A NIGHTMARE ABOUT AMERICA

Other people’s dreams, I know, are boring. We like to share our own but struggle to endure making it through someone else’s narrating his. Conceding that, I want to share a dream I had around fifteen years ago. Why it has come back to me this past week, I’m not sure. It may have been the news footage of armed national guards standing in the subway tunnels of NYC. They had been called in to deal with the increasing violence there. My dream, which came in three parts, was one of those where you are awakened by it, awakened extremely troubled and shaken to the core. Sweat on the brow. Pounding heart. Here it is: Part 1: Like a newsreel that suddenly starts rolling without any introductory remarks or tease, I saw a constant barrage of missiles filling the air. It was not unlike when the prophet Joel saw the skies darken with the advance of locust armies. Only these were not bugs they were bombs. My mind’s eye was hovering above our Atlantic shoreline. From beyond the distant horizon where sea met lowering sky rained these missiles fired from a distant land. America was under attack. There was some consolation in that the missiles had been launched from such a faraway place they barely made it to our shore. A faraway place, hmmm, where could that be? Coming so far, many fell in the shallow surf or upon the beaches, however, some made it to and fell on our major port cities along the coast. That the interior of our land wasn’t reached by the barrage brought no solace. I sensed this was only the beginning. That this was just a start. That more was yet to come. There was. Much more. Part 2: Suddenly “they” were here. After a cessation of indeterminable length--but it couldn’t have been long--suddenly, without my having seen them arrive, the sea was filled with battleships, destroyers, and carriers. Then, quantumly, landing craft, in a dark line on the comparatively white sands, were beached upon the shore, up and down as far as I could see. Their ramps were down, and they were disgorging themselves of swarms of tanks, armored vehicles, and heavily armed, running men. Running inland. Into America. Part 3: That second scene abruptly ended. In the last, I saw our interior major metropolises. Armies were marching down our subdued, trafficless streets. Rank after rank. They were marching in one of those parades whose purpose is to display a nation’s military might. Like you’ve seen in a certain Far East, communist country. You know, when each troop in rank after rank is in perfect sync with every other, marching in that straight-leg style. They filled and marched along every street. Miles of them. They passed by seemingly endlessly. They were not just here, they were in control. Besides the stomp of marching feet, there was only silence. Deep silence. Except for the rustling of loose litter blowing at the edges of the streets. The oddest thing about this invasion is that there was no resistance from Americans. When the missiles were raining down. No resistance. When the beachheads were made and our shores stormed. No resistance. Then, as the marching soldiers entered our cities and began their march down their streets, no resistance. It had been too late for resistance. America was vanquished. And occupied. America was no more. All without her exerting the slightest existence. I put little value in the oracular value of my dream. But, then again, my dream does not so much predict what will one day happen as it points to what is already happening. My dream is an analogy. Perhaps, of our condition politically. But for sure familialy, religiously, educationally, and socially. No one is much concerned when an occasional ideological missile comes from some distant place, from beyond the horizon of the familiar, the customary, the expected—from another country. No one is alarmed enough to offer any resistance when there is a visible inroad made to the institutions on the fringes—the liberal universities, the polar extremes of our political parties, the large number cable/satellite stations, the you-have-to-do-a-search-to-find YouTube channel. But then, suddenly the new, the dark, the twisted, the destructive is everywhere. It’s filled our cities. And homes. And hearts. Part One: This March marks for me forty-five years in ministry. For most of them, I have noticed these incoming missiles of different ways of thinking lobbed at the church. At times, I have addressed the unorthodox theology that appeared in an occasional book, popular preacher, and new hermeneutic. I was met with, “Why do you want to teach about that. I’ve never heard of it. I’ve never heard of a church where it is taught,” and such like. Part Two: Then, there were preachers and churches everywhere within Evangelicalism that had adopted and adapted these new, corrupting teachings and practices. “Well,” I’ve heard deniers say, “those are only outliers. They were never true churches or true teachers to start with.” Really? Part Three: Then, why, are they now everywhere? They have filled our forums, denominations, institutions, and churches. And, thank God for those who do, but there has been little resistance. Not in the aggregate. This same three-part progressive advancement of forces inimical to the Christian-Judaic view has played out in society, schools, government, entertainment, media, etc. And home. And church. And as in my dream, there is not much resistance. A few try. They are quelled and squelched. Not by the enemy. But by their own. By America. I’ve insisted I give no weight to dreams. Not even to my dreams. But what is presently happening in America is no dream. It’s a nightmare. --Pastor Clifford Hurst