Keep Dreaming!

We are in our Summer of Salt series, and this series is basically not a series at all, but what I've done recently is put a series within our random whatever God's telling me from week to week to share with you guys. I've put a message series, actually an older message series that I've done before, but I've kind of updated and used some new information about dreams. And we've been dealing with dreams for the last few weeks, because I think more than any other time that I've experienced in recent history, we need to be dreamers. We need to hear from God, because God speaks to us through dreams. He shapes our lives through dreams.

He doesn't often speak to us audibly, but He speaks to us through pictures. We see pictures of things. That sense, I'm trying to help you walk closer with God, so that you can understand where He's taking you. He's given a vision for your life, and we have a vision, huge vision for this church. I think God's going to do some amazing things through salt, and some of the visions and dreams that God's given me for salt, I'm almost scared to share them with you, because they're so big, okay?

And if they don't come true, or whatever. I mean, Abraham had huge dreams, you know? You see people throughout the Bible, they didn't even get to see the results of their dreams, but their dreams are here today. We are Abraham's children, right? Amen?

I mean, and he had a dream of what God gave him through his life and his ministry, and God has a ministry for all of us. And until we can dream individually, we can't dream together, right? So I'm trying to help you understand who God is, and as we come into this month, we need to really be leaning into listening to God, receiving what God has for us through prayer. And last week, if you want to go back and look at that message, I talked a lot about prayer and how to hear from God through dreams, you know, how he talks to us even in our prayer time, and some practical things you could do to grow closer to God. But if you look at Proverbs 29, 18, and I'm using the message paraphrase, it says, If people can't see what God is doing, they stumble all over themselves, but when they attend to what he reveals, they are most blessed.

So if we don't have a vision, if we don't have a calling, a dream, a purpose, what do we do? We stumble all over ourselves. We don't know where we're going. We need to hear from God. We need to know what God has for us.

If we all have a... All of us are longing for purpose. And we'll be most blessed when we walk in that purpose. It's not our purpose, it's God's purpose. And when our purposes align with God's purposes, we are most blessed.

And that's what I want to help you see here. In fact, I shared last week, Acts 2.17, it says, in the last days, God says, I will pour out my spirit on all people. And I answered the question, are we living in the last days? Yes, we are living in the last days.

In fact, the last days started at the erection of the church. When the church was launched, those were the beginning of the last days. Is God coming back tomorrow? Some of you are asking, when is Jesus coming back? Now, I'm not a prophecy pundit, I'm not going to tell you the time, because the Bible clearly says, we do not know the hour, the time when he's coming back, right?

So I'm not going to tell you when he's coming back, but we are closer to his return than ever before. That's just rational thinking, right? I mean, he's coming, and it may be tomorrow, it may be another thousand years, but what are we to do? In the meantime, we are to live as if he is returning tomorrow. We've got work to do, we've got to build his kingdom, and when that last person has been reached, of all that is happening in this world that we don't understand, and he's ready to return, we want to be as possible to Jesus, we want to grow his kingdom, because we care about those who are lost.

We are salt, and salt makes a difference, and a little bit of salt goes a long way. So how do we test dreams? Let me just start off with that. I was just thinking about that this past week. Some of you are like, I get these dreams, but I need to test these dreams.

Like, are they just bad pizza from the night before, or is this actually God speaking to me, you know? So here's just a few things to help you out. A few questions. Here are four questions. Does it line up with God's word, first of all, okay?

Does your dream line up with God's word? If you're doing something that's completely contrary to the word of God, then it's probably not God. If you're trying to find that soulmate, or whatever it is, that person, if you're not married and you're single, and that person's not a believer, and the Bible clearly says, do not be unequally yoked. He's not going to tell you to marry somebody or missionary date someone, right? He's not going to tell you to make some poor business decisions, some unethical business decisions.

Oh, I'm praying about this thing, you know, but it's unethical, and I haven't heard from God yet. He's not going to tell you to make some poor business decisions. No, it's unethical. You've heard from God. You know, you've got the Word of God there available for you to help guide you, so God's authority, His Word, if it doesn't line up with God's authority, with God's Word, then it's not God, okay?

