(Edited by sister Cheryl Lowe)
I took a nap this afternoon. After spending some time with brother Tim Pinson, I feel led to pray a bit about the things we discussed. As I laid down on the sofa to pray, I fell asleep and had this dream… I almost forgot the whole thing, until I sat down later with another brother. As I shared bits and pieces with him, the importance of the dream came to me. So here are some understandings of it before I get into the details of the dream itself:
Prior to my rest time, I had intended to comment on Matthew 23. So I laid down on the sofa to do some reading on it until the portion where Jesus prayed in sorrow in the garden of Gethsemane. What stood out to me was in Chapter 24, where several parables were offered by Him to admonish us to be watchful concerning His second coming. Two details caught my attention and the Lord offered me some further insight.
In the parable of the servant of the house (Matt. 24:42-51) it is asked, “Who then is the faithful and wise servant, whom the master has put in charge of the servants in his household, to give them their food at the proper time?” It is interesting to notice that one servant was set apart to be in charge of providing food for other servants in His House. I do believe that this is the place where He intended for His disciples to serve. It is an apostolic, or foundational, position. Evidently Paul spoke of this in various places… (1 Cor. 3) Recently I read in Galatians, where he mentioned Peter, James, and John as “pillars of the Church.” It reminds me of the vision where I saw myself became a stone pillar and surveyed the courtyard. The symbol of food is evidently how the Lord refers to Himself at the Passover meal. It would also be the manner in which Peter would serve, when Jesus told Him thrice to “feed His sheep,” – His very life.
The next parable is about the ten virgins. Here, it is talking about midnight. We normally use our time to define this midnight at 12:00 am. Such, I suspect, is not the connotation of midnight here however. Rather it is referring to the mid-night watch, which is the most difficult time for one to remain alert and watchful (as shown in the Garden of Gethsemane, where He asked His disciples to keep watch for Him and yet they could not). Another thing that has escaped my attention in the past is that the five wise virgins are holding jars of oil. So they are carrying two items at the same time: a jar of oil, and a lit lamp. They have been able to shine light into the darkness of the night continuously. The foolish virgins, due to lack of oil, could not keep their lamps burning any longer. Because of this, they proved to be useless in lighting up His way. If the oil represents the Holy Spirit, then the lamp must be their lives, which is being rendered as a sacrifice or service to light up the way of His coming.
Now let me start the dream:
Wake-up Call For 1:00 AM
My dream began as I was woken up from sleep by a voice. “Wake up, brother. Can you wake me up at 1:00 am?” My second brother, B.B., came to my room and asked me while I was dozing off after studying something. The time was briefly before 12:00 am in the middle of the night. I woke up and assured him that I had gotten used to reading in the night, and it would be no trouble for me to do him this favor. It then dawned on me that he was leaving in the early morning to visit my eldest brother in another city.
Family Reunion
We had not had a family reunion for about 2 or 3 months. My second brother, my sister (older than me), and I had now come back home and enjoyed a great time with our parents. The house we came to was a new home, bought by my father about one year before. My parents had just moved into the new neighborhood, and the house was newly constructed. It seemed that none of us had been married yet. Only my eldest brother had already gotten married, and he was missing from the reunion because he had trouble with his marriage and had abandoned his family. He had chosen to leave his wife and son in the city where they had made their home. My father demanded that he come back to his family and work out his relationship with his wife. But the wife’s heart was hardened, and also the child. The abandoned boy’s heart had become callous towards his father and to others, even to the point of rebellion. This made it impossible for my eldest brother to reconcile with his wife. Neither would his son would yield to any plea of his love. News of this reached home, and a family meeting was arranged. It was decided that my second brother would come to his aid as a mediator to the abandoned wife and son before he returned to his own city.
