The Future Inside You
The Future Inside You
Let’s face it: The whole world can feel a little inhospitable at times. But that’s okay—we can create the conditions for good and great things to happen. Any time. Any place.
Creativity allows us to create things that are not yet.
Out of the mind of a human being can come an idea that, when materialized, brings an entirely new reality into existence.
Philosopher and theologian Dallas Willard wrote about this kinship between idea and actuality in The Divine Conspiracy. Willard wrote that if you are seated in a room, probably everything you see owes its existence to the ideas of one or more persons.1
For centuries, brilliant minds—like Leonardo da Vinci—imagined the possibilities of human flight. Then, in 1903, the Wright Brothers created a powered flying machine and actually flew it in controlled flight. And when they did, a plethora of new realities began to come into being.
Today, these include an aviation industry in the United States that carries more than six million passengers a year, supports approximately fifteen thousand airports, and employs hundreds of thousands of people. We have entire economies that revolve around the airline industry. These expanding worlds were birthed from an idea.
“When He created us in His image, God instilled in our beings
the open-ended opportunity to give birth to new futures.”
A friend of mine, an African American criminal defense attorney, came to me with an idea. He conveyed his desire to start a program designed specifically for at-risk young black men. Over the course of his career, my friend noticed an alarming growth of clientele between the ages of fifteen and eighteen. Not only did he find more and more teenagers entrenched in the criminal justice system, but their crimes were becoming exponentially more severe.
This attorney proposed a program of mentoring and roundtable discussions between troubled young men and a panel of strong leaders in the community, such as police officers, entrepreneurs, judges, and educators. He hoped to target these young people by exploring and offering them positive alternatives for a better future.
Instead of being another statistic that gets lost in society, each of these young men will be able to recognize a new and better life. Instead of going to jail, a young man will be going to college, starting a business, and influencing the lives of future employees. Instead of overdosing on heroin, a young man will get married, start a family, and create a better life for his children—children who will never be born unless their father’s life is saved now.
All these futures exponentially impact thousands more futures. My friend has in him the futures of potentially thousands of people.
We are all called to work in the “futures” business! We must understand the implications of this truth—each and every one of us has a multiplicity of futures inside us. Futures that will not occur unless we create them. Futures for which we are accountable.
My friend believes that his idea is inspired by God. But he has a choice. He can opt whether or not to bring this into reality.
It’s this simple: it can and will come to pass if he cooperates with God in its creation. But if he refuses, those futures will be aborted.
There are so many things inside us. We often believe the only way they’ll get out is by watching God wave a magic wand to make things happen. God created human beings not as thoughtless robots but as partners with Him in continued creation.
“Take a moment. Reflect on your participation in God’s creative activity.
Look down the road thirty, forty, or fifty years. What futures exist because of you?”
Rembrandt could have decided whether or not to paint. Bach could have decided whether or not to write and play music. Do you have a book in your that needs to be written? Do you have a philanthropic idea that you can’t keep inside anymore? Do you have a ministry you just must give birth to? What is inside you, shouting to get into reality? We all have the capacity to determine futures.
Ludwig van Beethoven understood the call to birth his internal ideas into the artistic realities that made him a musical icon. In 1802, when he was thirty-one years old, Beethoven journaled thoughts now referred to as the Heiligenstadt Testament. He was experiencing the onset of deafness, which grew progressively worse until he was totally unable to hear.
Beethoven wrote of his relentless struggle with depression and suicidal thoughts as a result of this calamity. In his lament, however, he concluded: “It seemed impossible to depart this world until I had brought forth all the things I felt inspired to create.”2 His music was one that caused him to live.
What are you so desperate to create that it motivates you to live?
Each person has things inside that will not exist unless he or she creates them.
Hospitality creates environments for people and dreams to flourish.
What futures are inside you at this very moment? What sort of ideas do you have brewing in your mind that can significantly contribute to the worlds of business, politics, and social reform? Drop a comment and tell us about it.
1. Dallas Willard, The Divine Conspiracy: Rediscovering Our Hidden Life in God (New York: HarperCollins, 1998), 81.
2. Paraphrased from Beethoven’s Heiligenstadt Testament, http://www.all-about-beethoven.com/heiligenstadt_test.xhtml.
Adapted from Live Ten (Thomas Nelson) and The Hospitable Leader (Baker Publishing Group) by Terry A. Smith. All rights reserved.
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