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DREAMS SERIES UNDERSTANDING DREAMS We want to see what is prophesied about the last
days in the book of Acts chapter 2 and this is in line of what the Holy
Spirit is going to do in your lives. We have taught on holiness preparing
your lives for an increase in the manifestation and leading of the Holy
Spirit. We want to understand some of His leadings. For without understanding
we cannot receive. Acts 2:16 But this is what was spoken by the prophet
Joel: And in the last days it shall be God declares, that I will pour out 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: yea,
and on my manservants and my maidservants in those days I will pour out my
Spirit; and they shall prophesy. And I will show wonders in the heaven above
and signs on the earth beneath, blood, and fire, and vapor of smoke; the sun
shall be turned into darkness and the moon into blood before the day of the
Lord comes, the great and manifest day. And it shall be that whoever calls on
the name of the Lord shall be saved. What we want to focus on is the first part. What is
prophesied is that God will pour His Spirit upon His people. And He had
specially mentioned sons and daughters, young men and old men. That scripture
has always puzzled me. Until recently God began to give more light. It cannot
be that God is talking about physical age alone. We know that old men also
can prophesy. And here young men see vision old men dream dreams. We know
that young men can dream dreams too and old men can see vision. So it is not
just some thing to do with physical age. It is some thing more than that. In I John talks about spiritual age and not natural age.
I Jn. 2:12 I am writing to you, little children because your sins are
forgiven for His sake. Now that’s a spiritual age; little children
are those who have just been born again. I am writing to you, fathers,
because you know Him who is from the beginning. So spiritual fathers are
those who have known God from the beginning. Their knowledge of God covers a
vast expanse. He has to write from the beginning. I am writing to
you, young men, because you have overcome the evil one. So he talks about
the middle part of nurturing, of overcoming the devil, the lust of the eyes,
the lust of the flesh and the pride of life. That is growing into the depths
of God. We are learning to utilize the weapons of God. This is not referring
to physical age but to the spiritual age of children, young men and fathers
and old men. Now using the same analogy we bring you back to Acts
chapter two. And notice here that he specially speaks about the three stages,
prophesying, visions and dreams. That they begin manifestations of
prophesying, visions and dreams. In fact as the last days come we are going
to hear and see more people being in the realm of visions, dreams and
prophesying. It is going to be more than before. That’s what God is going to
do in these last days. I am not talking about ordinary spiritual things but
about spiritual prophecies, spiritual visions and spiritual dreams. I had a close look at the word dreams. I was surprised to
find that were two Greek words for dreams. One is the word onar, which
is the ordinary word for dreams. But this word for dreams is only used three
times in the bible in the New Testament. And here is Acts chapter 2 where it
talks about old men he is talking about those spiritually long in the
Lord. Old men shall dream dreams. The Greek word here is not the normal word
for dream. The word here is enupnion. It is more or less an ordinary
sleep. It has only been used one more time in the New Testament and used in
the negative sense. From the usage of the negative sense you could see the
fullness and the meaning in the positive. The negative sense is used in Jude
verse 8 when Jude talks about those who were like So in this particular area here when he talks about
this old men dreaming dreams the Greek word that is used is so special that
it refers to a message, a vision or a spiritual conscious experience of a
direction and leading of God in the sub-conscious stage. You see in Jude
verse 8 this group of people who were led by the flesh, were led not only
consciously. They have reached a point where they were led sub-consciously
and we know that can happen. Many people do things subconsciously. Our
conscious and our subconscious mind need renewal. We need the Word not only
in the conscious mind. We need to get it into our subconscious and get it
further down into our spirit. Our subconscious mind is not the human spirit.
