Tale of the Vanished Tennessee Safari Resort
Chapter 4 of Kingdom Lessons Three
Tale of the Vanished Tennessee Safari Resort
November 29, 2016 | wayneoconner | Holy Portal
Dreamed on the morning of November 29, 2016. The landscape looked like the area around the video of the lost logging town from Elkmont, Tennessee that Kathy Lewan had posted yesterday on Facebook, but the only animals I saw, except for a few birds, were monkeys and two types of rhinoceros. 
The dream started with me entering a resort that was tucked out of the way several hours away from populated areas. I only knew one couple, Pam, and Vinney. They are Christian friends who live in New York in real life. Four vans filled with tourists, each with a uniformed resort driver, were also with us. As soon as we pulled into the area, we could see something was wrong. Only two buildings were still standing. Both had huge holes in the sides as if they had been attacked by battering rams. The hotel was two stories tall. The dining area was in a separate one-story building next door to the hotel. Dozens of huts were lying in heaps as if destroyed by a tornado. No resort staff came out to greet us. Our caravan had pulled into what appeared to be a ghost town. We all nervously piled out of the vans and started walking towards the hotel.
My perspective shifted, and rather than looking around through my eyes, I suddenly saw everything from above and behind the group. I then noticed that I was not me. I was a wiry little man with long wavy white hair. My first sense of anxiety, being replaced by unadulterated fear, occurred as I noticed several birds – both native birds such as blue jays, robins, and scarlet tanagers, and also tropical birds such as macaws and parrots – began cawing or chirping frenziedly and then flew away. Monkeys that had been capering around the buildings became silent and raced for the trees. Next a group of rhinos of two types – one which I believe is either extinct or just a creature of fantasy – charged at the group.
We all sprinted for the two standing buildings. One of the “piggers”, as I nicknamed them, charged between myself and Pam and Vinney. I veered left and raced towards the dining hall. Pam and Vinney continued to dash towards the hotel building.
I called the squat hornless type of rhino “piggers” because they were half as tall and twice as wide as the standard rhinos. Rather than having a horn on their snouts, they had a rough bony mass on top of their noses and heads, which had two sections that looked like the hard fan-shaped fungi that grow on the sides of trees. The “pig rhino” almost bumped into me but sailed past and trampled one of the bus drivers and then dragged him off into the woods. The “piggers” would trample one person and then drag them away. The standard rhinos would bellow with a strange high-pitched squealing bark that would suddenly drop into a low groaning snuffle, reminiscent of a whale song before they would spear or trample two or three of the tourists and then rush back into the woods. The “piggers” had course matted hair that stank of rank garbage as if they rolled in rotting fruit, vegetables, and decomposing carcasses. “Piggers” grunted, squealed, and snorted as they dashed madly about, wildly rolling their grotesque heads in an odd macabre slam-dance against earth and sky or any object that barred their path.
Vinney and Pam made it into the hotel building just about the time I entered the dining hall. As I ran into the hall through the opening in the side of the wall, I could see that the dining area was a mass of broken chairs and tables. The kitchen, which was set up like a bed and breakfast along the northeast corner of the building, was in somewhat better condition than the rest of the dining hall but had another hole in the wall just to the right of the double fridge and griddle cook stove. I noticed that the kitchen area, in addition to having cabinets, had a row of shelving about sixteen inches higher than the fridge. Just as a rhino burst in through one of the holes in the west side of the building, I jumped onto a countertop between the stove and fridge. From there, once again glad that I was not myself but a wiry old man, I climbed onto the top of the fridge and from there onto the shelving above the fridge and kitchen cabinets. I yelled at the other screaming, shrieking tourists to do as I was doing, but they ignored me. A few of them managed to evade the rhino, but most were trampled. A few minutes later, a few “piggers” came in and dragged the dead and wounded away.
Some of the survivors wandered into the kitchen again. We whispered to each other. Suddenly, someone mentioned that they were hungry. The food pantries were well stocked, so I grabbed some buns and a leg and thigh of a turkey that had been in the fridge and then climbed back up onto the high shelf. I tried to talk the others into joining me on the shelf. They wouldn’t listen.
When there wasn’t another attack for a while, I finally came down again. I watched out of the holes in the walls and through the broken windows. The rhinos seemed to browse for grass and plants as normal rhinos would do. The “piggers” would eat grass or plants but then would sniff around on the ground. Then the piggish rhinos would rub their bony skulls along the ground, soften the dirt, and then claw down into the earth, pulling out worms and small rodents or nuts and roots.
Suddenly, another rhino charged into the dining hall. Quick as scat, I was up on my perch. I yelled again for the others to join me. They refused and tried to outrun the rhino. A few of them evaded the rhino, but several others died and were soon dragged away by the “piggers”.
Three that had survived the latest attack complained that the rhinos and piggers seemed to act as if I wasn’t there. I replied, “First, I have been protected by God. Second, I am climbing to safety when they attack. Every time I have pleaded with you to come up to the safety of the shelving unit, you keep yelling, ‘You aren’t listening! I said I don’t want to climb up there!’”
Just then the door that exited from the eastern wall of the kitchen opened. It was Pam. As soon as she came in, I warned, “If the rhinos or ‘piggers’ attack, jump up on one of the high wall shelves, and you will be safe!”
