What is the difference between a dream and a vision?
A dream is a goal you strive to attain; a vision is something that keeps reaching for you. The Lord is both my dream fulfilled and my vision unfolding.
Think of a high school basketball player saying, “My dream is to play in the NBA.” That dream has a finish line. Once he makes it, his vision might become, “I want to keep getting better.” Vision doesn’t end – it keeps pulling you forward.
Similarly, when I placed my faith in Christ, I received an eternal relationship with Him. He became a dream come true, realized freshly every day as I engage with Him and share my life with Him. He is now the lover of the deepest places within me, the friend above all other friends, the source of the life I once tried to achieve on my own.
Now that the dream is fulfilled, my vision is to grow deeper in that relationship for the rest of my life. There is no ceiling to a vision. It continually beckons us forward, inspiring us to “more,” “better” and deeper.
That’s why someone like the apostle Paul – who arguably knew Christ more intimately than anyone in his generation – still had a vision of knowing Him better: “I want to know Christ” (Philippians 3:10). And that’s who the Lord is to me – forty-seven years into my dream – the One I know well, and still long to know better.
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