Nabeel Qureshi was at a serious
crossroads as a 19-year-old medical student. Born and raised an ardent Muslim,
Nabeel viewed Christianity with disdain and the Bible as a corrupted book. According
to his Muslim beliefs, Jesus was a respected prophet but certainly not the Son
of God.
However, cracks began to form in
the foundation of his faith as a Christian friend named David started sharing
the Gospel with him. Through a series of conversations, David helped Nabeel
understand the real Jesus of the Bible, not the Jesus of the Koran.
It all came to a head one night
for Nabeel, when he asked God for a sign to help him know if Jesus was real.
That night as Nabeel drifted off to sleep he had a powerful dream. In his dream,
Nabeel approached a warmly lit house at night. Standing at a window looking in
he saw people sitting at a banquet table. The room was filled with laughter and
sumptuous food.
Everyone at the table seemed to be waiting for
the master of ceremonies to enter. As Nabeel listened to people chatting, he
became aware that they were waiting for Jesus to arrive. Then he saw his friend
David sitting among the guests. Nabeel called out to David but at first there
was no response. Suddenly a glorious figure dressed in white appeared in the
room. Even though Nabeel could not make out his facial features, he intuitively
knew it was Christ. That’s when David finally responded to Nabeel saying, “I
wanted you to come dine with us, but you never responded to my invitation.”
That was the end of Nabeel’s dream. The next
day Nabeel told David about it, in hopes he could help him make sense of it.
David pulled out a Bible, opened to the Gospel of Luke and read the following
words of Christ, “24 “Make every effort to enter through the narrow door,
because many, I tell you, will try to enter and will not be able to. 25 Once
the owner of the house gets up and closes the door, you will stand outside
knocking and pleading, ‘Sir, open the door for us’” (13:24-25).
Immediately, Nabeel understood that God had
spoken directly to him. Nabeel said, “It was clear to me at that moment I would
not be at the banquet of God—heaven—unless I responded to the invitation of the
Gospel. The door would be shut for good; and the feast would go on without me
forever.”[1]
That was the first time Nabeel had ever read the Bible, but it was enough.
(For more on Nabeel’s story watch this brief video
by clicking here)
The dream and the Scripture were pivotal in
leading Nabeel to faith in Christ. Since his conversion, Nabeel defended Christianity
on the world stage with Ravi Zacharias International Ministries. In 2017, Nabeel
succumbed to cancer and went on to be with the Lord, but his testimony is a
powerful example of how God still speaks today through dreams and visions.
In fact, Lee Strobel writes in his book The Case for Miracles, “More Muslims
have become Christians in the last couple of decades than in the previous
fourteen hundred years since, Muhammad, and it’s estimated that a quarter to a
third of them experienced a dream or vision before their salvation experience.”[2]
Students of the Bible know that it is filled
with dream experiences. While camping in the wilderness, Jacob received a
dream-like vision of a ladder extending to heaven with angels ascending and
descending upon it (Gen. 28:10-22). As a seventeen-year-old boy, Joseph had two
dreams which foretold his greatness and ascendency to political power (Gen.
31:1-11). Later he interpreted dreams for the Pharaoh of Egypt (Gen. 40-41). Daniel
also interpreted the dream of Nebuchadnezzar and was elevated in the Babylonian
kingdom (Dan. 2). In the New Testament, an angel spoke to Joseph twice in
dreams: once regarding the birth of the Christ child (Matt. 1:20) and another
time to warn him of impending danger (Matt. 2:12).
In many parts of the world, God seems to be
using visions and dreams extensively. In areas where there is little or no
gospel message available, and where people do not have Bibles, God is taking
His message to people directly through dreams and visions. This is entirely
consistent with the biblical example of visions being frequently used by God to
reveal His truth to people in the early days of Christianity. If God desires to
communicate His message to a person, He can use whatever means He finds
necessary—a missionary, an angel, a vision, or a dream. Of course, there is no
limit to what God can do.
At the same time, we must be careful when it
comes to dreams and their interpretation. We must keep in mind that the Bible
is finished, and it tells us everything we need to know. The key truth is that
if God were to give a vision, it would agree completely with what He has
already revealed in His Word. Visions should never be given equal or greater
authority than the Bible.
“I
will pour out my Spirit on all people. Your sons and daughters will prophesy, your
old men will dream dreams, your young men will see visions.” Joel 2:28
-DM
[1]
Lee Strobel, The Case for Miracles (Grand
Rapids, MI: Zondervan, 2018), 139-141.
[2]
Ibid., 141.
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