Chapter 2 — The Restless Dreamer

When a boy’s heroes wore helmets and hoses—and God began shaping a rescuer of a different kind.

I’ve always been a dreamer. From the time I could hold a crayon, everything I drew had sirens, ladders, and big red trucks. I wanted to be a firefighter—the whole nine yards—hat, suit, boots, and the flashing lights. I couldn’t stop talking about it. Mom would laugh and say, “Keep dreaming, son. That’s how big things start.” Dad would grin from across the table and add, “Just remember, heroes are made one day at a time.”

As I got older, that dream stretched and shifted. Sometimes I thought maybe I’d be a doctor instead—still rescuing people, just in a different way. Whatever form it took, I wanted to help. I wanted to save.

But somewhere between childhood and adulthood, the world’s voice grew louder than theirs. People started saying my dreams were too big. “Tone it down, Nathan. Be realistic.” So, for a while, I tried. I tucked the dreams away and worked hard to fit the mold others thought I should fill. Yet deep down, I knew I was made for something more.

Then one Sunday I heard a message on the life of Joseph, and it changed everything. Joseph, too, was a dreamer—mocked, misunderstood, even betrayed for the very visions God had given him. But through it all, God’s purpose never failed.

That sermon planted something new in me: the realization that dreaming is not foolishness—it’s faith. Dreaming is a gift from God Himself, and like every gift, it carries weight. Dreamers are how God writes His plans into the world. And sometimes, those dreams require being misunderstood for a season so that they can bear fruit in His timing.

Years later, I would learn firsthand that God never wastes a dream. He just redefines it. I may not have become a firefighter or a doctor in the world’s sense—but He turned my life into His version of rescuing.

The Call — Age Eleven

I still remember the first time I felt that pull inside me—the quiet whisper of calling. I was eleven, perched on the worn tractor seat as the sun stretched wide across the fields. The hum of the engine was steady, the soil dark and rich beneath the tires. I’d spend hours plowing, picking up rocks, harvesting grain—talking to God, singing old hymns, dreaming about the future.

Those were my first sermons, my first conversations with Heaven. That old tractor cab became a chapel on wheels.

Even then, I didn’t fully understand what God was shaping in me. I just knew He was near. Somewhere between the dirt rows and the songs, I learned that dreaming wasn’t just imagination—it was communion.

Life Between the Rows

Farm life gave me room to grow both roots and wonder. When the fieldwork paused, I helped my brother with carpentry or worked beside a general contractor, learning to build homes from the ground up.

Some days, Dad and I disappeared down by the creek—building treehouses, floating sticks like tiny ships, or sitting barefoot with the water running cool between our toes.

And then there were the raspberry-picking days—long, hot afternoons along the old railroad tracks. We’d come home scratched, sweaty, and triumphant, only to spend the night itching from those awful chiggers. Everyone else groaned and complained; I laughed until I cried. Somehow, knowing we were all suffering together made it hilarious.

Same with the skunks. Whenever we’d drive past a freshly sprayed one, the whole truck would erupt in “Uuugh!”—and there I’d be, doubled over in the back seat, laughing so hard I couldn’t breathe. That odd sense of humor stuck with me. Even now, it helps me face pain with a lighter heart.

Laughter doesn’t erase hardship—but it redeems it. It turns discomfort into memory, pain into story, and story into joy.

God’s Version of Rescuing

Looking back, I see now that the dream of firefighting and medicine was never wasted. God didn’t cancel it—He fulfilled it differently.

Through every trial, every scar, and every moment of rebuilding, He’s used my hands and my heart to help restore what’s been hurt—sometimes through work, sometimes through ministry, sometimes through simple kindness.

He took the boy who wanted to save lives and turned him into a man who helps souls find rest. That’s God’s version of rescuing.

“And Joseph said unto them, Do not interpretations belong to God? Tell me your dreams, I pray you.” — Genesis 40:8

So I keep dreaming. Not of firetrucks or stethoscopes anymore, but of healing places, redeemed land, and a community where faith runs as deep as the roots of the oaks that now bear His name. And in every dream, I still see that boy on the tractor—sun on his face, laughter in his chest, and Heaven whispering, “Keep dreaming, son.”