Big Dreams and Small Streams and Wisdom from a Waterfall
I have a confession to make: I’ve always wanted to do something REALLY BIG for God.
I know, I know, that sounds rather vain. But there’s something in me that has always dreamed of changing the world for the sake of my Savior.
I remember camping out beneath the velvety stars at church camp as a fourteen-year-old girl. And as the teenagers around me slept, tired from a day of beach play and capture the flag, I stared at those sparkling lights above my head and whispered these words to the One who had called every twinkle out by name that very night:
“Jesus, I want to live my whole life for you. I’ll go anywhere. I’ll do anything. You name it, Lord. I’m yours.”
Then I rolled over and joined my camp-mates in sleep, confident that Jesus had heard my plea.
When it came time to choose a college, I echoed my beach offer and made plans for life beyond the comforts of home. “Anywhere, Lord, I’ll go anywhere.”
When a full-ride scholarship planted me at a university just two hours from my small hometown, I wondered if God had heard me correctly on that starry night long ago.
Surely the Lord had bigger plans for a girl whose heart was bursting with big love for Him.
But I followed His lead and poured myself into my teaching major, certain that my big work for Jesus was just around the corner.
At twenty-two-years old, I finally felt like Jesus was taking me up on that offer I’d made on the beach as a gangly girl.
My first job out of college led me and my new husband to an international school in Salzburg, Austria. There, in a little yellow school house tucked in the Alps, my classroom was filled with students from thirty different nations.
I was certain that we were finally on the right track- Jesus and me, that is.
I was confident that I could finally accomplish big things for my Savior when I had access to the hearts of children from all over the globe. I created curriculum that would gently open the doors to faith discussions, and I prayed constantly for the students God had entrusted into my care.
But when my husband received his acceptance letter for medical school just nine months into our teaching stint overseas, I wrapped up the school year and followed my man back to Iowa so he could chase his BIG dream of becoming a doctor.
In the blink of an eye, we traded majestic hikes through the Alps for penny-pinching treks through the grocery store. I traded a classroom filled with international students for a crib holding one cranky baby.
My big dreams shrunk into a fog of sleep-deprivation and coupon cutting, and my life became consumed by small things.
I changed diapers and hosted play dates; folded underwear and led Bible studies. I plunged toilets, read board books, and managed end-of-the-day melt-downs (sometimes the baby’s; sometimes mine).
My husband studied and learned and worked uncountable hours. And while he chased his M.D. we checked off a slew of grown-up milestones.
We had more babies, signed mortgages, and joined a church. We created budgets, read parenting books, and began saving for retirement.
And even though my head told me that motherhood was a holy calling to something big, some nights when the babies grew quiet and my husband succumbed to sleep, I’d lay in bed and wonder if Jesus even remembered my words beneath that velvety sky long ago.
When the only job that surfaced for my husband upon his graduation from residency was a promising medical practice in the same middle-class small town where we’d grown up, I declared an all out war on God.
I told you I’d go anywhere. I told you I’d do anything.
And this is all you’ve got for me?
A small life planted smack dab in the middle of cornfields and endless sky?
What about Africa? Or India? Or at least someplace new?
By then, I was speaking to women regularly, and I was certain that God would want to use me as the next Beth Moore.
After all, I had plenty of passion and the gift of gab, and I’d already offered myself up for His big plans. Surely He’d want me to reach the biggest audience possible for His glory.
Instead, the Lord sent me to remote towns where women were famished for a splash of faith. He invited me to minister to worn-out moms at MOPS meetings and weary sisters at women’s retreats. And He showed Himself big in the smallest of places.
But I wanted a different story.
I had friends spreading the gospel on college campuses in France, building a school in Haiti, battling the horrors of sex trafficking in India, saving orphans in Africa, and serving the hopeless in Honduras.
I felt left behind in the cornfields of Iowa where my biggest mission field was still just the overstocked aisles of Wal-Mart and the space between the four walls of my messy house filled with sticky chairs and finger-printed windows.
I fought for gratitude, but secretly wondered why God wouldn’t let me do anything big for Him like so many of my sold-out-to-Jesus friends.
Then one night, while I lay awake wrestling with my own desires for more, my Maker finally responded to my incessant hounding. “Right now, I just want you to do small things with great love.”
It wasn’t Africa or India. It wasn’t Beth Moore or a release from the cornfields.
It was a call to live out the gospel in my own backyard, to change the world one diaper at a time.
It wasn’t the story I wanted. But it was the story He was scripting.
So I had no choice but to surrender to the tale He’d chosen.
Desperate to align my heart with His, I offered up a new prayer: Jesus, please grow in me a big passion for the small things right in front of me.
My craving for big things didn’t instantly disappear.
But I did begin to embrace the thousands of small ways I could share my giant love for the Savior…in the check-out line at the grocery store; in the hallways of my children’s schools; or in the words of hope I send to our three Compassion children battling the demons of poverty a world away from my tulip-lined town.
