Welcome to the River Mountain Church Preaching Library. This message was delivered from our pulpit in Shepton, PA. It is our prayer that it might inspire and encourage your life. So sit back, relax, and enjoy the preaching of God's Word. I'm calling this message, The Dream Catcher. One of the interesting things I find today in the church is that we're not big on dreams, at least the church by and large. We treat dreams as if Well, you know, it's no big deal if I have a strange dream or a weird dream. It was a dream. But we don't look at dreams as being ways that God communicates to us by and large, at least the church when I speak in the general sense. But let me just say this. God says in his word that dreams are an important way that he communicates. As a matter of fact, here's a scripture in the book of Acts, chapter two, verse 17. And it shall be in the last days, God says, that I will pour out My Spirit upon all mankind, and your sons and your daughters shall prophesy, and your young men shall see visions, and your old men shall dream dreams." Now, this started on the day of Pentecost, because that was the beginning of what the Bible refers to as the end times. But can I ask you a question? Do you think we're closer to the end now than they were? Yeah. We are living, if we could say, in the end of the end of time. And I believe if this was true of the church then, It should be true of the church now that we should be experiencing some of the things that they experience. It wasn't just and some people teach this, that this was just an initial thing to get the church started. But once the church got started, you no longer need this. And I find the biblical support of that argument to be very, very weak because throughout the scriptures and throughout the church age, God's Spirit has always done pretty much the same thing. And one of the things the Spirit does is He allows men to prophesy, that is to speak the Word of God. But another thing the Spirit of the Lord does is He gives visions. Just out of curiosity, how many in here have had a vision from the Lord? Do you believe that God has given you some sort of vision? Janine? I'm not going to ask you to share that. But it's good that somebody has received a vision. I know in my life, I received numerous visions. Some have been like I was watching TV. I mean, remember Peter fell into a trance as he was praying, and it was like there was a sheet, a blanket dropped down from heaven, and God gave him like an open illustration of eating unclean meat, which was a sign for him to go to the Gentiles. And the Gentiles were being received. God gives visions. He did it throughout the Old Testament. He does it in the New Testament. But let me ask you, how many in here are over 40? That's almost all of you. If this scripture is correct, you are in the dream category. Except for Janine. Janine's under 40, right? She's about the only one. She can still get some visions. As a matter of fact, she was the only one who had a vision, wasn't she? See, the rest of you, if you're not getting dreams, you're not getting anything probably, right? But it says here, the old men, and we'll put old women in here too, even though probably you don't like the term old woman. But God will give in the end times dreams to us. And if you're over 40, you should really, really take that to heart. But how do you get a vision? How do you get a dream from God? Because we get a lot of dreams that aren't from God. How do you get dreams that are from God? And I'll give you one little secret here to getting a dream that is from the Lord. It says, I will pour out my spirit upon them. And we get spiritual dreams, I think, when we get spiritual. We get spiritual dreams when we allow the Spirit of God to come and rest upon us. And we are walking in the Spirit and under the Spirit, then something is released from God to us. So, I want to look at three biblical characters. this morning that had dreams. And I've already stated that dreams are important to God. And as a matter of fact, they're so important to God that some of the most important revelations have come through dreams. And here's what I want to say to you. The reason why most of you aren't getting spiritual dreams is because if God gave you a spiritual dream, you would discount it immediately. Why? Because, number one, maybe you don't believe God still gives dreams. Or maybe, number two, you don't think dreams are that important. And because of that very fact, I think God would not give you a dream if you're not going to take a dream seriously. So I want to show you two biblical characters that took dreams really seriously and received incredible dreams that meant a lot, not only to them, but to the entire biblical story. And the first one is Jacob. And most of us have heard the story of Jacob. But here's what the Bible says. And he came to a certain place and he spent the night there because the sun has set. Just to give you a little background. Remember Jacob and Esau, the brothers who got into a feud and he kind of. tricks his father into giving him the birthright, and he becomes the one who inherits all his father's possessions. Well, Esau's not happy. So Jacob knows that, and his mom says, you better get out of town. And so he goes out of town. And as he's going out