Make a wish...upon a prayer

September 16, 2004

Personal Narrations

Joel Akin

Calgary, Alberta

3 John: 2 Beloved, I wish above all things that thou mayest prosper and be in health, even as thy soul prospereth.

The Following is a dream that is longer then normal. I decided to include all of it instead of bringing in just excerpts.

The Dream: I was in a house late at night. It was an old house, one of those farm homes you see in Wisconsin's corn belt. To my left was a wood table and to my right a couch but I was not paying attention to these things for my eyes were focussed out the window. Directly below me was a dirt driveway with a station wagon sitting there and a tree beside it but I could still see much of the sky. It is then that to my left, high in the atmosphere, I saw a shooting star. As it burned brightly I made a wish or a heartfelt prayer if you will. It felt more then just words but a longing. The gist of it was this. "If only those things I long for would come to my home."

 Then the strangest thing began to happen. As I looked into the yard shooting stars from a large section of the sky began to fall and landed in this grassy section of the yard next to the house. I watched in astonishment as some the size of my fist and others the size of a walnut fell to the earth.

 I ran outside and collected a large handful of meteorites. Rocks of different sizes and shapes. As I watched they continued to randomly fall about me but none of them touched or hurt me and the ones I picked up were definitely meteorites but none of them were hot from their ride through the skies.

 I ran inside and told everyone my story and all looked at me as if I had just told them there was grass growing or birds flying. None of the adults understood what I was saying but the children looked at me with fascination and in great excitement dashed outdoors where meteorites continued to hit the earth. All small but all fell within this certain swathe of grass. Part of me longed for the adults to see what I was referring to so I grabbed my family and said, "If this does not convince you then I will take you into the country where I will show you how real this is. So we drove across the flat land until we were in the middle of pastures and dirt roads, creeks and small lakes and ponds.  It was my ***** who seemed the biggest skeptic so I said 'watch and see'. I then closed my eyes and made the biggest wish prayer I could think of.

 Within moments streaks of fiery meteors gathered from every part of the heavens and joined together into a massive stone of fire the size of a four story building. It was traveling at near the speed of light as it streaked straight down into a nearby small lake. Then this pillar of fire and stone struck the water and in one instant of time night became day and then it became brighter then day and more intense then the sun itself and in great shock our family stepped into a place of darkness and a place of safety.

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Have you ever had a desire so strong that you felt as if you could call down the heavens to earth? Elijah prayed that it would not rain and it didn't for three years. Elijah called down fire from heaven on the prophets of Baal. Samuel prayed that it would thunder and rain as a sign to the Israelites.

 There are many examples of men called by God to have an influence on the weather or make supernatural changes that are beyond the ken of men. Yet in this dream, as I sought God for an interpretation, I do not think it had to do with just calling down 'rocks' from the heavens. God began to share a deeper understanding of this dream and he gave me two meanings. That which is personal, which I do not feel ready yet to share, but that which is for the church.

 In the books of Matthew, Mark and Luke Jesus said "Allow the little children to come to me and forbid them not for of such is the kingdom of heaven.."

I remember an incident when I was living in Brooks, Alberta when many of the church people had gone out to lunch at Boston Pizza. Among our number was a little baby not much older then six months. The reason I remember this child is that everyone was chatting away having their own little conversations. But I was watching this child and they seemed wrapped up in a world of their own. For they were following 'something' with their eyes that no one else could see.

 Why is it that the older we grow the more 'established' and 'settled' we become? When I first arrived in Canada back in the early 80's I was quickly molded into the Canadian way of doing, thinking and speaking. It was a difficult time for I had just spent five years adjusting to Bible College and American ways only to find out Canadians were not Americans. So I had to become like-minded in order to be accepted. Yet why is it that several years later these 'friends' told me I was now one of them but it did not make me happy?

 Have we done the same thing to our children? Have we stripped them of their personality and removed their innocence in order to protect them or mold them into what we think is proper? As God began to reveal this dream to me and its meaning I knew that what he said would not be popular. For God began to reveal that those who returned to the innocence of children and would become 'as little children' would be the only ones to receive the answers from heaven. Yet it goes much deeper then this. We have established our churches so they run like well oiled machines. Oil is good if it is of the Holy Spirit but terrible if it is man-made or synthetic. How often have we pushed out the squeaky wheel from our churches because we are uncomfortable with what they say? I cannot imagine John the Baptist would be accepted in our churches eating bugs and dressed in goat hair. If he wasn't in a mental hospital we'd have various folks drag him aside and share with him why he needed to put on a 3 piece and take a bath.

I believe this dream goes even deeper. If we think of the world vs the church we begin to see that the church has become complacent. I do not say this out of anger but more sadness. We have not just lost our path but lost the simplicity that allows us to be as the Kingdom of Heaven. In the dream when I made a wish and the 'stars' began falling a few interesting things happened. One is they fell even after I had stopped praying. Most of us don't really understand the power of prayer. We often think of Daniel who prayed for 21 days and his prayer was answered so we continue to pray for 10, 20, 30 years about the same issue without seeing any kind of change. What this dream tells me is that prayers to God can and do get results and those results just keep on coming. How can that be? The answer is too big to really delve into right now but suffice it to say there are two things at work here. The authority of the person praying and the power of God.

Yet there is also another issue here at stake. I believe the church is used to 'hearing' about miracles, perhaps to the extent of experiencing passivity. How is this possible? Simply because it is children who can see the wonder in ants and stones and seashells and nuts that fall from the tree. They see the world with wonder. Unfortunately I believe that when Gods power begins to fall it will not be the church that receives these initial blessings but those who are outside of it. Those who are young in their faith. Those who may even be considered the immature, the children. It is they who will collect handfuls of these blessings and in the process be blessed.

But we go even deeper into this great, huge wish/prayer that I made which brought down the powers of heaven so that the 'world' lit up brighter then the sun.

 There can be only one explanation for this part of the dream. The church will not see and understand the small miracles and thus will not accept them. God will have to reveal his power and his glory for the church to awake from her slumber. The only problem with this is I believe it will also come with great judgment upon the land. The church will get its answer for a great revival and a great outpouring of Gods spirit but it will come in the way of tribulation, suffering and sorrow. In a dream from a few days ago I saw the gospel tracks heading underground into a tunnel. This can only signify that the true church will have to become an underground church. Rejected by established religions, politicians and those of the politically correct mentality. Will we, at that time, continue to rejoice in our walk with the Lord? Will we then return to the simplicity of the gospel when we no longer are busy with activities that matter little in the long run?

It is my prayer that when these things come to pass that I will be ready and not afraid to stand up for the Lord Jesus Christ. He is waiting, with arms wide open, for us to come to Him as little children.