Holding a Dream

 Due to some doctor appointments today I am sitting in a public library trying to be productive between appointments. I am surrounded by thousands of books which makes me feel at home. Off across the room there is a blue quote pasted on the wall. "A book is a dream that you hold in your hands." - Neil Gaiman. Neil Gaiman is an English short story novelist and a comic book author. 

I just put down a power packed book by one of my favorite authors, Leonard Ravenhill. His books are hard hitting. He pulls no punches and goes straight for the gut. In his forthright prophet style he wrote about the dream of God's church embracing their role in prayer to usher in revival. You either love Ravenhill or you hate him. I fall in line with those who love him. I have read his works multiple times apiece. 

The book is 50  years old now titled Revival Praying. Some of the illustrations are outdated but the dream lives on. I held that dream in my hand in the well weathered, underlined and hand written notes on the pages of this classic book. In the time I have been here in the library more people have run to the computers than perused the bookshelves. That shows a lot about modern society. Surfing the internet is preferred to turning pages. 

I think one of my greatest regrets in life is that I cannot read all the books I want to read. I read too slow.  I cannot even read all the books I have back in my office. Each book containing a dream and a wealth of knowledge. Getting caught up in a good book can cause you to lose touch with reality. 

I got so engrossed in a book in second grade that the bell rang for me to go to another class and I did not even hear it. My teacher snapped me to attention out of the pages of that book to scurry me along to where I was supposed to be. God can whisk us away to other times and other realities through written words on a printed page bound together in books. 

When is the last time you thanked God for the gift of learning to read and the gift of books? I confess it has been a long while for me. Way too long. 

Though Ravenhill died nearly twenty years ago, his ministry lives on through the printed page. Today I held his dream in my hands. O that we would be a well read people and that we would be enabled to live out the very truths we read about.