Acts 2:17 “'And it shall come to pass in the last days, says God, that I will pour out of My Spirit on all flesh; your sons and your daughters shall prophesy, your young men shall see visions, your old men shall dream dreams.”
And so we come to God’s leading of His new covenant saints, through dreams. This is one method that the Lord uses to lead His saints, which has not changed between the old and the new covenants. We can confidently make that statement based on the authority of the scripture quoted above. We know that this prophecy given by the prophet Joel refers to the church age, because the Holy Spirit through the apostle Peter said it did. And so we see plainly that just as prophesy and visions are part of the church age, so are dreams. Nevertheless I do need to give a word of warning on this subject, which is that just as with seeking guidance through prophets, there is no account in the New Testament where the saints sought after dreams from the Lord, and there is also no place in the new testament where we are taught to seek guidance through dreams. It is interesting to note that the above quoted passage of scripture is the only time that dreams are mentioned in the New Testament. So why is that? The reason is because dreams in the New Testament are referred to as visions in the night, and there is a reason for that, which we will not discuss at this time as it falls outside the scope of this teaching. Nevertheless you will recall that when we examined the area of dreams under the old covenant, that we said that what the bible referred to as “visions of the night”, were in fact dreams (Job 4:13).
Ecclesiastes 5:3 “For a dream comes through much activity.”
Obviously not all dreams that we have are from the Lord. The vast majority of dreams that everyone has (believers and unbelievers alike), are a just a natural part of how our minds work while we sleep. In the above quoted passage of scripture the bible teaches us that one of the causes of dreams is a very active lifestyle. For our brains have to then work through all of that activity during the day, as those memories are processed and stored.
Isaiah 29:8 “It shall even be as when a hungry man dreams, and look--he eats; But he wakes, and his soul is still empty; Or as when a thirsty man dreams, and look--he drinks; But he awakes, and indeed he is faint, and his soul still craves.”
Another cause of dreams occurring is when we become pre-occupied with something in our lives. In the above quoted passage of scripture the Holy Spirit teaches us this principle through the example of one who is craving food and water, for He tells us that someone who is hungry dreams of eating, while a thirsty person dreams of drinking. And so that same principle applies to any aspect of our lives that we allow ourselves to become pre-occupied with, or anything that we may be anxious or concerned about. We will then find ourselves dreaming about those things.
Acts 16:9-10 “And a vision appeared to Paul in the night. A man of Macedonia stood and pleaded with him, saying, "Come over to Macedonia and help us." (10) Now after he had seen the vision, immediately we sought to go to Macedonia, concluding that the Lord had called us to preach the gospel to them.”
Nevertheless there are also dreams that believers receive from the Lord today, through which He guides His saints. We have already looked at examples of believers under the old covenant receiving guidance from the Lord through dreams, and there are also new covenant examples of believers receiving guidance through dreams. And so bearing in mind that because a vision in the night is in fact a dream, we can look at the above quoted account of the Lord’s guidance given to the apostle Paul through a dream. As a background to this account, Paul and his team had already attempted to preach the gospel in a couple of locations, and the Holy Spirit had forbidden them from doing so. And so it was during this time of actively seeking the Lord’s guidance as to where He wanted them to preach the gospel, that Paul received the above quoted dream. I want you to notice the simplicity of the dream that Paul received, for they were immediately able to conclude what the meaning of the dream was, i.e. the Lord wanted them to preach the gospel in Macedonia.
Michael E.B. Maher
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