Louie Giglio - The Thief of Dreams Must Die
If you have your scripture today, we're gonna pick up where we left off last week, and we're talking about dreaming again. This is the message for you today, God wants you to dream again. Some of you are living in a dream, some of you are on mission, some of you have visions, some of you know exactly where you are and why you are where you are, and what God has for you where you are, and you are going. But a lot of us in the gathering today, feel like somehow life has moved on and the dream has died, and God wants to restore that today.
We were reading that in Psalm 126. One of the Psalms of remembering, one of the Psalms that a pilgrim would pray on their way up the steps to worship in Jerusalem, reminding themselves of the faithfulness of God. This particular song or Psalm is about when God restored His people from bondage and slavery, to return them to Jerusalem to the place of worship and to the vision and the purpose that He had called them for. And they're remembering that God did that. They were in Babylon, but now they're home. They're in Jerusalem, they're on the steps, they're going to worship. God's plan now, is visible to them again. And so, this is their song on the way to worship God.
"When the Lord brought back the captives to Zion, we were like men who dreamed". We were like people who dreamed. And we're gonna unpack what that means exactly, to dream. But they had seen God work, and so, here is the story, "Our mouths were filled with laughter, our tongues with songs of joy. And it was said among the nations, 'The Lord has done great things for them.'" Just to speed up a little bit to where God wants to communicate today. There is gonna be a time and a day in your life, when the people around you look at your life and say, "No way. Look what God has done".
This story look like it was over. The dream looked it was buried, but God. God was still in the story. And in the same way, the people around you are gonna say, "Look what God has done". And then, they said it about themselves, "'The Lord has done great things for us, and we are filled with joy.'" Is there anybody in this room today that believes that? That no matter what part of this story you're in right now, there's gonna be a moment in the story where you can say, "The Lord has done great things for us, and we are filled with joy". They prayed, "Restore our fortunes, O Lord, like streams in the Negev because those who sow in tears will reap with songs of joy".
This is God's word today for someone in this gathering who's sowing right now, tears. There's gonna be a day when the tears bring a harvest, and the harvest is gonna be a song of joy. "Those who go out weeping, carrying seeds to sow, will return with songs of joy, carrying sheaves with them". This is God's promise today, you can dream again. Joseph had a dream. As a teenager, he had a dream. He was one of a bunch of brothers, loved by his father, had an incredible dream. We find it in Genesis 37 and there are a few things that God wants to extract out of the story of Joseph's dream, and He wants to inject them into the story of your dream today.
I want you to see how this opens up and how it unfolds in verse 3. Says, "Now Israel loved Joseph more than any of his other sons". And then, if you'll drop down just to verse 5, "Joseph had a dream, and when he told it to his brothers, they hated him all the more". They already were jealous of him and hated him because he was the favorite son, but now they hated him all the more. "And he said to them, 'Listen to this dream I had. We were binding sheaves of grain out in the field when suddenly my sheaf rose and stood upright, while your sheaves gathered around mine and bowed down to it".
Now, this is not the dream you probably wanna tell your brothers about. And his brothers said to him, "'Do you intend to reign over us? Will you actually rule us"? Now, this is their little brother. They're like, "Seriously? Okay, great. Sounds interesting". "And they hated him all the more because of his dream and what he had said". Now, this is not really a part of the message today, but if God reveals to you a big dream and purpose for your life, you can count on the fact that somebody's gonna hate you for that dream. It's just the way it works in life. And then, notice what happened, he had another dream.
"And then, he had another dream and he told it to his brothers. 'Listen,' he said, 'I had another dream.'" Like, I think I would've learned by the first dream, "Okay, I'm gonna just keep, you know, this other one under wraps". "And this time the sun and the moon and eleven stars were bowing down to me. When he told his father as well as his brothers, his father rebuked him and said, 'What is this dream you had? Will your mother and I and your brothers actually come and bow down to the ground before you?'"
Well, we know if God gives dreams, the enemy wants to steal dreams and that happened to Joseph pretty fast. His father sent him out where his brothers were taking care of the flocks and you can kinda pick the story up over in verse 16. "He replied, 'I'm looking for my brothers, can you tell me where they're grazing their flocks?' 'They've moved on from here,' the man said, 'I heard them say, 'Let's go to Dothan.' So, apparently, they'd gone to lower Alabama. So, Joseph says... somebody else watching in the world are like, 'I don't know.' Google it, you'll get it. It's a thing. So, Joseph went after his brothers, and he found them near Dothan. But they saw him in the distance and before he reached, they plotted to kill him. 'Here comes that dreamer. Come now, let's kill him and throw him into one of these cisterns and say that a ferocious animal devoured him. Then we'll see what comes of his dreams.'"
