Enlarging Your Capacity

Lucy woke out of the deepest sleep you can imagine, with the feeling that the voice she liked best in the world had been calling her name. 

-C.S. Lewis, Prince Caspian

We all have those dreams etched deep within our hearts. They come out at night and speak to us about what could be, what might be. We all long for our dreams to become our reality but too often, we stop and look at our current lives- the messy house, the backed-up laundry, the office cubicle- and we push aside the longings that bring our souls to ache. "Hope deferred makes the heart sick..." (Ps. 13:12) and we can only take so much deferring until we decide that the ache isn't worth it anymore. This isn't growing up... this is a tragedy. 

The only way we will ever grow our capacity is to take the next step, and then the next. Faith in God is the only thing that will grow us into maturity and "faith without works is dead" (James 2:17). Your belief and trust in God has to become greater than the fear that is holding you back. Only then will you find him already there waiting for you, and ready to fill you with more of himself. 

"Aslan," said Lucy, "you're bigger."

"That is because you are older, little one." answered he. 

"Not because you are?" 

"I am not. But every year you grow, you will find me bigger." 

-C.S. Lewis, Prince Caspian

The capacity you will need to fulfill the dreams in your heart is not the same capacity you start out with. But with each step of faith, each time you step out onto the ice (which is much scarier than it looks!) the capacity within you enlarges until one day, your doing things that you never even imagined before. He meets us right where we're at but he doesn't intend on leaving us there. He is whispering to our hearts through the dreams he placed there long ago. He is calling us out onto the ice where the results are uncertain, the risk is high, and the chase is wild. 

"After all," said Mr. Tumnus, "he's not a very tame lion..." 

C.S. Lewis, The Lion, the Witch and the Wardrobe