[I added an edit after the link about the anointing oils about Clove that I was unaware of when I wrote this. ] I have a broken tooth that is giving me some trouble. I do not have the hundreds of dollars the dentists want to take care of it. I am looking at options but have not found them except this. There is oil of anointing in the Bible that consists of Myrrh, Cinnamon, Cassia, and either sweet calamus or cannabis. (translation of herbs in the bible is difficult as translators often substituted plants they knew for those mentioned in the text even if the herb they chose did not grow in the original area where the text was written). I have found that a half juice cup of water, with a good bit of salt, a drop of Myrrh, a drop of Cassia, a couple of drops of cinnamon, and a drop of On Guard essential oils. I don’t like the taste of the Cassia as much but I like cinnamon and cinnamon has many natural healing properties. This combination has given me relief from the pain and helps irrigate the wound.
Beware of Essential Oils in Shops That are Not Safe to Swallow
I MUST point out that please do NOT use essential oils available in most New Age shops. ONLY oils that are cleared for dietary use may be used. I have included a packet for the oils I use. Surely, some will note that these have a price that is high enough that I could get dental care. However, I bought them over a year ago when our finances were better off. Since I had them on hand I was able to use them now that my finances are more challenging. Anyway, if it helps me perhaps it will help you as well (again, most essential oils you buy are not safe to drink but doTerra products generally are and each of these listed is. Still, I don’t drink it but use it as a mouthwash whenever the pain afflicts me.
Here Is A Kit for A Healing Oil That Goes Back Thousands of Years
Here is a kit that includes Cinnamon, Myrrh, Cassia, and On Guard to which a drop or two of each coupled with some salt makes an effective rinse and relieves my pain. To use as an oil for anointing leave out the salt. Obviously you are better off with proper dental care but I many not be the only one who is incapable of paying for it. Again – and pease nlote this – most of the oils available in New Age type shops are not suitable for dietary use so please do not use them. Most of DoTERRA’s products are. If you would like to get these products at 25% as a wholesaler dealer you may use the second link to sign up.
Here is a link to clove oil. Someone who read this mentioned it as useful for pain. I wet a cuetip, put a drop of clove oil on it and touched it to the gums and the pain immediately was relieved. Wow! I was surprised. So I have added this link for all to have:
I have been afflicted with back and joint pain from a service-connected injury I have suffered from since 1984. When I became familiar with DoTERRA products I began using Deep Blue Oil and Deep Blue lotion and with it have reduced my use of medical pharmaceuticals to relieve pain by 90%. And I find that I feel better and my mind is clearer without taking all of the pain pills that the doctors had recommended to me. (I have heard that the use of cannabis oil can help relieve aches and pains when added to the above mix but I have never used it. So that oil would be Myrrh, Cassia, On Guard, Cinnamon, and cannabis oil. Cinnamon in my experience can afflict skin with a rash but if used at the proper dose it could provide a “heat” that helps to heal. However, I have never used this oil and therefore I CAN NOT recommend it. I have only heard about it as a possibility so I share the information). However, I strongly recommend the use of Deep Blue to relieve all manner of pain from sprains, to arthritis, to nerve damage and other uses. It has helped me so much that I would not be without it. If you suffer from pain please stop suffering and try this, it has helped me immensely.
For an Athletes Kit including Deep Blue, Peppermint, Tea Tree Oil, On Guard, Breathe, and Lavender. We have used Lavender to help us sleep and relax and Breathe was invaluable when I struggled for every breathe with Covid and helps me with allergies. Peppermint and Tea Tree Oil have multiple uses.
I have always believed in living as naturally as possible and have described herbal tinctures as a way to help your body recover and change as opposed to modern medicine which forces your body to change – but only for the duration of the drug. I would never recommend avoiding medical care but I have always preferred doctors who were open to natural remedies, when possible, over pharmaceuticals. I prefer health and wellness over drugs and chemicals that suppress symptoms but do not cure them.
But that is just me and you must find your own way in the world. May God be with you and may you grow in peace and health as you come into closer relationship with the Source of All Life.
We are creatures who evolved and grew in dangerous circumstances. Our very instinct is to be on alert when we are not in a safe place. It is then not surprising that where we choose to pray or meditate should affect our success and ability to concentrate. The more comfortable we are the better it will work.
Being in Nature activates the same parts of our brain that are activated when we meditate.
Last time we discussed a time for prayer and how having a regular prayer time is significant and can aid us in our Spiritual Growth. Today we will look at how our place of prayer and meditation is equally significant. Nothing here should ever keep you from praying or meditating because you are not in the “proper” place or at the proper time. The proper time and place are when and where you are moved to do so. However, if you have trouble in prayer or what to expand your prayer life and experience in meditating then read on.
First, I would like to discuss a scientific discovery that has been known for many years but still seems new to a lot of people.
