To Dream Again

Genesis 37.19

And they said one to another, Behold, this dreamer cometh.

“To Dream Again”

Genesis 37.11, 18-20;

11 And his brethren envied him; but his father observed the saying.

18 And when they saw him afar off, even before he came near unto them, they conspired against him to slay him.

19 And they said one to another, Behold, this dreamer cometh.

20 Come now therefore, and let us slay him, and cast him into some pit, and we will say, Some evil beast hath devoured him: and we shall see what will become of his dreams.

Genesis 45.26-46.4

25 And they went up out of Egypt, and came into the land of Canaan unto Jacob their father,

26 And told him, saying, Joseph is yet alive, and he is governor over all the land of Egypt. And Jacob's heart fainted, for he believed them not.

27 And they told him all the words of Joseph, which he had said unto them: and when he saw the wagons which Joseph had sent to carry him, the spirit of Jacob their father revived:

28 And Israel said, It is enough; Joseph my son is yet alive: I will go and see him before I die.

1 And Israel took his journey with all that he had, and came to Beersheba, and offered sacrifices unto the God of his father Isaac.

2 And God spake unto Israel in the visions of the night, and said, Jacob, Jacob. And he said, Here am I.

3 And he said, I am God, the God of thy father: fear not to go down into Egypt; for I will there make of thee a great nation:

4 I will go down with thee into Egypt; and I will also surely bring thee up again: and Joseph shall put his hand upon thine eyes.

Joseph was next to the youngest son of Jacob/Israel. We have talked previously about the use of names to convey character in the Bible. Jacob’s name meant “heel grabber” or “supplanter” It signified his deceiver nature. When he made the change, his name was changed to Israel, meaning “one who has power with God.” In these scriptures, you will see both names used at times. The usage is significant.

Joseph was the son of Rachel. Jacob made for Joseph a coat of many colors. Joseph had dreams. In one dream, Joseph saw him and his brothers binding sheaves in the field. His sheaf arose and stood upright. The sheaves of his father and brothers stood round and made obeisance to his sheaf. His brothers hated him “yet the more.” In another dream, Joseph saw the sun, and the moon, and eleven stars. They made obeisance to him.

11 And his brethren envied him; but his father observed the saying.

Observed – Shamar – to hedge, to guard, to protect, to keep.

Sayings – dabar – a word, a matter, as spoken of

Jacob kept the dream. He held it in his heart and in his memory. Joseph gave his family his dreams. His brothers despised him, but his father held them dear. Joseph’s dreams became Jacob’s dreams. Jacob was no stranger to dreams. At Bethel, he had a dream/vision of the ladder reaching into heaven and God standing at the top. Jacob was a dreamer as well.

There came a time when Joseph’s brothers were tending to the flocks of sheep in Shechem. Jacob sent Joseph to check on them. When Joseph arrived in Shechem, his brothers were not there. A man told him that he had overheard them say they were going to Dothan.

Verses 18 through 20 recount the words and malice of his brothers, as they saw Joseph approaching from the distance. Their anger/envy spurred them to do in that moment actions they may not have done otherwise and even reconsidered later.

Interestingly, the word compound used to describe Joseph was ‘Ba’al Chalom’. It was two words. There was no Hebrew word for ‘dreamer’, therefore they called him (literally) the owner of the dream.

We will kill him, the brothers plotted, and then we will see what will become of his dream.

In our own history, men have tried to stop the dream by killing the possessor of the dream. Martin Luther King Jr was assassinated in what appeared to be an effort to silence his dream. Countless and faceless others have died throughout history in the effort of their killers to stop their dreams.

We are Ba’al Chalom

God has given us a dream. He has given us a vision. This vision is the fuel for our fire. It is the inspiration for our walk. Acts 2.7 tells us, “And it shall come to pass in the last days, saith God, I will pour out of my Spirit upon all flesh: and your sons and your daughters shall prophesy, and your young men shall see visions, and your old men shall dream dreams:”

Satan desires to destroy our dream – even with the blood of the owners if that is the only way. He tried to end the dream on the hill of the skull. On Calvary he thought he had stopped the dream with the death of Jesus Christ. Not many days hence, however, the dream appears to Mary at the tomb. Later, on the road to Emmaus ..