And the second thing is, will it make me more like Christ? Is this going to draw me away from Christ, or is this going to draw me towards Christ? Am I going to be more like Christ? That's the next question you need to ask. The third thing is, does spiritual authority confirm it?

So, if you're really ready to take the next steps, as we talked about, you can't just be a dreamer. You've got to start stepping towards those dreams. You can't just sit around your whole life dreaming about what God has for you. You've got to do it, but there needs to be some confirmation. Maybe, you know, meet with some spiritual authority here in the church and talk to someone, or talk to me, or whoever it might be that you place spiritual authority over you, and find out if that dream is legit, if it's God.

And the fourth thing, is it focused on others, or is it just about me? Is it focused on others? So, those are four things just to help you steer you in the right direction as you're deciding, you know, what does God have for me? And I believe He's given me this picture of something in my life, in my ministry, and the commission He's given me. So, those are some things to align.

So, the day I, just kind of shifting here a little bit, just want to give you that, but shifting here a little bit, I want to say don't give up on your dreams. It's easy to give up. It's easy to get frustrated when things aren't panning out the way you think they should. When you've been working hard, you've been doing the right things, you've probably done the comparison thing with someone, and they've done the same thing you've done, and you really feel like God's doing that, and they're being blessed, and you're not, or so you think that they're being blessed, and you're not. So, you're comparing yourself, and you give up, you get frustrated, and you have lost sight of your dreams, and we often give up right before God's getting ready to do something in our lives, because dreams are conceived long before they are achieved.

Dreams are conceived long before they are achieved, and when you're living in the space between, and that's where we are right now, right? We're living in the space between what God has for us, or what God called us to do, right? So, we're kind of walking in that, and this is where frustration comes in. This is where it gets a little weird, because, you know, God's not meeting those steps that I thought he would. In fact, I heard it said, Frustration is the gap between what you expected and what you experience.

It's the gap between what you expect and what you experience. As a church planter, we struggle with this all the time. What we expect of five, six years for salt probably isn't quite where it should be right now for me, right? And sometimes the frustration, I have to battle with that frustration sometimes because I have such a heart to reach as many people as possible for Christ. And you set these goals, but that's where the frustration comes in.

And sometimes, sometimes, when we're in the middle of that, we get frustrated. We want to quit. We want to give up. And we're a giving up generation, okay? People like instantaneous gratification, and when it's not happening right away, we're ready to just throw in the towel.

I don't want it. I don't like it. I'm not getting where I want to be. God, where are you? And we ask those questions.

You know, John the Baptist kind of threw out the question in Matthew 11. I mean, if you go, I'm not going to pull up that scripture right now, but just as a side note, he's in prison. He asked his disciples to go and talk to Jesus and ask him, are you really the Messiah or should I expect someone else? And then Jesus tells him to give the report back and tell him like people, miracles are happening, things are happening. And, and, and Jesus even said he's the greatest of all of them.

Hey, Jesus, like he, John didn't know he said that about him because he was in prison. He told his disciples, he's one of the greatest prophets that ever walked this earth. And here, here's John's experiencing some frustration because he's in prison. And, and did I do all of this for nothing? See, even John the Baptist had those frustrations, those frustrations.

And we get those frustrations too. Jesus has something for all of us here. Okay. And I think if we just walk this out, because time can talk you out of your dreams and there are days you're going to feel like giving up. Now, so I'm going to carry you over to the story of Joseph.

Okay. We talked about Joseph a few months ago and I are a really, really good message. You need to go back and listen to, but I want to take Joseph from another perspective because I can't get away from dreams unless I think about Joseph, the dreamer. Okay. He was a dreamer.

He was the youngest of 12 brothers. His brothers didn't like him much. He was his dad's favorite. And if you're not familiar with scripture, you know, you got Jacob, uh, is, is the third in line, you know, Abraham, Isaac, Jacob, the God of Abraham, the God of Isaac, the God of Jacob. So you have, have, have that going on, you know, so he's like third in line.

And And Jacob has Joseph, and there's 12 sons, and then Joseph is the favored, and his brothers didn't like him too much. And here's what Joseph did, and this is kind of idiotic, what Joseph did here, okay? He shares his dream. And if you want to turn with me, Genesis 37, 5 and 7, by the way, we do have the Bible app for you online. You can go to the Bible app, pull up the events section, find Salt Church, you can find it right there, and pull up the notes there.

