posted January 27, 2017 05:05 PM
Novabronte ... Thank you so much for the video on the man who had been involved in that cult, and his story of how that happened--- as a result of a 'spiritual wounding' he received by ignorance (or not) of that minister who neglected/rejected him.
Part of my story....
I know that with myself, as a teen, sometimes I used to linger after attending an RC Mass.
I had a sensitivity for 'subtle' energies. I 'felt' the honey, the anointing, that lingered after services, and would want to spend time soaking in the Presence till it lifts. (My parents would leave with the rest of the family... I would walk home afterwards.)
While I lingered in the back-chapel this one day, I began to have an Experience. We (in the choir) had sung the song "God is Love"... (And he who abides in Love, abides in God, and God in him.)
Suddenly, the words and the Beauty of the song, and sitting in the Flow, began to unlock a Mystery to me. I was receiving a revealed-Word from God.....
GOD is LOVE. ...
God is not the stereotype image of the old man sittin' on a concrete throne with pigeons flying around his head?!
GOD is A Spirit. The SPIRIT of Love that Abides and Abounds and Is Eternal and Always Inclusive, in All Ways *Creative*....
(The Love of GOD is All-Inclusive).
story continues...
A parish priest happened to walk through the back of the chapel. He was one of the basketball coaches (I was on the team). He noticed me, and approached to say something about practice. He started to talk.
I turned my face towards him, tears streaming down my face. My eyes bore into his, with earnest, and I said to him, Father!, (customary salutation for priests), GOD is LOVE! ...
I was flooded with the Goodness of God flowing through me in those moments. It was like honey and menthol, so brightly refreshing all-around and Opened.
But. ....... That priest began to RIDICULE me. He shred me apart, up one side, and down the other, as the saying goes. It was a thorough work.
It wasn't too long afterwards, that I turned into a different teen after that wounding surprise encounter with the priest. I eventually turned my back on God, on my parents and all authority figures.
I excelled at getting people to hate... especially those who would "try" to be nice to me.
And parallel, by the end of that month, we heard that this priest left the priesthood.
I turned into an atheist...
Then Nature-itself convinced me that there IS a God, but, I rationalized that He had created then 'left' and abandoned his creations behind. That He wasn't present anymore.
I started delving into some of the occult darker-type of people-- until a roommate became concerned for me, and knowing I had a hunger for the supernatural, steered me towards the "safer" approach of EdgarCayce people instead. They were more Christ-based in their spirituality.
It took an EdgarCayce group, a small group of older folks, who took time, and had patience and tolerance, with and towards me, to bring me into better Balance. They brought me back to being able to stand hearing the Name of Jesus being spoken in my presence.
..... I credit these metaphysical folks as having turned me around, bringing me BACK to a Right-relationship with God, and God's Love, in Christ Jesus.
So... I could really relate to what the man in the video relayed. The fringes of what he's said, had touched my own life... and GOD Preserved my Soul from falling off the cliff into the abyss that was baited and waited for me.
God is Good. And God is Love.
I also had some OTHER Direct-Experiences that further anchored me (at important junctures of my life). I have had a Living Relationship WITH The Spirit of God.
What bothered me a bit, Novabronte....
If you'd allow me the space to say this?
What you wrote after the paragraph about the man's vid?-- those words you included (about Satan and Allah) took me by surprise and shock ... and made me feel sooo sad and alone afterwards. ....
I don't totally understand what you meant?
How I (I hope falsely) interpreted that is AS an ANTI-Love remark, and a wound towards Muslims....?
GOD is Love. GOD LOVES and relates to ALL People-- Inclusively!
Biblically? this nation-of-believers are a genetic part of the Abrahamic Seed and God's Promise is assured them. ... This life is like grass, here today, then it's gone. We don't REALLY fully Know what goes on behind the Heavenly Screen? God has a PLAN.
Gently, GOD created EACH PERSON for a Certain particular use.
I know some BEAUTIFUL LL'ers who are of the Muslim faith here.
Not everyone is a part of ISIL. They are their own expression of evil to themselves; who (with a perverted sense) are MIS-Interpreting the 'LOVE and the WILL of God' upon this earth?? ....
(*crying here*)
We SEE the Contrast.
We SEE and feel what effects that a perverted selfish HATRED has on the world... every day, every day. Not just religious, but politically also.
With what happened to me, with what happened to the man(evangelist) in the video---
How do we know whether or not THAT is/was a part of God's Plan to PURIFY and Intensify, even To WITNESS to, 'The Power of The Holy Spirit' STILL resident on this Earth?
(music) Love One Another (GLAD, acapella) [2:45] http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=1UQJ9j61uEo
text/lyrics
Romans 12:9-21
Romans 13:8-10