I had a dream that made me afraid. As I was lying in bed, the images and visions that passed through my mind terrified me. – Daniel 4:5

Today’s Scripture Reading (June 6, 2017): Daniel 4

“I believe in everything until it's disproved. So I believe in fairies, the myths, dragons. It all exists, even if it's in your mind. Who's to say that dreams and nightmares aren't as real as the here and now?” The words belong to John Lennon. For the former Beatle, the worlds we visit during the night are just as real as the ones that we have to deal with during our waking moments. But researchers have also hypothesized that there is a connection between the worlds of our sleep and the world we experience when we are awake. That one influences the other. Maybe it is our fears and pains that affect the dream world of our sleep. But sometimes, is it possible that our dream world tries to warn us about the things that may happen when we are awake? If this is true, then there is a meaning behind the things that we dream and the nightmares that we experience.

King Nebuchadnezzar believed that there was a connection between the two worlds. And it was that connection between the worlds that caused fear in the King when he was awake. Nebuchadnezzar had a dream that terrified him when he was awake. And the only way that he could hope to escape the fear was to figure out what the dream meant.

But this also is confirmation of something that we probably already know. Bad dreams happen to all of us, no matter what our status might be in life. It is the present reality of Kings, Rock Stars, and ordinary people. Most of us have experienced nightmares that have crossed over the border between our sleeping world and our waking world. At times I have deeply understood what it was that Nebuchadnezzar must have experienced – I have had the dream during the night that has left me with a dark sense of almost depression during the day. And, in this sense, I probably have to agree with Lennon – every world is real that has an effect on the world in which I live while I am awake. Personally, I have to keep reminding myself that my depression is the result of my dreams. I have to understand within myself that these events have not happened in the waking world. And that ultimately God is in control of every world in which I live, whether it is the world I experience when I am awake or the worlds that I visit when I am asleep.

Tomorrow’s Scripture Reading: Ezekiel 40