Welcome to the Sense of Presence forum. The idea behind it is to provide a judgment-free space to explore unusual experiences. We can use this space to explore when people are most likely to recognize and remember such experiences; how people determine whether an experience is positive or negative; and what science can tell us about these remarkable events. Feel comfortable to share your own experiences and please be respectful of others who do so. Nothing posted on this side of the page is posted in the more public setting of facebook.
If you want to leave a thought without posting it online you can contact the author directly.
Here is one of my favorite experiences from the literature on mysticism:
“It happened in my room in Peterhouse on the evening of 1 February 1913, when I was an undergraduate at Cambridge … There was just the room, with its shabby furniture and the fire burning in the grate and the red-shaded lamp on the table. But the room was filled by a Presence, which in a strange way was about me and in me, like light or warmth. I was overwhelmingly possessed by Someone who was not myself, and yet I felt that I was more myself than I had ever been before. I was filled with an intense happiness, and an almost unbearable joy, such as I had never known before and I have never known since. And over all was a deep sense of peace and security and certainty … It was very wonderful and quite unforgettable …”
This is FC Happold’s account of the experience that moved him to assemble a remarkable anthropology of mysticism.
Have you encountered the presence of God in a similar way?
I want to know why im not connected with my old frineds from high school. I feel like I’m missing out on relationships. I’m also single and want to know why I’m not in a relationship with someone I can call my husband. I hate being alone and I feel the stress inside my body. I also don’t have a job right now. All I do is go to church faithfully but I’m not working unto God to advance in his Kingdom. I know god and I love him with all my heart but need to find those connections with others that allows me to feel connected again. I need to know that I’m loved and want to be in a strong relationships with other Christians. Please let me know what I could do to advance god’s kingdom. Thanks.. KIMVi
I am just finishing a Masters degree in Divinity, My wife is a consultant Psychiatrist. When she told me her Father was ill a few Mondays ago I received a message very clearly – just one word ‘Thursday’. I suggested she should contact her brother and mother (Her parents separated some years ago) and ask them to fly in from where they live to see the old man within the next 2 days – before thursday.
Despite the old man being released from hospital on Monday afternoon – her atheist brother arrived on Wednesday afternoon and was present when the old man passed on at 2 am on Thursday morning. Her slightly less atheist (more agnostic) mother was too busy. When she arrived at lunchtime onThursday he was already in the morgue. All she could do was help organise the funeral.
I study the scriptures most days – I get a word from the Lord that is as clear as that about every 5 or 10 years.
Is that the sort of thing that we are meant to post about on this forum?
I appreciate your hoensty here, Melissa. I was (am) so much like you when it comes to sharing my faith. Until this semester when God placed an atheist in my class (and I teach at a Christian college!) . . . at the same time that my pastor is speaking on God’s Answer to Atheism. I have started to realize, through wonderful discussions with my student (he’s really coming along, praise God!) that I should not be afraid to talk to people who don’t believe, because they are looking for the same thing we’re all looking for peace, joy, Jesus. The difference is, I have the TRUTH. With the truth on my side I have nothing to fear.
You assume much with neither experience nor evidence. The “atheist” in your class sounds like an agnostic to me, “someone who can’t make up his mind,” who wants it both ways, who is insecure and unclear. “We are all atheists about most of the gods that humanity has ever believed in. Some of us just go one god further,” Richard Dawkins in The God Delusion.
By-and-large, “people who don’t believe” have removed doubt from the equation, are NOT looking for the same thing “we” are “all looking for, peace, joy….” The consensus is that we Atheists have found truth, shaken off the enslaving mythology of deities, and have found peace and joy in ourselves, not in Jesus – whose historical existence I personally doubt and there is no evidence of – or any other sacred cow.
I ‘lost’ gØd and lost the fear of death, so essential to religious faith. I lost gØd and found peace of mind. I lost gØd and gained the joys of intellectual freedom and honesty. I lost gØd and gained reason. The moment you embrace gØds you abandon reason. The absurdity of gØd is irreconcilable with reason.
As an artist, a painter, I am lost in the only ‘prayer’ I know, my work, most often an out of body” experience, a pseudo-psychotic episode of sorts. In looking at the end product, I “don’t know how the image got there.” I listen to my inner voice and see my inner vision. To quote the painter Francis Bacon, “There is no such thing as inspiration, only regular work.” It comes from within, from your own personal effort.
In Atheism I found everything religion promised and couldn’t deliver and I assume personal responsibility for my failures and successes. I accept my finality as natural. What more do I need from life? I am content: born gØdless (as we all are), raised Catholic, Jesuit educated (who taught me to doubt all and question everything), reborn Atheist, good without gØds. I don’t discuss gØd. There is nothing to discuss. I don’t proselytize. I respond to the gØdly when pressed, as Ms Luhrmann has been doing in her unsubstantiated and unsupportable articles in The New York Times, if only because I’ve grown tired of religionists shoving their beliefs, delusions and hallucinations down our throats.
Hello, enjoyed reading the article which appeared on CNN this morning. Yes I have frequent encounters…..I pray throughout the day, although my morning prayer is very ritual. Almost every morning, when I have lift my arms to the sky in prayer, I feel the very strong shiver that enters from my right hand side and takes over my whole body….I know it is God, who is showing his presence and to also let me know, he has heard my prayers. This also happens when I help a needy individual and ask God to accept my donation in his mighty name…..right now that I am writing to you, he is present by me, since the wonderful shivers are going through me…..!
I am a christian and I have felt this many times, in some measure I have felt it all the time since becoming a Christian.
Yes. I had the exact experience–only once–40 years ago. I was 18, laying in bed, looking at the night stars and reflecting on the size of the Universe. After a while, my imagination had me way out there and my thought turned to the relative size of Earth from such a distance. To get things in scale I threw my own little self into the equation. I became so insignificant in comparison that I seemed to vanish into nothingness. In that instant a rush seemed to fill me, making me literally rise up. A sense of oneness with all, perfect understanding, accompanied by an all-encompassing presence of love. The effect was literally cleansing, leaving me with an image of purest water having washed through my veins. I concluded it must be a religious thing, although I went many years without mentioning it. I read a similar account by Thomas Merton years later, which led me to read Andrew Newberg’s books. Whatever the cause, I chalk it up to a real experience.
I have never told anyone this. I am a secular liberal. I was going thru a divorce around 1980 and was so afraid. I remember thinking, “Dear God, what am I going to do?” I heard a voice that said “You don’t have to do anything, you just have to be.” Not a thought that would have originated from my mind. And a voice totally outside my thinking voice. I received the same message again around that time, and have never had the experience again.
On Sunday, August 11, 2002, I awoke late, around 9:00 a.m., fully rested after a good eight hour sleep. I was lying on my back in bed. I clearly heard the voice of my mother calling, “Dave . . . Dave.” It was alarming. My mother, in her seventies, lived in a nursing home about ten miles from my home. She had Alzheimer’s. Because of the sad mixture of feelings I experienced seeing her like that, I had avoided seeing her for a few months since a family get together for her May birthday. Although her sight was nearly gone, along with her memory, she always recognized my voice.
That morning, when I heard her voice, I responded to her with my own voice in my head, guiltily, saying “I’m coming to see you today, Mom.” Shortly after getting out of bed, I called my sister to see if my mother had some recent health setback. She told me that she had seen her last week and that she was fine as she could be in her condition.
I went to see my mother that morning with my wife and son. She was cheerful. She seemed happy to see us. We had a conversation that was mostly spoken pleasantries that she heard, acknowledged, but clearly did not understand. Her last words when we were leaving were, “There’s that blue kitty again.” She had frequent benign hallucinations. Unexpectedly, she died of a heart attack four days later. Obviously, I’m very glad I heard her voice in my head that Sunday morning. I consider it the grace of God, mercifully sparing me the guilt of the neglect I would have endlessly felt had I not seen her shortly before she passed away. I have not heard any voices since then.
Around 1988, I told some of these stories to a Roman Catholic nun who was waiting outside the law office where I worked in Monterey, California at the time. I asked her what she thought. She smiled. “The language of Heaven,” she summed up. Catholic or protestant, evangelical or mainline, regardless of the denomination or non-denomination, Christian true believers know the language of Heaven. Their God is a living God who is at work in their lives. I am grateful that God cared enough to provide me with supernatural confirmation of His presence in the natural world.
see more at http://betweentwocities.com/spiritual-memoir/
When I was 6 years old in the 1950′s, my maternal grandmother came from Houston to St. Louis to visit us for several weeks. While she was there, my mother decided to go to downtown St. Louis to one of the large department stores to shop. My grandmother didn’t want to go, so she stayed home while my mother and I went shopping. We had been at the store for an hour or so, when all of a sudden, my mother distinctly heard my grandmother say “Oh Clotile (my mother’s name), Clotile, why can’t you be here.” It was so distinct that my mother abruptly stopped shopping and started frantically looking for my grandmother, whom she assumed had somehow managed to come to the department store – something that would have been impossible because she had no transportation from our house and would have had no idea where the store was located – she did not know her way around St. Louis. My mother had me help look for her. When we couldn’t find her on the floor we were on, my mother had her paged over the store intercom. She tried to call her, but our home phone was busy and she could not get through. Frantic, my mother abruptly stopped shopping. She was looking for a wedding present and had been on a true shopping mission, so to just totally stop and leave was incredulous to me – we had planned to spend the day in downtown St. Louis. We went home immediately and found that my grandmother had received a call from relatives in Houston telling her that her son had just died from a massive heart attack. When she hung up from that call, she had said to no one – she was home alone – “Oh Clotile, Clotile, why can’t you be here.” She then started calling other family members, which is why we could not get her on the phone.
