Interpreting Your Dreams
“If a prophet or a dreamer of dreams arises among you and gives you a sign or a wonder, and the sign or wonder that he tells you comes to pass, and if he says, ‘Let us go after other gods,’ which you have not known, ‘and let us serve them,’ you shall not listen to the words of that prophet or that dreamer of dreams. For the Lord your God is testing you, to know whether you love the Lord your God with all your heart and with all your soul. It is the Lord your God you must follow, and Him you must revere. Keep his commands and obey him; serve him and hold fast to him. Deuteronomy 13:1-4
Anyone who has ever had a dream they believe is from God or those who have desired to have dreams but have not, known just how frustrating the world of dreams can be.
Dreams are often filled with symbolism and timing that can leave us intimidated and confused as to what the source of the dream is and what is trying to be spoken through it.
Dreams can be very cryptic and symbolic in nature and we must be careful to know when to take parts of a dream literally and when to see it as representative of something else. For example; someone may have a dream in which their wedding ring is stolen and could assume a crime was about to be committed or the dream could represent a spiritual robbing of something intimate and personal from their lives.
One of the very first things to take note of upon waking from a dream is the overall primary emotion in and toward the dream itself. Based on that assessment (negative or positive, fearful or peaceful, excited or deflated, empowered or defeated and confused) I then ask Holy Spirit to begin to speak about the source of the dream, do I sense it is from God or is it fleshy or even demonic?
If the dream is from God or at least I am sensing it is from God, a good next step is to ask Holy Spirit for an increase in discernment of symbols in your dream. Since God speaks to His Children in very personal and intimate ways you will need to seek the Lord for interpretation of what you experienced and witnessed in your dream. For example, rising water in a dream for one person may cause terror of a fearful drowning effect while for another water represents the peaceful presence of Holy Spirits activity in their life.
God also uses dreams to open our eyes and ears to hearing His voice in times or seasons we are unable or unwilling to hear His voice while we are awake. We are not always open to hearing God’s voice because most of the time with our busy and hectic schedules, we close our ears and do not take the time to feel the Holy Spirit tugging at our hearts.
While God can speak to us when we set aside time for prayer and meditation, He also speaks to us sometimes when it’s inconvenient, like the times when you can barely hear yourself think. The times that life is so chaotic and crazy we feel we don’t have time to slow down to listen for what God might say. Or those times we put so much pressure on ourselves to hear that the stress of “not” hearing drowns out what God is trying to speak.
During our dreams, God can bypass our arguments, opinions and judgments toward a matter that can tend to dull our ability to hear. In our dreams, He is able to get straight to our hearts and speak without interruptions or resistance.
Even in our dreams, God will never contradict His word or His nature. So we can run our dreams through a test to discern if we need to pray into a dream or pray off a dream.
If the dream is full of the fruit of Holy Spirit or has precedence in the Word of God, or if the result of the dream brings repentance, conviction, restoration, reconciliation, empowerment to obey God etc. then that is a dream I am going to write down, pray into and ask Holy Spirit if there is anything I need to do to walk in obedience toward the fulfillment of the dream.
If the dream is full of fear, leads to terror, stirs a desire for sin, lust or rebellion, robs of hope or fills with condemnation and pride then I am going to pray for the protection of the Lord and shake off the dream by giving it no place in my thoughts and mind.
We have a tendency to allow these dreams to be rehearsed over and over in our minds giving them an increase of strength and power in our day time that is reinforced in our night hours by robbing us of rest and sleep. As a Child of God you have authority to put an end to these types of dreams! You are a Child of light and Gods desire is that you receive rest and sleep when its’ time to sleep. God doesn’t just want you to sleep, he desires for you to have sweet sleep!
"When you lie down, you will not be afraid; When you lie down, your sleep will be sweet." Proverbs 3:24
"I will both lay me down in peace, and sleep: for you, LORD, only make me dwell in safety." Psalm 4:8
God will be our defender and the One who watches over us as we sleep. He is not the author of dreams that cause us to be fearful of the night. He authors dreams that cause us to move forward in relationship with Him, that empower us to live abundant and beyond our self, lives that bring glory to His Name here on earth.
Today’s Prayer: Father God, give me courage to take authority over any dream that has not originated in your love for me. Thank you for your desire to reach me and speak to me through even the nighttime hours through dreams. Forgive me for any time I have made too much or too little of a dream sent by you. In Jesus Name! Amen.
Today’s Challenge: When you get ready to go to bed tonight, take a few minutes and ask the Lord to set a guard around your bed to watch over you as you sleep. Invite Him to speak to you as you are sleeping and for a supernatural recall in the morning to remember what you dreamed.
But there is a God in heaven who reveals mysteries, and he has made known to King Nebuchadnezzar what will be in the latter days. Your dream and the visions of your head as you lay in bed are these:
You must be able to determine if your dream or vision is of God or of the flesh. False dreams can come from our mind’s attempt to lead us away from God’s principles and precepts. In fact, false dreams can convey darkness’ own prophetic messages. Soulish dreams in particular speak to the heart’s fleshly desires.
But as he considered these things, behold, an angel of the Lord appeared to him in a dream, saying, “Joseph, son of David, do not fear to take Mary as your wife, for that which is conceived in her is from the Holy Spirit.
