It seems inevitable that each and every one of us will at some time in our lives, be touched by the painful
experience of a shattered dream. Some people may hold on to a fading dream with
tenacious passion, even above reason, until one day that dream lies broken in
jagged pieces at their feet. It may be a love that should have lasted for a lifetime, a
career that was to be the pinnacle of one's life work, or a financial nest egg
that was to be there at retirement to provide a measurable life of ease rather
than hardship in the senior years .... gone now, with only the memory of what could
have been.
Shattered Dreams are Real
Tragedy
touches everyone. Shattered dreams are real and they can leave a person
devastated and broken. A man who was very acquainted with
the reality of living on the raw edge of a shattered dream was the man
Jacob, a
character found in the Old Testament. He was the son of Isaac, the
grandson of
Abraham, and the fraternal twin brother of Esau. He was named Jacob as
he came
out of the womb with his hand grasping his older twin brother's heel.
(Genesis
25:26).
These two brother's were
opposite in every way, and their relationship was troubled by a harsh and divisive sibling
rivalry. It culminated in Jacob
manipulating both his elder brother, and his father Isaac to obtain a
birthright that was not his own (Genesis 28:4), bestowing upon him the promise
of The Abrahamic Covenant (Genesis 12: 1-3). This was a sacred rite and
blessing reserved for the firstborn son alone. Jacob later fled for fear that his
brother Esau would kill him for such treachery. Leaving his childhood
home he journeyed into the wilderness, alone and uncertain as to his
future. He found himself surrounded by a dry and barren wilderness.
“… Jacob left Beersheba and set out for Harran. When he
reached a certain place, he stopped for the night because the sun had set. He
gathered some stones there, and arranged them for his pillows, and lay down in
that place to sleep.” (Genesis 28:10-11)
The stones that Jacob had used to
rest his weary body upon may have symbolized what he might have felt that his
life had become ... barren and desolate. His shattered dream became a painful
reminder that what he had hoped for had not come without cost. Yet in God’s
grace and mercy, those very stones became an altar of worship, as God gave Him
a vision of the tomorrow yet to be.
When a Shattered Dream is given to God
In The Quiet Place, God can begin to
teach us that even a shattered dream can be used by Him to teach us something
of His mercy and grace that can only be learned when our hearts are truly open
and He is given full and complete access.
God's Mercy is
Revealed to Jacob
“He had a dream in which he saw a stairway resting on the
earth, with its top reaching to heaven, and the angels of God were ascending
and descending on it. There above it stood the Lord, and he said: “I am the Lord, the God of your father Abraham and
the God of Isaac. I will give you and your descendants the land on which you
are lying. Your descendants will be like the
dust of the earth, and you will spread out to the west and to the east, to the
north and to the south. Genesis 28:12-14a)
God's Grace is
Extended through Jacob
"All peoples on earth will be blessed through you and
your offspring. I am with you and will watch over you wherever you
go, and I will bring you back to this land. I will not leave you until I have
done what I have promised you.”(Genesis 28:14b-15)
When a Shattered Dream becomes an Altar of
Worship
“When Jacob
awoke from his sleep, he thought, 'Surely the Lord
is in this place, and I was not aware of it.' He was afraid and said, 'How
awesome is this place! This is none other than the House of God; this is the
Gate of Heaven.” (Genesis 28:17)
In life we often discover that what
we thought would make us happy and fulfilled is found to leave the heart empty,
restless and unsatisfied. How precious it is to discover that what
was once a shattered dream can became God’s means to bless us with much more that we could have ever imagined.
“Early the next morning Jacob took the stone he had placed
under his head and set it up as a pillar and poured oil on top of it. He called
the place Bethel, though the city used to be called Luz.” (Genesis
28:18-19)
The name Luz comes from the verb luz
meaning to turn aside. In the Bible this word is used mostly as a negative,
either as a turning away from wisdom (Proverbs 3:21, 4:21) or used to describe
being a "twisted" person (Proverbs 3:32, 14:2). It is used also to describe a crooked uneven pathway. The derivative azut
means deviation or crookedness. Jacob’s manipulative scheming to gain Esau’s
birthright, when given to God for Him to have His way, changed this barren
place into a place Jacob called, Bethel…The House of God; the Place where God
dwells. Jacob’s sorrowful place became His Quiet Place where God revealed His
will to him.
The name Bethel is a compound of two
Hebrew words. The first segment is the word bayet meaning house,
household, home or temple. The second segment is the word El, the common
abbreviation of the word Elohim. It is the first name given for God in the
Bible, "In the beginning God,
(Elohim) created the Heavens and the earth." Genesis 1:1).
