Some REM cycling of merit

I woke up feeling so pumped this morning... and I'm sure you will be glad to know that I am going to tell you why--
I had the most amazing dream.

I saw heaven, and it was the most amazing thing I've ever seen. But I jump ahead of myself.
The beginning: I was on my way to heaven. I hadn't died; I think it was the rapture or something. Either way, I approached a sort of turnstile gate. For some reason I was approaching this gate with my neighbor from back home (who's my mom's age). I was just sure that this was where God was going to separate the sheep from the goats (from the parable that Jesus tells about separating the believes from the unbelievers on judgment day). So I was fervently trying to convince her that she needs to put her trust in Jesus before it's too late. I went through the whole "get saved" spiel with her, but I don't think she responded. So we approach the turnstile... and we both got in--which perplexed me a bit.
We entered into this squarish waiting room with several other people. After a few minutes Jesus came in and was telling us that there were two options of what would happen next. He started out by saying, "This path [both paths which for some reason involved boats] will be easier. You will have to work some but you will mostly be coasting across the surface of the water." I see a picture of a rowing team/crew flash in my mind--all pulling together, requires some amount of work, but manageable. Then he goes on, "Or the other option will be very difficult..." I see a picture of a small craft rolling and pitching in a tempest, rain beating down--pretty much the classic sea-born storm. "This will be the journey with me." I remember this part very vividly. I didn't skip a beat, didn't have to think at all, but I came over and fell on my knees before him and said, "I just want to be with YOU."
So everyone chose his [Jesus's] path, except for my neighbor and one or two others--this was the "dividing the sheep from the goats" part. So he took us to these double doors. Outside these doors there were white tables and chairs and a stage, kind of like a setup for an outdoor wedding. This was heaven... sorta. So we passed through those doors and we were in heaven. Everyone was so excited. We were all jumping around and grinning and hugging each other. I just remember this overwhelming sense of joy... like my heart was so full like I had never felt before. This is all very cliche to write and describe.. but I felt it... there's just really no way for me to convey that through words other than to utilize the same trite and ineffective words that others before me have turned to out of desperation for expressing the inexpressible. They are... alright... but just don't capture the moment in the same way that I felt it. But anyway, I digress.
I was just so... Happy. Like this worldly stuff didn't matter anymore. Like I finally belonged. (I know, trite again, but also what I felt).
Anh was there. I specifically remember her being there. I think Jamella was there as well, and this girl (Melissa-not Tuttle) from church. But I remember Anh specifically because I noticed what she was wearing. It was this white baby doll top with white cotton capris. When we had entered through those doors, everyone (for the most part) had changed into white clothes. I asked her where she had gotten them because somehow I had known that she hadn't been wearing them before. She pointed over near the double doors at a display with lifesize dolls/mannequin-looking things and she and Jamella and Melissa--all in identical clothes--had all taken them from those dolls. But it wasn't weird in my dream, it was just normal. "Ah.. okay." That sorta thing.
So we were just talking and laughing and being generally very content for awhile. Then things got quiet and a tenseness settled over the crowd. Jesus walked up on the stage and I knew that we were getting ready to go before God for the Final Judgment. (I don't know why we were in heaven before we were judged by God, but for some reason that's how it was in this dream).
Sidebar: One way that I've heard the "Final Judgment" before God described is: we are so sinful and dirty and tainted that we could never stand before God and be found worthy. Never ever, no matter how many good things we do or how many people we help. God requires us to be perfect, to be holy. And everyone, no matter how hard you try, falls short of that standard. That's why Jesus had to die on the cross; it is HIS blood that makes us worthy. It is only by him stepping into the void between us and the standard that God requires that would allow us to bridge that divide. I knew this was about to happen: that we were about to stand before the throne of God and he would not see our iniquities but rather would see Jesus and his blood and his sacrifice instead. We truly are washed in the Blood of the Lamb.
But before this could happen, I knew that we had to stand and be confronted by everything we had ever done wrong--hence the feeling of uneasiness that had arisen in the crowd. The same feeling that rises to the pit of your stomach when you know that you're about to get in trouble for something that you actually did do--that's what was going through the crowd now. I just remember amidst that feeling of overwhelming shamefulness was, "Why didn't I do more when I was alive?" What had I filled my time with, the things that don't matter, that don't have any eternal merit. Why had I wasted all that time and let my Savior, the only one who's opinion and desires matter, the only one that I wanted to please, why had I let him down. Standing before him, I was just so sorry that I had been so selfish during my life, that I had neglected for so long the work that he desired.
It was in this air of tense shameful regret that...
... my alarm went off.

But
I awoke feeling so energized and ready to reprioritize my life. I really have tended to forget that this world is not my home, that I'm not living for me, that I need to take up my cross and follow Jesus. That the road with him is not always the easiest but that because it's the road with HIM, it's totally worth it. I just remember the feeling of absolutely no hesitancy when I fell on my face before Jesus, the Rock of my Salvation, and said that I will absolutely follow him no matter what because I just want to be near him. It was a very personal love that I felt for him.
And I was also impacted by that sense of shame and of "why didn't I do more with my life, why was I so self-centered and neglectful of Him in my life" as I prepared to stand in judgment before Jesus.

What a powerful dream. A very emotional and thought-provoking mixture of intense happiness/fulfillment, utter shamefulness and contrition, and absolute certainty of what truly matters in my life.

Phew. How exhausting.. I need a nap after such an exhausting dream.

-D*Sire-