It’s a part of our soul. So these people are moving subconsciously and
drawing on their own lust. He is talking about being dreamt into something
subconsciously. Apply that meaning positively to the old men dreaming
dreams it speaks about the depths of God’s leading and spirit in you being
received to the extend that it comes to the level of your sub-conscious. You
see you can have a vision right now. God can give you a vision but that
vision only touches your conscious mind. It is only the beginning. As that
vision grows in you, it becomes a part of your subconscious too. That vision
usually is a part of your spirit since it comes from your spirit. But what
our spirit has does not come out unless it can flow through the soul that is
renewed. So the first time we begin to understand and receive a leading in
vision it is our conscious mind that receives. Young men see vision old men
dream dreams. It’s the same vision that is now sunk into the subconscious
realm that dream dreams. Spiritually young men who have overcome the devil
now receive visions. As they continue walking with God for long, they become
spiritually old men whose visions have now sunken into their subconscious so
that they now dream dreams. The actual Greek definition of the word shall dream
dreams is enupniazo enupnion. Its from the word two words combined
“en” and “upniazo” which means simply something being presented
during your subconscious state, which is usually your sleep. And this is the
definition a supernatural suggestion or impression received during sleep or a
subconscious state. Old men dream dreams. Let me put that statement into that
and see how it goes. Old men shall receive supernatural suggestions and
impressions during sleep or a sub-conscious state. These are supernatural
leadings of the Lord. So what we are going to touch first of all on the
leadings of the Spirit on dreams. Why talk about dreams? You spend one third
of your life sleeping. Two thirds of your life is spent doing all kind of
things. We train Christians twenty-four hours. We train Christians to obey
God until man could hear God’s voice and move in the Spirit of God when they
are conscious. All the training is in that area. So we have covered two third
of your life. Unless we touch the other one third and tell you how to make
use of that part of your life you missed out a lot of your life. We spent one
third of our life sleeping so we want to know how we can be sensitive to God
during those times. In that way you could be twenty-four hours knowing the
knowledge of God. God speaks to us when we are awake. God speaks to us when
we are asleep. So we learn to understand dreams as well as visions. We look into that area to bring understanding in our
lives. God incidentally have given many of you dreams. So here is where God
wants to teach us the things that happen in our subconscious life when we are
sleeping. Dreams can come from three sources. We need to discern
between them and have some keys to understand what God is doing in our dream
life. To understand what God is doing in our conscious and thought life. But
in order to be full-fledged Christians for God and let God live in our lives
twenty-four hours we have to understand what God is doing while we are
asleep. Job 33:14-16 For God speaks in one way, and in two,
though man does not perceive it. In a dream, in a vision of the night, when
deep sleep falls upon man, while they slumber on their beds, then He opens
the ears of men, and terrifies them with warnings. This is the first time
I teach on this area publicly. The only time I teach on dreams was during the
overnight meeting. So we realize that when he talks about old men dream
dreams it is not just an ordinary dream. That’s what people think. Its not
the ordinary word for dream like onar. It’s a special word enupnion.
So that word talks about some thing received from the Lord supernaturally in
the subconscious state. This is the impartation that comes from God when we
are sleeping. Here it says that God speaks to people in dreams. And if you think that dreams are not important I want you
to know that the life of our Lord Jesus Christ was perfected by dreams. When
He was in Mary’s womb God spoke to Joseph in Matthew chapter one in a dream.
Joseph in Matthew one was praying whether he wants to believe Mary or not.
Mary gave an extraordinary story about how she met an angel and the child
that she is carrying is the Messiah. And here is Joseph engaged to her
wondering whether this is true or not. And being a righteous man he was
seeking to put her away, thinking that she was lying. While he was thinking
about this thing the bible tells us that while Joseph was asleep an angel of
God came and said take Mary as your wife and call her child Jesus. The next
chapter in Matthew tells us that the wise men were warned in a dream to go
back by a different way. So if people didn’t listen to their dreams they will
miss God. You can listen to God in your conscious state and hear the voice of
God and miss the other one third. If we miss what God is saying to us in our
dreams we may miss God. And in Matthew chapter two Joseph was warned by a
dream to go to Its only modern man, intellectual, logical, who don’t
believe that dreams can mean anything more. The bible is clear dreams are
important to give direction. They are part of the means of the leadings of
God in our lives today. So it says God does seals instructions to our lives.
