To me the word DREAM implies a sense of freedom and creativity. I decided to look up the definition in our big Webster's Universal Unabridged Dictionary, published in 1996 by Random House. I found the definitions got richer and broader as I read them. Here are some ways it defined the word "DREAM".

As a noun it is:

- a succession of images, thoughts, or emotions passing through the mind during sleep.

- the sleeping state in which this occurs

- an object seen in a dream

- an involuntary vision occurring to a person when awake

- a vision voluntarily indulged in while awake; daydream, reverie

- an aspiration; goal; aim

- a wild fancy

- something of unreal beauty or charm or excellence

As a verb (action) it is:

- to see or imagine in sleep or in a vision

- to imagine as if in a dream

- to pass or spend time dreaming…

- to form in the imagination (the action of forming mental images or concepts of what is not actually present to the physical senses)

As an adjective it is:

- the most desirable, ideal, bringing joy, mirth and gladness

DREAM is closely related to VISION

VISION refers to a series of images of unusual vividness, clarity, order, and significance, sometimes seen in a dream.

Reading that makes me want to peruse my dictionary more often. It also makes me aware that in order to dream I must be open and not feel guilty for taking time that may look like "wasted time" from the outside. That is challenging for an achiever who likes to measure personal success by accomplishment. But I know it's not really about that.

So then I looked up DREAM in the concordance of my Bible. In Acts 2:17-19 Peter quotes the prophet Joel and says,

"In the last days, God says, I will pour out my Spirit on all people. Your sons and daughters will prophesy, your young men will see visions, your old men will dream dreams. Even on my servants, both men and women, I will pour out my Spirit in those days, and they will prophesy. I will show wonders in the heaven above and signs on the earth below…."

The context of these words immediately follow the coming of the Holy Spirit on believers on the day of Pentecost in the beginning of Acts 2 (NIV).

"When the day of Pentecost came, they were all together in one place. Suddenly a sound like the blowing of a violent wind came from heaven and filled the whole house where they were sitting. They saw what seemed to be tongues of fire that separated and came to rest on each of them. All of them were filled with the Holy Spirit and began to speak in other tongues as the Spirit enabled them."

I used to read passages like this almost like a storybook or as a cool thing that happened to the people fortunate enough to live during those times and the benefit to us now is that we get to read it and hope that someday, maybe in the next life, we would get to experience something like that. I've had a paradigm shift. The past two years as I've read through the gospels and Acts, I see with new eyes. Jesus brought the Kingdom of God to us. Salvation is just a part of that not the whole. And the Holy Spirit who came like a blowing wind and tongues of fire is the same Holy Spirit who is alive in us now. And I believe at work with just as much power and reality as the times we read about in the Bible. So…

"Holy Spirit, pour Yourself on me, in me.

Guide my dreams and give me Yours,

give me Your words, Your vision, Your power

and most of all an awareness of Your loving Presence;

Show me Your wonders,

and make my heart to be like Yours…"

What does it mean to DREAM?