To any and all whom I have ministered to in the past and who read this thread, pray for me. I have done interpretations in the past for the sake of the Lord and His body, and to help others as much as the Lord enables me. But until I have greater assurance that I am helping rather than potentially hurting them, I have no choice in the matter.
Blessings and peace, in Christ Jesus our Lord,
Hidden In Him
I appreciate and respect your attitude toward this. Stepping back to make sure we are prepared and doing things as God wants can be a good thing to do and at times I think not enough people do that.
If it's any help, there have been a few times I've been in situations where someone mentioned a dream to me that did seem to have spiritual significance. It was like the meaning immediately popped into my head. I'd preface it with a "well, I'm not sure, but could it be..." so as not to put pressure on them. Each of these times, the person paused, and then then revealed more details of the dream that they have left out that fit. Also, each time, it was something that was going on spiritually in their life that they were struggling with.
In one case, I was at a national campus ministers conference and got up for one of the early morning prayer meetings. This is has been over 30 years ago so my recollection is vague but this is as I recall it. One fellow (actually one of the main leaders in the denomination who had just recently been appointed to a major new position to pioneer a new type of training in campus ministry) mentioned he'd had a weird dream just as he was waking up to come to the prayer meeting but couldn't shake that there was something about it. I forget the details, but it involved something like people shooting guns at him where the bullets turned in Dobermans chasing him and barking at him. He jokingly asked if anyone could interpret for him. Everybody smiled and chuckled, but as he asked it popped into my head that God was simply encouraging him that there would be a lot of serious looking things around him in his new role that looked like attacks but weren't going to touch him. I mentioned this and got a few stares of the "he was only joking" variety from people. He paused, got serious, and mentioned that the dream took place on the campus he was going to be ministering at and that the dogs never actually did touch him. There was something going on that I forget now, but it seemed to be something that registered with him and encouraged him spiritually. As I recall, the next morning at the prayer meeting, he mentioned that he hadn't had a good nights sleep in quite awhile but that last night he had slept soundly through the night.
I've heard many many dreams described over the years, and mostly I shrug my shoulders at them. But there have been a couple times this happened where there was just a sense that there was something very different about it, that it meant something very specific, and it was simply that it made sense to me, and then without me knowing anything about it, it fit with something serious in their lives that they'd been dealing with and there were details they hadn't mentioned that then fit. At this point, I'm averaging perhaps one of those per decade or so.
There have been times where people have had dreams that mentioned them that deeply concerned or scared them and I felt a spiritual sense of needing to comfort them. That was basically centered around the theme that God's speaking into our lives is for our growth, health, and positive change; not to accuse us or cause deep negative feelings. What I said usually had nothing to do with the dream itself but rather the effect it was having on them and that God's work in our lives is for our good, not to paralyze us with fear or discouragement.
A few of the best lessons I learned from people over the years were 1. To not to force anything. If God is doing it, we'll probably know it. 2. To take the risk on myself. That's why I usually preface any type of message like that with a "I'm not sure, but does this mean anything to you?" or "This may sound strange, but I just have this sense that God wants me to tell you this. Now I might be wrong here..." If it is something God wants said, God's Spirit will confirm it to their heart as something they needed to hear. I've had times where it was clearly something they had been concerned about, had not told me (or at times anyone else), and it was something they needed to hear. I've had times where it didn't seem to be relevant to anything to them and I tried to make sure that they were free to drop it as my error. Perhaps it was my mistake, or perhaps it was something that maybe became something for them to ponder on. In either case, it was best from me to drop it and take the weight of any possible error on myself.
Frankly, I much prefer to operate in the realm of common sense, experience, good advice, and biblical counsel. I'm much more comfortable there. But there are times I just simply have a strong sense to step out in faith that something needs to be said to someone that doesn't seem related to much of anything that I'm aware of.