DREAM MAKER - FOR LOVERS ONLY

A DREAM IN PROCESS?

At the conclusion of our three day retreat, the participants repeatedly expressed their hope that we would enable continuation of the loving community experience for them, with get-togethers and communication.

It is my desire that couples begin to lead the retreat experience for other couples. This one was by myself (divorced for 26 years), a single woman, a widow, a woman whose husband allowed her to help (he also attended, but admits he runs away from these things usually), and a young couple married six weeks ago.

We plan to have another within a year. We will test their commitment to their enthusiasm with a gathering next month when I pass through Jakarta on my way back to Surabaya from Hawaii, and possibly with monthly gatherings thereafter.

The words 'loving community' came entirely from them, but it has been my unspoken desire to create such a community. The idea is that participants will continue to meet for refreshement on 'dates' perhaps monthly, participate in planning, praying for, recruiting participants, and leading the future retreats. For Lovers Only will become a loving community within the community of churches in Indonesia. First for pastors, then maybe specialty groups like businessmen.

Well, it is just the bud of a dream, but if it is God's dream, then it will happen. We will see.

--HWK--

GREAT ANTICIPATION

Get ready for a flurry of photos and stories. News has been sparse the last few weeks, but that is about to change!

I am looking forward with great anticipation to the next two months. This weekend I spend in a mountain retreat with my group of disciples. This keeps me young, as they are all under 30, though a couple of the gals are rapidly approaching that magical age (it seems to be ‘old maid’ age here in Indonesia, as it seemed to be when I was young in America) and prayer requests include a life partner. The photo in Walking with Jesus blog is from the area. Lots of mountain trails, so if it’s not raining, we will be hiking.

The next weekend I preach in the morning Sunday and in the afternoon am on the plane for Bandung, a city about three or four hours out of Jakarta in the mountains. There, I have three days teaching six hours a day on the Holy Spirit to students in a School of Missions. This is my favorite topic, and will be the fifth (I think) year I have taught. Every time something different, but something spectacular happens with the students. Last year, when I started teaching on the final day, the Holy Spirit himself showed up and people started falling out of their seats, some laughing, rolling around on the floor (now I know why they were called ‘holy rollers’ when I was young), others sitting or laying on the floor quietly, and all kinds of in between. There were dancers, there were swimmers . . . you need to have been there to understand, I think.

After that is Vertical Leap Seminar, a two-day event with about 70 key personnel of a furniture factory. I am in charge of the prayer team for the event. We are intercessors before, during, and after, and during the event we also pray for the participants individually. I would like to be a presenting Coach (title for leaders of this seminar imported from America see www.bossthemovement.com) but it’s all in Indonesian, fast-moving and I am not ready with my Indonesian language skills.

Then I head for Jakarta where I take a group of 10 pastors and their wives on a retreat. Theme is ‘For Lovers Only.’ These are pastors from smaller, poorer churches, and I hope to encourage and refresh them.
Directly from Jakarta without going home to repack, I head for Honolulu and then Las Vegas, where Maile awaits (with other grandparents, cousins and such also in line for an audience).

Back here a week, then off to the Philippines.

DREAM MAKER - PEOPLE OF PROMISE

A Dream Maker enables dreams to be realized. One function of that is for people to realize that they have dreams, and to realize what those dreams are. The Bible makes many statements and promises about and for people. The People of Promise seminars (there are three: people who keep the promises they make, people who live in the promises for believers in the Bible, and people who live by the promise of the future within them) are designed to help people begin to live the abundant life the Bible promises.

Ecclesiastes 3:11 says He has made everything beautiful in its time. He has also set eternity in the hearts of men; yet they cannot fathom what God has done from beginning(NIV). The first part is familiar to many, and was for me until last year, when in preparation for a People of Promise Seminar, I happened to notice the second part. Eternity, that is, the vision or dreams of the future are placed in the hearts of men. The third and last part explains that peo;le don't realize it. Ephesians 3:9 and to make plain to everyone the administration of this mystery, which for ages past was kept hidden in God, who created all things.

This tells me that some mysteries that once were not fathomable we can now fathom, and as a Dream Maker I have discovered that when a person connects with the living God, Jesus Christ, Jesus reveals in the heart that part of eternity which is intended for the person. That is, God's plan for the person's life is revealed. This is often the dream in the heart which has gone unrealized, the dream that the Dream Maker enables to be realized.

Dare To Dream

Two years ago, I stayed in Indonesia for Christmas and New Year's, unusual for me. I was invited to be with a church leader retreat in the mountains over New Year's eve, and the next evening with the extended family (some 60 souls) retreat. For these and other New Year's events, I prepared a 30 minute video on the life of Joseph, the one sold into slavery by his brothers. The point was that Joseph's great dream seemed impossible for most of his life, but at the end, he was indeed elevated to be ruler over his brothers, mother/father, and indeed the rest of the known world!

