April 2, 2009
During my time with God in my sunny spot on the couch this morning, I was reading from 1 Samuel chapter eight to ten. Samuel was getting old so he appointed his sons as judges over Israel; however, his sons were perverting justice and the Israelites asked Samuel to appoint for them a king to rule over them. The Lord told Samuel that the Israelites were rejecting Him as their King and informed Samuel that he will give them a king who will rule over them. This king would be Saul. When Samuel informed Saul about the Lord’s plan Saul responded by saying he was from the smallest tribe of Israel and his family was the least of all families. He could not understand why Samuel would say such a thing.
Samuel took a vial of oil and poured it on Saul’s head, anointed him and kissed him. He told Saul who he would meet as he went home and what would happen on his journey. When Saul reached the hill of God, the Spirit of the Lord came upon him mightily and he showed himself a prophet. 1 Samuel 10:6 (AMP) actually says he was turned into another man and 1 Samuel 10:9 (AMP) says God gave him a new heart.
After I finished read this, I was sitting on the couch pondering how it must feel to have the Spirit of the Lord come upon you. The Holy Spirit brought to my mind a dream I had that I call “The Tornado.” (I just realized this now as I am typing this, but I had this dream on April 1, 2005 which is almost exactly four years to the day.)
The Lord was revealing to me a clearer understanding of that prophetic dream. In my dream I was taking shelter from a tornado inside a wooden hut. Inside the shelter are two friends of mine. Suddenly a man enters the shelter. I take one look at him and I instantly know that I love Him and He loves me and that He is sent to me from God. He yells that the tornado has touched down and is headed toward us. The tornado rips the door of the wooden hut off its hinges. It starts to pull the Man I love. He reaches out His hand and I place my right hand in His and He holds me tight. I turn around and ask my friends to grab my hand but they don’t move. They are too afraid; I can see it in their eyes. The forces of the winds are pulling me towards the open door. It is at this moment I realize that I have to decide if I am going to let go of this Man’s hand and save myself or not. I decide not to let go of His hand. The tornado is right over top of us now and it rips the roof off. The Man, whose hand I am holding, and I get sucked up into the middle of the tornado.
I have just explained to you the first part of my dream. Before today, I have always wondered if that tornado dream was, in fact, prophetic, but after today I am convinced it is. I just watched an interview this morning on It’s A New Day with author W. Paul Young who wrote the book “The Shack.” Paul was describing that the shack he refers to in his book is his heart. I have heard that this book is really good and it is on my summer reading list.
The Lord then reveals to me the meaning of the first part of my dream. The wooden hut that I hide inside for shelter is my heart. I never realized that before. Do you see the similarities from Paul’s book? I never would have thought of that if I had not just watched the program. It is amazing how God uses people to speak to us. The Man who enters my heart is Jesus. Before I realized the wooden hut represented my heart, I was not sure what the meaning was of the man in this dream but now it is crystal clear. I had this dream after I had asked Jesus into my heart. After Jesus enters my heart the door is ripped off its hinges and the roof it torn off. This symbolizes that Jesus had begun working in my heart. When He entered my heart, it was full of thick, tall walls all the way around it to shelter myself from the world and the people in it. Jesus was breaking down those walls, the very walls I had so carefully put up, brick by brick, after each wounding in my heart took place.
Samuel took a vial of oil and poured it on Saul’s head, anointed him and kissed him. He told Saul who he would meet as he went home and what would happen on his journey. When Saul reached the hill of God, the Spirit of the Lord came upon him mightily and he showed himself a prophet. 1 Samuel 10:6 (AMP) actually says he was turned into another man and 1 Samuel 10:9 (AMP) says God gave him a new heart.
After I finished read this, I was sitting on the couch pondering how it must feel to have the Spirit of the Lord come upon you. The Holy Spirit brought to my mind a dream I had that I call “The Tornado.” (I just realized this now as I am typing this, but I had this dream on April 1, 2005 which is almost exactly four years to the day.)
The Lord was revealing to me a clearer understanding of that prophetic dream. In my dream I was taking shelter from a tornado inside a wooden hut. Inside the shelter are two friends of mine. Suddenly a man enters the shelter. I take one look at him and I instantly know that I love Him and He loves me and that He is sent to me from God. He yells that the tornado has touched down and is headed toward us. The tornado rips the door of the wooden hut off its hinges. It starts to pull the Man I love. He reaches out His hand and I place my right hand in His and He holds me tight. I turn around and ask my friends to grab my hand but they don’t move. They are too afraid; I can see it in their eyes. The forces of the winds are pulling me towards the open door. It is at this moment I realize that I have to decide if I am going to let go of this Man’s hand and save myself or not. I decide not to let go of His hand. The tornado is right over top of us now and it rips the roof off. The Man, whose hand I am holding, and I get sucked up into the middle of the tornado.
I have just explained to you the first part of my dream. Before today, I have always wondered if that tornado dream was, in fact, prophetic, but after today I am convinced it is. I just watched an interview this morning on It’s A New Day with author W. Paul Young who wrote the book “The Shack.” Paul was describing that the shack he refers to in his book is his heart. I have heard that this book is really good and it is on my summer reading list.
