By Years ago, I had a very disturbing dream that I still remember vividly twenty years later. I was walking down a street at night and came across an alley where a man had just killed a woman. I ran to get help and he was apprehended and arrested. During the trial the man would sit and stare at me when I was sitting in the back and also on the witness stand with a smug smirk on his face. To say it was disturbing was an understatement. I was the key witness and testified that I witnessed him murder the victim and he was convicted and sentenced to death.
When it was time for his execution, they brought him to the electric chair. I was there as a witness along with the victim’s family. While the people conducting the execution were reading his charges and sentence, he sat in the chair staring me in the eyes the whole entire time with the same smug smirk on his face.
When the execution began and his body began to thrash, he never stopped staring at me with that creepy smile. When it was over, they drew the curtain and we were escorted from the building. I remember feeling such a sigh of relief knowing this nightmare was over and I would never have to see him again.
A few weeks later, I was walking down the street and a man dressed in dark clothes and a hooded jacket came walking toward me. He seemed to have an eerie presence about him but it was in the middle of the day so I just kept walking. As he passed me, I turned and looked at him and he had stopped right behind me. He kept his head down so I couldn’t see his face and then he spoke and asked me if I knew who he was. I shook my head no but I could feel a familiar dread.
He lifted his head and pulled back his hood and it was the man who I had witnessed being executed. The only difference this time was his eyes were solid black. I stepped back in horror and the only word I could muster was “How?”
He laughed and said that he had murdered so many people, but everyone just turned a blind eye and never dared to say anything or report him because they were all scared of him until I came along.
I looked around the neighborhood and I could see people out mowing their lawns and children running and playing and no one seemed to notice the creepy dude with black eyes. He then said, “They can’t see me, only you can.” I asked him what he wanted from me and he laughed and answered, “Your soul! I will drive you to the brink of insanity so you take your own life and I will collect your soul and carry it to the pits of hell so I can torture you for eternity.”
I remember being frozen with fear as what he just said sunk into my brain, but I was stubborn enough to not let him get me. The only thing I could think of was to go on my daily routine and try to ignore him so he would get bored and go away. For the next few days, I got up and went to work, out with friends, and did laundry the same as I always have. I didn’t say anything to him over the next few days and I would avoid looking at him or acknowledging his existence but he still followed me everywhere and whispering such things that ‘I couldn’t handle the stress’ or ‘I might as well give up’ all day and all night.
When Wednesday came around, I came home from work, made dinner and went to church. I looked in the backseat and he was still there but as I pulled up to the church he sat up and looked around and started cursing. I parked the car and got out and he did also but as I started walking up to the church he stopped. I turned and looked at him as he was still cursing and it dawned on me that he would not follow me into the church.
At that point in the dream, I began to smile, I had found his weakness and I was going to exploit it. I went home and I began to play worship music at the house. I began reading my Bible out loud as well as praying out loud as I walked around my house. At first, he responded with vulgar cursing and ranting and raving. For days he cursed at me and told me I was too weak and stupid and that I could never get rid of him and that I was doomed, but I didn’t give up and eventually he did. He became weaker and weaker and started disappearing for longer periods of time until he was gone.
I would continue reading my Bible, praising and worshiping Jesus but once in a while I would slip or fall back into my old ways and in a matter of days, I could hear him trying to manifest again but I refused to let him and dove back into prayer and even into my Bible study and worship. He would curse and say horrible things but he left.
At the time I had the dream I really didn’t understand what God was trying to say to me. At the time I had the dream I thought it was just a normal nightmare but it was so vivid and seemed to be more important than that. As I have grown in my faith, I came to understand that sometimes we don’t mean to open the door for those “demons” to step in. It can be as innocent as being in the wrong place at the right time. Taking pain killers to recover from an injury is innocent enough but can unknowingly lead to addiction and cause you to lose everything you have. Going out for “drinks” with your friends all the time becomes too much and you stay up later and later each night and end up calling off work and eventually losing your job.
These things can seem to “haunt” you even if no one else can see them. You will drag them everywhere you go and the weight will become unbearable. When you walk into church and give your life to Jesus and begin to focus on him those things will go away and keeping our focus on Jesus keeps them away.
If you have things that haunt you, please feel free to reach out for help at your local church or email me at: moppinguptheblessings@gmail.com or friend request me on Facebook to be added to our group so we can pray for you.
Tammy Bassett is a speaker and the author of the Mopping Up Your Blessings blog. She was born and raised a country girl who’s roots run deep in the mountains of Appalachia. She has worked a wide variety of jobs ranging from radio to insurance agent. She is now a stay-at-home mom, who along with her husband, are raising five daughters (ages 10 to 25), seven cats and one dog. She uses her accounting and business administration degree to help run her busy household.
She loves spending time with her family and homeschooling her two youngest children. She spends a lot of her day trying to conquer the obstacles in her home. With four of her children still living at home the laundry pile (nicknamed Mt. Wash-more) is her nemesis. Some days she wins and some days she doesn’t, but she always gets up the next day and tries again.
She also loves camping with her family as long as there is a camper with air conditioning, a comfy bed, and indoor plumbing. Her downfall is her obsession with iced coffee. Thankfully the closest Starbucks is an hour from her home, or she would be broke. She also loves reading and learning new skills such as homesteading, being more self-sustainable, gardening and foraging.
She relates the most to her favorite animal, the alpaca. They are both kind of weird and look like they are two months past due on a haircut. Much like alpacas she makes a gentle humming noise when happy and if irritated she often stamps the ground with her feet. Her husband has refused to buy her an alpaca much to her disappointment.
But more than anything, she loves the Lord and is growing more in her faith each day and hopes to inspire others to do the same. She wants everyone to understand that God’s grace is truly amazing and has changed her from the inside out and he can do the same for you.
by leaps and bounds 