sometimes dreams need breaking

Empty.

My soul is empty.

I just got back from an amazing anniversary weekend with my love. I should be refreshed. I should be rejuvenated. I should be ready for this week.

But I’m not.

Instead I lay my head down on our couch and close my eyes for the last few moments before I head out the door. My Bible is at my finger-tips…but it remains there. Unread. My journal sits next to it. Unmarked. My prayers remain within me. Unspoken.

Why? It’s because I have rested, but I have not rested in Him. I have let my dreams creep back into my heart without being surrendered. Dreams that have not been broken to submission to the Lord are dangerous. They can take over the mind and torture. They brew impatience and boil with the urge to rebel. My soul is wild and reckless – it needs a bridle.

What is my dream? It is to pick up the guitar and sing - to compose new songs of praise to my Creator. I yearn to go and sit at my desk and write – write until my fingers are numb and my creative juices have nothing left to be squeezed. I long to be a voice in this generation – I voice that cries out for justice for the oppressed and mercy for the needy – for faith without works is dead. Good things are they not? Still, I know that good things are often the enemy of the best.

For now I am beckoned to silence. “Be faithful in little, My daughter” I am told. Deep down I know that my heart is proud. My very will needs breaking. My soul needs purging from its desire to do something great for the Lord. I have more clarity than ever, but it seems that vision is so far away at the same time. Is it not enough just to have Him, O heart? Though He withholds an answer, is He not still worthy to be praised?

And so I come yet again to surrender. I let Him break me, my dreams and all that I hold most dear. I cannot put my desires above Him. Life is too short to waste in mourning for broken dreams. Nothing is worth holding onto except for Him.

May my heart say evermore, “You alone, O God, are enough.”



“The Lord is my chosen portion and my cup;

You hold my lot.

The lines have fallen for me in pleasant places;

indeed, I have a beautiful inheritance.”

 – Psalm 16:5-6