When Hopes & Dreams Fail

Lord, I feel like my doing is changing.

Instead of trying so hard just to get something off the ground (Lazarus, All Souls), it's shifting now to maintaining, shaping culture, tuning it...

And the doing is beginning to feel different – more like a long obedience in the same direction, but one where I know that both of these things (all of the things in my life, really) are going to fall short of what I hoped and dreamt for... I will have seen potential, but also know that it failed to reach what it could have been. That doesn't mean that it failed, per se... but the future / possibility begins to slip away, and you start to realize it's not going to happen.

Felt that with pole vault (in college). Felt it again in software (seeing what I could have built, but then getting to the point of realizing I wasn't going to be the one to do it, and therefore it wasn't going to happen)... Saw it with All Souls Missoula... Seeing glimpses of it now with Lazarus / All Souls Austin – Laz is probably never going beyond Austin – it's not out of the question, but it's not a burning in my bosom; it's probably never going to become something like Guinness, or one of the Trappist breweries; it's probably not going to make us wealthy; it may not even give us enough to retire on...

So too with All Souls. It's probably never going to be bigger than a handful of house churches (at best) – it's not going to be a L'Abri, or a Redeemer NYC, or spark any kind of movement, of leave much of a lasting impression on anyone other than a handful of people who were here, and experienced it.

But that's been the nature of the church (and life) since the get-go...

Hebrews 11 – this is the nature of the kingdom.

Lord, I feel like you have taught me so much that I'd like to write about, to share, to contribute. I feel like you have given me real insight! Yet it feels increasingly likely I'll be lucky to get any of it written down, and even if I do, will anyone ever read it? Probably not...