I wonder if the enemy's spoken that to anybody in this room. "Oh, here comes the dreamer. Let's kill him and throw him in a pit, and then let's see what becomes of their dreams". Well, let's see what became of Joseph's dreams. A few things I wanna extract from the story. Number one, the dream might be clear in the moment, but the dream often is gonna find its fulfillment in time. So, Joseph didn't wake up the next day after he had both of these dreams and have his mom, dad and brothers bow down to him. Instead, as some time passed, he went out to find his brothers with the flock and they in their jealousy and anger toward him, plotted to kill him and the story just went off the rails right there. Dream, but dreams often take time to be fulfilled.
In Joseph's story, just to remind us all who've been around church, and we know this whole story all the way down to our youth and, you know, the flannel board days if you're my age. But a lot of you just coming into the picture, the brothers were gonna kill him right on the spot. But all of a sudden, some gypsies came along who were headed to Egypt. And when these gypsies came by, the brothers kinda thought, "Well, we could do this," but one of them wanted to have mercy and he said, "Look, let's don't kill him, let's just sell him to the gypsies".
And so, they did. They sold him to these gypsies that are traveling to Egypt, and you're like, "Man, all of a sudden, dream huge dream. God's in the story, God's speaking, God's touching, God's calling, and the next thing you know, He's looking as the caravan is driving off and seeing his brothers back in the distance and he's on his way to Egypt. And you're like, 'What happened?' Well, I'll tell you what happened, just a little, you know, insight into the story. This story has its fulfillment in Egypt, so I need," God is thinking, "To get Joseph to Egypt. So, he's not going in a cistern, he's not dying in that pit, he's going with those Gypsies 'cause I got a purpose and a plan, and the purpose and the plan is in Egypt".
Oh, happen to have some gypsies coming by going to Egypt. Now, that's not clap-worthy. I don't know. I'm not sure why people are clapping. But if you're in the caravan going to Egypt today, don't clap for that. Just be encouraged that God's still in the story. They get to Egypt, and they sold Joseph into slavery, into the household of a man named Potiphar. And Potiphar is a very powerful man in Egypt, and he recognizes immediately that Joseph has got something special on his life.
That's interesting 'cause usually when you arrive at Potiphar's house at this stage in the story, you are bitter, you are angry, you are revengeful, you are mad, and you are not going to display anything close to honor. But somehow Joseph had managed, in the process of not getting thrown in the pit, getting sold to the gypsies, now getting sold to Potiphar, somehow, he'd manage to keep his feet anchored in the fact that God gave him a dream. Potiphar said, "You're in charge of everything". And he was, Potiphar had left the house, Potiphar's wife made a move on Joseph. Joseph said to himself, "I'm in charge of everything Potiphar has except you, and there is no way I'm gonna betray all that trust and throw away my character and get caught up in this moment".
And he ran away from Potiphar's wife. She grabbed his robe, ripped some of that off of him with scorn because she was rejected, accused him of assaulting her, Potiphar comes home, it's a mess. But he was honorable, He was so honorable that Potiphar didn't have him killed on the spot, he put him in prison. That's how you know that Potiphar knew that Joseph was telling the truth because he went to prison and not into a grave. And when he got to prison, guess what Joseph did? He was honorable. He got out in charge of the whole prison.
Now, again, not clap worthy, but he didn't lose hope. He was still a dreamer, and he was good with dreams. These two guys who were serving the Pharaoh, a cakemaker and a cup bearer, got out of favor with Pharaoh, they got thrown in jail too and they met Joseph. And he says, "What's y'all story"? "Well, we were right there serving Pharaoh, the most powerful person in the world, but then all of a sudden, we did something that offended him, and he said, 'Get them out of here,' and dropped us down here in the jail with you". Not too long after that, they both had dreams and they didn't know what the dreams meant.
And Joseph was like, "I'm good with dreams. I've been a dreamer for a long time now, tell me the dreams". And they tell him the dreams and he says, "Oh, wow. For you, the cakemaker, it's not gonna be good for you. Your days are numbered. The cupbearer, congratulations. You're going back into the good graces of Pharaoh. You're gonna be serving at his table again". And that's exactly what happened. One of them... and the other one of them right back into the good graces of the Pharaoh. And Joseph just said, "Hey," to the cakemaker, "It didn't matter, you're out". But to the cupbearer, he said, "When you get back, can you just remember me? Like, put in a good word for me. Can you just speak up for me when you get back"?