So if you want to follow along that way, or if you're old school and like your Bible and like to take your notes, praise God. Amen. I like you. I like you a lot, because you're going to go back and review them, right? No, I'm just playing.

You electronic people are really good. I'm terrible with electronics. I have to write stuff down, okay? So, Joseph, here's what it says. Joseph had a dream, and when he told it to his brothers, they hated him all the more.

See, they were already upset with him, and he was telling about his dream. And he said to them, and look at this, this is just a lesson on what not to do. When God gives you a dream, don't go bragging about it, okay? All right? Listen to this dream I had.

We were binding sheaves of grain out of the field when suddenly my sheaf rose and stood upright. And while your sheaves gathered around mine and bowed down to it. So he's like, hey guys, y'all are going to bow down to me someday, okay? I'm better than you, right? See, Joseph wasn't ready for his dream to be fulfilled.

If he, if God fulfilled, if God carried him all the way up to Pharaoh's office at that point, he wouldn't have been ready. He was not ready for that dream to happen. And later in verse 19, we see what his brother's, his brother's response. It says, here comes that dreamer, right? Here comes that dreamer, they said to each other, come now, let's kill him and throw him into cisterns and say that a ferocious animal devoured him.

Then we'll see what comes of his dreams. We'll see what comes of his dreams. It doesn't look too good for Joseph, right? In his perspective, it doesn't look good at all. Like, he had this dream.

He got this dream. This was a God dream. He knew God. He knew when God was speaking to him. He had a special gifting from the very beginning.

We don't know the early part of his life, but at that point when he is in the fields with his brothers, when this story starts, we know that he has a special connection with God. But as we journey through this story, We learned that God is teaching him how to dream well and how to make him who he's supposed to be. So with this, I want to give you three things. You know, that's kind of normal for me. Sometimes I'll give you four.

If I give you two, it's a little short. So three is kind of the midway point, you know, so I don't lose you guys. So keep dreaming. Keep dreaming. Let's look at Joseph and let's just keep dreaming, right?

The first point is even if it's a bad start. Joseph had a bad start. Joseph said some things he shouldn't have said. He did some things he didn't do. Joseph didn't have a great start and he was thrown into the pit.

He was thrown into a pit. He was sold into slavery. He's taken from his family. He had a hard time. In fact, you know, maybe you're at a place where you feel like you've made some bad starts.

You've had some really bad starts. Maybe you've done some things wrong. Maybe you're in a place right now where you're doing some things that are wrong and you feel like you're far from God. Let me tell you that you can restart fresh today. Today's a new day.

You can start right with Jesus. You can have Jesus in your life. You can walk it right. It doesn't care about your past. He doesn't care about your anger.

He doesn't care about your frustrations. He doesn't care about the neglect you experienced as a child. He doesn't care about maybe you've been abused. Maybe you've been put down. Uh, maybe you have some unforgiveness in your heart, but God doesn't care.

He just wants you to meet him now. And I'm going to give you an opportunity to know him, uh, at the end of this meeting. I'm going to give you an opportunity to know who Jesus is and, and you can have a fresh start today for Joseph. It wasn't a fresh start, but he got a fresh start because God has a habit of using the worst people to fulfill his purposes. He uses really bad people to fulfill his purposes.

I mean, look out, look through the Bible, just a cursory reading, reading of the Bible. We see adulterers, we see murderers, we see all kinds of stuff happening that we'd never get away with today. Right? Being a pastor, you wouldn't, you couldn't pastor a church. I couldn't be a pastor of church if I killed somebody last week.

You know, I mean, it's, it's just, God just uses people like this. You know, he uses people, he uses the, but he makes them, he uses the worst people. And think about Paul for a minute. I mean, he even said this, he understood this in first Timothy one, 12 and 13 says, I think Jesus Christ, our Lord, who has given me strength that he considered me faithful. Appointing me to do his service.

Even though I was a blasphemer. A blasphemer. I mean, this was like the guy he chose as the chief church planter in the Bible, okay? This is the guy who wrote a part of Scripture. He was a blasphemer.

