Dreaming Dreams and Seeing Visions

The International Church of the Foursquare Gospel had its annual national convention last week. Pastor George this past Sunday highlighted a few points from the “Connection.”  One thing that stuck out to me was the point of being “wide open to dreams and visions.” The Foursquare Church and for that matter the wider church should be seeing where God wants to take His church.  In Acts 2 Peter gave his great sermon after Pentecost saying:

            ‘In the last days it will be, God declares,

that I will pour out my Spirit upon all flesh,

and your sons and your daughters shall prophesy,

and your young men shall see visions,

and your old men shall dream dreams.

Even upon my slaves, both men and women,

in those days I will pour out my Spirit;

and they shall prophesy (17, 18, see also Joel 2:28, 29).

 

God wants to impart visions and dreams to people but not just any visions and dreams (though God can impart what he wills). He wants to impart dreams and visions that show people how to be partakers of and be participants within God’s Kingdom. What is God’s Kingdom, especially within this world? It is God’s rule and new creation breaking into the current creation anticipating the consummation of his rule. Or more simply put it is the answer(s) to the question, “What would this world look like if God were running it?”[1] We are partakers because we have been saved (Acts 2:21) in that God is now “running” us and we are participants in that we are witnesses to Jesus, who is both Lord and Messiah (2:36). Somehow by God’s grace and Spirit Christians are to be agents who help build for the Kingdom. We through dreams and visions help answer the above question. This I believe is where we can catch a glimpse of what God’s new world will look like. Dreaming dreams and seeing visions is seeing God’s new creation breaking in to this world. I see a vision of the New Jerusalem coming down from heaven, God wiping every tear from our eyes and we as a resurrected and united Church shall be called his people (Revelation 21). Let us then dream dreams of God’s new world!

My dream or vision is to see Christians (Pentecostal, Reformed, Catholic, Orthodox, and so on) united in prayer, scripture, and the mission of the church. This is a vision in which we as Christians put aside our differences and seek a unity that will be seen in God’s new world. As being in “the last days (ἐσχάταις ἡμέραις eschatais herais)” where we get our term eschatology, this vision is truly eschatological. This quotation by Peter of the prophet Joel anticipates an equal and united church with the inclusive language of sons and daughters, men and women, and so on. This inclusive language includes but goes beyond the Foursquare family. It also includes all of the Church. So my vision is to see this equality and unity now, as a way to anticipate the future eschatological reality of unity.

            So this is my vision or dream in its early stages. What is your dream(s) or vision(s)? How does this play a part (great or small) in God “running” this world? God wants to birth these dreams in us, which is also a way in which his new creation breaks in. It is never too early or too late to start dreaming! Let us dream dreams and see visions of God breaking into this world! And let us do it!

Thanks for reading,

Marcelino

 

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[1] Quote from N.T. Wright taken from various lectures