The last time I felt the Lord move me to write was almost two years ago.  The things happening in my heart were involving the disappointment I was having regarding a promise God had given to me about the leadership of FireUP (I have had dreams of speaking at FireUP since 2003.)  A year before I wrote about hope deferred, I had shared my vision with the Board of Directors of FireUP and had been rejected.  I knew God had promised this to me, and my heart was broken…  I was hurt, angry, frustrated, discouraged, everything I wrote about in those two blogs…

And now almost two years to the date after I wrote the first of those about my disappointment, we will be hosting our first ever FireUP be.loved and I have been charged with being the director.  The Lord did a mighty and amazing work to bring this about.  So what I want to share with you, is the path I had to walk to get here…  While I won’t share all of the details of the last three and a half years, what I will tell you is this:  Jesus is the dream, and whatever the current assignment he has you in, if you’re found faithful with that, he will entrust you with the potential he has planned for your life.

When God gives us these dreams, these promises, these hopes for our lives, He is giving us a potential we can live up to, if we walk faithfully with Him in love and obedience in what He has given us to do.  Our coming into His potential for us is dependent upon our abiding obedience.  Jesus spoke of the importance of abiding in His love, and how obedience and abiding are inseparably yoked together, “If you keep my commandments, you will abide in my love, just as I have kept my Father’s commandments and abide in His love.  These things I have spoken to you, that my joy may be in you, and that your joy may be full.” (John 15:10-11)  See, there isn’t joy apart from abiding in his love.  And there isn’t abiding in his love apart from obedience.  Joy, love, and obedience are all inseparably bound together.

So my point is this:  you can walk in the fullness of joy, and in the fullness of His love, long before you ever step into the full potential He has for your life.  If you’re waiting for circumstances to change before you walk in His pleasure, you’re falling more in love with an assignment, than you are with the Beautiful God who gives that assignment.  So establish yourself now in a deep and intimate love relationship with Jesus, walk in obedience in your current assignment, and He will bring you into the potential that He desires for your life.  That is the part that’s up to us.

But the truth of the matter is, He is the only one who gets us into the promises He has for us.  Over the years, we give up so many times, we complain, we stumble, we want to walk away, we run out of strength, and it is God, all God who finishes the good work He began in us.  The only thing we do is let Him pull us along in love and obedience.  And when we come into the promise he gave us, we’re so awestruck by His ability to get weak, broken, and powerless people into a glorious destiny that only He could create, that we’re humbled to tears at His kindness and sovereignty.

So now, FireUP.  To be honest, a lot of circumstances have changed in the last three and a half years.  We have a baby girl, Elisa Joy.  We bought a house.  We have another baby due in December.  I’m the Associate Pastor of Water’s Edge Church.  I’m the Director of the School of Life and Ministry, an equipping discipleship program in Marquette.  And I’m the director ofFireUP be.loved.  And I still work at Babycakes Muffin Company, a coffee shop downtown.  And I can tell you honestly, that while my joy has increased, the source has been the ever-increasing awareness of His pleasure in me as I walk obediently in love before Him.  He is just so kind, so good.  I’m so thankful that He kept me, and brought me into this time of life.

I’ll be writing the Director’s Blog here over the next months, both to keep everyone updated on our progress, but then as a resource for people who’ve attended the event to continue to go deeper with God throughout the year.  It’ll also be continually updated on the SLM website.  I look forward to this season God has for us together.