The Gift

“Oh my god!” his mouth hung open. “I heard that if Jesus comes to you in a dream it means you’re gonna die!” Studying my overly dramatic and superstitious friend and seeing the seriousness of his concern, I noticed a strong feeling of fondness wash over me. “Well none of us are staying here forever,” I giggled. “But no, that’s not the feeling I got from the dream; it wasn’t ominous.” Abel shook his head, staring at the ground for a moment, deep in thought and then looked back at me. I could tell he was still convinced that this was a portend of disaster. “But are you sure it was Jesus? I mean, you’ve never gone to church so how can you really know?” “I’m sure. It was Jesus. Don’t ask me how I know though. I just do. It was like I knew him, personally. But to me he was more than Jesus…he was my friend, my brother, like you, someone I knew well. But you’re right – I don’t know why he would come to me, someone whose never even given him a second thought.” We continued to walk the shaded path along the river that ran through the city. “Granted, I liked what Jesus had to say in the bible but I’ve never believed that he’s…” “Don’t! Don’t even say it!” Abel squeezed his eyes closed and held up one frantically waving hand, as if to block the blasphemy that he expected to complete my thought. I laughed. “C’mon Abe, if Jesus is who everyone says he is then I’m sure he won’t be offended by my questioning. Someone who preached forgiveness and love isn’t gonna condemn me, right? And wasn’t that what Jesus came here for in the first place…to teach? I mean, if we already had the answers he wouldn’t have had to come, right? And isn’t a teacher’s job to provide answers? And what do answers follow?” My friend looked at me confused. “Questions!” I slapped him on the back, laughing. “Look, I’m not saying I know, In fact, I’m saying that I don’t know but that I am willing to know. And to me, it seems like that’s the only requirement: my willingness. But if that’s not enough then…” Still convinced that I was going to hell (I could tell), Abel interrupted, “what’s required is faith! You just have to have faith!” “But faith in what?” I asked. “Faith in Him!” he said exasperated.

I loved these talks with my Christian friend. I knew he meant well, and so I was never offended by his beliefs and he knew my heart, and so was never offended by all my questioning of them. I knew he’d appreciate my sharing the powerful dream I had, especially since he was always trying to convert me to Christianity and “witness” to me about Jesus, which I knew came from a place of love. I was 21 then.

“Like I said Abe, I am willing to know, but I’m not gonna have blind faith in something I know nothing about. That’s why I question things. “But that’s what faith is!” Abel raised his hands to the sky, frustrated. “Faith is being blind?” I messed with him. “Arg!” he rolled his eyes. I laughed again. “I’m just messin’ with you Abe…I know what you mean. But whose to say that Jesus coming to me in my dream last night wasn’t Him coming to spark my faith?” We stopped to sit in the shade and popped open our bottled waters and drank heavily. It was hot outside. “I suppose that could be true,” Abel wiped his mouth with his arm. “Tell me the dream again,” he re-positioned himself in the grass and gave me his full attention. “Okay,” I took another drink and then capped my water bottle.

“The dream began with me standing on top of a burning barn and it was dark, night-time. I didn’t know how I was gonna get down and I was looking for a way. Then I saw this thick rope land at my feet, like someone had thrown it up to me. I knew I was supposed to use it to climb down to safety. And I must have because the next thing I knew, I was sitting in the middle of what felt like a huge empty field. The barn was smoldering now and the fire had been put out. I was sitting on a bale of hay, now at a safe distance. Then without warning, I felt myself start to separate from my body. My body stood where it was, sitting on the bale of hay, but me…my spirit, the part of me that was aware of what was happening, was being pulled backward. When I stopped, I found myself watching my body from behind. It was then that I could see that I was not alone. Jesus and I were sitting side-by-side on this bail of hay in the middle of this dark field! All around us it was pitch dark except for one bright, golden light shining down upon us…like a spotlight. I noticed that we both had a shining glow around our bodies. We were both dressed in plain, off-white colored garb, like robes or something. The only difference was that his had a brown sash. Then I saw that Jesus was talking to me! He was telling me something and I was listening, nodding my head and taking in his words. And as he continued and I nodded in agreement, both our glowing became brighter, little by little. Thing is though, from where I was, I couldn’t hear him! I wanted to, so badly, but I couldn’t. It was so frustrating! I knew that what he was telling me was so important but I could not hear! I had no idea what he was saying. All I could see was the side of our faces turned slightly toward one another. And as he continued to speak and I listened, that shimmering, golden glow that shined outward from our hearts and the top our heads – it grew brighter and brighter! Then I woke up.”

“Arg!” Abel’s body loosed in frustrated disappointment. “I know!” I laughed, “that’s exactly how I felt when I woke up!” He scratched his head, messing up his hair even more than the usual unkempt frizz that he usually wore. “And you have no idea at all what he might have been trying to tell you?” Abel asked, frantically. “No. No I don’t. But I intend to find out!”

