I’m not a very emotional guy. My wife has seen me cry three times, but as I write this, I fight back tears. Perhaps you are like me. I don’t know if this will touch or inspire you, but I know this will resonate with someone. Because I know I’m not alone in this deep aching of my soul. I have dreams, and—right now— these dreams hurt.
We Can’t Do It
I can’t do it. You can’t do it. That’s the sad and hard truth. We have these dreams and as we’ve pursued them we’ve learned what it takes to make these dreams come true, and we just can’t do it. We’ve measured ourselves up against what is required and we’ve found ourselves lacking.
This probably isn’t the first time either.
I can’t tell you how many times I’ve pitched my book to agents and publishers, and every single time it’s fallen flat. Every door we step through spits us right back outside into the land of the rejects, into the land of the “Not Good Enoughs.” We might as well start calling it home. It feels like home after all.
As much as we hate to admit it, it’s always felt like where we’d end up.
We can’t do it. And the more we dwell upon these dreams, the more these dreams hurt. They remind us of our failure. They remind us of the desire in our hearts that keep getting drowned out by each passing wave of rejection.
You might’ve held out for quite some time. You might’ve endured hundreds of waves already and seen so many others give up after just twenty. Somehow you’ve pressed on while they’ve drowned.
But now it’s our turn.
When Dreams Hurt
At the core of this deep calling is God, because we can recall when God first gave us this goal.
And, to be honest, it’s this fact that hurts the most.
We know the cause is noble. We know our world needs exactly what God’s called us to do. But we are burnt out, tired of hoping, and exhausted of trying. Every fibre of our soul mind and body just wants to stop.
We feel like we’ve let God down. We aren’t just failures, we’ve failed our Creator. We’ve let down our closest friend. Jesus, the one who endured all trials, difficulty, and pain, died on the cross so we could live, and here we are trying to serve him and falling short.
Of course God is loving, and it’s not our work that get’s us into heaven, but we want to love him. We want to do what he’s called us to, but we can’t. As much as we tried and held out hope, we failed him even after all he’s done for us.
And that hurts.
I’ve told stories since before I could spell, and I’ve written novels since the age of fifteen. Now, here I am at twenty-seven. And what do I have to show for it? Yes, I have a few books written. I self published one book. But has there been any fruit?
My goal is to inspire the church to trust God and take wild steps of faith for the sake of reaching the lost and especially the unreached around the world. There’s a huge need, and I know God’s called me to help meet that need by helping others see it.
Am I any closer to this goal than I was five years ago?
But We Can’t Give Up
Here’s the problem, though the waves of failure and rejection continue dragging us down, we keep swimming toward our goal. We have to. We know we will never reach promised land, but we can’t give up. Not because we don’t want to give up, but because we simply can’t.
We’ve worked toward these dreams for so long. If we give up, we’ll be utterly lost. We can’t begin to imagine where we will be if we let go.
If I give up on this dream that I know God’s given me, then what will my life become?
If I give up, the desperate cries of the lost will haunt me. How can I abandon them? How can I abandon who God made me to be and the path he’s set me down?
Oh we want to give up and quit this journey God’s set us on. Though we might be able to turn our backs to it for a season, perhaps a long season, the knocking on our souls will return.
One day the ache in our heart will remind us of the part of ourselves we let die, which now pleads to come back alive.
The Dawn
One day, we might just see the end of our relentless struggle. One day, the clouds just might break and the sun may rise. We might never see the fruit of our labor or the fulfillment of our dreams. Perhaps this whole journey is just so we are forced to lean on God as the waves beat against us over and over.
Whatever the end result may be, there is a dawn. We might not see it in this life, but we will in the next. Because, in the end, God is good regardless of how much we believe it. Regardless of how we feel. Regardless of how bad our circumstances are.
And, if we toil our whole lives. If our hearts never see rest from this aching. The most basic and certain reward for faithfulness is and always will be a closer relationship with God.
As much as our dreams hurt, even this, in its most basic form, is worth it.
This is how we live wilder.
If you can at all relate to this trial, don’t give up. For further encouragement, check out my blog A Message To Your Aching Heart
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