When we are in the woods walking, siting, or simply being it activates the same parts of our brain that are activated when we meditate. Therefore the same benefits of resetting our bio-rhythms, the deep relaxation, the rest, and the blood cleansing and health benefits that are obtained in regular meditation can be obtained by being in nature. One doctor even mused that meditation was developed as a life hack to reconnect us with the Source of All Life after we had severed our link to the natural rhythms of the world by living in cities.
There Are 74 Forests in Japan Medically Certified As Having Health Benefits
In Japan, they have medially certified, through studies, that just walking in these forests has health benefits. I don’t think it is only forests in Japan. I think that Ayurvedic beliefs are true we need to reconnect with the natural world. And being in nature is one of those ways.
I can attest to the benefits myself. I have always loved being in the woods and felt the stress and strain of life drain away when I was there. When meditating at Pioneer Park in NE, I would enter the Nature Center area, walk into the forested area, and walk about ten meters off the path to sit on a bank overlooking a brook. I always had the best results meditating there and it was very renewing. At the time I was going through a difficult divorce (as if there is an easy one,) and trying to reconcile myself to my two dreams of an army career and a wife and family was all crashing down around me due to the divorce and a back injury. But there, in the woods, my soul and mind quieted enough that I could actually meditate. So I went there every day to do so.
One day when I was sitting cross-legged and meditating I opened my eyes and there, about ten inches or so from my right knee was a snake. It was not coiled but stretched out about two and a half feet at an angle to my right. It was raised, not to strike but at what looked to me like curiosity. I know that snakes don’t see like we do so I have always wondered what it saw, and how long it had watched me. To add to the oddity there was a bird about the same distance from my left knee that had also been looking at me. Both the bird and the snake, sitting together looking at me meditate when they are mortal enemies of each other. It was astounding. I opened my eyes and watched them and suddenly they both left in haste.
Meditation Changes Our Energy Field and Can Reset Our Natural Rhythms Disturbed By Stress
I had read that meditation changes the energy field that surrounds us and the Ayurvedic teachings about meditation had preceded the scientific discovery by thousands of years through the teaching of Chakras and meditation. Could they sense the differing energy fields? Could they see them? Or was it something else that attracted them? But I never would have had such an experience without finding a spot in nature to regularly meditate.
The substantial health benefits of prayer and meditation have been proven in multiple double-blind studies but they are only verifying Life-Truths that have been known for thousands of years. Science didn’t make it beneficial. Science only now finally verified things that spiritual leaders and people have known for over 50 centuries. It is nice that it has finally caught up.
But if meditation is truly a hack for those who can’t get into nature. Like those who live in large cities. Then we need to discuss options. To this, I would like to add that I had trouble meditating in my tank. I don’t know if it was the electronics and steel that surrounded me but if that was the case then modern cities would also pose a bit of a difficulty. But it’s not impossible.
Say A Prayer Of Blessing Of Your Sacred Space
One of the things you can do is bless the area before you begin. Pray a prayer to cleanse and purify your area as light a candle, ring a bell, smudge sage, light incense, or burn holy water. The other thing you can do is have a set area in which you meditate. Then when you get to that place your body will begin to open up to the Divine. Getting into your place of prayer and meditation will alert your body and subconscious of your intention.
My wife made a “prayer closet” under the stairs. She had a small table she could kneel at and had her candles, incense, and prayer book there in that room where she could meditate and pray. No one else entered that room. Most of us cannot spare a room for each person but in a previous house we had a small bedroom that we used as a prayer room for all of us. In this house we are preparing the attic as our spiritual library and temple as we have stairs that lead up to it and it is floored as a room.
Preparing A Place To Pray Has the Same Benefit As A Regular Time of Prayer
Preparing a place to pray, study, and meditate has the same advantages as having a set prayer time. The atmosphere of the place begins to change and it just “feels” holy. You can place whatever reminds you of your spiritual life and your connection to the Divine, the Source of All Life, the Ground of Being.
If you cannot set aside something for only prayer-time place by your chair or common seat, kitchen table, or wherever, a cross or other symbol, a candle holder, an incense burner, and/or a bell, or any other symbol that reminds you of your spiritual life. You can also set them on a tray or in a box and pull them out at prayer time, especially if you use a kitchen table you may not want them out all the time. When you sit in your seat of prayer then take a deep breath,say a prayer of blessing and presence, light your candle, burn your incense, ring your bell, or whatever you need to do to signal to yourself and your subconscious that we are entering a sacred place and a sacred time that is outside of and protected from the myriad cares of the world. No longer is it your TV chair or the kitchen table but your own sacred space and table.
The story I told in the YouTube Video A Time Of Prayer that was interrupted by a knock on the door was in my chair in the living room, where I had a cross on my end table, lit a scented candle in front of me on the coffee table, and began to pray. It was the same chair in my living room that I sat in to watch TV, play games with friends, or just visit with family and company. But, when I lit the candle it became my place of prayer. In the next blog, we will discuss centering and grounding.
