There’s so much more than what you know.

Through the ache of unanswered questions and the burden of unmet longings, can you promise me you’ll always remember that there’s so much more than what you know?

Undiscovered dreams, unimagined victories, and unchartered territories are waiting to be yours, but you can’t get there any faster than I can get to summer. You’ve just got to let it.

Foundations shake when the things we hold so tightly are ripped from our clenched fists. White knuckles gripped so tight they bleed as the dry winter winds steal the moisture and make them crack.

Just let go.

When you don’t get the job or you can’t get the girl. When your GPA isn’t high enough or you fail that exam or you have no idea what you want to be when you “grow up.” You’re not even sure you want to grow up. When you expect life to be one thing and it turns out to be another.

There’s so much more than what you know.

But all you know right now is that you wanted it to be one thing, and it’s not. You thought that it would go one way, and it went another. You hoped that you would be there, but you’re here. It’s enough to siphon the whimsy right out of your soul and leave you stranded on the highway to Look At Me Now. But can I tell you something?

There’s so much more than what you know.

Though you can’t always see how, it will eventually be better. ‘Cause Yahweh God doesn’t just make the best of what you’ve got right now, He looks into the caverns of your wildest dreams and paints it upon the canvas of your tomorrow.

There’s this teeny tiny little speck of eternity in which you live, and an even tinier speck in which you can currently see. We’ve got the past + we’ve got right now. And everything else is mystery. Next year? Next month? Next week? Tomorrow?

It’s unknown. And we have to let it be.

Because the bottom-line? It’s not ours to know. It’s just not. It never will be, and it never should be. Because us? Me and you? We’re tiny, tiny parts of a big, big story. A story with chapters that you will one day live + love. But if you knew them now? Oh, dear brother.

If you knew them now, you would never take another step.

You would read a paragraph of Chapter 27 and say, “Me? No way. No how. I can’t. I won’t.” It would make you want to quit. It would make you squirm. It would make you doubt. More than anything? It would make you stop thinking about right now.

And right now is just too important.

But if you just live it? Oh, darling. If you just take it one little day at a time? You’ll walk into Chapter 27 with a full heart + bright eyes. You’ll have confidence you never would have believed in Chapter 14. But after Chapter 18? You’ll feel like you can conquer the world. Chapter 25? You’ll be the kind of person you only dreamed you could be. Chapter 30 will be wild + free and you’ll love every.single.second, but you need the beginning to get there. You need what you don’t yet know.

I believe in a King who knows. I believe in a King that watches you from above and is your biggest fan. And He sees you start Chapter 12, after Chapter 11 nearly took it all out of you, and He says, “Hold on! There’s so much more than what you know.” I believe in a King who wants the dreams + victories + joys of Chapter 30 for you more than you could ever want it for yourself.

I believe that Hope is a promise and I’m gonna sing it loud.

This my anthem, all my days:

a song of hope, a heart of praise.

And baby, you’ve got to get up.

Fear of who you are, or who you want to be. Fear that you’re not good enough for the job, or pretty enough for the boy, or worthy enough to be fought for.

We have reduced our worth to employment and relationship statuses, and GPAs. We have warped our understanding of reality to succumb to believing that if we aren’t “chosen” then we must be broken.

Instead of knowing that no decision slips past the sovereignty of the Almighty, we wonder what we’ve done wrong. We forget that our worth is not measured by who chooses us here, but in the One who chose us at the cross. The One who promised to make our paths straight. The One who works good out of evil.

The One who is ever making all things new.

Stop asking the wrong questions. Recognize that you are not broken, and your value rests not in avoiding closed doors, but in where you look when you’re waiting in that hallway. You can believe that Jesus hasn’t forgotten or misplaced the glory He will exemplify through your life. But you have to let it look different than your plans. It will be better than good, believe it.

Darling soul, you have to believe there is more.

You have to know that there is a King who is fighting for your purpose. There is a Creator who created you to create and the longer you lay in bed with the covers pulled over you, the longer it takes for His glory to shine through your summer lovin’ smile and wide eyes.

And that’s the thing. This, the glitz + glam + glory of a life fully lived, was never about us. It’s about a King that came to rescue + redeem and we get to be a part of the story. We get to be rescuers + redeemers but we can’t do it in this prison of fear. We just can’t, baby.

So get up. Get out of that cell and run toward freedom. The locks on that iron door were broken ages ago, and you’re only one step away from the clear blue sky.

The Sojourn.

Month: February 2014

There’s So Much More Than What You Know.