As an introduction to Part Three.
Yesterday I was texting my close friend Austin Howard and we were discussing today’s Presidential election. I ended my text with a phrase that as I began mulling it over it grew on me and I am appreciative to Austin for inspiring the thought.
So earlier this morning I began texting the phrase to people as a thought for the day.
Here it is.
“Whatever the future holds…let’s get on with it!”
As I do not believe in happenstance and coincidences I looked over what is to be Part Three of Dreams of Hope, written in November of 1984, it begins as follows.
If the Kingdom of God is the only hope for the future of this world, then we also have been entrusted with solutions of hope. We must dare to ask God for dreams that become solutions. Those solutions come when the plural is narrowed to the singular. We becomes I, and I must become responsible enough to become a storehouse of dreams that produces hope.
Our hope given to others becomes their specific hope, and their hope produces solutions. This cycle of dreams and hope begins at the heart of God just as the conception of Jesus Christ did.
I strongly reject the thought that the church has been put on earth simply to give encouragement. I understand that we must lift up and encourage but the main purpose of the church, secondary only to proclaiming the truth of the Gospel is to give God-given solutions which bring about the Kingdom of God.
If we give encouragement to people and yet no solution of hope then they remain in hopeless circumstances, desperately looking for someone else who will give them a solutions.
Jesus was a perfect example of going beyond encouragement to give hope. in John 21:3-6, we see Jesus giving a solution rather than encouragement.
The disciples had been fishing all night and it was now morning. Jesus ways in verse give, “Children, have you any food?’ Jesus already recognized the need, and the need was food. Encouragement would not have eased the disciple’s hunger. They needed a solution.
When Jesus had asked this question the disciples answered, “No.” In their minds were probably thoughts like, “This is hopeless, we will never catch any fish this way.” Jesus felt that hopelessness within them and said, “Cast your net on the right side of the boat, and you will find some.”
The disciples followed that specific solution and found more fish than they could draw in. Jesus could have said, “Well, if you stay there long enough I am sure you will catch something.” He knew that would not meet their need, so he gave them the specific hope for the solution they could not find by themselves.
JHH
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