And he was a persecutor and a violent man. And was shown mercy because I acted in ignorance and unbelief. See, we act in ignorance and unbelief, but God is ready to meet us right here, even if we've had a bad start. Number two, even if it's full of surprises. There's going to be surprises.

There's going to be interruptions. There's going to be the unexpected. And I'm not talking about good surprises. I'm talking about bad surprises. Things that you didn't think were going to happen, okay?

Because we think, oh, we're followers of Christ now. We, I mean, this should work out well. You know, everything in life. I'm a, I mean, I love new Christians. They're so ignorant.

I mean, they're like, it's going to, it's going to great on this side. And it is because you get that Holy Spirit moment in your life. But you've got to, but you've got to be prepared for bad things to happen. And you've got to know how to process those bad things. And chances are, you're going to get more bad days than good days, okay?

I hate to, to, to, to be that way, you know? But I've got to be, I got to speak truth. You're going to have some bad days. You're going to have some bad days. Be a little more positive, Pastor.

Be a little more positive. I'm being positive that you're going to have really bad days, okay? You are. You're going to have bad days. Let's look at Joseph's timeline.

And, okay, give up or go on. How will we do this? Sold into slavery to Potiphar. What will we do? Probably give up, right?

Living in a strange country far from home. That's pretty bad. We'd probably give up at that point, wouldn't we? Give him favor on Potiphar's staff. That's a good thing.

Yay, yay. So good things are happening that day, right? Then thrown into prison after that. That was not a very good thing. But put in charge of all the prisoners, favor in the eyes of the warden.

That's a really good thing. Okay, we got a good thing there. Forgotten by the cupbearer. That's a bad thing. Remained in prison two more years.

And then became second in command of Egypt. What we see here is twice as many bad than good. There's a lot of good. Ultimately, he came to the place where God had him. But there was a lot of bad moments.

Twice as bad as good. But look what Paul says in Romans 8. He says, and we know that all things. You guys know this is great. And this is a hard one even to yell out sometimes.

And sometimes we don't even want to hear it when we're going through some bad stuff. But it's true that all things work for the good of those who love him and who have been called according to his purpose. Because you have a purpose. And everything's working together for your good and his glory. Your good and his glory.

So keep thinking that way. Thirdly, though it may take a long time. Oh, this is the hardest one. It takes a long time sometimes to fulfill those God dreams. Those dreams that God puts in your heart.

That purpose and that vision he's given to you. I think about my friend and was a great mentor to me, Farrell Hardison. He pastored a very small church of 50 people way back when I was a kid. And I watched him for 25 years grow that church from 50 people to over 2,000 people. And I was sitting at a table with him one day and I said, you know what?

You know, we're church planters. You know, you got the guys who are at 2,000, 1,000. And you got the guys who are at 50, 100, 150. You know, we're just like kind of going back and forth, like learning from them and being mentored by them. And I said, you know what?

I hear all these great stories about your churches and stuff, but I want to hear, like, what were the pains? Because I'm going through the pains, you know, like we're trying to get to that. We're trying to get past where we are to reach more people. And, you know, how do we get, how do you get there? And he kind of leans over to the table.

He says, Leon, 25 years, 25 years of blood and sweat and hurt and pain and aching and all that. It took 25 years, Leon. It takes a long time. It takes a long time. Even people who are fast, who have churches that are fast growing say, there's just a lot of pain.

There's a lot of, it's a long process. You have to have resolve. And for your dreams, it's the same thing, you know. Paul went to Arabia for three years, you know, before he started ministering. Did you know that?

We think of Paul, you know, he got a call from God on the road to Damascus. Okay, let's go win everybody, you know. No, he went away for three years and studied and was seeking God. And he was processing it. I love how Habakkuk 2, 3 says it.

This is in the Living Bible. These things I plan won't happen right away. Okay? Slowly, steadily, surely, and the time approaches when the vision will be fulfilled. If it seems slow, do not despair, for these things will surely come to pass.

Just be patient. They will not be overdue a single day. See, God's plan is not overdue a single day. It may be overdue for us, but for God, it's not overdue. Your dreams are still there, guys.

Everything's still there. It's just not your plan. It's God's plan. And you need to resolve. You need to practice resolve and work through it.

