How short term limitations can steal your dream

Over the last few weeks, I have been thinking about how to make some changes to some aspects of the Lapid Leaders Experience. God had given me a vague picture of the end product, but the in between was still very unclear, and so I ended up talking to an uncle for ideas on how to effect this vision. This uncle told me that he would link me up with some influential people in his circles who could then give me ideas on how to effect the changes. The people he wanted to link me up with were in my books not a good idea, I felt that they would be inaccessible and would not be in a position to put in the hours to the vision I was working on. However, my uncle disagreed with me. He told me that my problem was that I was thinking of the short term headache rather than focusing on the long term goal. He told me that my long term goal was best served by these influential people that he wanted to introduce me to.

As I thought about this advice, I began to see how often we shortchange God’s plan for our lives by focusing on short term limitations. I began to hear God take me back to the same conversation we have been having in the recent past, dream big Esther! Last week I shared in this blog how God has been calling me back to living by faith not by sight (you can read more here). I promised to share more of these lessons as God unfolds them.

This has been a second lesson,”do not let the short term limitations become the reason you abort the long term dream.”

Lessons from Abraham

My daily devotion is normally based on the one year bible. This normally entails reading a book in the old testament, a new testament and often an psalm on a daily basis. However, this year I keep getting stuck in one reading for several days. God has decided to use the book of Genesis to unwind lessons for the season I am in.

In Genesis 24, Abraham is very old and he now wants to get Isaac a wife. He calls his servant and makes him swear that he will ensure that Isaac does not marry a Cannanite wife. Instead, this servant was to travel back to Abraham’s home country and get Isaac a wife from there.

This servant is wise, before he swears to anything, he wants to make sure he has all the facts right and so he raises a pertinent concern.  Genesis 24:5 “The servant asked him, “What if the woman is unwilling to come back with me to this land? Shall I then take your son back to the country you came from?”

This is a very logical question, afterall the odds of a woman being happy to relocate to some strange land to marry a man they had not met were not in his favor. So the next logical solution to this problem would be for Isaac to relocate to Abraham’s home country.

Abraham’s response to this problem tags at my heart. He says, ‘Make sure that you do not take my sone back there. The Lord, the God of heaven who brought me out of my father’s household and my native land and who spoke to me and promised me on oath, saying, ‘To your offsprig I will give this land’ – He will send his angel before you so that you can get a wife for my son from there. If the woman is unwilling to come back with you, then you will be released form this oath you have made to me’.

Focused on the Long-term goal

As I meditate on these words by Abraham, I see a man who is focused on the long term goal and will not allow the short term needs and limitations to steal from this goal. While it was important for him to get Isaac a wife, it was not going to be at the expense of the long term dream, to inherit the land that God promised.

Unfortunately, not as many of us are as focused as Abraham was. Today many of us are involved in relationships that compromise our relationship with God. Like the servant, we find men and women who have refused to come to the land we live in and instead of walking away, we compromise. Many are in compromising relationships in the name of a short term goal to get married, many others are in compromising works in the name of getting a job, many have accepted the norms and embraced these in place of the dream God has placed in your heart.

For me, I had absorbed the world’s view on the people I can access and work with. I had decided that these influential people would not be in a position to come back to this promised land. As I listened to my uncle, I felt God tell me, ‘don’t let short term limitations compromise the long term goal’.

Are you facing short term limitations? Are you compromising so that you have finances to run the vision God has given you? Are you compromising at the workplace as the thought of standing for what is true is too expensive? Are you compromising in your relationship in the name of fear of being alone? Short term gains can easily take us away from the promises that God has for us. If Abraham had left room for Isaac to go back to his home, valid as was the need for marriage, then the promise for the Land and to be the Father of all nations would be lost. How I pray that God helps us to be as focused as Abraham, to fully believe that God is able to move any situation, and even if He does not, we choose not to compromise.