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Summer Refresh: 4 Questions to Start Interpreting Dreams
125 Plays1 year ago
In the second part of our Summer Refresh series, we revisit some essentials originally aired in Episode 4 that will help set you up for success when identifying the sources of dreams and knowing where to start when interpreting. Grab a pen and paper because this is chock-full of dream interpretation GOLD! Taking her own advice, Margaux also goes through two examples of dreams from her life to model interpretation for us.
4 sources of our dreams: Body, Soul, Demonic realm, God
Before interpreting dreams:
- Write the date! If you happened to be somewhere that’s not your norm, this could add to interpretation.
- Write a title for your dream. For example, if it were a film, what would you title it so you could easily pick it out from a pile?
- Write down your emotions. Were they primarily positive or negative? This is an indicator of the source and can help with interpreting symbols within the context and with the witness of Holy Spirit.
Then, invite Holy Spirit to come be with you and to help interpret the dream.
4 Questions to ask when interpreting dreams:
- Who or what is this dream about?
- What area of your life does this pertain to?
- Are there any recurring themes in the dream?
- What are the main focuses of the dream?
*Scripture References: John 6:53-69; 1 Corinthians 1:27; Mark 4:21-25; Proverbs 25:2; 1 Corinthians 2:10
“God is not the author or source of all dreams, but this is secondary in importance to His sovereignty and relational pursuit of us through them.”
“The spirit realm operates on attention. If we’re going to talk about the currency of the Kingdom, we’re going to talk about faith. We have all as humans been endowed with this gift of faith, and we get to choose where we deposit this currency.”
More on Breathing Underwater Membership HERE
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Email: margaux@permissiontoreign.com
Instagram: @permission_to_reign
Intro Music by Coma-Media from Pixabay
Image by Claire Fischer from Unsplash
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Transcript
Introduction to Breathing Underwater Membership
00:00:00
Speaker
Opening this September is a fresh season of the Breathing Underwater membership. If you're ready to dive into God's voice in your dreams and in your life and grow in a prophetic community, this is the place for you. We'll be having an open house in August, so keep your ears peeled for that, and there's more details in the show notes. This is Breathing Underwater, the summer refresh series.
Humanity's Spiritual Design
00:00:30
Speaker
We were designed to hunger for the deep things of God, to thrive on faith and wonder, to seek out divine wisdom that defies human logic. We were designed to unlock the mysteries of God. This is Breathing Underwater.
Understanding Metaphor and Symbolism in Dreams
00:01:00
Speaker
Welcome back to Breathing Underwater. My name is Margo. I'm your host. This is episode four. We are cruising through. Last week, we talked about symbolism and the importance of learning the language of metaphor and symbolism and parable in the interpretation of our dreams because the majority of our dreams are going to be symbolic in nature. Even if we have literal dreams or there are literal elements to our dreams, learning the language of symbolism and recognizing that that's a primary way God speaks is very core to interpretation. So if you didn't get a chance to listen to last week's episode, I advise you to go back and listen to that.
00:01:43
Speaker
we are going to be building on that revelation today and really rounding out um what we learned last week and bringing real practicals to the process of interpretation. So today I'm going to be giving you a list of questions to ask and really just bring structure and boundaries to the process of
Sources of Dreams
00:02:08
Speaker
interpreting. So Yay. If you are a note taker today, you're going to be real excited because it's going to be a note taking kind of day. So go ahead and grab a pen and paper, however you take notes. And I'm going to jump in. Pun intended. Jump in. Get it? Breathing underwater. Jumping in. Okay. Anyway, I thought it was funny.
00:02:30
Speaker
I'm just going to jump in really first by answering a question that I get asked often. I think it's a good question, a valid question, an important question. And that question is, are all of my dreams from God? Now, if you've listened to the trailer for this podcast, you know that I made a pretty but bold statement in that trailer. I said that if we can push past our rational minds to seek after deeper understanding that we will find God in our dreams every time. And I stand by that claim.
00:03:06
Speaker
Now, do I believe that God is the author of all of our dreams? No, I do not. I actually think we have different authors and different sources of our dreams, but that is all really of secondary importance underneath the fact that God is so sovereign and he is relational and he is always pursuing us. And if we have the courage to sit with our dreams, even the ones that make feel a little weird or it might not be sourced in God himself, if we have the courage to sit with them, we will see him speaking to us. We will hear his voice speaking through that information.
00:03:46
Speaker
and that content. So, what do I mean that there are different sources to our dreams?
