Just A Dream

The past few days I have been sick with a cold. My voice cracks in and out like a young man going through puberty. My breath has the constant stench of Halls and cough syrup. By the time I get home in the afternoons I am so exhausted that I end up cat napping on the couch for about an hour or so and then by the time I go to bed I can't sleep. Last night was no different.

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I tossed and turned for several hours with Gabe right up under me. Shane is on the graveyard shift this week and Gabe usually becomes my "bed bug" during this week. I finally drifted off to sleep somewhere around midnight. I remember Shane coming home and waking me up enough to ask me if I was okay. I asked him for a Halls because my throat hurt and after shoving that in my mouth I rolled over and went back to sleep.

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I drifted off into an awful dream! I don't remember all the details or exactly what happened in the dream but the basic root of it was Shane died! I tried so hard to wake myself up but couldn't. I can remember thinking "When is this dream going to end?" I remember explaining to people in my dream how I just didn't understand how he died because he had just given me a Halls just before and it made no sense to me. The dream went on and on, forever it seemed like.

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I finally woke up and sat straight up in the bed. I tried to scream "SHANE!" but with my voice being so hoarse nothing would come out. I started feeling around in the bed and realized that it was Gabe laying beside me and not Shane. Fear started washing over me and I started thinking "Was it a dream? Is Shane really dead? What's going on?" I jumped out of the bed and started running down the hallway towards the living room. I was screaming "SHANE!" as loud as I could but it was nothing more than a squeak.

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As I came into the living room he was in the process of jumping out of the recliner knowing something was wrong. By this point I was in hysterics. I couldn't talk for crying and with my voice being so hoarse he really couldn't understand what I was saying. He just kept reassuring me that he was okay and it was just a dream.

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He came back into our room, woke Gabe up and got him down in his own room and laid down with me. I was still whimpering and almost panicked. My heart was broken even though I knew it was just a dream. "I don't see how people do it" I said.

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"What do you mean?" he asked.

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"I don't understand how people are able to function as a whole person after their other half has died!" I cried.

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Shane really didn't know what to say. He just laid there trying to reassure me that everything was okay. And, even though I knew it was, I was just heart broken. I was heart broken over the mere thought of losing him. I was heart broken for the women who were laying in their bed for the first time after losing their other half. I was heart broken for the mother's who were laying in bed weeping after losing their child. I couldn't stop crying and even though I cried myself back to sleep I must have continued to cry for some time because when I woke up my eyes were crusted over with dried tears.

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As I was going through my morning routine I just couldn't help but shake the impact this dream had on me. I am comforted to know that there will come a day where there will be no more tears, no more pain, no more fear, no more heartache, no more sadness. There will be a day where there is nothing but joy, worship, songs of praise, happiness, peace. Revelation 21:4 says "He will wipe every tear from their eyes. There will be no more death or mourning or crying or pain..." Are you ready for that day? Do you know that when you take your last breath you will be in the presence of Jesus who will hold you close, wipe away your tears and enter you into his glory? If you are not sure of your eternity let today be the day that you make the decision.

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Romans 10:9 "...if you confess with your mouth, 'Jesus is Lord,' and believe in your heart that God raised him from the dead, you will be saved."