Last night I had a frightening and thought-provoking dream. Usually I just have faceless action-movies in my head at night. I'm fighting, I'm being chased, I'm beating all the bad guys. They're pretty formulaic and therefore I often dismiss them as the "same old, same old." This one was completely different. A different kind of battle was going on all together. The intensity was such that when I awoke, I was frozen on my back with my palms extended. You'll see why.
There was a series of parties going on amongst my friends, happening in different places. I had been sort of making the rounds, but I was sort of an outsider to each one. The last was actually at a house much like my parents' and I knew it to be the one I would sleep in that night. It started out as not so much a party as a class. We were all set to do an activity but I had either previously completed it or didn't have the right materials. Everyone was sitting in a circle and I was on the outside of that circle doing something completely different. Once the assignment was finished, the teacher disappeared and it actually became a party. Everyone milled around talking. I knew all the people had been through a lot of problems, most of them struggles with drugs.
As it started to get late and the others began to head home, I sat there with three or four friends who would be staying in the house that night. One particular friend suggested we smoke something. Two looked down and I said: "We're not going to do that. Why do you want to do that all of a sudden?"
He replied: "I just can't spend the night downstairs sober." (He had been sleeping on a couch in the basement) "There are witches or ghosts or something in this house," he continued.
"I've felt that something was wrong here for a little while, but I guess it hasn't ever scared me because I know that they have no power over us. Come sleep in my room and they won't bother you."
He resisted for awhile, begging for some sort of mind-bending substance to put him out of the misery of fear. Eventually, he gave in, and we both went to sleep in my big bed. I awoke in the middle of the night to him, eyes wide open, hands reached over me as if to strike. He was frozen in this pose, and I placed my hands around his head and began to pray. He awoke, crying slightly, and apologizing. I spoke his name and then he was in some sort of trance.
I followed him down the hall, keeping my hands on him and trying to cast out or cast off the evil that held him. He got ahead and I chased, scurrying after. But it became difficult to do so, as my words were muffled. It was like I couldn't open my mouth completely. I could only speak for a few moments at a time before my jaw went stiff and then I'd be struggling to even get a word out. At this point, I think I almost woke myself up trying so hard to speak, but I snapped right back into the dream.
I felt stuck and ceased walking. He trudged ahead down the dark corridor. Then I prayed in tongues and he stopped in his tracks and turned to face me. Behind him was what looked like an open prison cell. Out of it walked a small boy who laughed at my outstretched hands and muffled words. I struck at him, commanded him to go, and continued to struggle against my sudden paralysis. He walked down a perpendicular hallway, too dark to see down, and said: "I'll get the others." At the end of that hallway were the bedrooms in which the other friends slept. I couldn't see them coming, but I suddenly imagined my friends striking at me in their trance. The first friend sat on a short ledge across from me, head down and arms limp like a shelved puppet. I looked at him and then stared into the dark. Then, I woke up.
I blinked awake and didn't feel scared as much as horribly grieved and stiff from being stuck in that position with my back flat, palms pressed outward but resting on my chest and stomach. I'm glad to be on vacation with my parents at the moment. I walked out into the living room to get their take on it. My dad of course was amazed that I was awake at such an early time when I didn't have to be. haha. When I finished relating the dream, he asked about my first friend in the dream, whose condition right now in the real world is questionable at best. Then he said that it meant that I need to be more prepared. A night may come when that friend is crying on my doorstep and I have to have been diligent enough in my walk with God to know what to do and how to embrace authority under Jesus Christ, the living God. Then he reminded me of a story in Acts 16:16-24 that stands hand-in-hand with my dream situation:
16 Now it happened, as we went to prayer, that a certain slave girl possessed with a spirit of divination met us, who brought her masters much profit by fortune-telling. 17 This girl followed Paul and us, and cried out, saying, “These men are the servants of the Most High God, who proclaim to us the way of salvation.” 18 And this she did for many days.
But Paul, greatly annoyed, turned and said to the spirit, “I command you in the name of Jesus Christ to come out of her.” And he came out that very hour. 19 But when her masters saw that their hope of profit was gone, they seized Paul and Silas and dragged them into the marketplace to the authorities.
20 And they brought them to the magistrates, and said, “These men, being Jews, exceedingly trouble our city; 21 and they teach customs which are not lawful for us, being Romans, to receive or observe.” 22 Then the multitude rose up together against them; and the magistrates tore off their clothes and commanded them to be beaten with rods. 23 And when they had laid many stripes on them, they threw them into prison, commanding the jailer to keep them securely. 24 Having received such a charge, he put them into the inner prison and fastened their feet in the stocks.
Paul knew that her words were just words. People can say all the right things and yet still be gripped inside with the bondage of darkness. As a lighter example, just look at how many Christians today are crippled by self-hatred and a penetrating stupidity that blocks out the truth that they were created beautiful by a loving Lord. That's a topic for another day, though. Another parallel with this story is that the "masters" of this possessed woman were benefiting from her disease. Those who enter the drug culture make themselves slaves to their dealers. And they don't ever want you to be free, because they make money off of your problems.
I will be praying for the friend who starred in the dream, because I think there is significance there, but I also took this dream as a sign that I've been slacking. And I'll admit, I have. If we do not practice with the Sword, we will not know how to wield it when the time comes.
No comments:
Post a Comment