"For God speaketh once, yea twice, yet man perceiveth it not. In a dream, in a vision of the night, when deep sleep falleth upon men, in slumberings upon the bed; then he openeth the ears of men, and sealeth their instruction..."

                                                                      Job 33:14-16

       Dreams have played a major part in our lives since the dawn of time. God certainly used dreams all throughout the Bible to communicate his will to his servants. The powerful dreams of Joseph and Jacob are just two that typify the importance of how a dream can impact our destiny. While it is true that all of us dream, it is equally true that not all of us remember what we dreamed or understand what to make of our dreams. Some dreams are congruent to thought and memory. Others are disconcerted, showing little to no sense at all.

       In all my years of study, trying to understand the intricate workings of the internal aspects of our mind, the one thing I am certain of is the fact that we really never forget anything. Thoughts and memories are displaced, but not forgotten. Your mind is like the memory on your computer. You can close a file and even try to erase it, but it is still part of your data system. You think it is not there because you cannot locate it, but by erasing the file name all you have done is removed it from its descriptive location, not necessarily from your hard drive. Haven't you found at times when you were trying to remember something from your past and it just didn't register? You couldn't pull it up. It seemed lost, when suddenly out of nowhere, something triggered your thoughts and it all came back. Maybe not in its exact detail, but you remembered.

       What caused that? It is because information recorded within your memory banks is cataloged forever, and there is far more information contained in the library of your mind than you can possibly think of in a given moment. Your mind is so amazing that it never stops recording images you see, voices you hear, and experiences you encounter. Much of the dreams you experience is part of your mind systematically trying to process all the information you have taken in throughout the day. A lot of what is recorded may not have passed through your conscious thoughts, which invariably is why you meet people, places, or things in your dream world that you think you never encountered in life.

       Dreams are very real, although the experiences we often face within a dream are not. At times, a dream can move beyond the usual. They can become so engaging that we actually feel like it happened. I have awakened from an encounter in a dream with someone in conversation that seemed so real that I felt deep within myself that I knew that person and discovered who they were; although in the natural, I had never held a conversation with them-ever.

       Our corporeal nature requires that we sleep, and it is in our sleep that our minds find time to decompress from all its daily activities. Although we are unconsciously aware of our surroundings in our sleep, our minds are still functioning just as our heart is still beating.  We are in a transitory state of being between the conscious and unconscious realm.

       God created each of us with the ability and the need to dream. But he also did it in order to speak to us in a way that we may not have been sensitive to hear with our conscious mind or in a more intimate way that is recorded in the Bible as being a "vision of the night." In Acts 2, it was prophesied that "...your young men shall see visions, and your old men shall dream dreams" (Acts 2:17). Dreams are important, especially when God is directing them. God can inspire a thought, reveal a strategy, warn of impending danger, expose the enemy's plot, give direction, drop a message into your heart, as well as a number of other vital interests that can correct, direct, and inform us of things that can impact our life and destiny. God will use dreams, even today, to speak to us. And when he does, may we be mindful of what he tells us-especially when our hearts bear witness that we know it came from him. Always pray over your dreams...and your night seasons. Who knows what may come of it, and what may be unveiled concerning the purpose of God for your life.