And so, it worked just he said, and the cup bearer comes right back to serve Pharaoh. But then, the last line of that chapter says, "But he did not remember Joseph". And two years went by, until Pharaoh had a dream. And Pharaoh was perplexed by this dream. It's seven amazingly healthy cows and seven terrible looking cows. Seven amazingly healthy stalks of grain and these seven terrible looking ones. And he's like, "This is important, and I don't what it means".
And he brought all the people around to help with the dream, and nobody could help him. And then, finally, the cupbearer was like, "Oh, wow, the guy. The guy. Yikes, the guy. Pharaoh, there's a guy, he's amazing with dreams". And Pharaoh said, "Get him". And they got Joseph out of the pit and brought him to the palace. A 17-year-old kid with a dream, now is 30 years old. Because most of the time when God gives a dream, the dream is known in the moment, but its fulfillment is somewhere in the distance.
The second thing God wants to extract is that most of the dreams are not dreamy. You're like, "What do you mean"? Well, A: we're on a broke, sin-riddled planet serving a good and gracious God who is sovereign over it all. Who to save us, sent His Son into the sin-riddled world to become riddled by sin. Jesus was crushed, crucified, dead and buried.
This is our story. His dream for saving humanity, His dream for making a way for all of us to be born again, it was not dreamy. It was hard, filled with sacrifice, ultimately filled with His death, yes and His resurrection but we're in a battle, people. And if somehow, we have sold a version of Christianity which is too dreamy and too comfy, then we've sold the wrong version of Christianity. We're in a spiritual battle on a sin-riddled planet, serving the sovereign God, but He's asking you and me not to get comfortable and He's asking us to sacrifice our very lives for Him. To join into this idea that God still has dreams and puts us in the story. Has a dream and a plan for me, but the dream and the plan for me might not be all that dreamy. He doesn't wanna make our lives miserable, but we are in a fight.
The third thing that God wants to extract is, that's it's never too late to dream again. It's never too late. I love this passage, this whole story is amazing, but this particular part of it in chapter 41. It says in verse 1, "When two full years had passed, Pharaoh had a dream," and so, now, the cupbearer remembers Joseph. And so, look what happens in verse 14. "So Pharaoh sent for Joseph and he was quickly brought from the dungeon. And when he had shaved and changed his clothes," That's a word for somebody, by the way, you are gonna... and I don't mean, necessarily somebody just look down the road with your son and said, "Praise God, I've been believing for it, and maybe today is the day". No. The beauty of what that means, somebody in this gathering is gonna shave and change your clothes. God is gonna bring you out, and when He does your very appearance is gonna change.
But look how He did it. It says, "He sent for Joseph, and he was quickly brought from the dungeon". You know, quickly, as in 13 years' worth and two years since he got forgotten by the cupbearer, but quickly. When it was God's time to fulfill God's dream that He had put in Joseph's life, bam, just like that out of the dungeon to Pharaoh. And Pharaoh says, "Here's my dream". And he says, "Can you help me"? And look what Joseph says in verse 16, "I cannot do it, but God will give Pharaoh the answer he desires".
I'm just mystified. That when he came out of the dungeon and now, he's standing before the most powerful man on Earth, that his first words wasn't, "That cupbearer right there? That joker told me that he was gonna remember me when he got back up here, and he only got back up here because I interpreted the dream right. He forgot me. You gotta get rid of this guy. You gotta get a new cupbearer. This guy hosed me. I've been down in the prison, by the way, for two years because of him. Just because he forgot me. Oh, you remember me now? Look, now... oh, I remember the guy now. But where was he two years ago when he told me he was gonna remember me? And I've been in this jail for a while.
You know Potiphar, right? One of your servants. Well, his wife, she hosed me also. I have a history of being hosed and I wanna go on record today while I'm here, before we get into whatever all of this is gonna be about, to just let you know a few things about my story". No, he came in shaved and in clean clothes. And the first thing he said out of his mouth was, "I can't help you, but God can".
How did he maintain that kind of nobility and character through 13 years of the enemy every single day, by jealousy, by pain, by hardship, by humiliation, exasperation, betrayal, delay. Separation, comparison, death? Every day the enemy was trying to steal that dream, but yet, somehow, now he stood before Pharaoh, and he was still a dreamer. And Pharaoh, when he heard the dream, it's gonna be seven great years, and seven terrible years and we gotta get ready here and we gotta make the right decisions in the seven great years so that we'll have plenty in the seven lean years. And Pharaoh got it. He realized, he's the guy.