My life has been affected by many dreams. I have recorded them down. They
changed my life. It is dreams that gave me directions many times over and
over again. Some times we cannot hear God clearly in our working hours He
tries to emphasize it again in our dream life. So that you don’t miss Him, He
seals His instructions in our life. Any man or woman of God any child of God
who desires to walk closely with God cannot afford to leave the area of dream
life out. They must learn to consecrate their dream life to God. Dreams can come from three sources. They can come from
God. They can come from the devil. Or they can come from your own self. See
the devil can interfere in your subconscious if there is sin. Sin will open
the door for the enemy to disturb you. It is the only door by the way. He has
no other door. If you choose not to sin and choose to be under the blood
there is no door for him to enter. The only door he has is sin. So remember
to always be in the blood. If you are not sure just thank Jesus. As you kneel
down besides your bed say, “Lord Jesus if I failed you in any way today, if I
missed you in my works in my attitudes in my actions Jesus forgive me.
Cleanse me with your precious blood. Continue to speak to me even in my
sleep.” Many Christians think that their lives for the day end when they
sleep. They haven’t its only the beginning of the next part of God working in
their lives. You pray for the day when you wake up. How about preparing
yourself for your sleep? We need to learn that. Many people are not receiving
because they are not cleansed under the blood. One of the reasons Satan tries to block your life at
night is also because God is trying to bring something to you there.
Incidentally if it is a frightening nightmare then that’s not from God. Sin
is the only door that opens. So put yourself under the blood of Jesus. Sin
opens the door and it blocks God working in your life when you sleep. Ecclesiastes 5: 3, for a dream comes with much
business, and a fool’s voice with many words. I remember in the early days of my ministry,
we used to drive down in our little Dahatsu Charade from Penang to But there are some principles that are involved in dreams
that are very vital that we need to see and understand from the Word of God.
This is why we need to see some principles of interpretation of dream. To a
certain extent all of us dream dreams. Throughout your life you do have
dreams. What do they mean? What are they saying? We have to understand what
they say so that we could determine the message of God. Do you know that
there are three types of dreams from God? A dream from God can come in three
ways. A dream can come as No. 1 symbolic dreams. No. 2 as actual dreams. No.
3 as a message dream. The easiest is the second type. Let me give examples of
the first, second and the third types. The first type is symbolic dream. In Genesis 40 Pharaoh
had a dream in fact he had two dreams. Remember when a dream occurs twice it
shows the urgency of something. Joseph through the wisdom of God says to
Pharaoh the dream occurs twice because it is sure to come and there is
urgency involved. So if you have a particular dream that come forth several
times, God is trying to tell you that it surely is and there is an urgency
involved. Pharaoh had a dream. This was his dream. He says he saw the seven
ears of corn and fat ones and seven lean ones ate them up. He woke up and he
went back to sleep. Then he saw seven fat cows and suddenly come seven skinny
cows. And the amazing thing was the seven skinny cows ate up the seven fat
cows. And he said this after the seven skinny cows ate up the seven fat cows,
the seven skinny cows were still skinny. That is a symbolic dream. Later Nebuchadnezzar had a dream and Daniel interpreted.
These dreams are called symbolic dreams. The reason I mentioned this is
because there are some people teaching out there, they teach only the second
part of the dream is from God. That is unscriptural. They say if God gives
you a dream it will be real and there is no need to interpret any more. It
will be just as it is. What about the bible? What about the symbolic dreams?
Are they not from God? See what you believe must be in line with the Word. So
No. 1 there are symbolic dreams. Symbols are involved. In Gen. 39 how Joseph
interpreted the dream of the baker and the butler. Who would have interpreted
that the baker has those loaves of bread on his head it means that his head
is coming off. There is no natural way that we could have gone into that kind
of interpretation. So the first type of dream is symbolic - it needs
interpretation. They are the most difficult dreams to handle. They are easily
misinterpreted. If you have a dream that is symbolical you go to 20 people
you will get 20 interpretations. The second type of dream is the real life situation
dreams. Dreams are one of the leadings of the Spirit an important leading.