On that road there were two travelers. One was Cleopas. The other was unnamed and unidentified. For the sake of now, let that second traveler be us. They were both followers of Jesus. They were walking away from the dream. They were walking away from Jerusalem. They were walking toward their old home. It is three days past the crucifixion. Without doubt, their mind had to be on the events of the last few days.

It was on this road, away from the dream, that Jesus joins them. He finds them discouraged, down, depressed, and despairing. Their hope is nearly extinct. The scripture tells us that as they walked they talked about the events that had transpired. While the walked and talked, Jesus came to walk with them. Their minds were clouded that they did not recognize him. Jesus asked them why they were so sad.

“Are you a stranger,” Cleopas asks, “Are you not aware of all that has happened in Jerusalem? Do you not know of Jesus, a prophet mighty in word and deed before God and all the people? Do you not know how the Chief Priests persuaded the people to have him delivered to death? We thought He would be the one..”

See the dialogue of the one who has lost the dream. “We thought he would be the one to deliver us.” The seeds of doubt have fallen on their soil, turned by the plow of events not understood. The ground of belief they stood on in days past was shaken. What was once firm was now scattered with rocks to cause their walk to be halted and unsteady. Such is the walk of those whose dream has been taken. It does not matter whether the dream dies because of the death of the dreamer or merely the loss of faith in the dreamer. The result is the same. Their walk is a walk of uncertainty. Confidence is replaced by questions. “I know,” is replaced by “I thought.”

To the disciples on the road to Emmaus, Calvary was the end of their hope. It was the end of the dream they held. Their heads were down so they did not see the savior approach. Their walk was slow to reflect their spirit. Their comments decried their doubts. The road was between Jerusalem and Emmaus, but it might as well have been called ‘the road to despair.’ There on that road, the road of despair, the road of the dreamless, there, they met Jesus. It is there that Jesus travels. The writer of Psalms 139 said in verse 8 “If I ascend up into heaven, thou art there: if I make my bed in hell, behold, thou art there.” Where will I go that God cannot find me? Where will my life take me that God is not there? He is there in the clouds of my exhilaration. He is there when my despair and failure take me to the depths of Hell.

In verse 25, Jesus opened the scriptures. Let me tell you who is he:

From Moses, He is:

· The promise to Eve (Genesis 3.15)

· The promise to Abraham (Genesis 17.6-7)

· The Paschal Lamb (Isaiah 53.7)

· The Scapegoat (Leviticus 16.10)

· The Brazen Serpent (Numbers 21.9)

· The Star and the Scepter (Number 24.17)

· The Smitten Rock (Isaiah 53.4)

He is:

· Immanuel (Isaiah 57.14)

· The Child Born to us (Isaiah 9.6)

· The Good Shepherd (John 10.11)

· The One ‘who bore our grief’ (Isaiah 53.4)

· The Branch (Isaiah 11.1)

· The Heir of David (Isaiah 11.1)

· The Ruler from Bethlehem (Micah 5.2)

· The Lowly King (Zachariah 9.9)

· The Pierced Victim (Isaiah 53.5)

· The Smitten Shepherd (Isaiah 53.4)

· The Messenger of the Covenant (Malachi 3.1)

· Our Savior and Redeemer (Isaiah 63.16)

As they approached the city, He went to go away. They prayed that He would stay with them. As He broke bread with them, their eyes were opened. Once He was recognized and their doubts dispelled, He vanished into ‘unseen-ness’. The dream came in. They left at that moment and returned to Jerusalem. The distance between the two was approximately 7.5 miles. Though the scripture does not record their demeanor on the return journey, I have to imagine that it was a remarkable difference than their demeanor on the trip toward Emmaus.

Without the dream, they walked slowly and trudgingly.

· Their every step was weighted by their doubts and fears. (Have you been there?)

· Every step was an effort to place in front of the next. (Have you ever walked a walk where every step was filled with the wish it were the last?)

· They walked with their heads bowed by their burden. (Have you felt that weight?)

