Peter was enjoying a restful night’s sleep when he was suddenly awakened by an angelic boot in the ribs.
“Arise up quickly.”
They were not dead – yet.
“Gird thyself, and bind on thy sandals. Cast thy garment about thee, and follow me.”
I think perhaps that was the way it was with Peter that night.
I wouldn’t be a bit surprised to learn that Peter was in the midst of a dream when he awoke.
Perhaps he was dreaming about the Lord Jesus, Whom he had known and served for years.
Perhaps Peter was dreaming about being in jail and being taken out to be executed.
Perhaps it was a dream about the Sea of Galilee and the wonderful years that he used to spend there.
Or maybe it was a dream about traveling to a new and exotic place like Heaven – or Babylon.
And then all of a sudden some angel he had never met was blowing reveille & telling him to get dressed.
He staggered to his feet and did as he was told.
His cell door opened, but he didn’t see exactly how his visitor had opened it.
The two guards outside his cell were just as comatose as those to whom he had been chained.
Then they came into one ward and then into another, before passing through the great iron gate that stood at the entrance into the prison.
It wasn’t until the angel had taken him down one street and into another that Peter finally realized what was going on.
“And when Peter was come to himself, he said, NOW I know of a surety, that the Lord hath sent his angel, and hath delivered me out of the hand of Herod, and from all the expectation of the people of the Jews.”
This was after verse nine had told us: Peter, “went out, and followed him; and wist not that it was true which was done by the angel; but thought he saw a vision.”
It wasn’t until he was outside that Peter realized that his deliverance was real and NOT JUST A DREAM.
This morning let’s think briefly about dreams and visions.
So I put the word “dream” into Google and in point 54 seconds it came up with 15,700,000 links.
After I looked at the first ten, I realized that the internet wasn’t going to help me one bit.
So let’s stick with Biblical revelation and common knowledge.
There are many, many cases in the Bible where God spoke to men through dreams and visions.
For example, when Jacob was fleeing toward Padanaram, during the first night out as he slept he …
During that dream the Lord reiterated the covenant that He had made with Abraham.
That was a particularly important dream.
Joseph’s Pharaoh had dreams about seven skinny cows and seven fat ones.
And there were the dreams that the Lord gave to Pharaoh’s butler and baker.
Gideon had an important dream as he became a judge in Israel.
And Solomon had a memorable dream, where the Lord asked the new king what he wanted, but Solomon wanted nothing more than wisdom to be a good ruler.
We could multiply references to important revelations that God gave to people through dreams & visions.
And Peter was not unfamiliar with those visions himself.
One afternoon while in prayer the Lord revealed that he was supposed to go to Caesarea and to give the gospel to an unsaved Gentile.
In this case it wasn’t a dream per se, because Peter wasn’t asleep at the time, but its really hard to distinguish between the dreams and visions of the Word of God.
And then of course, the Lord gave the reverse side of that vision to Cornelius.
Now, how many dreams have YOU had recently?
There are people who wake up nearly every morning with a vague memory of a dream that night,
Science tells us that just about all of us all dream every night, but that we have poor memories.
“For now we see through a glass, darkly; but then face to face: now I know in part; but then shall I know even as also I am known.”
A couple of weeks ago I told Judy about a dream that I had that night,
I suppose you might say that it was a product of my imagination, because it was something that I had been thinking about during the day;
It flowed over into my subconsciousness and reappeared as I slept.
That dream wasn’t sinful, but I can’t say that it was of God either.
Solomon once said, “A dream cometh through the multitude of business.”
Have you ever blamed your dreams on the kind of food that you ate just before you went to bed?
But I have heard people who weren’t old wives say that really spicy pizza can give people nightmares,
Or maybe it was it that root-beer float?
“Mare” was an Old English synonym for a female demon.
A nightmare was said to be the visit of one of those demons.
Isn’t that a bit scarey?
Anyway, of those dreams that you’ve had over the last couple of weeks, how many were because of the pizza and how many were revelations from God?
And then there is the question: why are many of our dreams pleasant, but some are terrifying?
Science is studying this subject pretty diligently right now,
And if the Lord gives them enough time before His return, they might figure some of this stuff out.
Why is it that some dreams are so terrifying that we can’t go back to sleep?
Even some of the dreams and visions that God gave to Biblical saints could be classified as nightmares.
Sometimes the recipients were shaken to their very bones.
In some cases they even fell to the earth as dead men.
So even Biblical dreams are an interesting study.
I have never noticed a Christian book on the subject of dreams.
When you write yours I’ll try to help you get it published.
Actually they weren’t dreams at all.
And THAT IS THE POINT that I’d like you see here.
Sometimes things are so good in people’s lives that they think: “this can’t possibly be real.”
For Peter, who may have been dreaming when his deliverance began,
When he was taken out of the prison it was so marvelous that his mind just assumed that it was the continuation of the earlier dream.
Haven’t YOU ever been in the midst of a dream when the phone rang or there was a noise outside and for a few seconds, before the reality struck you, those sounds became a part of the dream?