The Lord then reveals to me the meaning of the first part of my dream. The wooden hut that I hide inside for shelter is my heart. I never realized that before. Do you see the similarities from Paul’s book? I never would have thought of that if I had not just watched the program. It is amazing how God uses people to speak to us. The Man who enters my heart is Jesus. Before I realized the wooden hut represented my heart, I was not sure what the meaning was of the man in this dream but now it is crystal clear. I had this dream after I had asked Jesus into my heart. After Jesus enters my heart the door is ripped off its hinges and the roof it torn off. This symbolizes that Jesus had begun working in my heart. When He entered my heart, it was full of thick, tall walls all the way around it to shelter myself from the world and the people in it. Jesus was breaking down those walls, the very walls I had so carefully put up, brick by brick, after each wounding in my heart took place.
Philippians 1:6 (NIV)
being confident of this, that he who began a good work in you will carry it on to completion until the day of Christ Jesus.
The friends inside the wooden hut represent my old life, my old nonbelieving friends and the fleshly things of this world. Once I am holding Jesus’ hand I am given the choice of either letting His hand go or hanging on for dear life. Either I can hold on to the fleshly desires and things of this world, hold on to the bitterness, the resentment, the anger, the unforgiveness, etc., or I can choose to not let go of Him and let Him transform me into a new person.
2 Corinthians 5:17 (NLT)
This means that anyone who belongs to Christ has become a new person. The old life is gone; a new life has begun!
It is interesting to me that in my dream I had to decide if I was going to let go of this Man’s hand and save myself or not. The funny thing is, I chose not to let go of His hand and that is exactly what I needed to do in order to be saved. I thought that if I let go I would save myself but I was only fooling myself by believing that lie. Satan often tries to make the things of this world seem so appealing that we don’t want to or don’t think we can give them up. For example, after accepting Jesus into your heart He might start dealing with you about all of those little white lies you tell throughout your day, or he may start dealing with you about how you need to stop drinking alcohol and hanging with certain friends that are bad influences.
I will continue now with the next part of my tornado dream. The roof has just been ripped off the wooden hut and the Man and I have been sucked up into the midst of the tornado. Inside I am spinning around and around. Dust and debris are flying all around me. I am screaming at the top of my lungs, feeling as if I am going to die. I am terrified for my life. Suddenly, I am thrown from the tornado and I land on my knees in the mud. I am badly injured. I look beside me and the Man whose hand I was holding is also on His knees in the mud right by my side.
I believe the tornado symbolizes the tests and trials in my life. The tornado symbolizes my divorce and the years that led up to it. The tornado symbolizes the panic disorder with agoraphobia that hit me hard and stopped me dead in my tracks in 1995. The tornado symbolizes all of the other hardships I have endured throughout my life. Remember how I described feeling like I was going to die and being terrified for my life in the midst of the tornado? That is exactly how I feel in the midst of a panic attack. I also believe the tornado symbolizes how God deals with us about old baggage from our past that he needs us to deal with and face in order to bring healing and restoration in our lives. The amazing part that brings tears to my eyes is finding out that Jesus is going through it right beside me. Jesus is right by my side. Isn’t He amazing? He will never let go of your hand. God does not promise us we will never have to endure hardships but He does promise He will never leave us.
Hebrews 13:5 (NLT)
“I will never fail you. I will never abandon you.”
Although I have had panic disorder with levels of agoraphobia for 13 years now, I truly believe that if the Lord had not allowed this to happen to me, I never would have turned to Him. Before the agoraphobia and panic I was so full of myself, so selfish and conceited. It was during the lowest part of my marriage and the lowest point of the panic disorder that I hit rock bottom. I had nowhere left to turn and I had no idea how I was going to survive anything else in my life. I finally stopped looking inside myself to try to save myself and I looked up. When I looked up I found a loving, caring Father with His arms stretched out towards me, waiting patiently for me to come to Him; for me to choose Him.
I will continue now with the next part of my dream. I am on my knees in the mud with the Man beside me. Some people gather us up and take us into a large school for shelter and safety. I am injured and limping yet I go right to work helping the volunteers by serving juice and snacks to the scared children inside. I stop once in awhile and tell them a funny story to make them laugh. Someone announces that the storm is heading towards the school. They warn everyone to stay away from the windows and doors or risk being sucked out. I look out a window and I see more kids outside running towards the school. All of the doors are locked from the outside. I look around and not one person is willing to risk their life to go and open the door for the children outside. I run over to the door and let the remaining children inside. The door is being pulled so hard by the strong winds, I cannot pull it shut. I leave it open and stand back, waiting for the storm to pass over.
The part in my dream where I am injured and limping symbolizes how my heart and soul have been injured in my past but I don’t let that stop me from serving God. I am then serving juice and snacks to the children inside and trying to make them laugh. I want to see joy on their faces. This is my desire now to serve the Lord with all of my heart and to share what God has done for me in my life. The children are, of course, all people (God’s children). Even though I still suffer with panic disorder and agoraphobia, I do not let that stop me from my desire to share God’s work in my life and what He has done for me. My desire is to see others find the same joy that I have found in Jesus. I have begun to do so by creating this blog. It is not always easy to share the intimate details of my life but I feel the Lord has asked me to do this in order to help others.
There are more parts to this tornado dream but I cannot share them with you at this time as I feel this dream is prophetic and the Lord has not yet revealed to me the remainder of the meaning of this dream. I hope that my story has brought you some comfort and hope.
