Calif. Pastor: Don't Let Setbacks, Religion Steal Your 'God-Dreams'
A California pastor who was raised in a dysfunctional, racially prejudiced family and in harsh, religious fundamentalism now leads one of the most racially diverse churches in Los Angeles. And he is also now unleashing thousands of people into the dreams God has given them to change the world.
Philip Wagner, 63, together with Holly, his wife of 32 years, have been leading Oasis Church for the past three decades and spearheads Generosity.org, an initiative to bring clean, safe drinking water to impoverished nations of the world. The Christian Post recently spoke with Wagner about his new book Unlock Your Dream: Discover the Adventure You were Created For and how God's redemptive hand has transformed his own story.
Below is the transcript of the interview which has been lightly edited for length.
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CP: Pastor Wagner, could you describe the importance and relationship of dreams and faith in Jesus Christ?
Wagner: Being a pastor in Los Angeles, people come from all over the world to LA to pursue a dream. It's the city of dreams. Even the movie that's just come out, La La Land that's popular. I think it's 100,000 people a year come in and out of LA searching for their dreams. It's not just exclusive to Hollywood or LA. I've been to many countries, in Africa, Uganda, Haiti, and everybody has a dream in their heart.
And I like to say, you don't have to have just one dream. You can have more than one. What I've noticed is that people get discouraged, people lose hope, people forget about it. And I think that we're created to have dreams. It says in Proverbs that hope deferred makes the heart sick. But a dream fulfilled is a tree of life. I wanted to encourage people to rediscover the dreams they have in their life. Maybe review it and get a better picture of what that is. A lot of it came from my own experience because of some of the experience of what I'm doing now. So it really came through [in what] I've written about in the book.
CP: In Unlock Your Dream, you write at considerable length about "God-dreams." What is the difference between a God-dream and just a dream?
Wagner: I think that God-dreams are ones that we're created to do. I like to tell people that your other dreams—I've always wanted to go on vacation here, travel there, etc.—all those are great as long as they don't lead you away from the God-dreams. The God-dreams are like the things that God has for you to do and it usually has to do with touching other people's lives, reaching other people. There are things that we can achieve in this life, but when we leave earth we're going to leave all those things behind. But the things that we're not going to leave behind are the people we've touched for the Kingdom, who we have helped. In a way, it is who we have helped reach their dreams. So looking around and seeing the needs and we start to recognize that "Hey, there's something that I can contribute here." I think when we help others reach their dreams it changes us. In the book I say that "some people follow their dreams only to discover that other kind of dream that involves reaching beyond themselves that to change the world for others."
CP: If you had to describe the heartbeat of Unlock Your Dream, what would it be?
Wagner: To continue to reach for the God-dreams to move toward them and not give up. We face setbacks. We tend to think that if we're on track with God's will it's going to be easier. And it's not necessarily. I kind of relate it to marriage. You're in love, you're excited and you get married. And then, you have problems. You fight, you disagree, struggle. And so many people think "Well, I married the wrong person." You're probably just normal. Because everybody has to work for it and grow. It doesn't mean that you married the wrong person. It means God has something for you as a couple to grow it. So the point of the book, which is to not to put their dreams on lockdown, not let other people tell you it's too late. But if it's God's dream for your life then keep going, keep moving.
CP: It seems to me that unfortunately in some churches, religion has a way of quashing people's dreams. Can you speak to the importance of shedding religious, behavior-controlling mindsets in order to unlock dreams?
Wagner: Many great things that God has done on earth has been somebody who is doing something a little different or it's a fresh perspective. So I think the religious part of it is that we try to set limitations and set what's right and what's wrong for other people. Of course, we have to follow scriptural guidelines but it's God's guidelines, not ours. When I was a kid I was brought up in a very fundamentalist home. Our whole thing was "well, everybody else was wrong." It's not life-giving. So then whether you're overcoming religious limitations or shame from your parents or families or failures, all those things that steal the dreams from our lives.
Just think of the apostle Paul. Somebody could go "Well, Jesus could save you but he could never use you to build the church because look what you've done in your life. But that's not how God see things. He has a way of qualifying the disqualified. And that's what Christianity is about.
One of the things I like to say is that the extraordinary is hidden in the ordinary. A lot of people don't do things because they're looking for that big thing. Maybe that happens for some people. Mostly for me it has been being faithful with a little ordinary thing and that's what opened the door. And that's what led me to the next thing. And the purpose of God kind of unfolds. He doesn't give us that "Here's 5 things You're Going To Do In Your Life." It kind of gets revealed to us. And the pain from our past can serve a purpose, rather than it being a limitation and a negative thing. God has a way of using our problems and pains to bring a [redemptive] message.
For more on Philip Wagner and Oasis Church, click here.
