Dreams

“God's love consumes us, owns us, and then—we often miss this part—He gives ownership of our life back to us, except now we're connected to His love, assistance, guidance, grace, light, truth, and correction.”~ Paul Coughlin My daughter and I were talking tonight about our dreams. We laughed about how stupid some of them can be, like the ones where you dream you are still in high school, trying to pass a test, and then you realize it’s been many years since you graduated, or ones that are about doing the dishes, or things like this. For as long as I can remember, I’ve dreamed of being lost inside a huge house, unable to find my way out. Doors would open into empty rooms, or the rooms would have parts of the floor missing, and I would have to carefully step around to find my way out. In some of the dreams I would be climbing staircases that went nowhere, or would lead up to attics that I was afraid to venture into. These dreams were often frustrating; it was if I was searching for something I could not find. And as me and my daughter talked tonight, I realized that I haven’t had one of these dreams in quite some time. I tried to remember just when it was that I last had one, and I think they stopped almost a year ago, probably around the time when I joined the Catholic Church. So much of my life has changed in that time. Actually, nothing is the same anymore. Where there was once despair, there is peace. The moment I opened my heart back up to Christ, He came in and took over, and gave me the life I had always dreamt of. At first, it was so easy. God owned every part of me. I was so caught up in the joy from this, and it consumed every part of my life. Over the months, the intensity of this faded somewhat. I had to look at some things from my past and deal with them. I questioned why I was going through some problems, and what was I supposed to learn from them. A few times, I felt completely alone, although I knew that I wasn’t. God was probably closer to me at that point than I realized. All of my problems were and are not magically solved, but I now have the grace of God to deal with them. I think the reason I had the dreams of being lost in the house was because I was searching for something, and that the reason they have stopped is because I have finally found what I was so desperately looking for, the infinite love of God.