We have traveled through regions of the land.

We have driven in sunshine, snow and rain.

We have visited old friends and had conversations late into the evening.

We have told stories and listened to them.

We have seen a museum that glorifies God as Creator and Savior.

We have meandered through a gigantic ark.

We have sojourned overnight with the Amish.

We have worshiped in the company of the saints.

We have had dinner rolls thrown to us in a restaurant.

We have driven through a Civil War battlefield.

We have talked, prayed, laughed and enjoyed meal fellowship everywhere we’ve gone.

We have been on a Tour of Friends, the best kind of tourism.

I’m back, friends! I hope you have missed me as much as I have missed you…

I’ll probably drop this off at the Bureau of Blog Tourism in the morning.

A recent dream:

The monster in my dream was a man who became a giant when he ate a small white egg-shaped thing. In his giant form he was destructive, intent only on murder and mayhem, always rampaging and seeking to destroy. He came at us in his giant form but just as he was upon us, he went through an explosive transformation back to a man. When this happened, the egg dropped and he picked it up again and ate it, so that he could continue in this cycle: from man to giant to man to giant again. Whenever he became a man, it gave us a short reprieve, a chance to escape.

We ran into a tall building and began to run up the stairs going around and around. We could hear him behind us, a giant again. We knew the transformation back and forth happened fairly quickly – it was just a matter of outrunning him. As we were getting to the top, he transformed back into a man, but this time when the egg fell, it went to the bottom of the stairs and one of our group grabbed it. It seemed that victory was on our side. We threw it down from the top of the building, somehow under the impression that when it fell it would explode and end the cycle. It did explode, but the cycle did not end. More eggs were created in the explosion. The man/giant took one, but we took one as well and found a hiding place to regroup and determine a new strategy in the fight.

We decided that the best way to fight the giant was for one of our number to eat an egg and meet him in battle. The decision made, one of us ate the egg and instead of transforming into a giant, he became an elephant. He rushed out and ran toward the giant to fight him. The giant grabbed the elephant by the trunk and held him firmly, in a sense completely disarming him. What now? We went into hiding, demoralized that the egg gained us no advantage whatsoever. It seemed that all was lost.

But in the next scene, we saw that our despair was premature and not based on reality. For the elephant had befriended the giant and in that friendship, peace had been forged.

There are so many intriguing elements to this dream. On the surface, it is a nonsensical dream story. But upon closer inspection, I can see that I am the monster, continually eating the sin-egg, repelling it, but being compelled to eat it again, a never ending cycle. And I am also the person being chased by a monster, always in danger of being destroyed. And then there’s the element that one of us, a representative of us, had to be willing to eat the egg, to risk becoming the monster to in order to overcome the monster. And lastly, the one who was going to save us has been seemingly defeated by the giant, a moment of false despair that lifts when we find out that the savior had a different kind of battle in mind. The enemy has been overcome by a friend. I don’t want to draw too much of a line from this to the gospel, because it’s a bad analogy at best. But I still see it there, in seed form, in shadows grasping at reality.

But then again, maybe I’m all washed up. Thoughts?

I’ll probably dream about deleting this in the morning.