00:03:53
Speaker
Well, I have been taught and I do believe that there are four different sources that our dreams can come from. And that is the body, the soul, the demonic realm, and God.
Interpreting Body and Soul Dreams
00:04:06
Speaker
So I'm going to break those down briefly. If we're talking about body dreams, we're talking about a dream that we might have where our body is communicating to us. This could be as simple as, I dream that my arm is falling off. And I wake up to realize that I was sleeping on my arm and it had fallen asleep. And it was numb, you know, that tingly feeling. So this was my body actually saying, hello, cut off circulation. And it ended up manifesting in a dream of my arm being cut off. So my body was telling me, just roll over, I need some circulation.
00:04:37
Speaker
This could mean that I am having an increase of dreams that are really anxious or I'm feeling really fatigued and flat in my dreams. And maybe this is because there's some sort of chemical imbalance or adrenal fatigue that's going on that I didn't have the space or capacity to actually pay attention to in my waking life. You know, our bodies speak to us and it's really easy for us to push past pain because we've gotten used to it. But pain is actually a voice. Pain is a voice saying something's wrong, something's off, can you pay attention to me? I need something here from our bodies. So because we focus so much on whatever we have to focus on in the day, our families, our work, our job, the the stresses of life, it's easy to miss stuff like that. And so our bodies might be actually using our dream life to communicate that something physiologically could be going on. And so this is definitely something to consider.
00:05:36
Speaker
I would say the body our body dreams are fewer and further between than the rest of the sources for sure, but it is a valid source of a dream. Then we have soul dreams, which I think, conversely, are actually a lot of the dreams that we're having. And these are the dreams where our soul is speaking to us or processing things. And when I say soul, I mean our emotional life. I mean our hearts, our mind will and emotions. Again, there are not enough hours in the day to process all of the things that we are taking in and the feelings.
00:06:10
Speaker
especially if we're in a season of stress or transition or trauma or loss, our soul is always trying to catch up in processing because often we don't we don't give enough space during the day, which I would challenge us all to do to actually shift that to pay more attention to emotionally what's happening and the well-being of our souls during our waking life. But because we don't always have that space, our souls are processing a lot out in the night. So this could be current things or this could be past stuff that we're processing. And these dreams are going to feel, I would say, mostly pretty emotional. Pretty roller coaster emotion, if you will. probably anxiety or fearful or stress-oriented, a lot of the familiar feelings that we would experience during the day getting process processed out at night. Now these dreams, I actually have a really high value for. Just because the source is our own soul, I i think very highly of our souls and I believe God does too.
00:07:19
Speaker
I believe our souls are so beautiful and intricately made and that they were created to actually be in connection to God and to live whole and in health. And so if we aren't actually living in wholeness and health and in connection to God in all these places, these dreams are just a beautiful invitation to that very thing. Let me give you an example. There's a reoccurring dream I was having, I would say this was a couple months ago, where I was missing my plane or I was missing a train somewhere. And I knew in the dream it was really important that I was making these flights and these train connections. And when I would miss it, I would feel so frustrated and devastated in my dream. And I would wake up feeling that way. I'd feel
Understanding Demonic Dreams
00:08:06
Speaker
awful. I'd feel stressed. I'd feel angry. I'd feel frustrated and and sad, really, like I missed it. I lost it.
00:08:13
Speaker
And of course, my first instinct is like, I don't want to sit with this dream. I don't want to sit with this feeling for one moment longer than I need to, right? But the reality is that information and that emotion was already sitting in my heart anyway. And just because I go through my day and I put on my hopeful hat and I speak truth and I decide to rise above it, doesn't mean it's gone. Doesn't mean that fear and that worry isn't there. So I decided to take my own advice, which, hey, I'm pretty good at that. Taking my own advice and valuing this dream, especially because it was reoccurring. I'm like, all right, something is being said here. And really what was being said that it was that my heart was afraid.
00:08:54
Speaker
that my heart was feeling fear, that I'm not doing enough, that I'm going to miss my destiny, that I'm going to miss my calling, that the ship's taken off without me metaphorically, if you will. And of course, this just isn't true. This just isn't the way it works when we are walking with Jesus and in the counsel of the Holy Spirit. We depend on God for timing. We depend on God to open doors and get us on planes metaphorically. and literally. And so once I sat with my soul and was like, I hear you. I hear that you're feeling this and went to God. I'm sorry. I'm feeling this fear that I'm trusting in this fear, like it's up to me. And I just released it to you. And I came back into that relationship with my source again, being God and Him carrying the heavy weight of this. So this was a beautiful example of me having a soul dream, wanting to throw it out, but instead going, Oh no, I'm going to let this draw me into intimacy with God and myself.
