CONQUERING THROUGH HOPE

When I was a boy, I wanted to be Superman.  I was inspired by the TV show that came on our old black and white Motorola each weekday afternoon that began: “Faster than a speeding bullet; more powerful than a locomotive; able to leap tall buildings at a single bound.  Look—up in the sky!  It’s a bird; it’s a plane; no, it’s Superman!”  I would tie a towel around my neck for a cape, extend my arms and jump off the porch, “flying” around the yard for a while until I encountered kryptonite—Mom’s kryptonite!  She would say, “Get in here and clean up your room right now!”  Then I became Clark Kent, mild mannered reporter for the Daily Planet, took off my cape and put on my glasses—robbed of my super powers!

Superman wasn’t the only afternoon show to grab me.  Another one came on around suppertime—the Lone Ranger.  It would hear the William Tell Overture and I was captivated by it immediately.  So, that evening I might be the Lone Ranger, and would cut out a cardboard mask, grab my cap pistol, and mount a rocking horse with, “Hi, ho Silver—away!”  I’d chase outlaws until time for bed—and was quite successful at it.

Our local TV affiliate would periodically run the old Johnny Weissmuller Tarzan movies.  If I watched one, I whipped off the shirt and shoes, beat my chest and did my best Tarzan yell as I swung from the swing set.  It was a jungle call that surely struck fear into all the lions in our neighborhood—or, at least, the elderly lady next door!

Youth is a time for dreams—a time when hope fills our hearts. 

That was true of a young man named Joseph.

Now Jacob dwelt in the land where his father was a stranger, in the land of Canaan.  ‎This is the history of Jacob. Joseph, being seventeen years old, was feeding the flock with his brothers. And the lad was with the sons of Bilhah and the sons of Zilpah, his father’s wives; and Joseph brought a bad report of them to his father.  ‎Now Israel loved Joseph more than all his children, because he was the son of his old age. Also he made him a tunic 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 peaceably to him.  ‎Now Joseph had a dream, and he told it to his brothers; and they hated him even more.  ‎So he said to them, “Please hear this dream which I have dreamed: There we were, binding sheaves in the field. Then behold, my sheaf arose and also stood upright; and indeed your sheaves stood all around and bowed down to my sheaf.”  And his brothers said to him, “Shall you indeed reign over us? Or shall you indeed have dominion over us?” So they hated him even more for his dreams and for his words.  Then he dreamed still another dream and told it to his brothers, and said, “Look, I have dreamed another dream. And this time, the sun, the moon, and the eleven stars bowed down to me.”  So he told it to his father and his brothers; and his father rebuked him and said to him, “What is this dream that you have dreamed? Shall your mother and I and your brothers indeed come to bow down to the earth before you?”  ‎And his brothers envied him, but his father kept the matter in mind. (Genesis 37:1-11)

But this was no childish fantasy inspired by a television show; it was a God-given dream implanted in his heart.

Do you have one?  What are you doing about it?  God has a purpose for your life—and it’s time to find out what it is and fulfill it—to take the first step, or the next step—even perhaps recover from a misstep.