Everybody dreams, whether they remember them or not is the real issue. As you will know from this website especially the dreams and interpretation menu, I am an advocate that you should pay attention to your dreams.
In the last month I came across Tania Harris who has written a number of books, has a website and other material about how to hear from God and one of those ways is through dreams. She speaks of the three types of dreams that we experience. They can be God dreams, psychological dreams (soul dreams) or spirit dreams (dreams that come from another spirit source than God). The dream I am about to write about is a psychological dream yet I was encouraged through it. Tania disagrees with some who have written or spoken that all dreams are from God. I have read this myself. I agree that not all dreams are from God but that He can use or speak through any of them. This dream fits into the latter category.
The background to the dream was a night where my brain seemed to be quite busy. It was like there was a conversation going on in my head. Not all the thoughts were easily articulated. They didn’t have a strong focus. The dream which I share was not one of a clear image which I can sometimes have, yet as I was reading the Bible after waking up, it came back to me. Some dreams I have, I come out of them as I wake up. This one was further back in the night as it were. Here is the dream in its raw form. I share it as I have with other dreams on this website with a view to help you the reader be able to interpret your own dreams. We can ask the Holy Spirit to help us with this process which is something I do regularly. Dreams are made up of symbols, metaphors, pictures, plays on words and once you begin to see this they are understandable. Like Tania explains on her podcast, dream interpretation isn’t a science it’s more like an art.
Here is the dream in its raw form (any references to people within dreams are rarely literal – they often refer to how the dreamer sees that person and can vary what they represent depending on the context within the dream).
A guy called Rob McSween came to me and said that he’d seen or heard that Satan is on the rise. I wanted to tell him but didn’t, that even though he’s heard or seen this, that the Bible talks about standing firm and that those things as Christians we’ve prayed for, about revival and renewal are coming because it speaks about the restoration and the renewal of all things. We need to hang in there.
This dream was potentially a frightening one as it relates to a figure that is known in the history of the church and in the Bible as an evil character. There is not space here to speak of this name, suffice to say I initially took it rather literally – to my shame! I think that is the nature of what happens when his name is invoked or used. There is no need to be afraid if we consider that Jesus is Lord and King. Others have written more than I can say here. I point you to a number of resources including a bible dictionary and the work of Michael Heiser, his books Unseen Realm, Supernatural, Demons* and Reversing Hermon as written about elsewhere on this website (* video)
That aside I parked this name for a moment and took a look at the meaning of McSween. I know the meaning of Rob as that’s the same name as I have which I will come to shortly. I was interested in the meaning behind Sween. This comes from the Gaelic ‘Suibhne’ meaning ‘pleasant’ or ‘affable’. Seeing this meaning I realised that the dream was most likely psychological as I am a pleasant and affable person. So by extension the dream is about myself.
You will when you examine your own dreams find similar symbols. At this point a connection came together in my mind. The reference to Satan was symbolic. From this point on I will be using a lower case ‘s’ for satan. From my studies I should have remembered this as I considered the dream. I like the example that Michael Heiser uses which I will use here or a paraphrase of, when describing how the term is used. In Hebrew the word ‘ha’ is put in front of satan (when together it’s pronounced ha (as in fat) sat (same as fat) arn – ha satan) to infer that it’s a title not a name. We don’t say in an English sentence The Michael or The Rob. Yet we can say the satan as it’s a title and it means the accuser, obscurer or adversary. With that in mind I understood that what I was being told by the other Rob in my dream was that accusations are on the rise.
There is another relevant detail that will not be apparent from the dream. This other guy Rob used to be a gardener, it’s what he did in the past. Gardening is my current trade and it’s where I do a lot of thinking as I have a lot of time to myself. The garden reference is more implicit in the dream. This can also refer in my case to my heart or mind. The link here is that accusations that come are often from things that happened in the past. We have to put the past behind us and move on. The Apostle Paul speaks of this after the middle of Philippians 3.
In real life, that is my none sleeping life – my awake life, I am aware that in my mind, accusations have been flying around. In a sense it was encouraging to be reminded of this. These accusations are not from myself, although in a sense in waking life they are as I hear them in my own mind as my own thoughts. I do not have to let them land, or agree with them but I can refuse them and take the sword of The Spirit to them. In my dream I am reminding the other Rob that is what is required by the way I respond in a way that is more hopeful. The dream is also about restoration and renewal. This is what the life of someone who follows Jesus is about and one that the whole world is waiting for.
The meaning of Robert is bright fame. Bright is that which is radiating or reflecting light. The light of Jesus is shining through me as a person. This is not something I hope for it’s a spiritual reality. It’s not that I am boasting about how great I am or what I’ve done it’s that I am taking hold of what the word of God says about those who follow Jesus. Fame originally meant character attributed to someone (c13th). I prefer this original meaning of fame as it relates more to the character of someone.
