Signs and dream meanings....

Do you believe that "signs" or messages can be given to us just in a regular moment of the day?...Or through our dreams at night?

Personally, I believe this happens.

Recently, my mother told me a story of something that had just happened to her during the week. She told me this story, not in an over-joyous way, but in a tone of wonder and mystery. It's a story about a clock....

This clock sits inside a globe and is made to sit on a table. It has a golden regulator that spins four little golden globes when it is working. It was a wedding gift to her and my father 37 years ago when they were married. The clock has never worked from the first day.
Mom said, "You remember this clock?", as she pointed to it on the table in the living room. I noticed it was working and I had never seen it work before. I remembered the clock.
She said, "This clock has never worked before and it just started working. Its time is a little fast, but it's working."
"Ha", I said, thinking that it was interesting...wondering why it never worked and just started working.
Then she said, "You know, the funny thing is, it's an answer to a prayer. I said a prayer for something and I thought to myself, 'Why can't I have a sign about this? Why can't it be this clock?' Then not long after, it started working."
This touched me. How we need these signs sometimes! I thought. It's a treasure when we're given one. "Is it the answer you wanted?" I asked her.
"Yes."
"I don't suppose you're going to share what the prayer was?", I asked.
"Nope."
I smiled....and looked at the working clock.



I've had a couple of experiences myself where I believe God was telling me something. Like everyone else, I've also had many dreams, but only a couple that I believe were truly something God was wanting to tell me. I've always kept these things to myself...always remembering that my imagination can make up a wide variety of things and better not to throw out a stumbling block if I'm wrong. I say this because I also think there is a danger of interpretting these kinds of things to mean what we want them to mean. In a way "seeing what we want to see" so-to-speak. But I believe that God does give such things as a gift when we really need assurance. We need to keep our focus on Him, not only what we want for ourselves.


It seems though, in the Bible stories, that God TOLD them that "this is a sign to you...", so how could they get it wrong?

Is it just me, or does it seem like science (and I love science) has seemed to cause people to take a reductionistic view of what once were seen as "magical" or "mysterious"...as something from God?
For example, before science could give a scientific explanation for lightning, it was probably seen as one of the mysterious creations from God, and something that lead people to be awestruck, and at times maybe even thought it as God communicating something (not always but maybe more so than today). Now...although it is still a creation from God, we probably are more likely to see lightning today and not think much of it...Such as it being just the charged electrons reacting when hot and cold air collide...and so forth. In other words, explaining it away or dismissing it because there's a physical scientific explanation for it. Or...maybe...dismissing it just because we're "used to it" or take it for granted.

One example would be the rainbow God sent as a sign to Noah (see Genesis 9:12-17)
God sent the rainbow, but in the verses it says that "God said to Noah, 'This is the sign of the covenant'...." But when we look at a rainbow today, yes we think they're beautiful, but do we remember it as a sign from God, or just think about how it is the reflection of rays from the sun and those rays are bent from water in the air?

I remember once about a few months ago, I was wandering through a large bookstore and came across a book by Frederick Buechner (a great author, by the way!). I picked up a book I've been wanting to buy since it first came out and just haven't done it yet. It's called "Secrets in the Dark". And I remember randomly flipping through the pages and I came across the beginning of a story in the book that told about a young boy. I don't know how old he was, but young...maybe pre-teen or something...with a mouth full of bubblegum, and he was gazing at the stars. The book gives a desciption of the stars he is gazing at...They spell out the words..."GOD EXISTS" (or something really close to that...I'm going by memory here). And as the young boy gazes, wide eyed...staring, chewing on his gum, his response is...."So what."

When I think of signs, our personal signs from God, some people may wonder "Why don't I receive a sign from God about this?"
Well, are we truly looking for it? Do we really believe a sign will be there if we ask Him? Are we keeping Christ at the center of our universe and not ourselves? After all, when we do see a sign, sometimes we realize it has been in front of us all along. Has it always been right in front of us....and we've only been saying "So what?"

If God truly knows our hearts better than we know our own hearts, doesn't he know whether or not we'll recognize a sign when he sends it? Maybe He doesn't send one because He already knows we won't see it for what it is.

I believe we need these signs from time to time. Something inside us needs this wonder and mystery...to know that we are being watched over by someone much greater than ourselves.

I want the eyes of my heart to be open.





Just some thoughts.