Salvation is Salvage

I had a disturbing dream yesterday, and today I received a disturbing revelation about it.

The dream was about an African grey parrot that looked like my own parrot, Marvin. The parrot’s back was glued to a hinged steel arm attached to the back of a garbage truck. He was flapping as hard as he could, but the arm moved him wherever the operator wanted.

I reached up to the parrot and called it, and I willed the arm to move toward me. The parrot was released, and I held him and comforted him.

I saw a fat, loathsome, bearded creature slouching away from the truck. It was a lot like a man. Caucausian, sort of. Long, greasy black hair. It wore a ridiculous black leather vest that looked like it was supposed to be protective.

It was looking at me to see if I had spotted it. It didn’t want me to see it. I was full of hate for it, and I said things to express that hate. I don’t remember what I said. I wanted to take a blade like a sword and cut through this thing while it was still alive, causing its organs to hang out of it and nearly severing one part from the other.

I knew the vest couldn’t even slow a sword down.

I have strong protective feelings toward Marvin. My other bird, Maynard, has injured him a number of times. I think the last time it happened was before 2000. For some reason, no matter how I tried, I could not always keep them apart.

I always felt terrible when he was hurt. I had to have him sewn up more than once.

People who don’t own parrots can’t understand what an African grey is like. Marvin is very gentle; he doesn’t even like to bite the vet. He is extremely affectionate. He loves being held and wrestled. He makes all sorts of cute noises to show his love. He even tries to feed me regurgitated food when he’s feeling particularly affectionate.

People are funny; we have a powerful instinct that drives us to protect cute animals. Activists lose their minds over the killing of baby seals, but animals that aren’t lovable generate a lot less enthusiasm.

It’s very disturbing to see anything bad happen to Marvin. I have had a lot of dreams in which he or Maynard was in danger.

I asked God what the dream meant, and I believe he said the parrot, who was not Marvin, represented a soul. The garbage truck represented inclusion among the souls headed for hell. The long steel arm was Satan’s tractor beam: temptation and iniquity. The loser creature that drove the truck wanted to take the soul to the dump, which represented hell.

My hatred must have been God’s hatred. As for a desire to slice the creature with a sword, swords represent the word of God.

This morning, I got a better understanding of the dream. I believe God sees every trapped soul the way I saw that bird. He must be continually enraged at the spirits that try to take people away, and he must be eager to inflict the worst kind of agony and humiliation on them.

I thought of a verse from the Bible, and I looked it up. It’s Psalms 35:17: “Lord, how long wilt thou look on? rescue my soul from their destructions, my darling from the lions.”

I had always wondered why the KJV used the word “darling.” I looked up the Hebrew, and the original word was used in connection with Isaac, when Abraham was commanded to kill him. It means someone extremely close to you. Someone irreplaceable. Like a firstborn son. When God loses a person who is trying to get to him, he must feel the way Abraham would have, had he plunged his knife into Isaac.

If God sees us the way I saw that bird, then he suffers tremendously when we are picked on. If this is true, then he must be extremely eager to help us through miracles and other supernatural means. He must also be furious at anyone who abuses people he cares about. He must be looking for people who will be conduits of his power, to help and protect others.

For centuries, churches have been lying to us, saying miracles have dried up. They tell us there are no prophets. Meanwhile, God is trying to get us to believe he will help.

This morning I thought about the billions of people on the earth. I thought about all the people who are on their way to hell. The burden is impossible for a human being to carry or understand. If we are ever going to be even minimally effective, we will have to have miracle power working through us all the time.