The Father has delivered and drawn us to Himself out of the control and dominion of darkness and has transferred us into the kingdom of the Son of His love, in Whom we have our redemption through His blood, the forgiveness of sins. [St Paul’s letter to the Colossians 1:13-14, Amplified Bible.]

Submission and Fire

Awesome as it was, the dream-vision recounted in The last day of my life didn’t make me want to rush off to church. There was much to mull over, especially its meaning to my way of life. Its ramifications needed deep consideration and not only did I need to assess the dream’s impact, but I also wanted to find well-informed believers who took Jesus seriously. First, however, I needed to check out New Agers’ claims of the Bible having been tampered with by early Church councils, as well as its history and content.

In my wariness of religious people I surmised none would be able to listen to me, or even comprehend my story. They’d be ignorant about such things. AND none of them would have been through my kind of bad, meditative ‘trips’? Or so I thought!  But help was at hand…

Whenever I went into a local Christian bookshop one book would almost jump off the self at me! The Lord was directing me to biographies of Christians who, like me, had been tied into New Age and occult activities. They’d been rescued from terrifying situations by calling upon Jesus’ name. Their true stories brought home to me the truth of what had happened in that exceptional dream. I became so deeply grateful to the real living God for having saved me. I didn’t know that Satan himself masquerades as an angel of light; his followers as servants of righteousness (2Cor 11:14). I’d been deceived and beguiled but the scales were starting to fall from my eyes – an awesome awakening, and a homecoming!

Tal Brooke, son of American diplomats and pioneer in meditation with crystals, held a privileged position in the inner circle of the revered Indian guru Sai Baba, of whom he later wrote, “I had discovered an absolutely satanic thing operating behind Baba’s veneer”. Tal’s personal encounter with the devouring darkness behind the ecstatic light and consciousness called ‘nirvana’ validated my own experience. Roy Livesey had been in the same brotherhood as I had and his book, too, had been thrust upon my attention.

Upon reading Livesey’s account one lunchtime I prayed the ‘sinner’s prayer’ and on 29 March 1990 gave my life to Jesus as my personal saviour. Driving home, however, the spiritual enemy tried to get me into a couple of road accidents. And when I arrived home I found he’d even attempted to burn down our new, wooden-framed house. Thank you Lord for being there – the fire had been put out by throwing water onto flaming fat in an electric oven!!

Moving Towards TOTAL Freedom

Months after the dream, I’d learned some members of the church that had invited me to hear Billy Graham met in the school next to our house. Later, I heard that these people had given Peter prayer backing for his discussions with me – they’d targeted me!  God had definitely answered their prayers by giving me the dream-vision.

The first service I attended there was a culture shock! – before me a young man, devoid of dog-collar but bedecked with acoustic guitar, led the meeting in song. He went on to  conduct the ‘service’ from his head and heart, without any script or ritual. And he even encouraged discussion!  Some testified to angelic protection in their lives: I’d thought this subject was lost to churchgoers. And, starting the sermon, he announced that they were going to look at the shortest gospel, that of Mark, and continue over the next weeks. In saying, “It’s action packed and full of urgency” he intrigued me, and this fitted in with my intention to check out the Bible.

Therefore, I thought it might prove useful to come again. One thing he taught stuck in my mind – “In Mark, who first recognised who Jesus really is?”  Answer: an unclean spirit (see Mark 1:24). I was thus reminded of that dream’s events.

And so I came into a good place to build upon the message of that dream by learning about the Bible and, more importantly, by listening to God through His written word. The first of many times this has happened was incredibly clear proof that God does speak through the Bible, as claimed by this group of believers.

I decided to re-view the occult brotherhood’s teaching on Jesus from a massive mound of monographs. After having checked all those specifics, I asked God for guidance upon this matter and opened my new, pocket-sized Bible. I’ve never been able to repeat what happened next – it fell open at the second chapter of the Apostle Peter’s second letter, as here. The first ten verses stood out with startling clarity, the rest was hazy! Therein, Peter warns about false teachers:

…who secretly introduce destructive heresies, even denying our sovereign Lord…Many will follow their shameful way and bring the way of truth into disrepute. In their greed these teachers will exploit you with the stories they have made up. Their condemnation has been long hanging over them…2 Peter 2:1,3 [emphases especially hit ‘the bull’s eye’] 

Those verses go on to explain that assessment and what happens to such teachers. This answer from God to my question was startlingly exact! I was most amazed.

Also, in those early days I reviewed my earlier uncharitable views about the clergy. Readers may understand from my story how very difficult it was for me to contemplate attending church, let alone with any regularity – not to mention being under the oversight of any sort of clergyman whatsoever.  And, as mentioned above (reiterated to show my strength of feeling): they certainly couldn’t comprehend where I’d come from.

