Made For This -- "What's Keeping You From Dreaming?"

He chose us in Him before the creation of the world to be holy and blameless in His sight. Ephesians 1:4

Please read pages 54 through 57 in Made For This.

What is stopping you from dreaming? What is stopping me?

I fear that many of us have taken on what the world (our world) expects of us as our God-given purpose. I worry that we've assumed pleasing our people is the same as pleasing God. What if these expectations are bondage, and we need to be freed?

Let me be honest.... I fear that I've wasted moments and purpose because I worried that following the way I believed Jesus was leading me would let someone down. These words hit a little too close to home for me,

Some of us have decorated our prison walls so beautifully that we have forgotten that we're sitting in a cell wasting our lives. (page 55)

Here's the beautiful thing, though.... In God's economy nothing is wasted, and it's never ever too late to bust out of that cell. When we are free, we get to remember that we don't search for purpose in order to make our lives matter, because we already matter.

YOU already matter!

We must search for purpose and meaning, because we want to fully participate with Jesus in His Gospel story. We want purpose, because living in our calling will allow us to share Jesus with others through the pieces and stories of our life. It all matters, because He says we matter.

Please read Ephesians 1: 3-14 and complete the Respond, Read, & Reflect sections in your book.

I hope you're journaling your thoughts and your answers. This is where we get to journey with Jesus. These deep questions will cause us to evaluate our life choices and begin to make a plan to step into our next with Him.

Just for fun..... Share a dream you had as a little girl! No dream is too silly, ladies. Let's lighten the mood a little mid week and giggle about our "plans" when we were young and didn't yet know that dreams could be called silly. :)

Dear God, thank you for giving us purpose. Thank you for making us to matter. We need to be reminded of that daily, and we need to know that we've been placed in our communities with purpose. Help us to see with Your vision and cause us to want the purposes You've planned for us.