LED BY THE HAND OF GOD
Years later, I needed that kind, hearing, powerful God to help me with my
battle. Was it futile to attempt to gain knowledge of religious truth?
Would
God help me see the truth for what it is? By 2004, I knew that I could not
defend Islam in the face of Christian arguments, but I did not know if
that
was due to my intellectual inability or to the power of the truth. In all
candor, I was hoping that God would come to my aid and fight for me,
showing
Islam to be the correct path. But I truly had no idea what was true and
knew
there was only One who could show me.
A Vision
Near the end of 2004, my father and I were in Florida. For months, I had
been praying to God for an answer to my question; however, never had I
prayed like I did this particular evening. It was the night of December
19th, and my father had fallen asleep in a hotel bed next to mine. But I
was
still awake. It was dark in the room, though not completely dark; there
was
still some light. The precariousness of my fate manifested itself in my
mind. I admitted that despite all I thought I knew, I actually knew
nothing.
I needed God to show me the truth. I couldn't do it without His help. At
that instant, the most humble moment of my life, with tears in my eyes, I
beseeched God for an answer. I asked for anything-a vision, a dream, a
sign
of some sort that would show me whether Christianity or Islam were true.
No sooner had I prayed these words than the room became pitch dark before
my
eyes. I had been looking at the wall, but it was not there anymore;
instead,
it was replaced by hundreds of crosses. I was paralyzed.
The vision was as simple as that. Just as quickly as it had come, it was
gone. My reaction was that of most anyone. I said, "God, that doesn't
count.
I don't know if that was really You or if my eyes were playing tricks on
me." As you can see, I did not want to believe in Christianity. I instead
took refuge in my uncertainty and prayed again, saying, "God, I don't know
if that was really what I thought it was - I could subconsciously want to
become a Christian and my mind could be deceiving me. So visions won't be
any good; please give me a dream, and if the dream corroborates the
vision,
I will become Christian." Thus I began trying to stall my decision, but
God
wouldn't allow it.
The First Dream - Iguanas and Crickets and S****s. Oh My!
That night I had a dream. Upon waking, I was fully aware that it was an
answer from God, but I wasn't sure what it meant. I wrote everything down
as
soon as I awoke. Permit me to post my entry:
Date: December 19th/20th
In the beginning of the dream, there was a poisonous s**** with red and
black bands going around it, separated by thin white stripes. All it did
was
hiss at people when they stepped into the garden. The people in the garden
couldn't see it - it was far away and watching from a stone perch. This
perch was across a chasm. That perch then became my vantage point for the
first half of my dream.
In a garden-like area with hills and lush green grass and trees, there was
a
huge iguana, like a dragon. It would lie still and hide by becoming like a
hill - no one who walked on it knew it was an iguana. If they had known,
they would be scared, but the iguana liked the fact that no one knew. Then
a
giant boy comes, and this giant boy knows that the iguana was an iguana,
and
he stepped on it, accusing it of being an iguana. The iguana got angry, so
he reared back to bite the giant boy, who had stepped on its tail.
As he was about to bite the boy, the boy had a huge cricket that
challenged
the iguana to a fight. My vantage point changes now, and I am directly
beneath the iguana, looking up at its head. The iguana accepted the
challenge, and as the cricket flew away to go to a fighting place, the
iguana turned to me and tried to lunge at me and kill me. The cricket saw
that the iguana was lunging at me, so he came back and bit its head off,
decapitating it.
Now, I analyzed this dream from many angles. I tried substituting the
ideas,
concepts, and symbols in the dream with various aspects of my life. The
most
obvious implication that I could find was this: the s**** at the beginning
of the dream had to be evil in some way, simply because it was a s****.
Since I took its place for most of the dream, I gathered that there might
be
some hidden evil within me. In addition, when the s**** hissed, it was
reminiscent of the iguana when it reared back to bite the boy; there was a
striking similarity.
Across the chasm, the giant iguana was blending in with the garden. I took
the garden to mean the world (I just had that sense when I was dreaming).
Since the iguana was there in the beginning of my dream I took the iguana
to
be Islam (Islam was there in the beginning of my world). I took the giant
boy in my dream to be David, who called out the iguana for what it was.
