The Power Of A Dream
Sermon
It's News To Me: Messages of Hope for Those Who Haven't Heard
Cycle A Gospel Sermons For Advent, Christmas, Epiphany
Object:
Do you dream? Do you remember your dreams? I remember a number of years ago when I was leading a women's study group, and someone wanted to read and study about dreams. I wasn't too eager to pursue the idea, because I wasn't convinced that a study of dreams had much merit. Nonetheless, the group persisted, and we chose a book about dreams whose title I've long since forgotten. We set about reading and discussing it, and I began to become a bit more open to the possibility that dreams can be a way for God to get through to us, and they can literally change and re-direct our lives.
If we study the Bible closely, we can clearly see that dreams have great significance, and can be ways for God to speak. That's certainly a very valid way to understand and interpret what we find in the Bible passage that we have for today. There are three different times in the story of Joseph and Mary and the baby and their flight to Egypt that we are told that Joseph heard from God via a dream. First, he had a dream that an angel came to him, and told him to go to Egypt to escape the wrath of Herod. Later on, an angel came to him in a dream, telling him to go back to Israel, and a third time he received direction in a dream to settle in the area of Galilee. And each time, we either read or see evidence of the fact that Joseph obeyed the instruction he had received in the dream. Clearly, he believed that dreams were a way for God to speak to him, to reveal a purpose for his life and to give him a sense of direction. Throughout the ages, that has been an accepted understanding of dreams and their significance.
Does it still work today? Does God, in fact, "speak" to us through dreams? While I'm certainly not an expert on the matter, I would have to say, "Yes, God can and does use dreams to communicate with us." The real issue has to do with discerning what dreams are of God, and what dreams are merely provoked by the things we've just experienced in our lives, or some sense of wishful thinking. I believe that all of our dreams have the potential to reveal our deepest longings and passions, and to reveal God's will for our lives.
Fortunately, there are many others who have spoken about the power of a dream -- whether that be an actual dream while we're sleeping, or some God-inspired revelation or desire. For example, Walt Kallestad, pastor of Community Church of Joy in Glendale, Arizona, has written a book titled, Wake Up Your Dreams. In it, he says things like: "One 'small' dream set in motion is powerful enough to unleash the potential in other dreamers and, dream by dream, to reshape the world."1 He also writes, "Dreams can help us see the invisible, believe the incredible, and achieve the impossible."2
Dreams are important, because they are guideposts to a future that is, as yet, unseen. Dreams are important because they are life-giving, and because they can be revelations from God. They can point us toward what God is calling us to be or to do. They can fill us with energy and hope. When we have dreams, we have life.
A dream gives us a reason for being, a sense of purpose and meaning for our lives. Dreams can give us a picture of the future, and they can inspire. They lead us to reach higher, and be more than we thought we could be. They lead us to new, unheard-of horizons. They give us energy and hope that a new future, a preferred future can, in fact, come into being.
You're probably thinking that I've totally lost it with all this dream stuff! As I stated earlier, I used to be a real skeptic about all this. I firmly asserted that I never dreamed, and, even if I did, I certainly could never remember my dreams. Even if I remembered, they could be completely justified by something I'd read or recently experienced. However, I've had three different experiences that have changed all that. Two of them occurred after the deaths of my parents, and I'll share them another time. But the one I want to tell you about this morning is one that has direct bearing on the ministry in which I'm spending my life -- THE GARDEN.
It happened in November of 1994. For months prior to this time, I had been wrestling with where God wanted me to be in ministry. I was considering the possibility of leaving pastoral ministry, and pursuing some other venture. I had been in conversation with the placement personnel of our denomination about moving to another church, and another appointment, but it just didn't work out. Nothing seemed to be right.
This may come as a surprise to some of you, but the church has a very political nature, and advancement often comes with moves, and many pastors get caught up in "moving up" in the system, and making it into one of the top churches. I'm not very proud to say that I was getting myself caught in that, and I was in constant turmoil wondering what I'd be offered. Would it be all right? Would it offer sufficient advancement opportunities?
