Why Do We Dream?

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On Relevant Radio.
At night, the same way you prioritize your day, when you wake up in the morning, who do I have to call, who do I have to email? When you go to sleep tonight, your unconscious is going to prioritize the one situation or person that's bugging you. And so every dream at a surface level is triggered by something that either happened to you yesterday or something that you thought about yesterday.

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It's The Drew Mariani Show on Relevant Radio.

**Drew Mariani** (0:49)
Yeah, that was Laini Dolphin. Dreams are wild, aren't they?
She's an expert, supposedly, on why dreams and why we dream what we dream. And I'm going to be talking about that today. We're going to be speaking in just a moment to Mark Giszczak. I'm going to be speaking to a sleep specialist on this. And I want to explore dreams. Have you ever awakened from a dream and, gosh, you thought it was so real? Did God ever communicate to you, maybe through a dream? I know that's a big ask. Or is it simply your subconscious at work?
Throughout scripture, though, God spoke to kings and prophets. He's spoken to saints, humble carpenters, right? Does he still do it today, or was that reserved for the Old Testament? And is that reserved just for saints? And how do you tell the difference between an ordinary dream and a genuine movement of the Holy Spirit? We're going to explore that today. You are always welcome to join me. You know that. I tell you that many times a day. It's 888-914-9149.
I think this is one of the most fascinating, most misunderstood ways that God has communicated to his people. And yeah, I was thinking about it a little bit earlier today. I was going to do a quick search to see how many references there are in the Bible to this. You know, I think about scripture. I just saw at the top of my head, you know, Jacob, he dreamed of the ladder reaching to heaven. The angels ascending and descending. And of course, you've got Joseph, the son of Jacob. He received that prophetic dream that, you know, he interpreted Pharaoh's dream, then he saved Egypt, you know, after his brothers had betrayed him. And of course, Daniel interpreted King Nebuchadnezzar's, you know, dream and the New Testament, one of the most famous of all, the St. Joseph. He had, what was it? Two, three, four separate dreams that directed him to take Mary, his wife, to flee to Egypt, to return and to herds wife and settle in Nazareth. So the Lord used that way of communicating to St. Joseph. Of course, the Magi were warned in a dream not to return to Herod. So, you know, and the old Pilate too, Pilate's wife played it with her husband. She dreamt the night before about receiving, you know, about how he's gonna handle Christ after receiving a very disturbing dream about Jesus. I'd love to know what that was all about, right? So yeah, I would argue God does communicate through dreams. Clearly, it's laid out in scripture. What about today? You know, notice something I think really important.
He does it occasionally. This is not a routine thing. And when I get into this territory, I can get a little woo woo, so I just want to be careful. You know, the church is always, always cautioned against assuming that every dream carries some sort of divine message. You do not want to go down that lane. I mean, we do have a subconscious as well. And I want to talk about that too. How do you tell the difference between your subconscious and perhaps a movement of the Holy Spirit?
I would say sometimes you can't. And maybe a dream might remind you to forgive someone, or maybe it motivates you to return to prayer, or to pray for that child that you just dreamt about, or that spouse, or that deceased loved one.
Maybe it's a call just to trust God a little bit more. You know, you don't know. Maybe it's not important where the dream came from, but maybe it's important where it leads you. I'm joined right now by somebody who's gonna help us better understand this. And if you wanna join the conversation, feel free to do that. But Dr. Mark Giszczak joins me. He's a professor of sacred scripture and the director of the Institute for Catholic Theological Formation at the St. Paul Seminary in St. Paul, Minnesota. Author of a number of books. You can read his blog at catholicbiblestudent.com. Doctor, it's so good to talk with you again. Welcome back.