Friday, March 7, 2008

Dreams and Miracles

This has been a challenging season for me, not because of what has been happening but because I have had to forcibly shift my way of thinking. Each night, I go to bed feeling like Syciphus wondering if I will ever get that bolder up and OVER the dang hill. I'm mentally and sometimes spiritually exhausted.

But that doesn't always mean I get to actually sleep.

A few nights ago, I collapsed into bed after our nightly routine of pajamas, brushing teeth, and prayers. I begged God to send me some sort of uplifting words or images in my dreams. I tossed and tossed and finally got comfy.... just as the electric company parked out on my street to do "regular maintainance" at 1:00am. Being the middle of their workday, they didn't think twice about leaving radios on and truck doors open. After I thought I had blocked the radio out of my head and started to drift off again, they began pulling out all their tools. Apparently the next thing they are supposed to do is drop them all over the asphalt so that it echoes throughout the street and ping right into my dark room just for the purpose of startling me awake.

Heavenly Father... zap them... HARD. Oh yeah, and send me a soothing dream.

An hour later, it was dark and quiet... until a little voice came crying into my room. Something about having to go potty and the lights not working. I forgot about the outage and thought, "Oh man! Did we forget to pay the bill???" Thirty seconds later, I had the presence of mind to fumble us towards my bathroom before having any incidents that would keep me awake any longer than necessary. Once she was tucked back into bed, I prayed to God for the third time that night to visit me with his dreams. To reassure me that all would one day be right. But I just tossed... and tossed... and eventually went to sleep in fits and bursts, but no deep REM.

Darn.

The next day, I was at the computer attempting to put our most recent drama in perspective and not give it any more power than all the good that has been coming my way. I was happy to take a break and answer a call from my City Girl daughter. "Is everything okay, mom?" I stammered a little and then just admitted that no, in fact, things were pretty tough. I told her about the previous two days and tried really hard to hold back tears of despondency. "I thought so..."

"I had the weirdest dream about you last night."

After talking and reading and praying, we realized that God had visited me through my beautiful daughter. The vision he gave her translated into something meaning that things were going to be okay. Specifically, to learn from the situation, not to dwell on the negative, and that soon I would be cleansed from my troubles and disappointments.

Praise God.

God comes to us in all forms. It's our job to be present and listening when He comforts us. They may seem like little miracles sometimes... Nothing that the Vatican would consider big, anyway. But for the receivers, these miracles are as big as the parting of the sea in order that those in captivity would be set free.


~

2 comments:

Lela said...

So how exactly does one get to be the new, hotter, fresher Anne Lamott? Not that you are, you'll all Sugar, but I'm just saying, she's got nothing on you. And she's my hero!

Anonymous said...

I think that "God" is visiting me through you...giving me some perspective.

~ Beth