Matt. 1:24 When Joseph woke from sleep, he did as the angel of the Lord
commanded him. When did the angel spoke look at verse 20 But as he
considered this, behold, an angel of the Lord appeared to him in a dream. In
a dream he saw an angel coming to him giving him a message. In chapter two we
see the same thing in verse 13. The angel appeared again in a dream gave a
different message. Then in verse 19 the same angel came and told him to leave
The third type of dream is the message dream. Where there
are a lot of things here and there but there is only one message. Example in
Matt. 2 verse 12 the wise men were told not to return to Herod. So some times
your dreams can be that way. There are a lot of things that happened in a
dream and when you get up you forgot everything but you only got one message.
The reason we teach on this area is Christians are learning to obey God and
be led by the Spirit. But they are still not sensitive to God when it comes
to dreams. They take them lightly. They don’t record them down. When some one
prophesies, thus says the Lord, our ears prick up like a dog. But when we
have a dream from God we say, “That’s only a dream. I wonder what it means,”
and afterwards you forgot it. We took it too lightly and we missed the fact
the Holy Spirit is working in our lives even when we are asleep. One of the
majors leading of the Spirit is through dreams. It is even prophesized in the
last days God will lead His people in dreams. Old men shall dream dreams.
These are supernatural impartation of wisdom that comes to them when they are
asleep. So there are three types of dreams and these are the
rules that you apply when you interpret dreams. I give you four rules to
apply for the interpretation of dreams. Rule No. 1 is that the symbolic
dreams must be interpreted. The second type of dreams needs no
interpretation. The third type needs no interpretation. It’s the first one
that is quite difficult. No. 1 the symbols in your dreams must be the same
meaning and symbols as in the bible. They must be biblical symbols in your
interpretation. For example if in your sleep you dream about a dog, a dog in
the bible symbolizes Judaizers. Paul was fighting with those people called
the Judaizers and he called them dogs. There is only one statement in the
bible where Paul says beware of dogs. Dogs also refer to people outside the
covenant of God. When the Canaanite woman came Jesus said the bread is for
the children and not for the dogs. She was outside of the covenant of God. So
you can see that dogs represent things that are outside the covenant. They
don’t represent things that are good. And so even if in your dream you had a
white dog or even a golden dog, when you get up, you thought that’s a good
dream. I wonder what the dog represents? Blessings? A dog in whatever color
of the rainbow in your dream still represents some thing not good. You can see obviously that the more Word you have in your
life and the more understanding you have of the bible the greater your
ability to interpret dreams. If you understand the bible and the symbols that
are in the bible, it will help you to interpret dreams. Because you know what
the symbols represent. If you see a snake whether it is a white snake, black
snake, even they sing some nice songs in your dreams they still represent
evil and deception. So there are many symbols lands, gold all kind of things
in the bible. When you get a dream and you don’t understand the symbol search
the Word. Don’t try to interpret some thing outside the Word. Your symbol
must be in line with the bible. That’s the first rule when it comes to dream
and how to understand and interpret them. The second for us to realize is in Ecclesiastes 5:3 it
tells us that dreams come through much activities. In your dream your
personal attitudes and feelings can affect the accuracy of it. Remember this
rule otherwise you will misinterpret. If some one tells me a dream and ask
for an interpretation, one of the first thing is that I must apply these four
rules. Then the second rule is this. As the person share I must discern what
kind of spirit this person has. The kind of attitude this person has so that
I could interpret the type of dream he has. If for example he is a person
filled with hate. And he has a dream that some body is angry with him. It may
not necessary that, that person is angry. But he always sees people to be
angry with him. See his own attitude colored his dreams. So that his dream
didn’t become the color God wants it to be, it added, polluted, and blurred
the vision. Just like in our waking hours when we are awake you hear God’s
voice. But some times God’s voice feel like an inner thought and you wonder,
“Did I think about that or is it really the Holy Spirit?” And some times
those dreams reveal your inner most feeling. That means your dreams come from
your daily activities. Some dreams come from your inner subconscious thinking
and they need to be dealt with. They are not a message from God but yourself.
