"Now listen, you who say, 'Today or tomorrow we will go to this or that city, spend a year there, carry on business and make money.' Why, you do not even know what will happen tomorrow. What is your life? You are a mist that appears for a little while and then vanishes. Instead, you ought to say, 'If it is the Lord's will, we will live and do this or that.'" — James 4:13–15
Cultural or Biblical?
We began this message with a simple game. A phrase would flash on the screen, and the only job was to shout out one word: cultural or biblical?
It sounds easy until you try it. Because some of the sayings we repeat the most — the ones on our coffee mugs and our Facebook feeds and our graduation cards — are not as biblical as they feel. They are not always bad. But they are not always good either, and we have to be careful. When we absorb a saying from culture without testing it against the Word, it can quietly steer our lives in a direction God never set.
So before we get to the heart of this message — submit your dreams — let us run through the game, phrase by phrase.
1. Humble Yourself — Biblical
"Humble yourselves before the Lord, and he will lift you up" (James 4:10). The world says lift yourself, promote yourself, push past anyone in your way. The Bible says the opposite: bow first, and let God do the lifting. You cannot raise yourself higher than His hand.
2. You Only Live Once — Cultural
You only live once. It sounds harmless — but as a philosophy it is dangerous. Do it now. Buy it now. Try it now. You only live once. It pushes us to grab everything in this life because we assume this life is all there is.
But if you are a Christian, you do not only live once. You claim the resurrection of Jesus. You hold the faith of eternal life. "Set your minds on things above, not on earthly things" (Colossians 3:2). We were made for more than this world, and our choices here echo into forever.
3. You Are Enough — Cultural
This one fools a lot of people, because it sounds kind. You are enough. It even sounds biblical. But it is not the gospel. The gospel begins where you are enough refuses to go: with the honest truth that you are not — and that you do not have to be, because Christ is.
"My grace is sufficient for you, for my power is made perfect in weakness" (2 Corinthians 12:9). It is okay to be weak. It is okay to lower yourself, to take the place of a servant — because the Lord's power is made perfect exactly there. The cultural saying ends at you. The biblical version ends at Christ is enough.
4. Guard Your Heart — Biblical
This one is biblical — but the way the culture uses it usually is not. "Above all else, guard your heart, for everything you do flows from it" (Proverbs 4:23). The world treats "guard your heart" as a reason to shut people out and protect our feelings. But Scripture means something different: everything we do flows from the heart, so we must watch over it carefully.
When you are angry — stuck in traffic, stung by a small misunderstanding, provoked by something minor — guard your heart. Do not let one small offense flood you with anger and push the Holy Spirit out of the driver's seat. Guarding the heart means keeping watch over what governs it.
5. Believe in Yourself — Cultural
The world's creed is believe in yourself. The Bible's answer is believe in Jesus. "Believe in the Lord Jesus, and you will be saved — you and your household" (Acts 16:31). Don't just believe in what you can do; believe in what Jesus can do for you and through you. Even the verse we love — I can do all things through Christ who strengthens me — is not really about self-confidence. It is about Christ.
Follow Your Dreams — or Submit Them?
And then the last phrase: Follow your dreams. Cultural.
We say it to everyone. But the biblical version is different — and harder. We do not merely follow our dreams. We follow Jesus, we believe in Jesus, and we submit our dreams to Him.
Bro. Marc has taught us to picture our lives like a classroom: God gives tests, assignments, and big projects. Some of those projects are huge — a breakthrough at home, a transformation, a healing. And our dreams sit in that space too: to be secure, to provide, to have peace, to be loved. None of that is bad.
Dreams vs Purpose
But there is a difference between a dream and a purpose, and most of us have confused the two.
A dream is fueled by your desires. It answers the question, "What do I want to do with my life?" A purpose is assigned by God. It answers a different question entirely: "Why did God create me?"
Dreams are not bad. But a dream only finds its rest when it lines up with the purpose God assigned. The problem with the modern way of dreaming is that we pour everything into climbing a career or chasing a goal — and in the end, we fall, because we were made for more than just surviving in this world.
Here is the thing I came to see clearly: when your dreams are not aligned with your purpose, that is where the burnout begins. You can force the dream. You can chase it with everything in you. But without alignment to God's purpose, you will get tired. You will get drained. When your dreams flow from your purpose, that purpose is what sustains you, fuels you, and gives you the energy to keep going.
"Yet you, Lord, are our Father. We are the clay, you are the potter; we are all the work of your hand" (Isaiah 64:8). We are the clay. God is the designer. We are made by His design — and the clay does not get to argue with the potter about what it was made for. So instead of only asking what do I want, ask the Designer: what did You make me for?
Alignment
This is why I want to reclaim a word from the world of personal development: alignment.
In the context of our faith, alignment is the state in which your daily actions, thoughts, and behaviors directly match your core personal values and priorities. So if you are exhausted — worn out from work, from business, from chasing whatever you are chasing — it may be a sign that your daily actions are no longer aligned with what you actually value most.
If your priority is the Lord, does your calendar show it? We are handed twenty-four hours a day, seven days a week. We fill the schedule with work, school, business, friends — and then, only if something is left over, we give God the scraps. If our core values are the things Jesus taught us — the fruit of the Spirit, patience, kindness, forgiveness, love, grace — and yet we are quick to anger and slow to forgive, is there really alignment?