I did not hear the voice, but my mother said it sounded like my grandmother was only a few feet away from her, and it was very distinct. Neither of these ladies were mentally “off”, and I don’t know of another incident like this. My mother was a Rice University graduate and held professional jobs all her life.
I am now 60+ years old, and my conclusion from this dramatic experience is that there are, in fact, other means of communication that few of us experience and that we don’t – with our modern, western civilization understanding of the world – understand. I firmly believe experiences like this cannot all be dismissed as some manifestation of mental illness or brain dysfunction or cultural training.
When I was in my early 20′s I was in the midst of turmoil. My father had recently died from chronic alcoholism at the age of 57. I was stumped as to what my life path should be. In about two or three instances of great inner turmoil, I clearly heard a woman’s voice- strong and firm (yet gentle) giving me encouragement and guidance. I often wonder if that voice was a manifestation of the Holy Spirit.
Since I was so upset and didn’t know what else to do I went home. I had never prayed anything but emergency prayers in my life, you know, God pleeeeeease don’t let this airplane fall out of the sky, I had had a couple of close calls, one in a jungle in Africa and believe me, I was praying. Or God, if you get me this job, I promise I will do something, not do something. I truly did not know how to talk to God but I remember saying, “You know how terrible I feel and I don’t want to die and I don’t want to live like this any more. Please help me”.
The Lord spoke to my heart for the first time I ever really heard Him. His message was clear and unmistakable, in words I heard in my brain not in my ears. These are the exact words He said, “Forgive those people. Don’t look behind yourself at them, look ahead to Me.” Instead of the suicide thing that is what filled my brain! I almost fell over, I could not believe that God Himself had a message for me. I was surprised to know I needed to forgive my parents, but I immediately did. The Lord delivered me at that moment 24 years ago and I never felt suicidal again. I didn’t even know the Lord but I was already experiencing His power. He was “calling me out of darkness into His marvelous light”.
The first entry here of FC Happold’s experience describes mine better than I’ve ever been able to. It was in 1981 when I was a sophomore at the University of Arizona, pursuing a degree in Aerospace Engineering. I was reading a book about the Shroud of Turin out of scientific interest, curious about the results of the scientific investigations performed a few years prior. I was in my apartement, alone in a bedroom set up as an office. The experience came on suddenly but gently. I simply put the book down and let it happen…
Hi, can you say more about this? It sounds so interesting …
Around ten years ago, the chairman of the board of elders of our small church stood up and announced, “Pastor S. has something to tell you.” The pastor, pale and shaken, confessed to a 13 year pornography habit. The next morning, my wife woke up and told me, “That’s strange. I just had a dream and was given two Bible references, and I have no idea what they say.” I replied, “I just had a dream and was given one reference, and I have no idea what it says.” When we looked the verses up, they said, essentially, “Expel the immoral brother,” “I was homeless,” and “You took me in.” We told the church board about the dreams and said we felt we were to open up a room in our home–my wife’s office–for the pastor, whose wife had kicked him out. He stayed with us for five months. That by no means solved all of the problems, but the message coming from dreams of two individuals seemed to be a clear direction for an action to be taken at the time.
I consider myself an Evangelical Christian like you spoke of, but I am not affiliated with the Vineyard church. I am a member of a non-denominational Charismatic Christian church. I do believe that God speaks in a way similar to what you talked about, but I believe He also (and more prominently) speaks to us through His Word (the Bible). As Christians, we believe that the Word is inspired of God so even though it was written by men, it is His words to us. While it is certainly an ancient text, it is described as “profitable for doctrine, reproof, for correction, for instruction in righteousness” (2 Timothy 3:16). So, let me give you an example of how I believe He speaks through the Word.
I normally spend about 45 minutes in the morning studying my Bible and praying. I have a daily devotional that I read, but I also use other references such as books by pastors or sermons from podcasts. Sometimes I’ll play worship music. Often times there will be a common theme throughout all of these sources, sometimes there will be the exact same scripture. Normally for me, when God is trying to share something with me I will encounter that scripture three times (which is the Biblical number for completion). I remember one morning where I woke up and a certain scripture came to mind as soon as I stepped out of bed (and we’re not talking about the super common scriptures that everyone knows and pastors use all time, these are obscure scriptures that unless you read the Bible often, you’ve probably never heard them). As I sat down to read my devotional, it was a study of that exact same verse. Later that night as I got into bed, I opened my book that I read before I go to bed at night and it was talking about the exact same scripture.
Another time, I picked a random song in iTunes and the singer was singing a specific chapter of Psalms. I opened my devotional afterwards and it was studying the same chapter. I remember another time that I was studying a specific verse, and I just didn’t understand what it was trying to say so I read it over and over in different translations. I used my Greek dictionary and different concordances. I probably sat there and studied this verse for at least an hour trying to understand what God was saying. I finally gave up and decided to go to bed. I opened up the book I read before going to bed and the author was talking about that exact same verse and he talked about it with such clarity and understanding that I immediately understood the meaning.
I had actually been conducting my own study over the last few weeks on the topic of “the Word”, but I didn’t really know why I was or how I was supposed to apply it to my life at the time. When I was listening to your show, I starting thinking about all the things I had been studying and how the Word is the primary way that I hear from God. This morning as I was thinking about what I wanted to write to you, I picked up my morning book and read this, “The Word of God will not change for anyone. The word of God is like a two-edged sword, dividing even the soul and the spirit (Heb 4:12), and it is all the time putting away what man says and giving you what God says.” (Smith Wigglesworth on Heaven).
On November 5, 2011, while walking for exercise, I thought of a former pastor of a large church we attended for seven years, from 2000 through 2007. Call him Pastor John. When I got home from the walk, I sent him this email:
Pastor John:
I was walking today listening to Matthew’s gospel on my iPod, and I thought of you. We attended your church for nearly seven years. I still listen to your doctrines of grace series on my iPod once a year or so. About nine or ten years ago you spoke in your sermon about vacationing at the Sea Ranch in Northern California. In 2002 I read a short poem, “Afternoon Walk: Sea Ranch” in Poetry Magazine, and I meant to send it to you. I forgot. I remembered today, found it in my archives, and hope it is God’s timing. I lived in Carmel, CA in the late 80s and drove by the Sea Ranch several times driving up Highway 1, looking out over the ice plants at the sea as I drove by. The poem moved me and I only drove by the Sea Ranch. Here is the poem, and I have attached it as PDF in case you like it and want to share it.
AFTERNOON WALK: THE SEA RANCH
In memory of E.L.G.
Late light, uneven mole-gnawed meadow,
gullies, freshets, falls, whose start and speckle
Hopkins would have loved – and you – you too,
who loved the sheen and shade, the forest dapple
where grass meets cypress just beyond the house –
you’d praise the mushroom-sprout, the chilly glisten
as the hedgerow folds into the solstice
and suddenly the last crisp leaves unfasten . . .
This time of year, this place, light dims at the pace
of a long late afternoon walk, light seems to slow
and sorrow as the meadow turns its face
into your unlived season, the winter hollow
where only a steep sky, in quarter inches,
adjusts descending sun, ascending branches.
SANDRA M. GILBERT
Poetry
October/November 2002
The “Hopkins” reference is surely to Gerald Manley Hopkins and his memorable nature poems written in 1877, of which this is his most famous:
GOD’S GRANDEUR
The world is charged with the grandeur of God.
It will flame out, like shining from shook foil;
It gathers to a greatness, like the ooze of oil
Crushed. Why do men then now not reck his rod?
Generations have trod, have trod, have trod;
And all is seared with trade; Bleared, smeared with toil;
And wears man’s smudge and shares man’s smell: the soil
Is bare now, nor can foot feel, being shod.
And for all this, nature is never spent;
There lives the dearest freshness deep down things;
And though the last lights off the black West went
Oh, morning, at the brown brink eastward, springs —
Because the Holy Ghost over the bent
World broods with warm breast and with ah! bright wings.
———————————-
The first poem in the email that I had forgotten to send him for 9 years describes the memory of walking through the Sea Ranch, a Northern California resort on the shore of the Pacific Ocean, with a deceased loved one, likely the poet’s spouse.
A few days later I was at Starbucks and noticed a younger man reading a book by R. C. Sproul, a favorite Christian theologian and writer. He was also writing in a notebook. I struck up a conversation, telling him how much I admired R. C. Sproul, and that Sproul’s book Chosen by God was one of my favorite books – a clear and concise discussion of predestination and Calvinism. He said it was also one of his. We were both Calvinists. [As I see it, John Calvin adopts the doctrine of election and predestination first articulated by the Apostle Paul in his letters, and then by St. Augustine. Calvin relies on Scripture and Augustine, and states the doctrine so well, that his name was attached to the Biblical doctrine. Martin Luther also accepted the Augustinian view of predestination and election].
The young man said he was a pastor of a church nearby, that he had come to Calvinism gradually, having been educated at an Arminian seminary, and was now a Presbyterian pastor, in the same denomination as Sproul. Calvinists believe that God alone saves people — He chooses His elect before the foundation of the world, his grace is irresistible and once a person is saved, he will persevere. Arminians believe that God, and man through the grace of God, and his free will, chooses God, that therefore God elects believers who choose Him, His grace is not irresistible, man can resist, and that once saved, a believer can fall away and lose his salvation.
