Do you ever have those moments where your heart forgets that you’re a stable adult abounding with maturity, wisdom, and credit card bills? And instead, you find yourself believing in magic and fairy tales again like you did when you were four? I had one of those moments last night. My sister and I went to the Fox Theater in Atlanta, Georgia, to see Rogers & Hammerstein’s Cinderella. It was a part of a wonderful birthday gift from her, and when we were finally at the box office, our faces aglow under the light of the marquee, we knew that our night would be a magical one.
I think every little girl can relate to Cinderella. I certainly did growing up. And if last night is any indication, I still do. So much of what I saw struck a chord in me. Sorrows don’t last forever. Kindness is always the high ground. There is worth in us even when we don’t see it. Faith and hope are powerful weapons. But there was one line in the show that stayed with me.
After Cinderella’s magical night at the ball, her dreams to see the prince again are thwarted by her stepmother. As she cries in the dirt, her dress ripped to tatters and her hopes dashed to pieces, her fairy godmother arrives once more on the scene. And she says this to the broken Cinderella: “When you have a dream, expect that you will have to fight for it. Otherwise, how will you know that dream is yours?”
Important things are worth fighting for. And dreams from God are important things. Every step in His plan is essential. Every life is significant. Every promise He makes is crucial. And every dream He gives is vital. Take a moment and examine your life and recall the dreams that the Lord has put in you. I don’t mean glass slipper dreams of fancy living with a handsome prince and easy living because God doesn’t promise those things.
I’m talking about the God-inspired kingdom-driven dreams — the ones where the Savior of the world looked at you and invited you to join Him in His plan to rescue mankind. The ones that you leapt at and immediately started planning and walking in. The ones that you maybe were so jarred by or embarrassed of that you didn’t dare tell anyone.
Are you still walking towards them, still believing for them? Are you still fighting for them? Or have they been deemed “impossible” and discarded?
Oftentimes, when God gives us dreams and hopes, we squash them down as compact as we can get them, shove them in a lockbox, and swallow the key for good measure. Usually, it’s because we look at ourselves in the mirror and see the words “unworthy” and “incapable” written on our foreheads in sharpie. Or we entertain lies from the enemy that convince us those dreams aren’t from God at all but are products of our own selfishness or imagination.
But here’s the truth of the matter. If God has birthed something in you, something for you to do or say or start or carry out or whatever the case may be, then He must know something that you don’t. He must see something that you can’t. Isaiah 14:24 says, “As I have planned, so shall it be. As I have purposed, so shall it stand” (ESV).
Whatever it is that’s stopping you from fulfilling the calling of God on your life — thinking that you’re too small or sometimes thinking that the calling is too small — I urge you to remember that He makes no mistakes. God creates in all of us the capacity to hope for big things and the capacity to believe in Him for those things. And the dreams that you’re wrestling with, if they’re from the Lord, then they are for you to pursue and bring to the light. God did His part by giving them to you. It’s your job to chase them down before the clock strikes midnight.
Cinderella had no problem letting her fairy godmother doll her up for the ball. She had no problem being charmed by and dancing with the handsome prince. But when it came time for her to fight for what she wanted, she wilted like a shriveled up rose and said, “If he sees who I really am, he won’t want me anymore.” I think that claim resounds in all of us. It’s the one that says that you and I aren’t enough. But she was enough as are we though it isn’t by our efforts. It isn’t by any measure of worth or capability that we might possess.
God looked at Jeremiah and told him he had appointed him to be a prophet to the nations when he was still forming inside of his mother, before he had strength or ability to boast of (Jeremiah 1:5). We’re enough simply by virtue of being God’s children. Isaiah 58:11 says, “The Lord will guide you continually and satisfy your desire in scorched places and make your bones strong; you shall be like a spring of water, whose waters do not fail” (ESV). He makes us enough. He gives us dreams. Then He makes us strong enough to carry them.
If you’re looking for the typical fairy tale to motivate you, here it is. Once upon a time, you were lost and dirty and trapped. Then the King arrived astride a white horse with His sword in hand, and He looked at your cinder-covered face and found you worthy. And in order to win you, He exchanged His freedom for your bondage and laid down His life for you. He dressed you in the whitest robes He could find, placed shoes on your feet, and a ring on your hand. He calls you beloved, and He’s waiting for you on the other side of happily ever after.
But the fairytale doesn’t stop there. This same King exchanged your stone heart for a heart made of flesh, and He planted dreams in that flesh heart. They are dreams that accomplish His good pleasure and fulfill His Great Commission. Psalm 37:4 says that God grants us the desires of our hearts when we delight ourselves in Him, and the amazing thing is that when we walk with God, the desires of His heart become the desires of our hearts.
His Word tells us over and over again that if we trust Him, lean on Him, and acknowledge Him, He will establish our steps. And those steps will guide us to leading small groups, writing music, missionizing our workplaces, publishing a book, fostering children, starting businesses, earning degrees, launching ministries, winning our lost friends and family, whatever dreams God has planted in us.
If dreams were easy to come by, everyone would run after them. When dreams don’t unfold easily, human nature leads us to give up. But we aren’t slaves to our natures. If the Son has set you free, then you are free indeed. So walk in that freedom. Examine your dreams again, the ones you know came from God. Reawaken yourself to the idea of them. Invite the possibilities, whatever they are. And when your dreams buck against you as dreams as apt to do, plant your feet, straighten up the backbone that God gave you, and fight.
Whether that means silencing the voices of doubt and unbelief coming against you, re-submitting the article you wrote again even though it’s been rejected three times, or waiting expectantly for the next step God gives you instead of wallowing in disappointment. Whatever this looks like for you, grit your teeth, trust in the Lord, ball up your fists, and stand your ground. He’s worth it.
And the dreams He’s given you — however large, however small — are worth it, too.