00:09:51
Speaker
It's important that we're having self-connection. And then we have the next source. Number three is demonic dreams. These are often pretty darn obvious. It can look like a couple different things. It can look like the classic nightmare, which I think most of us are familiar with. And those are not fun dreams. And those are not okay, actually, for those of us who are in relationship with Jesus and are walking, like I said, in the counsel of the Holy Spirit. Having these dreams should not be the norm. If they are, no shame. This is just a beautiful
00:10:28
Speaker
indicator that something is off, and the kindness and sovereignty of God is allowing you to have these dreams to show you that somehow the realm of darkness or the demonic realm is has access to you, has access to your heart, has access to your thoughts, has access to your emotions, has access to your dream life somehow. And when we do recognize that, then we can better contemplate this and sit with, okay, where have I actually opened a spiritual door to give access to this? Or where have I partnered with something that is allowing access to my heart and emotions and my dream life? This might be really obvious. Like, yeah, I full on watched a horror film last night, and it was really scary. And I just opened that door to fear wide open. And now I actually need to go and shut that door and come out of agreement with that.
00:11:26
Speaker
Or it might not be as obvious. It might be something from the past, but it's the kindness of God to reveal this in the moment. Maybe in your past you had gone to see a fortune teller or partnered with some kind of witchcraft or had that going on in your life. And now it's starting to show up in your dream life. And and God is just showing you, hey, this door isn't shut yet. This is still open. These spirits still have access to you. And so you can then go with him and shut that door and come out of agreement. So beautiful, such a redemptive purpose.
00:11:59
Speaker
This could also mean that we are just partnering in our in our faith life with the wrong realm. So the spirit realm operates on attention. And if we're going to talk about the currency of the kingdom, we're going to talk about faith. So we have all, as humans, been endowed with this gift of faith. And we get to choose where we deposit this currency. Are we going to deposit this currency into fear's bank account? Are we going to put our trust in fear? Are we actually going to deposit our faith into worry? Are we going to put our faith in divination and horoscopes? Are we going to deposit our faith in scripture? Are we going to deposit our faith in what God is speaking? Are we going to deposit our faith in hope?
00:12:54
Speaker
Are we going to deposit this currency into our trust and relationship with God? We get to choose that. So if we've been making deposits into fears bank account or into controls bank account, then we're actually giving focus. and attention to that realm, and that's giving it space to speak into our
God Dreams and Divine Imagery
00:13:21
Speaker
lives. so So it could just be as simple as, oof, I need to adjust that, I realize, just like in my dream. I was putting a lot of my currency into my ability to make something happen or not, which I would call a spirit of performance or false responsibility or just fear, fear that I was going to miss it. So I just recognized it and was like, oh, I'm making a withdrawal. I'm taking my,
00:13:44
Speaker
my faith back out of that account and I'm going to put it over here instead. And then, of course, we have God dreams. Actually, you know what? I'm going to pop back and say one more thing about demonic dreams because sometimes these are very discernment oriented and I want us to just know that this is a really important way to dream as well. I would say I have a lot of these because my strongest gift, I would say, is discerning of spirits. And that means that I naturally feel sense pick up on what's happening in the spirit realm. Now that could mean demonic spirits, that could mean the angelic, that means the Holy Spirit, that means human spirits. So I'm just picking up on spiritual dynamics all the time during the day, and I'm doing it while I'm sleeping as well.
00:14:29
Speaker
But because I'm also called as an intercessor and to partner with the kingdom of God and release His kingdom on earth, when I have these dreams of discernment where I'm picking up demonically what's happening in a situation, this is essentially me getting a battle plan. This is God exposing what's happening on the enemy's side. And now I have the upper hand and I get to use the authority that He has given me. and pray into that or release his word into that situation. So sometimes he's just pulling back the veil on something that's going on in a situation and he's showing us demonically what's happening there so that we see Kim for his answer.
00:15:10
Speaker
and we get to release his answer in prayer over that situation. So those are going to feel demonic because you're actually feeling and sensing and discerning those spirits and the source might be from from the demonic realm, but God is using it. He's absolutely using it so that we're not unaware and that we can wield our sword of authority. So again, it's all a call into intimacy and into truth and clarity. Okay, now we'll move on to God dreams. God dreams are our favorite. And I would say that they're usually pretty easy to discern, but not always. If you have that sense, oh, that was a significant dream. I just know it. It's a God dream.
