As a child I suffered from occasional nightmares.  And for a period of time after each, I’d be anxious about falling asleep, for fear of having another.  This was not a clinical condition, but an experience common among children of a certain age.  I’m talking garden variety, “there’s a monster under my bed”-type stuff.  Problems, worries, a scary film, an encounter with a barking dog that suddenly lunges, all can manifest themselves in the visions produced in the subconscious, as we sleep.

These nocturnal images are profoundly disturbing in the moment, but typically dissipate on waking.  Whatever it was that was chasing us, or that shockingly morphed from something cuddly and harmless into something ugly or threatening, tended to lose its terrors when the sun came up.  From a very early age, I prayed to avoid such intense and unpleasant dreams, and was very grateful for a nightlight.  Don’t laugh—sometimes a nightlight could make all the difference— (irrational, I know, but human and real, too).

Mercifully, my nightmares dwindled in frequency as I grew older and my dread of them waned.  Better still, by adulthood I had managed to develop the ability to wrestle back control of the mind just long enough to think, “You are not real, whatever you are.  You are a phantasm.  This is only a bad dream, and you have no power to hurt me.”  

I also discovered that if I aggressively attacked these phantoms, rather than fleeing from them, these insidious shadows would shrink or retreat.  I gradually became so adept at this, that I could sense when a dream was trending disagreeably and “will myself” awake.  Balloon popped.  Bubble burst.  End of problem.

But today, the “real world” has become fodder for grown up nightmares, terrors that banish all thoughts of sleeping and yet, from which there is no waking.  [Perhaps they should be known as “daymares,” to distinguish them!]  Here, in no particular order are some of the current conditions people are losing sleep over.  This list is illustrative, not exhaustive.

• Constant crises, chaos, and controversy
• “Unprecedented” crime rates, corruption, and censorship
• Failed economic, social, and foreign policies
• Rising rates of drug abuse, addiction, and suicide
• Widespread turmoil, upheaval, and violence
• Destruction of time-honored traditions and social contracts
• Shortages of food, water, and energy
• Governments falling, sliding toward anarchy
• Tyranny and endless rule by emergency decree
• Rampant price inflation
• Wars, regional conflicts, and uprisings
• Ethnic tensions
• Collapse of trust in institutions
• Bias, dishonesty, and deception in media
• Unqualified, incompetent, and power-hungry leaders
• Increasing power of the digital surveillance state
• Monopoly power of corporations and fusion with governments
• Rapid theft or erosion of civil liberties
• Outbreaks of new and deadly diseases
• Lawlessness, unequal administration of justice

The present circumstances assume truly nightmarish proportions when the God of the universe is excluded from the solution set and the same reckless, feckless, and sinful human beings who created these problems in the first place are put forward as just the right people to lead humanity out of them.  Honestly!  It beggars belief that people created in the image of God could possibly swallow that one.  It’s such a monstrous insult to God-given intellect, that one doesn’t know whether to laugh or cry.

But this column is not an indictment—the guilty know their blame.  No, this situation reveals the fathomless depths of demonic deception, and exposes the fact that Satan has already blinded the vast majority to the true source of our individual and collective difficulties (sin, which causes separation from a holy God).  In that sense, it is tragic.  When Jesus Christ, the one true Savior, the Lamb of God who takes away the sin of the world is ignored, locked out of the hearts of those His hands have made, what hope is there?

If I didn’t believe and trust in Jesus in these perilous, pessimistic times but had to depend on myself or on fellow sin-sick, proud and deluded human beings to secure my future, my despair would know no bounds.  I should likely have turned to soulless escapism, frenzied denial, self-destructive behaviors, and utter madness long ago.  I’d no doubt be on suicide watch by now.

