Jeremiah 23.5-8, Matthew 1.18-24
Holy Communion, Parcevall Hall, Wharfedale, 18 December 2018
Joseph had a dream. In it the angel told him to put his fears and social inhibitions aside and take Mary as his wife, for the child was God’s special one.
The Christmas story is full of people having dreams. Do you remember old Zechariah being told of the coming birth of his son John; or Joseph’s other dream where the angel told him to escape to Egypt to save his precious baby's life. And the very similar dream of The Magi where the angel told them to avoid scheming Herod and to go a different way home?
It seems like God likes telling us things in dreams.
It seems like the best time to hear God speaking to us is when we¹re asleep!
I wonder if you’ve ever had the experience of having had God speak to you in a dream?
I wonder if you’d be open to the idea as you turn the light off tonight?
Sometimes of course we dream when we¹re awake. People dream of better times ahead - of winning the lottery, of getting that better job, of finding that ideal partner, of receiving the longed-for care of our family. We are born to dream, it¹s part of who we are.
"I have a dream!" said Martin Luther King, Jr., the black civil rights leader, many years ago, "I dream that someday the children of former slaves and of former slave owners will be able to sit down together at the table as one family, and live in a nation where they will be judged not by the colour of their skins, but by the content of their characters."
To make that dream come true, Martin Luther King, Jr. got people organised in all sorts of protests and eventually the change he dreamed of did come. Even though he lost his life in the meantime all his efforts had been worthwhile.
Good King Wenceslas was a dreamer. He dreamed that by trudging through the snow to deliver gifts to the poor man, he would close the gap between them, put things right between them.
And Bob Geldof was a dreamer. Remember him? He dreamed that a bunch of lazy, self-obsessed musicians could start to put an end to the famine in Africa. That was thirty-four Christmasses ago now, and for all the funds it has raised we know that his project Band Aid really has helped to feed the world.
What do you dream of? For yourself? For the world?
I’m inspired by people like those who dreamed up the Bradford Emmaus project, dreamed of providing a home for some of the city’s rough sleepers and not just a home but meaningful work in their social enterprise. This dream is now a reality of course, and the rough-sleepers have become residents and companions, in the Emmaus community, regaining self-esteem and grasping the opportunity to regain control of their lives.
I think that God loves a dreamer. Because dreamers are people able to see the world in a new way; to see the possibility of re-shaping the world into the way that God intended.
This Christmas, dream on. And may God be with us in our dreams.....
Note
Originally preached as Dream On, in Liverpool on Boxing Day 2004.
Parcevall Hall is the retreat house of the Anglican Diocese of Leeds, near Appletreewick in Wharfedale. I lead their Tuesday communion occasionally.
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