00:15:51
Speaker
It's a God dream. If you wake up feeling just overwhelmed with peace and joy or that deep, holy experience of His presence, or you're feeling super connected to Him or or seeing the throne room or having a heavenly experience, that's going to be quite obvious in your dreams. And those are all all important um types of God dreams that we can have, encounter dreams, healing dreams where he's actually imparting healing, where his presence is really, really tangible.
00:16:24
Speaker
But then we have other God dreams where that his presence might not be quite as tangible as that, but he's still speaking through the dream. And one of the ways I would say that I know it's a God dream is when my emotions were really positive in the dream, even if the imagery was weird, because sometimes imagery is weird. And let's be real, God's imagery is weird. I mean, if we just take a minute and go and look at Ezekiel and the visions that he was having, visions s injury and dreams, hello, he's seeing like, you know, heavenly creatures that have eyes on eyes and wings all around and there's some crazy stuff going on there. Or the vision that John had of revelation. I mean, that's some really interesting and challenging imagery, right? So God's imagery and language and symbolism can be a little weird and it can feel offensive to our rational minds.
00:17:15
Speaker
So this is why it's really important that we are partnering with faith and that we are paying attention to what we're sensing and hearing so that we're not allowing offense to keep us from what God wants to speak to us.
00:17:34
Speaker
It's one of my favorite stories in scripture. It's in John 6, where Jesus is speaking to the disciples, many disciples. This was more than just the 12. He had many following him at this point, and there were some pre-believer Jews there as well. And he makes the audacious statement that if, unless you eat of my body and drink of my blood, you will have no life in me. and they are offended. He repeats this two or three times and people are so weirded out and grossed out and so offended in their minds that a chunk of his disciples left that day, Scripture says. It says in that passage that many of them left. And Jesus says, so I've offended you and even speaks to his own disciples and Peter included, so are you going to leave too? Is my language too offensive for you?
00:18:33
Speaker
You know, he wasn't in that moment like, oh, wait, wait, wait, don't go anywhere. Let me just explain really quick what I meant. You know, like this, this is actually prophetic and oh no, don't leave. I'm sorry. I offended you. Oh, I love Jesus. He doesn't do that at all. He just lets it fall. He just lets that imagery fall and lets the childlike remain and the prideful leave. And how many times is that us too? that we can think, oh, we know what this means. Oh, I'm just going to judge this immediately. Oh, this isn't anything. I'm not going to pay attention to it. That's foolish. But he uses the foolish things to confound the wise. And I love in this moment, he's like, are you going to leave too, Peter? Peter's like, where would I go? Where else would we go, Lord? You you have the words of eternal life. They come from you. So we're staying. And that's the invitation for us.
00:19:29
Speaker
I love in Mark 4, I'm gonna read this actually from the Passion Translation. This is when Jesus is teaching about um the parable of the lamp and how important it is to put a lamp on a lamp stand so that everything that is hidden will be revealed. Just after that he says, be diligent. to understand the meaning behind everything that you hear. For as you do, more understanding will be given to you. And according to your longing to understand, much more will be added to you. For those who listen listen with open hearts, that child-likeness without offense, for those who listen with open hearts will receive more revelation. But those who don't listen with open hearts will lose what little they think they have. Boom, Jesus.
00:20:20
Speaker
That is mark for 24.
00:20:28
Speaker
So this is the invitation to all of our dreams. For those of us who are hungry and longing to understand, keep our hearts open and we're going to receive revelation and we're going to receive him on the other side of these dreams. So this is going to take practice. And let me just tell you, I even wake up from a dream and I'm already judging it in my natural mind and thinking, I don't want to touch that because I think I already know what it means. And 90% of the time when I do actually sit with it, it doesn't mean what my rational mind thought it meant. It isn't as literal as I thought it was. That thing didn't mean what I thought it meant. It was actually something else that once I sought out the mystery, it was revealed to me.
The Joy of Discovering Mysteries
00:21:17
Speaker
This is another amazing scripture. This is from Proverbs 25. It says, it is the glory of God to conceal a matter, and it is the glory of kings to search it out.