Finally, I took the cricket to be Christianity. The iguana was happy to be
deceiving people, but it got angry when discovered. Though it almost
killed
me, it was ultimately decapitated by the cricket. Interpreting the symbols
as such, I thought that God was telling me about the state of my world and
the true nature of Islam and Christianity, something I had asked Him
specifically.
Indeed, there was more that caused me to interpret the symbols in this
manner. Upon telling my parents of this dream, they gave me a partial
interpretation: the iguana is a hidden enemy, as is the s****; the boy is
a
great helper; the cricket is a fighter; and the garden is the world. This
interpretation came not from them, but from an Islamic book on dream
interpretations.
After interpreting the dream to mean that Islam is deceptive and that
Christianity is the truth which would ultimately save me, my reaction was,
again, that of most anyone. I prayed to God and said, "God, this dream was
far too symbolic for me to be able to interpret it accurately. Rather than
one dream, three seems like a better number. If they all point towards
Christianity, I will definitely become a Christian."
At this point, I was not trying to escape God; rather, I wanted to be
certain before making a move that would determine the rest of my life. I
also prayed to God that He would make the next dream much clearer-so clear
that I would not even have to interpret it. The fact that He answered each
detail of my prayer is overwhelming.
The Second Dream - The Narrow Door
Date: March 10th/11th
I am standing at the entrance of a narrow doorway which is built into a
wall
of brick. I am not in the doorway, but just in front of it. The doorway is
an arch. I would say the doorway is about 7.5 feet tall, with about 6.5
feet
of its sides being straight up from the ground, and a 1 foot arched part
on
the top capping it off. The doorway is slightly less than 3 feet wide and
about 3 or 4 feet deep, all brick. It leads into a room, where many people
are sitting at tables which have fancy and good food on them. I think I
remember salads, but I'm not sure. They were not eating, but they were all
ready to eat, and they were all looking to the left, as if waiting for a
speaker before the banquet. One of the people, at the other side of the
door
just inside the room, is David Wood. He is sitting at a table and is
looking
to my left. I asked him, "I thought we were going to eat together?" And he
said, without removing his eyes from the front of the room (i.e. left
side),
"You never responded."
That was the whole dream: a detailed narrow door leading to a feast, but I
was not eating because I had not responded. As soon as I awoke, I had an
interpretation. Even within the dream I felt that the room with the feast
was Heaven itself. I was not able to enter because I had not responded to
the invitation David provided. I had no idea what the narrow door meant,
however.
The following day I contacted David and asked him what he thought of the
dream. He said that it was as clear as day; and I agreed. It was at that
moment that I recalled that I had prayed for a very clear dream from God.
David said, however, that he did not even need to interpret it. He
referred
me to Luke 13:22-29, which reads thus:
The Narrow Door
Then Jesus went through the towns and villages, teaching as he made his
way
to Jerusalem. Someone asked him, "Lord, are only a few people going to be
saved?"
He said to them, "Make every effort to enter through the narrow door,
because many, I tell you, will try to enter and will not be able to. Once
the owner of the house gets up and closes the door, you will stand outside
knocking and pleading, 'Sir, open the door for us.'
"But he will answer, 'I don't know you or where you come from.'
"Then you will say, 'We ate and drank with you, and you taught in our
streets.'
"But he will reply, 'I don't know you or where you come from. Away from
me,
all you evildoers!'
"There will be weeping there, and gna****ng of teeth, when you see Abraham,
Isaac and Jacob and all the prophets in the kingdom of God, but you
yourselves thrown out. People will come from east and west and north and
south, and will take their places at the feast in the kingdom of God."
I had asked for a dream that I wouldn't need to interpret, and God
provided
me a dream that was virtually a scene straight out of the Gospel of
Luke-something I had never even read.
This dream was clearly telling me that I would not be at the feast of God
unless I responded to the invitation, though I was standing at the narrow
door and it had not yet closed. My reaction, once again, was that of most
anyone. I prayed to God, saying, "Thank you God. I think I know what
you're
telling me now, but please give me one more dream to be sure. This time,
please not so scary." Indeed, the second dream was terrifying because it
was
quite clear that my life would have to change very shortly.
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