Eternal life... Death Dreams

John 3:16 sketch

John 3:16   -  digitized sketches in Illustrator then did a mockup in Photoshop

Do you dream and remember it?

I've always had an over-active dream life... nightmare life, more like, and I often remember what I dream. At least I remember enough snippets of dreams to put them together - probably because I don't have kids or family that forces me to pop out of the bed like a daisy and go to running... [I have too much quiet time... is that even a thing?] Sometimes these dreams become the genesis of a short story, but other times I know they are helping me work out the scary stuff that's happening in my life.

Why am I talking about dreaming? It's because I had a weird one that woke me at 4am this morning. A dream that woke me because I died in it - little unusual for me. There's usually danger in my dreams, but I don't usually die in them. Well, thankfully it was an accidental death vs any other sort of terror - the car I was riding in drove off a bridge and into the ravine/river below. In the dream we were preoccupied with something behind us, something done to us in the past. I saw we were going to crash, but by that point there was nothing I could do to stop it. I closed my eyes and braced for impact. There was a burst of light combined with a pervasive feeling of peace, and then I was awake with prayer on my lips.

I googled it, the symbolism of dying in a dream, and the explanations that came up didn't sound outlandish considering what's been going on with me. Loss took me by surprise - not by what happened, because that's normal enough and almost expected, but by how difficult that loss has been to deal with. The bafflingly strong emotional response to something that I still believe shouldn't have caused so much trouble has been more than a tad unsettling - has caused me to re-evaluate. I've sobbed for weeks, almost like I did ten years ago when my heart was broken - this certainly isn't that, but it's nearly as painful as I try to determine what I should do, if anything. There's no clear direction yet, so I've been waiting.

Life is never what I expect it to be - never goes how I expect it to go - it's usually better [and worse] than I could ever have imagined for myself. I figure that's because God is in control of everything that happens. He allows bad and He sends good, all in His never-late/never-early timing. Even this strange emotional pain is pressing me closer in to Him and there's intense joy in that despite the red puffy eyes. He continues to show me things about Himself, and about myself, that make me worship Him all the more, makes me humble, and keep me on my knees. I've surely been chunking my cares on Him lately. I highly recommend the practice.

I've been listening to some old Alistair Begg sermons this week on the way to and from work. I like that Begg can speak to me in a language I understand, with illustrations that make sense, in addition to an inherently logical way of connecting ideas that enhances the message. I donno how he can speak in such a way as to make me feel both convicted and not personally attacked. I figure it's the Holy Spirit using him in that way. I've been immensely thankful for how God's been using those messages from TFL to grow me while I wait on God to provide some clear direction in this time of transition. And I've been wallowing in the Psalms - I highly recommend that for when things aren't going well... or even when they are.

So - have you ever had a dream that stuck with you? I'd love to hear about it. Drop me a line on facebook or comment below.