Do you remember when you were a kid, what you thought was ‘old’? What was the magical age that you officially turned ‘old’? For me, I think you were old when you hit 40. That was over the hill in my book. By 40 life seemed pretty well established, and like everything was in order. What age was it for you? Funny thing is, the closer I get to 40, the younger it seems!
When you were a kid, what did you think that your life was going to look like when you were 25, 30, 35, 40, etc… What did you think your life would look like at the age that you are now? Probably you had visions of playing in the major league, or already having been on the cover of Vogue, or some other magazine. Maybe you envisioned owning several beach houses, and a yacht. Who knows. But chances are your childhood version of you was somehow way cooler than the version of you right now.
What holds us back from being the childhood version of us? Why do we stop dreaming and planning, and envisioning ourselves for greatness? FEAR. Fear of failing, disappointing, and even fear of trying prevents us from being, or doing the things we once dreamed we would be.
Jennie Allen writes in her book Restless,
I think in twenty years, we will regret more of the things we didn’t do than the things we did imperfectly.
I totally agree with her. Life is filled with crazy-scary-choices. Things like, going back to school, having another baby, leaving a successful job you have, to go get the job you’ve always wanted, or asking her to marry you. But what if the rest of your life was lived without this kind of hesitation. What if 20 years from now you looked back and realized that hesitation wasn’t apart of your lifestyle… I wonder what kind of a difference that would make in what you were able to accomplish.
The Bible is filled with men and women who were faced with crazy-scary-choices. The amazing thing about the Bible is we get to see how they turned out though. They didn’t. We know the end of their story, were as they only saw the problems. Think about people like Moses, Joseph, Esther, Rahab, Elijah, Abraham, Joshua, Peter, Paul, and many others. They were each faced with their own challenges, but they stepped through them with bold faith.
God has positioned you for right now, and for right where you are. Step into that moment and own it. The next few moments, days, and weeks, can be some of the most defining moments in your life. God has invited each one of us to join Him in what He is doing in the world around him. Jesus prays for each of us saying, “The glory that you have given me I have given to them, that they may be one even as we are one, I in them and you in me, that they may become perfectly one, so that the world may know that you sent me and loved them even as you loved me.” (John 17:22, 23 ESV)
Jesus’ desire for each of us, His prayer, is that we would be a witness, we would be someone who reveals the glory of God to the world around us. So dream a dream about who you want to be and what you want to do for God, and get out there and do it. Because after all, our biggest regret might just be the things that we don’t do, rather than the things we goofed up on along the way.
~Peter