I told him that I had come to agree with Calvinism over time in the late 90s, and that I became firm in that doctrine from the teaching of Pastor John, to whom I wrote the email above. He said he was a good friend of Pastor John. Then, he told me that Pastor John’s wife had died a week ago. I had not heard about her death.
I was shocked to hear this. I had just sent Pastor John a poem about walking at the Sea Ranch with a deceased loved one within a week after his wife had died, a dear loved one with whom he had surely walked at the Sea Ranch. I hope that God wanted Pastor John to have that poem now, and that it was a blessing to him in his grief, and something he could refer to in the years ahead to recall fond memories. If it was as I hope, then surely it was God’s timing for me to remember to send it to him after 9 years!
I thought that I would share with you, one of my many strange experiences. Let’s call it “God and the Paperclip” First, a quick back-round. I was raised Catholic. Believed in God, because it’s what I was taught, but never really experienced God for myself. Looking back it seemed like the fear of God was to be the main lesson. That’s all a little fuzzy now. Closing in on 49 years of age. Wow! I digress. Back to the paperclip. My instrument of choice is the guitar but a friend of mine approached me to play the Bass guitar for a church service. I said yes and found myself really enjoying the services held by Pastor Lee Eclov so I attended for a couple of years. There were times where I could sense lulls in my faith.
I assumed that everyone had them and didn’t give it much thought. I guess you could say that I chocked it up to being human. One evening , my girlfriend and I headed off for the evening rehearsal. (the song that night was called “Man of Integrity” written by Warren Sullivan. The only song that moved me to tears to that point in my life) Moving along……. I was at the bottom of one of my above mentioned “lulls”, so when we got to the rehearsal, I found myself going through the motions. I was sitting in the front of the auditorium, waiting until I was called to “assume the Rock Position”. As I sat there waiting, I noticed a paperclip at my feet. What is the first thing you do, when you’re sitting idle, and find an unassuming paperclip? You straighten it out! You make it into a ring and wrap it around your finger. You make it into an “almost square” cause there is that little space missing that just doesn’t quite make it square. I’m sure that I had contorted that poor paperclip to the point of breaking. At one point, I had ahold of both ends and I was spinning it between my fingers. I noticed that it felt a little off balance. As I looked down I saw something quite astonishing. And for the record, I don’t ever recall feeling truly astonished before that moment. Perhaps I didn’t know the true meaning of the word until that day. There in my hands, was Christ on the cross! Tanya, I don’t think I can accurately express the level of detail or how incredible it was to scale. My first reaction was to look up at the Crucifix that was there in the church. I should mention that my heart rate was off the charts. The detail was ridiculous. The head was in perfect proportion to the body. The arms were exactly to scale with the legs. The head was cast down in the same manner as the Crucifix. The legs were overlapped in the exact manner too! I wanted to yell out, look at this! I didn’t ,but it was close. When my girlfriend finished her part of the rehearsal, she came down from the stage and I showed her the paperclip. She said, Wow! that is really awesome! I explained that I hadn’t fashioned it….it just happened. I’m telling you, Tanya I never looked at paperclip, after I had the failed attempt at that darn evasive “square” (can’t be done). I tried to recreate my creation a few years later. Not even close. I kept that paperclip in my wallet for a few years until ultimately it disintegrated. Seemed that I got what I needed, when I needed it.
I had the privilege of listening to you talk about your new book on NPR yesterday, and while I did not necessarily agree with everything that you said, I truly enjoyed listening. I wanted to share something with you that I thought you might find interesting since it relates to the idea of God speaking, but is a somewhat different perspective.
I consider myself an Evangelical Christian like you spoke of, but I am not affiliated with the Vineyard church. I am a member of a non-denominational Charismatic Christian church. I do believe that God speaks in a way similar to what you talked about, but I believe He also (and more prominently) speaks to us through His Word (the Bible). As Christians, we believe that the Word is inspired of God so even though it was written by men, it is His words to us. While it is certainly an ancient text, it is described as “profitable for doctrine, reproof, for correction, for instruction in righteousness” (2 Timothy 3:16). So, let me give you an example of how I believe He speaks through the Word.
I normally spend about 45 minutes in the morning studying my Bible and praying. I have a daily devotional that I read, but I also use other references such as books by pastors or sermons from podcasts. Sometimes I’ll play worship music. Often times there will be a common theme throughout all of these sources, sometimes there will be the exact same scripture. Normally for me, when God is trying to share something with me I will encounter that scripture three times (which is the Biblical number for completion). I remember one morning where I woke up and a certain scripture came to mind as soon as I stepped out of bed (and we’re not talking about the super common scriptures that everyone knows and pastors use all time, these are obscure scriptures that unless you read the Bible often, you’ve probably never heard them). As I sat down to read my devotional, it was a study of that exact same verse. Later that night as I got into bed, I opened my book that I read before I go to bed at night and it was talking about the exact same scripture.Another time, I picked a random song in iTunes and the singer was singing a specific chapter of Psalms. I opened my devotional afterwards and it was studying the same chapter. I remember another time that I was studying a specific verse, and I just didn’t understand what it was trying to say so I read it over and over in different translations. I used my Greek dictionary and different concordances. I probably sat there and studied this verse for at least an hour trying to understand what God was saying. I finally gave up and decided to go to bed. I opened up the book I read before going to bed and the author was talking about that exact same verse and he talked about it with such clarity and understanding that I immediately understood the meaning.
I had actually been conducting my own study over the last few weeks on the topic of “the Word”, but I didn’t really know why I was or how I was supposed to apply it to my life at the time. When I was listening to your show, I starting thinking about all the things I had been studying and how the Word is the primary way that I hear from God. This morning as I was thinking about what I wanted to write to you, I picked up my morning book and read this, “The Word of God will not change for anyone. The word of God is like a two-edged sword, dividing even the soul and the spirit (Heb 4:12), and it is all the time putting away what man says and giving you what God says.” (Smith Wigglesworth on Heaven).
There I was, in the Autumn of 1994, in the Manhattan Beach house, very nice, of Lance, a very comely, eloquent, and recently divorced young man, a corporate executive, staring at the nape of his neck and his blond hairline, about to make love to him. We’d made love once before, after our second date, in my Beverly Hills flat. Lance, by his own admission, was adopted and educated in Switzerland, by a very wealthy Mormon couple. I met him whilst out sipping cocktails, smoking Dunhill’s, after work, in one of my favorite West Hollywood watering holes, when I lived in Beverly Hills and worked in Century City.
Following in the footsteps of my high-school hero, James Joyce, and the hero of A Portrait of an Artist as a Young Man, Stephen Daedalus, I decided, after much thought and prayer, believe it or not, that The Bible and God were nothing more than a myth. This belief, I must say, was reinforced by my freshman year formation at Stanford under the tutelage of my advisor, an Andover-Harvard educated Marxist/materialist historian. Mine was a lost faith, totally consistent with the ideas about world myth promoted by the lapsed Roman Catholic Joseph Campbell, professor of myth at, I believe, Bryn Mawr. But, really, my lost faith happened long before I reached Stanford or even heard of the books on myth by Joseph Campbell. (“Joseph”…foster-father of Christ, his protector and Mary’s…how ironic, in Professor Campbell’s case.)
Staring at the nape of Lance’s neck, looking forward to another night of love-making, feeling very loose and relaxed, having consumed two martinis, earlier that evening, suddenly, I hear a voice.
It speaks from inside me, I note, as Lance hears nothing.
It says, in about three sentences, something to this effect: “Down that way lies death.” I tried but couldn’t commit to memory verbatim what the voice said. But, I was able to summarize the voice’s message, in the manner above, and remember that. Again, the voice used I’d say two to three sentences, which my mind crunched down to one.
While it said what it said, I felt something, like a vibration, but not quite a shock, move through me. The vibration seemed to push out all the intoxication or inebriation, from the two cocktails, and I was, in the space of five seconds, rendered from moderately buzzed to totally sober. That was amazing enough, but what was suddenly happening to me did not stop there.
Once sober, I felt in addition to being sober, more rational, logical, and intelligent than ever before! In that moment, I clearly recall thinking, Wow! Let me take the SAT, GRE, LSAT, again, right now! For I’d score within the 99th percentile. (For the record, my GRE score in logic or analytical thinking was above the 90th percentile and my English or verbal score above the 95th.) I felt so pure, new, and mentally powerful! I was made “pure” and “sober” and hyper-rational to choose. I didn’t understand why, but I definitely saw this connection, in an instant.
My mind then began to analyze the message or warning of the voice. I thought, “Death,” uh-oh, what could this mean?
I thought, first, a physical death. Lance must have some deadly STD, like HIV. Or, may be we will do drugs, later on, and I will overdose. (For the record, I was not then or have I ever been, a drug-user.)
I paused, considering these two possibilities.
Then, suddenly, against my own lack of faith, my own agnosticism, and my own personal conclusion that the Bible and God were merely primitive myths, I thought, Or, the “death” mentioned by the voice was the death of the soul. An eternal death. Hell. The willful, knowing, and reflected upon rejection by a human spirit of the holy life of the following/people (“church”) of God (see Lev. 20, 13 and 1 Cor. 6, 9) and all relationship to God the Father (“[B]e holy; for I, the LORD, your God, am holy,” Lev. 20, 7) through God the Son in union with God the Spirit, not only on earth but for all eternity. This seemed to strike home; it seemed a real possibility! And, both these definitions of “death,” physical and spiritual, which shot through my mind within the first 5-10 seconds or so, following the out-of-the blue, shocking, internal utterance, seemed to be in play as real possibilities, insofar as the meaning of the absolutely beautiful warning was concerned.