Your own dreams that come forth. Its funny you cannot lie to yourself in your
dream. Your conscience affects it. Your feelings, your personal attitudes
color your dreams. So to interpret dreams check the people attitudes that
received the dream. Whether the receiving station is in functioning order,
the transmitter is in order heaven never breaks down. But it is our receiving
station that breaks down. Sometimes the battery water needs to be changed.
What is that? The Holy Spirit is not there, the prayer life is not there and
the Word is not enough. The voltage has gone so low and the attitudes are
wrong it colored our dreams. So the second rule is remember in whatever the
three types of dreams to check your personal attitude and feeling whether
they are coloring the dreams. In helping another person to understand their
dreams check their attitude too. Discern it by the Holy Spirit in order to
get the accurate picture of what God is saying. So the bible says in Jude 33
that God speaks to us. Lets look at the third key in interpreting of dreams. In
the book of Genesis chapter 41 and look at how Joseph interpreted the dreams
and have the third key coming forward. Here we have Joseph interpreting
Pharaoh’s dream. In verse 28 that’s where the interpretation starts. It is as I told Pharaoh, God has shown
to Pharaoh what he is about to do. There will come seven years of
great supply throughout all the Then secondly you have to check whether it is from your
own life. Recently you have been swimming for seven days. Then after you have
checked these areas if you finally feel that is a warning from God, all you
have to do is to pray against that fear. And it will never come to pass. Most
of the time this type of dreams come from the enemy. Some times from our own
life, our own fear brought the dreams. For this reason those of you who just
fall in love and you are praying to God, “God is that man (or woman) Your
will for me?” And then you dream about you and her or him in a wedding. You
cannot trust that dream. You know why? Your feelings are involved. It is very
hard to hear God’s dream when your own feelings are involved. Those are the
times where you should trust your dreams least, especially dreams in the area
of marriage and life partners. Your own feelings, your own desires are coming
out. You got to examine them. So you cannot say after you wake up from that
dream, “Bless God, I have the confirmation.” So when your feelings come into
play it is not necessarily that the Lord has sent you that dream. God never send a warning like this type in order for it
to come to pass. And some of you businessmen you are so rational. You have
been hearing from God in dreams but you are not paying attention to it. God
warns you in your dreams some times in your business. He warns you. He gives
you direction. He tells you of situations not to enter. In your dream you
could be dreaming about certain partnership that you are praying about. And
here in your dream you saw some thing happening that you never saw in your conscious
state. You wake up and ask, “Is it going to come to pass? Is this going to happen?” No, it should not
happen. It’s a warning to prevent you from allowing that event to happen. It
must always be positive. The interpretation must always be positive. It must
not bring fear, grief into people’s life. So here is Joseph interpreting the dream and did you know
his interpretation stops in verse 32. Verse 33 onwards is not an
interpretation. The interpretation has finished there is nothing more to
interpret. But verse 33 is the application, the wisdom and that is the third
key. In order to apply dreams in our lives you will need No. 3 the wisdom of
God for two areas, the wisdom of God to interpret and the wisdom of God to
apply. The third key is the wisdom of God for interpretation and application.
Now Joseph was not applying the dream. It has nothing to do with Pharaoh’s
dream. This is from Joseph’s spirit. He says, “Pharaoh this is going to
happen. Choose a man who is wise. And gather all the abundant of grain in the
first seven years, so that the next seven years we will excess and extra.”
That is wisdom. It is not the gift of the word of wisdom. That is a
revelation of the future. But it’s a gift a spiritual wisdom an application.
