For those of you who know me, you've probably heard of my dream called "The School Shooting and the Graveyard". In summary, the dream was in two parts. The first part was a dream about a school shooting. It wasn't a prophecy about a real shooting, but rather was used by God to illustrate, in somewhat graphic terms, "where I'd been" during that time of my life. The shooting in question was not an actual school shooting like you see on TV, but instead a summary of a period of time in my life, during which I was being trained by God, that I was attacked by Satanic forces and spiritually wounded. That's kinda the dime tour of what it all meant. The second part of the dream involved a graveyard. However, to best describe this, allow me to summarize for you the dream. FYI, this occurs right after the incident with the school shooting when we were running away for safety. Also, as a small side note, a large part of what you're going to read next is the back story and preamble to the main point of this post, all of which is necessary to help you understand the part that is actually the followup to the original dream. So hang in there with me and it'll all make sense. :)

Anyhow, the graveyard part of the dream began as we entered this sorta half circle type building (the flat side of the building faced the street and had two doors, and we entered via the door on the right) and ran down this path through the building, which was full of these 1800's era gravestones covered in dust and cobwebs. At the far end, near the left side door, we ran into this old man, the caretaker, who sympathized with our plight and took us in. He then had is rest and recover in a small waiting room off to the side. Inside were these unbelievably uncomfortable chairs on which we had to sit, and where we were asked to stay as the healthy among our group tended to the wounded, including myself (I had lots of painful glass shards in my back from the earlier incident). Inside the waiting room, were four distinct things. There was a self serve concession stand with hotdogs and other snacks. Second, there was a drink vending machine nearby. The third was an old 80's era TV with the world "Hawaii" on the screen as it played relaxing, tropical music. The forth was the previously mentioned uncomfortable chairs.

Anyhow, that's a summary of the graveyard dream. In hind sight, and after someone interpreted it to me, I came to understand that the graveyard part of the dream was talking about the debt situation I was in at the time (and still am), and that God was promising that, if I waited on Him, He would resolve that for me. My discomfort in the chairs was an expression of my impatience and unwillingness to wait on God, as I wanted that relief now, if not yesterday, and it better be there or else. Yes, it was that level of impatience. I refused to wait on God at the time, even though He'd promised to relieve me of all my debts. Not HOW He would do it, or even WHEN He would, simply that He would do it. That's all the promise I had. So you can see how much faith is required for me on this one. Anyhow, fast forward a bit. Along the way my old car dies. Well, not dies, but it was to the point that it was in such bad shape that I really needed a new car. So, I bought a new one, and did it with a car loan, which just made my debt situation all the worse. Nine months later some dude hit me head on, on a slippery, winter day, and totaled the car. One week later I had a brand new car, one that had literally just arrived from the factory, which came with a brand new car loan, even bigger than before. So now, at this point, I'm even further down the hole.

The interesting part about this is, for this new car God had me get a lease. I didn't understand until recently WHY He'd had me do that. But I'll explain that in a bit. Anyhow, in order to keep the car at the end of the 3 year lease, I needed to buy it outright, and buy out the rest of what was owed on the car. A year and a half in, seeing how the world was going, I panicked and converted the lease to a loan. Bad, bad move on my part. I ended up adding about $2k to what I would've owed under the lease, plus interest, and all that other madness. Thankfully, before doing this, I'd been starting to save money to pay that off. So I had enough money to get started, but not enough to pay off the balance of what I owed. Hence the loan. And wow, did that loan go bad. I mean, I didn't lose the car or anything. God protected me in the midst of my foolishness and impatience. But the pain and suffering I had to go through for that loan was TOTALLY not worth it. In hind sight, I should've NEVER taken that loan, and just stayed with the lease as God has originally told me to do. Yep, my impatience got the better of me, and got me into a heap of needless trouble.  But, through all this I learned a BIG lesson in trust and patience. Had I stayed with the lease, as I should've, I'd have paid off the car in two years flat, and, at the very LEAST 2k less than I ultimately did. Plus, because I wasn't trusting the Lord, I forced myself to work a whole year of 60+ hour weeks (yes, 52 or so of them back to back) just to pay off that loan and free myself from that debt; a fact that nearly killed me as I was near the point of dropping dead from exhaustion at the end of it all, regardless if the car was eventually paid off or not. But, yeah, anyhow, lesson learned.

So, long story short, even though God blessed me as He did, I still haven't completely sorted out everything that came out of that little bit of disobedience, impatience, and mistrust. Had I done it the right way, and stayed with the lease, it would've been in, out, done, in two years, and would've faced none of the pain and suffering I went through. So I learned a major lesson on being patient from that painful event. Now, all that being said, which is the preamble to what I'm about to share, all of what I've just told you being necessary to set up the scene for the followup to that dream.  Anyhow, as is a custom with God and I, sometimes He'll talk to me through dreams at night, and reveal to me many things that I need to know.  However, not so commonly He will also speak to me in daydreams (I actually several of these logged in my dream journal, as they were very impactful to me) and this was no exception.  And to provide to you what these daydreams are like, I can't say they're visions, as they don't have the same feel as a vision, of which I've had before.  They are, to me at least, very much like a normal daydream, but with more substance.  Anyhow, this daydream came about shortly after I'd paid off my car loan, and was now able to drop back to my regular 46hr weeks, which allowed me to once again start enjoying my normal 3 day weekends. As I spent those weekends sleeping, resting, and recovering from the absolute physical and mental exhaustion of a year of perpetual overtime, I began to think and kinda berate myself for the foolishness of my actions with the car loan, and not trusting God with the car payoff.

