DREAMS

“And it shall come to pass in the last days, saith God,
I will pour out of my Spirit upon all flesh:
and your sons and your daughters shall prophesy,
and your young men shall see visions,
and your old men shall dream dreams:” (Acts 2:17)

Dreams.

Your old men shall dream dreams.

I will be 55 on Saturday. Maybe it’s a sign that I’m getting to be an “old man” because I tend to dream A LOT when I sleep!

I learned recently that “dream interpretation” is the latest craze in the “cutting edge hyper-Charismatic” churches. I know some of you will not understand what I’m talking about, but in Christian circles, and then in evangelical circles, and finally in Charismatic circles there’s always an “in church” that “everybody” is going to, or an “in thing” that everybody is doing. In the 1990s, one of the “in things” was “holy laughter”. At a number of “cutting edge hyper-Charismatic” churches in the 1990s, scores of people in the congregation would be ERUPTING with laughter during the service...even during Holy Communion or the pastor’s sermon. This was seen as a very good thing...that they were opening up to the Holy Spirit and enjoying His presence. I went to one of those services one time and I spent half of it laughing my head off. I later told my wife, “I don’t think I was laughing in the Spirit...it all just struck me so funny I couldn’t stop laughing!” (In fact, I DO think the Holy Spirit CAN move upon you in a supernatural way and give you SUCH joy that you WILL laugh. However, I would not expect that to happen to scores of people simultaneously, and I certainly would NOT expect that during a sermon or an observance of Holy Communion.) At other times, there have been such behaviors as people howling like wolves, crawling around like animals, etc. supposedly being “in the Spirit”. (I’ve got a video which shows such behavior going on at a Boston area church in the 1990s.) God is a God of order. And while SOMETIMES God can move in what we’d consider unconventional ways, I DON’T believe He promotes chaos and foolishness.

Well, back to the topic of “dreams”. Yes, “dream interpretation” is the latest craze in cutting edge hyper-Charismatic churches. On the one hand, God CAN and DOES definitely give Christians dreams. We find clear examples of that in both the Old and New Testaments. Joseph in the Old Testament was given dreams and was given the ability to interpret dreams. In the New Testament, another Joseph was told in a dream not to be afraid to marry Mary and that she was indeed supernaturally pregnant...a virgin who would give birth. I’ve had a handful of dreams in my life which were supernatural, and TWO of them were absolutely from God. These dreams were VIVID. They were in color and as REAL as REAL LIFE! They’re very personal to me and I’m not going to share them at this point.

On the other hand, I have dreams all the time. Do I believe they’re all from God? Maybe some of my brothers and sisters in Christ would disagree with me, but I don’t. My old friend D.C.M. used to say that most of our dreams came from “eating too much pizza” and he’s probably right. Dreams ARE interesting, however. It’s AMAZING the stuff our brains will put together...better than anything Hollywood dishes up!

I remember a dream my mother spoke of having. She was not a particularly big Celtics fan, but she dreamed she was at Boston Garden and Bob Cousey was showing her all around. Why would she dream that? Over the weekend, my son dreamed he survived a nuclear holocaust. Why would he dream that? I worked at Draper Mills in Canton when I was in my late teens and early twenties. These were awful factory jobs. Amazingly, sometimes I will dream I’m back working at Draper’s! In fact, when I was working there, one of the few Christian guys I knew that worked there (his name was “Buster”! No kidding!) said he once dreamed he worked at Draper’s all night, then he had to get up and go to work again. He said he felt like he worked a double shift! Saturday night, I had a whole series of dreams. It was like I had watched a bunch of T.V. shows. I also felt like I needed to go back to bed after I woke up! In one dream I had gone to Antarctica. I’ve never dreamed that before! I was at an American settlement that looked like a small town. There were roads and telephone poles and such. I was driving around. I turned down a street. The snow was piled so high, I had to turn the car around. I asked someone what season it was there and he said, “It’s October but this is like April in this hemisphere.” He explained that it was one of the more pleasant months there. On Sunday, I told my wife about this dream and Mary Ann told me that Antarctica is actually a desert, and that it snows very little there. (Of course there are huge ice shelves, etc.) In another dream, a family from our church in Framingham was going to spend Thanksgiving with my daughter Amy in Springfield, Missouri. I was telling them to be sure to visit the Bass Pro Shop and other things to do there. I had another dream in which I lost an important letter. I was trying and trying to find it. I then realized I’d mailed it, but I forgot to make a number of corrections to it and it was annoying that I put it in the mail too soon. I think I had another dream or two, but I’ve forgotten them now.

I wonder what the modern “dream interpretation” people would say about my dreams?! I think my friend D.C. M. would say I ate too much pizza, but I haven’t had pizza for over a week! I do think they were just nonsense dreams! I’m just curious why my brain put those plots together.

Anyway, I DO want to be in tune with God. I never want to stop being open to visions and dreams FROM HIM and I never want to stop doing HIS will!