It’s always okay to take a deep breath and start again.
I love learning. Like – really, really love learning. I love understanding how things work and teaching myself how to do things. So when I ventured out to release a book and start doing more of an online business, I ate up every resource I could. I spent hours watching videos on best practices and went to work designing all the pieces and parts to start to get this wheel rolling.
But after a year of “leaning on my own” newly begotten understanding about how to walk this walk, I got tired and I got real. And I asked God for help.
Now, I honestly had already been including God throughout the journey, but there was a unique kind of surrender this time around: one that said, we could throw everything away and start from scratch if you just teach me where to put my foot next, Lord.
I imagine He is always excited to be invited in to lead us.
In His kindness, the next step began right where I was as He began to show me in a myriad of ways how He – and my own heart, had been trying to get my attention.
One of the questions God asked was simply, “What has your attention?”
I feel like I’ve often heard this question in the church world and it’s often intended as a rebuke – as in, you aren’t focused on God enough. But God wasn’t spanking me with this question. This wasn’t some kind of heavenly lecture about watching too much Netflix.
[On a side note, My experience with God suggests He is more interested in inspiring than lecturing his children- when I focus on His love and character it has a unique way of disciplining my heart and transforming me. Not that He doesn’t correct or bring truth, but His ways of fathering me into maturity are miraculously void of shame and condemnation. He leads with love and life through intimacy. End of side note.]
I felt like God honestly wanted me to be keenly aware of what had my attention, because He had something to say to me about it.
One of the things that had caught my attention was a blog of a woman who had a thriving online business. I had spent a fair amount of time reading her blog, meandering over her site and watching how she approached using social media. I loved that her blog was simple – no ads. She created simple ebooks full of recipes that she sold from her site. And whenever she shared content online she simply shared about her passion and journey to live healthy and use quality ingredients to nourish her and her family. It was real and honest and – she had made beyond a full-time income by simply going on a journey and inviting others to go along.
And God began to prompt, Now why does this have your attention, Sara?
And simply put – I wanted to approach online business like this too.
I simply wanted to be on a journey, and invite others into it.
But what journey was I on?
And that’s when the Lord reminded me of an impossible dream and offered – what about walking towards this, and seeing what happens?
My dream? The Restlands.
Not the book.
A real, live Rest – land.
A place for people to come to rest, to refresh, to dream, to create, to grow, to launch. A place for community and campfires and gardens and fresh air and porches and beauty. A place to spend all your moments adventuring with Papa.
I dream so often of gifting rest to people, and I dream of having a place where that could happen.
Looking at my life right now – there’s just no way.
Looking at my God right now – nothing is impossible.
His advice: What can you steward now to prepare for that dream and what would it look like to invite others into that journey?
So I began to think –Well…I suppose I could learn to garden. And make great fresh food. And maybe I could ask other people about their journeys of pursuing dreams and taking risk and finding God in the midst. Maybe I could sit at kitchen tables with people I admire and desire to learn from and capture the conversations that stir and equip my heart to keep moving forward. Maybe that would be a journey that would encourage others in the dreams you have for them too.
I could feel so much life rising up in this conversation, until I wondered one thing –
Papa, what if it never happens?
What if I invite all these people into a journey and I never see the dream come to fruition?
And His response was simple and convincing,
What if what happens along the way is what this was about all along?
What if the journey itself is the dream you were really longing for?
I wonder as I dream of a real-life Restlands, if He will build me into a Restland – and I will learn to draw others into His rest and abundant life in Him, one story at a time.
So here’s to a new journey. The journey of a very real kind of Restland.
And how to walk towards impossible dreams, resting in the sound of His voice.
I wonder what has your attention.