Daniel 2:28 –
But there is a God in heaven who reveals secrets, and he has shown King Nebuchadnezzar what will happen in the future. Now I will tell you your dream and the visions you saw as you lay on your bed.
This chapter Daniel learns of and interprets one of King Nebuchadnezzar dreams. He had asked of his magicians, enchanters, sorcerers, and astrologers to tell him what his dream was and to interpret it. None could
do this and it infuriated the king so much he started to have all his wise men killed, including the 4 from Judah. When they came to execute Daniel he asked for a day to do this and then prayed to God for help. As you find out God granted him the wisdom of the knowing the dream and its meaning.
Daniel saved the day for them and we granted not only freedom, but a high position in the kingdom. As we will see this gave him influence over the king and his treatment of the Israelites. This story is similar to that of Nehemiah who as cup bearer to the king was able to rebuild Jerusalem. It shows the way God works to help the people of Israel even in occupation.
Now in reading this I often wonder the visions and power of dreams. Often I have some crazy ones, but wonder if any are from God. God uses dreams to communicate with us from time to time, although I think we tend to try to read too much into them over our lives. In the Bible God has used them to warn leaders of future events (here and Gen 41), provide revelation to prophets (Num 12), warn us of decisions (Matt 27), reveal his destiny in our lives (Gen 37) and he answer petitions and prayers (1 Kings 3). But one of the most overlooked reasons for dreams is just to handle the stress of the day.
I think we tend to read more into them that we should; most of the time they are just our internal method of coping with stress. I can honestly say over the years I could maybe attribute 1 or 2 dreams as messages from God. Unfortunately (or fortunately) I don’t dream much and when I do they are just strange. I would love more communication from God in that manner, but at the same time I think we all know the responsibilities when God starts talking to us. Look at Moses, he ran away for 40 years before the “matured” or was convinced to do what God was asking. Here people’s lives were dependent on Daniels dreams, so maybe I’ll just keep to my odd ball dreams!