What happens when our dreams and Heaven's dreams don't match?
What happens when they do?
Have you ever had a dream that was so real, you woke up convinced that it was? Of course you have. Have you ever had something so shocking happen that you felt it wasn’t real, that you were living in a dream? Again, I know you have.
We all have dreams both real and imagined. Our imagined dreams are the deepest hopes and wishes we imagine during our waking moments for ourselves and for others. Conversely, when we sleep, we have little control over the real dreams our unconscious brains present us. We often focus much of our life trying to accomplish our imagined dreams, while our minds show us movie after movie of every human emotion.
The magic is when the two meet, the conscious and the unconscious dreams—not because one produces the other, but because they are a single, heavenly reality on earth. Scripture repeatedly teaches that one way the Spirit teaches us is through dreams. Think of Jacob, his grandson Joseph of Egypt, Daniel, Ezekiel, Lehi, and many more. All had night visions or dreams wherein God’s communicated his will. For these and many other faithful disciples, their imagined hopes squared with often symbolic dreams bringing peace and direction.
This happened to me about a year ago. I share it not to say I’m spiritual (I’m a still-reforming sinner as anyone who knows me would tell you), but to say I’m 49-years old and our Father remains patient with me as I continue trying to figure out mortality. This is a story that spans decades but was only confirmed last year. I hope it is encouraging.
When I was a teenager, I wanted to serve in the Navy like my grandfather. I saw myself as a Navy pilot shooting of the deck of an aircraft carrier with Kenny Loggins singing “Danger Zone” in the background. By the time I was married, I had more practical thoughts of serving in Naval Intelligence. Something else had changed, however. I returned from my mission with a burning desire to change the world as I had been changed. The Navy, though a dream, didn’t really fit that, nor did my other passion, politics. I was good at it, but I didn’t like the firebrand it brought out in me. I was fortunate to become a seminary teacher. What better way to change the world than teaching the Gospel of Jesus Christ? I began in 1995 and have never looked back. I’ve been blessed to help thousands of young people trust in Heaven.
Around the year 2000 I had one of those dreams, the ones that seem so real that you’re convinced they are. As I write it, the dream feels as real today as it did twenty years ago. I’m at a Church Educational System event all dressed up with my beautiful wife by my side. President Gordon B. Hinckley, the prophet at the time, had just finished addressing the congregation of religious educators and spouses. We then stood in line to shake his hand. After quite some time, we arrived at the prophet. I stretched out my hand, but before I could say anything, he warmly spoke, “Ahhh, Brother Sainsbury, so good to see you!” taking me by the hand.
“You’re at BYU, right?” he said to me as he turned to shake Meredith’s hand.
“No, I’m at Woods Cross Seminary,” I explained, perplexed. He turned back to me and smiled that trademark President Hinckley smile that was so loving and happy. Before my eyes left his, I noticed a sparkle, that remained even after he winked at me with a sly grin. The message was clear. “I know something you don’t know.” And then I awoke. It was so vivid, so lucid, I was convinced it was real, that it had happened. I knew it meant something, but I wasn’t sure what.
In sharing it with Meredith, I recalled an interaction I had on my mission while serving in Pisa, Italy. By then I had fallen in love with Christ and with His word. I spent most of my free time devouring institute manuals and other Church books in the apartment. One of the elders, who had attended BYU remarked, in jest, that one day I would be teaching the Bible at BYU. That struck a chord with me, and though being a professor seemed impossible for someone like me, it was in the weeks that followed that exchange I began to consider becoming a seminary teacher when I returned home.
I had just begun my master’s degree at BYU when I had the dream and decided that its message must be about that. I graduated two years later and prayerfully considered if and where to do a doctorate. Late one night, kneeling alone in our front room, I desperately plead with heaven. I was so unsure of what to do and so convinced that Heaven knew. The answer was one of the clearest in my life and not the one I had expected. I enrolled at the University of Utah to do a Ph.D. in history.
In time, I began to see a path of getting my degree and then possibly teaching institute or even becoming a professor at BYU or somewhere else. However, cancer attacked Meredith multiple times and a four-year project turned into twelve. The struggle just to finish was very real and it wasn’t as important anymore anyway.
Out of the blue during the early fall of 2013, the Church and the Navy recruited me to become a Navy chaplain. The head chaplain west of the Mississippi flew in and took us to dinner at the Garden Restaurant overlooking the Salt Lake Temple shining in the darkness. It was amazing! Heaven’s dream seemed to be an even better version of my dream! I would be in the Navy, but doing God’s work, not to mention they committed to stationing me in San Diego. We signed the preliminary paperwork that night.