One last thing. I have found that any part of my body completely surrounded by metal reduces effectiveness. I hold chains that I wear with my medal of St. Joan of Arc and my wedding ring in the palm of my hand when I meditate. Any necklace on a string or leather doesn’t seem to affect it. It makes sense to avoid conductive metal if you are dealing with energy fields but do what seems right to you. Nothing is effective if it makes you very uncomfortable to do it.
Do what seems right to you but be open to growing and trying new things. – Namaste
Prayer and Meditation, Orienting our Hearts and Minds to the Divine
When we think of prayer many of us think of Christian prayers that are either written out or extemporaneous. I believe both are valuable. But every religion has prayer and meditation. It is an act of striving to communicate with our deepest selves as well as the Living Force, the Ground of All Being, the Source of All Life. Every religion from the Far East to Rome to the Bible Belt of the Midwest has references in their scriptures to ‘prayers rising like incense‘ as well as to the importance of meditation. I hope you will join your intentional prayers, meditations, and light to ours by keeping the prayer list from ofNaturesGod.com in your heart and mind.
In this blog, I will give a very brief introduction to prayer and the importance of having a regular time of prayer as part of our Spiritual Discipline and practice. In future blogs, we continue a brief series focusing on prayer and how to “listen with the ears of our heart.” Then we will look at Centering and Mediation. However, because of the nature of blogs, we will only be able to scratch the surface here but we will go into much more detail, for those who are interested and join the ofNaturesGod community through Patreon. We cannot do that here unless that was all that we did here and there is much for us to discuss and many facets of our spiritual lives to cover here.
Indeed most religions have practices that include lighting candles and/or incense during a time of prayer and meditation. This symbolizes that the prayers rise to heaven even as the smoke rises from the candle or the incense. Although I am clear about the Divine Presence is everywhere about us and within us, and that it is the presence in which we live move, and have our being I still light a candle and incense on my home altar each morning. I do that not for God. Not to appease some Divine overlord or make an offering to keep him from smiting me. I do it out of love to help orient my thoughts and my actions for the day to the Divine Presence. As I go about my morning and day seeing the candle or incense burning reminds me of where my heart draws its strength from and that we are not alone. As I light them I say a quick prayer to the Trinitarian Presence as I understand it:
Queen of Heaven,* Lord of Light, Eternal Holy One be with me and guide me this day, strengthen and guide me as I go about my business, and defend and sustain me against all trials.
(or something similar).
For many, prayers of this sort coupled with a quick prayer at bed, rising, and/or before and after meals is the extent of their prayer life. It was the extent of mine when I was a child. My life changed when I was 12 and had my first religious experience and my heart turned more to God. I would like to say I have served th Lord of Life faithfully since but my spiritual life has been ups and downs rising to the gates of heaven and wallowing in the muck of swamps that were largely of my own design.
I want to talk to you about taking your spiritual life deeper.
First, you must understand that we are creatures of habit. Because we are physical creatures ritual is important and has a powerful effect on our spiritual life. That is one thing I like about Catholic services. They are deep in ritual. However, because we are physical creatures we run the risk of going about these rituals habitually without thought and without engaging our hearts or emotions in the actions. Rituals practiced in this way are worse than useless. I say they are worse because following these rituals of prayer or whatever we may do, even attendance at Mass or Worship and service to the poor IF they are done without engaging our hearts, or if they are done as a slave seeking to avoid the master’s punishment, they can give us the illusion that we are doing something “spiritual” and that we are right with God when we are not. However, if we perform the ritual as a way of moving our hearts and consciousness toward the Divine Source they are very powerful. Scott Cunningham, a Wiccan, to be sure has described Wiccan Ritual as Prayer with props. These rituals are powerful as a way to give our body something to do as our mind and heart orient upon the Divine. Similarly, I found that praying the Catholic Rosary sometimes “got my mind out of the way” so my heart could pray directly to my Creator. The Bible says when we are distressed sometimes the Spirit intercedes for us with “sighs to deep for words.” Indeed, it was reading his books on Wicca that made me realize he had directed his heart to that Creative Force that controls and created the universe. A Force that I knew, among other names, as Yahweh or Elohim.
It is possible to “go through the motions” and never orient your heart to this Divine Source. To just do the ritual with your body and mouth while your mind and soul go elsewhere and worry about grocery lists, your project at work, what to feed the kids, or any of billions of questions we could consider instead of touching the Source of Life. Jesus said, many will come to me on that day (when they die and on the day of judgment) and say “Lord Lord!” in joyful greeting and he will say, “Get away from me you doers of iniquity! I never knew you!” Unfortunately, I think many who attend our churches, as well as many who don’t, may be in that group who are rejected. In other words many who follow rituals or religious practices but never engage their hearts or enter into a living interacting relationship with the Divine may believe they are being spiritual because they are doing the right “things” but its like turning on a lightswitch that has no power to it. You can flip the switch all you want – you may do the right thing but the light will not come into your life. You need to complete the circuit and activate the power. The power of our heart, our intention, the emotion and not just of our mind.