They walked like the dreamless masses we encounter every day. They have no real root except in the shallow surface of this world. Their moods controlled by how their favorite teams did in last night’s game, or how the stock market fared today, or who spoke to them or didn’t speak to them in the elevator this morning. Their future is the next vacation or long weekend. Their dreams are a future uncertain retirement. Their dreams are limited because they are earth bound and contingent on the whims and winds of this world. (The Bible tells us the Satan is the god of this world and we saw in the ‘Job’s House’ lesson how Satan cares for those things that are his.)

The return trip to Jerusalem was vastly different. The dream was alive. Their hope was beyond this world. There was a spring in their step. There was a light in their faces. The burden was lifted. Their heads were held high. The dream was alive again.

The dreamless cannot understand the ‘owners of the dream.’ They do not understand our optimism that goes far beyond ordinary optimism. They do not comprehend our hope that goes beyond this world. They cannot fathom our trust in an unseen personal Savior. While we face the same financial uncertainties and the same sicknesses and diseases, we maintain a sense of hope. They cannot grasp this. The dream lives within us.

Jacob lost his dream. He lost it in the blood drenched garment belonging to Joseph. Sorrow clouded his vision and obscured the dream. To Jacob, all of Joseph’s dreams died with him. However, God was not finished. Too often we finish before God does. We live in the TV generation. Characters and problems are introduced and solved in an hour. We microwave our meals in a fraction of the time it takes to cook them. We are an impatient generation. If God does not answer in an hour, we are ready to change channels. Though unseen, the dream continued. Jacob could not dream, the dreamer was gone. The Ba’al Chalom was gone.

Time passes. Joseph advances in position in his new land. The events that occur in this time will make several Bible Studies. Time comes when Joseph, by interpreting the king’s dream is in charge of the storehouses. There is to be a famine in the land. There will be seven years of plenty and seven years of famine. Joseph has the Egyptians save one-fifth of each year’s harvest to be stored for the day of want. It is in these years of want that the brothers of Joseph come to buy grain. In time, after the brothers revealed the change of their natures in their willingness to be lost to save Joseph’s younger brother, Benjamin, Joseph revealed himself to them.

He sent word with them to his father.

Genesis 45

Vs 25 .. He is called Jacob

Vs 26 .. He is called Jacob

Vs 27 .. He is called Jacob

“..The spirit of Jacob their father revived.”

Vs 28 .. “And Israel said, It is enough; Joseph my son is yet alive: I will go and see him before I die.”

‘Israel’ dropped into obscurity during the sorrow. When it is revealed that the dreamer is still alive, his spirit revives. His hope, once dead, is alive again. The hope is alive. The dreamer is alive. The power came back when the dream came back. “Without a vision, the people perish.” In chapter 46, God speaks to Israel in a dream and tells him that he will become a great nation and Joseph will put his hands on his eyes. This is a reference to dying. God told Jacob that Joseph would be with him until his death. The custom was that the favored son would perform the last offices of affection by closing his eyes in death. On his death bed, the father would take the hands of his favored son, kiss them, and place them on his eyes, his face, and his mouth, and say, “now I die.”

Jesus will be with us always, even unto the end. We have this promise. It is part of our dream. When I close my eyes in death, I will not be alone. His hands will cover my eyes, my face, and my mouth. My dream will carry me to death and beyond.

Let me dream again.

When my heart is becoming hardened, let me dream again.

When my faith is failing, let me dream again.

When my strength is low, let me dream again.

When my desire is weak, let me dream again.

When my heart is broken, let me dream again.

When I have no right, when hope has escaped me, when I am covered in sorrow, when all seems lost, let that dream shine through. Let me dream again.

Have you lost your dream?

Deliverance, joy, victory, what have you lost?

The two on the road to Emmaus, the dream came home with:

· Communion with God

· Time with the Word

· Meeting Jesus at the table

Will you dream again?

Will you meet him at the table (altar)?

Will you become the Ba’al Chalom again ?

The Four That Brought the One

Mark 2:1-3

1. And again he entered into Capernaum, after some days; and it was noised that he was in the house.

2. And straightway many were gathered together, insomuch that there was no room to receive them, no, not so much as about the door: and he preached the word unto them.

3. And they come unto him, bringing one sick of the palsy, which was borne of four.

Here we find that Jesus has returned to the place of his lodging. Depending on the Biblical scholar you prefer to read, this was generally accepted as the house of Peter, but some claim that it was the personal lodging place of Jesus when He was in the city. The scripture says that “it was noised that he was in the house. “ The word was out that Jesus had returned to the place where he lodged. It was here that the people of the city knew where to find him. This was the place to which one could expect to be directed if they were asking where one might find Jesus.

As soon as the word was out that Jesus was in the house, a crowd gathered. They came in such numbers as to make it impossible for any other person to enter the dwelling. They crowded even at the door to hear the words of Jesus. Understand this; this was a time when the only form of communication available was word of mouth. Someone told someone who told someone. There was no media blitz. There was no ad campaign. There were no event coordinators involved in this appearance of Jesus. There was no market saturation with media rumors. Someone told someone who told someone.

The crowd did not wait for Jesus to come to the synagogue. It would be reasonable to assume that He would come to the synagogue on the Sabbath. They thronged the house. They came from near and far. Some came, no doubt, for cures. Some came, possibly out of mere curiosity. Some came because of the possible advancement of their social standing. For whatever reason, they came; they came and filled the house. For whatever reason they came, Jesus “preached the word unto them. “

To this time and place came five men; one, sick of the palsy, carried by four men. They came, each carrying a corner of a sick mans bed. The distance they traveled is not recorded. What is important is that they did come. This particular story in the Bible can be noted for its starkness and lack of detail. The story is recounted in Matthew and Luke, as well as here in Mark. Matthew gives us the outline and Mark and Luke fill in the sparse detail.

The key elements in the story are as such:

· Jesus was in the house

· A crowd gathered filling the house

· Jesus preached the word

· A paralytic palsied man was brought by four friends

· By extraordinary effort he was brought to Jesus

· His needs were met

I want to look at the four that brought the paralytic to Christ. The writers of the scripture do not give their names or relationship to the man. It is possible they were friends. It is possible they were generous strangers. It is more probable that they were relatives or regular companions of the sick man.

In this Bible Study, I am going to give them identities. These are the four that brought a man to the house where Jesus was:

Need

The first man carrying a corner of the bed was called need. It is need which brings us to Christ. In all of us is the inherent need to find Jesus. Man was created with the purpose of serving and worshipping God. When sin entered the world and corrupted that relationship, it severed that regular communication with God. (He came in the cool of the evening [as usual] to commune with His creation.) Since that day, man has sought ways and means to restore that communication and relationship with God.

Evolutionists will tell us that we created the idea of a God in order to give our lives meaning. It is our effort to give us the security of not believing that we are on a ball of mud and stone hurling through space around a ball of noxious gasses without someone in control. Their claim is that we need God to be real because it gives us hope and meaning. I have found that the simplest explanation is the best. It is simply that God created us with fellowship in mind. He created within us a desire to commune. With a few exceptions, mankind is not a solitary creature.

Beyond that basic need to communicate, we are rife with other needs. We need sustenance. We need shelter and protection. Those needs drive us. Most of what we do can be boiled down into basic needs categories. Work provides us with challenges and rewards. It provides a sense of accomplishment. It provides the necessary money to meet our other basic needs. It also provides us with our sense of being needed.

When we have a need, we will move to meet it. When my body needs food, I go to the place where I may find it. When my reserves are low, I go to the grocery. When my fuel gauge is nearing empty, I go to the gas station. However, need, in and of itself, is not enough to take us where we need to go.

The palsied man needed healing. Just needing healing would not prompt him to move if there was no reason of expectation of that need being met. Need alone will not cause a man to leave his mire of sin. Need, by itself, will not cause a blind man to cast aside his garment and come to Jesus. Need, by itself, will not cause a woman with an issue of blood to fight through a crowd to touch the hem of Jesus’ garment. It takes more than need to compel the father of a dying child to leave that child and seek out a renowned prophet to ask for healing. When the bank account is empty, there is no need to go to the grocery, regardless of how much I need groceries. There must be more than need to bring me to Christ.

Hope

Hope was carrying one of those corners. Without hope there was no need to bring the paralytic to the crowded room.

Have you ever seen hopelessness? Hopelessness does not take into consideration any possibility of resolution. Without hope a person will never move from the misery they are in.

Hope is one of the three main elements of the Christian life. 1 Corinthians 13.13 says, “And now abideth faith, hope, and charity, ..” It is the opposite of seeing or possessing. Hebrews tells us that faith is the substance of things hoped for, the evidence of things not seen. If we have it in our hands, we do not hope for it.

With this palsied man, there was a reasonable hope within him that if he could get to Christ, he might be made whole. It didn’t even have to be a definite thing. There was no assurance that Christ would heal him, but Christ had healed others. Christ had touched the blind and they saw. He had touched the deaf and they heard. His reputation as a prophet and healer proceeded Him. In the reports this man had heard, there was hope. It is said that a drowning man will grab at straws to save himself. Anything that gives hope will be tried. Without it, there is no movement.

Have you ever saw someone that had given up? They seem drained. It is as if you can actually see the loss of hope in their eyes. How devastating it must be to be without hope.

Hebrews tells us that to please God we must first believe that He is, and the He is a rewarder of those the diligently seek Him. Jairus had hope. The woman with the issue of blood had hope. Bartimeus had hope. They were spurred by that hope to come to the place where Jesus was. You will never come until hope takes a corner of your bed. You will never cry out until hope swells up inside you. Hope needs only be a small flicker. It will grow. It will multiply. Every good report feeds that hope.

Paul, speaking of hope, said, “If in this life only we have hope in Christ, we are of all men most miserable.” Our hope goes far beyond this present world. We have hope of healing. (By his stripes, we are healed.) We have hope of blessings. (He is our reward giver.)We have hope of our needs being met. (I have never seen the righteous forsaken nor His seed to beg bread.) Even beyond that, if our hope is in what we can only gain in this life, we would still be the most miserable of creatures. Praise be to God that our hope transcends our mortality. Our hope surpasses our corruptible flesh. Our hope goes beyond the temporal. We have a hope of immortality. We have a hope of an incorruptible body. Our hope reaches into the eternal.

This hope, this immortal, incorruptible, eternal hope, drives us forward. Need motivates us. Hope enables us.

Faith

Couple with hope, it is one of the top three possessions of the Christian. 1 Corinthians 13.13 says, “And now abideth faith, hope, and charity, ..” As we stated above. It is much akin to hope. Faith is the substance of things hoped for. Faith and hope are two of the carriers that bring us all to Christ. It is difficult to talk about hope without talking about faith. It is difficult to talk about faith without talking about hope.

Faith is a much needed and much talked about commodity. James tells us that faith without works is dead. He tells us that he will show his faith by the preponderance of his works. While need is our motivator, and hope is our enabler, faith is our demonstrator.

Faith reaches out.

The woman with the issue of blood had spent her living on doctors. She was not better, in fact, she was worse. She suffered her hemorrhagic condition for 12 years. All the cures given to her by the physicians of the day had a twofold effect. It made her condition worse and it drained her finances. Here, a woman with great need, with nowhere else to turn, got a hold of hope, and with faith, made her way through a throng surrounding Jesus, and, by faith, touched his garments hem. She was healed instantaneously. Jesus, immediately perceiving that virtue had left his body, stopped and asked, “Who touched my clothes?”

When she was identified, He spoke to her, and said, “ Daughter, thy faith hath made thee whole; go in peace, and be whole of thy plague.“ Mark 5:34 While her need and hope also brought her there, her faith was demonstrated when she reach out.

Faith walks the miles.

Jairus left the side of his dying daughter to seek out Jesus. He walked the miles to find Him. Jesus and the crowd followed Jairus to the side of his daughter. It was in the midst of this crowd that Jesus stopped to find the woman with the issue of blood. I can only imagine the urgency of Jairus. I can only imagine how he felt as Jesus stopped to heal others. His need was so great. His hope was carrying him.

While Jesus was still talking to the woman, someone came from the house of Jairus with the devastating news, “Your daughter is dead. Do not trouble the healer any longer.” How his heart must have fallen. Need and hope had brought him this far. Now they were cast aside. His ship was dashed on the rocks. He had come so far and now stood seemingly empty-handed. I do not know how close they were to the house. For all the miles he walked, when he heard his daughter was dead, were wasted. Jesus spoke to him, “Be not afraid, only believe.”

He stopped the throng. He allowed only Peter, James, and John to follow him. They entered the house of the ruler. The mourners were there. In these days, there were paid mourners. They were paid to come to the funerals of families to dramatize the loss. It is interesting that they were there, as is they were like vultures, awaiting the news so they could come and collect. They were feeders on death. Jesus asked them why they mourned, the child was but asleep. They mocked and scorned him. Jesus put them all out. With the mother and father, and his three disciples, he entered the room. He took the child’s hand and told her to rise. She sat up immediately and walked.

Faith takes you farther than need. Faith takes you farther than hope.

Faith casts the garment aside.

Bartimeus was blind. As a blind man in those days, he wore a garment which identified him as blind; much like the white cane with the red tip identifies blind people today. Bartimeus sat by the road begging. He heard that Jesus was passing by and he cried out to him. The crowd tried to quiet him, but he cried out the more. Jesus called for him. Bartimeus arose, cast aside his garment, and came to Jesus.

How many times have we asked Jesus for something but held on to the crutches of our infirmity?

There is so much negativism in the world today. Look at the news. Look at current events. We used to vote for the better of two choices, now we vote for the lesser of two evils. We fear to turn on the news because of the growing reports of violence daily. Society has stripped our citizenry of their value. We are just a cog in the wheel. We are numbers in the machine. As a citizen of Earth, I am 1 of 6,706,993,152. As a citizen of the United States, I am 1 of 307,942, 180. As a Kentuckian, I am 1 of 4,041,769. See how easy it is to get lost in the numbers. Even in the small town in which I live, I am less than 1/50^th of 1% of the population. As a Child of God, we must guard against that devaluing.

Our faith takes us beyond the percentage of our life. When we exercise our faith, we walk into the throne room of the Most High God boldly. The paralytic, by numbers, was well outside the attention of God. Need, Hope, and Faith had brought him to the place where he could see the throng. He could possibly hear the teaching. He could make out the encouraging words and teachings of Jesus. Need, hope, and faith had brought him this far, but there was one more carrier.

Determination

We live in a TV society. Character and problems are introduced and solved in an hour. We microwave our food to reduce cooking time. We are in a hurry. If we don’t get the answer in an hour, we are ready to change channels.

Need, hope, and faith had brought this man to the place where he could hear the words of Jesus. He was so close, but not close enough. The swelling of the crowd restrained him. For all they had done, they could not get him into the house of Jesus or into his presence. There was one more carrier there that day, and his name was determination.

How many times have we stopped just short of a victory because we lacked the determination to take that extra step?

What would the man with the palsy have received if they stopped at the door?

How would he have gone home if he only got close enough to hear the words?

Need was the motivator. Hope was the enabler. Faith was the demonstrator. Determination was the finisher.

The race is not to the swift, but he that endures to the end. We are in an endurance run. We must be determined to outrun our doubts. We must be determined to go beyond our fears. We must be determined to exceed our disbelief.

It was determination that came up with the idea of going to the roof. It was determination that began removing tiles. It was determination that brought out the cords to lower the sick man into the presence of Jesus.

Four carried the one to the presence of Jesus. Four carried the one to deliverance. Four, working together, brought the paralytic to his life changing encounter.

Where will you stop?

Will you stop with a need?

Will you stop with hope?

Will you quit with faith?

We must be determined to go all the way. We must be determined to reach the end of our journey with Christ. We need the four to bring us to the place where our life will change.

Having the need will not bring us to Christ.

Having hope will not bring us to Christ.

Having faith alone will not always bring us to Christ.

Having a need, coupled with hope, linked with faith, pushed by determination, will bring us to Christ.