This writer is keenly aware that the world in rejecting Jesus Christ, is preparing to embrace Antichrist.  [The prefix “anti” means ‘against’ and ‘in place of’ Christ.].  Jesus Himself warned about this in passages like this one: “I am come in my Father’s name, and ye receive me not: if another shall come in his own name, him ye will receive.” (John 5:43)

I am not addressing myself to those who have made their choice and are eagerly awaiting Antichrist, not Jesus Christ.  I am speaking to those who may not be aware that if they were to die at this moment, without believing in Jesus, His sacrifice will not apply to them.  Their sins will not be forgiven.  The pardon Jesus purchased for them with His own precious blood will go unused.  They will be condemned right along with those who reject Christ:

“For God so loved the world, that he gave his only begotten Son, that whosoever believeth in him should not perish, but have everlasting life.  For God sent not his Son into the world to condemn the world; but that the world through him might be saved.  He that believeth on him is not condemned: but he that believeth not is condemned already, because he hath not believed in the name of the only begotten Son of God.”  (John 3:16-18) 

No nightmare, no matter how frightening, is like this one.  For it will never, ever end.  And the most horrible part of the suffering it brings is the realization that this awful fate was entirely preventable.  The fatal turning comes with the spurning of God’s breathtaking love and the refusal of His outstretched hand of mercy. If you leave no room for His undeserved favor, the void will be filled with His justice and righteous indignation. 

If you have not yet repented of your sin, believed in Jesus, and called upon His name, I urge you to do so now, right now, without another moment’s delay.  Don’t throw away God’s gift of salvation.  Reach out for it with both hands now, while you are fully awake.  Don’t let your eternity become a non-stop nightmare.  Then rejoice with us that you are invited to partake of the joys of heaven and your name is written in the Lamb’s Book of Life!  

HOW TO BE SAVED:

• Admit to God that you are a sinner (that you have not kept His moral law to perfection; in your thoughts, words, and actions you have done what His law forbids and have failed to do what His love demands).  This is seeing yourself from God’s point of view and agreeing that He is right about you.  Be as specific as you can.
• Believe in your heart that Jesus died for your sins and that God raised Him from the dead.
• Sincerely repent (turn away) from your sins, asking God to forgive you and to use His power to help you resist temptation, no matter how strong the pull of sin may be, at first.
• Acknowledge Jesus as the Lord of your life.  Invite Him to move into your heart and take up residence there, so that He can change you from the inside out.
• Trust His promise to save you and give you a new spiritual birth and a new nature (thoughts, desires, priorities, hopes, dreams, and character).

SOME KEY TRUTHS:

• “For all have sinned and come short of the glory of God.”  (Romans 3:23)
• “As it is written, there is none righteous, no, not one.”  (Romans 3:10)
• “For the wages of sin is death: but the gift of God is eternal life through Jesus Christ our Lord.”  (Romans 6:23)
• “For God so loved the world, that he gave his only begotten Son, that whosoever believeth in him should not perish, but have everlasting life.”  (John 3:16)
• “But God commendeth his love toward us, in that, while we were yet sinners, Christ died for us.”  (Romans 5:8)
• “For I delivered unto you first of all that which I also received, how that Christ died for our sins according to the scriptures; And that he was buried, and that he rose again the third day according to the scriptures.”  (I Corinthians 15:3,4)
• “But as many as received him, to them gave he power to become the sons of God, even to them that believe on his name.” (John 1:12)
• “Behold, I stand at the door and knock: if any man hear my voice, and open the door, I will come in to him…”  (Revelation 3:20)
• “For whosoever shall call upon the name of the Lord shall be saved.”  (Romans 10:13)
• “That if thou shalt confess with thy mouth the Lord Jesus, and shalt believe in thine heart that God hath raised him from the dead, thou shalt be saved.”  (Romans 10:9)
• “Verily, verily, I say unto you; He that heareth my word, and believeth on him that sent me, hath everlasting life; and shall not come into condemnation; but is passed from death unto life.”  (John 5:24)
• “But these are written, that ye might believe that Jesus is the Christ, the Son of God; and that believing, ye might have life through his name.”  (John 20:31) 
• “These things I have written unto you that believe on the name of the Son of God; that ye may know that ye have eternal life, and that ye may believe on the name of the Son of God.”  (I John 5:13)