Puzzles and Dreams

David Henderson kept dreaming the same dreams. Details varied, but the pattern was the same. He faced something so frightening, he fled with all his might. But once safe, he would wonder: “What frightened me so much?” Then, in the dream, he would go back to discover what had so panicked him. But it was gone.

He dreamed these dreams, three to four a night, his first year of college. Finally, he discovered the monster. He dreamed he was driving down a road when he saw a man behind a fence. David screamed. At first he thought the hooded figure was a Klansman. But as he peered more closely, he recognized the man as Jesus. Jesus invited David to his side of the fence. He no longer felt frightened. Together they left the ground and had a wonderful time flying.

At the end of the dream they stood on a stage, where David was defending Jesus to a crowd. Hostile, the crowd was throwing things at the pair. Wounded, Jesus lay down on the stage. Wounded, David continued to defend his new friend.

Crowds are still throwing things at Jesus. In fact, the sport is getting popular. Some publishing houses are discovering that books about Jesus sell well, especially the “creative” ones where scholars argue that we really don’t know the real Jesus at all (see “Who Do Scholars Say That I Am?” in this issue). They argue that the church has distorted this Galilean Jew, that the Gospels are biased accounts that serve the interests of the early Christian community.

Think of a jigsaw puzzle with thousands of small pieces. You feel intimidated. The puzzle is a popular one, and lots of your friends are working on it. One tells you the picture on the box is a lie; the real solution is a secret, that you don’t even use all the pieces–if the result looks like the picture on the box, you’ve been duped. Another friend says she used the picture on the box and everything fit perfectly. Your first friend just shakes his head.

So how do you put together the puzzle?

Jesus is a puzzle: A rural peasant rabbi who becomes the fulcrum that tilts all of human history in a new direction. How do you explain that?

You look at the box.

David’s dreams led him on a three-year journey, at the end of which he admitted he’d rather fly with his Savior than run from the monster. Fifteen years later, he is defending the wounded body of Christ by pastoring a church in Colorado.

What would David say to the scholars who say we shouldn’t trust what the creeds and the Gospels say about Jesus? I imagine he would say: The Jesus described in the New Testament is alive, here, now. What Jesus and his apostles said all fits together; it’s all true.

And those “innovative” scholars will probably just shake their heads.