The Daily Guide. grow. pray. study. from The United Methodist Church of the Resurrection in Leawood, Kansas, United States for Saturday, 17 December 2016 - "Dreams: one way God keeps on guiding God’s people"Daily Scripture
Joel 3:1 (2:28) “After this, I will pour out
my Spirit on all humanity.
Your sons and daughters will prophesy,
your old men will dream dreams, your young men will see visions;
Acts 2:14 Then Kefa stood up with the Eleven and raised his voice to address them: “You Judeans, and all of you staying here in Yerushalayim! Let me tell you what this means! Listen carefully to me!
15 “These people ar en’t drunk, as you suppose — it’s only nine in the morning. 16 No, this is what was spoken about through the prophet Yo’el:
17 ‘Adonai says:
“In the Last Days,
I will pour out from my Spirit upon everyone.
Your sons and daughters will prophesy,
your young men will see visions,
your old men will dream dreams.
Acts 16:6 They traveled through the region of Phrygia and Galatia, because they had been prevented by the Ruach HaKodesh from speaking the message in the province of Asia. 7 When they came to the frontier of Mysia, they tried to go into Bithynia; but the Spirit of Yeshua would not let them. 8 So, after passing by Mysia, they came down to Troas.
9 There a vision appeared to Sha’ul at night. A man from Macedonia was standing and begging him, “Come over to Macedonia and help us!” 10 As soon as he had seen the vision, we lost no time getting ready to leave for Macedonia; for we concluded that God had called us to proclaim the Good News to them.
-------
Reflection Questions:
On the day of Pentecost, seven weeks after the Passover on which Jesus was crucified, God sent the Holy Spirit in a dramatic way. Some skeptics in Jerusalem claimed the Spirit-filled Christians had just started drinking early. Peter forcefully told them this wasn’t inebriation—it was God pouring out the Spirit, as promised in Joel 2:28. Later, during the Apostle Paul’s second missionary journey, the Spirit guided in a much quieter way. On his first journey, Paul had planted churches in Asia Minor, and now planned to visit them. But Paul’s night vision of a man calling “Come over to Macedonia and help us!” changed his direction. It expanded the church’s reach by sending Paul into Greece, and on into Europe, to preach.
- In Acts 1:4, Luke wrote that Jesus told his followers “not to leave Jerusalem but to wait for what the Father had promised. He said, ‘…in only a few days you will be baptized with the Holy Spirit.’” Acts 2 recorded how that promise came true. When have you needed to wait on God? Were you able to wait, or not? What did you learn through the experience? How good are you at moving, as Paul did, into unknown territory (physical or mental), if that’s what it takes to carry out the mission God calls you to?
Prayer:
Lord Jesus, you kept your prophetic promise on Pentecost, as in the end you keep all your promises. Help me, like Joseph, like Paul, like millions through the ages, to trust and move forward, holding to your promises. Amen.
Family Activity:
When Joseph learned Mary was pregnant, he may have felt confused, discouraged and even hopeless. Then, in a dream, an angel restored Joseph’s hope. Everyone feels hopeless at times, but because of Jesus, people can always have hope. As a family, create a collage of hope. Gather magazines, markers, glue, scissors and a piece of poster board. Look through the magazines and cut out pictures of images that bring hope to your family. Use the markers or crayons to draw pictures and write words that communicate hope. Include images and words representing what brings hope to the whole world. Place your collage of hope in your home where everyone can see it, or give the collage to someone who needs hope. Pray and thank God for your family and for hope.
-------
Dave Robertson is the Director of Community Life at the Church of the Resurrection’s West Campus.Dreams are very interesting to me. I took a short course on dream interpretation one time and learned some very interesting things. The course didn’t, however, explain to me why I dream what I dream.
Most of my dreams are just silly. I rarely have a scary or bad dream. Most of the time I’m playing right field for my favorite baseball team, or something happens that causes me to awaken and laugh.
I have had a couple of “holy” dreams in my life. I believe I had these because God had a message for me at that particular time, and I probably wasn’t listening well during my awake hours. One of these “holy” dreams involved Joseph, the earthly father of Jesus.
In my dream, Joseph had just discovered his betrothed, Mary, was with child and he knew it wasn’t his. He decided to seek advice about what to do from a prophet who resided on top of a nearby mountain. After hiking up the mountain, Joseph discovered another man meeting with the prophet with the same issue. He overheard the man ask the prophet, “My betrothed is with child and it is not mine. What should I do?” The prophet responded, “The Scripture proclaims you have the right to have her stoned to death.” That is exactly what the man wanted to hear and he set off down the mountain to see that it was done.
Joseph then asked the prophet the same question. “My betrothed is with child and it is not mine. What should I do?” The prophet responded the same: “The Scripture proclaims you have the right to have her stoned to death.” Joseph responded, “Is there anything else I can do?” The prophet’s response was, “You can have her put away quietly.” That is what, in my dream, Joseph decided to do.
I then awoke. God’s message to me was crystal clear. God chose Joseph to raise the Son of Man, the Christ, because Joseph had a heart like God’s. Joseph sought the most noble thoughts about life and about how to treat others.
There’s no going back to sleep when God gives you a “holy” dream. I went into another room and worked on the Bible study I was teaching. The story was about Abraham having an encounter with God. After the encounter, Abraham gathered rocks and built an altar to the Lord because of the “holy” moment he had had with God. I got up from my chair (in the middle of the night, mind you) and went outside. I found a small flat rock and inscribed the word Joseph on one side, and the Scripture from Genesis on the other. I placed it in the back yard, where I began a small rock garden. Anytime I had a “holy” moment, I added another rock.
God calls you to have a heart like God’s, to seek noble thoughts, dreams, and visions. God will help you with that when you surrender your life to God. Joseph was not alone in coming to the decision to take Mary as his wife. God gave him a message through an angel, or messenger. It took both the noble heart and the message from God to achieve God’s purpose. Seek nobility and God’s message in your life.
-------
Download the GPS App
The United Methodist Church of the Resurrection
13720 Roe Avenue
Leawood, Kansas 66224, United States
913.897.0120
-------
No comments:
Post a Comment