Dream Talk

Has God ever talked to you through your dreams?

Now after they had left, an angel of the Lord appeared to Joseph in a dream and said, “Get up, take the child and his mother, and flee to Egypt, and remain there until I tell you; for Herod is about to search for the child, to destroy him.” Then Joseph got up, took the child and his mother by night, and went to Egypt, and remained there until the death of Herod. This was to fulfill what had been spoken by the Lord through the prophet, “Out of Egypt I have called my son.” When Herod saw that he had been tricked by the wise men, he was infuriated, and he sent and killed all the children in and around Bethlehem who were two years old or under, according to the time that he had learned from the wise men. Then was fulfilled what had been spoken through the prophet Jeremiah: “A voice was heard in Ramah, wailing and loud lamentation, Rachel weeping for her children; she refused to be consoled, because they are no more.” When Herod died, an angel of the Lord suddenly appeared in a dream to Joseph in Egypt and said, “Get up, take the child and his mother, and go to the land of Israel, for those who were seeking the child’s life are dead.” Then Joseph got up, took the child and his mother, and went to the land of Israel. But when he heard that Archelaus was ruling over Judea in place of his father Herod, he was afraid to go there. And after being warned in a dream, he went away to the district of Galilee. There he made his home in a town called Nazareth, so that what had been spoken through the prophets might be fulfilled, “He will be called a Nazorean.” - Matthew 2:13-23

At first reading, we see God helping Joseph escape harm for his child, but what about all the other children?

Joseph was being directed through his dreams, so I wonder if that is one way God talks to us, and maybe we just aren't listening.

One problem is we don't all remember our dreams.  Studies have shown that the ability to recall one's dreams depends on the amount of two chemicals in the brain, acetylcholine and norepinephrine.

Once we wake up, the levels of these chemicals change, but it is the density of the white matter we have in our brains that seems to make the difference between those who recall their dreams and those who don't.

Now,  I know that when I wake up and get up right after experiencing a dream, I have better recall than if I go back to sleep and try to recall it later.

So, perhaps the God talk dreams need to awaken us, or else the message becomes subliminal, a part of our subconscious that can change our behavior without us knowing it was God doing it.

In other words, God may be talking to us more than we think.

In Joseph's case, the messages from God came in visions of angels.  Maybe that is why he remembered them.  God knew the right images to trigger Joseph's memory, and get him to act.

So, it comes back to God.  He pulled some strings here, and that could leave us both happy and sad.

We are rulers of our own fate, and that  means we make our own decisions.  So when God shows us a possible danger, it is up to us to decide to act on that warning or not.

Today is the remembrance day of the Martyrs of Memphis.  These were the nuns who stayed to help the sick when others left the city for higher, drier ground during the 1878 yellow fever epidemic.

They knew the dry ground was safer than the low lying areas, but they didn't know why.  They had no idea mosquitos were the carriers of the disease.

They chose to stay, even though God may have been warning them, as others who left may have been warned.

In the end, the decision is ours.  God will give us wisdom and guidance, but it is up to us, as Joseph showed, to act.

More to come...