I knew immediately it was a dream. But I went with it anyway. I figured it might serve as a blog post. I haven't written many recently.
I was standing in a line of some sort. On my way into something. A perturbed individual behind me to the right was complaining to an attractive but slightly stooped young lady.
"I can't believe you don't have parking attendants. I just drove around for like, five minutes, looking for a spot. What a waste of my time."
"I'm so sorry sir. As the lot really isn't that big, we figure people who are smart enough to get their licenses shouldn't have too much trouble finding a place to park." I liked her already.
Mr. Wasted Time harrumphed and said, "Well. Where's the latte bar? If I'm gonna spend 30 minutes of my time listening to your speaker, I at least need something to keep me awake." "Sir, I think you may have us confused with First MegaGiga down the street. We don't do lattes. But your welcome to join the folk in the discussion area, if you'd like. We serve Tim's." A look of fear mixed with a soupçon of disgust crossed his face. "Tim's?! You're right. I AM in the wrong place."
And then I was thirty feet forward in the line. Dreaming in Cinemascope. A man a few feet in front of me was struggling with a weight around his neck. It seemed to be crushing him. My hearing's been more than a little off lately, but I was pretty sure the f-bomb was tripping liberally from his lips. Which kind of surprised me as I thought we were in some kind of church. I began to push forward to help the fellow when a firm hand gripped my arm and a warm voice said, "Wait."
The wait was a mere moment. I looked from the hand on my arm back to the man under pressure, and he was lifting what looked like 100s of kilos of concrete off of his shoulders. Pride rippled ugly across his broad face. "I'm done with this shite, you f'n' morons." And he smashed the concrete to the beautiful granite floor, where it soundlessly disintegrated into dust and immediately dissipated. Soundlessness had overtaken underpressure man as well. He stood stunned. And then rushed out of the building in the wake of Mr Wasted Time.
The warm voice said gently, "He fashioned that yoke himself, even as he claimed it a mantle placed upon his once broad shoulders by important people. And though of little consequence in its destruction, it was crushing him and the people he so ruthlessly herds. But I'm afraid he's off to find one made of brass that will not so easily be destroyed."
And then I was on a balcony where I had a wider view of the proceedings, about a hundred feet in front of me an area had been set up with nice tables and comfortable chairs. There had to be seating for hundreds and that seating was full. And sure enough, people were fondly clutching their Tim's mugs as their rather raucous conversation reached my ears for the first time. (I really must find a new ENT.) "That's the discussion area, Hortense was inviting your Mr Wasted Time too," the warm voice said - his grip no longer firm but his touch still present.
'My Mr Wasted Time?' Had I spoken this moniker aloud?
"People like to come here to talk," warm voice continued. "This is important to them." I felt no need to turn and look at the source of the voice. Our proximity and conversation seemed both normal and familiar. "And what do they talk about?" I felt, more than heard a brief chuckle. "Everything. They talk about everything. Even when there is nothing more to say, they will still talk. Most eventually leave. Perhaps they can't handle an honest cup of coffee." He actually giggled that time. "But some get in the line."
The line. I'd forgotten the line. It was a dream after all. Which both the voice and I knew. And I had had pizza the night before. But still. The line.
And though I wanted warm voice to tell me, I already knew what the line was for. You see, when I awakened to the reality I was dreaming I heard two lines of scripture echoing in the synapses of my right brain - 'pick up your cross and follow me' and 'my yoke is easy and my burden is light.'
"Calling it the CYB line would be a little crass, Bill," warm voice chuckled again.
I was back in the line. Near the front. No. That's not right. I wasn't "in the line". I was just observing. And this time it was someone I'd known since her birth. "This isn't her first time through the line you know. She loves children. As she grows in her calling, she returns to be refitted by the Master. She has the healing gifts of her mother and the teaching gifts of her dad and she knows that this is home. She has touched many lives and will touch thousands more. You must remember that there's both a blessing and a calling on that entire family." (Perhaps the pizza had begun to speak.) I turned, and there was her brother, having just returned from his own sojourn. His hands held tightly to the cross. His eyes more alive than ever,
And then there was Kaili and Robyn - laughing uproariously as they so often do. But hadn't I just told them on Friday as they left for South Africa to be a little more circumspect in public. And here it was, way early Monday morning and they were as full of life as ever. In my dream no less. Have they no propriety. After all, my dream was taking place inside some kind of Cross/Yoke/Burden church. (Perhaps I'm to start a new denomination. Now, that, was definitely the pizza.)
"Life streams out of them, Bill. It is how the Master constructed them. See how they have no idea of the cross they are carrying or His yoke and burden already on them. But soon they will. And they will learn to let his Spirit carry them in the midst of the hurt and pain they will soon see. Yet more so, they will see the hand of the Father at work in them and in the children and staff they serve as their Master teaches them to pick up their crosses and follow him, promising that his yoke is easy and his burden light."
"Now what of you?" warm voice asked. But I chose instead to awaken. And write.
This dream happened early this morning. Some of it in that funny space between sleep and wakefullness. There is a little poetic license in the telling. I attribute much of dream to things I was reading before I went to sleep and to the Pizza Nova pizza that was our evening sustenance. Though I did register crossyokeburden.com... just in case. :-)
