The Dream Machine
Isaiah 65:17-25 | 11/21/2004
Here these words from Isaiah 65:17-25:
65:17 For I am about to create new heavens and a new earth; the former things shall not be remembered or come to mind.
65:18 But be glad and rejoice forever in what I am creating; for I am about to create Jerusalem as a joy, and its people as a delight.
65:19 I will rejoice in Jerusalem, and delight in my people; no more shall the sound of weeping be heard in it, or the cry of distress.
65:20 No more shall there be in it an infant that lives but a few days, or an old person who does not live out a lifetime; for one who dies at a hundred years will be considered a youth, and one who falls short of a hundred will be considered accursed.
65:21 They shall build houses and inhabit them; they shall plant vineyards and eat their fruit.
65:22 They shall not build and another inhabit; they shall not plant and another eat; for like the days of a tree shall the days of my people be, and my chosen shall long enjoy the work of their hands.
65:23 They shall not labor in vain, or bear children for calamity; F203 for they shall be offspring blessed by the Lord— and their descendants as well.
65:24 Before they call I will answer, while they are yet speaking I will hear.
65:25 The wolf and the lamb shall feed together, the lion shall eat straw like the ox; but the serpent—its food shall be dust! They shall not hurt or destroy on all my holy mountain, says the Lord.
Ah, dreams. Dreams of no more weeping—ever, no dying babies, no cancer, and enemies living in peace.
Sweet dreams.
We want them, we enjoy them, and after a long and stressful day we really need them. But there is nothing more unpredictable than the content of our dreams, and the specific shape of our slumber has always been impossible to control.
Until now.
A Japanese toy-maker has invented a dream machine—just in time for Christmas gift-giving--that is intended to banish nightmares forever. Instead of bad dreams, you get good ones by programming your most heartfelt hopes and hungers, whether you dream of winning on American Idol or scoring Olympic gold. You can even plug in Isaiah’s vision of a new earth — a serene and peaceful place in which the wolf and the lamb will feed together, and the lion will eat straw like the ox (65:25).
Standing 35 inches tall, the dream machine is equipped with a voice recorder, an array of lights, a picture frame, a fragrance display and a selection of stored background music. These components work together to allow you to design your own dreams through a multi-sensory combination of sweet smells, sounds and soft lights.
The way it works is this: A few minutes before bed, you put a photo or image of your desired dream into the picture frame. Then you concentrate on the image, and make a voice recording of several key words that describe your fantasy. Next, you insert one of the dream machine’s scents into the fragrance dispenser and select an appropriate type of background music.
Something soothing. No heavy metal.
Now you are ready to drift off to sleep, and the dream machine helps you to do this with soft lights and serenades. During the next eight hours, the device is set to work in sync with your REM sleep, which is the period associated with dreaming.
The genius of the machine lies in its link to REM, which usually occurs for about an hour each night. During this dream period, the machine is at its most active — playing the selected music, releasing the fragrance, and repeating the recorded phrase. If all goes well, you’ll end up experiencing the dream of your dreams.
If this device succeeds in sweetening a few hours of slumber ... beautiful. There’s nothing wrong with pleasant dreams. But no matter how well it works, the dream machine cannot transform the world we wake up to each and every day. If you find yourself stepping into a nightmare when you climb out of bed, there is not a single thing that the dream machine’s lights and smells and sounds can do to change this reality.
Now it’s true that much of the world would look at our lifestyle here in the United States and say: “What a dream!” Half of the world — nearly 3 billion people — live on less than two dollars a day. Almost 800 million people in the developing world are chronically undernourished, and 1.3 billion have no access to clean water.
It makes you wonder: Who in the world are we to say that life is a nightmare?
But suffering is not limited to any one nation or economic class, and the nightmares of spousal abuse, parental neglect, business failure, betrayal, loneliness, depression and despair are going to afflict the rich every bit as powerfully as the poor. Walk down any street in America, and you are bound to encounter people who are living bad dreams during every waking moment.
Maybe you are one of them.
What we really need today is a dream machine that can change our days, not our nights. We could use a device to transform real life, not dream life. Something that could introduce the new world predicted by Isaiah — one in which there is no weeping or distress; one in which no baby ever dies and no elderly person fails to hit the century mark; one in which there is quality housing for every family and complete job satisfaction for every worker, just as Isaiah records. (65:19-22).
Unfortunately, there is only so much that a gadget can do. But with God, there are no limits — with God, there is an ongoing and eternal effort to “create new heavens and a new earth” (17). God dreams of a world in which infant death is replaced by longevity, homelessness is transformed into homeownership, and meaningless efforts are reworked into productive and enjoyable labor. Best of all, this dream is no nighttime fantasy — it’s a vision of what God desires for the wide-awake world in which we live every day.
Unfortunately, the vision of Isaiah 65 has very little to do with reality — not Isaiah’s reality, or ours. This is not the real world. And if there is anything we’re into these days, it’s reality, not beyond-our-reach dreams.
So what’s the point?