And this is what he says about him in verse 39, "He said to Joseph, 'Since God has made all this known to you, there is no one so discerning and wise as you. You shall be in charge of my palace and all my people are to submit to your orders, only with respect to the throne will I be greater than you.' So Pharaoh said to Joseph, 'I hereby put you in charge of the whole land of Egypt.' And then, Pharaoh took his signet ring from his finger and put it on Joseph's finger. He dressed him in robes of fine linen, put a gold chain around his neck, he had him ride in a chariot as his second-in-command, and men shouted before him, 'Make way!'"
Of course, they did because God was making a way the whole time. And it took 13 years for people to figure out what God was doing the whole time. But when God revealed it all and made it clear, men said what God had been saying at the pit with the gypsies on the auction block in Potiphar's house, in the jail, in the dungeon forgotten, God had been saying every single day, "Make way. This is my guy. This guy has got my plan. This guy has a dream. This guy is in my story. Make way". And can I just speak that over you today? God is making a way for you even today. "Thus he put him in charge of the whole land of Egypt". It is not too late for you. And that is not hype, that is not church talk, that is not preacher talk. I was just bringing the tone down as low as I can. It is not too late for you. You can go from the prison to the palace in one sudden move.
Last thing, extract really quickly. The dream might involve you, but the dream that God has for your life isn't all about you. Now, that runs contrary to everything else we're gonna hear in this world. You know, "Get your dream, go after your destiny, fulfill your calling, move into your future". Listen, there's only one future, and it's God's future. There is only one story going on and it's God's story. There is only one glory happening on Earth right now, and it is God's glory. And the beauty of it isn't me actualizing my dream for my destiny. The beauty is me realizing God has out a dream in me for His... And it might involve me, but it's not about me and it's not all for me.
And Joseph got it. He understood something that has become one of the most powerful and most famous, most quoted verses in all the Bible. He realized at the end of the day that when Pharaoh put him in charge, yes, there were seven years of plenty and so they stored up all the crops. They took a portion of everybody's crop and brought into the barns and Egypt. So, in the seven years that there was no food to eat, Egypt had food, not only to feed Egypt but now people are coming from the surrounding nations like his brothers and his family who are dying of starvation.
Now, they're coming to Egypt because they heard there's food in Egypt. They don't know the kid they sold to the Gypsies is running it all. They haven't heard, "Make way," yet, but they know there's food there. And as it turns out, at the end of the day, they did come and bow down to Joseph. They did bring dad and they all bowed down just like the dream. But when dad died after a couple of years of them being in Egypt, they thought, "Man, Joseph's right now, he's gonna, all this is coming back on us. All the revenge and all the humiliation he went through and all the repressed anger, that's all coming back now".
And they went to him and they said, "We are so, so, so sorry. And I know dad's gone, but please have mercy on us". And this is what he said to them, he said, "Don't be afraid," this sis the end of Genesis 50, "I am in God's place. You didn't put me here, God out me here. God was working on this dream the whole time. I am in God's place". And then, this is what we quote so often. Joseph said, "What you meant for evil, God intended for good," not a period there. Most people who quote the Bible, that's all they know about that verse. That is not the most important part of that verse. The next line is the money, "What you meant for evil, God intended for good, for the saving of many lives".
The dream that God has for you, it's for the saving of many people. And if your dream doesn't involve a lot of people coming into life, and health, and into their own dreams, then you don't have a God dream. Because God's dreams always terminates with other people coming to awaken to the fact that he wants to bring them back to Zion and out a new song in their mouths to say, "Look what the Lord has done. He has done great things for us and we are filled with joy". At the end of this, he says to his brothers, "You don't have to be afraid because this whole setup of God is not just for you, to save your life, but it's also to save your kid's lives". And he lived to be 110 years old, Joseph did. And it says, "At the end of his life, that the latter generations would come and sat on his knee".
In other words, this dream, this vision, this God story that he was in wasn't for him, wasn't even for his brothers, it was for their children, and their children, and their children. It was for the generations to come. And God isn't just looking at you and saying, "I have a dream for you today". He's looking at you today and saying, "I have a dream for the generations to come through you". And He wants to put that in somebody's heart today. I don't know what the circumstances are speaking over you, but I know what god is speaking over you today.