely, we're too eager to interrupt with our own similar experience. We don't respond with pulling questions to find out more, we're just not interested or empathetic enough to go any deeper.

I do have some really great listeners in my life and being in a group or conversation with them is always so rewarding. I can tell that they care about me by the way they give me a voice above all the noise. I actually feel like I can be me and be loved unconditionally. I can reveal things to them from my heart and not be afraid of how they will respond because I know they want to hear my heart and not just my words.

James 1:19 says, "Post this at all the intersections, dear friends: Lead with your ears, follow up with your tongue, and let anger straggle along in the rear." (MSG) How can we lead with our ears? What will it take to get that lost art of listening back? Will it be slowing our lives down? Perhaps biting our tongues for a few extra minutes? Crucifying our pride and assumption that we have something more important to say than our conversation-mate? Intentionally caring for a person enough to hear and understand the heart behind the words? Look them in the eye when they are speaking?

Let me know how you've developed your listening skills . . .