A Dream Of Brothers

"This is how we know what love is: Jesus Christ laid down his life for us. And we ought to lay down our lives for our brothers." 1 John 3:16

"So, my brothers, you also died to the law through the body of Christ, that you might belong to another, to him who was raised from the dead, in order that we might bear fruit to God." Romans 7:4

Previously in my blog posts I've talked about how I want to talk about dreams more... it would be just like God to give me more opportunities by giving me more dreams! The other day I had another dream that was so basic, yet so wonderful.

I had a dream that my dad had another brother- a much younger, "surprise I'm part of the family" brother. This man came to us and told us the truth about being part of our family, and it was someone I knew and went to high school with. It just clicked for us, it all made sense somehow that he was my uncle, and I remember being so happy that he was part of our family, and he was so happy that he was part of our family. We'd even joked about how it was a good thing we never dated in high school, given that now it turned out he was my uncle. One thing there wasn't in this dream was the feeling that this was bad news of any kind. There wasn't any kind of accusing thoughts or remarks towards my grandparents, it just was accepted that this man was my dad's younger brother. And there was such joy in the family because we had this new family member- that's what I remember the most. Hugging my new uncle and both of us being filled with joy because we were related.

When I woke up, my first thought was about this young man in the dream. He was a rare friend in high school. While we weren't close friends, we were decent friends, there was never any thought of dating, and we shared other common friends in school as well. He is one of the people who I think about every once in a while from school, and I hope he is happy and doing well. When he was very young, he'd lost his parents in an accident, and was being raised by his grandmother. Well, his grandmother passed away our senior year, just after his 18th birthday, so all the sudden this teenager was responsible for himself, his two older brothers were in college, so essentially, he was alone a lot at the end of his school career. So I thought about all these things, and I prayed a little for him, that God would bless him and make Himself real in this man's life.

And then I really thought about this dream, and I kind of played the "what if" game, what if something like this actually happened- a new family member just appears and says I'm part of your family, and I remembered the joy in the dream and then I understood. The excitement, happiness, and joy from this young man being a part of our family is the same excitement, happiness and joy we should feel every time a new believer comes to Christ. These feelings of love that we have for our family members should extend beyond our physical family, and should embrace our Christian family as well. Think of a family reunion, think about how excited you always are to attend and see family members you haven't seen in a while. We should feel the exact same way every time we see a brother or sister in Christ. Understanding what this dream was saying was so exciting- because it was just such a happy thing! I was instantly able to compare it to how I have felt about going to church, and how blessed we are to be a part of a body of believers where I feel this way each and every time we walk in the doors at church.

I talked about the young man in my dream a bit above to share a point about dreams. One of the things I've learned about dreaming, is that sometimes you need to look at a person or a thing or a detail and think specifically about what that means to you. Any young man could have been used in this dream to make this point, but I think by using this particular one, it drove the point home more. To me, when I think of this person, I think about his family and how he didn't have much of a family growing up, and that drove the point of joy home even more. Think about how much more joy someone would have finding a family when they didn't have family before. Of course, the added bonus in this case of knowing the young man in the dream was that I had an opportunity to pray for him, and maybe he needed that just then.

God is so great, and I know that He is filled with joy every time someone comes to Him through Christ. And I also know that joy is ongoing. Think about how much stronger the body of Christ could be if we could stop looking at each other with the eyes of humans, and instead, look on each other with God's Eyes, the eyes of love and compassion. I want that. I want to see my brothers and sisters in Christ and feel the same joy that I felt in that dream when I found my new uncle.

"...for the joy of the LORD is your strength." Nehemiah 8:10