of town, he has this experience. He is not a man who is usually out in the woods. He's a man who likes to stay close to the home and in the tents. But he has to go on the run. So he comes to a place And there it says that he places his head on a stone, and he lays down in that place, and he has a dream. And behold, a ladder was set on the earth with its top reaching to heaven, and behold, the angels of God were ascending and descending. This is an amazing thing. He's in the wilderness in the middle of nowhere. There's not a town, not a city, not any homes, just someplace out in the boonies. And in the boonies is a ladder that goes from heaven down to earth and he sees angels going up and down the ladder, ascending and descending. How many people heard the story of Jacob's ladder? You've heard the story probably in Sunday school. It's an important story. But I want to play a little clip right now about Jacob's ladder and the story of Jacob. It's about a four minute clip, and I hope you don't mind. It's one of those clips that came from the History Channel on Jacob. But the reason why I want to show this to you is because a lot of attention has been given to the idea that there are ladders in which angels ascend and descend. Well, the first thing you notice when Jacob comes to Bethel is he's frightened. He's vulnerable. And he has to go to sleep in the out of doors. Now, we've been told before that Jacob was a man of the tent, not a man of the fields. So he is not a hearty outdoorsman in his L.L. Bean gear, getting ready for a night in the great outdoors. He suspects that he might well become the victim of demonic attack. Instead of demons, Jacob will be visited by angels. He had a dream in which he saw a stairway resting on the earth, with its top reaching to heaven, and the angels of God were ascending and descending. There above it stood the Lord. Genesis 28, 12. God speaks to Jacob. He promises his protection and affirms that it is through Jacob and his offspring that the Holy Covenant will become the faith of a great people. Through the ages, countless generations of artists have tried to envision this scene. What did Jacob's ladder really look like? Actually, the Hebrew word for it, maslul, means a ramp. We think of it as a ladder you have to climb rungs on, but it's not that way. It's a ramp. It's a kind of a pathway up to heaven. Some have speculated that Jacob's ladder was in reality a ziggurat. a step pyramid of a kind that was commonly found in the ancient Near East. Strangely, when Jacob wakes from his miraculous and mysterious dream, he makes a vow which seems to place conditions on God. If God will help and protect me on this journey, and bring me safely back to my father's house, Then I will choose the Lord as my God. Genesis 28, 20. Jacob makes deals. That's what he does. And he made this deal with God. He just wanted to be sure that he was well covered and that God understood his terms. It's a pretty amazing piece of arrogance, but there it is. the pivotal point of human history up to now, which is God's approach to Abraham and God's promise of a covenant, of a land, of a law, of a future. All of that rests on Jacob's shoulders. The problem is that up to this point Jacob doesn't seem to be the kind of noble figure who can carry that forward. One of the enduring questions raised by Jacob's story concerns the dream of Jacob's ladder. Why are the angels climbing in both directions? Down from heaven and up toward it? It is in seeking an answer to this mystery that many find meaning and inspiration. In the Talmud, a rabbi is asked, what does God do now that God has finished creating the world? And his answer is, God spends his time making ladders for some to ascend and some to descend. And perhaps the message of this story of Jacob's dream is that God is saying to Jacob, Jacob, the world is filled with ladders and you can spend the rest of your life going up them or going down them, ascending or descending. But what you do from this moment on will be the shape of your life and your legacy to future generations. The Hebrews believe that there were many, many ladders in many different locations in many places in which angels ascended and descended. And you remember the Apostle Paul and even John, for that matter, discovered these ladders. John was taken up and saw the end of all time. And he was on the island of Patmos. And he gets this incredible revelation about what's going to happen in the future. The Apostle Paul was taken up to the third heaven. And the question is, what do angels do ascending and descending in various different locations? The Bible tells us in the book of Hebrews that angels are ministering spirits who have been sent to us to serve us. And so in many ways, the angels ascend and descend in service to humanity and One of the things that the text tells us is that at the top of the ladder, God is looking down on the angels ascending and descending. And this also fits in when Jesus talks about the angels and he says, they behold my father's face continually. There's an idea in which the angels never take their eyes off of the face of God as they're in service to humanity. They're walking down the ladder, looking at the Lord. They're walking up the ladder, looking at the Lord. And they are there to serve