Encouraging Fresh Dreams

Wayne Cordeiro

Seasons come and go, and in this one, my goal is to encourage the potential out of people. In the book "The Dream Releasers," I remind people that every person has one ... a dream of what they can be. The potential that lies within us may yet be undeveloped, or it may lie under the rubble of past failures, but we each have a dream. As for me, there were a few people who encouraged me to live my dream: to risk, to study, to stop at nothing until what God has deposited within me becomes reality.

In this season of my life, I am spending extra time in our Bible Colleges in Hawaii and in Eugene, Oregon doing just that. Too many people take their dreams to the graveyard. Under the rectangular pieces of sod are songs yet unsung, books left unwritten and masterpiece paintings that were never painted. If I could mine the potential out of one graveyard, I'd be the richest person on the earth!

This may be a new season for you as well. Why not nudge to flight the dreams in someone's life? I am raising scholarship funds for worthy young leaders who have dreams inside them. For more information, you can email me at waynecordeiro@ebc.edu.

Author and consultant, Florence Littauer, wrote a wonderful book entitled, "Silver Boxes: The Gift of Encouragement." In it is contained a vivid story about the author's mother-in-law.

When Littauer asked her mother-in-law what she would have been if she could have done anything, she replied, "an opera singer." But her parents discouraged her by saying that studying opera was a waste of time and she could make more money in a different field.

Here is the story in the author's words:

"In Mother Littauer's last years her brilliant mind faded, her memory left her, and her ability to articulate ceased. When we went to visit her, we found her beautiful but silent. To see this woman whom we remembered as dynamic and powerful sitting silently and staring beyond us gave us an eerie feeling.

"I asked the nurse who cared for her, 'Does Mother ever talk?'

"She replied, 'Oh no, she never says a word.'

"As we discussed the tragedy of a once brilliant mind gone dead, the nurse made an interesting comment, 'It's the strangest thing. She can't talk, but every so often she sings opera.'

"The nurse, who knew nothing of mother's repressed desires, marveled at how she could stand and sing when she couldn't say a word.

"The night before Mother died, the nurse later told us, she stood by her chair after dinner and began to sing. She put on a moving performance, and the nurse clapped in approval as Mother bowed and smiled. The next morning when the nurse went in, Mother was lying with her hands folded across her chest with a smile on her face.

"Mother had talent that was never developed, a music box that was never allowed to play, a career that was never begun.

"Mother died with the music still in her."

We cannot allow this to happen with young, emerging leaders who have dreams inside them of what they can be for God. Help me help them. Any gift will help. Please email me about helping with scholarships.

Let this year be a time when we let (encourage would probably be better here than let but let is okay) the music boxes in our young leaders begin to ring!

Wayne Cordeiro
waynecordeiro@ebc.edu

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