My Eldest Brother’s Trouble with Marriage
A scene of this family meeting and discussion flashed in my mind as I learned all of this. In it, the three of us siblings were gathered to discuss this with our father. My second brother asked, “What if the wife does not listen to my mediation and demands a divorce? Should I have B.T. (my eldest brother) to wait for her heart to turn around, or permit them to separate?” My father answered: “If she will not listen to you, then let B.T. divorce her. We will not have anyone whose heart is not towards us included in our family. If she wants to go, so be it. Let your brother come back.” Now, as I saw this discussion happen in my dream, it also dawned on me that if this separation did happen, it would be the second divorce for my eldest brother. (In real life, my brother did have some problems with his wife, and their son was a little spoiled. But he was never married before her. He has only had one marriage.) It was implied also in the dream that he would not be able to get married again, unless he turned away from our home and family policy. (I was thinking of his age as I understood this implication. He was about 35 or little older, which is much younger than he actually is in real life). It seemed that we had all come to an agreement that as the new home was ready, all of us would move into it and live together eventually.
Last Clean-Up Item for Myself
Now, as I woke up from sleep in the dream, I found that I was in a room like one of the rooms in our old home in the small village where I grew up. In this moment the room seemed to belong to me alone. I had had a different room before this one, but it was similar to the room I had now. Now, I was in the process of being situated into this new room, where I had my laptop plugged in and was doing some writings. I recognized that I had some dirty clothes that needed to be taken care of. So I walked into my old room and found them under the sofa. There were two sets of clothes: (a T-shirt and a shorts, and a long-sleeved shirt and a pair of pants) and also a pair of sandals. I knew that I needed to get rid of all of these. Apparently, after I was moved into my new room, my parents had bought me some new clothes and it was “preferred” or “advised” that I should wear only my new clothes. But the old clothes were actually still quite new, and only the T-shirt and shorts were dirty. It took me some time to decide what to do with these old clothes. I remembered that I really wanted to keep the shirt and the pants. Anyway, these seemed to be the last items that I had to take care of in my transition.
Now the scene changed. I was brought back to one or two days before…
Moving My Old Stuff to An Open Space
It became clear that I had been in a college or university. Strangely, the college I went to was not in the same city where my eldest brother lived. (In real life, I went to a university in the capital city of our province, where my eldest brother’s family lived.) It became very clear that my educational life had nothing to do with them in the dream. In the dream, I lived far away from his family. Now, as my second brother was ready to visit my eldest brother after the family meeting, I discussed with my father that I would like to have my bed and a folding table delivered to them by my second brother. My father agreed. So the three of us (my father, my second brother, and myself) packed up the bed and the table on a cart and decided to move it to a storage place.
Surveying Our Properties
We pushed the cart out of our house (Area B) and down a corridor, which was situated between two walls to an open place (Area E). The place was at the end of a strip, walled or bordered on either side with different sections allotted for diverse purposes. (I made a sketch of it. It roughly draws out the sections for your reference…) There were many young students playing around (middle or high school boys and girls). Obviously the students knew us well and enjoyed freely of our kindness towards them. We, as a family, were happy to see these young people taking advantage of what we could offer to them.
Now here is a part either I am confused within my memory, or it was a little messed up in my dream… Anyway, as we walked back, we first followed the way where we came from, which is the corridor. However, now it seems that I could see through the high walls on either side. I saw next to the playground that there was a sports court and some students were playing basketball in a very nice playground area (Area D). There were other sports grounds as well. This was a place for more serious or formal games. On the other side, which was another strip of space, there were young people as well, but there were no buildings.
Suddenly we changed sides. We were now walking from the other side of our strip and looking to our right of a school building. It was a very tall building, with many stories. I recognized that somehow my father had made a good purchase with the sports yards and the open space, but the school remained independent and operational and was not very friendly to us. The school grounds were enclosed and would not allow us to approach. The people who ran the school shied away from us as well. But somehow, they could not prevent their students from befriending us, so our spaces were available to be used for their enjoyment.
Now, next to it was our house. Enclosed with four walls was a crimson (a mixture of red and brown) castle. It was a very stately and elegant structure. I recognized that my rooms were actually situated on the second or third floor, just behind two pillars.
Discussion of Moving Our House
As we walked by, I began to suggest to my father that it would be wonderful if we could move our house adjacent to the places we just bought, so all our properties would be together. My father enjoyed the idea greatly. He responded that even if he could have the school agree to move, we would not be able to do so, as the buildings had already been built in their places. Now interestingly, my father seemed to enjoy great authority and influence. The people in charge of the school, like it or not, would have to yield to his decision if their interests were not seriously undermined.
