Glamour Shots
This post is a entry out of my devotional, "The Struggle is Real"
** A couple things about me, I am totally incapable of taking a selfie, I am the most "un cool" person I know, I have some of the best friends on the planet (the other girl in the pic is Kaitlyn and my life is better because she is in it! Follow her blog here Facebook here and instagram here)
I have always thought it would be awesome to be a model. Who doesn't want to say that their profession is “model”? They are like unicorns, and when you are around them you have to keep yourself from smelling their hair because you are certain it smells like candy and rainbows. I decided that I would get some professional pictures taken at Glamour Shots (you may pause from reading for a moment to laugh). They did my hair and makeup, and I selected my most awesome outfits. I struck my most sexy poses along with the "sexy face." I felt like a million bucks, until they showed me a slide show of the shots they took, and in over 90% of the photos I looked like I was drunk and stuck in a wind tunnel. It wasn't exactly the picture I had in my head of how this dream would become a reality, and I had to come to terms with the fact that I wouldn't be a model.
We each have been given dreams in our heart. It gives us a clue as to what we have been created to do. I encourage you to write down all of the dreams you have in a journal. Some of these dreams may not happen for years, but don't stop dreaming and hearing from the Lord about how to prepare for what He has for you. You can start reading books about the dreams He has placed in you. Don't give them up! God has a plan and a purpose for your life, and you may be in a season of preparation to get your heart ready to make that dream a reality. It says in Ephesians 2:10, "For we are God’s handiwork, created in Christ Jesus to do good works, which God prepared in advance for us to do." Maybe you feel called to politics, or to education, or to ministry. God wants to use YOU to make His name famous wherever you go and in whatever you do.
In Genesis chapters 13-21 there is a story of a woman who had a dream. Sarah had a dream in her heart to have a child. She prayed about it, cried about it, even went as far to have her servant get pregnant thinking this was the way the dream would become a reality. Sarah became impatient, tried to force it to happen, and ended up with a big mess. We can get impatient as we wait for our dreams to materialize and become a reality, and we can try to force it to happen before it's time. Just a word of advice: if the dream is from God and you are obedient with what He is telling you to do, when He tells you to do it, He will make it happen when it's time. We don't have to try and "force" His hand by manipulating the timing. Sarah was 90 years old when she finally gave birth to her son, Isaac. God was faithful to make her dream a reality.
One of the keys to having a dream is to submit it back to God and lay it down at His feet when that dream springs up in your heart. We need to pray over it; ask God to open doors, prepare our hearts, and provide a way for it to become a reality. Then it's our job to step back and let Him be God and open the doors before us (and it's also our job to obey and step through them). I'm not saying to stop being active in the dream. Sarah still had to do “her part" in making a baby, but it was God's timing when it became a reality. We can be at peace knowing that God’s timing is perfect and His ways are perfect. When we put our dreams in the hands of God we can be at peace while we wait, and rejoice when the dream becomes a reality because we know it's GOD who made it happen. There is not a dream too big for God. Pray big prayers and dream big dreams, because we serve a big God who wants to use you to make His name famous on the earth.
1. What dreams do you have in your heart?
2. When a dream doesn't happen when you think it should, how do you react?
3. Have you ever made something happen before it was time? How did it turn out?
4. When you have dreams in your heart, do you take complete ownership of them or do you submit them to God?
You can purchase "The Struggle is Real" here.
**I want to share my platform with a group of women who have a dream to write, for the month of September. Each week I will have a guest blogger post in my place to give them an opportunity to use their gift.