00:21:32
Speaker
And this is where we're at. God doesn't conceal things because he's trying to trip us up or keep us locked out of some sort of revelation. He loves to be found. He loves to be known. But I think he is wanting to train us in what it means to be royalty, what it means to be kings and queens, what it means to have the glory of seeking out a matter. And I can tell you. without question that when we seek it out and we find that revelation that was hidden in there, the glory of God is so palpable. I actually just helped a friend interpret a dream yesterday and we knew it was an important dream. We knew we were going to get something out of it. We went in with childlike faith and from the outside, it looked like, you know, kind of just a normal dream or, yeah, this is going to be prophetic. There's definitely symbolism in here.
00:22:23
Speaker
But as we mined into this dream, we had no idea the depth that it went to and how deeply it touched her heart and how profoundly God spoke to these questions that she had had and brought peace to a whole seasonal situation. We just didn't see it when we took it at face value. So it's just this beautiful honor. as kings and queens, as sons and daughters, to be able to take the posture of a child and to be hungry and long for his mysteries. Amen. Amen, Margo. Man, really wish I could hear you guys say amen back to me, but it's okay. I'm just saying it in my head.
00:23:13
Speaker
Okay, now we know the four sources of dreams, and I'm going to move on now to some important questions to ask and steps to take prior to the interpretation that are going to very much help point us to the interpretation of the dream. Now, if you listen to episode one, At the end of that episode, I gave you three little things that I advise you do anytime you're recording your dream. Now, if this is when in the middle of the night when you're just getting up to write a couple details down or get your dream onto a voice memo, you don't have to do it in this moment. But do it when you actually go to write the dream out or sit with the dream.
00:23:56
Speaker
Even if you're going to write it out and shelf it for a while, meaning put it on the shelf, I would write these three things down with the dream as soon as you can. And that is the date that you had it. First, the date that you had it. Sometimes the date can actually correlate to the interpretation, especially if you're going back to a dream after a couple of years, then it can help jog your memory of actually contextually what was going on in your life at that time.
00:24:23
Speaker
I would also write down if you happen to be somewhere that's not your home or not your norm. If you have a particular dream while you're visiting a friend's house or you're in a hotel or you're in a different country, I would write that down because that could definitely add to the interpretation. The second thing I would do is write a title for your dream. Give it a quick title. You don't have to stress about this, but just think if it were a film, like how would I title it quickly so that I'd be able to find it again in a pile.
00:24:52
Speaker
And then thirdly, I would record the emotions that you had in the dream. If you can't remember each emotion, it doesn't mean you have to be like, I felt fear in this point. And then I was anxious in this moment. And then I was disillusioned in this moment. Like if you have that kind of clarity, great, write it down. But really more than anything, what we're looking for is the overall positive or negative emotion of the dream. This is going to be an indicator, like I mentioned before, potentially of the source of the dream, but it's also going to be really important in how we are interpreting the symbols with the emotion and the context of the dream, and of course with the witness of the Holy Spirit.
00:25:32
Speaker
So we have those three things written down. So then when we're going to actually interpret the dream, we sit down or we go for a walk or whatever we do.
Practical Steps for Dream Interpretation
00:25:42
Speaker
And the very first thing we're going to do is we are going to invite the Spirit of God to come and be with us and reveal to us the mysteries in the dream. Because like we spoke of last week, the Spirit searches all things the and the deep things of God. The Spirit is ah the one that will give us all interpretation because these things are spiritually discerned and we really need to lie rely on the Spirit of God. So that's going to be the first thing we do always. And then I would ask yourself these questions about the dream. One, I would ask who or what is this dream about?
00:26:24
Speaker
Oftentimes, the dream is going to be about you because God speaks to the dreamer. He speaks to us so often about the things that are close to our heart, the matters that we are meditating on, the things we're praying about, the concerns of our heart and our family. This is a real
00:26:41
Speaker
um medium, I would say, and palette for God to paint upon our dreams, to speak and answer questions for us. So often the dream is going to be about us. Now, if you are in the dream and you are very active in the dream, then I would say the dream is about you. If you are in the dream and you're active in the dream, but there's also family members and other people that are active in the dream, the dream could be about you and that area of your life. So family members and the area of family, or It could be about you and the dream could be about them as well, individually. Or if you're having a dream where you are observing a bunch of things happen, you're not actually participating, but you're watching other people participate, then I would say the dream is not about you and the dream is about those that you're observing. Now this could be because you're actually going to share the dream with them and it's going to give them some revelation and insight into their life.
00:27:36
Speaker
Or maybe this is just to pray. And if you're someone that is a real prayer warrior or I would say has a real um gift of empathy or compassion, you're probably going to have more dreams about other people than most of us do. So that's a good indicator. Who are the major participants in the dream?