And God's got something for you. Because we live in an instantaneous gratification culture, and it's really, really difficult for us. I love those, you know, those credit card commercials that used to come on, like, years ago. I don't know if they still come on where they had the black card and the gold card, and they're like, unlimited, this and that, and you can do whatever. And they just promoted that.

You can just go and get your house right now on a credit card, you know? I mean, you can do stuff like that. And people have probably bought into that, because we live in that kind of culture. But God's timing is not our timing. It might work in a store, but it won't work following God, okay?

But if you keep coming to church, and you keep, you know, seeking God, and you keep working for Him, and you keep pushing, you know, if you keep on, you keep on, you're going to find your way to what God has for you. You're going to walk that out. You're just going to have to walk it out in seasons. And you're in a season, and God's got something for you. So I hope that's encouraging for you.

And along the way, here's what I want you to do. Here's what I want you to do. In Galatians 6, 9, it says, let us not become weary in doing good, okay? While we're waiting for that to come, while we're waiting for the promised land, while we're getting there, let's not stop doing good. For at the proper time, we will reap a harvest if we don't what?

Give up, okay? Are you ready to give up? Don't give up. Here it is in Scripture. Are you ready to give up?

No, we're not ready to give up. We want to move forward, amen? We want to move forward. We were listening to God. So three principles.

See, I got another three here. So actually, it was six points, okay? I'm sorry, okay? Three principles real quick that will be some of the best you will ever hear as you're waiting. So get ready for this, right?

First of all, recognize and value. Value the process, okay? Recognize and value the process. I've heard it said, enjoy the journey, right? Stop getting caught up in the, this isn't here and that isn't here and I haven't met these goals.

Enjoy the journey. When something bad is happening in you, God wants to do something in you, okay? When something bad is happening to you, God is doing something in you. And it's not the part of God that we enjoy, right? It's not the part that we just get excited about because instead, let's, you know, instead of like taking it for what it is and what you're going, you know, stop for a minute and just ask God when you're going through those times, it's best to refocus and say, what are you doing in this, God?

What are you trying to do inside of me? Instead of focusing on why is all this happening? Why is he taking this away from me? Why has he put me here? Why hasn't he answered the prayer yet that he's placed in my heart?

Instead, say, you know, what are you doing in this process? What are you trying to show me in this process? It's like God's trying to do something in you. He's trying to make you more like him. He's trying to grow you up.

He's trying to help you. He's trying to give you the best, right? He really is trying to find the best for you, okay? And sometimes on the outside, it doesn't seem that way. It's like my kids, you know, when they don't want to get up in the morning to go to school, you know, or they don't want to clean their rooms or they don't want to, you know, they complain, well, I don't want to do this.

I'm tired, but I want the best for them. So I make them get up. I put them through the process. I start teaching them how to do these things properly because I know it will better them. It will help develop them because I'm not interested in their comfort.

I'm interested in their development. God's not interested in your comfort. He wants to develop you, okay? And he's going to break you out of that comfort. Or that Christianity isn't a comfort story, okay?

It really isn't. It isn't this comfortable thing. It's better, but it's not comfortable. And we need to be comfortably uncomfortable. We need to step out and be comfortably uncomfortable, you know, as God grows us and helps us grow.

So if you don't recognize and value the journey, I'm just going to be honest with you. Life is just not going to be fun, okay? It's going to be a bummer if you don't stop and value and recognize. That this is a process that God is taking me, because life is not what happens to you, it's how you respond to it. Let me just give you a real quick scripture, amen.

So Peter says this, 1 Peter 1, 6, he says, so be truly glad, there is wonderful joy ahead. You need to hear that, okay? Wonderful joy ahead. Even though you have been, have to endure many trials for a little while, these trials will show that your faith is genuine. See, he's going to push through that, he wants to know that you're really in this, because if you bail, you're not really in this, okay?

It is being tested as fire tests and purifies gold, though for faith, your faith, excuse me, your faith is far more precious than mere gold, so when your faith remains strong through many trials, it will bring you much praise and glory and honor on the day when Jesus Christ is revealed to the whole world. If that's not good enough for you, look at James 1, 2, and 3, consider it pure joy, my brothers and sisters, whenever you face trials of many kinds, because you know that the testing of your faith develops perseverance. There you go. the whole world. so know, you