So once again I decided to put preachers’ claims about the Word of God to the test. I asked if God could let me know His opinion about clergy…

Again! my Bible fell open to give the most apposite instruction at Hebrews 13:17:

Obey your leaders and submit to their authority. They keep watch over you as men who must give an account. Obey them so that their work will be a joy, not a burden, for that would be of no advantage to you.

That well and truly put me in my place and enabled me to make my mind up. Thank you Lord for answering and correcting me!

Only upon revisiting this testimony in later years did I realise those two passages starkly contrast both forms of leadership under which I submitted. The first was ungodly, and the latter is blessed by God and proves to be the better, nay ‘most best’, spiritual cover for protecting His children.

Not Yet Fully Free

But back to those early days. From those who’d trodden the same path as me I learned the importance of being completely cut off from my old life in the ‘New Age’. This meant getting rid of books and objects associated with it, but I was slow to so do. Although I’d turned away from that past life an unseen bond seemed to remain.

It needed to be dealt with next because I wanted what’s promised in the written Word:

So if the Son liberates you, then you are really and unquestionably free.  [John 8:36 Amplified Bible] 

Installments

1. No 7 and my journey into freedom
2. “You shouldn’t be at our school!”
3. Searching for truth leads me into captivity
4. The last day of my life came ‘like a thief in the night’
5. Rescued from Satan by The Lord of Hosts
6. The real Truth delivers me from captivity
7. Confirmations of the reality of my visionary encounter

Bible quotations are by courtesy of BibleGateway.com – thank you for this facility.

At Mum’s sister Jenny’s house, Leicester (1962).

The intellectual freedom of higher education in the ‘swinging 60’s’ enabled me to break loose from the values of my parents and their generation. Even so, I recognised their values had enabled them to come through the destruction and deprivation of the Great Depression, World War and post-war Britain austerity with great fortitude.

As outlined in “You Shouldn’t Be At Our School!”, a formative influence upon a child of the post-war ‘baby boom’ was the disharmony and hypocrisy between churches. In my mind it tarred all Christians with the same brush and badly reflected upon the God they believed in.

Nevertheless, when a child I’d once thought it must have been awesome to have been around Jesus and seen everything He said and did.

Also, two verses from Sunday Mass got embedded into my brain and, although buried in the unconscious, they never got overwritten. One was of Jesus telling his disciples they’d do even greater works than He was doing! The other was by someone who’d been with Jesus, and who surmised: If everything He’d done was written down there wouldn’t be enough room in the world to contain the books! [John 14:12 and closing sentence of that Gospel.]

In view of that close, eye-witness account and churches’ misrepresentation of their founder, I became convinced a lot of what he’d taught had been lost, or even suppressed, by the early church.

THE NEXT STAGE OF MY JOURNEY INTO ‘FREEDOM’

The first two stages leading to my freedom had come from the clash of school and church. My reaction directed me elsewhere. The truth must be out there somewhere and so I decided to investigate and search it out for myself.

First port of call was the supernatural and possibility of an afterlife. After all, maternal grandmother occasionally referred to the first. Seances seemed open to trickery and were renowned for variability and inconsistency. So I never attended any. Having a scientific bent I looked for consistent, reliable reports of such contacts. Accounts by those who’d almost died seemed more authentic than mediums’ claims of contact with the dead.

Then came yoga and eastern religions a few years before the famous Beatles took an interest in Transcendental Meditation. I delved into and accepted these esoteric spiritual doctrines, such as reincarnation and karma.

At 21 years of age, after learning about the Western esoteric tradition, I joined a mystic brotherhood supposedly descended from ancient Egypt through a chain of historic personages such as Da Vinci, Bacon, Wren and Newton all of whom, it was claimed, added to and transmitted that ancient wisdom which had been held ‘sacred’ by 12-13th Century ‘heretical’ Cathars of southern France, and later the Knights Templar. (Later freemasonry merely skimmed the surface of that arcane, initiatory knowledge.)

What made it especially attractive from my standpoint were references to the ‘mystical life’ and ‘secret doctrines’ of Jesus (eg, John the Baptist was the prophet Elijah reincarnate!) and who was claimed to have been one of several perfected ‘masters’! This teaching is similar to that of Gnosticism and the Jewish Kabbalah.

My historical interests devoured the rise of the early Church, medieval alchemy and the start of scientific method in the early 17th Century, as well as literature and secret codes then in use in England and German Brunswick-Luneberg and Palatinate of the Rhine.

