HE DREAMED

Otago Daily Times, Issue 26245, 31 August 1946, Page 3

HE DREAMED

THE MIND AND CONDUCT Written for the Otago Daily Times By the Rev. Gardner Miller The Bible is the most wonderful picture gallery. On its walls are hung portraits of men and women without a flattering touch. Sometimes it seems as if the portrait painters of the Bible were determined to reveal every blotch and weakness. The ruthless truth of the Bible is one of the reasons why it has never been displaced by any other book. And if you pay attention to the portraits in this amazing picture gallery you will see that some of the sitters are painted more than once; and if you have eyes that can see beneath the surface you will be aware of a subtle difference in each portrait. Right'by the doorway of the gallery you will, at once, recognise the portrait of a man whose story is better known to millions to-day than is the story of any modern statesman. It is the portrait of Jacob; and, in fact, there are three portraits of him in the gallery. This man Jacob has a peculiar fascination for us; he left his mark upon history that nothing can rub out. He was a shifty character and God had to use drastic measures to shape him for great purposes. Jacob was a man whose deeds were dramatic; cheating his father, being cheated himself, wrestling with an unseen antagonist and, above all, his dream. This latter episode is the first thing that grasps the mind as soon as his name crosses it’s threshold. Jacob the dreamer! It is probably because most of us dream that we feel interested in Jacob’s dream. I say most of us, for not everyone dreams. I have a friend who has never had a dream in his life. And I think it would be true to say that we are all interested in dreams because of the general hope that we might dream of something very wonderful that will happen to us one day. I am not going to write about dreams, of how they occur and their meanings, but I would like to tell you of a dream that amazed me. It happened just about two weeks ago. I made a hurried visit back to Christchurch to meet my fellow workers and to discuss with them a very important matter. Not one knew what I intended placing before the meeting. Naturally no one could know what the discussion would be, I least of all, for I had made sure that my own views and decision were to be determined by the meeting after all the facts had been discussed. A decision was made, so very important that we all felt that we were shaping the future course of our life’s work. Next morning walking across - the Square I met one of the city’s derelicts, a man whom I and my workers have tried for years to rescue. He stopped me with the words, “Mr Miller, I dreamed about you last night.’’ And thereupon he told me what had happened at the meeting in my house and the decision we had arrived at. It was uncanny. There was not, I knew, the slightest possibility of his contacting any of those present at the meeting. I frankly took it as a sign that God had honoured our decision, knowing from experience that He chooses all kinds of messengers for His purposes. So when I read that Jacob had a dream I immediately ask myself what is the God-intention behind it. You will remember that in his dream Jacob saw A Ladder. You will find the story of his dream in Genesis, chapter twenty-eight. The ladder is obviously a means of communication. The pith of the dream is that this crafty man who was always out to get the best of a bargain, was inly aware of the Presence of God. That his ideas of God—so bluntly expressed in the second paraphrase (O, God of Bethel)—cannot be ours, for bargaining with God is obnoxious to us. must not prevent us from being fair to Him. What to me is so important here is that even to a man like Jacob God is willing to reveal Himself. And when I think of my own life, so richly endowed with the knowledge of God as Jacob’s could not be, I am amazed that God should condescend to me. So it was that to Jacob then came the sense that God had not forsaken him in spite of his cheating. I sometimes think that it is only when the demands of the day are dismissed in sleep that God has a chance to speak to some of us. “ He giveth His beloved, sleep,” means much more than that He closes our eyes; it means that many of His gifts which we could not see during our waking hours He makes us see in our sleep and presents us with them. Who has not known the gift of the quiet mind, the answered question, the solved problem, as the results of God’s goodness to us when we slept! Whether we are aware of our dreams or not, there is a spiritual restoration going on, that is, if we take care to be in tune with God as we lie down to sleep The Pavement But after the ladder there came, the hot dusty road, to Jacob. To us, it is the pavement. I am a lover of pavements, for where the feet of the multitude have stood there rises the song, sad and joyful, of humanity It is what we do on the pavements, on the ways by which daily life leads us, that our characters are made. To dream is fine, but not to translate your dream into deeds is fatal; for then you

become unfit for the hurly-burly of life. What occupies the mind determines the conduct. If your mind in sleep is in spiritual communion with God then your feet should be active in goodness during your waking hours. I know it is possible to hold within yourself the serenity and strength of your communion with the loving Christ and to draw upon that strength and serenity during the demands of your working day. If ever there was a true statement in the New Testament it is that which says that Christ lives in us. When our lives are His, ‘in sleep and in activity, His Presence is never withdrawn, though often we pull down the blinds of the soul’s windows. Life is hard for most people. God has not promised immunity to any of us from the grind and the dust, but He will refresh us in our dreams, if we seek His face at all times. Then with my waking thoughts. Bright with Thy praise—to be Nearer, my God to Thee! Nearer to Thee.