When I was six or seven years old, I had two experiences that I’ve come to think of as either a testing period, or a tuning of sorts. It just seems that way to me. In the first one, I woke in the night and sat up in bed. As a child I was scared of the dark, so if I woke up I would call to my mother and tell her I was thirsty, or I had a leg ache, or anything else I could think of that might buy time with her. Sometimes I just needed her to lie next to me until I felt relaxed enough to go back to sleep. Not this night.
I woke up (I thought), sat up, and just waited. In the dark. A small white light appeared on one wall, drew itself into a glowing line that passed in front of me, and attached to the opposite wall. I leaned forward to touch it, but my hand went right through it. Sitting back, I then watched a pair of socks appear on the line, then a slip and a pair of underwear. Weird neon laundry. I tried again but couldn’t touch them. Then each item winked out in the opposite order it appeared, the line erased itself, and the initial dot of light vanished. There was nothing left to see, so I lay back down and went to sleep.
A second dream came on another night. Again I sat up and waited. This time I saw nothing, but heard people in the kitchen next to my bedroom. No light shined under the door, so I knew the kitchen light wasn’t on. In such a small house I always knew when someone was up. I was confused. I recognized the voices of a teacher from my school and the principal as they calmly talked to each other, though I didn’t focus on what they were saying, because a swell of other voices started to drown them out. A bunch of kids began talking and laughing loudly–all next to my room. It was very noisy.
After several seconds the voices died down, and I heard chairs being pushed back from the table. I could hear high heels clicking on the linoleum floor, and heavier footsteps that I assumed belonged to the principal. They walked out of the kitchen with all the children following them. The sound of their steps changed when their shoes hit the hardwood floor of the living room, and then everything faded through the front of the house and was gone. I sat briefly in the stone silent house before putting my head back on my pillow and drifting off.
Nothing about these experiences frightened me, probably because of their familiar and benign elements, but even at a young age I was aware of the high strangeness. It’s been more than half a century and those two experiences are still sharp in my memory. I don’t think it’s a coincidence that later in life, when I was the most lost spiritually, I began having vivid dreams–visuals and voice dreams–that I eventually understood were pointing me to Jesus and the Bible. God doesn’t do coincidences. He coordinates events, and sometimes uses dreams.
After I surrendered my life to Christ, the night visuals and sounds kicked into high gear. I couldn’t keep what was happening to myself, but in the course of telling I sometimes ran into resistance. I let it discourage me. Maybe I was too exuberant and off-putting–I couldn’t tell–because my own story fascinates me. I think everyone should be fascinated by their own story. God is nothing short of mind-blowing, and I committed the crime of clamming up about Him around people who I thought didn’t want to hear.
When people suggest your imagination is overactive, or imply you’re trying to make something special from the ordinary, or even worse, tell you not to pay attention to it, it can squelch a good thing. I was newly saved, on fire, and burning to share with anyone who would listen. I needed validation. We’re supposed to share what Jesus has done for us, because He’s amazing.
Nearly a year into my walk with the Lord, the Holy Spirit convicted me of, well, being a wimp. He gave me a dream to change my thinking.
In the dream I found myself walking out of a one-story building as the sun was getting low. I felt the need to be alone, away from a small gathering of people milling around inside. I walked through a door onto a private back patio, which was surrounded by a large area where some kind of crop had once grown. Now it was just dried stalks much taller than me, like cornstalks without leaves. As I was looking at how the plants had been growing right up next to the patio, a fish came swimming out, through the air.
The fish was about shoulder level above the ground, making its way through the stalks toward me. It was a rich golden orange color, roughly six inches tall, and about two feet long. It had a circle of small protrusions on its head that looked like something trying to push through to the surface. Gorgeous and graceful, very long and lean, it glided effortlessly in and around the dried growth. It swam up and lightly bumped me below my collar bones, then turned and went back.
I hurried into the building to tell the people inside about what just happened. They followed me back outside, but the fish didn’t show up. Everyone left me on the patio and went back inside. The fish came back. It swam up to me again, then turned and went deep into the stalks. Again I went inside to coax people outside to see it, and again the fish didn’t show. Three times I went to get the people to come out, and each time the fish was nowhere to be seen and the people would leave. I was stumped.
Suddenly I was aware of two young men standing together a short distance behind me. One of them said, “We can see it, too.” They seemed as flabbergasted as I was, and suggested “there must be a portal” that the fish was going in and out of. I didn’t know what to think. The fish kept coming so close that it would lightly bump me, and then it would turn around and go back into the stalks.
Just as I began waking up from this dream, I heard a male voice say emphatically, “The gold fish will not testify.”
Boom!
“Ichthys” is the Greek word for fish. Early Christians used this word to form a symbol identifying Christ followers. Each letter in the word came to stand for the Greek words, Iesous, Christos, Theou, Yios, and Soter, which mean Jesus Christ God’s Son Savior. The fish was a symbol commonly used by pagans during that time, so it supposedly would draw little attention when cautiously scratched in the dirt by believers identifying themselves to each other. Fish were a big part of life in the Galilee, and are featured often in Scripture. The ichthys/fish symbol is still used today to represent Christianity. I have one on the back of my car.
If Jesus can be symbolized by a fish, then it seems fitting that He’d be a fabulous golden one. Since that dream, I’ve read of others who have had dreams where Jesus was symbolized by a golden fish for them as well. Author Eric Metaxas wrote of one in his own dream, and how that brought him to faith. When I first saw the one in my dream, I thought “goldfish” because of its orange tinge. But the voice said it as two distinct words–gold fish.
I’m sure that gold fish represented Jesus. He didn’t reveal Himself to those inside the building, because this was something between me and Him. What I saw was a fish out of water, and if Jesus had never been anything else, He was certainly a fish out of water, one with a crown beneath His flesh. He said, “My kingdom is not of this world.”
A witness is someone who has first-hand knowledge of an event or a fact. The two men behind me were my witnesses. They validated what I saw when no one else could. In Jewish law there had to be two witnesses present when someone was convicted of wrongdoing. I’m not under Jewish law, but it’s described in the Bible, and the symbolism here is telling. One of the Holy Spirit’s jobs is to convict us of sin, wrongdoing. I was being convicted. I needed to stop feeling intimated and speak out.
There might be things about this dream that I won’t understand for a while, but I believe the basic message is clear. Since Jesus’ death and resurrection, believers are instructed to testify on His behalf, spreading the Gospel and telling others what He’s done for us.
Sharing can be difficult, especially if you’re introverted and there are people in high places that discount God’s method of dealing with you. Just keep pushing through, and by all means use discernment, because once your life belongs to Christ, Satan likes you a whole lot less, and he won’t hesitate to confuse you. Stay in the Word, keep talking to God, and trust no dream that contradicts Him!
Jesus was urging me not to clam up, even if people don’t believe what I say. I have to give my testimony just as it happened. I have to testify. I have to be His witness.
“You are My witnesses,” says the Lord, “And My servant whom I have chosen, that you may know and believe Me, and understand that I am He. Before Me there was no God formed, nor shall there be after Me. I, even I, am the Lord, and besides Me there is no savior.” (Isaiah 43:10-11)
“You will receive power when the Holy Spirit has come upon you, and you will be my witnesses in Jerusalem and in all Judea and Samaria, and to the end of the earth.” (Acts 1:18)
“Go….” (Matthew 28:18-20)
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