Jesus asked the question that exposes it all: "What good is it for someone to gain the whole world, yet forfeit their soul?" (Mark 8:36). What good is it to chase every dream, achieve every goal, and forget the most important thing — being in the presence of God? This is hard teaching. It is uncomfortable. But we have to face it, because the burnout we feel is often the sound of a life that has drifted out of alignment.
Why Do We Need to Submit Our Dreams?
So here is the question. Why submit our dreams? Why can we not just hold on to them ourselves? There are three reasons.
1. So We Do Not Get Out of Design
"Surely your goodness and love will follow me all the days of my life, and I will dwell in the house of the Lord forever" (Psalm 23:6). When we keep God first — one day at a time, ten minutes a day in His Word, daily prayer, a life given to Him — the blessings follow. You do not even have to chase them; goodness and love follow the one who walks with the Lord.
But when we sprint ahead chasing dreams, wealth, and the things we want, we get out of the design. We run so far ahead that we leave the Provider behind — and then we wonder where He went. He has not moved. We have. Submitting our dreams keeps us inside the design God drew, where His goodness can actually catch up to us.
2. So We Do Not Settle for Less
This is the one we never expect. We assume submitting our dreams means settling for less. The opposite is true.
"Now to him who is able to do immeasurably more than all we ask or imagine, according to his power that is at work within us" (Ephesians 3:20). Immeasurably. More than we ask. More than we imagine. Our prayers are often too small — we do not really believe what God can do, so we ask for crumbs. But God is able. Not yesterday, not someday — now. Whatever your dream is, when you submit it, God can multiply it beyond anything your mind could engineer. Our imagination is limited to logic; God works outside of logic. To submit your dream is not to shrink it. It is to hand it to the only One who can make it immeasurably more.
3. So We Do Not Backslide
The third reason is the most sobering. Backsliding is the slow return to the old life. When we were baptized, we were raised with Christ and proclaimed Him as Lord and Savior — but the struggle did not end there. In many ways, baptism is where the real journey begins. The flesh still calls. And if we do not submit our dreams to God, our worries multiply, our focus drifts, and slowly we slide back.
There are two dangers when we refuse to submit a dream. The first is that God may block it — because He loves us too much to let us run somewhere harmful. The second is more frightening: the enemy may grant it. The world can hand you the job, the house, the car, the lifestyle you dreamed of — just enough to pull you away from God and from your brothers and sisters. A dream answered by the wrong source is far more dangerous than a dream denied.
"My people have committed two sins: they have forsaken me, the spring of living water, and have dug their own cisterns, broken cisterns that cannot hold water" (Jeremiah 2:13). A cistern is a man-made well — and a broken one holds nothing. When we forsake the spring of living water and dig our own way instead, we end up dry. Submission keeps us at the spring.
The Bible Is a Compass, Not Google Maps
Here is a picture worth keeping. When we do not know where to go, we want the Bible to be Google Maps — to show us the whole route, every turn, with an estimated time of arrival. By this age I'll be married. By that age I'll be rich. By forty I'll have the whole life figured out. That is not how it works.
The Bible is a compass. It shows you the direction to go next — but it does not hand you the timeline. "Your word is a lamp for my feet, a light on my path" (Psalm 119:105). Not a vehicle's headlights blazing miles ahead — a lamp for the next step. The Word will faithfully show you which way to walk; it just will not give you the arrival time. So read the Bible as a compass. Ask the Lord for the next step, and trust Him for the step after that.
What James Actually Said
Now hear the passage at the heart of this message. "Now listen, you who say, 'Today or tomorrow we will go to this or that city, spend a year there, carry on business and make money'" (James 4:13). Look at the confidence buried in that sentence. We will go — he is sure he will still be alive. Spend a year — he is sure God will give him the time. Carry on business and make money — he is sure the results will be good. Next year I'll get married. Next year I'll be rich. Next year I'll buy the house. It is a life planned without ever asking the One who holds tomorrow.
"Why, you do not even know what will happen tomorrow. What is your life? You are a mist that appears for a little while and then vanishes" (James 4:14). I do not want to be morbid, but the truth is we do not know if we will see next week. We are a mist.
And Proverbs lands the same truth: "Many are the plans in a person's heart, but it is the Lord's purpose that prevails" (Proverbs 19:21). I am not against your plans. We plan here in the church all the time — planning is good. But we have to correct the direction of our plans. Too often we fill the schedule with everything else and fit God into the leftover space, when He should be the priority the whole plan is built around.
"Instead, you ought to say, 'If it is the Lord's will, we will live and do this or that'" (James 4:15). James was not just being poetic. He wrote this to believers who were being persecuted — people who genuinely did not know if they would be alive tomorrow. If the Lord wills. That one phrase is the difference between a boast and a prayer. With it, a plan becomes an act of trust.
Challenge
This week, write down the dream you have been chasing the hardest — the career, the relationship, the goal, the picture of the life you are building.
Then write four words above it: If the Lord wills.
That is submission. Not the surrender of the dream itself — the surrender of your grip on it. You are still allowed to want it. You are still allowed to work for it. You just hold it with an open hand, ready to hand it back to the One who gave you the heart to dream in the first place, and who alone can fuel you to the finish.
If God says yes, the dream becomes a calling, and immeasurably more flows out of it than you imagined. If God says no, He is sparing you a broken cistern. Either way you win, because the Designer is the One holding the clay.
So do not just follow your dreams. Submit them. Trust the compass, not the map. And say, with everything in you:
If it is the Lord's will, we will live and do this for God.