I often qoute a diddy that Fr. Hoolighan, an Irish Catholic, once shared with me:
Mr. Business went to church; he never missed a Sunday; But Mr. Business went to hell; For what he did on Monday.
Saint Benedict told us the most important aspect of prayer was not speaking but learning to listen with the ears of our heart. How do we do that? While I will go into more detail in future blogs this question of how do we live, breathe, and pray in the prescence of the Divine is vital to all of us? We will cover that two blogposts from now and go into even more detail in our community. Indeed, that is one of the things I created the ofNaturesGod Patreon community to help with but I will strive to help everyone here in a general way, as I am able: www.Patreon.com/ofNaturesGod
Because we are creatures of habit if we can resist doing things habitually. Doing them without thinking and without engaging our heart or intention and keep our whole existence focused on the Divine then the rituals can actually help us get in touch with our Creator, that Creative Force that brought forth life and ordered all creation.
Time of Prayer and Meditation
If we have and keep a regular time of prayer and meditation our body orients its internal clock toward the Ground of All Being. If you create such a regular habit and you miss your time of prayer and meditation you are likely to have your subconscious remind you, “Aren’t we usually praying or meditating about now?” Similarly, when we enter our regular time with this Living Force, our body, our consciousness, and our soul all naturally orient toward the Source of All Life because doing so has become a living ritual. If we get it into the “habit” of doing so at a particular time our body and consciousness adjust. This does not preclude us from doing so at other times as well for the Divine Presence is always with us. But because we are physical creatures having a regular time in which we are not interrupted, when we consciously turn our hearts toward that Presence in which we live, move, and have our being, is very valuable to us for our spiritual development, our health, our balance, and our resilience in life.
I learned from one of the Saints of the Church to put up a sign to salesmen and people who come to our door (or maybe even to tell family members,) that you are in a time of prayer and not to be disturbed.
“Please Be Quiet and Do Not Knock on the door. I am at my regular prayer time and I will not answer. Please come back later.”
A note like this or something similar can reduce your interruptions. Shut off your phone and shut off the notifications on your computer or go where you cannot hear them to ensure that your full heart and attention can be oriented toward the Divine Presence. If you are distracted by noises outside play soft music without words (that is important because words will distract you – even if they are holy songs.)
I was in deep in prayer and struggling with an issue that I had not talked to anyone but my wife about. My prayer time had actually become kind of a time where I was arguing with God and telling the Creator of the Universe that He/She/It had made a mistake and that I was really not the person to do the job that I felt the Lord of LIfe was pushing me to do. (Yes, I will argue with anyone.) During that time I had a knock on the door! Didn’t they read the note? I usually ignore it but something made me answer this time.
“May I help you?”
“Hi, you probably don’t remember me. My sister brought me with her to your church once last year to listen to your preach and we met briefly after church.”
“Yes, I do actually remember you. How can I help you.”
“Well, I don’t know what you believe about Christianity. I know people have different ways of thinking…”
“Yes,” it was clear to me whatever it was was difficult for her so I thought I needed to say something to help her get out what she was trying to get out.
“Well, I was praying and God told me I need to come here and tell you something. May I tell you his message so God will leave me alone and I can get back to my regular prayers?”
“I think I know what you mean,” I smiled. “Yes, you may tell me what message God has for me.”
“God told me to tell you: ‘You need to accept the power that God wants to give you.’ Does that make any sense to you?”
“Why yes, it does. In fact, I was just arguing with God about that very thing when you knocked. I guess I need to listen and obey instead of arguing. I think God would like me to tell you, ‘Well done, good and faithful servant.’ That was a very important message to me. Thank you.”
She left and I never saw her again.
But I will never seriously entertain anyone who tries to tell me that the Creator, the Universe, the Ground of All Being, the Source of Life, the very Presence in which we live move and have our being doesn’t care about us and doesn’t interact with us. My entire life is an experience to the contrary and I would say if yours has not been it is not because God doesn’t care about you but perhaps it’s because you are too busy or self-absorbed to hear the Divine Force which may speaking in that still small voice heard by the prophet Elijah in the Old Testament. Quietly speaking, and waiting for you to slow down, be still, and listen.
If you haven’t experienced that, if no one has ever taught you to listen with the ears of your heart, follow me here or join me on Patreon and I will help you learn to listen with the ears of your heart so that we may all grow close to the Source of Life.
[Watch for the upcoming blogs on A Place of Prayer and Listening With The Ears of Your Heart.]