I had just left some of that behind in Indianapolis, and was on a flight winging my way west to conduct some interviews as part of my doctoral studies. A colleague was flying there with me, but he had gone to sleep. I had been reading, and decided that I, too, would stretch out and take a little nap.
I can't tell you exactly what happened, but I dreamed about the story I had just been reading in a book by Tom Peters about the invention of Nintendo. I don't think I slept very long, but when I woke up, I knew exactly what I was supposed to be doing in my ministry. I felt an amazing sense of calm, and all the turmoil I had experienced over the last few months had virtually evaporated.
I leaned over to my fellow traveler, and said, "Steve, I've had a revelation from God. I know what I'm supposed to do in ministry." He thought I was sick or something, since this didn't sound like the Linda McCoy he knew, but I knew it was for real. That sense of calm has never left me, and the vision was clear. That dream was God's planting the beginning vision for what we now call THE GARDEN.
As a result of that dream, many of us have experienced a whole new insurgence of the love of God. Empowered with the incredible energy of God, many of us have reached beyond our wildest dreams. I don't think I'm the only one in this room this morning who is firmly convinced that dreams are God-given. We know they are powerful, and they can come true.
Closing Word
Probably the most well known address about having a dream is the speech by Dr. Martin Luther King, Jr., during a civil rights march on Washington on August 28, 1963. Listen to what he said:
I say to you today, my friends, that in spite of the difficulties and frustrations of the moment, I still have a dream... I have a dream that one day this nation will rise up and live out the true meaning of its creed... I have a dream that my four little children will one day live in a nation where they will not be judged by the color of their skin but by the content of their character. I have a dream that one day every valley shall be exalted, every hill and mountain shall be made low, the rough places will be made plain, and the crooked places will be made straight, and the glory of the Lord shall be revealed, and all flesh shall see it together....3
Do you have a dream? Do you have a dream that one day, you'll be living as you're called to live? Do you have a dream that God is trying to communicate to you?
As we leave here this morning, may God speak to each of us. Let us open our hearts to our deepest dreams. Hold onto them; reach higher; know they can come true; and go in peace. Amen.
____________
1. Walt Kallestad, Wake Up Your Dreams (Grand Rapids, Michigan: Zondervan Publishing House, 1996), p. 17.
2. Ibid., p. 23
3. Dr. Martin Luther King, Jr., "I Have a Dream," delivered on the steps of the Lincoln Memorial in Washington, D.C., on August 28, 1963.
If we study the Bible closely, we can clearly see that dreams have great significance, and can be ways for God to speak. That's certainly a very valid way to understand and interpret what we find in the Bible passage that we have for today. There are three different times in the story of Joseph and Mary and the baby and their flight to Egypt that we are told that Joseph heard from God via a dream. First, he had a dream that an angel came to him, and told him to go to Egypt to escape the wrath of Herod. Later on, an angel came to him in a dream, telling him to go back to Israel, and a third time he received direction in a dream to settle in the area of Galilee. And each time, we either read or see evidence of the fact that Joseph obeyed the instruction he had received in the dream. Clearly, he believed that dreams were a way for God to speak to him, to reveal a purpose for his life and to give him a sense of direction. Throughout the ages, that has been an accepted understanding of dreams and their significance.
Does it still work today? Does God, in fact, "speak" to us through dreams? While I'm certainly not an expert on the matter, I would have to say, "Yes, God can and does use dreams to communicate with us." The real issue has to do with discerning what dreams are of God, and what dreams are merely provoked by the things we've just experienced in our lives, or some sense of wishful thinking. I believe that all of our dreams have the potential to reveal our deepest longings and passions, and to reveal God's will for our lives.
Fortunately, there are many others who have spoken about the power of a dream -- whether that be an actual dream while we're sleeping, or some God-inspired revelation or desire. For example, Walt Kallestad, pastor of Community Church of Joy in Glendale, Arizona, has written a book titled, Wake Up Your Dreams. In it, he says things like: "One 'small' dream set in motion is powerful enough to unleash the potential in other dreamers and, dream by dream, to reshape the world."1 He also writes, "Dreams can help us see the invisible, believe the incredible, and achieve the impossible."2
Dreams are important, because they are guideposts to a future that is, as yet, unseen. Dreams are important because they are life-giving, and because they can be revelations from God. They can point us toward what God is calling us to be or to do. They can fill us with energy and hope. When we have dreams, we have life.