Lastly, after my instantaneous conclusion that the “death” warned of was more than simply a “death” of the body, but one also of the soul, my mind immediately and automatically began to analyze the voice giving the warning. It was nothing like any earthly voice I’d ever heard. It was so intricate, elaborate, and utterly beautiful. It was very near to what I might describe as Shakespeare, at his very best. A door-sculpture at Chartres. A piece of stained glass at Notre Dame de Paris. In other words, this was not “me.” This was not my or our modern American English. This was not my conscience, my internal do-this or don’t-do-that voice, speaking, one heard with the ears of the heart, not the head.
This voice was something else, something older, something so old, in fact, that I was overcome by this vision of an ancient, craggy, desert landscape, in my effort to place this voice, while it spoke. And, it was from this ancient place that the truly unique and beautiful voice spoke. In the moment, I sensed that this voice was coming to me, speaking to me, from someplace on on earth, but from a place and time before man began. That’s what I concluded, on the spot, which, along with everything else about these five seconds, utterly shocked, baffled, and troubled me. I was perfectly sane. I didn’t believe in God. I found Lance comely, accomplished, and charming, if not lovable. What the hell was going on? I questioned. The voice and its message stopped me dead in my tracks.
I’d never experienced anything like this before or, thankfully, since (for how unnerving it is for something like this to happen).
Given this, I felt that I had to set aside the gifts that Lance had given to me that evening; that I had to set aside our brand new relationship, which was totally new and different for me…so seductive, so mesmerizing, so seemingly good; and that I had to get out of there, his Manhattan Beach house, and think about what just happened, about what just transpired…and about what it meant for me and my life…the voice…the message/warning…the vision of a pre-man earth…and all!
It was so powerful. What occurred. It changed my life. Totally! In an instant! Although I was not given any charge from God, like St. Paul during this conversion experience, I can definitely empathize with him as a man who was hit and changed by what only can be called a supernatural experience, something beyond the laws of nature, reason, or everyday reality. I may not have been knocked off a draft animal and blinded, but trust me when I say that it sure felt like it!
So, within about fives minutes of the internal warning, I made up some lame excuse, left, hopped in my car, and hit the 405 Freeway headed north, thinking, “Oh my God! There is a God! NO WAY!!!”
I would see Lance again twice to sort of work out the break up. It was hard. It was clear than we’d fallen in love. In fact, his confessions of love, before that fateful night, that ended it all, were honestly spoken so beautifully that they were as deep and remarkable, in every way, as any poetry I’d ever read! His words to me, the words that seduced me, were astounding in their beauty that on one occasion I wondered, Could they be real? They’re so perfect? So…immortal?
Nevertheless, that night I was given a choice: to choose love of Lance (and death) or love of God (and life). In an instant, I guess the Catholic boy in me chose God. I’ve never regretted it. It has never felt wrong.
In 1996, Lance died. I suspect near or with his parents, who lived in Washington. I don’t know; we’d gone our separate ways by then. I don’t what he died of, but it doesn’t matter, for in my gut, I know. I know. At the tender age of 30, Lance passed out of this life two days before I would turn 32. Years after his death, I would research and find this out, trying to make sense of this whole experience.
So, the voice spoke truth. It did not lie. And, it saved me life, not only my life here on earth, but my eternal life. For that, I will be forever grateful.
It took me five years to speak about this experience to another human being, a fellow law firm lawyer, over cocktails, who, at the end of the night, asked if I wanted to share her bed. She was engaged, and I really didn’t think it, well, “appropriate.” So, I, as graciously as possible, declined, despite her graduating number one in her law school class and being quite cute. (For the record, she broke off her engagement.) Funny, I thought sharing the experience would have the very opposite effect on her; but, alas, it didn’t. I think she found it “sexy.” I don’t know, I’ve never been quite able to figure out women. They are very different creatures from men.
I’ve shared my conversion story with my family, friends, and a select group of priests and nuns. The Catholics (and Reform Christians) all think my conversion experience to be very much like St. Paul’s and to be a genuine mystical experience and that I may have a calling, a gift, and/or a mission of some sort, which I must discern. However, the others — namely, my atheist friends — think I lost my mind, at least momentarily, that night at Lance’s.
For the record, I’ve sought out two professional psychological opinions, regarding this incident. And, I was told, by two separate psyche professionals, the exact same thing, that the “voice” in 1994 was NOT “the kind of voice that people suffering from psychosis hear.” Then, both professionals said, with over 40 years experience between them, in very serious, muted, disinterested voices, “The voice you heard was, in my opinion, God.” Of course, I had to undergo a battery of questions and a number of sessions, before this conclusion was reached. The last psyche professional, who switched careers from Christian ministry to psychology and who held a M.Div. from the Fuller Theological Seminary, became convinced in the course of our analysis of the 1994 incident that I had a calling or vocation. I disagreed and continue to disagree with this, even if this opinion is shared by others who know me very well. The beautiful, truthful, graceful voice that spoke to me, only once, that e vening in ’94, did not call me to the priesthood. Nor did it give me a charge, duty, or responsibility, as it did St. Paul, some 2,000 years ago. In that regard, our conversion experiences differ. The voice merely warned me. It saved me from a potentially bad or deadly outcome out of love, divine love. Nice.
Frankly, I wish these psyche professionals said, my dear friend, modern medicine (i.e., the DSM IV) tells us that you suffer from such and such a disorder; here, take this pill! Then, I could forget all about God, religion, the law of love, sin, works, judgment, Purgatory, Heaven, and Hell, and all the rest! And, go back to living my life, my humble, simple, anonymous, sensual life, according to my own lights.
But, alas, I can’t. God (and my totally logical/rational conscience) won’t let me.
Needless to say, after much thought and exploration, I ended up back in the Church and her sacraments and prayer-life (i.e., Liturgy of the Hours).
Unlike other men with a gay or bisexual past, I don’t feel as though I’m “living a lie.” On the contrary, I feel, very much, to be “living the truth.” A truth that I don’t impose on anybody else. A truth that is entirely my own. Appropriate for me and all that I am and ever will be.
Of course, this does not mean that I don’t believe that the truth God spoke and sent vibrating through every cell of body that night isn’t an objective reality or impartial truth that others would be wise to heed. For truth is truth, and I do believe that what was given me, that night, was objective, eternal, universal truth. I just don’t go around beating up people, straight, gay, lesbian, bisexual, transgender, or otherwise with it. That is NOT me. Moreover, as the New Testament teaches, it is the Spirit who truly converts the heart, not man.
I initially thought that I wouldn’t, or shouldn’t, share my Pauline conversion experience. But, people need to hear it. People need to be reminded that there is something more to life than what our current physics, etc., can reduce to a mathematical formula; that the narrative given humankind through The Bible is no accident; we are beings of consciousness, consciousness stored in memories, memories stored in narratives; God knows this, for He created us this way. People need to know that we are connected to a much larger drama, and that we all play our respective roles or parts, whether we like it or not, or even if we realize it or not.
Don’t be afraid. Take courage (Bon courage). And, play your part.
Make a difference. Life is short. Tomorrow is not guaranteed.
(read more, if interested, on my blog http://cdleightonjr.blogspot.com/)
Social Networking satisfies teegrneas need of imaginary audience where they think the world must know what is happening to them. There are teegrneas who constantly log onto facebook to update everything they are doing such as I am in class or I am hungry. They believe that people will read their status and maybe other people will respond or comment on their post. Social networking also provides a channel for sympathy because when you put up a pessimistic status message, many people will either click like on the post or comment on it, which generate more negative energy and the person might feel more need to update the sad stories about their lives. One thing parents and teachers should do is to acknowledge what these teegrneas are going through. We should provide comfort and positive sympathy toward these kids. They need to know that you care about them and God cares about them too. No matter who what where and what, God is always watching and ready to comfort us. I find that kids who have a strong relationship with parents and God are less likely to log on to these social networking websites because the people around them satisfy their need of attention.
At a very young age, my mother told me that Jesus lives in my heart. With the faith of the child that I was, I accepted that, and He has always loved me and guided me, even when I was ignoring him during my teens and twenties.
When I was 27, too many things were not going the way I wanted them to. I was layed off of my job, my boyfriend of 5 years broke up with me, my best friend moved to CA, my childhood dog died and I came home one day to find my fridge was broken and all the food was spoiling. That pushed me over the edge. I cried and cried and just kind of asked, no one in particular, why everyone I love leaves. Why things have to always change. Then, over my right shoulder, I heard as clearly in my heart as if it were spoken out loud, “I’m still here. I never change.” I turned to look, and tho I didn’t really see Him with my eyes, Jesus was standing right there, smiling with open arms.
Yes, you make my point. Spinoza tried to make it all go away. As it happens I AM aionstgc about the spectral martians, in exactly the way I am about gaad. I cannot a priori disprove their existence or non-existence. But, and this is what you don’t seem to grasp, like gaad, their existence or non-existence is of such screamingly small importance to me, of absolutely no smidgeon of relevance to anything I do or think, that to all intent and purpose I am in fact an effective non-believer.However note effective , use of the fact that I can’t disprove their existence is enough for me to claim definitional aionstgcism.Clear?