I think that an ancient proverb from the Middle East recorded in Proverbs 29:18a is a proverb for our time. Everywhere we look there appears to be chaos and we have been cut off from our roots. Without knowledge of where we came from, we have trouble telling where we are and thence don’t know where we are going. In other words without a Vision the people perish.
It is probable that this means without knowledge of the Divine Will and communication with the Ground of All Being we become cut off from who we are and who we were created to be. We flail about unable to find a course to our life, a purpose in this chaos, or meaning in … well, anything.
Religion has a bad rap these days but I find it interesting that “Religio” (the root from which the word has grown) means “to bind us back.” To bind us back to our roots. This is essential because without its roots a tree doesn’t grow. Similarly if we are unaware of our own roots and foundational beliefs we become lost and confused. Religion, properly conceived should bind us back to the Source of All Life/The Ground of Being/Das Ding An Sich – or The Thing in Itself or as the book says: I am that I am. We humans become too hung up on names and outer trappings like ritual, names of the Divine, and even each others skin color and tend to overlook deeper connection and meaning. The very connection and meaning that religion is intended to help us create with the Creator (or Creatrix if you prefer).
I have a theory about religions and you will find it on the Page: Religions. but I think at their source there is a reality that each religion stumbles toward and that is the Ground of Being. Our language is inadequate to describe it, as anyone who has had a “religious experience” and had contact with the Divine Presence knows very well. The Bible and other sacred works are our groping efforts to describe the indescribable. But it is exactly this experience of the Divine and our listening to its promptings (which the Bible says is partially reflected in our conscience,) that we find purpose and meaning. I will post guidance on centering and listening to this guidance in the days to come but I firmly believe that we are cut off from who we are and who we were meant to be.
Before I formed you in the womb I knew you, and before you were born I consecrated you; I appointed you a prophet to the nations. – Jeremiah 1:5
By forgetting who we are and losing contact with the one who knit us together from the very first we are unable to find our path. Everywhere today we see the consequences of people, society, and religious institutions who have been cut off from their roots. They have lost their vision. We have lost the knowledge of who we are and are disconnected from the Source of Being. It is not surprising that so many don’t know who they are or why they are here. And then, depression sets in.
In my sermons I often said, “Children of the Living God remember who you are and who your father is! And then act like you remember.”
It is by remembering who we are we are guided back into a relationship with our Source and Ground of Being. It is where we find the purpose and vision to weather the trials of life and adversity and make a difference.
As I have said before, spiritual reality is a matter of poetry and song. It is emotion and feeling and not simply a mind thing but a heart thing. Here is what I was trying to say as this song sings praise to “the God of his heart.” I believe we will all find the Divine in the core of our hearts, if we center and look for it. (This one’s for you Chuck):
In thi,s the author praises the “God of His Heart” that Being which he hadthe deep and abidingexperiencef. Listen to what the author was trying to communicate of his experience that was too deep for explanation and could only be expressed in song. I know some have had troubles with people who are in churches and some doctrines. If you are one I ask you to set that aside and listen with the ears of your heart to what is being said.
I know that many think there is no evil but I have experienced something that seems to feed upon negative emotions, suffering, and destruction and it hates the light, joy, and love. In its presence, the hairs on my arms and the back of my neck stand up and I feel cold, sometimes dizzy. Things that terrorize children and cause them to scream and point when adults no longer have the eyes to see, where animals brace and growl with the hair on their back standing up and they jump if you reach out to reassure them. Perhaps you want to call it something else but it seems to me that this is exactly what evil is and how it has been described for millennia.
I have performed a couple of exorcisms as a pastor and investigated infestations of an unseen presence. Besides paranormal groups, my youngest son and my wife have worked with me to investigate various unseen presences. I was contacted by some friends of a family member who needed a minister to accompany them to an investigation in Omaha. In this investigation, there were two children that had died but continued to come up and play with their toys. Their toys would roll, bounce, or otherwise go across the room, and it was a flat floor – the wind does not account for the ball bouncing down the hall toward us. However, the toddler girl who was still alive in the family was terrified of a “diamond man” who came into her room.
The investigation seemed to indicate that the deceased grandmother was present protecting the spirit children and the young girl who saw the diamond man. Both the husband and the wife had experienced the man’s mother (now deceased,) coming in and sitting on the edge of the bed, as she did when had been alive. They not only felt her sit down but when the lights were on they could see the indentation in the bed. She seemed to remain in the house and would hurry the spirits of the children into another part of the house when the “diamond man” showed up. Talking with the family we decided to cleanse the house with sage and prayers and try to get the diamond man to leave without banishing the children or grandma. As far as I know, it worked. I didn’t hear from them again.
