Jun 12, 2017

November 30, 2011 Can God Speak Through a Dream?

Everlasting Father, thank You for the peace I felt during my vacation. Your plans for peace in our family truly surpassed anything I could have imagined.  For the past five days, I have basked in the peace that lingered upon my return to our little apartment.
Yet, today, my heart is troubled. I had a dream last night, a distressing dream that left me feeling unsettled. I can still picture the events quite vividly and in color. I wonder, “Why has this particular dream convicted my heart so? What might You be saying to me?”
In this dream, I was standing on the front end of a long ocean pier while watching ocean waves roll under foot. I noticed, to my side stood a teenager from my church congregation. Next to him, were a few strangers.
Within minutes of watching waves crash against the shore and deep in conversation, I noticed that the portion of the pier we stood on had detached from the rest of the pier and we had begun to drift. In my dream, somehow I still felt at peace, as though we were simply bobbing up and down on the porch of a houseboat. Perhaps that’s why the young man and I continued our conversation as though nothing was amiss.
Then, all of a sudden the waves increased in size. A tall and overbearing wave crashed violently against the front of the pier. Its force tossed a woman in our company into the water. I helplessly watched as her long black hair sank in the water below. She could hardly keep her head above water as she reached one arm out of the water to signal for help. I hesitated in assisting her. Instead, I remained still while my heart filled with worry.
Instantly, several men wearing long off-white linen robes with maroon and white striped sashes over their heads and across their shoulders floated across the water to where I stood. The men stood in a long row, spanning out to the right of the front of the pier. I could only make out the face of the one man who had long, white hair and a white beard and who stood directly in front of me. He had positioned himself between me and the oncoming, enormous wave. I stood still, trying to discern the image before my eyes. 
The young man immediately to my left grabbed my hand and screamed with delight, "Oh my gosh, do you know who that is? Do you know who that is?" From his reaction and the expression on his face, I was certain that the person standing directly in front of me was Abraham from the Bible.
There was silence. Without consideration, I stretched out my right hand and laid it on the man’s left shoulder. Immediately, the man turned around, pointed his long finger directly at my heart and said in an unforgettable tone, "Inch by inch our Souls!" Instantly, fear came upon me and trembling, which shook me to my core.
My heart panted. Fearfulness filled me. By now, I knew the surest way to know Your Will is to hear You speak to me directly from the Holy Scriptures. So, I jumped out of bed and grasped hold of my Bible. I opened my Bible as usual by taking hold of the spine and allowing the pages to settle. Gradually, the pages landed on Matthew 6:27.  I began to read, "Which of you by worrying can add one cubit to his stature?" (NKJV).
“Oh LORD, could You be reminding me not to worry about life’s quick and violent storms? If so, please LORD, prepare my heart for what may come so that I may do Your will and bring You glory. Through Jesus, I pray. Amen.”
Later On   
            Today, I shared my dream with a local priest. If I had to guess, I’d say the elderly man was in his late 80’s. So, I figured he had to have been walking with you for awhile. As I shared the details of my dream, the man listened quite intently. Then, he humbly said, “In every journey with the LORD, there’s joy.” A simple reminder. However, I don’t think I truly heard the message the man was conveying. Shaking my head from side to side as I walked away, I prayed, “Please LORD, help me understand what You are trying to say to my heart.”
Then, just after tucking Travis into bed, I decided to watch a little television. Right away, I turned to my favorite Christian broadcasting station. A movie was portraying the Gospel of Matthew verse by verse. I just so happened upon the moment when in chapter six of Matthew’s Gospel, You say, “Look at the birds of the air, that they do not sow, nor reap nor gather into barns, and yet your heavenly Father feeds them. Are you not worth much more than they? And who of you by being worried can add a single hour to his life?” [1]
Finally, I began to understand. I need not worry because You will always be with me to provide for all my needs.




[1] Matthew 6:26 Matthew 6:26 (NKJV) “Look at the birds of the air, for they neither sow nor reap nor gather into barns; yet your heavenly Father feeds them. Are you not of more value than they?”

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