Does God Speak Through Dreams?

Does God speak through dreams today? That’s the unexpected topic of conversation I had yesterday with two separate people. One was recounting a family member who had a very clear dream that she interpreted as a sign from God. The second was a note from a church member saying she had a vivid dream Saturday night that mirrored with detail the sermon I preached to her the next morning (she of course had no knowledge about what I was going to speak on).

So, does God speak through dreams to people today? I believe He does. That might make evangelicals uncomfortable. We like to preach that God can speaks exclusively the Bible. Well, if you read the Bible, guess how God often spoke to people (like Mary and Joseph)? Through dreams. If God did it then, why wouldn’t He do it today?

Some would make a good point that God doesn’t need to speak through dreams today because we have the Bible. My main argument for God still speaking through dreams is the fact that I don’t feel I have the right to limit what God can or cannot sovereignly do. If He can speak through a donkey (see Numbers 22), if He can sovereignly use a worm (Jonah 4), He can speak through a dream.

Now, that doesn’t mean that dreams will be the primary way God communicates or even that God will even use a dream to communicate. I believe that God has the right to sovereignly communicate through a dream if He so chooses. God has never spoken to me through a dream. That’s fine with me. I don’t seek it out. God speaks to me through the Bible regularly.

Important caveat: One of the biggest dangers of dreams is that they can be confusing or misleading. If you have a vivid dream, it may be your own imagination, it may be a bad bowl of chili, or it may even be an agent of darkness sent to mislead you. Relying on dreams to communicate is an easy way to be misled, since dreams can come from a variety of sources. The Bible is the safest bet, since we can rest assured that all of its words come from God.

But at the end of the day, if someone asked me whether or not I believed that God can still speak through dreams today, I would say ‘yes.’

QUESTION: Do you believe God still speaks through dreams today? Has God ever spoken to you through a dream?