us. And they are to bring primarily messages. Because the word angel means angelos, which means a messenger. So, one of the primary things that they are doing is they're bringing messages from God to man. And how do they bring the messages? The Bible tells us they bring the messages many times in a dream. And here's the way the story goes. It says, Behold, the Lord stood above the ladder, and He said, I am the Lord, the God of your father Abraham, the God of Isaac. in the land which you lie, I will give it to you and your descendants, and your descendants shall be like the dust of the earth, and you shall spread out from the west to the east to the north to the south. You and your descendants shall all the families of the earth be blessed." Here God says in a dream to Jacob, here's what's going to happen. Your descendants are going to be my people. And who were the descendants of Jacob? They were the 12 brothers who became the 12 tribes. And a Jewish person will tell you today that they can trace the founding of the Jewish nation, not back to Abraham, not to Isaac, but to Jacob. And when you look at the story, the entire 12 tribes of Israel have been prophesied and given to Jacob in a dream. And here's what I want to tell you. Dreams have power. When God said this to Jacob, that was going to happen, and it was going to take place exactly the way the Lord said it was going to take place. And not only that, but the Lord was going to give him a promise. And here's the promise. Behold, I am with you, and I will keep you wherever you go, and I will bring you back to this land, and I will not leave until I have done what I have promised. If God gives you a dream, if God gives a promise to you in a dream, that promise is as good as reality. It is going to happen as the Lord spaces out time. He is going to pick a time in which that dream will become reality. But the thing you need to realize is that the beginning of the reality happens in a dream. So what happens here is Jacob awoke from his sleep and he said, surely the Lord is in this place and I did not know it. And here's what I want to tell you. Unless you get a revelation, you can live your entire life under a ladder and not know there's a ladder there. You can live your entire life in a place in which angels are ascending and descending and never know that unless God gives you a revelation that he is in that place. And it's interesting. He calls this place after this. He calls it Bethel, meaning this is the house of God or this is God's house. Let me say something that sounds a little crazy, as if what I have said already isn't crazy enough. Because when you go in and really examine the Bible, you realize that it exists in a different realm than what we normally walk. And if you ever want to enter into the biblical story, you are going to have to believe certain things about God. For instance, one of the things you're going to have to believe is that God has ladders. in which angels are ascending and descending. And you don't know where these places are, but I guarantee you there are places on the earth in geographical spots in which angels ascend and descend. Why do I say that? Because the Bible says that they exist. But here's what I want to tell you. And this may shock some of you. And I wasn't prepared to actually say this. This isn't even in my notes. But when we came to this area, The Lord said to me, this area has angels everywhere. And I said, in this little area? He said, there are angels ascending and descending everywhere in this general geographical location. Now, here's what I want you to know. Number one, when I say that, I'm not like a guy who just fell off the back of a pickup truck saying I saw a UFO. I mean, this is biblical. This is nothing unbiblical, but ladders ascending and descending. This area was founded by Moravians, who were godly people, and the name of the county is Luzerne County. The name of Bethel was Luz, L-U-Z. Luzerne comes from Luz, it comes from this idea of Bethel. And I thought that was amazing that they would name this region the same name that Jacob named this place. He called it Bethel, but it was really called Luz, and that is where we get Luzerne County from. And whether you realize it or whether I realize it, there are angelic forces that are at work in this area. I don't want to get into that too much and too deeply, but I do want to say this to you. When they bring a message, there is a reason why they say what they say. What happens to Jacob when he hears this is he becomes afraid. He says, how awesome is this place? This is none other than the house of God. It is the gate of heaven. And by the way, you know what? If you try to find Bethel on a biblical map, there's nothing there today. As a matter of fact, scholars don't even know exactly where it is, but they still believe it's out in the middle of nowhere. The next person that we see in the story is his son, Joseph. Remember, Jacob has 12 sons. They become the tribe of Israel, the 12 tribes. Joseph is the one son who gets pretty much his father's DNA. He is the one who gets this same gift to understand dreams, not even understand dreams, but have dreams. So here's the story of Joseph. And I just want to tell this to you real briefly. The Bible says that Israel, that is, Jacob, loved