In the two and half years that stood between me and their maximum entry age of forty-two-years-old, I had to finish my Ph.D., get a master’s in theology online, and get in better shape. The next three summers I would be away from my family, at Officers Candidate School, Georgia (residency requirement for the theology degree), and on an aircraft carrier (an apprenticeship) respectively. It seemed a lot, but we were energized by Meredith’s good health and what seemed not just my dream, but heaven’s will.
Yet, within months it began not to feel right. Even though things were falling into place, we both knew it wasn’t right, even if we didn’t know why. I was so depressed to let both the Church and the Navy know I was withdrawing. Not long after, cancer reemerged in Meredith. It was stage-two, small, and beatable. It shouldn’t be the reason to hold us back, I thought. After Meredith’s treatments finished in late spring and she was declared in remission, she decided to have surgery that would help stop the cancer from coming back a fifth time.
After the surgery, Meredith developed a large and dangerous blood clot. She hovered between life and death in the ICU for days. After weeks of stabilizing, she finally came home but was not the same. She was constantly ill and couldn’t eat. Week after week she would be admitted to the hospital only to be released after a few days. As the summer wore on, it became worse, and she was staying in the hospital. Her hope and will for life were just flickering. Finally, a priesthood blessing promised hope and the next day it came. After another surgery, she was home in a week, quickly returning to health.
I spent most of that summer with her in the hospital. If I had followed the chaplaincy, I would have been back East. God knew all this, and for that I was grateful. But I also doubted my ability to know Heaven’s will. Sure, we had felt that the right thing was not to do it, but only after we both felt that it was the right thing to do. Honestly, I gave up on dreams and decided to stay the course I was on and just let things happen and believe that it was God’s will. I finished my Ph.D., lovingly continued to teach seminary, and began turning my dissertation into a book.
When I began shopping the book to publishers, I met with someone from BYU’s Religious Studies Center. Again, I felt something there that felt right and decided to publish with them. The professor mentioned that there were two open spots in the Church History Department at BYU and that with my teaching skills, research, and forth-coming book I should apply. Of course, I began to believe again that this was the right path, and he was right, I was a good candidate, so I applied. I was incredibly shocked to receive a letter that I wasn’t even going to get an interview. “You did it again,” I thought. Just live life and stop reading your heart into things.
In November 2019, I received a call from seminary headquarters. Would I take my family and coordinate and teach institute at Harvard, MIT, and Wellesley in Boston? What a dream! Meredith and I love cities, the East coast, and history. I was a perfect fit, I was told, as I had the right skills to not only instruct students from such prestigious schools, but I had the skills and beliefs to interact with priesthood leaders who are more liberal than the Wasatch Front. But we still had a son in high school, another serving a service mission from home, and they wanted us there by January 1. We had to turn down a dream opportunity, again.
Three months later, I had the opportunity to be the high school soccer coach at Woods Cross where I had returned to teach. Working there again was a dream come true and being able to coach felt natural and right, as I had coached competitive soccer for 15 years and assisted at three different high schools. I interviewed extremely well and, you guessed it, it felt right. And, again you guessed it, I believed it was what I should do. To my surprise, my boss, and his boss, both men I knew and respected came to talk me out of it. It flew in the face of not only precedent allowed to other teachers but what I “knew” to be right. While it was a courteous one-hour discussion, I was frustrated inside.
By the end the decision was “It is your choice, and you won’t be black-listed, but we don’t want you to do it.” At that moment, a line from my patriarchal blessing came word-for-word into my mind. I knew instantly, despite not wanting to know, that I should withdraw my name for consideration. After my bosses left, I disappointedly made the call. We are way passed strike three now in my field of dreams.
Two months later, I received another phone call from headquarters. “Would you be willing to go down to BYU on the teaching rotation?” I was blown away. I hadn’t asked for it, in fact, I had said in my annual placement interview that I was content teaching at Woods Cross Seminary. Excitedly, I said yes! My bosses knew that this was coming but couldn’t tell me at the time, hence their determination to persuade me not to coach.
In the next three months the floodgates opened—my book was published, I did dozens of interviews and podcasts, had an article accepted for publication, and was invited to present at three academic conferences. All this before I set a foot on campus. The week I moved into my new office at BYU, I stared at the “Y” on the mountain. I felt an overwhelming peace that this was where I am supposed to be now. I closed my eyes and saw President Hinckley wink and grin. I smiled back.
I am grateful for Heavenly Parents who watch over me and guide me most especially when I don’t recognize it. Righteous dreams, hopes, and desires are what They have for us on a grander scale than we can even imagine. When life does not go the way we plan or does not seem to match our interpretation in timing or manner of divine answers we’ve received, we can rest assured that it is alright. Mortality is messy and that’s part of the plan. We do the best we can, strive to stay in tune with heaven, and stand still and see the salvation of God. This I know is true: Dreams do come true…eventually.
-Derek