It’s the same kind of wisdom that Solomon asked. It’s the same type of wisdom
that James tells us to ask. If any lack wisdom let him ask from God. So the
third key to interpret dreams is wisdom. The fourth key is important to understand that there is
timing for interpretation at times. Some dreams may be shut up until its time
to be opened. So what we have to do is record them down. And the Holy Spirit
will bring it to mind even though you may consciously forget it. The Holy
Spirit will remind you when its time to open it up. A similar type of
situation can be seen in Daniel’s life. Daniel had a lot of vision some of
them in the night dreams. And he did not understand them because the time was
not ripe to unfold them to him. But through his prayers he was able to
understand some. Towards the end of the book of Daniel the angel told him,
“Go thy way. These things are shut up for the end of time.” So the full
understanding did not come to Daniel. But some times the fourth key is to
remember if the Holy Spirit did not give an interpretation don’t try to put
your own. Don’t try to get into human rationalizing or human intellectualism.
If you sense that there is nothing in the Spirit write it down. If you are a
growing Christian you should have kept three books. One book to record dreams
and visions and prophecies. One book to record your bible studies, notes that
you have from your bible study so that you continue to grow. The third book
to record your prayer items. Note down all those things you are believing God
for. So that when they are answered you can note when they are answered. So
we need to record them down for the time that the Holy Spirit determines for
the interpretation to come forth. We are going to conclude with how to receive the gift of
interpretation. In the book of Daniel chapter one. There are two things that
are similar between Joseph and Daniel. Daniel was a man of dreams and also
visions. Joseph was a man of dreams. You notice Joseph in the book of Genesis
and Daniel in the book of Daniel both were similar characters. Both were
faithful to the Lord when they were young. Both sought to do the right ways
of the Lord. So you will find these three keys to receive the gift of
interpretation in both their lives. Some times these keys were developed in
the silent years in Joseph’s life but its clear cut in Daniel’s life. I
believe it also was in Joseph’s life. So here in Daniel chapter one verse 17 As
for these four youths, God gave them learning and skill in all letters and
wisdom and dreams. Look at it there is such a special gift. And notice
some thing about Joseph somewhere between the time he was in Potiphar’s house
to the time that he was in prison he received the gift of interpretation. He
interpreted the butler’s and the baker’s dream. And he interpreted Pharaoh’s dream.
Somewhere along the line Joseph received the gift of interpretation of
dreams. And it is available for every one of you here. If you develop the first four keys you have already moved
in that direction to understand and interpret dreams. Here we see in Daniel’s
life, he was given a special gift. Daniel when he was brought to Joseph made a choice to choose the path or righteousness.
Daniel also made that choice. What did you see in common about them?
Faithfulness. So the first requirement is faithfulness to the Lord, to His
Word, faithfulness to His covenant, faithfulness to keep yourself for Him.
Many people don’t realize that the Lord has more to give you than the devil.
