camped out

Many years ago I had this picture that God gave me in a dream. It was too powerful of a message to just have been a random “too much pizza” dream.

I was walking in rolling fields of flowers and grain. Far off in the distance was a castle. He showed me that each field I was walking in represented a different aspect of my relationship with Him; the sheep and the Shepherd (Ezekiel 34:11-12, 14-15, John 10:1-18), clay and the Potter (Isaiah 64:8, Jeremiah 18) daughter and Father (Romans 8:14-17), servant and Master (Proverbs 31:30, Matthew 25:14-30, Luke 19:11-27), friend to Friend (John 15:15, James 2:23, Proverbs 22:11), bride and Groom (Hosea 2:19-20), etc.

As I walk through these fields I was growing closer to Him and the castle. While I was on my journey I saw a fence. There were many people camped out in front of the fence. I walked up to the people around the tents and I asked why the people were camped at the fence, each had a different excuse… “it was too high”, their “ friends or teachers were camped here", they were “comfortable”. As I heard the excuses, I begin to wonder why there would be a fence in fields that represented our relationship with God. I knew God wouldn't put up a fence (Matt. 7:7-8). So I walk up to the fence, then I walked right through it. It was a hologram! It was just in the imagination of those camped out, something they had built between them and their relationship with God.

In all the things that God is teaching me, this dream came back to my memory. It is amazing how many things are coming together for this lesson God is trying to teach me. He is trying to renew my mind to His thinking instead of my selfish prideful thinking. Every message, verse, book, bible study I read and hear all are echoing the same message…complete and utter yielding to Him.

“Blessed are the poor in spirit, for theirs is the kingdom of heaven.” Matthew 5:3

Often I have wondered what Jesus meant when he said this, I assumed it mean we must be humble. The other night my husband pointed out this verse’s full meaning. There are 2 words in the original greek for our word “poor”. The one used here means: a person utterly, absolutely, destitute; a person who has no hope of surviving unless someone reaches out a hand to help.

When he was defining this, I keep picturing the people in Haiti, a country already devastated before the earthquake. I remember seeing the desperate people trying anything they could to get to the fresh food and water their families needed. Often I have thought, what would I do if it was me and my two little ones going days without food and water or my little one stuck under the rubble… what would I do to find the nourishment they so desperately needed.

When we realize our desperateness for Him then and only then can we grasp the Kingdom of heaven.