Dare To Be Derek

This morning I stumbled across something that I wrote a few years ago, when I had the opportunity to go to Milwaukee, Wisconsin with my best friend Dani. She was there for a training, but I just got to hang out and spend time with Jesus. As I was walking by Lake Michigan, these words came into my head and I want to share them with you:

As I walk along the path leading to the lake I see a bright piece of plastic trapped in the branches of a tree. I pause for a moment to look closer and see that this is no ordinary piece of plastic, it is a kite. A kite, which is meant to soar and be free, but is now stuck amidst the branches of a leafless tree. As I see the one, I begin to notice that this kite is not alone, I survey the scene and I see that in many of the trees around where I stand there are kites who have lost their lives to the unforgiving grip of the barren monsters with destructive arms whose grasp is unrelenting.

As I look a little more I begin to imagine being a child again, with my kite in my hands and all the possibilities in the world. Nothing can keep me down because I have my kite! So I let it fly, it launches into the wind as I struggle to hold on; the excitement is building; which way will the wind blow next? Then, as I continue running with my kite, without any warning it stops. It’s stuck. What happened? I look up into the sun with devastation in my heart… a tree… And now the joy, the possibility, and the wonder have all gone, stolen by the grip of the tree whose grasp holds the kite still.

I can’t help but think that this is what happens all too often in life. As children we believe that anything can happen, that we can be whatever we want to be and we can change the world! But somewhere along the way the dream gets lost, something happens or someone says something and just like the tree holds onto the kite, we allow these things to steal our dreams. We lose hope that anything else is possible and we settle for the world as it is. We begin to see the world through the lenses of doubt, “realism”, and cynicism and we submit ourselves to the belief that there is nothing we can do. But I believe that this is a lie, the God that I serve is the God who brings hope to the hopeless, faith to the doubter, gives dreams back to the “realist” and a new heart for the one ruined by cynicism. Our God is the God of BIG DREAMS that seem impossible, but with Him nothing is ever truly impossible! He desperately longs to work inside of you and I to bring a change that can be displayed to the watching world; that they might see in us restoration. He desires for us to live out hope and love for the hurting and the broken.

Getting back to the kites for a moment, our God is a loving Father, who doesn’t just leave the kite stuck up in the tree, but He is the Father who takes time to climb into the tree and untangle our kites and set them free again. It is His desire that you would allow His dreams to become your dreams and that they would fly freely in the wind, as a kite set free. I ask you now, is your kite stuck? If it is, you need only ask the Father and He will set you free!!! OUR GOD IS THE GOD OF FLYING KITES!!!