In the dream my father and I are driving to the record store to pick up my brother, Charles. We've just been to the barber shop and both of us have new haircuts (his hidden beneath the Stetson hat he always wore). We're having a wonderful time together, such a time as I can't remember us sharing since I was a very young child, and indeed, I AM a lot younger in the dream.
We stop at the record store and he stays in the car while I run in to fetch my brother.
I find him and we look around for a few minutes at all the new albums before we leave.
On the way out Charles notices my haircut and mentions it to me. "You got your top chopped, didn't you?"
"Yeah," I reply, "Dad and I both did".
And so we get to the car, Charles climbing into the back seat, and in the back of my mind I'm thinking how odd it is that he's not fussing about "having to ride in back". I'd always thought of him as "Daddy's boy", they had always been so close, and I figured he'd want to sit up there with him. But he let me get in the front seat with no hassle and I thought that was swell of him, because I did want to continue riding shotgun with dad.
Charles and I got into the car at about the same time and he reached up and gave our father a hug and told him he loved him. I felt a tremendous wave of affection for him, too, and thoughts went through my mind of how a couple of years earlier he had died, but somehow, maybe a miracle, maybe a medical marvel, he had come back to life...but this was not like those stories you hear about doctors saving a person whose heart has stopped for a few minutes. No, my dad had been dead long enough for me to have very vivid memories of what it was like to live in the world without him, the loss and the grief still fresh in my mind. But there he was, sitting behind the wheel, waiting for us to get settled into the car, with that sweet familiar smile breaking out on his face when Charled told him that he loved him. He looked over at me and I felt a wave of love pass over me like a tsunami tide. I had to tell him something and I wasn't about to let it slide.
"Dad, I just want you to know that every single day I thank God for giving you back to us..."
He looked me in the eye and I could not read the expression in his face. No matter. I savored it for a moment as the realization slowly dawned on me that people don't get such second chances after they're dead and in the ground so...
this...
must...
be...
a...
dream.
I woke up into the real world where over 6 years had passed since I last saw my father alive. The dream was so realistic it almost broke my heart to leave it behind to waking life.
I have had similar dreams periodically over the course of the last few years. Some took frightening turns and some, like this one, were comforting. In all of them I come to the point where I realize that it's impossible for us to be together because he's passed on and I'm still in the land of the living. That's usually the point where I wake up.
I don't know what the dreams mean, and I can't say that I really want to know. They're bittersweet for me, but I wouldn't trade them for anything in the world.
Maybe I'm naive but I've always thought that pleasant dreams were a glimpse of heaven, that sleep was a portal to another reality every bit as real as the one we inhabit, that such dreams are meant to be a source of hope for eternity.
As such, it is nice to see my dad and be with him in this manner as often as I'm blessed with these particular dreams. As I grow older and get closer to the day when we will be reunited I find that I can appreciate the dream as a reminder of how things once were. As such the waking and the realization of the difference between dream and reality are not as heart-breaking as they once were.
For whatever reason I'm reminded of what Jesus said, "With God all things are possible". In His sovereignty He has ordained laws of nature that, for our own good, place limits on human experience that demand terms like "possible" and "impossible". In the world of the spirit, however, there are no limits. Dreams take place in the world of the spirit where there are no limits.
I don't really know what the point of all this is...except that I miss my dad and I thank the Lord for giving me these dreams of him to tide me over until the day I leave this world and stand with all of my departed loved ones before our Saviour, together singing His praises and worshipping Him, celebrating with thanksgiving all the good things that come from Him...
