I had a dream the other night. I was a little boy and I was standing in the midst of the big green field in Balboa Park in San Diego California. Off in the distance there’s a big pavilion and I was watching people going up and down the stairs there. I don’t know where my father or mother or brother are which is strange. Usually if we go to Balboa Park it’s a family event. Mom and dad and my brother and I will go to Balboa Park in the morning and then go to Old Town and have Mexican food in the afternoon. So as I’m wondering in my dream where everyone else is, I began to enjoy the palm trees waving in the gentle breeze, the other huge trees, the famous flowerbeds  and watching the people going up and down the stairs at the pavilion.
Suddenly and surprisingly someone takes my hand and we begin moving rapidly across the sward towards a shaded lot against a hill. I have to jog a bit to keep up and jump a bit to keep to stride. I know it’s my father and I’m not afraid. What I can’t make out is if he is just getting me somewhere we need to go, or if he is angry with me for not paying attention to where I was in the first place?
He led me at a rather rapid pace to a little trailer that had been set up to sell things. He bought me a box of  “Cracker Jacks”.

Now, I don’t like cracker jacks. I didn’t care for the prizes. The cereal box prizes where better, but I was happy because my Dad bought it for me.

That is where the dream ended and I had at the time no idea what meant.  I am still not sure but I might have a hint.

Luther notes that “when God seizes man, man is by nature weak and disheartened, because he does not know whether God is taking him in hand out of anger or in grace”.  In my dream I waited to see our destination, hear what my father might say, and look at his face to read what it might reveal.

I don’t have to do that now because I know the destination, I have the Father’s voice about Jesus His beloved who has given me all things when he paid my redemption price, and I have seen the Father’s benevolent face.  I have a prize everlasting life, and I trust my Fathers mercy because of Jesus.