Arising in the morning, as if being cast out into life from beneath the warm covers of shielded dreams, one may find oneself struggling to clear one’s mind
through the fog of slumber in a cold, foreign landscape. Yet, to consider one’s salvation and the journey to such a promised land, we can draw a direct correlation between the gentle demeanor of being conspicuously conscious or morbidly asleep; the distinction between the two is a determinate as to how aware we are of our soul’s mortality, whether to live is to die, or to die to oneself is to live. The discernment comes from realizing the truth and awakening to its sunrise of hope for one’s life therein.
“All the days of my appointed time will I wait, till my change come.” – Job 14:14
Struggling through the day-to-day hardships of one’s daily toil, it can seem as if we are on a never-ending merry-go-round, the escape only seen as a demise of career or character. The screenshots flicker as if watching some ancient film projected in black-and-white upon a roughly plastered wall, the cracks and crevices adding to the tumultuous torment. Seen from the future in which we inhabit later in life, we realize that the scope of our focus had been all for naught, had we only strove for those secular things of the world, trying to achieve but never reaching the highest pinnacle of success, waging a war against something we could alone, never defeat. Time, the master of all, eventually sees its victims succumb to the gravity of mortal existence. Meanwhile, each night, we seek to escape through those sparsely recalled dreams in which we fly into other worlds, void of the bondage upon which we have inflicted of our own desires.
How ironic then it is that when we reach the threshold of life’s journey, the sunset begins to shed light upon our pathway, and in reflection, we seek those dreams, to recall them forward in an effort to relieve the peace with which they brought; yet, never granted. In waking, we find that the eternal life we neglected now faces us head-on, a glaring prospect for which we have little preparation. Suddenly, we are not only confounded by our previous stupidity but rather sickened by our neglect of the consideration that was before us all along. We begin to awaken only to see that the eternity we face is the dream in which we shall forever embody, to the point it becomes reality. To seek that which we cannot see, but that which we accept on faith, is in a sense, dreaming while conscious, having hope in something that transcends what we can logically conceive. Herein is the meaning behind what George MacDonald wrote, “It may be notwithstanding, that when most awake, I am only dreaming the more!”[1]
To bring it back to something more perceptible, consider the phrase and what it means, “To live the American Dream.” Herein, we find the earthly essence of finding that perfect career, the perfect home, wife, and children, all in a sweet little package that we can envelop within the comprehension of our minds. To have a life free of persecution, torment, or strife, to not know suffering or pain, these are the idyllic visions we often are taught to impose upon ourselves in this life. Yet, there was never a promise as such granted by anyone or anything. Becoming a Christian does not take away the suffering or pain, nor does it guarantee a life void of persecution. If nothing else, it only promises that those torments will only be assured. If one were to consider the vision aspect, this perception would be more likely to be considered a nightmare than a dream.
Yet, we have drifted away from what it is to dream, meaning that the realities of living the “Dream” aren’t necessarily what we would accept as dreaming any more than one might consider holding one’s breath underwater and consider it breathing as a fish. To awaken from one’s sleep is to come to consciousness – knowing that the world you inhabit is one of concrete realities. But to awaken from the perception of something beyond this world is to awaken into something without form, void of the physical, and herein, we find ourselves awake while dreaming. As Novalis wrote, “Our life is no dream, but it should and will perhaps become one.”[2]
Herein lies the ultimate truth.
To consciously seek that which cannot be seen nor terrestrially found is to live in a state beyond the reality of now and to find hope in something beyond the natural, the eternal. By seeking context in the meaning, we can better understand the purpose of this discussion in the simple word “Salvation.” To know that God became flesh so that he might live as we live, to know the pain and sufferings of this conscious life, then to die an earthly death, to know the torment and anguish, taking upon himself the sins of the world, the one that knew no sin, so that we might be freed of our sin, our secular fleshly desires, if we confess our sins and accept Him into our hearts – that is what it is to awaken from the slumber of discontented pleasures, to understand who He was, and still is. God came to make it known to us that in the state of what may be considered to be dreaming, we, too, can find something beyond what our earthly existence would have us know.
Once finding salvation in the hope of life eternal, we can finally realize what it is to realize we are most awake when we are dreaming all the more.
Thanks be to God.
[1] George MacDonald, Lilith (London: Walter Scott Publishing, 1895)
[2] Novalis, Philosophical Writings, trans. Maurice B. Cramer (Albany, NY: State University of New York Press, 1997)
