Don't Stop

CHAPTER 1

a ten-year-old president

I grew up in a beyond-rural small town of fewer than five hundred people. Most people owned at least five different kinds of animals. Some animals were friends, but most were food. Gravel was just as common as blacktop, and each family usually had at least one truck. In the summer, baseball and the Current River were kings.

Dreams were small, and for the most part, that was what people wanted. I remember feeling different. I dreamed about being the president of the United States.

When I was in fourth grade, Al Gore and George Bush (the younger one) were each vying to become the commander in chief. Every aspect of something so public was intriguing to me, particularly how two people were each able to get 50 percent of the nation to believe in them. My family seemed to support Gore, but I was drawn to Bush. He seemed real to me, and I felt like he genuinely cared.

My school was staging an election to teach us about the Electoral College, campaigns, and voting. Each class throughout the grades nominated several students to run for president. The first obstacle was getting the class to choose you.

After I got my class to choose me as their presidential candidate, I was able to move on to persuading the entire student body. Each of those who made it through their class primary was set to travel from grade to grade, class to class, and perform a speech that would seal the deal as the next US president. On the day of the actual countrywide election, our student body conducted its own election. The winner did not really win anything, as it was a learning experience more than anything else. For me, it was a moment to transpose what had so intrigued me on TV to my own life.

In a landslide, I was elected the president of the United States. I was ecstatic with the results and could not believe they had been so overwhelmingly in my favor. After all, it took a very long time to really know who won between Gore and Bush. They gave me the cardboard ballot box, constructed by a teacher, that contained all the votes that the students had cast. Several times over the next few years I sat in my closet, where I stored this big box, and performed recounts of my own. Each time I allowed my confidence in my strategy to spur me on to develop even more.

Some months later, it was career day, and we got to dress up as the occupation we hoped to have in the future. Since I was just elected president, it made sense to dress up as that. I had been putting the Missouri and US flags on and taking them off the school flagpole every day and learned how to properly fold them. I even formed a team to help and started to delegate responsibilities pertaining to the flags. Every day, as the flag went up and came back down, I thought about myself sitting in Jefferson City and governing the Show-Me State.

They took pictures of us in our career outfits, and our guidance counselor happened to be walking by. I did not really know her or even what a counselor was. I just thought she was nice. She stopped at each of the kids and read the name tags that displayed the title of their career choice if their outfit was subtle. When she got to me, she mistakenly said, "Preacher," as she read it, instead of president. I did not correct her because I was embarrassed. But I was also inspired.

The embarrassment came from not feeling good enough, even at that age, to be a preacher. Sensing that maybe I was not too bad to be a preacher, I felt new life. For the first time, I started to dream about what that would be like. I went to church every Sunday and had always regarded pastors with the highest level of respect. To me, their influence was greater than that of the president of the United States. Unfortunately, from my experience with preachers, all I knew was fire and brimstone. It made me think preachers were perfect. I also thought they had to be.

I took off my president tag and let people guess what I was for the rest of the day. Over the years, I would wrestle with my path, but that moment of getting my photo taken did something to me. I had taken off the label that I had assigned to myself. I allowed myself to dream big and without shame.

dream big

To this day, I always ask people what their dream job is. I do this because it tells me a lot about a person. Recently, while I was getting my hair cut, I asked my stylist, Stevie, if this was her dream job. She laughed at me. She laughed a lot.

"Absolutely not!" she said.

How was I supposed to know? I pressed, now intrigued and really wanting to know, "Well, what is your dream job?"

She replied, "We don't have enough time to get into all that." I could sense that she was not happy with her life or her vocation, though she was good at it.

How terrible it would feel to live a life in which we are not doing what we feel like we are supposed to be doing. Or even worse, to feel like we don't have a purpose at all. God actually created us with intent. We have something to accomplish, a mission perhaps, that we are uniquely designed for.

My heart broke for Stevie, and I changed the subject. I also left her a good tip.

God's thoughts about you

Sometimes people don't live out their purpose because they are afraid to dream. I can make a compelling case that it is sinful not to dream big dreams with our lives. This book is centered around you discovering that for yourself. God designed you for something only you can accomplish. Finding your purpose is the answer to a plethora of life's anxieties.

Think about your walk with God like this: out of all the beautiful places on earth-the waterfalls, beaches, snow-covered mountains-you are his treasured possession. You are the apple of his eye. He's crazy about you.

Before you were born and while in your mother's womb, God breathed life into you and declared you to be fearfully and wonderfully made. The Creator knitted you together, you as his creation. And when you were born and took your first breath, God was the one who ushered in the oxygen to your lungs. The thoughts he has of you, good thoughts, are more numerous than the stars in the sky or the sands in the sea.

And that all takes place in your first second of life. How much more he has for you! The plans he has for you are for a hope and a future, for you to prosper and not be harmed. Somewhere along the way in this life, we stop dreaming. And without dreaming, we stop living in the vast potential that God has for our life.

Or as a saying often attributed to Ben Franklin says, "Most men die from the neck up by the age of twenty-five because they stop dreaming."

famous dreamer

Joseph was one of the most famous dreamers in the Bible. You can read the story of his dreams beginning in Genesis 37. He was given a lot of favor from his family, and God revealed something amazing to him in one of his dreams.

In this dream, Joseph pictured a scene in which he was in a position of influence ruling a nation. His brothers, who already held a little animosity toward him, actually bowed down to him in this dream. Joseph seems like he was a pretty humble guy, but what I love is that he was able to share his dream with his family unashamedly.

Of course, his older brothers did not like the idea of them bowing down to him. This didn't sit right with them. Culturally, the little brother was supposed to bow to the older brothers, not the other way around. They were also fed up with the special treatment he received as the golden boy of the family. They decided he deserved to be punished. At first, they actually thought maybe they would kill him. Luckily, one of the brothers was smart enough to know that this was not the best route. Instead, they found a big hole, threw Joseph in it, and waited until a caravan of merchants came by. Then they sold him. Joseph's brothers sold him into slavery.

As a slave, Joseph worked diligently and received favor. He still believed in the dream that God had placed on his heart. He was not going to let something small (hah!) like being sold into slavery stop him.

Eventually he would achieve a position of influence as the chief slave in the home of Potiphar, a prominent Egyptian leader at the time. Potiphar's wife was naughty though. And one time when her king was away, the wife came out to play. She lunged at Joseph, wanting to engage him sexually. Joseph, true to his convictions, declined the invitation, and at the wrong moment, he was caught in an innocent but compromising scene. Not wanting her husband to perceive her as guilty, Potiphar's wife accused Joseph of rape, and Potiphar threw him into prison. Once again, while in prison, Joseph gradually gained more influence.

He worked his way up to chief prisoner-not a title I would be happy with if I were him. He made friends with the guards and the other prisoners and interpreted their dreams there, a move that would eventually bring his own dream to fruition.

Pharaoh began to have dreams and tried everything to understand what they meant. After Pharoah had tried just about everything he could think of, one of Joseph's old prison buddies spoke up about the dreamer. And at just the right time, God brought everything together.

Joseph was able to interpret the dreams Pharaoh was having. This move positioned him to set up the nation well for hard times that were to come. Pharaoh also placed Joseph in a prominent position as the second in command over their country. Some years later and just like he dreamed,...