Thanks for the post Nick. I am always trinyg to find entry points for other educators to get involved with social media and the discussion of advocacy is a great way. At least on local terms, I would like to think that all educators are advocates for their students and/or their schools. Becoming active just to advocate for what is going on locally would be a great start. Once people see the positive influence they can have in smaller circles maybe they will have the confidence to take their message to a larger audience?
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My name is Matthew. I was a former pursuer of all worldly vice. For some reason, God chose to save me from my madness and foolishness and turn my heart upside down from my old loves of perversion, lying, adultery, deception, greed to a newfound desire to please him and walk in righteousness. The change of heart was given to me but I was not looking for it. July 20th 2008, I was at the end of my rope. Being audited by the IRS, juggling my deceptions to my then wife and family, being almost pennyless, I was told to go to my living room couch by that “voice”. I was interested in this tug on my soul for I never had heard a voice like this speak to my heart. The only voice I knew to obey was the one that seemed natural and that natural voice only led me to do horrific things. But this voice spoke peace to me. But it also was one that I didn’t have the power to ignore and I am admitting I didn’t want to ignore it. It was conquering me as I picked my journal and pen to take with me. I sat down, was given the ability to see my life come to a head. In my soul, my mess was laid before me and I knew of nothing else but to look to Christ. He presented himself to me in such a compelling way that I saw glory in his life, death and resurrection from death. I thought, I wanted that, whatever “that” was. In a moment, a flash, a blinking of an eye, I was granted a new mind, a new heart and a new longing for something. God had conquered me. I mean really conquered me. I wanted to be clean. In that moment, I was free from the shame, the robe of iniquity that I was clothed in was removed from me and I had a new clean rob to wear. I walked away from that couch free to pursure God with no more hindrances. Free to love in ways I never dreamed my heart could experience. I was free to lay my life down for others instead of using them for my own perverse reasons. Christ saved me and still continually holds me.
I was 29 and on my second post-doc as a theoretical physical chemist, living in a shared house in a funky part of Boston, when I had, I guess my second strong spiritual experience (my first was when I was 6 years old). I was happy with my life and my dream was to get a teaching and research position at a strong liberal arts college. I also did volunteer work in shelters for homeless people and families and also in free medical clinics (as a lab tech). I thought I knew what I was doing.
Then one night I tossed and turned and I couldn’t sleep. It lasted the whole night. I broke out in a sweat. I was not distressed but I just felt unsettled. Suddenly I felt an emotional rush. There were no words but I suddenly realized I was not doing what I was meant to do. I was meant to be a medical doctor. I realized this with a sudden and complete conviction. I had toyed with that idea but really, all my young adult life I had rejected that notion because I despised (really despised) the pre-medical students I had known, and I hated the thought of medical training. But that night was transformative.
Once I “got the message,” I relaxed and fell deeply asleep. The next day I began plans to go to medical school. It took me 4 years to get in. I had no background in biology and had to take introductory biology including labs. It was not as bad as I had expected. I took the entrance exams and applied to a whole bunch of medical schools. I was rejected at every one in my first try. Then I landed my dream teaching/research job. Then that year I got into medical school. Do I leave my dream job after just one year, or do I stay? There was no question. I left. Training to be a doctor took 10 years (4 years of medical school and 6 of post-graduate training). I really hated the first two years, which was mostly book learning, cramming in as many facts by brute force memorization as possible. But I loved everything else, the patient care, the human drama. Now I am a pediatric neurologist at an academic center. I take care of children, I teach, I do research. I love my job.
My research is starting to develop into something, too, including something with commercial possibilities. Some 6 years ago, when this research was nothing much, I had another moment while visiting with my wife’s family in Europe. I realized that if I made any money, I should not keep it, or not all of it. I have obligations to my children, of course, but I promised to myself and my wife that I would give half of it away. I did not really think I would ever make any money from research (most academic researchers never do), but since that time, I have made a (very) small bundle, and I have kept my promise.
I was raised a Catholic but was never devout, nor borne again. I would say I’ve had about four transformative experiences, all of them strongly emotional, a couple of them occurring in dreams with a strong visual and emotional content, but none of them really with any words. I would “understand” the intent but not “hear” it and not in a logical way.
As a scientist, I am this way, too. First I do my due diligence. I study the problem intensely and “feel out” the territory. Then I leap; I “guess.” I do this even with mathematical problems. It drives my wife crazy (she is a classically trained theoretical physicist). Then I work backwards to see if I am right. As often as not, I hit on the right answer before my wife does. But I know, in science, I am often wrong and then I have to try again.
However, in these religious experiences (I do consider them religious), I have not ever been mislead. When I have one of these experiences, I accept what I experience and I do what I must, or at least I try. And I have come back to the Catholic Church, not as a literalist but I guess I do have a kind of faith now. I do not “listen” to my bishop or pope if what they say goes against what I feel to be right, but I have a sympathetic pastor and that makes it all right for me.
I began having unique auditory experiences about 30 years ago. I use the term auditory loosely, because I really just hear it in my head rather than through my ears. I’d like to think they are divine in nature, although I’ve come to think of God as plural although having a single voice. With a few exceptions, I hear things in a quatrain poem format, much like Nostradamus. I tend to hear things based on world events or when someone loses a family member. They pop into my head fully formed and I just write them down. Once I do, I generally don’t remember them. If I don’t write it down right away, it just sort of plays in my head until I do. I’ve written hundreds over the years. People have been contacting me for years with requests and I almost always have a response to whatever they may be dealing with. I’m currently working on my fourth books worth. Feel free to request one for yourself – it’s free. http://www.sacredpoems.com
This morning I read your opinion article “My Take: If you hear God speak audibly, you (usually) aren’t crazy”.
I am the author of “George W. Hamilton USMC: America’s Greatest World War I Hero” (McFarland Publishing 2011). The book is available through the Stanford University Library (Green » D570.348 5TH .M67 2011). Major Hamilton tragically died at age 29 in 1922. While involved with intensive research into his past I heard a loud and clear voice one day
Until lately I have held back mentioning this story, however I am propelled to tell this in part because E. B. Sledge boldly sated in his book “With The Old Breed” (pg. 91) ““Suddenly, I heard a loud voice say clearly and distinctly, “You will survive the war!””
My research led me to truly believe that USMC Major George W. Hamilton was the greatest American hero of World War I. Before I committed to writing Hamilton’s biography it was apparent that step one would entail identifying his parents. The bits of information through magazine articles by Allan C. Bevilacqua, Ronald J. Brown and David C. Homsher, delved into Major Hamilton’s life, however they did not reveal who his parents were. Major Hamilton’s own obituaries from 1922 also did not mention his parents. The known fact was Hamilton graduated from high school in Washington D.C. and for some reason entered the Marine Corps through the state of New York. My theory was that his parents must have been rather prominent as common parents would have hailed their son’s achievements far and wide. Additionally the localities of Washington D.C. and New York might support my prominent theory.
With access to the internet my computer search process began by searching “Hamilton” related databases in conjunction with Washington D.C. and/or New York. Naturally descendants of Alexander Hamilton surfaced quite often. I came upon one Hamilton, who was a prominent early aviator, but he was from the state of Connecticut and before long I discarded this avenue. A couple of months full of intensive searching had passed with no leads. Then one day at my desk during lunch calm, but very distinct and clear voice came into my head stating “His father was a writer.” Did the voice come from God, an angel or a group of “Old Breed” members in the realm high above? Was he an author of books or a journalist? I was convinced that I needed to search for a rather famous “Hamilton”, who wrote and would have been in the age range of Major Hamilton’s father. My search of authors named “Hamilton” did not reveal any clues. Then, I chose to search the NY Times archives for a “Hamilton” obituary from the 1930’s through the 1950’s. After all New York was one state I was focused upon. Finally I came upon the 1942 obituary of Charles A. Hamilton in the NY Times under the headline “Charles A. Hamilton, Newspaper Man 86″. Charles Hamilton was known by his peers as the dean of the Congressional Press Corps serving for as a Washington D.C. correspondent for then record 60 years from Chester A. Author to FDR. The article listed three children who survived him. There was no mention of his son George. Still, knowing the power of the voice I heard, I went home that evening and confidently told my wife I had identified Hamilton’s father. A few days later I went to the Z. Smith Reynolds Library at Wake Forest University and through the Washington Post microfilm I viewed Charles Hamilton’s front page obituary that mentioned his son George in the final paragraph. I was elated, yet not surprised.
I asked Don Ritchie, the U.S. Senate historian, if he was familiar with Charles Hamilton and he affirmatively noted that he had written briefly about him. I mentioned that I was finishing the biography of his son George Hamilton and Don stated he had served in the Marine Corps and he did not know of Major Hamilton or the connection.
Several months ago I mentioned this inner voice story to Col. William V. H. White USMC (Ret), who officially reviewed my book. Unlike some others, he fully believed my story.
This is going to be a long post, but I think you’ll find it’s an amazing story. I don’t exactly fit the mold of what I’ve read in what you’ve written. I’m not one who was big into praying, nor did I hold particularly strong religious beliefs. But I did find myself in a situation where, in order to help a friend, I was doing some pretty intensive Bible reading… which resulted in some very unexpected results. And yes, that included hearing a “voice”. But also SO much more!