The word beth ha-'elohim, is
a designation of the Hebrew word for sanctuary. In a moment of profound
personal revelation, Jacob discovered that his desert place became "The
House of Yahweh," the place where God does dwell.
It is only when we allow God to dwell in midst of
the broken pieces of our shattered dream, that that very place of grievous sorrow,
becomes The Quiet Place of the House of God to our soul. It becomes personal
and real, when upon the dark lonely pathway through the forest of
disillusionment; the night shadows become aglow with the presence of God.
Jacob understood that in a lonely desert place,
his shattered dream had become the pathway to a deeper understanding of the
will of God for his life.
Give your Shattered Dream to God
Jacob realized that his bed of stones had become an
altar of worship, but only as he yielded his heart and broken dreams to the
infinite purpose of God. Are you in a struggle with God, wrestling over a shattered
dream that needs to be laid at His feet in humble obedience? Give Him the
pieces and He will show you the pathway to discovering how only His will can
lead to the creation of a new beginning in your life.
“…and Jacob vowed a vow, saying, ‘If God will be with me, and
will keep me in this way that I go, and will give me bread to eat, and raiment
to put on, So that I come again to my father's house in peace; then
shall the Lord be my God.”
(Genesis 28:20-21)
Honor God with
Obedience and Sacrifice
Jacob recognized that God wanted him
to sacrifice a measure of His provision for him, as a token of trust and
obedience that God alone must have His way in Jacob’s life.
“… and
this stone that I have set up as a pillar will be
God’s House, and of all that you give me I will
give you a tenth.” (Genesis 28:22)
When the Pathway to
the Future is Unclear
The Quiet Place is where
understanding becomes enlightenment, and enlightenment becomes a ministry to
others. When the way seemed unclear to Jacob, God would later remind him, to
return to this place he called Bethel, where God had taken his shattered dream,
and gave him the vision of a promised blessing that lay in store for him. God
would remind him to return to worship Him there, in The Quiet Place of the
House of God.
“I am the God of Bethel, where you anointed a pillar and
where you made a vow to me. Now leave this land at once and go back to your
native land.” (Genesis 31:13)
“Then God said to Jacob, “Go up to Bethel and settle there, and
build an altar there to God, who appeared to you when you were fleeing from
your brother Esau.” (Genesis 35:1)
Where once it was enough to have his
father’s Isaac’s blessing, now in the wilderness of his shattered dreams, he
had to have God’s blessing. When our dream is no longer as important as His
blessing in our lives, then the horizon of the future will not be the central
focus of our hopes and dreams, but rather our focus will be His glory and His
blessing alone. It is only then that the Quiet Place becomes not merely a place
to clear our heads, but a place to clear our heart and hear the whisper of His
voice alone.
Letting go of the sorrow of a
shattered dream is no easy thing. For Jacob, this lonely desolate time became a
testimony to others as to how God alone can take a shattered dream and use it
as a pathway into a deeper understanding of God’s will, God’s provision, and
God’s blessing.
“…and let
us arise, and go up to Beth-el; and I will make there an altar unto God, who answered
me in the day of my distress, and was with me in the way which I went.” (Genesis 35:6)
As we journey through our lives, we
may discover that the stones that are embedded in the pathway before us, are the
footprints of those whose hearts and dreams were shattered and
broken. They were fellow pilgrims upon the path of life that experienced personal
tragedy in the loss of a life dream.
What is important to remember is
that the rock strewn path need not be seen as headstones meant to mark the graves
of lost hopes, but rather, stepping stones to remind fellow pilgrims to never
give up their quest to dream yet again, when sorrow cloaks the day into night.
The dawn will bring forth the sunrise of God's promise to each one who mourns
the loss of a shattered dream.
Recommended Resource:
Shattered
Dreams: God’s Unexpected Pathway to Joy
If God loves me, why does life hurt
so much?
"A new way to live is available
to us," writes widely respected author and counselor Larry Crabb, "a
way that leads to a joy-filled encounter with Christ, to a life-arousing
community with others, and to a powerful transformation of our interior worlds
that makes us more like Jesus."
You'll see how God moves you from
shattered dreams to better dreams to the highest dream - and the
joy that comes from dreaming it.
"Shattered
dreams, "writes Dr. Larry Crabb, "are never random. They are always a
piece in a larger puzzle, a chapter in a larger story. The Holy Spirit uses the
pain of shattered dreams to help us discover our desire for God, to help us
begin dreaming the highest dream. They are ordained opportunities for the
Spirit first to awaken, then to satisfy our highest dream."
