25. THE DREAMS

“And in the second year of the reign of Nebuchadnezzar Nebuchadnezzar dreamed dreams, whereby his spirit was troubled, And his sleep brake from him.” Daniel 2:1

The face was sort of known to me, but without a name from my memory. She walked into the somewhere that I was and approached quickly to where I was seated. She smiled an unfamiliar smile, and without a word, directed a young girl out from behind her to stand before me.

“Okay, go ahead and say hello.”

“Hi.”

The word was soft, alive, and with great expression. Unpracticed, yet anxious; anticipated, but unnatural. I looked at her carefully and then up to the face with the unfamiliar smile.

“I don’t understand,” I stated honestly.

“Look at her, so tall and skinny for all of her eight years: That flowing raven hair, those penetrating green eyes, and the broad and inviting smile. Surely, you understand.”

I looked hard as my heart raced, with a deep inspection this time. She was in many ways like the woman who stood before me, though her hair was red. The confusion was choking, but the words came eventually.

“Hello darling. Can you tell me your name?”

The girl looked toward the smiling face with no name, which quickly turned down to me with a detached compassion. What a contradiction. I had no idea what was happening here. As my eyes darted from the woman to the girl, the woman disappeared from sight. The young girl followed her dutifully, smiling at me into a fading nothingness.

I looked around to see if anyone else saw the scene played out before me. I saw no one. There was no detail to where I was: a table and chair, and me – somewhere. I bowed my head into my hands and sighed deeply. My eyes remained closed. My mind was jumbled, my thoughts, on edge.

I opened my eyes and lifted my head quickly, sweating profusely, and turned on my side in the bed. Just as quickly I turned on my back, shut my eyes and softly muttered, maybe to God in my silent lack of understanding.

“She’s dead, isn’t she?” There was no answer. There never was.

The darkness turned to light and the day went on like all the days before. I stayed in the darkness, however. Each foot went through the motions carrying me to where I was expected – but not my thoughts: they were left in the somewhere of a sensation of drowning. They needed rescuing. But how? To whom could I turn? Who would believe me now, or understand? The prescribed pills had deadened reality for a time, as would a vacation, but I always came back. And none the better for it. I needed something else. One can’t stay on vacation all the time. The clergy that I went to hadn’t helped – they denied that I had a problem. They claimed that they weren’t in the ministry to deal with questions or dreams. My questions or dreams, anyway. Whatever I was going through was someone else’s fault, or it was just plain made up in my head because of those religious people who said so. But, wasn’t it the clergy who sent me to the pill man anyway?

Ah, another day gone. Did I do my job today? I couldn’t say, for I was there and not there, at the same time. Light was turning back to the darkness where I lived and met the dreams each night. They weren’t all the same. Perhaps tonight I would sleep and wouldn’t dream, wouldn’t sweat nor fear. I wouldn’t drown after all. Perhaps tonight I would get an answer to my question.

I knew better.

The story is one that haunts many people before salvation. It is subtly, but openly taught in most public places where people can be influenced. It is a hopeless godlessness. Despair. Our present generation is steeped in it. From politicians to gangs, and everything in between, we see this evil move afoot.

Ephesians 2:12, sums it up this way-

“That at that time ye were without Christ, being aliens from the commonwealth of Israel , and strangers from the covenants of promise, having no hope , and without God in the world.”

Romans 3:13-18, says this-

“Their throat is an open sepulcher; with their tongues they have used deceit; the poison of asps is under their lips:

“Whose mouth is full of cursing and bitterness:

“Their feet are swift to shed blood:

“Destruction and misery are in their ways:

“And the way of peace have they not known :

“There is no fear of God before their eyes.”

No hope and without peace! What a combination. And they reside dormant in each individual that is without the Lord Jesus Christ as their personal Savior from sin. These two areas are allowed to be awakened by a system that pays professors and teachers and even some preachers to so influence the mind that most never seek the truth from the Word of God. Publishing houses are quick to retain authors who can write well and have a good following in order to make sure the hopelessness and the absence of peace dominates the book. Those authors who write of peace and hope in Christ are quickly criticized and relegated to unknown publishing houses without great exposure.

Kind of unbalanced? Of course it is. The world system is unbalanced in favor of sin, corruption, deceit, no peace, no hope: just whatever man made system of government, education, and religion are in power at the time. When the Lord Jesus Christ walked the earth in His public ministry, He challenged and refuted what organized Judaism had become: burdensome hypocrites (read Matthew 23 slowly – this was what had happened as the Jews walked away from God and to their own view of how things should be in religion). Roman rule had no use for Judaism and less use for Biblical Christianity. The Romans were proud pagans. Anything else was always at risk and in danger of prison or the loss of one’s life. Look at how things are today. In the United States , that same Biblical Christianity that existed in the New Testament is the only belief system that is allowed by law to be discriminated against and persecuted; that same Biblical Christianity has been ruled to be unconstitutional, and as a result, legal precedence is given to outlaw real prayer, Bible reading or study, and Jesus Christ. The world’s religions however, are all safe havens for these strange birds of prey on the unknowing and ignorant.

Hold on however, for in the end, it is Biblical Christianity that wins! The Lord Jesus Christ has already secured the victory in Himself through His substitutionary sacrifice by blood on the cross, His subsequent death, and His literal, bodily resurrection from the dead three days and three nights later. The debt of deceit, corruption, sin, without hope or peace, has been paid in full by Christ. Your sin debt is no more, unless you die in your sins without Christ. Accept Christ as personal Savior from sin, realizing that neither you, nor anyone else can pay their own debt, but can only rely on what Christ has done – change your mind concerning salvation – and trust Christ solely by faith alone. He can, and only He can save you. He wants to right now, not next week, next month, of next year, but right now where you sit or stand. Won’t you come to Him by faith?

Ephesians 2:1,2,4,8-10,13-14,18 says:

“And you hath he quickened, who were dead in trespasses and sins;

“Wherein in time past ye walked according to the course of this world, according to the prince of the power of the air, the spirit that now worketh in the children of disobedience;

“But God, who is rich in mercy, for his great love wherewith he loved us;

“For by grace are ye saved through faith; and that not of yourselves: it is the gift of God:

“Not of works, lest any man should boast.

“For we are his workmanship, created in Christ Jesus unto good works, which God hath before ordained that we should walk in them.

“But now in Christ Jesus ye who were sometimes far off are made nigh by the blood of Christ.

“For he is our peace.

“For through him we both have access by one Spirit unto the Father.”

Only Jesus Christ can do for you what you, the world, or the world’s religions could never do: Save your soul for all eternity, give you peace with God now (Rom.5:1), and instill in you through the power of the Holy Spirit, that He, the Lord Jesus Christ is your Blessed Hope (Eph.1:13-14;4:30; 5:18; Acts 1:8; Titus 2:11-13!

A genuine salvation and a changed life: the only combination that works and lasts! And it is found only in the Person of the Lord Jesus Christ.