~*~*~*~

When I was a little girl, I recall being frightened by the pictures, statues and images of the agonizing or already dead guy called Jesus. I never understood why these images were glorified. Of course I was too young to understand, even if someone had tried to explain the idea of sacrifice that these images were meant to portray. I related more to the pictures of him with children and animals or even him standing behind and guiding a sailor steering a ship; I liked those ones. But the whole “death and dying” theme repelled me. As I got older, I didn’t want to know about any such “God.” Because even in my limited understanding, I had always thought that the point of Jesus’ life was the resurrection, not the crucifixion; life, not death. But every church I had ever been forced to enter by my grandmother or to attend for some funeral mass always seemed to honor his death more than his life. The biggest, most prominent focal point was always Jesus on the cross. Dying Jesus. Dead Jesus. Spooky Jesus!

And then I recall how, at the age of 7, my grandmother tried to force her religious beliefs upon me by sending me to Catechism class at a local Catholic church. The first time I heard we were gonna have to eat the body and drink the blood of Christ I was outta there! More spooky stuff! So my grandma would drop me off, I would wait until she was gone, then sneak away to play at a nearby park until it was time for her to come pick me up. Nu-uh! I wasn’t going back into that spooky place with all that death, blood and body-eating creepiness! If this was what God was all about, I wanted no part of it!

When Catechism didn’t work, my grandma somehow talked my mom into enrolling me in a Catholic elementary school. It wasn’t long before I made the decision to stop going! My mom had no idea of course, at first. Being a latch-key-kid, I was able to devise a plan. Mom and I would leave the house together and as she continued on her walk to the bus stop to go to work, I would turn down the block and presumably continue my walk to school. Ugh! The dread! Sister Paula Marie was a mean-spirited woman. She wore short fluffy hair and had big bushy eyebrows that crowded her beady little eyes. And her eyes set way too close together at the top of her giant nose which loomed down on children when she scolded them for no reason. Her only saving grace was the fact that she looked like one of my favorite Muppets from Sesame Street. I’d giggle to myself watching her fly-away hairs shake wildly and float up toward the ceiling as her little spittle landed on my face, even while slapping the top of my hand with her ruler. Maybe that’s why she picked on me so much…because she could tell I wasn’t afraid of her and suspected my amusement. Yes, “twisted-sister” combined with those scary images of that painfully wounded and bleeding man nailed to a cross – again – and then topped off with the weird “Bloody Mary” games the kids would try to force me to play in the girls bathroom mirrors; that was enough to guide my skinny little legs back around the block and straight back home!

Every morning I would put on my ugly, plaid school uniform, walk with mom to the corner, kiss her goodbye and skip right back around the block and let myself into the house and go about my day. Until finally, over a month later, I was busted! See, we didn’t have a phone and there was no internet back then, so in my mind there was no way my mom was ever going to find out that I had quit school. I was too young to consider the U.S. Postal Service however and we eventually received a letter inquiring into my whereabouts. My mom didn’t tell me about the letter but instead, played along as we left the house the next morning. I recall her asking way too many questions about school. How was I liking it, what was I learning, etc.? Having always been a terrible liar, this was pure torture for me! I could stand it no longer and burst into tears! I knew that she knew! She grabbed me by the ear and pulled me almost all the way to school, all the while me crying and begging her not to make me go back to that awful place! Almost there and sensing my very real anxiety, she finally stopped, looked at me and burst into laughter! “You really haven’t been to school in over a month?!” Very soon after, I was back in public school. Thank God for mom!

“Let those who have ears to hear, hear.”

Although by the age of 21 I had skimmed through the bible, I knew that my natural inclination to reject the laws of man and its ideas of God was something that had hardened my heart. I knew that I did not have the ears to hear. But thanks to that dream, one that the Spirit of Christ knew was the only way that I would be willing to open my heart to its message, the Spirit found its way in. That dream all those years ago did indeed spark a faith in me. I couldn’t get it out of my mind! I even drew a picture of it and have kept it always visible in the private spaces I create in all the homes I’ve lived in since then. Staring at it over the years and wondering what he was telling me is in large, part of what sent me on my quest to know. It ignited an urgency within me. I desperately wanted to know what Jesus was saying to me in that dream. I wanted to have the ears to hear.

Today I understand that to be the reason for the dream. And I say, the reason, because what was revealed to me in that dream is revelation that is still unfolding in my life today; something that I suspect will continue to unfold eternally. But on that night of the dream it was as if I were given the greatest gift of my life, all at once, and I am still unwrapping its treasures like a bottomless gift. So far, I have come to understand that this gift that the Spirit of Christ came to show me was a gift that had always been mine.

The gift is my own heart, open.

I just needed to be reminded. And that dream was exactly what I needed to awaken me to accept the gift that was already my own. How ironic that it took a dream to prompt my waking. But then again, isn’t life just a dream? Maybe that’s what all this is for…perhaps life is simply the dream we all need, to come upon our own awakening, and the gifts that lay dormant in every heart. Let us rise and shine!!!

In Love and Light,

ReV