Thursday, March 31, 2011

Freight Train~

Last night I had a really crazy dream.  There was a tornado, and it was eating up everything.  It wasn't one of those wide ones that just stays on a steady path... it was skinny and wild.  And it was after me. 

Now, normally I would admit that a tornado like that is pretty scary in and of itself - but this one was much more frightening - if that's possible.  It was after me.  It had intent... and motive... it was a wild, violent, deadly, harrowing storm... that was pursuing me.


Everywhere I went - every direction I turned - it pursued, and at one point I thought I discerned a wickedly malicious face in the midst of the wind and debris.  I ran left... it followed... I turned... it turned... I scrambled, and it gained on me. 

I was losing, and I knew it.  There was no way to outrun, outsmart, or survive in general.  Just as I was beginning to feel it's claws at my heels I relinquished my ability to defend myself at all... and then I woke with a start.

My chest was heaving with the breathless fear of terror.  I looked around my room - silence.  I listened to see if there was thunder, or even rain outside, thinking that maybe my mind was just associating external sounds with imaginary imagery.  There was nothing.  I breathed a deap sigh of relief and laid my head back on the pillow and, after seeing 4:30 on the clock next to me, I closed my eyes for just a bit more rest. 

It was a train this time.  And not just any train.  It had a face that seemed to personify evil.  Brow furrowed, wicked smile, and the most evil scream that I'd ever heard.  I looked down and I was standing in the middle of the tracks, and it was racing directly for me - and it wasn't far away.  There was no time to act, no brief instant for an instinctive jump to the side... I saw the face, heard the scream, froze in terror, and it was upon me... when again I woke up, just as it would have engulfed me. 

"What is going on?!" 

What was even more eerie was the fact that the train was one that's on a cartoon my children watch every morning.  Now, lest you think I feed my children's brains with evil stalking trains before they navigate their day, please know - THIS is the train they watch...


So, adding to the idea that something is pursuing me, I now have to reconcile the fact that the 'something' could be an otherwise harmless and even good thing.  WHAT?

Two dreams, and an overwhelming sense of foreboding, started me thinking along the lines of ~ WHY.  Why is something pursuing me?  Why is it that in both dreams I was completely unable to get away?  Why were they both actually pursuing me?

The Bible is clear in it's representation of our enemy.  1 Peter 5:8 says that he's like a roaring lion, seeking to devour.  It's not like he's just out there patiently waiting while I go about my life.  He's not sitting back, watching, awaiting the moment I screw something up on my own.  He's actually seeking...  he's pursuing....  and his goal? - to devour.  Hello, tornado.

And what's up with the train?  Yeah, doesn't the Bible also say that he appears as an angel of light? (2 Corinthians 11:14).  That leads me to evaluate - what is in my life that appears to be beautiful, but is actually deceptively seeking to attract my attention away from the Lord.  Now, before I get a flood of emails about the fact that no one can ever take us out of the hand of God - know this... I know.  But I can't count how many times I have felt the something encroaching upon my engagement to God. 

I mean, really, how many times have you sat down to have a quiet time, and all of a sudden - things go haywire?  Or, building a business has become so time consuming and attention captivating that you struggle just to keep your priorities right?  I have.  I remember that phrase - "The good is always the greatest enemy of the best."

But there is good news -
2 Timothy 4:17 states "But the Lord stood with me and strengthened me, so that through me the proclamation might be fully accomplished, and that all the Gentiles might hear; and I was rescued out of the lion's mouth."

In my dreams, I woke just before the moment of despair.  Just before I was completely engulfed - there was a rescue.  Read it again - rescued out of the lion's mouth. 

That means I was in the lion's mouth in the first place.  That enemy knew me, targeted me, pursued me, attacked me, and clamped his wicked razor sharp teeth on to me.  I was hopeless to prevail on my own, and powerless against his ferocity.  UNTIL I WAS RESCUED....

So for today -

Hold on ~ help is on the way...
                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                             

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