00:27:56
Speaker
Then number two, I would ask what area of my life or their life does the dream pertain to? Usually there will be clues in the dream about that. Like I previously mentioned, if it's a dream about you and your family, your husband and your kids, and you're going on a trip, then I would say the area of your life is probably your family life. If you're dreaming about you interacting with a boss or you're at your workplace, I would say it's probably pertaining to your work life. If it's you on a hike in the woods, this could be just speaking to your personal life or your spiritual life. ah There's all kinds of different areas of our life that our dreams could speak to, but I would ask that question. What area of my life does it look like this is speaking to? Could be more than one as well.
00:28:44
Speaker
Then I like to ask this, not everybody does this, but I like to ask, are there any reoccurring themes? Are there any reoccurring themes in the dream? I actually just interpreted a dream and in the dream there were two different times. One at the beginning of the dream and one at the end of the dream in different circumstances where there was a speeding up or a ah something moving fast or an acceleration in the dream.
00:29:15
Speaker
And so I recognized, oh, because there's repetition here, repetition will indicate importance. It's the same when you're reading scripture. If something is repeated, this is an emphasis. So in your dream, if you have a repeated theme, this will very much be highlighted as a part of the interpretation. It might not be as obvious as that. It could be a little bit more abstract, meaning you, at one point in your dream, you saw a deflated beach ball. And then later in the dream, you saw that your car had a flat tire. So both of those were actually symbols of something being deflated or losing air or maybe there being a hole in something, right? But that is still, I would say, a repeated theme. And so I would absolutely write that down because that is going to very much point to the focus of the interpretation or one of the focuses, which leads me to number four.
00:30:10
Speaker
This is where we will ask, what are the main focuses of the dream? Now I would say don't go past five, maybe focuses four or five focuses. If you have a dream that's really long and epic and detailed, you might be a dreamer that dreams that way. I have friends that dream that way.
Personal Dream Interpretations
00:30:30
Speaker
And it can be really easy to get bogged down in every detail. And it's like, oh my gosh, I have to interpret all of these symbols. What did this mean? What did this mean? What did this mean? But usually there are just a core
00:30:42
Speaker
handful of focuses in the dream to really crack the code. And that's what we want to do is we want to kind of get to that ah aha moment of oh, yep, this is the overarching interpretation for the dream. And then if we want to, and if the spirit leads, we can go into interpreting um the extra details that are on the outside. But I would really stick with what are the key four to five focuses in the dream. Now, it might be less than that, especially if it's a brief dream. I am actually going to give you an example now, an example from my own personal life, a personal dream that I've already interpreted, but I'm just going to bring you along in the process with me. Okay, so let's put our interpretation hats on.
00:31:34
Speaker
I had this dream many years ago. So this I would say was 11 years ago now. I don't have the date in front of me because I only remember the dream. I have it written in a journal from way back when it was probably 2010 ish. At this moment, it's important to recognize the context of my life. So I was at that point living overseas. I had been traveling and doing missions work for a year and a half. And I was at the point where I was praying into where I was going to go when I left the field. So I was getting close to my time to leave. And I had this dream.
00:32:11
Speaker
I dreamt that I was on a mattress, a bare mattress. I was sitting on the mattress and the mattress was out on the waves of the ocean, out in just open ocean. And the waves were moving and rocking and... pushing forward, advancing and guiding my mattress that I was on. And then all of the sudden a big wave comes and it pushes me up onto the shore and i I beach on this sand beach that I don't know where it is. I stand up to get off of the mattress. I look up and I see the Golden Gate Bridge. That was it.
00:32:50
Speaker
Now I immediately had the interpretation, which will happen to us often. Sometimes we'll just, as soon as we have an experience, we'll know exactly what God is saying. And sometimes we don't. But for the sake of interpretation, I'm going to walk you guys through the interpretation. Okay. So the date, I don't have the date of it because it was a long, long time ago, but it was sometime in 2010. If I were to title the dream, I would say beached in San Francisco. And the emotions in the dream, I remember just being really matter of fact. It wasn't overly negative or positive, but it was just kind of like, oh, this is, this is what's happening. But I would probably put that in the positive category because it wasn't overly negative.
