Title: Have a Dream and Hope
Isaiah (131) Have dreams and hopes (Isaiah 54:1-3)
< Blessing rests in the heart >
Even if your present self is miserable, if you acknowledge and give thanks to God in everything, the time of restoration will surely come (verse 1). Do not complain about the role of life entrusted to you now. A successful life is already planned for the children of God. It is God's strategy to call a life that is not wonderful and use it beautifully. Therefore, even if you are lacking and weak, never lose heart and go out singing more praise. If you complain about it being difficult, the devil and curses will come to you.
Praise even when you are sick. Praise can even beat cancer cells. Some cancer patients praise and thank and keep imagining white blood cells eating cancer cells, so they finally get cured. Gratitude and praise are sources of power. If you look closely, how many miracles do you live? It is a miracle that a blind man opens his eyes, but it is also a miracle that he can see now. It is a miracle to get up, but it is also a miracle to be able to walk now.
Feel the excitement in your daily life and never stop giving thanks and praise. Blessings are in the heart. God opens his mouth wide and fills the width of his thoughts. If I have a big dream and a vision, believe that my future will be good, and sweat a lot, God will surely give me a chance. So, no matter what, never give up. Everyone has the potential to be blessed. If you want to make the possibility of that blessing into a real reality, expand the boundaries of your life with big dreams and visions (verse 2). Life is markedly different depending on what you dream and think about.
<Have dreams and hopes>
While learning Greek culture and philosophy from his teacher Aristotle, Alexander the Great admired the culture and raised the army with the mission of spreading Greek culture. Before leaving on the expedition, the great king gave away all of his wealth to the people. The gods dried up. "sire! If you share it all like that, your Majesty has nothing to own, right? Then the king answered. “I will hope!” And with 20,000 troops, he defeated the 500,000 Persians to create a great empire, and not only expanded the territory, but also planted Hellenistic culture in every conquered area, ushering in the Hellenistic era.
Saints must also turn their eyes to the world with the mission of preaching the gospel. There is an old saying that if you love your children, make them travel. When your child goes on a foreign trip or a short-term mission, his eyes change. So don't spare the money. Don't consider studying abroad a luxury. Just as in the old days parents sold cows to send their children to college in Seoul as a luxury rather than a luxury, consider it wonderful for parents to sell their houses and send their children to study abroad.
In the past, studying abroad and traveling abroad were condemned because there was no dollar, but now it is different. Now is the era of globalization where we have to look at the world to survive. To earn more dollars, show your children abroad. Even though the country is small, if you condemn overseas travel, you become a frog in a well. If a small country like Hong Kong or Singapore condemned overseas travel, what would happen to those countries? In the age of globalization, it is just a call to sit and perish and die.
The United States is a union of more than 50 states, an average of twice that of Korea. There is no condemnation in the United States for going from California to neighboring Nevada and from New York to neighboring New Jersey. It even takes 5 hours by plane from New York to LA. Distance from Seoul to Bangkok. In a situation where domestic travel in a large country becomes overseas travel in a small country, the future of that country is darkened even if it is condemned even if it cannot encourage overseas travel. If the country is small, it is necessary to increase the number of overseas travel opportunities, not as a luxury.
Even a small reduction in huge private education expenses can show your children abroad. When you know how to look outside, your heart will grow and your boundaries of blessing will expand. Let your children have dreams and hopes. When God blesses us, he first makes us have dreams and hopes. Dreams and hopes are the greatest assets in life. A beggar is not a person without money, but a person without dreams and hopes. If you live as a spiritual beggar with no dreams and no hopes at all, you become a real beggar. On the other hand, even if you look like a beggar now, if you do your best with dreams and hopes, the possibility of blessing turns into a real reality.