The Dreamer

The Dreamer
Genesis 37:5-36

I have known one or two people who had dreams or visions or words from God (indeed, I have had one or two myself). Sometimes these have been rather general and uncheckable, though edifying and at worst harmless. Sometimes they have been vindicated by events or confirmed in some other way. Sometimes they have left me thinking, “Yes, well, he or she would think something like that. Saying it is a word from God just gives spurious authority to what is essentially just that person’s thinking.” I particularly remember an angry prophet who was angry and bitter even when he was not prophesying. Annoyingly, however, those words that seem simply to reflect the humanity of the dreamer, the visionary, or the prophet can also be edifying, or (worse still) can be vindicated by events or confirmed in some other way. Just because it is the kind of thing this person would say doesn’t exclude the possibility that God is involved in the saying of it...