In the dream there is reference to renewal, the restoration of all things and revival. This is where the title of the article is explained. The fact that whatever we do will be paid back to us whether good or bad is something that’s part of what is to come.
For we must all appear before the judgment seat of Christ, in order that each one may receive back the things through the body according to what he has done, whether good or bad.
2 CoR 5:10. W. Hall Harris III et al., eds., The Lexham English Bible (Bellingham, WA: Lexham Press, 2012)
What we do affects the world, the land, the soil around us which is another topic to be explored fully another time. A little taster is that the Bible speaks about how our broken connections with God and one another (also called sin) not only affects our relationship with God and one another respectively, it also affects the land and the ground. (The first example of this recorded in the Bible is with the story of Cain and Abel). This can be seen on various levels from the individual to the corporate. In short for things to be better in this world on land and in the sea righteousness needs to prevail.
In the dream I hear the words from my own mouth about restoration, renewal and revival. These words have been working around in my subconscious as I’ve been considering them in my day time thinking. This sparked an interest to acknowledge these and other important English Bible words used in Christian thought. Here are a number of English Biblical words beginning with ‘re’ which are very important in the Biblical narrative. Some of these words occur frequently throughout the text, others not as much yet are still important. Some of the references do not have the same word from the list but when you look them up you will find synonyms for them. The version of the Bible used is the LEB which works with Logos Bible Software. There are web, desktop and mobile app versions. (The references that go with this list are not exhaustive, they are examples – hopefully they may encourage you the reader to do some digging around in the Bible yourself):
- Rebuke Jude 9
- Receive Matthew 6.2
- Reconciliation 2 Corinthians 5.18
- Redemption Ephesians 1.7
- Refresh Acts 3.20
- Regeneration Titus 3.5
- Rejoice Philippians 4.4-9
- Remember Genesis 9.15
- Renewal Psalm 51.10
- Renovation (Restoration) Titus 3.5
- Repentance Luke 5.32
- Rest Hebrews 4
- Restoration Psalm 23.5
- Resurrection Matthew 16.21
- Returning Isaiah 30.15
- Revelation (Reveal) Numbers 24.4
- Revival Psalm 85.6
- Reward Ecclesiastes 4.9
Whilst preparing this article I have been reading through portions of 1 and 2 Peter and studying them. This has been in the last week. I might hear a phrase from scripture when I wake and I had one of those in this period too. The connection between those two sentences may not be immediately apparent. The connection comes further on with the reference I speak of in 1 Peter. The phrase was ‘David encouraged himself in the Lord…‘ This comes from 1 Samuel 30 it was this:
And ⌊David was in a very precarious situation⌋, for the people spoke of stoning him, for the souls of all the people were bitter, each one over his sons and his daughters. But David strengthened himself in Yahweh his God.
W. Hall Harris III et al., eds., The Lexham English Bible (Bellingham, WA: Lexham Press, 2012)
The passage then goes on to say how he did this which I hadn’t quite realised before, by calling the priest and asking that he’d bring the ephod. This was used for consulting a god in local cultures of the time. In this specific instance it was used to consult Yahweh with a specific question or two. David was wanting to know what was the best thing to do and he was asking the right person! A lesson to be learned there I think.
EPHOD (אֵפֹד, ephod). A garment worn by priests, especially one of the sacred vestments of the high priest. Biblical Relevance Ephod of the High Priest As described in Exodus, the ephod of the Israelite high priest is an extravagant garment, made of wool, linen, and gold thread. The wool is colored blue, purple, and scarlet (Exod 28:6–14). The exact shape of the ephod, however, is unknown. The presence of shoulder pieces indicates that it hung from the shoulders; furthermore, the use of sash indicates that it extended below the waist. The ephod included shoulder pieces, which contained two onyx stones on which the names of the sons of Israel (six names on each stone) were engraved. The onyx stones were in gold filigree settings on which were placed twisted gold chains. The high priest wore the ephod over a linen tunic. The gold, jeweled breastpiece, which held the Urim and Thummim, attached to the ephod. The priest wore a robe of blue wool over the ephod. Lastly, the high priest wore a turban, on front of which hung a gold plate with the words, “Holy to the Lord” (קֹ֖דֶשׁ לַיהוה, qodesh laihwh; Lev 8:7–9).
Ronald D. Roberts, “Ephod,” ed. John D. Barry et al., The Lexham Bible Dictionary (Bellingham, WA: Lexham Press, 2016).