A dream gives us a reason for being, a sense of purpose and meaning for our lives. Dreams can give us a picture of the future, and they can inspire. They lead us to reach higher, and be more than we thought we could be. They lead us to new, unheard-of horizons. They give us energy and hope that a new future, a preferred future can, in fact, come into being.
You're probably thinking that I've totally lost it with all this dream stuff! As I stated earlier, I used to be a real skeptic about all this. I firmly asserted that I never dreamed, and, even if I did, I certainly could never remember my dreams. Even if I remembered, they could be completely justified by something I'd read or recently experienced. However, I've had three different experiences that have changed all that. Two of them occurred after the deaths of my parents, and I'll share them another time. But the one I want to tell you about this morning is one that has direct bearing on the ministry in which I'm spending my life -- THE GARDEN.
It happened in November of 1994. For months prior to this time, I had been wrestling with where God wanted me to be in ministry. I was considering the possibility of leaving pastoral ministry, and pursuing some other venture. I had been in conversation with the placement personnel of our denomination about moving to another church, and another appointment, but it just didn't work out. Nothing seemed to be right.
This may come as a surprise to some of you, but the church has a very political nature, and advancement often comes with moves, and many pastors get caught up in "moving up" in the system, and making it into one of the top churches. I'm not very proud to say that I was getting myself caught in that, and I was in constant turmoil wondering what I'd be offered. Would it be all right? Would it offer sufficient advancement opportunities?
I had just left some of that behind in Indianapolis, and was on a flight winging my way west to conduct some interviews as part of my doctoral studies. A colleague was flying there with me, but he had gone to sleep. I had been reading, and decided that I, too, would stretch out and take a little nap.
I can't tell you exactly what happened, but I dreamed about the story I had just been reading in a book by Tom Peters about the invention of Nintendo. I don't think I slept very long, but when I woke up, I knew exactly what I was supposed to be doing in my ministry. I felt an amazing sense of calm, and all the turmoil I had experienced over the last few months had virtually evaporated.
I leaned over to my fellow traveler, and said, "Steve, I've had a revelation from God. I know what I'm supposed to do in ministry." He thought I was sick or something, since this didn't sound like the Linda McCoy he knew, but I knew it was for real. That sense of calm has never left me, and the vision was clear. That dream was God's planting the beginning vision for what we now call THE GARDEN.
As a result of that dream, many of us have experienced a whole new insurgence of the love of God. Empowered with the incredible energy of God, many of us have reached beyond our wildest dreams. I don't think I'm the only one in this room this morning who is firmly convinced that dreams are God-given. We know they are powerful, and they can come true.
Closing Word
Probably the most well known address about having a dream is the speech by Dr. Martin Luther King, Jr., during a civil rights march on Washington on August 28, 1963. Listen to what he said:
I say to you today, my friends, that in spite of the difficulties and frustrations of the moment, I still have a dream... I have a dream that one day this nation will rise up and live out the true meaning of its creed... I have a dream that my four little children will one day live in a nation where they will not be judged by the color of their skin but by the content of their character. I have a dream that one day every valley shall be exalted, every hill and mountain shall be made low, the rough places will be made plain, and the crooked places will be made straight, and the glory of the Lord shall be revealed, and all flesh shall see it together....3
Do you have a dream? Do you have a dream that one day, you'll be living as you're called to live? Do you have a dream that God is trying to communicate to you?
As we leave here this morning, may God speak to each of us. Let us open our hearts to our deepest dreams. Hold onto them; reach higher; know they can come true; and go in peace. Amen.
____________
1. Walt Kallestad, Wake Up Your Dreams (Grand Rapids, Michigan: Zondervan Publishing House, 1996), p. 17.
2. Ibid., p. 23
3. Dr. Martin Luther King, Jr., "I Have a Dream," delivered on the steps of the Lincoln Memorial in Washington, D.C., on August 28, 1963.