Don’t get me wrong, I’d still love to speak to an arena-full of women.
Or settle in a third-world country and love on the least of these.
Or write a book that God uses to change the world one reader at a time.
But last week, as I hiked through the Rockies with the soft hand of my littlest one tucked safely in mine, I studied the small silver trickle of the gurgling stream that wound like a ribbon across the craggy surface of the mighty mountain we were climbing.
And I pictured the gushing waterfall we’d discovered earlier that day miles below.
I remembered the roar of the rushing waters, the beauty of the fan-like falls, the wild spray of the frothy white cascade.
And for the first time, I saw it clearly–how a tiny trickle can gain momentum as it flows and grow into something big and beautiful.
Then, right there on the mountainside, I took off my shoes and dipped my toes in the cold crystal water of that narrow stream.
And while I waded quiet on holy ground, I prayed that somewhere down the road, the Creator of the stars and the Maker of the mountain falls would take the small things that I’ve done in great love and turn them into a rush of something big and beautiful.
For His glory, and His glory alone.
Joining Ann for Multitude Mondays. Thankful for these mountain moments…
2086. Fog rolling off the pond as the mountains wake with light
2087. Josh’s toothless grin when he catches his first trout
2088. The kids climbing the rocks to catch the waterfall’s foamy splash
2089. A rainbow over the mountain after an afternoon cloudburst.
2090. Barefeet in a cold mountain stream.
2091. The view from the top of Pike’s Peak… America, the Beautiful, indeed!
2092. A four-year-old friend to entertain Maggie on the train ride down the mountain
2093. Roaming the little shops of Manitou with Maggie
2094. The kids’ non-stop chatter after their ziplining adventure
2095. Reading books to Maggie in a tiny town library tucked in the mountains
2096. Maggie singing and picking wildflowers around the pond.
2097. Kids covered in mud splatters after a wild ATV ride with Dad!
2098. Savoring my friend’s amazing novel as I sit on a quiet porch with a mountain view.
2099. A hot cup of coffee on a cool mountain morning.
2100. Luke patiently fixing Josh’s tangled fishing line.
Laura for playdates with God, Jen for soli deo gloria, The Better Mom, The Mom Initiative, and with Sarah for Mom Notes, and Jen at Rich Faith Rising.
De strf8mledningene var virkelig prkekin over i`en. Har aldri sett noen bruke dem slikt pe5 et bilde. Se5 +++ til deg!Hesjedalsfossen har jeg aldri hf8rt om engang, men det ser jo ut som om den og omgivelsene kan ve6re verdt et besf8k!
Oh, friend, you are singing my song. Small things with great love. Mother Theresa had such amazing insight, didn’t she?
Yes, and a life that lived that motto out every day!
Alicia, your words brought tears to my eyes and an ‘amen’ to my lips! Thank you so much for sharing your story… I heard a resounding… ‘You, too’ from God! 🙂
I wonder if we just spoke it aloud if we wouldn’t find out we’re not alone in this dreaming and wishing. There are so many more like us who have hearts that desire to do something BIG, and yet God may be be asking for “loaves and fishes.” SO GLAD you stopped by, Kelsey!
My friend, Kelsey, shared this with me, and I am so thankful she did. What a beautiful testament to how God works in the big and the small. Praying He continues to give you peace over His calling. He has big plans for you, even if they don’t seem big in our earthly minds, and all things come in His perfect timing. Continue to live life giving glory to Him, trusting Him to guide you where He wants you. I’d urge you, too, to look at those who God used in scripture. My friend, Rebekah, recently wrote a great post about Miriam here: (http://threebeesinabluebonnet.blogspot.com/2013/07/chasing-history-miriam-keeping-our-eyes.html)… but if you look at Moses, who didn’t do “big things” until he was middle-aged… or Abraham and Sarah who were in their 90s! We may be young or old when He calls us with that BIG thing, and in the meantime, continue to trust, pray and live for His glory in all things 🙂 Such a great post, Alicia. I just loved it!!! Blessings to you today!
Vanessa, thanks for the link to the beautiful Miriam post and for the encouragement to trust and keep walking faithfully in all this small stuff! So blessed to meet you here today.
Uhm weißspitzen Riffhai steht nicht auf eurer Liste wurde aber von mir genannt und is definitiv öfter ursache für verletzungen im Auesialrtchsn Territoeien als der Große Weisse.
You are one of my favorites. Yes, totally true.
Oh, and ps your dream is already happening. He’s using your Words here to touch others in major ways.
And YOU are one of my favorites, too. Thanks for the encouragement. Always. I love how God has used you to bless me in BIG ways, friend!
Alicia, how I relate to your big dreams and your willingness to go anywhere (meaning not right here) that God sends! And then the everyday small and his powerful work in doing the small things with great love. This is my story, too, friend, and thank you for placing it right before my eyes in the way I needed to hear today. Bless you!