This story about the grandma sitting on the bed reminded me of when I was just about to fall asleep, I was very depressed and down. My wife and I were staying in different places and were not getting along. I was lonely and I felt my German Shepherd get on the bed. I had two but the female seemed to have the idea that when my wife was gone that she became the alpha female and I woke up once or twice with the dog in bed with me with her head on my wife’s pillow. The dogs weren’t allowed on the bed because I had asthma back then. Anyway, the lights were off and I felt the dog climb up onto the bed, kinda surreptitiously like so that I wouldn’t notice. I did notice because I knew what it felt like and had caught her trying that before. “Claire get down!” I commanded as I sat up and turned on the light (we had named our dogs Francis and Claire after St. Francis and his sister in Christ. It was then I realized that Claire had died a couple of years ago and Francis was in the hallway and came to the door to see what I had yelled about. I shut off the light and lay back down. “Claire, you can get back on the bed if you want to. I miss you.” She had to be put to sleep due to cancer and as I held her when she died she licked my wrist. Kinda broke up my son, and me.
There are other times I know of spirits making a difference. I had a parishioner awakened once by her husband. “You need to get up the house is on fire!” She immediately got up and dressed and turned around, asking her husband what was burning. It was then she remembered that her husband had recently died. I could offer many other stories. Another parishioner feels she was warned by God that her husband was dying. She was alone in her house doing dishes and someone said “Go check on Verlin.” She was startled and thought someone was in the house with her. She searched the house but no one was there. She went back to her dishes and heard it again only louder and more insistent, “Go check on Verlin!” She got into the pickup and drove out to the field where he was working and his hand had been severed by the threshing machine. She drove him to the emergency room in Cameron, which was miles away, and they were able to save his life and re-attach his hand. He was in shock so he couldn’t have helped himself. The voice saved him.
As I told my son when he was little and came up and told me about a little girl he saw. With kids, you never know if it is an imaginary friend or what. But I have always believed the reason we don’t see things is we have been taught by society that this stuff isn’t real. So we come to dismiss the information our senses take in. Children don’t yet know this but I have become convinced that everyone has at least some potential in this area. (Army experiments reported in Military Intelligence magazine in the 80s – the unclassified experiments, obviously – demonstrate with 98.6 percent statistically significant results that everyone has some sort of psychic or telekinetic ability. But it’s like walking and running. Almost everyone can do it but that doesn’t mean everyone can be an Olympic runner.) Anyway, I asked my son to describe her. He did and I had seen her in the house too. (A friend told me she had known everyone who had lived in my house and no one died there. But the girl wore a shift that looked like it was from the 1800s and I venture to say that she couldn’t have been sure that no one had died in this spot then.) “Did she scare you?” I asked my son. “No, she wasn’t scary at all.” “I don’t think so either son. I think she is just someone who died and is here because we can see her. Maybe she’s lonely, I don’t know. But you tell me if it gets scary at all and then we can do something about it.”
When I was young I explored the occult and summoning things from other realms. That didn’t go well. I left for the Army but people complained about things in my folk’s basement where I had lived. When I came home on leave I woke up and saw an evil-looking face staring at me. I told my sister who was a pastor and had first taught me to meditate and who was “powerful in the Force.” But we didn’t do anything since we decided it must have been a dream. But, we noted, that my German Shepherd at the time, refused to go downstairs to my bedroom and living room. He stayed on the landing. He always slept on or at the foot of my bed between me and the door. Always. But not here. We went out to dinner and left him downstairs since my mom didn’t like dogs or animals in the house. When we came back he had tried to get out of the basement landing. We knew that because of this 120 lb. The German shepherd had gouged scratch marks a quarter inch deep in the door leading to the upstairs. Curiouser and curiouser. He never had had such anxiety before…maybe it was the new place? Later, my mom called a furnace repair man. She took him downstairs and showed him the furnace. She was then working in the kitchen at the top of the stairs when she heard this man run up the stairs and slam his way through the door to the outside. She followed him out and he was trying to light a cigarette but his hands were shaking. My mom asked him if something was wrong and he said, “No, I’m alright I was just startled. You didn’t tell me you had a dog it surprised me and I guess my imagination ran away with me.” He smiled uncertainly. My mom was confused. “I don’t have a dog,” she said. “Do you have some kind of pet, grey and black, furry, and about yay big?” He held his hands about 2 feet apart. “No,” she said. He didn’t say anything. She went back inside as he looked away and smoked his cigarette. After a while, she thought she should see if he was alright. He had left leaving his tool bag and a thick binder downstairs. She called him up and reminded him he left his stuff and asked if he wanted to get it or if she should send it to him. He said no. He didn’t want anything to do with anything that is or had been in her basement. Then my mom finally decided maybe there was something going on. She called my sister and my sister went downstairs and investigated. She wrote me that I had opened a portal and when we got back she would help me with how to do, and close those things.