First, some background. When I was in grad school in Indiana, I had a girlfriend named Sharon. We met at a biological lab where we both worked. When we met, she was pretty wild. Well, I guess we both were. In fact, we slept together hours after meeting. But she had one of the most purely loving souls I’ve ever encountered. She was raised in Richmond, Indiana, by very faithful parents in an evangelical church. Needless to say, she had “strayed” quite a bit. She had married young, divorced, and had two young children that lived with their father in California. In her heart, she had always felt a “tug” pulling her back to her evangelical roots. In the meantime, she went to college, where she smoked pot, got involved in lesbian relationships, and of course, was sleeping with me, too. After she graduated, she first lived in Indianapolis — with a lesbian lover — and then she moved to the LA area to be close to her kids and got a job working at UCLA Medical Center. And then she started exploring her spiritual side again.
At first, she did in the traditional way, finding a church she liked, but then she met this guy… I’ll call him the “beach preacher” because he hung out on Venice Beach, preaching to anyone who would listen. She was one of them. He was charismatic, and I suppose she was attracted to that because of her evangelical roots. He actually lived there, in his pickup truck with a cap on the back. She was totally taken in by him. When I talked to her on the phone, she started sounding like a completely different person, the complete opposite of how I had known her. She started spouting Bible verse, and adopted an extremely conservative, submissive attitude. She had fallen in love with this guy, and even went so far as to give up her apartment and most of her possessions to live with him in the back of that pickup truck! Making things even worse, it turned out that the beach preacher supported himself by selling drugs on the beach! How he did not see a disconnect between his actions and his preaching is completely beyond me… But he had her help him in this endeavor, which she did feel was against her beliefs, but did so anyway based on the misguided belief that the “man” was the “head” of the woman, and that she had to do what he directed. She told me the sin would be on him, not her, but her sin would be in not obeying him. Can you believe this crap?
You might imagine my reaction and frustration — I had always loved this woman dearly, and she was clearly completely and utterly lost, having given up EVERYTHING for this guy, brainwashed… and I was thousands of miles away, helpless, only being able to talk to her briefly at work, being she no longer had a phone (it was the 1980s, before cell phones). I wrote her a looooong letter, laying out in very logical terms, what was wrong with this picture, and trying to get her to see how this went against everything she held dear. But she wrote back in Bible speak, citing chapter and verse (as he had apparently taught her), rejecting everything I said, and adding that if my words weren’t coming from God, then they must be coming from Satan, and she would have none of it! But I just could not abandon her. I HAD to find a way. Then things got worse. She developed a serious back problem, and could not even leave the back of the pickup truck. She would lay there all day, unable to do anything for herself — not eat, not get to a bathroom — while he went out and preached and sold drugs. I only learned this after much time passed because she wasn’t making it into work. I tried to show her how he couldn’t love her, leaving her like that, but she wouldn’t hear it, coming back at me in chapter and verse. In response to my pointing out how his actions, like selling drugs and abandoning her, were against his “teachings”, she responded that we are not judged by our actions, but rather by what is in our hearts and in our words. I needed to counter that belief. I wasn’t very religious, and certainly didn’t know the Bible well enough to quote anything. So I decided I had to learn to speak in her “language” if I was going to get anywhere at all.
Now, I was somewhat familiar with the New Testament, having decided to read it over one summer, largely based on a challenge from my Divinity major roommate in college. But I didn’t really know the Old Testament, and I certainly couldn’t come back with chapter and verse on any of it like she could. So I started to read. And read. And read more. I was unemployed at the time, so I had plenty of time. I’d get up in the morning, open up the Bible, and just read one book after another. I was searching for just that “right” thing to tell her, but I wasn’t finding it. I got together with my old roommate and asked for his help. He suggested some readings, but none were exactly right. He also gave me two books that he said I could give her. One of them was “Women, Men, and the Bible” by Virginia Remy Mollenkott that specifically addressed how men and women should relate to each other in accordance with the Bible. It debunked old conservative beliefs, and was therefore much more on the mark. Still, it didn’t address a point I wanted to make about how his actions revealed him as a man that was a fraud, and that she needed to get away from him. So I kept reading, all day long, day after day, completely exhausting myself until I couldn’t stay awake any more and give in to sleep.
That’s when it happened.
One night, exhausted, I got into bed, reached over and turned off the light. My head had just hit the pillow when I “heard” in a loud voice… “ACTION”. Now I put “heard” in quotation marks because it was weird… I didn’t hear it like it was coming through my ears; it was like it skipped that part and just went directly to my brain. It made me sit up with a start. Not sure what to make of it, I turned back on the light, and went to the concordance in the back of my NIV Bible to look up “action”. I went to each and every verse that was referenced. None of them was right. After spending this time getting nowhere, I concluded that I hadn’t heard anything at all — obviously, I reasoned, I had already started to fall asleep and simply dreamed it. So I turned off the light once again, and laid back down. And once again — as soon as my head hit the pillow — there it was again! “ACTION!” This time, I jumped up so quickly, I was immediately standing next to the bed. I was shaking. I couldn’t deny it a second time. So, standing there, in the dark, I said out loud, “Okay, fine… action. I looked it up! I didn’t find anything! Where do you want me to look??” And this time, standing, fully awake, I “heard” the words “First John”.
You can imagine by now my heart was pounding, and my hands were shaking. But I managed to turn on the light, and I opened the Bible. It opened up right to “1 John”! I looked down, and the very first thing I saw was “Dear children, let us not love with words or tongue but with actions and in truth. This then is how we know we belong to the truth…” Oh. My. God. That was it! That’s what I was looking for! In the same chapter was: “dear children, do not let anyone lead you astray. He who does what is right is righteous, just as he is righteous. He who does what is sinful is of the devil, because the devil has been sinning from the beginning.” This also spoke directly to her situation. I checked the concordance again, and for some reason, it had missed referencing this usage of the word “action”, but my friendly “voice” that night certainly hadn’t!
While I had been doing all these days of reading, as luck — or God — would have it, Sharon ended up briefly returning to Indiana. Her back had gotten even worse, and she was going to spend time at her parents to be evaluated by a specialist they knew. Quite odd, I thought, being that she worked for a major hospital in LA! But that put her within driving distance, and I decided that I had to leave the next morning and bring her this “message” in person, especially while she was out of the immediate influence of the beach preacher. So I did. About 13 hours straight driving. Thankfully, both she and her parents were very receptive to my impromptu visit.
Soon after arriving, I got her alone in a room and told her my story. I had no idea how she would react. But she listened. She really listened. We talked for a long time. I gave her the books that my old roommate had given me, talking to her about the things that Mollenkott had to say. But then we also got out and just spent time together. That included visiting her mother where she worked at a very small bookstore of a very small college, Earlham College, student population of about 1000. I started to see the “old” Sharon, but a more mature, less wild version. I really liked her, and after spending a couple of days with her, we were connecting again. I was getting through to her. I felt like it was all worth it. There truly was a purpose to everything I had done. It was looking like I had saved her.
But then I got thrown a curve. A car pulled up. The beach preacher had driven all the way from California! WTF?? As soon as he arrived, she got sucked right back in. She started talking in Bible speak again. We all had dinner together, and I remember challenging him on some point he was trying to make, and she jumped in to defend his position. Afterwards, he told her it was time to get back to California, and he was taking her with him. And she dutifully obeyed. I watched her get in the car and they drove away.
What was it all for? Why had I driven all the way out there? This is something that replayed in my head over and over and over again while I drove back home, just me alone with my own thoughts for 13 hours. I drove right through the night. As I was nearing the end of Pennsylvania, soon to enter NJ, the sun was coming up. I had had it. I cried out in a loud voice, although it was just me that was going to hear it, “WHY?? What was it all for?? You did such a GREAT job of showing me what to say… now how about letting me know WHY? What good did it do? What do I know? I’m no religious expert! Maybe I really DID just imagine a voice in my head! And what do I know about this book I gave her? Maybe this Virginia Remy Mollenkott is a complete nut! I’m unemployed. I have no money left. And I went and spent the little I had on gas and tolls to drive to Indiana. I spent all that time reading the Bible when I should have been looking for a job! WHAT WAS IT ALL FOR?? She just got in the car and drove off with him like it never even happened!” Suffice to say, I was a tad upset. I had even started to think that maybe there was a chance she and I could reconnect romantically, but obviously, THAT was delusional.
Immediately after my outcry, I got off at the next exit to find a place for breakfast. I stopped at a Wendy’s hamburger place, where they had breakfast sandwiches. I sat by myself at a table, reading something I had brought with me. If you’ve eaten in a fast food place, you know that people are so transient, they just ignore everyone else. They eat and they get out. That’s it. This is why I was surprised when an older gentleman approached me, and was curious about what I was reading. I showed it to him, and we started to talk. He asked me what I did for a living, and I told him about my environmental consulting. He said, “Really?” and went on to tell me about property he owned nearby, and how he wanted to see if it could be developed. He hired me to look at it for him on the spot, and we went back to his office. As it turned out, the property was part of a religious retreat that he ran. He got a phone call while we sat in his office, and I looked around at what I could see from my seat. I noticed the very same paperback copy of the New Testament that I had read that summer, and I picked it up. Inside was a paper bookmark advertising the very small bookstore at Earlham College! The very same one I had just been at, where Sharon’s mother worked! How weird was THAT? It was more than 10 hours away! So when he got off the phone, I told him I had just been there. He asked me why… and in what was probably not a good move for someone making a first impression on a new client… I told him the whole story.
