This week, with states around the country beginning to have conversations about reopening I found myself doing something I haven’t done in many months. I found myself beginning to dream of a life beyond this trauma. It brought my spirit great joy to do so even if all that I dream of never comes to pass. Future thinking is an important part of our well being as human beings. When we aren’t able to do it we become anxious, depressed, and irritable.
In his book Stumbling on Happiness, Harvard psychologist Daniel Gilbert writes, “To see is to experience the world as it is, to remember is to experience the world as it was, but to imagine—ah, to imagine is to experience the world as it isn’t and has never been, but as it might be. The greatest achievement of the human brain is the ability to imagine objects and episodes that do not exist in the realm of the real, and it is this ability that allows us to think about the future.”
In the book of Acts, we see this type of imagination at work in the early Christians as they begin to build a community different than any they had ever known. A community with Jesus as their messiah known for its generosity, compassion, grace, accountability, and love.
Old men and women with more of life behind them than in front of them were dreaming dreams again. Young men and women on fire for Jesus saw visions and prophesied. The dry bones that had withered in the oppressive environment of fear, isolation, and scarcity began to come alive again and be filled with the Spirit. What a beautiful and powerful time in which they lived.
As we begin to slowly emerge from our various shelters, I wonder what new possibilities might lay before us. Much has changed and grief still lays heavy upon our hearts. But it’s in those moments that God is often able to do his best work in us. I don’t know what the future holds for our church, our country, or our world. But I haven’t given up on it and neither has God. It is my prayer that as we move forward that we have the courage to dream big dreams even if they fail. The Spirit is at work among us. Stay strong my friends. Better days are ahead and together we will get through this.
Pastor Leslie