Your Dreams can be Resurrected

As I travel around the world preaching the gospel in numerous churches and cities, time and time again I see first-hand the searing pain felt by people with unfulfilled dreams. Some have heard of our exploits in the mission field to which we have devoted our lives and it convicts them in their hearts.

Tear-filled eyes gaze at me after services as these people bare their hearts to me, confessing that God called them to reach the nations years ago. "I wish I had gone," they sigh. The seeds of this dream were planted in them by God, yet they aborted it.

Have you killed off a dream given to you by God in the past? You felt the call in your life and knew the dream God wanted you to fulfil. Maybe it was not to go to the nations. Maybe you were called to pastor, sing in the choir or to be an evangelist or a deacon. Maybe your dream was to succeed in business so that you could invest vast sums of money to propagate the gospel. Many dreams and desire-, may have been born in your heart, then for one reason or the other, they died.

Some dreams die because the dreamer buckles under criticism, others because the pull of materialism is too great or someone has a massive debt to pay off. Some dreams bite the dust because of a life partner or a lack of one, some through lack of financial provision, others for the lack of direction and some for the lack of encouragement. For a thousand different reasons, Christians have allowed these aspirations to die. But as time passes, these longings come back to haunt them and they are obsessed by thoughts of what might have been. The unfulfilled heart is filled with discouragement. The murder of their dream has affected what happens in eternity, and most of these dear people are convinced that it is too late to do anything about it.

Imagine what would have happened if the person who led you to Christ had given up on the task God was calling him or her to perform. Possibly you would never have-known God's salvation. The Word of God tells us that we are all part of the Body of Christ, and that means the-church can never be all that God intended it to be unless your God-given dream comes to fruition!

Your dream can be resurrected:

John 11:32 - 44 tells us about the resurrection of Lazarus.

When Mary reached the place where Jesus was and saw him, she fell at his feet and said, "Lord, if you had been here, my brother would not have died." When Jesus saw her weeping, and the Jews who had come along with her also weeping, he was deeply moved in spirit and troubled. "Where have you laid him?" He asked. "Come and see Lord," they replied. Jesus wept. Then the Jews said "See how he loved him!" But some of them said, "Could not he who opened the eyes of the blind have kept this man from dying?" Jesus, once more deeply moved, came to the tomb. It was a cave with a stone laid across the entrance. "Take away the stone," he said. "But, Lord," said Martha, the sister of the dead man, "by this time there is a bad odor, for he has been there four days." Then Jesus said, "Did I not tell you that if you believed, you would see the glory of God?" So they took away the stone. Then Jesus looked up and said, "Father, I thank you that you have heard me. I know that you always hear me, but I said this for the benefit of the people standing here, that they may believe that you sent me." When he had said this, Jesus called in a loud voice, "Lazarus, come out!" The dead man came out, his hands and feet wrapped with strips of linen, and a cloth around his face. Jesus said to them, "Take off the grave clothes and let him go."

When Lazarus died, everyone around him decided it was too late. Everyone knew that too long a time had passed to do anything about it, for he had been dead for four days. The body had been balmed, but already begun to decay. Surely it was too late. Then Jesus came, filled with the power of the Spirit, here was the very presence of God In the face of opposition from the majority, God war, saying: "You are never too dead for resurrection! Your dream can be resurrected."

Thus Lazarus came out of the tomb. All that Jesus had said to Martha and Mary was, "If you can believe, you will see the Glory of God. "

What about your dream? Do you think it is too late in revive? You and those around you have come to terms with the fact that too much time has passed, too many years have gone by, and that your dream has no chance of ever coming to pass. But our God has a different opinion - He says your dream can be resurrected. Romans 4:17-21 says:

As it is written: "I have made you a father of many nations." He is our father in the sight of God, in whom he believed - the God who gives life to the dead and calls things that are not as though they were. Against all hope, Abraham in hope believed and so became the father of many nations, just as it had been said to him, "So shall your offspring be." Without weakening in his faith, he faced the fact that his

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