00:33:37
Speaker
Now let's ask those questions. Who or what is this dream about? Well, it was definitely about me because I was the only person in the dream. And what area of my life was this pertaining to? And I would say this was pertaining to my life I knew because I was praying about where I was going to land, quote unquote, and where I was going to live. But also, if you didn't have that information, you can look at the mattress. So what is a mattress? A mattress is a place that you lay your head. It's a place where you rest. So this is speaking to the area of my life of where I'm going to lay my head, where I'm going to rest, where I'm going to live. There were not any repeated themes. That one doesn't apply to this, but the main focuses are me on the mattress, though the movement of the waves and the Golden Gate Bridge.
00:34:29
Speaker
So they're pretty easy to interpret. Here I am already on this kind of itinerant, transient, not transient, transitional, in this transitional season where literally the place that I'm sleeping is changing from month to month and even week to week, sometimes day to day. And the fact that it was a really bare mattress, it wasn't like a bed that was all made up, speaks even more of an indicator to that season because I was living in a backpack. So it was pretty bare bones. And water, especially big bodies of water and ocean or lakes can represent the move of the spirit, can mean the Holy Spirit. They can also represent, especially if we're having waves or choppy water, it can speak to our emotional life. But in the context, knowing that I was praying into where I was gonna land and my emotions were not negative, the interpretation of the ocean being my emotions didn't doesn't work.
00:35:27
Speaker
So if the interpretation of the ocean is a move of the Spirit and the Holy Spirit and the move of the Spirit is actually moving the place where I'm resting and residing, that makes perfect sense. And that there's going to be a wave of the Spirit that's going to come and it's going to beach me up on the beach and I'm in a land in San Francisco. So I knew in that moment God was saying, you're you're going to San Francisco when you leave here. Now, it's also important to note, this is all resonating with me because I'm the dreamer. If you were interpreting that from the outside, you would want to ask a lot of questions that I already gave you the answers to. But I already had lived in San Francisco before, so this wasn't far fetched. It just felt like confirmation, and I came to peace, and everything in my heart was like, yes, okay, thank you, God. Thanks for speaking that.
00:36:12
Speaker
Now I know where I'm going. If I had never lived in San Francisco before, and that felt really left field, I might ask more questions about this. I might ask if the Golden Gate Bridge was actually symbolic. What could the Golden Gate Bridge symbolize? It could symbolize a Golden Gate, a an opening, a door opening, a gate into something new, a glorious gate into something new. Bridges often represent transition as well because they connect two different pieces of land. It's a transitional place. It's a place where you're going from one place to another, right? So if it wasn't literal, I would be maybe speaking about a big transition that's coming or asking questions about that. But in this case, it was literal and I knew it was literal because I was praying about this and I had lived in San Francisco before and everything just aligned in my spirit.
00:37:07
Speaker
Beautiful, fun, right? I'm gonna do one more. I'm gonna do another dream from my own life that I do already have interpretation for. It's a nice short one. I'm just gonna read the dream and then I'm gonna go through the questions that you would ask yourself. Okay, so in this dream, I was writing a $5,000 check to a friend of mine and I was giving it to him with strict instructions that I was giving him this check because I believed in him. I told him, this is not for your family. This is for you to do what you want to do with for you because I believe in who you are and I'm investing in your ministry and in you.
00:37:48
Speaker
I remember feeling like my heart was really in it. I don't remember there being a lot of emotion except for feeling adamant and passionate about this being personally for him. That was it. Okay. When did I have the dream? What was the date? I had this October of 2022. So just this last fall. What was the title I gave the dream? I said a check for Adam. His name is Adam. What were the emotions in the dream? Well, like I mentioned, when I read this, I don't remember a lot of emotion, but it was definitely positive. It wasn't negative. And I was passionate about giving him this check. Now, who or what is this dream about?
00:38:33
Speaker
Well, I am participating in this dream. He's not participating at all. So I would say the dream is about me, although it does pertain to him as well. What area of my life does this pertain to? And I would say it pertains to my relationships, to my my friendships, this important relationship to me.
00:38:54
Speaker
Were there any reoccurring themes? ah Nope, nothing important in this one. And then I would ask, what are the main focuses in the dream? Now this is really short, so that'll be easy. I would say the check, the number 5000 seemed important. um Him, Adam.