The whole time, he listened, not saying a word. Then when I was done, quite calmly, he looked at me, and said, “Virginia Remy Mollenkott is amazing. I know her and that book well. I use her to lecture at my retreat frequently. If you gave her that book, you did the best thing you could possibly have done.” Can you imagine how I felt right at that very moment? All of a sudden, it dawned on me. It was like Peter hearing the cock crow the third time. What had I asked for just minutes before meeting this man? I asked to know that I had done the right thing; that there was a purpose to it all. I had asked to know that giving her the book by Virginia Remy Mollenkott was the right thing. I had expressed my need to find work and earn money. And of ALL the people on the planet, this one man was probably the one and only person that could have satisfied all of that. This time, I didn’t hear any voices in my head. But my prayer, even though I didn’t really think of it as a prayer at the time, was answered in an unmistakable, resounding way. And I felt a calm come over me.
I did the job for that man, and I got paid. It kept me going for a while. Soon after, I received an announcement from Sharon for her marriage to the beach preacher. For a moment, I wondered again what it all been for, but I now had faith that there was SOME reason, even if I didn’t understand it. Years passed. She had a son with him, who she named Caleb. I don’t even remember how I knew this, because we hadn’t talked since that day in Indiana. She was gone from my life. I met a woman who I didn’t love as much as Sharon, but we dated for 3 years, starting shortly after I got back from that trip to Indiana, with her wanting to get married. I was now 32, and wasn’t meeting anyone else, so I finally gave in.
I had also found employment in that time, first at one consulting firm, and then moving on to another. For the second, I was hired to open up a new office for the firm in Cold Spring, NY, and was working there alone. About a month before my wedding, the phone there rang. To my utter disbelief, it was Sharon! We hadn’t talked for more than 3 1/2 years. She had somehow found a number for where I grew up (pre-internet days, mind you), and got my father, who gave her the number for the firm where I had worked, and they gave her the number where I was now working by myself. She was apparently quite determined to find me. We started to talk, and she told me she was now divorced. She said she needed to find me to thank me — that my trip to Indiana changed everything for her. It took 3 years, but she said what I told her stuck with her. She couldn’t forget it. She read the book by Mollenkott, and she found truth in it. She started to see how things were wrong. It all gave her strength, the strength she needed to finally get out and leave her beach preacher husband. It was amazing! The whole thing really had been… a miracle. And for some reason, God chose me to work through. Me. At best, nothing more than lukewarm Catholic.
Then she said one more thing… she asked, “Are you married yet?” I said, “uh… well… not yet…” And she said, “Because I was thinking maybe it was finally time for us.” Oh God. I then went on to tell her how my wedding was just a month away, and I didn’t see how it could be stopped at that late date. STUPID ME! I now feel that her phone call was God working through her, returning the favor. If I had perhaps just a little more faith than I did… maybe a little more vision and wisdom… I would have found the strength to call off that wedding and saved myself from a pretty crappy marriage! I would have been in a very happy marriage with Sharon.
So while things didn’t exactly work out for me, I’m happy to say that Sharon now (in 2013) lives in Florida, where she is happily married to a normal, and very faithful, man that she met in her church. I can’t say that God ever really intended anything for “us”, but the night that I heard that voice turned out to be life changing for both of us.
1. circa 1965; no voice heard but still profoundly dramatic: I was asked to serve on the parish council at Immaculate Conception Church, Towson, Maryland. I mused over this but was reluctant knowing it would take much of my time. Then suddenly, I thought this would be like a two-year military service I had missed from deferment for education and defense industry employment. This viewpoint sufficed for me and I did serve on the parish council
2. circa 1988: after writing a software program to aid preparing my annual IRS return I realized it would be useful to others and should become a product. Again I knew this would take time I was reluctant to invest. Standing in my computer room one day I distinctly heard as from someone right there: “Would you not do this for me after I have given you all this equipment?” I wrote a user manual, advertised my product, and sold a few dozen copies
3. circa 2000: after Sunday Mass came the usual annual announcement of forthcoming Lenten services, including Stations of the Cross. I reacted with my silent litany of Reasons Why I’m Too Busy. Suddenly in my mind were the words: “Would you not walk with Me on my way to Jerusalem?” This was not my thought; I would not have phrased the question this way. And why Jerusalem, not Golgotha? But the first few Stations are for events within the city walls. Was this the voice of Jesus? Begging the question, I felt He wants us to relive the road to Calvary with Him at Easter time.
We can reject such experiences as mere imagination or idle thoughts, but what do we mean by a personal God? Is it not one who speaks to us? We must be open-minded. Then, as in 1 Samuel 3 — “Did you call me?” — it will be easier to recognize and accept: “If today you hear His voice, harden not your hearts;” Hebrews 3. Is it vain to reveal such very personal experiences? I think not, because God speaks to us even when we are sinners.
My Jewish brother-in-law introduced me to his rabbi last Wednesday and I related my three anecdotes. The rabbi repeated your reference to the old joke on prayer versus schizophrenia but was still open-minded about voices from God.
My second return to belief (and the Catholic church) was totally unplanned. After my second prolonged period of agnosticism/secular humanism, I tried again to do some non-religious Buddhist type meditation. No go. Couldn’t get by those distractions.
I then chanced upon an article about prayer beads used by various traditions. I did a little research, and they all seemed too esoteric and requiring considerable study. I then thought of the two old rosaries my wife, a Lutheran, had found in the basement and had hung up on our dresser mirror. My first reaction to seeing them there was embarrassment: someone might see them. I hurriedly put them in a drawer. But what the heck, I thought; I’ll try these familiar beads. Rather than try to sit and breathe a certain way (which I found distracting), I knelt down and took one rosary in hand. It was almost physically impossible to do this. It was too embarrassing, too humiliating. I didn’t want anyone, including my wife, to see me. But I fingered the beads and said the words, and they did help reduce distractions, but it was painful reducing myself to this. Yet I did it daily, paying no attention to the words which were like the sounds of a long mantra.
I should have known better, for eventually I felt less embarrassed, less humiliated. I felt humble, which I think has to be a big part of meditation. After about 2 months, my problems with the church and the vatican gradually faded, and I returned to the church. In Mary’s month, May 2001, I went to confession to Father Paul, after a 10-12 year absence.
Prior to this I had agreed to play in a small brass choir for a multiple church service (including my former parish) welcoming in the new millenia. I helped provide the music for something I didn’t believe in. But looking back I can see this was the first small step back into sort-of inchoate believe. I don’t think I had a chance maintaining my unbelief after that.
You can’t sincerely or even insincerely pray the rosary for a month or more without some change of perspective.
I know I made my bed so lie in it, so no reason stating the obvious. I had a mistress for 2 years and she called and told my wife when I finally told her I would never leave my wife for her. My wife and I stayed together and trying to work it out. Now the mistress is threatening to give some info that she held back like my mistress and I having sex in our marital bed and our sexual activities which I feel is embarrasing. I think the wife may try to forgive, only because she kind of has low self esteem, but not entirely sure what she will do. My question is what do I do with my X mistress go back to her to keep her quiet?
I have been with her 2 years she knows where I live and work and contacting my wife twice to disclose information is not a crime.
She is blackmailing for us to get back together not for money. The additional info she has is damning and embarrassing. It includes a video I made of myself.
Wow. A lot of this makes me feel sorry for the X mistress. She is hurting too. I realize I did string her along with pretenses of me leaving my wife. I really thought I would, but changed my mind.
Thank you for sharing and opening up this area of focus to folks. I have felt for some time that my culture’s values are turned upside down and that I & other folks around me are mostly other-directed and have lost touch w/ our inner cores. I probably didn’t hear God’s voice or sense His influence because I was so busy looking around to see how other people viewed me & if I was current w/ trends.
It is refreshing to back away from consumer-driven perceptions of ‘needs’ and ‘wants’ and begin to breathe again in a direction that will (hopefully) lead to a more spiritual focus for me–and others whom I may influence.
I really want to know what you think of this article, by Dr. Oliver Sacks. I just read it at The Atlantic. He basically says that Near Death Experiences & other such visions are really just hallucinations produced by our brains. As such, they are Not SuperNatural at all. He mentions you & your book in the article as well. He says that Christians, by going over and over again in their heads, a meeting w/God, sort of psych themselves up for such a visit by hyper imagining it, until it becomes a “reality” to the person. In other words, Dr. Sacks is calling all religious experiences bunk, though he’s not so impolite to use that expression. What do you think? Here is the article link: http://www.theatlantic.com/health/archive/2012/12/seeing-god-in-the-third-millennium/266134/
Hi, I am not sure that he is. I do think that you can just focus, as a scientist, on how the body experiences the supernatural, and leave the real reality of the supernatural to the side. I don’t think I’ve got the authority to answer whether God really shows up–but I can see something about the conditions in the body that lead one to acknowledge that something odd is happening.
Hi,
Thank you for your reply! The “real reality” that you mention is what means the most to me, but I don’t see how, if it cannot be scientifically validated, it can really be seen as “real” or a “reality” at all! (So yes, that’s why they call it “faith”, right)? The problem is, that faith can just be something that is produced inside our brains. As such, it intrigues me, but brings me no comfort at all. However, there is a doctor in the article by Sacks (there are at least 2 or 3 doctors he mentions, who have experienced NDEs) who has a take similar to what I think yours is: Yes, it is God speaking to me through this NDE and yes it’s by using my physical senses (or the physicality of the brain?) to do this. So, this doctor sees no contradiction in that. What worries me is that atheists (and I may be one, or at least an agnostic) can take what Dr. Sacks says – that NDEs & other Spiritual Hallucination are Not Super-Natural (which he Does say, at the very end of the article) and therefore conclude that this is Proof Positive that there is no God, because it’s all produced by the Brain. In fact, I think otherworldly states can even be produced by Scientists! (By manipulating the brain). In the end, I feel as lost an alone as I ever did & not sure What to put my “faith” in. It’s like: I have a deep need to believe (in a sense or Presence, as I see fit & to the extent that I am able to), while at the same time, it all seems to very empty, because it’s really just a pretty (and cozy & sweet – and sometimes harrowing, albeit) fireworks show that our amazing brains are putting on before: Lights Out. (Btw, I Love this forum & hope to participate more on it. What a Wonderful Name for it: “The Sense o Presence” Forum! I really Have to get your book, too)!!!
