Perspective in an age of dreams & visions....

My wife recently saw a friend share a video on Facebook about a 9-year old girl who claimed to have a vision from God.  Her vision apparently took place while she was in prayer.  In this vision, she claims to have seen "Jesus....wore a white robe with a blue and red sash around His shoulder and waste."  She also claimed that in this vision, Jesus told her to warn others of the coming rapture, which would be soon, and that there would be a great earthquake before the rapture event occurred.  The video concluded with the girl reciting John 3:16 and John 14:6.  Other than having small issues recalling wording in the passages, she had no struggles in sharing the details of her vision.  She seemed to know it, she knew what she saw, and she told it well.

On the surface, this sounds exciting and even biblical.  She was a sweet, innocent girl with her mom by her side sharing with the world what she believes Jesus told her in a vision.  We have no right or reason to question her, right?

Wrong.

These visions, dreams and prophecies are a dime a dozen these days, many of which have been debunked or dismissed with background cases of collusion, misinformation, or greed.  Movies and best-selling books have been sold on supposed trips to heaven and hell only to show themselves to be false.

How do I know that and how can I speak so strongly on this?  Because the Bible tells me so.

The video this 9-year old girl and her mother posted was only about 2 1/2 minutes long, but in the video there are obvious discrepancies between Biblical accounts of Jesus and her vision.  For the sake of this post, I will share two obvious issues:

1) She claims Jesus wore a "white robe with a blue and red sash..."  The white robe is correct, however, upon further study of the book of Revelation and John's prophetic vision, Jesus, as He stands today, is wearing a white robe/garment with a "golden band about His chest" (Rev. 1:13b).  Where would she get red and blue from?  The source could be from any number of places, but our movies, pictures and children's Bibles often picture Jesus in a white shepherds robe with a blue and/or red sash.  And usually, the red and blue are not mixed together.  We're actually never told what color Jesus' sash was while he walked the earth, much less if He even wore one like we see in pictures and movies.  

2)  She claims Jesus told her that there would be a "great earthquake just before the Rapture."  First of all, the Rapture event is a hotly debated event.  Some conclude it is an actual, secret event different from the 2nd coming of Christ that will take place in the End Times (PreMil) while others argue there is no secret Rapture of the Church but rather it is simply one in the same with the 2nd coming (AMil, PostMil).  My personal leaning is that there is no clear biblical evidence that argues for a secret, separate event outside of the 2nd Coming of Christ where the Church is taken away.  The popular Thessalonians passage is used to point to the "catching up" of the saints, but the timeline does not necessarily suggest a "catching up" that is separate from the catching up that will take place when Christ returns for the 2nd time.

Furthermore, Revelation speaks nothing toward a great earthquake taking place before a secret Rapture event, in Matthew's Gospel Jesus only referred to there being many earthquakes over the course of the whole End Times, and 1 Thessalonians 4 does refer to the "catching up" of both the dead and alive in Christ by the trumpet but without any great earthquake.

Simply put, as sweet and innocent as this little girl may be, and as well-meaning as her mother may have been, who by the way claimed to also receive visions from God, these visions are false by the test of Scripture.  These books and movies depicting extra details about heaven, the glory of Jesus, hell, etc. are nothing more than dreams made by the mind of man.  It is even possible that they are placed there by Satan, who "masquerades as an angel of light" to confuse us and to take attention away from the Word of God, which is something he has always done (2 Cor. 11:1-15).

Finally, this must be said: How can it be that so many today can write hundreds of pages and even make movies out of supposed visions from God while Apostles Paul and John, along with the OT Prophets, struggled coming up with the right words to describe what they were seeing?  Paul couldn't even write down, much less utter, what he saw in the "third heaven" until 14 years later and even then he couldn't share the great and wondrous things he saw in great detail nor could he share what he heard.  Yet, we'll take the words of a small child or a grown man who claims to have a perfect recollection of what happened in a dream or a vision?  

Here's a good rule of thumb when we see things like this pop up, and we will:

Jeremiah 23 - If someone claims to have a dream, vision or prophecy from God, it better be verified by Scripture or it is false.

And if you still don't believe me, then take it from Voddie!