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altView: todd erickson
Growing up, I was always told that there were no dreams other than saving souls.
That the only thing that was eternal, that was meaningful, was the souls of other people, and everything else was meaningless and would pass away.
I was told, in fact, that whatever I loved most, whatever my fiercest, dearest dream was, God would ask me to give it up for Him so that I could save souls.
This seemed, overall, to point at a terribly empty and pointless existence where we were all biding the time increasing the size of our club while we waited to be evacuated to another place. It seemed, especially reading the words of Christ, like there should have been much more.
Over time, from doing my own studying, from reading other Christian scholars and authors, I’ve begun to see that yes, there is a great deal more to life than just how many people in a particular community have checked a box that says “yes, I’m saved, and I’d like to experience public immersion”. I’ve come to understand that we are designed with dreams and talents and abilities by God specifically to use them for His Glory…and that God is Glorified when a child learns to read, or when people eat, and eat well, or when friends share comfort and a belly laugh.
For far too many people, Christianity has brought not life (and life more abundant), but law and restrictions and the death of hope and dreams, and that’s simply wrong, it’s unhuman. It’s using the Gospel of Christ to bring more of Hell to earth, and that’s simply not acceptable.
We should be in the process of dreaming dreams, better dreams, and then making them come to life. Of being the Hope that the world truly needs, on a daily basis. And loving the beauty of that existence.