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Are you a dreamer, or a realist?

I love to dream but, I am a realist. Knowing what is to come is different then what I would like to see come.

Anyone who knows me at all knows that I am a 100% realist.

Dreamer, usually to the extent that I hide from reality.

Let me rephrase that...

There is more reality than the reality I see; there are deeper, more wonderful things than I can comprehend. I can only see a tiny fraction of space and time, not eternity. God has blessed the creatures that bear His image with an imagination that, while sorrowfully imperfect, allows them to examine beyond the realm of our moment-by-moment sight, sound and feel. We do not merely survive; we remember, we experience emotion and personality, we name and create. Though we live in the Now, we have the responsibility to store up eternal treasure; though we can't see the path ahead of us, we step out in faith.

Since we are so limited, we can't grasp Reality as we should without weaving it into a story; something that has characters, a beginning, a middle, and a solution. Jesus spoke in parables, and in story-form He told us that He is a door, a vine, a shepherd, a mother hen, a lamb. Israel was told many versions of her own story, refering her to a vine, a woman, a sheep, etc. David was given a story about a poor man's lamb to convict him of sinning against God with Uriah's wife. The Hebrews in the wilderness were told to pass the story of God's commands, wonders and outstretched arm to every generation, to speak of it when they lay down and when they rose, to write it where it could be seen and remembered. All creation is a marvelous story designed for the glory of God.

So I'm a Dreamer; I'm thrilled to see the Story in everything, and it takes away some of the anxiety of day-to-day life. When I focus too much on "my reality", I tend to lose sight of better things, and I sin my removing my attention from God.

I'm a realist too, since every Christian must persue truth and righteousness; too much "dreaming" can make us lower our shields and accept lies, idleness, apathy, and every other worldly-sweetened thing that may come our way. We must always be ready for battle.

Paul speaks of a runner who races for the goal; he is a realist, because he has trained hard and is determined to win. He is a dreamer as well, because he is shooting toward a prize he has not yet seen, but in faith he accepts that this prize is so valuable that nothing he encounters is difficult enough to deter him from that goal.

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Hi DreamWeaver.  Yes, and Sapphire the eternal realist.

Wow, Willow, what a sililoquy.  And your concluding question face.  Very nice.

It is a paradox, humanly speaking.   But only humanly speaking.

Perhaps it's that paradox, that is the portal, or threshold, into the "World of Jesus Christ".   Where it would no longer be a paradox, or a contradiction.

The "faithful" is a dreamer for believing in the unseen; he's a realist b/c this world is passing away.

So neither answer is the correct one, depending on the situation.

We don't want a surgeon operating on us, to be a dreamer.


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