Word Dreams
“So he got up, took the child and his mother and went to the land of Israel. But when he heard that Archelaus was reigning in Judea in place of his father Herod, he was afraid to go there. Having been warned in a dream, he withdrew to the district of Galilee, and he went and lived in a town called Nazareth. So was fulfilled what was said through the prophets, that he would be called a Nazarene.”
Today’s Text: Matthew 2:13-23 (Living Life Daily Devotional)
God’s great plan of salvation for the world in Christ Jesus will be fulfilled whether I realize it or not—whether I choose to ignore it or not.
There are about 8.3 billion people living on this earth, and most of them either have never heard about or simply choose to ignore the reality of God’s great plan of salvation for the world in Christ Jesus. And yet, God’s great plan of salvation for the world in Christ Jesus is the reality that drives all of human history. It is the reality that determines the course of every single one of our lives.
All of us don’t get to experience God’s great plan of salvation for the world in the way that Joseph did. Some people may wish that God would guide our lives on a material level in the same way that He guided Joseph to Nazareth so that the word of the prophets might be fulfilled.
Is that really what we want, though? Because God’s guidance of Joseph came through dreams. If I were Joseph, would I trust that God was guiding me through my dreams?
Recently, I’ve had a couple of opportunities to share my testimony of how I chose a life of ministry. It started with a dream: “Follow Me!” We didn’t. Not right away.
Five years later, there was even a prayer for a sign. “Lord, Do you want me to go into ministry? If You do, make it rain.” And it rained. And yet, I chose to think of that sign as “just a coincidence caused by global warming.” Until my pastor said explicitly from the pulpit on that Sunday, “What’s up with the rain this past week? It never rains this late in the season.”
When he said that, a dark and heavy cloud came over my heart that I knew was the Holy Spirit. I tested God, not at all expecting that He would call me.
I was scared. I had a nice home in Livermore. I had three beautiful kids. I had a wife who had clearly expressed her feelings about our going into ministry five years earlier: “over my divorced, dead body!”
But then, one day, out of the blue, she says to me: “You used to think about going into ministry. Are you still thinking about it?” I was in no mood for a fight (I never am). But I couldn’t deny the fact that God had flung the door wide open for me to tell her about the rain. And when I did, she goes, “If God has called you, then I have to follow.” There was the real sign.
I started seminary that August. And interestingly enough, one of the first classes I took was Old Testament. And the professor said that testing God with prayers like I did often demonstrates fear and a lack of trust in God.
Because if God had been tugging on my heart to pray that prayer in the first place, should I not just trust Him and say, “Lord, Here I am.”
With every dream that God had given to Joseph, Joseph never tested God. He just trusted.
We all receive direct guidance for our lives through the word of God. It may not be telling us to move to Egypt or Nazareth or to even go into ministry (or is it?), but God is guiding us to the purpose of our lives: God’s great plan of salvation for the world in Christ Jesus.
Father, You have a plan for all of us. Forgive me when I disregard Your plan, because it’s not what I want to do. Help me—help us—to see the joy that we reap in trusting in You and pursuing Your plan for our lives. In Jesus’s name. Amen.
