When Dreaming Requires a Dare...
... the dreams of a few of our 9th grade young men...
DARE ... to have sufficient courage
What do you think of when you hear the phrase 'Dare to Dream?'
Do you really think that the very act of dreaming is something that would require 'sufficient courage?'
I, Laura, dreamed easily, and mostly, still do. I was raised in fertile soil where dreams grow.
Do you know that there are MANY young people for whom dreaming is absolutely an act of courage?
Why?
Imagine you are geographically isolated. Literally, you have limited land access to larger cities due to a variety of corrupt political practices. A road needed to be built 30 years ago and there was aid to be had... and yet, why use that money to connect an entire people group when it is easier to just leave them to themselves?
Imagine you have few examples of dreamers. Literally, your mom left school in 2nd grade to work on the farm and had you when she was 15 or 16. She knows not how to encourage you other than 'you have to go to school.' She doesn't really even know why, she just knows.
Imagine you have zero resources. Your mom works hour-to-hour eeking out a below-poverty level existence to feed you and your siblings. Your dad has gone to live with another woman and has other children. Your grandparents have more mouths to feed than they can count.
Imagine the only people around you who you see as successful are involved in an illicit trade. Your cousins provoke you to give up on that long, hard education and try the easy route. Your siblings need to eat. You are hungrier than you should be. Your mom is crying. Easy decision.
It is 2014. I find myself teaching in a school God built with my husband's hands, my heart and many friends seated around many tables. As my heart pounds and my Spanish falters, I ask our first group of 7th graders... What is your DREAM?
Silence.
I rephrase and ask again.
Silence.
I smile big and pat a student on the back... do you have a dream?
Imagine that you stare back at me and smile. 'What is a dream?'
My heart stops.
Imagine ... you don't yet know how to dream.
The process of opening yourself up and exploring the very courage to dream takes years. There are so many reasons not to dream. And yet, these teachers keep standing up in front of you and saying... DREAM. People arrive from far-off places and say... DREAM. Your mom begins to imagine and encourage... DREAM.
You say to yourself ... DARE I Dream?
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My middle-aged life song has been one DREAM after another. I have sung the same dream song in many different keys for the last 20 or so years. Many of you have spent time dreaming with me and even taken some of the dream as your own.
In just 6 weeks, I will be in the US to share how one very small dream that God planted in the hearts of a few folks has grown into a full-color, living, breathing testimony of God's faithful care.
Please join me on Saturday, November 3, 2018 to hear how daring to dream in one place allows others to DARE to DREAM in another far-off place. I look forward to being with you and sharing it all together.
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