How Big is Your Dream

Introduction

One of the things that amazes me about people is how little their dream is for their life. When I am counseling people I often ask them the question: “Where do you see yourself in 5 years.” You should see the blank looks and stairs.

Most people live their life, at the most, one month in advance. That’s how near sighted we are with our lives. We can only put it in a context of one month.

That’s how we budget our calendar.

That’s how we budget our resources.

We know at the church that If I start promoting an activity 3 months in advance most of you will not have the frame work in your life to put the activity in context. So you don’t remember it. Most have no idea what your doing 3 months from now.

I would even imagine that we have some dreaming week to week.

What is the Big dream that God has given you for your life?

Let me ask it another way, Why did God put you on the planet?”

Were you a mistake? Does God not care what you do in this life? Did He truly bring you into existence for you to have no impact on the world you live in?

I don’t believe that! I refuse to believe that!

God has a dream. It is a dream that will surely come to pass. And in that dream he has placed you to be a part of that dream. Some smaller parts and some major parts but all are apart of that dream.

But because we don’t understand the bigger picture we don’t understand how we fit in the dream.

Through the life of Joseph I want us to learn how to see the big picture and begin to fit our lives inside that picture.

Let’s look together at

Biblical Message

Genesis 50:22–23 ESV

So Joseph remained in Egypt, he and his father’s house. Joseph lived 110 years. And Joseph saw Ephraim’s children of the third generation. The children also of Machir the son of Manasseh were counted as Joseph’s own.

Your faithfulness in your little dreams will prove out God’s faithfulness in the big dream.

Joseph was always faithful in the moments of his life even though all he had was his personal dreams from God.

God doesn’t need to give you the whole dream for you to be faithful it what he as given you.

At the end of Joseph’s life he could see clearly how his dream fit into the big scheme of God’s plan.

Genesis 50:24–25 ESV

And Joseph said to his brothers, “I am about to die, but God will visit you and bring you up out of this land to the land that he swore to Abraham, to Isaac, and to Jacob.” Then Joseph made the sons of Israel swear, saying, “God will surely visit you, and you shall carry up my bones from here.”

Gen 50:24

How did Joseph know what God was doing? How was he able to put his entire life in the context of God’s big story.

Joseph knew the words of the Lord.

Genesis 15:13–14 ESV

Then the Lord said to Abram, “Know for certain that your offspring will be sojourners in a land that is not theirs and will be servants there, and they will be afflicted for four hundred years. But I will bring judgment on the nation that they serve, and afterward they shall come out with great possessions.

Gen

Because he knew to words of the Lord he could put his life in the context of the word.

Many people struggle to have a dream from God because they have no idea what God is doing or how they fit.

God is the God of prophecy. He has always been faithful to tell his people what is coming next.

Most people today have no idea what God is doing next and therefore walk around aimlessly.

What if you knew what was coming next? What if you understood the big picture of God?

You too would be able to put your life in context and see God at work around you and join him in that work. (Experiencing God)

Joseph knew he was at the beginning of the prophecy but was just as sure about the end of the prophecy.

Moses understood the context of his life in this same big dream of God.

Acts 7:25 ESV

He supposed that his brothers would understand that God was giving them salvation by his hand, but they did not understand.

Acts 7

Moses was faithful to carry out Joseph’s dream because he could see it in the big dream of God.

Exodus 13:19 ESV

Moses took the bones of Joseph with him, for Joseph had made the sons of Israel solemnly swear, saying, “God will surely visit you, and you shall carry up my bones with you from here.”

Joshua was faithful to carry out Joseph’s dream, seeing it in Big dream of God.

Joshua 24:32 ESV

As for the bones of Joseph, which the people of Israel brought up from Egypt, they buried them at Shechem, in the piece of land that Jacob bought from the sons of Hamor the father of Shechem for a hundred pieces of money. It became an inheritance of the descendants of Joseph.

Josh 24:

When you understand God’s Word you will have the faith to live our your dreams.

Hebrews 11:22 ESV

By faith Joseph, at the end of his life, made mention of the exodus of the Israelites and gave directions concerning his bones.

Hebrews 11

Joseph’s faith was not a blind faith.

His faith was based on the facts of God’s word.

When you know God’s word to can be confident in your actions.

When you don’t know God’s word you are unstable in all your decisions.

Hebrew 11:

Hebrews 11:13–14 ESV

These all died in faith, not having received the things promised, but having seen them and greeted them from afar, and having acknowledged that they were strangers and exiles on the earth. For people who speak thus make it clear that they are seeking a homeland.

Knowing the future gives you the faith to live out your God dreams today.

On August 28, 1963, Martin Luther King, Jr. stood on the steps of the Lincoln memorial and gave his I have a dream speech. What made this speech so power was not that he was a black man fighting racism. It was not just that he was bold enough to have a dream.

What made his dream so powerful was that is was a God-given dream. Because it was not his dream to begin with the dream lived past his life and is still being fulfilled today.

His life was cut short by those who opposed the dream, but you can’t kill God’s dream. God’s dream will out live us all. Our job is just to find our place in it.

There are still people living the dream.

Those that know God’s word and are finding their place is God’s big dream.

Those that are living by faith and not by sight.

Those that can see farther than a month down the road.

What is Your Big Dream?

Some of you are just living the American Dream: Own your own home and have the opportunity to own your own business.

This is such a small dream when you place it inside the Big Dream of God.

4 Steps to Living our God’s dream for your life.

Become a part of the dream by becoming one of God’s children. You need to be saved through Jesus Christ.

Learn the Big dream of God so you can understand your context.

Ask God to show you how you fit in His Dream.

Be faithful to live it out until the day you die.