Joseph more than all of his other sons because he was the son of his old age and he made him a varying colored tunic. And his brothers saw that the father loved him more than his brothers. And so they hated him and could not speak to him in a friendly way. Jacob had many, many sons, twelve of them in all. But the first son that he had from the wife that he really loved, which was Rachel, he saw as really his legitimate firstborn son. Because all the other ones he had from either a handmaiden or from Leah, and he never loved or planned any of those really. And so the one that he has from Rachel later in life, when God opens up the womb, he says, now this is the real firstborn. And so, he sets his son aside to be very different. And his son is different. But what makes his son different, at least initially, is that he has the same ability to have these dreams. And what makes him who he is, is the dreams. Look at this. And Joseph had a dream. And he told his brothers. And they hated him even more. And he said to them, he said, please listen to this dream which I had. For behold, I was binding sheaves in the field, and lo, my sheave arose and it stood erect. And behold, your sheaves gathered around the sheave and they bowed down to it. You tell a dream about your sheath being erect, and you talk about the other ones bowing down to it. The brothers immediately interpreted this as being that Joseph was saying that he was greater, and all of his brothers were going to bow down to him. That's the way it was interpreted. And so his brothers saw this dream as Joseph saying, I'm my father's special one. One day I will inherit everything, and as my brothers, you will be under me. And because he said it, they hated him. Now listen, here's what I want to tell you about this dream. Joseph doesn't know what this dream means. And he's not interpreting it to mean what they think it means, that he's going to inherit the father's land and he's going to be the primary one in church. He doesn't think it's that. He doesn't know what it is. He just knows that he sees himself as wheat and he sees his brothers as wheat that has fallen and they're bowing down to him. And so the only reason he tells them this dream is because he cares about them because they're in the dream. And he's saying, I don't know what this dream means, but listen to it because you're in it. You're going to fall down before me. And they're like, oh, we know what you mean. You're saying that you're going to be the top dog. And I really believe that he's like saying, no, that's not what it is. I don't know what this means, but something is coming that you're going to need to know this. What else happens here? is the brothers give the interpretation. They say to him, are you actually going to reign over us? Are you really going to rule over us? So they hated him even more for the dream and for his words. And here's what I want to say. You get a crazy dream. This was a crazy dream. And you say, I'm not going to share this dream. Much the way I'm saying, I'm not going to share this sermon because this sermon sounds crazy. I'm not going to share this dream because this dream sounds crazy. And you decide not to share it, it loses its power. The power is in the sharing of the dream. Because here it is. The dream is, this is what's going to happen. He decides he's going to share it with his brothers. His brothers hate him because of the dream. And what do they do? Huh? You know. They decide to put him into slavery, or to throw him into a pit rather, then eventually sell him into slavery. That slavery leads him to Egypt, which eventually leads him to Potiphar's house, which leads him to the second place in command, which leads him to get other dreams about a famine, which leads him to store up barns so that there's enough food so that when his family comes during the famine and are all going to die because they don't have anything to eat, And they come to Him, He's got food to feed them. And here's the thing about a dream. The sharing of the dream brought the dream to pass. When you share something that's from the Lord, it has within it a seed that causes something to happen upon the earth. In this case, the sharing of this dream caused jealousy to be born in the brothers, which caused them to hate him more, which said to them, listen, here's the way we stop the dream. He thinks he's going to inherit everything from dad. All we got to do is get rid of him and he'll inherit nothing. You can't kill the dream of God because the more you try to kill it, the more you're going to help it happen. Satan said, Oh, I know the Messiah is going to come and he wants to save humanity. So what I'm going to do is I'm going to stir up the crowd to kill him. And what Satan doesn't realize is that by stirring up the crowd to kill him, he's actually making the dream happen. And every time we get a dream from the Lord, and we share the dream, and there's ramifications that come as we share the dream, the ramifications are not coincidental, they are actually manifestations of what the dream came to bring. Does that make sense to you? I realize that sounds confusing. But God gives a dream for a reason. We don't know what the reason is. But we try to be as beating as we can, and in doing so, we actually stir things up