Dreaming

I am an incredibly restless sleeper.  I am the only person I know who can manage to work a pillow out of the pillowcase just by thrashing about at night.  And I dream -- a lot.  Mostly crazy stuff that involves fragments of my life thrust together in bizarre combinations as my over-active brain tries to assimilate the millions of pieces of information it absorbs in the course of my waking hours.  Which is why I put little stock in assigning any kind of meaning to most of my dreams.

Except once in a while, I'll dream a dream that just won't let me go.  It seems that there is something in it that needs to be wrestled through, some feeling or event that some deep part of my soul knows needs to be dealt with even if my conscious mind is unaware.  I need to think about what I've dreamed, test it by the light of the Word, work it through. 

I was with someone I trust, someone I know would not deliberately hurt me.  And then I was asked to let go of something, and I couldn't.  I knew I should.  I knew it was right.  I knew that it would be ok to let go.  But it seemed like it was too much to ask.  It stretched beyond the limits of my trust.  I simply could not do it.  I was crying, in my dream, for sadness of not being able to let go even though I wanted to.  And then I woke up.

But I've been thinking about it ever since.  Praying.  Thinking about it in light of the Word.

Lord, is there something you're asking me to let go that I haven't been willing to let go?  Is my desire to be in control so strong that I won't let go even when I know it's right and good (and safe) to do so?

In the past several months, I've been confronted repeatedly with my own weakness and inadequacies, and I long for his wisdom and power.  So I've been praying, praying for wisdom and discernment to know truth from falsehood, right from wrong.  Praying for courage to stand up for truth, however unpopular it might be.  Praying for strength to persevere when those around me, even fellow followers of Jesus, think I'm paranoid, overzealous, or just plain wrong.  Praying for humility to find and follow the truth, and not to be blinded by a need to cling to my preconceived notions.  Praying always to be more like my Jesus.  "I want to know Christ and the power of his resurrection and the fellowship of his suffering, becoming like him in his death, and so, somehow, to attain to the resurrection from the dead."  I know that means letting go.  I have thought that I was prepared, or, at least, preparing.

So why, then, the dream?  Is it just a dream?  Just a crazy misfiring of my neurons in the night?  Or does it really mean something?  Does it mean that, despite my well-intentioned prayers, I'm really NOT prepared to follow wholeheartedly?  I don't believe that.  I have followed in the past, through really difficult stuff.  I have let go of dreams (the waking kinds) and desires.  I have let go of hurts of the past, unforgiveness, and heartache.  I have let go of financial security and community.  I have let go of personal beliefs and dogmas that were so embedded in my psyche that uprooting them turned me inside-out, all because I read differently in His Word.  If Jesus gave me the strength and courage in the past to uproot those things which were not obedient to him, he will do so again.  I may not have confidence in myself on that point, but I do have confidence in him.  There are no deal-breakers.  "Lord, you know all things.  You know that I love you."

Or maybe it's just a reminder of the truth.  Asking God to fill me with him means emptying me of me.  And emptying me of me hurts.  It's humbling.  It requires massive amounts of trust.  It's always a struggle.  There is always that moment when my grubby fists grasp a little tighter around whatever it is to which I'm clinging, and my heart cries out, "I can't!" and the tears run down my face because I want to open my clenching fists and submit it to Jesus, but it hurts so, and it's just so hard.  There is always that moment.  I don't fear that moment anymore.  I used to think it meant I lacked faith.   I know now that it is merely the death throes of a bit of Self, and it will pass.  It will pass, and I will open my hands and submit to the One I love and trust, the One with whom my soul is safe.

Maybe it meant something.  Maybe it was just a dream.

But nearly a week after I'd had the dream and wrestled it through, I was faced with a choice that scares me, a choice that in normal circumstances, I'd say no to because it extends beyond my level of trust.  But because of that dream, and the prayers that followed, I didn't say no.  I didn't say yes right away, but I didn't say no, either.  I still had to think it through, but it didn't take long.  I have no idea where it will go or what it means.  Maybe nothing.  Maybe something.  But maybe it's part of letting go and allowing the Lord to fill those parts of my heart that are still broken.  Even saying yes is a blow to fear, if that is the farthest it goes.

So perhaps that's what the dream means.  Perhaps it was preparing me.  Perhaps I just woke up a moment too soon.  I missed the end.  The part where I say, "Father, not my will, but your will be done."

Or perhaps it was just a dream.