I had studied dreams in college psychology classes. I'd learned what Freud had to say; I'd learned what neuroscience has to say about random neuron firing. I've recently realized that there was one expert opinion with which I'd hadn't yet familiarized myself: God's.
My initial thought about the Biblical take on dreams was one of skepticism; thanks to the acculturation of the secular and "church" worlds, my immediate association with dreams and dream interpretation was with witchcraft, tarot and spiritists. In short, dream interpretation seemed like a seedy topic and one of which I ought to be wary.
Then, as He has a habit of doing, God got involved and shook up my world view (I'm so glad He does that!). In the constant richness of the Bible, I often find new verses, new inferences, and even new stories. Somehow, however, I had simply overlooked the importance and relevance of the numerous stories in the Bible in which the Lord speaks to His people through their dreams. If someone had asked me, "Does the Lord speak to people in the Bible through dreams?," I would have said, "Yes, a bunch!" But, that said, I'd still somehow overlooked the relevance of this fact to my own life!
Naturally, like most (all?) of us, I have dream all the time when sleeping. I even remember some of them sometimes! ;) I was telling a friend that, sometimes, I wake up and can see traces of random conversations from my day in my dreams; and I've had some dreams that are hilarious to recount, many of which seem to be peppered with these amalgamations of my day.
On the other hand, sometimes I have dreams that, when I wake, I seem to sense a certain significance. In the past, I hadn't really put two and two together; the "significance" seemed sort of cosmic and perhaps psychological. I hadn't put much stock into it.
Then, I had a conversation with a friend in which she talked about her own ideas about dreaming, and God speaking to us through dreams. Then (that very same night, in fact!...God is funny that way), I had a dream that I knew was significant. It had that same "sense" about it, and thanks to the preparation that came by way of my conversation the evening prior, I knew to start looking for a new layer of insight.
I prayed about the dream and what I thought it meant; I asked for God to confirm and enlighten. In the couple months since this dream, it's been on my mind and heart a lot. I wasn't really sure inside about relying upon it. So (finally!), I decided to check it against my manual for life: the Bible.
The Bible doesn't have anything to say about the specific scenario in my dream, but it does have a lot to say about dreams. I did a quick study for the word "dream" in some of my Bible software, and across various translations, I came up with 661 hits! Wow! I encourage you to do your own search if you'd like a more in depth review.
What I will summarize with is this: There are a multitude of examples in which the Bible says the Lord speaks directly to people through dreams. The vast majority of these are in the Old Testament, but I didn't find anything that indicated His practice was or would be different after the coming of Jesus, although the new gift of the presence of the Holy Spirit does seem to be a potentially impacting factor. One New Testament reference, however, talks about the end times and that, in those times, "old men shall dream dreams" (Acts 2:17).
While it isn't explicitly stated, at least based on my inquiries so far, I think it's reasonable to assume that God's usage of dreaming for communication is likely to be continuous from the times of the Old Testament through today and on into the end times.
This isn't a particularly profound closer for this post, but my heart has been encouraged and stimulated by the realization of a new way in which God can communicate with me, and in which I can now better receive from Him! I'll be taking any dreams I feel are from Him back to His feet in prayer, and I trust He will reveal to me whatever He wants me to see!
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