00:39:14
Speaker
Yeah, I would say those are the three three key things and maybe for the reason that I was giving that to him. So now we're going to sit with those symbols and go, okay, is this literal or is this metaphor? Now, I really wish that I could say this could be literal, that I actually could be writing a $5,000 check to my friend, but sadly that is not possible at the moment. So I knew immediately, even in the dream, that this was that this was symbolic. So, if it's symbolic, what is the symbolism of a check? Well, just like I was talking about earlier, what's the currency
00:39:52
Speaker
the currency of the kingdom. Faith. It's faith. So I believe God was speaking to me about faith. Now 5,000 is an important number. I just knew, because I've done a lot of symbolism stuff, that 5 can opera um often represent grace. But 5,000 is a multiplication. So I knew just off the cuff that I was giving him a multiplication of grace, that I was actually releasing my own faith in into him and multiplying the grace for him to have faith in this season, in himself, in his ministry, right? Because that was what I was so adamant. This isn't for you and your family to just go spend on something you need or do something like this. This is really for you.
00:40:42
Speaker
and for your ministry because I believe in you." So was he literal? Yes, he was literal, and especially in this time and even currently. I know that as I'm praying for him, that I'm praying for him to have faith and grace too to take steps forward in what he's called to do and in his identity. So I knew that it was literally for him. So that's a really easy interpretation. I woke up and sat with this and of course asked the Holy Spirit to help me. And really what I felt was the Lord saying, I want you to write this check from your own account. I want you to actually release your faith through prayer or through words, whatever that means. Your faith into him, your belief in him, because you're releasing grace for him to believe in himself. You're releasing grace for him to have faith.
00:41:36
Speaker
And then it wasn't until later that I decided to just go to a dream dictionary and look up thousand. Like, is there an interpretation for a thousand? Is there a common symbol? And interestingly, a thousand represents ever increasing. So whatever the number is, and it just so happens that 5,000 is ever increasing grace. So in this dream, God was speaking to me about releasing from my own faith, an ever increasing grace for him to step into faith and into identity and to believe in himself. So isn't that lovely? It was so lovely. It would have been really easy to be like, oh man,
00:42:18
Speaker
Is that literal? There's no way I can do that. I'm going to toss that dream. That was probably nothing. But it's actually given me strategy to pray for him and to know what he needs right now. Interestingly, as I was sitting with this this morning, knowing I was going to record the podcast, I actually really felt that this was for now, even more than it was in October. And that's another thing you're gonna notice with dreams, is that we can get an interpretation in the moment, but oftentimes it's multi multifaceted, or it's actually for an appointed time, that when that time comes, it's really, really obvious. So if you're sitting with a dream trying to get interpretation and and nothing's really coming together, nothing's really clicking or landing, don't stress.
00:42:59
Speaker
You're either waiting for maybe to share it with someone else and them to give insight or just waiting on the Holy Spirit. It doesn't all happen in a moment. It really, really doesn't all happen in a moment. Sometimes it does. And other times, I mean, I have, man, so many dreams that I don't have interpretation for yet that I have just filed away. that I have on my phone, listing the date and the emotion and the title, and I'm really waiting for the Holy Spirit to highlight that and bring it off the shelf for it to have its moment two to get interpretation. But in this moment, even though in October I had the interpretation for this and I was praying in that time, just me bringing it out again today, I felt, oh my gosh, I actually feel like this is for now. And interestingly, I forgot to put this in my notes, but I remember
00:43:48
Speaker
That right after I had this dream, I saw a flash of a pair of binoculars, like like a snapshot right after the dream before I woke up. And binoculars can represent a bunch of different things. It could mean whatever the Holy Spirit is highlighting it. But in this moment, I felt like it was vision for a future time. Because if with the binoculars binoculars, you're seeing something that's coming down the road. So even today, I remembered that part of the dream that came right after the dream. And it felt confirming of, oh, this, I had this in October, but this is really for now, that this is really for now.
00:44:25
Speaker
Well, there we have it. We just barreled through 43 minutes of really good content. I hope you enjoyed it. I had so much fun being with you. I am going to let you go now to jump into your own realm of dreams and just remember, with whatever we learned last week with symbolism, that as you're sitting with these questions I gave you to ask as as a structure to walk you forward, and you're learning to interpret the symbols, to really invite the Spirit of God in, and to be making sure that you're looking at the emotion and the context of the dream, those things have to align for it to make sense. And then, of course, above and beyond anything else, the confirm confirmation
00:45:07
Speaker
for the correct interpretation is going to be the witness in your own spirit or the yes in your own heart of, oh, I feel moved. I feel loved. I feel seen. I feel like God answered me. I feel like this is an invitation to draw closer to God. If you're not feeling those things on an interpretation yet, I would say might not be the interpretation, okay? So we will speak more in coming episodes about how to judge interpretation correctly, but this is a really great place to start. I will leave you now. I look forward to being with you next time and happy dreaming.