When I looked up the Hebrew word for strengthened I was drawn to another meaning of the word which I was not aware of which took me on a little trip through some of the scriptures around the exile period of the people of Israel. The word which I was drawn to is another ‘re’ word. The word was repair. Also whilst doing some scripture meditating another phrase came to me which was ‘a body I have prepared for you’. When I checked out where that was, it turned out that phrase was from Hebrews 10.5 and the last word was ‘me’ not ‘you’. When I looked at the Greek words behind the word prepared and the word for healed in 1 Peter 2.24 respectively, I noticed that they also could be translated as repair. The use of this word repaired obviously depends on context and wasn’t used by the translators. It was intriguing that my attention was drawn to the word. I think it was because I had the ‘re’ word list in my head. Although I say that I believe that Holy Spirit was speaking through that to me and getting my attention. Repairing is something He is drawing my attention to as that’s what he wants to do currently.
If you follow the thread I spoke of earlier in the article relating to the Hebrew word behind strengthened in this case where it is translated repair, it was most of the time relating to the repairing of the temple or the Holy City. When I say this is what I think the Holy Spirit is speaking about it’s just that. He is about repairing the temple, more specifically his church and the individual temples as believers that we are. Preparing us for his return.
I have heard Christians say especially those who are prophetic, that when you find a scripture or a specific word that there’s this law, the law of first mention in the Bible. That seems to be where that specific topic was most important and has something to say.
In this instance the first time the use of repair behind the Hebrew word חזק (ḥzq) occurs in the Bible is:
Jehoash said to the priests, “All of the money for the sacred things that is brought to the temple of Yahweh, ⌊the money taxed at its proper value for each person⌋ and all of the money that comes upon the heart of a man to bring to the temple of Yahweh, let the priests take for themselves, each from his treasurers, and let them repair the breach of the temple for every place where damage is found.”
2 Kings 12.4,5
The Lexham English Bible. Bellingham, WA: Lexham Press.
I wanted to find when the first mention of repair occurs in the Bible so I did an inline search on the Hebrew word that I have been looking at. The Logos Bible app search engine came up with Genesis 48.1,2
And it happened that after these things, it was said to Joseph, “Behold, your father is ill.” And he took his two sons with him, Manasseh and Ephraim. And it was told to Jacob, “Behold, your son Joseph has come to you.” Then Israel strengthened himself and he sat up in the bed.
The Lexham English Bible. Bellingham, WA: Lexham Press.
Not being satisfied that this was exactly the first mention, albeit a good one as you can’t go back further than Genesis! I tried an inline search of the word repair from the first mention of it that I’d found. Another reference came up where I discover another Hebrew word which can mean repair. 1 Kings 18.30
Then Elijah said to all the people, “Come near to me,” so all the people came closer to him. He repaired the altar of Yahweh that had been destroyed.
The Lexham English Bible. Bellingham, WA: Lexham Press.
Strangely the root of the word i.e. its lemma in Hebrew is ‘rp’ (רפא) for the word I found. Now this could become a rabbit trail into English Etymology. The same letters there are used in our English word repair if you hadn’t noticed! I digress.
In linguistics and natural language processing:
Google
A lemma is the canonical or dictionary form of a word. It represents a set of word forms that share the same meaning and grammatical category. For example, the lemma “run” represents the words “runs,” “running,” and “ran.”
Now if I want to continue looking for the word repair (repaired, repairing etc) I can go backwards from this point or I can just look up the various ‘repair’ combinations in a concordance or Logos search engine. As I am using the LEB in my study I would have to broaden my search using different translations to see if the word repair and its variants came up. Suffice to say this last scripture referenced is the first place the word is used. It does not appear further back in this version of the Bible.
If I continued to look at the Hebrew word behind this same reference I would discover that the first place it is mentioned is in Genesis 20.17 where the English word healed is used. Now that’s a different study. It appears that’s the first time that word is used in the whole Bible. As this Hebrew word also means repair we can see that it is something that is involved in healing. To heal in a sense is to repair. This looks like how the Hebrew people would have understood it.
So to bring all of these thoughts together. At the beginning I was speaking about the rise of accusations. To combat accusations we need to strengthen ourselves in Yahweh (The Lord). One way to do this is to listen to what he’s saying. The word of God is a defensive weapon against accusations and the truth of the word is a defensive belt holding the middle part of the armour together. This word of truth also has a purifying affect on his people. Not only can we encourage and strengthen others we can do this to and for ourselves. In this sense we can repair what is or may be breaking. If it is already broken we have an opportunity to repair it. The ‘it’ here are things like our relationships or our inner person. We can ask the Holy Spirit to show us where we need repairing both individually and as the body of Christ.
- Ask the Heavenly Father to first help you recognise accusations for what they are, who and where they come from.
- Learn to stand firm and take up and use the word of God and speak to the accusations.
- Check anything that needs repenting of.
- Be thankful, be obedient to the voice of the Lord.
- Ask also that Heavenly Father would help you by Holy Spirit to see what needs mending and repair it.
Postscript:
