Marja Kostamo says of herself, “At 21 years of age I was desperate. The chaos and uncertainty of our lives was making me lose my mind. I cried out to God and He asked me for one hour a day with Him. How do I find an hour in my already endless, crazy day? What at first were hours of dry praying and reading the Bible, opened up into a treasure hunt because God started to answer my prayers. I began to hear the voice of God.”

I met Marja at a conference last year and asked her to share a story for this newsletter.

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I Asked the Lord for a Dream

It says in the Bible that in the last days God will give dreams and visions (Acts 2:17-21). It also says that He wants to give the Holy Spirit to those who ask. In fact, it says “how much more will your heavenly Father give the Holy Spirit to those who ask Him” (Luke 11:13). Dreams and visions are part of the activity of the Holy Spirit, so I asked for a dream….

….and I woke up to a dream. This is what I dreamt.

It was a fall day, getting colder, grey, and moving toward winter. There was a lot of activity in a hospital and in a large parking lot of a nearby shopping center. Groups were meeting and talking, mostly they were Christians I knew. We were getting ready to go somewhere. There had been instructions given to quickly pack a bag and leave everything else behind. I was going around making sure everyone was doing this and packing my things too, trying to figure out what to take and what to leave.

Then it was time to board the ship, ready or not! It was an old cruise ship now used for what seemed like an evacuation. It began to move down a river and soon was out in the open ocean. As I walked down a hall with a teenage girl, the lights began to flicker and then go out, leaving us in complete darkness. I thought, “This ship is falling apart!” We made our way to a lounge with big windows that gave natural light.

Suddenly an announcement came over the speakers, saying, “The ship is going to flip!” Immediately I felt us tilting. Within seconds we were in a roll and under the water. I was flying around and saw the water roiling and churning through the big windows. I thought This is it.We’re going to die now.

Just as quickly as the roll began, we came back to an upright position. We had done a 360 degree roll, and then carried on our journey. It was like a kayak roll.

I woke up knowing this was a dream from God, but what did it mean? I asked for the interpretation and used a dream symbol book but nothing fit. Nothing had that “aha” sense of being right. My husband walked into the room and settled into his recliner. He asked if I had been listening to any of the new music on YouTube, Psalms turned into songs. He put one on and as I listened, I quickly recognized it was Psalm 46.

When these following words were sung, I knew this was the interpretation:

Therefore we will not fear
Though the earth gives way
Though the mountains be removed
Into the heart of the sea
Though its waters roar and foam
(Psalm 46:2-3)

Why won’t we fear? Because…

God is in the midst of her She shall not be moved God will help her when the morning dawns (Psalm 46:5)

Though the promised birth pangs Jesus spoke about are increasing in the earth (Matthew 24), and the nations are making an uproar (Psalm 46:6), Jesus is the Captain (Joshua 5:14) of the boat and will lead His people safely. “He led them safely, so that they did not fear, but the sea engulfed their enemies.” Psalm 78:53.

Thank you Marja! Marja Kostamo is the author of Treasures of Darkness.

Image Credits: Ship amidst storm and Stormy sea voyage by StockCake

Hugh Knowlton, a participant in a recent Listening to God cohort, shares two dramatic warnings he received from God.

When I was 21, I had recently taken a Bible class which taught me that the Bible is the Word of God and can be trusted. I had met the Lord when I was around 7 or 8 but my parents where not church goers, and I had no Bible teaching in the years in between.

Long Island Expressway Accident Averted

One summer day, three of my believer friends and I drove to Jones Beach on Long Island, New York to have a day of fun at the ocean beach. I remember driving my 1967 Chevy Nova station wagon which my parents had given me.

Photo taken from Over-Drive Magazine

On the drive home on the Long Island Expressway, I suddenly had a video clip run in my mind. In my mind’s eye I saw myself driving over a hill in the road only to see stopped vehicles in front of me and then driving on the grassy shoulder on the left to avoid hitting the stopped cars. I remember being a bit puzzled by this but continued driving.

Not more than one minute passed and guess what? I came over a hill in the road and suddenly saw that all the cars in front of me had stopped. I immediately swerved the car to the left and drove on the grassy shoulder. There was no way I could have braked and stopped the car before hitting the cars in front of me. That vision I received kind of programmed me to spontaneously react in the only way I did to avoid a collision.

Crushed Toyota Corona

In August of 1974, I was driving from Ohio to Connecticut (about an 11-hour drive). I had just taken a Bible class about the nine manifestations of the Spirit (1 Corinthians 12:8-10). A lot of the class was about receiving revelation from God. I had someone with me on this trip whom I did not know well. She also took the class and needed a ride east. I drove several hours until I needed a break and then Joan took over driving. I was resting with my seat inclined and fell asleep.

After a while, I had a dream. I saw my 1974 Toyota Corona station wagon roll over several times. I woke up startled. I decided it was a bad dream and chose to ignore it. After falling back to sleep the same dream came again. Immediately the station wagon we were in violently rolled over several times on the left side of the road. I woke up in a cloud of dust with both of us, fortunately, alive and relatively unhurt. My wagon was totaled and looked like a shoe box crushed sideways.

Apparently, Joan was not an experienced driver and drifted onto the left shoulder and then overreacted to bring the car back onto the highway causing the car to flip.

Many people stopped and picked up our clothes. My three-ring binder with class syllabus and notes were blowing down Highway US80. Kind people picked up every page and to my amazement I was able to put it all back together not losing a single page!

The cool part of this story is that God showed my mother that something happened to me and I was in need. When Joan and I finally got to a hotel after going to a hospital to get checked out, I called my mom, and she immediately asked where I was. She was all ready to get in her car and drive to pick us up. My mom was not a believer, but that didn’t stop God from communicating with her. I guess that’s why he’s God!

Thank you, Hugh. Let’s learn to pay attention to God’s warnings!

Post photo from Pinterest

Maroon Chevy Nova photo taken from Over-Drive Magazine

Toyota Corona photo taken from Mecum Auctions

Lane works among Spanish speaking migrant workers in Alberta. He shared this fascinating story in one of his recent newsletters.

I had finished the latest chronological Bible Study with a group of seasonal workers from Mexico in Southern Alberta. After I finished the formal part of the study, I preached, reminding them of who Jesus was and that only through knowing Him can we be saved. Then I said, “All that is left now is to ask, ‘Who of you all would like to know Jesus, to trust Him for your salvation?’”

I didn’t have to wait long before one of them put his hand up and indicated with great excitement that indeed he wanted to know Jesus. Then another slowly put his hand up and said that though he wasn’t going to attend that evening, something inside him said that he needed to, and he was glad he did.After him, another said the same thing. Soon, all nine men in the room indicated they wanted to know Jesus. I made sure they knew what they were saying, and I told them that if they were sincere, Jesus would send them His Holy Spirit and give them a holy nature so that God would see them as perfect and that they would be saved eternally. There was a great peace in the room. I prayed for all of them, I gave them my contact info, we took a picture, and they left, all but one man.

Juan (not his real name) came up to me, right up to me, like two feet away from me, and said, “You aren’t going to believe me, but I know you.” I wasn’t sure I understood. He repeated himself. I was still confused and asked him how he knew me.

He continued, “I saw you in a dream six months ago when I was still in Mexico. From the first time you showed up here at the greenhouse, I knew it was you.” I got goosebumps. I asked him if he was sure that it was me he saw in his dream. He said, “Yes. It was a white man with coloured eyes just like yours, it was you.” I asked him if there was a message associated with his dream. He responded that there was a message, and it was clear, “Listen to this man’s message.” I was dumbfounded.

Then he told me about another dream he had shortly after the first one. The enemy appeared to him, but all he saw was his feet. The message from the enemy was, “You don’t need to listen to anyone, you are mine.” I put my hand on his shoulder and told him that a spiritual battle was taking place for his soul. Please pray for Juan and the other eight men who have, by their own confession, trusted Jesus. We have tentatively planned a baptism service when they get back next season.

Thanks, Lane, for sharing with us. If you would like to know more about Lane or his ministry, feel free to reach out through the Contact Us form at the bottom of this page.

Dreams in the Bible

In the Bible there are several instances of God giving information in dreams and visions to people who are not yet believers. Cornelius is one example (Acts 10). Abimelek (Genesis 20:1-7) is another.

Here Juan had a literal dream that gave him an instruction for his future. Most dreams, however, including the majority of the dreams recorded in the Bible, are symbolic. Symbolic dreams require interpretation.

If you want to learn more about how God speaks in dreams, check out Chapter 3 of What if Listening to God Was Easy? or sign up for the Listening to God is Easy Course.

I have a photo of Juan and the other workers, but since I don’t have their contact info, I am using a stock photo by Mark Stebnicki in this post.

In Week 5 of the Listening to God Course, we examine how God speaks through dreams. Here are some dreams from course participants:

I had a dream and when I woke up, though I didn’t remember many details from the dream, I understood I should start taking multivitamins. Even though I had multivitamins at home, I kept postponing taking them. About a week later I developed a sore throat and a few days after that I started coughing. If I had started taking the vitamins the day I had the dream, I don’t think I would have fallen sick.
—Maria

As Maria experienced, God sometimes uses dreams to speak about practical matters in our lives. God used a fragment of one of my own dreams to spur me to action.

In November I woke up with a funny word on my lips, evidently the remnant of a dream. I had no idea what the word meant until I checked my email inbox that morning. The word was the last name of a magazine editor I had written to several days prior. This dream prompted me to sit down and write an article, an article that was published in January.

But sometimes our dreams don’t just deal with events in our own lives.

During one of our classes, Ken shared a dream in which he saw massive destruction caused by flooding. He was a bystander in the dream, not affected by the flooding himself, but simply observing what was going on.

The whole class tried to discover the meaning of this dream, but we just couldn’t figure it out. Three weeks later, Ken had the answer. He was watching TV one day and saw the same images on TV that he had seen in his dream—images of extreme flooding caused by unusual weather. Ken, it seems, had received a dream that predicted a future event. I wonder if God gave him the dream to teach him to pray.

The Bible gives many examples of God speaking though dreams. Here are some examples:

• Abimelech (Genesis 20:3)
• Jacob (Genesis 28:12; 31:10-13)
• Joseph (Genesis 37)
• Pharoah (Genesis 41)
• Gideon (Judges 7:13-15)
• Solomon (1 Kings 3:5-15)
• Nebuchadnezzar (Daniel 2)
• Daniel (Daniel 7)

Lest we think God communicating through dreams is only an Old Testament phenomenon, let’s remember what happened at Pentecost. Peter stood up and unequivocally taught that dreams are one of the ways in which the Holy Spirit speaks (Acts 2:17).

God communicates through dreams, but most dreams are symbolic and therefore almost always require interpretation. If you want to learn more about how to understand dreams, you could read chapter 3 of What if Listening to God Was Easy? or sign up for the Listening to God is Easy course.

Photo by Johannes Plenio on Unsplash
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