Visions and Dreams

By Os Hillman


Acts 2:17
In the last days, God says, I will pour out My Spirit on all people. Your sons and daughters will prophesy, your young men will see visions, your old men will dream dreams.

"I need to meet with you," said the man from England during a break at a conference overseas. We walked outside to have a coffee break and sat down. "God wants you to know that He removed your finances in order to reserve His reward for you in Heaven. He has done you a great service."

I was shocked. I'd never met this gentleman before. How would he have known I had lost a half million dollars in the previous few years, virtually all of my financial net worth, to some unusual calamities? We shared for the next several minutes.

That week, during our lunch and dinner times, I had been enjoying wonderful, juicy oranges from this island in the Mediterranean Sea. It came time for the gentleman and I to conclude our coffee break. We bowed in prayer. As we prayed, the man began to describe a picture he was seeing in his mind.

"I see a picture of a large orange tree. The tree is full of large, ripened oranges. They are beginning to fall to the ground. You are the tree!"

Again, I looked at the man with shock and amazement, and now tears in my eyes.

"You are the third person in three years that has had a similar vision during a prayer time like this. The first two people were also strangers to me."

I went back into the meeting rejoicing that God could be so personal in my life. He used a servant who had gone through similar trials to supernaturally speak a word of encouragement in a way that I would know it was God who was speaking.

There are times when God supernaturally speaks into our lives. He does this to demonstrate His power, His love, and His intimacy with us. Do not be surprised if God sends one of His messengers to speak into your life when you need it most. Be open to how God might want to speak into your life today.

He is like a tree planted by streams of water, which yields its fruit in season and whose leaf does not wither. Whatever he does prospers (Psalm 1:3).

Visions and Dreams

The Wider Life: Chapter 2 

By J.R. Miller


      We owe everything that is good and beautiful--to our visions. They lead us ever to higher things. They show us glimpses of character, of attainment, of achievement, beyond what we have yet reached, and the beauty or the excellence visioned before us--starts in us a discontent with our present state and a longing to climb to the loftier heights!

An artist has a vision of something lovely--and paints it on his canvas, or hews it out of his block of marble. An inventor has in his mind a dream of his invention, something which he believes will prove a blessing to the world. He thinks and broods, and at last gives the fruit of his thinking and brooding, a form that makes it practical.

Columbus was a dreamer. It was the belief in his day that there was nothing beyond the sea. He had a vision of a continent beyond, and heard the bidding, "Go and find it!" Learned men laughed at his dream--but he could not put it out of his mind, and, sailing forth, he found a new world. Thus all progress and all advancement, have been achieved. Men have dreamed and followed their visions and made them real.

One of the promised results of the coming of the Holy Spirit, was the bringing of larger, fuller life. "Your young men shall see visions, and your old men shall dream dreams." It is supposed that old men do not dream any more. Their attainments and achievements are all in the past. But this need not be so. If this world were all, if death ended everything, there would be little use for the old to dream. They cannot do much in the small margin of life left to them. But death is not the end of life; it goes on beyond, infinitely and forever. Paul was an old man--but he was as full of hopes and enthusiasms as if he had been in the midst of youth. He was old when he described his scheme of life as forgetting things behind--and reaching forward to things ahead.

Let not the old man think for a moment, that his work is done, though he has lived his threescore and ten years, even though he is physically feeble. Let him keep his heart young, though his hairs are white. Let him keep his enthusiasms, though he is feeble and frail in body. Let him keep love in his heart, love for people, love for young people and children, sympathy with human need. Let him keep interested in others, not allowing himself to withdraw from active life, and then in a little while shrink away into a shriveled shell of decrepitude and uselessness.

Old people with ripe experience can be of great service to younger people. "Old men for counsel." Let the old people feel that their work is not yet done, that the world still needs them, that they have no right to lapse into indolence. "Your old men shall dream dreams", dreams of beauty, of helpfulness, of service--and then go out to make their dreams come true. Sometimes we hear it said, that miracles have ceased. This may be true in a sense--but it is not true that communication between heaven and earth has ceased. The ladder has not been taken down. God still puts into men's hearts inspirations, desires, hopes, longings. Every case of human need or distress that makes its appeal to us--is a heavenly vision, calling us to do an act of kindness.

There is a pleasant legend of Martin. He was a soldier. It was in the depth of winter. One bitter night a beggar, scantily clad, asked alms of the soldier. All he had was his soldier's cloak. Drawing his sword he cut the cloak in half, gave one part of it to the poor man and was content himself with the other part. That night he had a wondrous vision. He beheld Christ on his throne. Looking closely, he saw that the King in his glory was wearing the half of the cloak which he had given to the beggar that night. Amazed, he heard the King say, "This cloak, has Martin given to me."