Especially since none of the bad things I'd been expecting happened, and I was still very easily able to fully pay off the car and do it in an astoundingly fast amount of time.  Well, anyhow, during one of these episodes of thinking I remember daydreaming, and thinking about the graveyard dream. In the midst of that daydreaming I suddenly found myself standing in that graveyard, somewhere about halfway between the two doors into the building, which was shaped akin to a half circle, and stood quietly on the pathway that stretched through the middle of this semi-circular graveyard just quietly thinking, and looking at one of those dusty old, cobweb covered gravestones as I did. I remember many thoughts going through my mind as I contemplated the graveyard dream where I'd first seen this building, and these gravestones, and remembered my inability at the time to get comfortable in the chairs within the break room. It was symbolic of my inability to be patient, to rest in God, to trust Him in everything, and let Him do all the work of lifting me out of my debts in HIS time and HIS way. I felt really bad about how I'd disparaged His kindness, and His willingness to do this for me, especially since I did not feel that I deserved such a blessing, given how poorly I'd managed my finances over the years. Anyhow, after contemplating this for a bit, I walked slowly down the pathway towards the left side front door of the graveyard building, down to where the door to the waiting room sat, and greeted the old man who was there (the caretaker), the same way I'd met Him there before.

I remember the kind, loving smile on His face, and the compassionate look in His eyes (note, I use a capital H here because the old man seen here in the daydream, as well as the previous night dream, is God Himself in representative form. So I capitalize His name in respect and honor to Him, if you happen to be wondering why I'm doing this) as He stood there and saw the remorse, sadness, and repentance on my face. Yet He didn't chastise me. All I saw emanating from Him was love. He knew why I was there, and what I'd done, and the hard lessons I'd learned in the process, and took compassion on me, even though I did not deserve it. So there was no need for Him to be angry with me. as I had repented of my impatience, and so He was more than willing to forgive me for that. I then smiled sheepishly, and said, "I think I'll take that hotdog, now."  (this is in reference to the above refreshments mentioned from the prior dream)  He smiled kindly at me, and replied, "Would you like just one?" I replied, "Yes, please. No, actually, give me three," to which he asked, "What would you like on them?" I requested my normal condiments, namely ketchup, mayo, and a light dab of relish. He then handed me a plate with 3 hotdogs on it, for which I thanked Him, and then took them into the waiting room. However, unlike last time, where the break room was a scene of chaos, full of scared, wounded teachers and children, I instead found it empty this time, save only for myself.

Also different from last time, instead of shunning the chairs that were there, I remember grabbing a small table, on which I put my plate, and then dragging the only chair in the room (yes, there were differences to last time, such as one chair vs many, and so on, but I think those were appropriate to the scene, and the fact that this was about God and I, and not the many other people that'd been with me before in that room) where I sat down, directly across from the TV. However, once I sat down, I realized that I didn't have anything to drink. To my good fortune, the soda machine was directly to my right. Now, you might laugh at this, but at the same time, this is how my mind works, and God seems okay with letting me do things like this, both in my daydreams with Him, and my night dreams too. Anyhow, not wanting to get up and go to the machine for a can of soda, I remember reaching out to my right and literally force pulling (yes, think jedi) a soda out of the machine and into my hands. Realizing what I'd just done, I laughed about it, and I even felt God laugh a little about it too, which was rather comforting. Some of you may deride what I did, but in dreams, day or night, the bounds of physics don't apply, so doing things like this are not only within the realm of possibility, but also allowable. Anyhow, I then cracked open the soda, looked up at the TV, and just relaxed in the chair as I ate my hotdogs.  One other item of note.  Unlike before in the prior dream, despite the chair being the same, it actually felt comfortable this time, and was very easy to sit in, despite being no different than before.

So, with that said, the summary of all of this that I have written is this one thing: The first time God presented this promise to me, that He would lift me from my debts, and change the season in which I lived.  All I had to do was be patient and wait on Him.  However, I was impatient and unwilling to do so.  I wanted it now, and by golly I was gonna do that one way or another, with or without Him.  However, after the trials and tribulations of the past year, all or most of which was the fault of my impatience, and my unwillingness to wait on God, trying to do myself all that He had promised to do for me, and do it all in my own strength, I realized that, if I'd kept going, and not stopped and waited on Him as He had asked me to, I would've killed myself with exhaustion or, at the very least, destroyed my health, in such a way as to put me out of action for quite a while, if not permanently. And all of this because I didn't want to wait on God. The fact that I had this little daydream, through which I was able to repent, and reconcile myself to God for my sin of impatience, committing myself to wait on Him for the removal of my debts, and the lifting of this financial enslavement from off of me, was an important step. It won't be an easy step, as every day that these debts stay around is another long, and painful day under which I remain a slave to my lenders. However, since God has promised me His divine relief, and in His time, and His way, at the exact hour and second that He has planned and prepared for me to be set free, I trust and know that I WILL be set free. But, if I try to do it by myself, without God, and force the issue before its time, I will only come to ruin. But if I wait patiently for His miraculous hand to move in my favor, on my behalf, the blessings I shall gain by such patience, a trait of which is not my strong suite in any ways, will be beyond comprehension.

Plus, by being patient in this matter, it will teach me to be patient in other, bigger, more important things; things that I will need to trust God for in the future. So the fact that He used this time to teach and train me to be patient (they always say you learn best when you suffer the most) is a testament not only to His love for me, but also His deep, enduring patience with me, especially when I fail to be patient with Him.  That fact alone is beyond words, and is a fact to which we should all be grateful for. The alternative, namely impatience, will only end up getting all of us in grave trouble, and force us to go through pain, suffering and heartaches that we shouldn't need to go through, but are made to do so because we will not wait. As for me, I shall patiently wait upon the Lord, and the fulfillment of His promises, both in His time, His way and His hour. :)