By the way, I love the new look of your blog!
Thanks, Ashley. Anywhere but not right here.. isn’t that the crazy part of the “willingness”? Hmm… humbling to really record it in writing. But so encouraging to know I’m not alone in the wishing, the wondering, and the wrestling. And by the way, I loved YOUR story about the llama! Still laughing at what you can find when you sneak out to write at a coffee shop 🙂
Love your story and your honesty. I too wondered for so long why I wasn’t called to Africa. Now I hear – tend to the person I place right before you. I used to ignore them in the hopes, no my desires to do bigger. God calls us to serve where He puts us. guess it takes a life time to really learn that. Good thoughts here today. Glad I came over from SDG to read your words.
So glad to have women ahead of me with a “lifetime of wisdom” who are serving right where God puts them. I’m glad you came over, too, Jean.
I’ll go anywhere and do anything, Lord… except stay right here. Yes, I can relate to that, my friend. One of my wise mentor moms recently told me she dreamed of doing big things for God, but instead he placed her in a home with nine children, most of which she homeschooled (can you imagine?), and now that they are older, she is seeing the purpose and fruits of her labor. Her kids are now moving forward to do the “big” things in her place. It’s her desire, multiplied. Be encouraged, my fellow faithful mom! I’m guessing you’ll still check that book off your list one day soon. I sure hope you do.
I’m not sure why I’m sitting here fighting tears as I think about that dear mama. Maybe because not long ago a wise woman suggested the same idea to me. Such a bittersweet thought. Yes, multiplied fruit is a gift- just hard to wait to see how it all plays out. And yes, I want my kids to live BIG Jesus-loving lives. So I’ll take that scenario if it’s the story God wants. Thanks for sharing the wisdom, Becky. You’re my kindred spirit, dear friend!
What an absolutely beautiful post! I too have struggled with ministry and calling in the mundane. Thank you for this reminder!!
“ministry in the mundane”- I think that phrase is the perfect description of my life, of motherhood, of all the ordinary things God invites us to do in extraordinary ways. So glad to know I’m not the only one who has to wrestle this thing out, Rachel!
Your living room looks pretty and colftroabme, Kristen. I love the mixture of aqua blue, white, and light brown. For some reason, it gives me the impression that you are fascinated with aquatic and underwater life. I love it. The design is also very pleasing to the eye and the area is a perfect spot to relax and just have a good time.
Have you ever wondered who posts some of this stuff that you come across? Recently it seems to have become an epidemic, although it seems to be changing for the better. Do you agree?
NASA scientist James E. Hansen, who has publicly criticized the Bush administration for dragging its feet on climate change and labeled skeptics of man-made global warming as distracting “court jesters,” appears in a 1971 Washington Post article that warns of an impending ice age within 50 years.One of yoyur boys eh ??
January 3, 2012Howdy are using WordPress for your site platform? I’m new to the blog world but I’m trying to get started and create my own. Do you require any coding expertise to make your own blog? Any help would be greatly appreciated!
Jim Olson knows better than almost anyone what it’s like to face Nestle in a legal setting – and also what the multinational is capable of when its profits are on the line.Nestle accumulated a very black eye when it fought to maintain its 400 cfs pumping rates in Mecosta County, MI – even after a judge saw the damage being done and threatened an injunction.Mr. Olson is as responsible as anyone for forcing Nestle to be the good citizen it claims to be – only he had to do it via the legal system.He’s definitely worth seeing.
I’ll try to put this to good use immediately.
I think sometimes translation gets lost – and we mis-interpret big in the world’s language – when Jesus told us the first shall be last the the last shall be first – that maybe small is really big – the world just doesn’t see it. Little things sometimes have the biggest impact – we just don’t always see that impact:) Like you, this is a topic I’ve pondered and chewed over for quite a while – because God He is faithful – sometimes we just have worldly expectatiaons. What an awesome opportunity in Austria – and what a beautiful piece of time for your life quilt!
Oh, you are SO right. Jesus has an upside down kingdom and then I still want to look at it through human eyes. If only I could glimpse through His eyes! I truly appreciate your wisdom.
This is just beautiful and such a great visual! I can just see the trickle of the tiny stream feeding into the mighty roar of the waterfall. Thank you for relating how God shows us what we need to see!
I do love how God uses the simplest of things to speak to us right where we’re at. Glad you came today!
Dear Alecia
I was just the same and with the Fm/CFS I cannot do much in any case, but then I read that wonderful verse in Acts that God is not served with human hands! I think loving Him with my whole heart is just about the greatest gift I can give Him.
Blessings XX
Mia
Oh, Mia, I definitely agree. It’s all He asks, isn’t it? Funny how we add our own definitions to what it means to serve Him well. So glad you stopped by today.