Thanks. I actually find it comforting that you can come to very different conclusions from the same material: if faith is the evidence of things unseen, that’s got to be true. If there is a God, the idea that he could be dissected in a petri dish would make him, well, unGod like.
Liebe Kurs-MusikKfcsse,ich freue mich sehr euch so frf6hlich zu hf6ren und zu sehen.I am a child of God. Und ich will frf6hlich sein, dass das so ist.Danke ffcrs Erinnern. Ihr seid gesegnet in all eurem Tun.Brigitte
You write: “if there is a God”, but your book is called: “When God Talks Back”, so I wonder at the contradiction here, if there is one. I wish someone who is open-minded, such as yourself, would tell me & others if there is a God (at least, as you perceive God). The Fear of Death is very Strong. It’s very painful for me to be neutral about God. Yet, at the same time, I have a very open mind and am not inclined to close it w/definitive views (either of the Atheistic or True Believer dichotomy). I like it when people really Know there is a God – yet, don’t expect me or others to know, but will also not shy away from saying: “Yes, as I perceive it, there IS a God”. After all, many if not most Atheists are fine w/saying: “There is NO God”. I have been trying to listen to God, to see if He/She/It/Whathaveyou talks back to Me. So far, nothing. Yet, just the concept of allowing for the idea that there Is a God and God Could talk to me is very heartening. But I feel so Lonely for God, too. What if the Voice of God makes me crazy? There is always that fear. One never wants intrusive voices to intrude. Of course, if it comes from God, the voice would Not be Intrusive. Yet, God could be a Little MORE Obvious than He or She or The Undefinable is wont to be. A little MORE direction would be appreciated. I like a Mystery as much as the next person, maybe more, (probably More) but that doesn’t mean I want to meditate for 20 more years so I can say: “Yes! I Finally have a sense of the Ineffable!”. I want something NOW. I’m tired of waiting. I’m tired of Doubt. I need a bit of fireworks, just a bit, but Something. I need something to Bolster my Faith. Others can have their own take on what They need or do not need, want or do not want. I’m just stating it out for Myself & I feel rather irritated. God is an Awfully Big Concept to take on Faith…
Zell, may you find encouragement in this Ted talk.
http://www.ted.com/talks/jill_bolte_taylor_s_powerful_stroke_of_insight.html
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I respond to your article in NYT 4-13-13, where you say that your approach to theodicy is not really available to mainstream Protestants and Catholics. As a spiritual guide my whole life, especially in retreat houses, what you describe is the main focus of Catholic spiritual guidance: that direct and personal experience of God especially in the difficult times of life. It may to some extent be filtered through church and sacraments, but not necessarily. I think further research by you in retreat centers would affirm this position. This focus upon immediate experience of God is also very characteristic of many men and women religious, a tradition that is centuries old.
Satellite ” Yamal -402 ” did not appear on the calculated orbit _ttp://www.interfax.ru/news.asp?id=280005.
Best of all domestic government should solve everything as easy as possible and no options – shove somebody all of the oil with the gas company to close, employees spend for sausage, but by leaving the first flight to Switzerland.
Re: Is That God Talking? Many years back when I was trying to sell my house, I was sitting alone worrying about what price the house would sell at and when it would sell. At that time, a voice clearly whispered in my ear, a dollar amount. About a week later the house did sell at that exact same price (the real estate agent brought the offer – I did not suggest the price or tell him about the voice and it was quite different from the listing price). I don’t think it was God speaking to me – it was some discarnate being trying to be helpful. There are many discarnate beings all around us – most of the time we can not hear them even if they try to speak to us. Sometimes, they do manage to get through to our brains. These reports above of people hearing voices are all voices of discarnate, astral beings – they have absolutely nothing to do with God. There is as much chance of God talking to a living human being as there is the chance of a human being talking to a specific cell in his body and the cell actually hearing it.
Tanya – May I suggest an Experiment:
Ask God to show you if He is real.
Keep an open mind and see what happens.
I read your article in the NYT today and it moved me to relate several experiences. About 35 years ago, when I was 27, I was asleep and I woke up at 2 AM for no reason. I had not used alcohol and I have never used drugs. Sitting in a chair in the other side of the room was the figure of a young man. He didn’t identify himself as God or Jesus. He simply said to me, “Do not be afraid, I love you”. The figure then vanished but I knew at that moment I was in the presence of God.
Second incident. My mother died when I was 41, on Mother’s Day to boot. I was staying at her house the following July 4th and because many of my siblings were also there, I had to sleep in her bed, although I didn’t want to. This bedroom was furnished with a mahogany bedromm set that I had refinished for her complete with new brass drawer pulls so it had a particular meaning for me. My mother also has a cocker spaniel who was prone to skin infections from flea bites and the dog smelt horribly , despite our efforts to fix his health. The dog was long gone before this evening. Again, around 2-3 AM I was awakened, this time by the clanging of the brass draw pulls and the overwhelming smell of the dog. This lasted for several minutes and then both the noise and the smell stopped. The next morning, I related this story to my siblings who all laughed at me. I don’t believe that I experienced a hallucination or that I was dreaming. I believe this was a real sensory experience, perhaps it was something else. However, previous to that I had scoffed at anything that suggested of a spiritual realm. After that night, I never scoffed again.
One last thing, the last time I saw my father before he died of a sudden heart attack he looked at me oddly as I left his house. I realized after his death, that he was saying good bye from the look in his eyes.
I never heard voices (or a voice), but had other sensory experiences starting in college, that led me to seek an explanation for the experiences throughout my life. I’m surprised I am only now hearing of your research!
My first experience was in 1972 when I was a sophomore in college. I woke up in the middle of the night in my dorm room–completely awake, I was not dreaming–to see a bird perched on the top of the slightly open closet door. As I looked at the bird and wondered how it got into the room, it spread its wings and flew right over me and disappeared into the wall beside my bed. I did not take my eyes off the white bird which seemed to glow as it flew above me then disappeared. My initial reaction was WTF!? I was completely freaked out and could make no sense of what I had just experienced. I was not able (I think I was a bit afraid) to go back to sleep and stayed awake until it got light. I did not tell ANYONE about this experience for many years, but I would often think about it and try to figure out what it could mean. At the time, I was dating a guy who was a pilot and was on a short tour in Vietnam. I wondered if this was some kind of psychic message that something had happened to him. He came back fine, so that wasn’t it. I also wondered if it could be some message from the beyond (from my mom who died when I was younger), but couldn’t figure out what it could possibly mean. As an avid reader, I also read a lot of psychology books to see if I might find some explanation for my experience in their theories. From this, the idea that my “hallucination” was simply a projection of my own mind in some kind of symbolic form made some sense to me. Jung’s archetypes even provided possible meaning or interpretation of the white bird that made some sense to me.
That was the only experience like it that I had until a dozen years later, when I had another kind of sensory experience on more than one occasion. This happened when I was driving alone in the car on the highway and started to doze off. As I dozed off, I would feel something kick the back of my car seat which would jolt me awake. The first time it happened, I was quite spooked; but by the time it happened a second and third time, I figured, okay–either there is a benevolent force in the universe that is looking out for me and it is not time for me to go, or my own subconscious is making sure I don’t kill myself just yet.
Those last experiences were in the ’80s, and I have not had any other similar experiences in the 20+ years since.
Although I was raised Catholic, I had already left the church before my first experience in college and I have had nothing to do with organized religion since then. For a time, I considered myself an atheist–which is why I sought some kind of logical, if not scientific explanation for my initial experience. But I eventually decided that I do believe in “the force”–not a God in our image as sold by religion, but the One Mind of which we are all a part. Until science can explain exactly how the mind works, I will put my faith in a higher power.
‘I pray to Allah every day and you know what I’ll be dropping by to see you.’ Full stop: I bet that got your attention and not in a good way. I wonder why? Paul, Mohammed were products of answered prayers. My experience has been that when God talks back run. Reference your article in today’s New York 5/5/13.
the creation nravrtiae is such a powerful story, enjoy sharing it. I have a key phrase I use when discussing this stuff with teenagers and I like to start there before digging into it:”Either this story is history or it’s a metaphorical. Either way, we learn that God loves us, God created everything, & we were made for relationship with God and others.”I find that TOO many people make evolution a case God’s non-existance, which I don’t think can be made. It’s important that our teens know that even if the creation story is a metaphor, then we’re can still have faith. They’re going to go to college someday and a very smart professor will convince them evolution is at least partially true.
Priscilla, thank you for taking the time to read and to post .truly a blsseing to hear from you. And yes, you are so right that it is so easy to forget how He is our everything and wants to be our everything, our life daily. Beautiful, heart-melting words my friend.Thank you for praying that we will awaken to His truth in all it’s fullness and glory .Yes Lord, Yes Lord, we pray .Thanks again for posting ..love you and love hearing from you. (keep me posted on your search I want to know!)