Pam said, “The second floor of the hotel, which has the guest rooms is safe. It works the same way. They are hard to get to, though. The stairwells have been broken and battered in by the beasts. We lost most of our group before we could get them up. Vinney is repairing one of the stairwells just enough to make it easier to get upstairs in a hurry if we need to. The social room over there is a shamble just like this!”
When the wind was right, I was able to smell them faintly, as was now the case. Rhinos smelled like dust and wet leather. The “piggers” scent was an overpowering essence of rank pig slop. A monkey ran in and began begging for fruit. We tossed him some fruit. Suddenly he screamed and bolted out of the kitchen.
Just then, more rhinos and “piggers” charged into the room. Pam scrambled up onto another perch. We both yelled for the others to jump up on the shelving unit. Only one of them joined us. The others were horned by the rhinos and then dragged out by the “piggers”.
After the attack was over, Pam and I and the other tourist, exited the kitchen door, peeked both ways to see if there were any rhinos or “piggers” and then dashed across the narrow alley between the dining hall and hotel building to help Vinney. End of dream.
Spiritual Lessons
Psalm 91:1- 16
1 He that dwelleth in the secret place of the most High shall abide under the shadow of the Almighty.
2 I will say of the LORD, He is my refuge and my fortress: my God; in him will I trust.
3 Surely he shall deliver thee from the snare of the fowler, and from the noisome pestilence.
4 He shall cover thee with his feathers, and under his wings shalt thou trust: his truth shall be thy shield and buckler.
5 Thou shalt not be afraid for the terror by night; nor for the arrow that flieth by day;
6 Nor for the pestilence that walketh in darkness; nor for the destruction that wasteth at noonday.
7 A thousand shall fall at thy side, and ten thousand at thy right hand; but it shall not come nigh thee.
8 Only with thine eyes shalt thou behold and see the reward of the wicked.
9 Because thou hast made the LORD, which is my refuge, even the most High, thy habitation;
10 There shall no evil befall thee, neither shall any plague come nigh thy dwelling.
11 For he shall give his angels charge over thee, to keep thee in all thy ways.
12 They shall bear thee up in their hands, lest thou dash thy foot against a stone.
13 Thou shalt tread upon the lion and adder: the young lion and the dragon shalt thou trample under feet.
14 Because he hath set his love upon me, therefore will I deliver him: I will set him on high, because he hath known my name.
15 He shall call upon me, and I will answer him: I will be with him in trouble; I will deliver him, and honour him.
16 With long life will I satisfy him, and shew him my salvation.
While Pam and Vinney are real Christian friends, the dream as a whole may have a different meaning for them than for general readers.
The general intent of the dream meaning seems to be that dark times are coming. For those who trust the “high protection”, which symbolizes the protection of the Lord, there will be safety. That protection may or may not be full protection. The provision may only be minimal.
I believe that the two types of rhinos represent two types of danger. The standard rhino would exemplify natural physical danger while the substandard rhino would represent demonically-enhanced danger. For those who have walked close to the Lord, and have been prepared, they will have a future opportunity in a traumatic situation to help others survive. They won’t save the world, but through the protection and provision of the Lord during a time of great difficulty, they will be used to preserve small numbers. The wiry, old man represents people brought alongside those who have been called to have sanctuaries to help them. Even though this dream is very dark and very bloody, it points to hope for those who serve Jesus during the darkness that will one day come. If one walks out of that protection or has been called to martyrdom, that protection may not remain.
During the dream, opportunities were given, but to benefit, one needed to be obedient. Disobedience may limit or even totally negate protection or provision. This is true, but during the dark time that is one day coming, this principle may mean more than just that obedience may result in avoiding irritation or suffering, but may also mean that disobedience will result in the negation of protection and provision that leads to either quick or lingering death.
Especially here in America, we are very accustomed to living independently, and even those who are “poor” tend to live better than many of those who live in poverty throughout the world. Being able to live in community, which is not easy even for those who have the golden character of the truly mature Christian, is challenging. Living in community, during that dark time to come, will be something the Lord puts in place to provide divine shelter through the storm.
While I viewed the dream through the eyes of the wiry, old man, I am very much unlike that person. Being tall, obese and disabled I would not have been able to hop up on furniture and then high onto a shelf quickly enough to outrun rhinos and “piggers”. I would have been much too slow to outrun even the slowest of those creatures. That said, I have a friend who says that in the spiritual realm I am like a ninja, but because people look at me with their natural eyes rather than spiritual eyes they do not see it.
During the dream, there were those who were warned of danger but refused to listen when given counsel for what to do to receive protection. They were not spared. Not only does this have to do with disobedience but also reminds me that just as there will be spiritual sanctuaries, the Lord himself will also create places of judgment where those called to judgment will flee to during the dark time. Rather than those places being places of safety, they will be places of death and despair. This also reminds me of people who will make the decision to suffer and die rather than become accountable to God.
Ephesians 4:17 – 20
17 This I say therefore, and testify in the Lord, that ye henceforth walk not as other Gentiles walk, in the vanity of their mind,
18 Having the understanding darkened, being alienated from the life of God through the ignorance that is in them, because of the blindness of their heart:
19 Who being past feeling have given themselves over unto lasciviousness, to work all uncleanness with greediness.
20 But ye have not so learned Christ…
The Rhino picture was taken from:
Wikipedia.https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Rhinoceros#/media/File:Waterberg_Nashorn2.jpg
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