Isaiah’s agenda here, for one thing, is honesty. We are not to conclude by looking around us that this is the way things are meant to be. It’s very easy to ignore the suffering of the oppressed and the difficulties of those who have less than we do. And where there is ignorance, there is indifference; and where there is indifference, there is intolerance. And where there is intolerance, there is injustice.
So Isaiah shows us God’s dream, not unlike what Dr. Martin Luther King Jr. used in his “I Have a Dream” speech. The dream makes it clear in no uncertain terms that the reality we experience now is not what we want for ourselves, or what God wants for us. The dream keeps before us a reminder of how far we yet have to go. So when we look around us — that’s honesty.
God’s dream is also to give us something else--hope. Isaiah points us to a better day. Today’s reality is not truly satisfying, today’s injustice is not acceptable, today’s unhappiness is not permanent, today’s experience of life is not the end of the story. God’s dream has not come true in the world today — that is for sure. Isaiah gives us this vision to keep us focused on something beyond the reality of our present unhappiness, and he promises that God will offer us his peaceful kingdom in surprising times and places. Probably when we least expect it.
David Argo is a Methodist pastor who spent his teenage years — like many of us — in a turbulent relationship with his mother. The two of them felt quite distant from one another. Then, when he was a young adult, they battled over which of them had the correct view of the world — a battle that led to a kind of uneasy truce. As they both grew older, they invested less and less energy in who was right and who was wrong, but they never really felt a sense of peace in their relationship.
Then, when she was 92, David’s mother suffered a massive stroke. The doctor said that she might not live for very long, so David traveled across several states to be with her. He sat by her bed, not knowing if she was aware of his presence or not. For several days, he talked to her, sang hymns to her, read the Bible to her, prayed, and cried.
The hospice staff was amazed that she was continuing to live. Finally one of them said, “We think she just enjoys having you here.” David realized that he had not been in the same room with her for entire days since the time he was an infant. Somewhere in the course of those nights and days, he realized that “the wolf and the lamb were feeding together.”
Of course, he was not sure exactly who was the wolf ... and who was the lamb.
David was given an experience of God’s glorious new creation as he sat by his mother’s bed. He came to understand that there are people that he needs to sit with, spend time with, and find a way to see more clearly. Even if he once saw his mother as an enemy, he has found that a shared hunger can allow a peaceful new creation to unfold — even here, even now.
So when we look beyond us — that’s hope. (PAUSE)
Finally, Isaiah gives us a vision of God who will bring this “dream” to pass. For Isaiah, the introduction of this kingdom is an entirely God-centered event; only God can make it happen. Let’s review: no weeping, people who die at the age of 100 will be considered a youth—meaning super longevity--housing for everyone, vineyards and plenty of fruit, construction workers will build their own houses instead of others’, descendants will be blessed, God will hear prayers before they are spoken, the wolf and the lamb will “feed together,” and the “lion shall eat straw like the ox.”
Okay, then. Only God can do this. The reminder is important because it is so easy to believe that God has totally lost control. Sometimes we look beyond the comfort of our little worlds and we see that elsewhere, things are out of hand. Today, across the world, 1.3 billion people live on less than one dollar a day; 3 billion live on under two dollars a day; 1.3 billion have no access to clean water; 3 billion have no access to sanitation; 2 billion have no access to electricity. Where is God? How can there be a God? Isaiah’s dream machine evokes the image of a God who is very much hands-on, a God who will bring to pass what we cannot do for ourselves.
Of course, elsewhere in Scripture we get the whole story. Jesus said, “The kingdom of God is within you.” We know that God calls us to work toward the birth of this kingdom, this new heavens and new earth. Jesus tells us to pray, “Thy will be done on earth as it is in heaven.” So when we look within us — that’s God! A God who works with us to bring about his will — on earth as it is in heaven. We must take time to look within us, to seek God who lives there. We must be open to God’s presence within us and listen to His guidance and let His will take precedence over our own.
To summarize:
When we look around us — that’s honesty.
When we look beyond us — that’s hope.
When we look within us — that’s God!
But for now, it is enough to be thankful that God — who so often seems distant and removed from our reality — will indeed bring to pass a world of harmony and peace.
And when it comes, it will be a dream come true.
PLEASE PRAY WITH ME:
Father God, we so long for that day when our every dream comes true, not just shallow wishes for more money or a bigger house, but dreams of health and happiness for everyone, a day when no one has reason to cry and wars are something we only vaguely remember. Lord, Lord! Let us be a part of creating a new earth for your Son’s sake, who died for us. Amen.
BENEDICTION: You have listened to God’s vision of a new heaven and a new earth. Now dreamers, romantics and rationalists, open your hearts, open your souls, to Adonai, our beloved God, who does what He says. Amen.
Sources:
Argo, David. “The kingdom in a hospice room.” Walking in the Word: UM Connection, November 7, 2001. Bwconf.org.
Knapp, Louise. “Sweet dreams made by machine.” Wired News, January 23, 2004. Wired.com.
