I interviewed for a job at my local Target store recently. As part of the interview I spoke with one of the “Executive Team Leaders” at Target. This woman has an office complete with a desk, a computer, and lots of file drawers. She said she has been working with Target for just over two years. She could not be much older than me. She is well on her way to a future with a company that offers a stable career path.
I sat in her office and recounted stories from walking through a desert in Africa. I thought about how much safer her life is compared to mine. I thought about how if I worked hard I could have an office just like that in about two years. I thought about how my life is turning out to be very different from most people I know, different from most other people my age.
I heard Donald Miller, a popular Christian author, speak recently. At one point he spoke about how he lived his life shortly after the success of his book Blue Like Jazz. He said he bought a comfortable chair and watched an entire season of Oprah. The rest of his talk, and the topic of his new book, is the story of the resulting malaise from that stage of life. It led him to examine his perspective on life. He started thinking about his goals and why he does what he does.
Miller had said for a long time he wanted to be a successful author, and once he achieved that goal he wasn’t quite sure what to do or how to act. Before I started the Race, and for a good portion of the Race itself, I thought maybe I wanted to write a book. I thought about the idea fairly often. I even tried to think about how I would structure such an opus. Gradually my interest waned. I still like to write, and I wouldn’t turn down a publisher if he turned up on my doorstep, but my dreams are changing.
Don Miller’s new book is about how we need to live more interesting lives. Most people are afraid of conflict and trial and shrink away from doing things that really matter. They settle for, say, writing a book over, maybe, starting a foundation that provides quality mentors for fatherless boys in America. That’s what Miller did. He achieved his lifelong goal of being a successful author. He thought he would feel great about himself, but he didn’t. Then he reevaluated. He thought about his passions. He remembered that he doesn’t think any boy should end up without a father. He grew up in a fatherless home and knows the toll is takes on a person. Now his foundation, The Mentoring Project, is about to go national and there are over 300 churches nationwide waiting to be involved. Chasing a bigger dream wasn’t easy, but it got him out of his living room. His bigger dream is changing more lives and affecting lives more dramatically than his smaller dream ever did.
So I’ve thought about how I could do a lot of things. I could even work at Target for a few years and work my way up to a real nice office. But I think I’d rather spend more time chasing a bigger dream.
In the past year I’ve been awoken to a big vision. I’ve seen God work in big ways. I’m alive and ready to minister to the hurting and broken all over. I think all the people who call themselves Christians should taste the kind of life I’ve found. The Church needs to be mobilized. That’s the dream I’m chasing.
I believe the hundreds of churches around the country, around the world, truly can be the Church. I believe for them to be the Church they were meant to be, their people need to wake up to the full potential that God has given them. The people need to chase their bigger dreams.
I want to see the Church mobilized. I want to see people activated. I’m not sure where God is taking me on the way to that goal. For now I have plans to continue working with AIM and the World Race (more on that in the next couple blogs), because I believe they are mobilizing Christians better than most organizations I’ve seen. Part of me feels a long-term calling to my home community. Most of me is terrified. But I can’t risk it. I can’t risk living a smaller dream only to wake up one day after napping through a commercial break while watching Oprah in my comfy chair.