A Craftsman Offered Solution
Suddenly, coming out of nowhere, a craftsman offered us a solution. Somehow, there were actually a good team of experienced craftsmen who accompanied us during our walk, ready and eager to work on the things that my father would assign them to get their hands on. The one who had the solution was a white man in his 40s, a typical workman with a strong build and a weathered red face. He felt greatly honored and excited that he could finally offer us his help. It was as if he was ready to do whatever was required of him. In the dream, the Lord revealed to me that he was an angel who had long waited for his assignment. He was very happy that his time had finally come.
The solution was very simple. According to him, we could easily cut the bedrock upon which the foundations of the two buildings were laid, and shift their places. My father and I expressed our doubt. Strangely, by this time, my second brother had faded out the scene.
An On-Site Study
The craftsman was eager to prove the feasibility of the deal. We then went to look at a block behind our house, where new foundations of a building were recently laid. It seemed to be also our property, but the construction had ceased, or was in waiting to be continued. I could not recall the exact nature of its usage but it seemed that it was going to be a tall building of condos. The workman showed us a hole in the ground where a layer of thick rock (about one and half average human body height) was revealed. He began to explain how to cut the rock and put wood boards under the four edges and lift the whole building up. It seemed to be fairly easy. He shared that he had done this before; it did not even need wide boards. In my vision, I saw our house being lifted up on four lines of thin wood boards. Now, my father was concerned about how exactly to do that. The workman motioned enthusiastically to show us how it could be done. He began to step back a bit at the edge of the hole (Spot 1) in the middle of the block. I (Spot 3) had to warn him to step forward. As I did so, a young black girl (Spot 4), obviously one of the students hanging around, curious about what was going on, asked my father why the foundation was laid in the shape of four walls within the block. (These young people seemed to be very familiar with us.) My father explained to her that it was the right way to build something up on top of it, as the other two buildings were designed with the same pattern. As they were talking, I took notice that it was getting quite late, almost 7:00 pm. It was time for the youngsters to get back to their dorms or school. My father took my advice and decided that we would stop the study and continue it the next day.
(A note: After I woke up, I was really intrigued by the four walls design with the foundation. I asked the Lord why this pattern. He told me to open up the Bible. I opened it to Ezekiel 46:21-24.)
Some comments:
- I took a walk after all this. I asked the Lord why my old brother was getting divorced. Is he representing the institutional church or something else? The answer, which is not so certain, is that it might point to certain apostolic leaders of the day. The first divorce implies that they had separated from the institutional church. But after that, the second wife also became burdensome and unfaithful. Their son is rebellious. Their family is not a functional family. They will have to repent and return on the call to come back to our family.
- My second brother, as in many other dreams, might represent the Lord himself; while my father is my Heavenly Father. The craftsman and his companies, as revealed during the dreams, are angels.
- I do not know what to make of the school. I suspect it is the present-day leadership, who knows only how to teach, and encloses itself from the needs and desires of young people, God the Father, and the Lord Jesus Christ. Even though it has positioned itself in the place of the House of God, it could not teach others the ways of the family of God.
- I think that the three sections represent the pattern of the temple of the Lord. The sports yard was designed for professional usage, while the open space is a playground, indicating different orders within each sphere.
- The relationship of the young students with the school and us as a family is very illuminating as well. They are caught in a transition, not of their own choice. The next strip was also interestingly symbolic. I believe it is a counterfeit. There is no school or home in the whole place. No building at all.
- The composition of people of all races is very interesting as well.
- My old clothes hidden under the sofa imply personal sins: the lust of the flesh, the lust of the eyes, and the pride of life. These have constantly hindered me to walk in the newness of life. It is time to deal with them completely.
- The new lots, the new home, and the right placement of the buildings imply that the Father is serious about putting things in order this time. He does not want His little ones running around anymore. Interestingly, I just finished commenting on Matt. 23, where Jesus wept over Jerusalem. He will gather His own and bring them back to the Father.
