“Why do you think we dream? Why do you think we dream SO BIG sometimes? Does your dreaming ever give you ‘possibility overload’? Possibility overload is imagining so many massive changes in the world and in your life that you can’t hold it all in. I love it when my students are caught up in a reverie of possibility overload. Have you ever been lost in a dream when you suddenly realized you were smiling or crying out of joy? Or a reverie that got your heart going so fast you had to jump out of your dream?”
-Scott McKnight, One Life
Lately, I’ve been stuck in permanent possibility overload. I go to work each morning and am surrounded by little ones who need my love and attention; my heart aches for the little ones who don’t have anyone to love them. I go to the gym and complete my assigned circuits: my heart aches for the boys and girls who don’t have enough strength to lift their heads because of severe malnutrition. I go to church and worship my Savior who frees me; my heart aches for the men and women who live a life of slavery and loneliness.
I go and I go and I go, and all the while I am reminded of Jesus’ command, “As you are GOING, make disciples…” and I think to myself, “Life is immensely different when I really DO that.“
And, just like that, I’m stuck in possibility overload.
What if I loved the unloved? What if I fed the hungry? What if I clothed the naked?
Can you imagine?
There are children who need to be held, boys and girls who need to be fed and clothed, men and women who need to be freed! Above all else, these people need to know the redeeming love of Jesus Christ! I’ve lived so selfishly for so long, but God has pursued me, and now He is giving me eyes that see the possibility. Soon, I won’t being going to work, to the gym, or to my home church in Shepherdsville. Soon, I’ll be going a little bit of everywhere! And as I am going, I will preach the Gospel and make disciples– just like I’m commanded to do here and now.
I feel like my heart could literally burst at the thought!!!
I am overwhelmed by the love that our Savior has lavished on us that we should be called children of God (1 John 3:1)! And I pray with all my heart, “that you, being established and rooted in love, may have power, together with all the saints, to grasp how wide and long and high and deep is the love of Christ,” (Ephesians 3:17-18) and that this realization would leave you standing speechlessly in a reverie of possibility overload, and that your convictions from the Spirit of God who lives in you would move you to ACT!
I dare you to recognize the power of our gracious God. Then, I dare you to dream.
(Watch Joseph’s video, below, to see a small glimpse of his time on the World Race– and a small glimpse into my heart!)