The devil shows the carrot in your eyes and then say, “Donkey come on.” He
says taste the pleasures of sin for a short time and we say no to it. You
become a Christian don’t sin, you don’t commit adultery, you don’t smoke, you
don’t drink, you don’t do this you don’t do that. It’s a miserable life. I
don’t want to become a Christian. I will miss all these things they say. They
don’t realize what God has. They have only been experiencing what the devil
is tempting them with. Its temporary and he is going to collect them
afterwards. What they don’t realize is what God has. If any one of you
dedicate yourself to the Lord let me express the help of our Father. I have
never known our Father not to give you a gift. I have never known our Father
not to reward faithfulness. He has always. One of the things that Gordon Lindsey mentioned was that
he realize that in the ministry he spent so much time with the Lord that some
times his family pay a heavy price because their father and husband is a man
of God. But then as he looked back, he found that God gave special grace to
his family for the sacrifice that was made. God gave different types of gifts
to them. See God never robs you. He is a Father. When you dedicate yourself
to Him first you will have the opportunity to choose. During the time of
choosing you may not see God’s reward. I am not making it up. James chapter
one says when you endure temptation you are rewarded. When you choose no I
don’t want these things of the devil. No I don’t want the things of the
world. I want the will of God. It looks like you are giving up everything. But
later you find that you found everything. God begins to start giving you
things. God begins to bless you financially. It is God Himself who say I will
add this to you. All these things in Matt. 6:33 I will add to you. Plus you
will have spiritual graces. And among them as his case and in Daniel and in Joseph He
added that remarkable ability to interpret dreams. Do you know that it was
that gift that promoted Joseph to Prime Minster? If Joseph did not interpret
dreams he could be a good man. He could be a hard worker. He would never made
it to be Prime Minister. He made it to be Prime Minister because he
interpreted dreams. The gift of God was on his life. When God gives you a
gift that gift promotes you. The gift of God promotes you. Promotion comes
not from the East or from the West it comes out from God. It was the gift of
God that Joseph developed that promoted him. Do you realize in Daniel’s life
it’s the gift of interpretation that promoted him? Doesn’t that weigh more
than money? Worth more than anything in the world can buy. We don’t realize
it. When we choose the ways of the Lord it looks like as if we are loosing
everything. You are not. You are going to gain many things. In fact it does
not pay not to obey God. It will cost you more. Sin will bring you to a
position where you will go further than you want to go and it will cost you
more than you can take. It is important for us to understand faithfulness to
the things of the Lord. Faithfulness to say I don’t want any thing else in
the world but the Lord. I only want my Lord and keep making this you will be
rewarded. So one of the first keys to receive the gift of interpretation is
faithfulness. The second key after that an incident occurred in which
Nebuchadnezzar in Daniel chapter 2 gave a command for all the wise people to
be slaughtered because they could not interpret a dream. And when they wanted
to interpret his dream he said, “I forgot the dream. You all have to tell me
the dream and then tell me the interpretation.” And they could not. He said,
“Off with their heads.” So the word got to Daniel. Daniel asked why this
urgency to kill everybody. And when he heard what it was in Daniel chapter
verse 16 And Daniel went in and besought the king to appoint him a time,
that he might show the king the interpretation. Do you notice Daniel in chapter one he
already had the interpretation but it was not fully operating yet. He was not
in the same position like Joseph. In Joseph’s time the king gave the dream
and he gave the interpretation. Here Daniel had to give the dream and the
interpretation. That is harder still. But Daniel said give us time. In verse
18 And told them to seek mercy of the God of heaven concerning this
mystery, so that Daniel and his companions might not perish with the rest of
the wise men of The third key to receive wisdom, understanding and
interpretation of dreams. Daniel chapter 10 Notice some thing here in verse 3
it says Daniel was fasting and in verse 11 it tells us the reason why he
fasted but the answer came O Daniel, man greatly beloved, give heed to the
words that I speak to you, and stand upright, for now I have been sent to
you.” While he was speaking this word to me, I stood up trembling. Then he
said to me, Fear not, Daniel, for from the first day that you set your mind
to understand. Do you know why one of the reasons for his 21 days fast,
is to seek revelation, is to seek understanding. So fasting brings
revelations. It puts you in a position to receive revelations. And you could
put one of the objectives of the fast to receive revelations to understand
some thing. It may not come during your fast. But the answer may come some
time after your fast. But the answer is traced to your fasting. One of the
things I constantly do in my fasting is I fast for revelations. If I don’t
understand the passage in the bible I will bring it before God and fast and
pray. During the time that I fast revelation may not come but at least I have
the satisfaction to know that I fasted over it and I committed it to the
Lord. And God in His timing will bring it back to me. And He does, some times
one year later, some times two years later He says, “This is the answer son
that you prayed two years ago.” I said, “Thank you Lord.” I will not say,
“Why did You take two years to answer me?” because I know the answer. He will
say, “You were not ready two years ago.” So the third key is to live a life
of fasting and prayer.
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