Learning to dream with God.

I was 16 the first time I left my country.

I am 26 now and over the past ten years have spent approximately four years of my life living abroad. After my first international trip, a switch was flipped and I began dreaming of building a life abroad full of all the things I loved and hoped for in life- people, purpose, growth, adventure, freedom.

For years, that dream became my north.

I finally thought I was close to the dream this year, on the verge of making it happen, when as life would have it, I decided to move back to Louisiana. Deciding to move home felt a little bit like moving backwards. I struggled to decide. I weighed dozens of options, reasons, pros and cons. I was terrified that deciding to go back would equal giving up after ten years when I might finally be close to reaching my dream. I did not want to surrender ten years of hope and dreams.

I felt disappointed about how things did not work out how I expected. Disillusioned, even. But I've learned this from experience: anytime the Lord allows our plans to fall apart, he gently refines what we thought we wanted and turns it into a better solid foundation for what is to come.

While moving back home feels backwards, maybe it's really just advancing in a way I didn't expect.

Maybe moving back isn't just about a location change. Maybe it is about learning to surrender the version of the dream I held so tightly to for so many years.

Because we live in a constantly changing world, sometimes it can be hard to accept when things turn out in a way other than planned. We can dream and plan for years only to find ourselves at the end of the rope with an unfulfilled dream and a lot of frustration.

Today, God reminded me that he is both truth and love.

There is a quote that says "Truth without love is brutality, and love without truth is hypocrisy". He is not interested in shoving harsh truth in my face that leaves me hopeless. He also is not interested in building a world of rainbows and butterflies that doesn't prepare me for reality. He holds both truth and love perfectly.

At first, I thought that my dream not coming to fruition was in some way a harsh wake up call to be more realistic. Now I think it is a gift. He is willing to refine the dream so that it lasts. I thought surrendering meant giving up or losing something that was somehow part of me. I'm learning that no dream is ruined when surrendered to God.

If I choose to hang on to the hope of the dream itself, it can turn into an idol, or even escapism. I don't think this happens intentionally or in a toxic sort of way, just in the type of way that we humans hang on tightly to things that give us hope in this chaotic world.

But I want to remember that the dream itself should never become the source of hope.

As I move back home, I want to bravely and hopefully hold my dreams in my hands, surrendering them to my heavenly father, giving him the opportunity to transform them. It's not that I don't want the dream, but I trust and want a relationship with him more. The dream cannot fulfill me, but his truth and love can.I won't stop dreaming. I will try to hold it all with open hands and allow him to purify and refine. Maybe my timeline or location doesn't look like he has in mind. I'm learning to trust that it can still be a good thing.

So maybe you are like me and are hanging on to dear life to a picture-perfect dream you have spent years working on. Maybe you are afraid that if you surrender your dream to God, you will have nothing left to hope in or hold onto. I get that. But surrender is not the end of the story. What if surrender is where the dream comes to life?

I don't always do this well, but today, I choose to believe that the King is for me and not against me. I accept his invitation to dream with him. And maybe along the way I'll realize the dream he put in me was always just his way of keeping us close, which was his dream all along.

Where do you see tension in a dream you hold in your heart? How could that be an invitation from God?