I encouraged each group, with different scriptures, stories, and examples appropriate to each group, all based upon the lessons to be learned in the story of Joseph. Of course, the day after Christmas just before was the great tsunami that changed thousands of lives forever, and Indonesia was perhaps the nation most affected, though not most reported due to difficulty in getting people and information in and out of the area.

This was one of the earlier times I was aware of my work as Dream Maker - one who plants dreams, encourages dreams, and enables people to realize their dreams!

Today, as you approach the New Year, I encourage you not to just make resolutions, but to dare to let God plant a dream into your life, and let that dream be a guide post to deciding for adventure into unknown and (for you) uncharted territory. For a truly worthwhile dream will take you into these things.

Write the dream down. Many of my dreams, conceived in the New Year, written in my journal, were forgotten until then end of year review came. I often read these forgotten dreams, and realize that they have become reality over the year, just because I had dreamed them. I would be unaware of the power of dreams if I had not written them, and I would not have realized that a dream came true. A significant part of Dream Making is consciousness of the dream, though we may drift in and out of that counsciousness. Writing the dream helps to plant it more firmly, and will often be a reminder later of how dreams do become reality!

DREAM MAKER - MY VISION

For the Very Rich Only

Investment Opportunity: invest in the lives of the future

Investing wealth from rich into poor. For the rich to invest, not just give, or transfer wealth to the poor, a mentality of abundance rather than a mentality of poverty is required, and with it the power to gain wealth.
Deut 8:18 But thou shalt remember the LORD thy God: for it is he that giveth thee power to get wealth, that he may establish his covenant which he sware unto thy fathers, as it is this day.

The key is in education and paradigm
Example: Some think they are too poor to make an investment like this, they do not have enough.They do not know that if they consume what they have, it cannot work for them to produce more. They do not know that if they do not plant, there will be no harvest, and that if they do plant, eventually they will reap a harvest.

The principle of sowing and reaping is not known to them. Education can change this. Or, perhaps they know the principle but their experience locks them into a paradigm that prevents them from sowing (or investing), so they will never reap a harvest.

Education can help change this paradigm to enable them to sow rather than just consume.

When we say "For the Very Rich Only' we are not talking about material substance, but about a mentality.

Poverty Paradigm: says I do not, will not, have enough to invest.

Prosperity Paradigm: says I can not afford not to invest. I have more than enough, will have more and need not fear lack.
This is regardless of material possessions at the time. A person with Prosperity Paradigm does not fear starvation nor deprivation, for he has learned, as did the Apostle Paul 'I know both how to be abased, and I know how to abound: every where and in all things I am instructed both to be full and to be hungry, both to abound and to suffer need.' Phil 4:12 (also note verse 13 just after this)!

DREAM MAKER - BASICS

Dream Maker: Enabling Realization of DreamsSome basic aspects to the work of a Dream Maker:

1. To help people realize (become aware of) dreams that lie dormant inside of them. Many people have dreams lying dormant inside, but for a variety of reasons are unaware of these dreams. Maybe they have been told they are worthless and will never accomplish anything, and they believed it. Maybe they are afraid to fail, so afraid to dream. Maybe they think dreams are just fiction movies we see inside our brains. Maybe they . . . and on and on, reasons why people do not get in touch with dreams God has planted inside. Dreams intended by God to become reality.

2. To help people realize (become aware of) dreams that they want to adopt as their own. Martin Luther King said "I have a dream" and through these words, people today are still picking up this same dream, planted by the words of a man long since passed away. So a Dream Maker speaks dreams into people, sometimes consciously (preferably) but sometimes without being aware of it. In Charismatic and Pentecostal circles some call this speaking prophetically into a person.

3. To help people realize (have dream become reality) their dreams. In my case, I focus on education. MY VISION is a separate posting, but education in a variety of ways.

a. Education about who they are in Christ: Philippians 4:13 - I can do all things through Christ who strengthens me! WALKING WITH JESUS Seminars are one vehicle for this.

b. Through scholarships to enable to attend school those who otherwise cannot. I have a scholarship program in the Philippines, and am beginning one in Indonesia. These are for high school and college.

DREAM MAKER - THE PROGRAM

Two basic vehicles: scholarships and retreat seminars. Speaking engagement and one-day workshops also provide opportunity, though they are less effective.

I started in the Philippines with scholarships for poor for high school and College candidates, and retreat seminars which provide free for participants a three or four day experience, including two (or three) nights lodging, all meals and transportation.
Will continue on limited basis in the Philippines. Now will be developed in Indonesia on continuing basis.

Seminars for pastors, pastors/wives, church leaders, and for businesspeople have been successfully conducted in the U.S., Philippines, Indonesia, and Vietnam, and together with Barnabas Ministries in Europe and Africa as well as the Philippines.

Formerly funded mostly personally, now I will open the opportunity to share in this investment.