With a grieved soul Hannah prayed to the Lord and wept bitterly. Making a vow she pleaded, "O Lord of Hosts, if You will take notice of Your handmaid's affliction and remember me and not get me and give Your handmaid a son, then I will give him to the Lord all the days of his life."...Although her lips were moving, her voice couldn't be heard, so Eli concluded that she was drunk..."Oh no, my Lord" Hannah replied..."I've been pouring out my soul before the Lord."...
Eli responded, "Go in peace and may the God of Israel grant the petition that you've requested from Him."
Never dream without prayer. When we talk to other about the dreams in our lives, we often get blind stares of disinterested discouragement-roadblocks, rejection. But when we take our dreams to God, we begin and adventurous journey of faith. It may mean being broken along the way, but only to let our dream escape. It may mean going through seasons of searching, but only to determine how much our dream is selfish-and to prove how badly we really want God's way. Prayer keeps holy dreams alive.
Hannah was tested.
We are tested so our character will match our dreams. Christian character is a work in progress for us as believers. When God gives us a dream, we may need a lot of work on and in our lives to enable us to handle the dream. Our sufficiency and strength should always be in God-and God alone. As with Hannah, it usually is a pretty good clue that the test or the dream is from God when things don't work easily.
The greater the dream, the greater testing.
Do you have a dream that feels like it's dying in your life? Don't give up. Take it to God in prayer today. And trust Him to do more with your dream than you could ever do yourself.
Exert from "Women of Character" by Lawrence Kimbrough
1 comment:
Thank you. I do have one of those dreams. The same one Hannah had. I know God has no deadline but it's hard to keep clinging somedays. I have been blessed beyond measure in that God has answered my prayers in other ways. ANd am working through him saying "no" to me as well...
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