Читать книгу There is More: When the World Says You Can’t, God Says You Can - Brian Houston, Brian Houston - Страница 11

The young dreamer I’m talking about is, of course, Joseph. Here is the story of his dream:

Joseph, being seventeen years old, was pasturing the flock with his brothers. He was a boy with the sons of Bilhah and Zilpah, his father’s wives. And Joseph brought a bad report of them to their father. Now Israel loved Joseph more than any other of his sons, because he was the son of his old age. And he made him a robe of many colors. But when his brothers saw that their father loved him more than all his brothers, they hated him and could not speak peacefully to him.

Now Joseph had a dream, and when he told it to his brothers they hated him even more. He said to them, “Hear this dream that I have dreamed: Behold, we were binding sheaves in the field, and behold, my sheaf arose and stood upright. And behold, your sheaves gathered around it and bowed down to my sheaf.” His brothers said to him, “Are you indeed to reign over us? Or are you indeed to rule over us?” So they hated him even more for his dreams and for his words.

Then he dreamed another dream and told it to his brothers and said, “Behold, I have dreamed another dream. Behold, the sun, the moon, and eleven stars were bowing down to me.” But when he told it to his father and to his brothers, his father rebuked him and said to him, “What is this dream that you have dreamed? Shall I and your mother and your brothers indeed come to bow ourselves to the ground before you?” And his brothers were jealous of him, but his father kept the saying in mind.” (Genesis 37:1–11, ESV)

Sheaves of grain bowing down to him, and even the sun, the moon, and the stars! From where Joseph sat, tending sheep in the land of Canaan, his dreams looked absurd. Talk about shooting for the moon—he imagined that even the moon would be within his grasp!

When I dreamed as a child about traveling to places I had learned about in school, there was nothing in the natural that made these dreams look possible. I would take a pen and doodle on the back of my schoolbooks pictures of such places as Paris, with its outdoor cafés, poodles, and endless baguettes. I dreamed about London, with its unique black cabs, double-decker buses, and destinations I knew from our family Monopoly board, such as Fleet Street, Coventry Street, Park Lane, and Mayfair. And I was always fascinated by bigger places, such as Australia or other countries that then seemed so far away. The United States of America and everything it offered seemed like another world back then. Today those dreams have become so much a part of my life that I hardly think about the fact that they were once a dream.

How often do you believe for the impossible?

About twenty years ago, I spent an afternoon in my office with a blank piece of paper in front of me and wrote down the words “The Church That I See.” Quite miraculously, the amazing thing is that thirty years on, in many ways, those words I wrote down are reflective of the church we now lead. But it wasn’t always that way.

In 1983, Hillsong Church was a gathering of less than one hundred people in a tiny school hall. It was a passionate, vibrant, young community of believers, along with a few almost believers and even nonbelievers, putting out chairs, sweeping the floor, and praying in a broom closet before and after services each Sunday. The “stage” was a road case, and the quality of the band was modest at best. Hillsong Church looks very different now, but many of the values that we built on are the same today.

Hillsong has always been a worshipping church. Before there was Hillsong UNITED, before there was Hillsong Young & Free, before there was “Shout to the Lord,” “Mighty to Save,” or “Oceans,” there was worship. Passionate worship. It wasn’t always polished, there weren’t always lights, and in those early years, there wasn’t even a stage, but we worshipped. We sang and we began to take baby steps in writing songs that resounded in the hearts of the people in our community. Sure, the piano had one or two notes that didn’t work and was out of tune, and the drummer didn’t keep a steady beat. Jack, our smiling senior accordion player and his wife, Elaine, not only were a part of the band but also looked after the tiny group of kids in our children’s ministry, including our own four-year-old and eighteen-month-old sons. Those were rough, raw, pioneering days, but the fruit of the labor of many faithful people early on began to give way to opportunities beyond our wildest dreams.

It was on that piece of paper, more than two decades ago, that I wrote these words: “I see a church whose heartfelt praise and worship touches heaven and changes earth—worship that influences the praises of people throughout the earth, exalting Christ with powerful songs of faith and hope.”

Only one year before I wrote that, in 1992, the very first live Hillsong album was released: The Power of Your Love. But even before that, we recorded our first musical effort, Spirit and Truth, in a tiny home studio. I was so proud of that little collection of original songs that, when I had the chance as a pastor to speak at a citywide gathering of hundreds of ministers (almost all older, wiser, and more seasoned than I was), I made them first listen to some of the songs. I can still see the blank stares sending a clear message that no one in the room was anywhere near as excited about this as I was. But the idea of recording an album simply came from our passion to worship God in our local church, along with the belief that our local church was called to resource other local churches with words and music that would glorify our worthy God. At the time, we never could have imagined that our albums would be sung throughout the earth, but we had a belief that God had called us to do something with what was in our hands and that, as we were faithful, He would also be faithful.

Now, more than ninety albums later, God is growing and stretching and changing the story of Hillsong Worship. But it was long before those first albums that the songs of God and the sound of our house were established as a priority, an arrowhead, and a cornerstone of who we are—all because of a God-breathed dream.

The Bible tells us in Zechariah 4:10, “Do not despise these small beginnings” (NLT). Whatever it is God has entrusted into your hand—your family, your career, your ministry, or whatever—don’t count it as insignificant. Whatever dreams are in your heart and still seem like a world away, don’t be discouraged! I believe that in the eyes of God and with His leading, wisdom, favor, and provision, if you hold fast to that dream He has placed in your heart, you, like Joseph, will see it come to pass.