The darkest encounter I had, besides my portal, was ironically in a church. The thing I exorcised was the darkest encounter I had experienced up to that point. As I said, when the pastor told me they thought there was something in their church and God seemed to tell her in prayer that I could help. While I thought that it was odd since I had always thought that demons couldn’t enter hallowed ground I thought perhaps some parishioners had brought negative energy in with them and that was why she said she couldn’t feel the presence of the Holy Spirit in there. She could feel it in prayer and preparing for her sermon but when it came time to preach she said it was like there was a heaviness upon her and she had trouble just getting through the service.
I had never felt anything when I had visited but I tend to shut off my feelings so I am not bombarded by things day to day. Since I am used to closing off my feelings day to day I hadn’t felt anything and I thought there might be some residual negative energy there from a family with a bad attitude maybe some generational stuff and just some “bad vibes.” But I had written a prayer naming who I thought the chief actor was. And prepared by a ritual bath, prayer, and meditation, and blessing of my accoutrements and garments. When I got to the church I entered and stood in the foyer and opened my awareness up. It was like I was hit with a wall of dark energy so powerful and malignant that I staggered backward as if I had just been hit by a wall of wind from a massive storm. My wife steadied me and kept me from falling over, yes, I was literally staggered. With god’s help, I rallied and started reading the prayer I had prepared. As I read my prayer it was difficult and when I came to the part where I named the person I suspected and the forces of darkness my throat closed and I couldn’t speak the words. I could only read part of it invoking God’s presence but not the power phrase that would banish any evil and darkness. I determined to do what I could read as much as I could I began blessing every room, every window, and every doorway. I blessed the pulpit, lectern, and the chancel area especially thoroughly with holy water, incense, and prayer and visualizations. I finally came to an ancient full-length mirror in a children’s Sunday School room I looked into it and immediately felt as if I was falling into it like a vortex, it felt like some sort of portal. I gave it some extra attention and closed it as I had been taught. Anyway, at some point I somehow knew for a fact two things: 1) I could now read the whole prayer, including the banishing commands; and 2) whatever was there in that church and watching me did not know that I was able to complete it. So I kept this information to myself and did not change anything I was doing until I reached what I had determined was a key room for this dark presence and then finished the entire prayer giving the banishing commands in a loud command/drill sergeant voice. Instantly we heard a door slam. We had opened every door in the church and I thought someone had come in and ran out in a huff during the ceremony and prayers. It would have had to have been someone with a key because all the external doors were locked. No one was outside and no one had left the building. We went through looking to see what door had slammed but they were all open and the external access doors were all still locked. But the door slamming was so loud it echoed in the church. Years later I was talking to someone who said, condescendingly, “Yeah, we tend to find what we think we are going to find.” “Yes we do,” I agreed. “But that is not relevant here. EVERYTHING I have ever read and believed said that demons and evil presence cannot stay on holy ground that has been blessed. This was a church and I didn’t think this evil presence could be there. It was absolutely NOT what I was expecting. I expected a vaguely uneasy feeling, not a presence more powerful than I was.” Later, I reflected upon it and realized that in the mainline denominations there are a lot of ministers who say the prayers and go through the ritual but don’t speak with their hearts and emotions in it. So they are just repeating empty words and not actually blessing anything. Prayers from a priest like this are of little use. One pastor came to the aid of a family and prayed for them, apparently thinking it was just psychological and if he went through the motions they would be better. It got worse. He came back and almost through a Bible at them and said “This stuff isn’t real. You need to read your Bible and come to church.” I found that interesting since, if HE read his Bible, he would find that stuff in there. As he would in nearly every other single religion in history if he read their scriptures. An angel destroyed Sodom and Gomorrah, another killed all the firstborn of Egypt in a single night. Even fallen and cut off from God the fallen angel or demon would be…something people on their own cant deal with. Fortunately we are not on our own.
Oh, I forgot to mention. One of the neatest things I have seen: the tech guy was setting up the equipment for the above house investigation. One of the things he used was one of those sensors that are used in VR gaming so that you can move and act out in the game. The leader of the investigation was a musician by trade and a song came on the radio he liked. He started dancing in the kitchen, by himself, to the music. The tech guy motioned me over. We looked on the sensor’s screen and you could see a stick figure of the guy dancing. The amazing thing was there were two little kids (presumably the ones who had recently died and were still playing with their toys,) dancing with him. One on either side. It was fascinating to look at the man, dancing alone, and then to look at the screen and see the three dancing together.
After this event, I began to think that I didn’t want to deal with this stuff but also that God had raised me up to deal with this stuff. I was praying to God about it and saying that I am not the best person for this spiritual fight because everything says you must be pure and holy and I was “just me.” In the midst of my prayer time, there was a knock on the door. It was someone I didn’t know but she said, “I don’t know if you remember me but you are my sister’s pastor and I heard you once. This may sound really weird to you but I was praying and God gave me a message for you and he won’t leave me alone until I deliver it. I don’t know what it means but maybe you do.” That was different. “OK, what is the message?” “You need to accept the power that God wants to give you.” When I was twenty-one I had a near-death experience and almost died in an army hospital. The angel told me I could come into heaven if I wanted but that God sent me here for a purpose and I had not yet accomplished my mission. It was up to me whether I returned to Earth or entered the kingdom at that time. I had a parishioner tell me once I had great faith. I said “no I don’t Faith is an assurance of things unseen. I have been to the gates of heaven and seen it. So I cannot claim to have faith. I’m too stubborn and I had to be shown.” This stuff is all very real.
