In a dream I am a young girl, all alone in a strange place.  I do not have anyone or anything with me.  I am totally alone with only myself.  I can not even remember anything being around me. There was only dark emptiness.  I now think that it was like solitary confinement; all alone with … nothing.

Then one day a young boy entered into my dungeon and came along beside me.  I never asked him who he was, or where he came from.  I was just thrilled to be with someone.  I was no longer alone.  He is my best and my only friend. When he entered, it seemed like it was no longer a dungeon, and I no longer felt like I was hopeless or helpless.  Then, as I (we) grow older I “hear and see” that the boy’s teeth will no longer be filed down, but would be allowed to grow into what they really were: fangs.  From here on out, he would grow into his true form.  Still, he was with me and never left my side.

Next, I see him as I am full grown, and he is also full grown and in his true form.  His face is familiar to me, yet he resembles a lion more than anything else.  It is still him, but his lion features are now apparent.  I had an instant flashback of seeing his transformation with his jaw extending and the fangs growing at the time I heard they would no longer be filed down.  I looked around me and found myself in the most wonderful place! It was a lush and beautiful garden-like place, populated with many animal-people of various species.  They all were intelligent and talked and thought as a human would, only their forms were as animals.  I wondered if I was also an animal…. I do not think so.

Now, I began to wonder if I was the only human in this place, and I began to look around me.  Almost right away, I saw a person standing a short distance from me on my right.  When I looked at him, I was thrilled as I recognized my childhood friend!  I waved excitedly to him and and he waved at me like he was glad to see me also.  He was standing in the midst of the animals.  I ran to him with great joy!

My lion friend was at home with all the other animals and I wondered why we had been friends for all this time.  Understanding suddenly hit me as I thought of the sacrifice it must have been to him to come and spend all that time away from his true home!  He was not like me.  He only was like me when I would have been afraid of him NOT being like me.  But as I grew, he took on more and more of His true form.  And it always seemed to me that he was always the same age as me, and I thought he grew as I grew.  I realized that he was only there for me!  I was all alone before he came to be my constant friend!  I was overcome with the realization that I have never been alone!  I have never been without my constant friend since the day he left his home and came to me!

I know this is a picture of Jesus.  He, disrobed Himself of His deity in order to become flesh and dwell among us.  He became a man of sorrows and acquainted with all our griefs. He cried with us and He laughed with us.  He experienced all that is common to all men.  He came in the same form that we are, so that we would would know Him as a friend who knows us and all our weaknesses.  He can relate to all of us.  Jesus comes to each of us exactly where we are.  In the middle of our darkest night when we cry out to Him, instantly He comes to us.  Jesus walks with us through all our trials and never again are we alone!  (Matthew 11: 27-30, Isaiah 43:1-7)

As we spend time in Jesus’s company, we no longer need Him to cloak Himself.  For as we grow in maturity, He reveals more of Himself to us. As babies in Christ, He comes in a way we can recognize and find comfort in.  But you cannot spend time with the Lord of life and not change and grow! There comes a day when no more will His glory be veiled from our eyes!  (2 Corinthians 3:18) We can now receive more and more revelation of who He really is in all His glory and power. (1 John 3:2-3)

The more we know Him, the more we realize the exquisite sacrifice He made to be with us!  He left His position in heaven, as Creator with God the Father to come to life in a skin of fallen flesh!  He who fills all creation with His glory now came into this tiny fallen world as a lowly baby!  He who is One with God, submitted Himself to fallen men, to be despised and rejected and scorned by fallen corrupted men, so that He could be my friend, and I could be with Him forever in His Kingdom!  (John 1:1-5, 14, Hebrews 1,  Colossians 1: 15-20, Isaiah 53, Isaiah 42:1-9)

Like the lion in the dream, I never once considered the sacrifice of his friendship to me, until I saw him in his true form, as he really is!  (1 John 3:2-3) Then, I was like Peter, James and John when they witnessed their master transfigured, as bright as the sun and ministered to by Moses and Elijah on the mountain!  I have only glimpsed His glory.  But I know that when finally I do see Him as He really is, I shall finally be like Him!

[Originally composed: August 30, 2005]

The Scripture passages are referenced so that you may study the scriptures to see how beautifully everything conforms together and is grounded in Him.  The references are not intended as a direct quote of any written translation of the Bible, but rather as a reference to anchor my writing in scripture.