Genesis 40: 5-8: “And they dreamed a dream both of them, each man his dream in one night, each man according to the interpretation of his dream, the butler and the baker of the king of Egypt, which were bound in the prison. And Joseph came in unto them in the morning, and looked upon them, and, behold, they were sad. And he asked Pharaoh’s officers that were with him in the ward of his lord’s house, saying, Wherefore look ye so sadly to day? And they said unto him, We have dreamed a dream, and there is no interpreter of it. And Joseph said unto them, Do not interpretations belong to God? tell me them, I pray you.”
Joseph understood how the Lord worked and he was experienced with dreams. This is in contrast to Samuel’s early days when the Lord’s word was precious (see 1 Sam 3: 1 “And the child Samuel ministered unto the LORD before Eli. And the word of the LORD was precious in those days; there was no open vision.”) The people in those days had rejected God’s word and they were no longer in a position to hear what He had to say to them. However, Joseph was different, in spite of his difficult circumstances he didn’t stop trusting and obeying the Lord, therefore, he was able to hear what the Lord had to say to him. In those days they didn’t have any of the Bible readily available so the Lord communicated by visions. The Lord had an important message to give to Pharaoh but Joseph had to be in a position where Pharaoh would listen to what he had to say. The Lord put these two high officials in prison and gave them dreams so that Joseph could develop a reputation as someone who could interpret dreams. They had their dreams but Joseph was humble enough to give the credit to the Lord. Does this mean that we are to look for visions from the Lord and special people to interpret them for us so that we can know what God’s will for our lives will be? NO! God’s will for each Christian is substantially the same. We are to follow the advice that the Lord gave to Joshua “This book of the law shall not depart out of thy mouth; but thou shalt meditate therein day and night, that thou mayest observe to do according to all that is written therein: for then thou shalt make thy way prosperous, and then thou shalt have good success.” (Josh 1: 8) That is, we are to read and meditate on God’s word daily. We are to “Pray without ceasing. (1 Thes 5: 17) This doesn’t mean that we are to pray every minute of every day but remember “And he spake a parable unto them to this end, that men ought always to pray, and not to faint;” (Luke 18: 1) Finally, “Be careful for nothing; but in every thing by prayer and supplication with thanksgiving let your requests be made known unto God.” (Phil 4: 6) When we do all these things then we will have real peace when it comes to making the simple decisions in our lives and we won’t need dreams. However, it still good to have a vision for our lives; “Where there is no vision, the people perish: but he that keepeth the law, happy is he.” (Prov 29: 18)
(The view expressed in this blog are my own and should not be taken as inspired in any way.)
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