that actually bring the dream to pass. See, the question is, should he have shared this dream with his brothers? Yes. But I want to show you one other dream that he had that is even worse than this dream. In a sense, this is the kind of dream that you would say, if you had this dream, you would never share this with anybody. Especially not with your family. And here's the dream he has. He has another dream and he relates this to his brothers and he says, this is what happens in this dream. Behold, the sun and the moon and the eleven stars are bowing down to me. So his brothers realize what's happening here. And so they go to the father and relay this dream because who's bowing down in this dream right now? Not only the eleven brothers, but who else is bowing down? The father and the mother. And this is strictly taboo in Jewish culture. To think that while your dad is still alive, he's going to bow down to you. Now, if he dies and he leaves you the inheritance, and you become the next in command, that's fine. That's the way it's supposed to work. But if you think that your dad, while he's still alive, is going to bow down to you, that is sacrilegious. That is not honoring your parents. That's not honoring your mother and father. And that would be considered taboo. Here's what happens. When he shares this, he shares it with his dad. And I want to show you this little clip of how this dream affected his father and why this dream was necessary even to share with his father. Thank you. Joseph. I made this. For you. Father. I could never wear that. Why not? It's beautiful. They already hate me because I count the sheep for you. Oh, let them. You know what they will say. What? That you gave me that coat only to show that... That I love you? Put it on. Father. Enough. Here. They envy you. It was you who learned to count and to write, because you chant the story of our fathers that I taught you. My father Isaac and his father Abram. And his father Terak. All right, father. Now you let me have a portion of the herds, like my brothers. A wife. Tents of my own. But leave me? Never. Never. If I could only be like the others, I wouldn't be having those dreams. Dreams? What dreams? Like the sun and the moon and eleven stars bowing down to me. Eleven stars? Eleven brothers? The sun? Who is the sun? Am I to bow down to you? No, father. I just want to be one of twelve. No! Remember your brother Esau. You fled for your life. My of ten Esaus. I said no. You're still a boy. Don't leave me. I need you. You have Rachel's eyes. Oh, Father. All right, Joseph. Your brothers are at Shechem. Take provisions and go to them. Find out how they're doing. That's not exactly how the story goes, but here's what the Bible says about the relaying of this dream. He relayed it to his father and to his brother, and his father rebuked him and said, What is this dream that you have had? Shall I? And your mother and your brothers actually come and bow ourselves down before you to the ground. And his brothers were jealous. But here's the key phrase. But his father kept the saying in his mind because Jacob realized that he initially when he got his dream, it came about. When he gets another dream, it comes about. And now he sees his son Jacob as being the true lineage that's going to carry forth the nation of Israel. And so even though the dream sounds ridiculous to his father, that he's going to have to bow down to his son, he keeps it in mind, knowing that there's power in a dream. And here's the final point that I want to make to you about dreams. The primary thing I think a dream does for us, is it lifts us out of reality into the kingdom of heaven where ladders are ascending and descending and gives us messages that are so far beyond anything that we can actually ever experience here on earth that it creates in us a hunger and a desire to be closer to God. I want to play one last clip here and this clip is Jacob, when he gets his first dream, and I want you to see that what God shared with him in this dream and how he reacted to it. God was here! He spoke to me! Yes! The angels came down the steps, and He spoke to me! He said, I am with you! I will bring you back to this life! I will give it to you! And you're off with me! Ha ha ha! God! God! Right. The kids are spooked out, obviously. I don't know who they're supposed to be, but I know they're supposed to be like cherubims or whatever. But the thing that you see. Is that when God speaks to him in a dream? He doesn't discount it, but he puts in a sense he puts all of his faith in it happening, and here's what I want to say. We're going to have a lot of dreams and we're not we're going to most of the dreams that we probably have are not of God and they're just from You know things that we're thinking about but I want you to be aware of the fact that God desires to speak to you in dreams, so let's pray and I'm just gonna pray as I as I kind of sense that God would have us to pray tonight or today about tonight is that I And we're not demanding God to give us dreams. But what we are saying is, God, in the last days, you desire to speak to your people by putting your spirit upon us and by giving young men visions and old men dreams. And this is the only thing I want you to pray is this, is Father, I'm open to receiving a dream.