Peter may have already given up hope for any escape.
So as he was lead out of the prison, completely contrary to all logic, he assumed that it was a dream.
I wish that I had more information about the mind-set of the person who told Rhoda, “It is his angel.”
Most commentaries suggest that he was thinking that it was Peter’s spirit or ghost,
I don’t see the disembodied spirits of Biblical saints traveling around visiting people.
So the commentaries suggest that it was a Jewish superstition.
If indeed the Jews had that superstition, why hasn’t it been burned out of these enlightened saints?
That is a possibility I suppose, although once again we don’t have any Biblical precedent for it.
The problem with that interpretation is that the translators of our King James Bible didn’t think that this was a mere human messenger or they would have translated the word rather than transliterated it.
In any case, those Christians were living in a kind of dream world – a nightmare world.
You know, Psalm 126 describes similar situation.
“When the LORD turned again the captivity of Zion, we were like them that dream.
Then said they among the heathen, The LORD hath done great things for them.
The LORD hath done great things for us; whereof we are glad.”
But neither for the Jews returning from Babylon, nor for Peter walking the streets of Jerusalem, were their situations actually dreams.
They were wonderful, but they were NOT too good to be true.
Last week, I used Peter’s deliverance from prison to illustrate the salvation of the sinner from the judgment of his sin.
When it comes to messages like that, I wish that one thing would stand out above everything else:
When a sinner is saved, it is by the pure and wonderful GRACE OF GOD.
“Marvelous grace of our loving Lord, Grace that exceeds our sin and our guilt,
Grace, grace, God’s grace, Grace that will pardon and cleanse within;
Grace, grace, God’s grace, Grace that is greater than all my sin.”
And even if our initial salvation were accomplished by God, we know that if justice prevailed we’d be back in our prison before the arrival of the morning sun.
We are repeat offenders; we are sinners whether converted or unconverted.
It will be a dream that day what he comes again to receive me unto Himself; that where He is there I will be as well.
There are so many people who when asked if they are Heaven-bound say things like:
“Yes, I think so; I feel like I’m a Christian;” or “I believe that the Lord is pleased enough with me.”
Those people are living in a dream, and when they die, they will instantly awake to their peril.
I don’t want to base my eternity on hopes and dreams; I want substance.
So I’ve turned to the Word of God.
There I read of the Lord Jesus on the cross.
There I read God’s commands for me to repent and to rest on the work of Christ.
There in the Bible I read the promises of God.
“I know whom I have believed, and am persuaded that he is able to keep that which I have committed unto him against that day.”
“Oh that my words were now written! oh that they were printed in a book!
For I know that my redeemer liveth, and that he shall stand at the latter day upon the earth:
And though after my skin worms destroy this body, yet in my flesh shall I see God:
Whom I shall see for myself, and mine eyes shall behold, and not another; though my reins be consumed within me.”
That hope is just about as far from a dream as is divinely possible.
Acts 12:11 says, “And WHEN PETER WAS COME TO HIMSELF, he said,
And hath delivered me out of the hand of Herod, & from all the expectation of the people of the Jews.”
When Peter had COME TO HIMSELF, he knew that he wasn’t in a dream.
How many hired servants of my father’s have bread enough and to spare, and I perish with hunger!”
He had grown up with all of his needs being met; in fact there may have been some wealth in his family.
And so he had become somewhat filled with himself; HIS wants; HIS lusts, HIS goals, HIS way.
When he reached the acceptable age he said to his father,
And not many days after the younger son gathered all together, and took his journey into a far country, and there wasted his substance with riotous living.”
He fell into the trap of thinking that money, pleasure, fun and waste were the things that made life worth living.
Through squandering his wealth he gathered a few false friends around him.
If he was a part of our world today, he would no doubt have been immersed in liquor, drugs and immorality.
He ate, drank and was as merry as far as his father’s money could make him.
Like the old joke says, “He thought he was eating the world’s largest marshmallow, but when he eventually woke up, his pillow was missing.”
“When he had spent all, there arose a mighty famine in that land; and he began to be in want.
And he would fain have filled his belly with the husks that the swine did eat: & no man gave unto him.”
Or as the Bible puts it: “he came to himself.”
He realized what a fool sin had made him; he began to realize what it was that he had left back home.
And with his hat in his hands he returned to his father.
There is no indication that this was a parable, a fictitious story devised to teach us spiritual truth.
Although WE may have dreams,
We cannot afford to live in our dreams.
And we can’t assume that our love for the things of the world will feed us throughout eternity.
“Except ye repent, ye shall all likewise perish.”
“He that believeth on the Son hath everlasting life: and he that believeth not the Son shall not see life; but the wrath of God abideth on him.”
The Prodigal thought that he was in reality, but it was a dream.
Fortunately for both of them, they came to themselves.
Have YOU yet come to yourself and come to the Saviour?
Come kneel at the foot of the cross.
Come and repent of your sin.
You, and everyone else in this world, need a Saviour – you need THE Saviour.