But before you cry ghost or demon you should always try to rule out every single logical explanation that you can think of. My son has always liked ghost hunting shows and I am very critical of them and skeptical. That may seem odd considering my experiences but I think some of the shows are hilarious and fake…a few are not. Some of it is my experience as a counterintelligence agent and security director. I have done over 3000 investigative interviews and have both experience and training in investigation and reading the body language of liars. Sometimes it is apparent in these shows. But I greatly respect Ed and Lorraine Warren as well as the clairvoyant Derek Acorah and the work they did in their life. But, as my pastor friend said, “Fr. @@@@ has told me that out of hundreds of cases in Nebraska the Catholic Church has only acknowledged a few as demonic. We were talking and he didn’t believe in demons except as a psychological construct. I responded, “M., did you hear what you just said? A few ARE demonic.” Please don’t experiment with this stuff. Someone I know brought into their life something I call efreets by experimenting with psychic phenomena and astral travel, they appear as a smokey column with red eyes. The family started all sleeping together because their toddler was terrified. I don’t know that these ARE efreets. That is just the creature of myth that most closely resembles it.) It terrified the family until I got rid of it. At some point, the most logical explanation IS that there are ghosts or demons.
People, please do not try to deal with any of this on your own or treat it like a game. Don’t read this and think, I want to experience stuff like this! These things can scratch you, pummel you, and even hurl you against the wall. And, as some investigators have found out, sometimes, once you get their attention. They focus on you. People I know who have paid for their mistakes.
Pray that you don’t find out this is real. But if you have, I would like to hear about it below in the comments.
Here we are talking about whatever it is that is out there that gives meaning, life, stability, patterns, and some semblance of order to the Universe. It has been called many things, “Das Ding an Sich” (the Thing in Itself), the Ground of All Being, the vast otherness, the Divine, the Force, the Living Force, the Ancient of Days, Fate, Destiny, the Universe, YHVH, Allah, the God of Nature (or Nature’s God), or simply God (and for some this concept is a unitarian one, for others a trinitarian one, and still others a multiplicity. )
I believe in Panentheism. Most people understand pantheism and many confuse these two terms just as so many confuse cavalry and calvary. Like the two “c” words the two “p” words are very different.
Panentheism is the belief that the divine is in all things. Not just reflected in all things but it is what Paul TIllich said is what we live in, move in, and have our very being. That is another word for God I forgot…Being. What Moses was told when he asked what God he was talking to he was simply told “I Am” or “I Am That I Am” or more colloquially “I be what I be.” Obi-Wan, in a galaxy far far away and a long time ago described it as an energy field that surrounds all and connects all living things. It can and will guide us if we let it. Master Yoda said it surrounds us and protects us from harm.
Some people have trouble separating these two thoughts: that everything is itself divine of its own power and might, and that everything is infused BY divine power and might. Saint Paul in the Book of Romans says, “Do you not know that your body is the temple of the Holy Spirit and the God’s Spirit dwells in you.” God is not only close but part of us. If you look at The Call you will get an idea of some of what I am speaking of here.
But why bring up Yoda and Obi-Wan they are fiction. Be serious. I am. The Force was developed when George Lucas spent long hours of conversation with a great scholar of gods, heroes, and myths named Joseph Campbell. The roots of the Jedi lie in ancient Eastern Culture and it is no accident that they resemble the mystic masters of antiquity in powers and attitude.
But I’m a Christian and that was developed in the West not some Eastern religion, some would argue. My Bible instructor at Seminary would have disagreed with you. He would have said that Christianity is largely Western Greek Philosophy artificially grafted onto an Eastern Religion and to properly understand the Bible you have to understand that the Bible came out of the Middle EAST and they had a more Eastern than Western mindset in the Old Testament while the New Testament was a mix.
For me, it is a vast mystery that we can interact with and I have no interest in arguing whose God is better or how many angels can dance on the head of a pin. I am interested in exploring what people have said about this bewildering vast presence and expanding my knowledge of it. I invite you to come along. I will often refer to this power that created the Universe, Natural Laws, and the fascinating pattern that underlies all existence at the micro and macro levels as The Divine, God, the Force, the Living Force, Tao, Nature, the Universe, Nature’s God, or by the name that is used by whatever source I am quoting to give knowledge.
In general, I honor the ancient scriptures and will try to meet them where they are, mediated by my own experience of the divine, my powers of reason, and tradition.