This opened up research into early Church history including the ‘French connection’ to Glastonbury and its legends. Developments of early science from alchemical literature and secrets buried in codes, plus claims about Cathars of the Langued’oc (persecuted Christians also known as Albigensians) and the Knights Templar in France were highly fascinating.

Consequently, I was well placed and connected to know modern authors’ claims about a supposed romantic connection between Jesus and his disciple, Mary Magdalene, were untrue. Such stories and their dramatic conspiracy claims make fascinating fiction. (My publishing source confided that it was a marketing ploy to increase sales!)

[For more on the last read What Have Paul Keith Davis Video and Mary Magdalene In Common? and my ‘The Magdalene Legacy’ – a Critique’, as well as Ian Paul’s article The Evidence for Jesus outside the New Testament.]

‘FIRST CONTACT’

The mundane event of a dinner party in mid-1980s played a pivotal part in my journey into freedom. But I knew it not. This social event held by young parents, the father being in training as an Anglican curate, included his vicar and a couple from Cheam Baptist Church. We got around to chatting about our philosophies of life but these folk were like ‘aliens’ from my highly ‘enlightened’ viewpoint!

I was surprised the vicar was open-minded and seemed to agree with my New Ager claims that all religions lead to God, just like spokes of a wheel connected to a hub.

BUT the Baptist couple would have absolutely none of that and strongly disputed my views. How closed and ignorant!

I recall my outraged thought, “Baptists are such Biblical bigots – I’ll never touch them with a barge pole!” However, I never expected this was all borrowed!  This vow would come to be used against me…twice!  That is, I was yet to discover the Lord God has a sense of humour!

Soon afterwards, the curate invited me to a public meeting with a guest speaker, John Richards. It was a memorable occasion for three reasons; first, his name is my Christian names in reverse order and, secondly, for having gently confronted me upon noticing a small pin on my jacket’s lapel displaying a cross within a star of David. He asked, “What does your family say about that?” and I retorted “Nothing, what’s it got to do with them?” After all, they were aware of my search for lost Christian-related wisdom. But John was referring to a church ‘family’ – which didn’t apply because I wasn’t a churchgoer!

Therefore, I had nothing further to discuss and later listened warily to his investigations into witchcraft and satanism as secretary to the bishop of Exeter’s study of exorcism, later an advisor to the Archbishop of Canterbury.  It was all very irrelevant to me in view of my disliking the ‘black stuff’ (including freemasonry) – but that was a mistaken notion!

So for many years I gave no further thought to that John Richards’ event…BUT the fact it did play a significant part in my long journey has been confirmed by his name popping up 47 months after publication of this post – and ’47 is my birth year!. At a conference on healing on 9th September 2017 in Guildford Cathedral I attended a session by the bishop’s advisor on deliverance. He began with his personal testimony and how it involved his spiritual director John Richards! (In view of this ‘God-incidence’ these three paragraphs are new.)

REALITY REVEALED

You may think of that esoteric brotherhood as akin to freemasonry, which seemed quite ‘creepy’. There was no ostensible connection and the history, principles and exercises taught by the first made it very different. They taught about a ‘Cosmic’ supreme being, not the God of Abraham, but an ultra-intelligent, superhuman, all-pervasive mind. Thus, it was important to ‘attune’ with its ‘cosmic consciousness’ by exercises for developing the inner self and supernatural senses – even the facility of invisibility.

Naturally endowed with being able to dream vividly in colour, I now found I could control and change content during a dream. That is, to make a conscious decision to shut down one unsatisfactory dream and move into, or even replay, a better one. I was, however,  to fail spectacularly with two, as you’ll read later…

Whilst asleep I once experienced nirvana – the sublime state sought by Buddhists – only to discover its deep danger. I floated in a transcendent, golden light. BUT going deeper this light changed, as though an invisible hand had drawn a curtain aside. Then I saw behind the peaceful and beautiful light a terrifying darkness lay deliberately hidden. It appeared as a gigantic, devouring spider – I was thoroughly repelled and frightened for my life!  Next, I awoke alarmed and grateful, yet unable to fathom its meaning.

My search for Truth had led me unwittingly into captivity and I became entangled within an invisible demonic web. I didn’t know I’d been seriously misled and deceived and was in grave personal peril.

After 21 years of searching for and attaining extensive esoteric knowledge, however, I’d find myself in a diametrically opposite situation – utterly incredible!

My journey into freedom was to enter its next stage, where the allure of a ‘false Gospel’ lured me to the devil’s door >> (next).

[Bible quotations are by courtesy of BibleGateway.com]

[RETURN to overview: “Jesus Freed Me!“]