1 Timothy 2:3-4
3 For this is good and acceptable in the sight of God our Savior, 4 who desires all men to be saved and to come to the knowledge of the truth.

Belief in “god”

I was raised a Catholic.  I attended Catholic grade school, middle school and high school.  I always prayed and believed in God due to my Catholic upbringing.  Looking back on it I know that I really didn’t know the true God or Christ personally.  I had religion but no relationship, no understanding of my own personal sin in relation to a Holy God, and no understanding of the Cross.  I felt empty attending the Catholic church, and I realized it was because my relationship wasn’t with God, but with traditions, ceremonies and creeds that I repeated.  So I left the church when I was 20 years old and lived my life however I wanted.

I was in college at the time and because of my love for video games I decided to get a Computer Science degree in 1991.  I wanted to design games for a living.

Divine Coincidences

Instead of programming games I decided, in 1995, to start a gaming business where players could dial in with their modems and play against each other.  I would be the hub for all the game play!  A friend and I started this gaming business and, at the time, I really felt like “god” wanted me to do this because I seemed to be guided by an unseen force to start the business.  I didn’t concern myself with why “god” would want me to do this, but only that he did.  After all, I loved video games so why wouldn’t God allow me to pursue something I loved?

When I would think of an idea for the business I would see an article about the idea the next day in magazine or book!  These coincidences happened so often that it reinforced my belief that “god” was guiding me.  This happened on an almost daily basis.  These articles were in magazines or books that may or may not have anything to do with gaming.  I began “worshipping” my business because it was the cause of my life for many years.  In fact, it gave me a purpose I didn’t have before.

Divine Glitches

After a year or so in the business I noticed something else going on.  There were things that kept the business from growing, technical problems that couldn’t be explained by the manufacturers of the hardware/software I purchased.  Problems that, according to the manufacturers, were only happening to me.  These technical glitches happened on a frequent basis, and so did the mystery as to why they were occurring.  I remember I was having problems with some software we were giving to customers.  I called the tech support line and spoke to one of their programmers.  After many hours on the phone running various tests he finally told me “We record 3,000 installs per day of this software around the country and you are the only one this problem is happening to.  Our code wouldn’t cause the problems you are having when one of your customers installs it.  We simply do not know why its doing this!”

Breaking My Spirit

I was working quite a lot in those days because I had a full-time programming job and I also maintained the business on the side.  Needless to say I worked all the time.  For four years I worked long hours, and had some successes but also had these technical problems.  On the one hand I felt like “god” wanted me to do this business and then on the other hand I noticed uncanny coincidences and technical issues keeping the business from growing, so I became confused, then utterly frustrated.  I really did put my heart and soul into it and I really did believe God wanted me to do it.

All of this raised so many doubts about God’s will and in fact who God really is that it finally broke me.  I fell on my knees on my office floor and prayed, “God if you are real I want you to show me the truth, and I don’t care what that truth is.”

The Class Begins

After that prayer I stood up, went to my computer, and started investigating.  For the next few years, for 3-4 hours every day, I accessed websites with radio interviews of people who had anything to say about spiritual things.  Anyone who claimed spiritual experiences.  And I do mean ANYONE.

If there was something I didn’t understand I filed it away in my brain for later but kept on searching.  I listened to people who have been abducted by aliens, people who see visions of the Virgin Mary, people who have out-of-body experiences, shamanism, remote viewing, Nostradamus and and other prophecies, any aspect of the spiritual.  The whole time I trusted that God would answer my prayer.  I did this on a daily basis for several hours a day, always learning, always trying to listen with an open mind, forming ideas about things, and holding opinions until I received more information.  I felt like I was taking a class and an unseen God was my teacher.

Sometimes I would reach for a book in a bookstore only to have a strong urging to reach for a different one.  I had spiritual experiences of waking up in the middle of the night paralyzed, and “something” was on top of me holding me down.  One night I was walking to the back of my old house to go inside when, in an instant, I felt like my consciousness expanded to the sky and I was in the universe, and then back.  I remember one time I asked God for a sign, I fell to my knees on the driveway looking up at the stars and a shooting star went past my view.  Strange things like that occurred frequently, convincing me I was being guided.

Having said that I didn’t believe all my experiences were of the Lord.  I realized I was studying topics which dealt with spirits and its very possible evil spirits could be guiding me to deceive me.  It was obvious there was a war going on in my mind and heart.  There were too many contradictory beliefs, its impossible for all to be true.  My overall attitude was that I trusted God would deliver my mind and heart so I could know Him.  While some of these experiences, and there are more I haven’t mentioned, caused me to pause about who exactly was doing this I knew God was above that watching over me.

I started to notice patterns in the different doctrines being pushed by entities.  I noticed that messages from “aliens” talk about Christ a lot.  Other people who talk to entities or ghosts talk about Christ a lot too.  I wondered why this was.  They didn’t mention “Buddha” or “Mohammad”!

I learned about people who are into Remote Viewing (a technique anyone can use to be Psychic).  After I learned how it worked and was convinced of why it worked I tried to do this myself, but I couldn’t do it.  I had an intense feeling of dread as if my conscience were screaming at me.  This feeling was so strong I immediately stopped.  I concluded this bad feeling was God’s way of telling me I have learned enough on this subject.  Its time to study other subjects.  So I backed off and went on studying the next topic I was led to study.  This occurred about 6 other times with different subjects.  I would learn about something, became convinced of its validity and when I tried to do it something told me to stop.  So I did.

I started looking into the Bible as well, because many of these people who write or talk about spiritual things mention Bible verses.  I noticed they misquote it, take it out of context and twist the meaning.  By this time I was becoming convinced by the evidence I studied that Christ is God and the entities that talk to people through many religions and beliefs are all demons impersonating “aliens”, “virgin mary”, “ascended masters”, etc..    You can tell this by what the entities say and the philosophies they promote.  Their words echo satan’s in the Bible.

I learned that the Bible is divinely inspired because of the archeological, scientific, textual, and prophetic evidence.  There is no way it could have been written by men without God’s direct hand in it.

I was led into studying Creation/Evolution which further convinced me the Bible was true.

The Truth Set Me Free

At this point the truth of God became ingrained in my mind and heart from all the evidence I was given.  I realized I am not a good person but a sinner who needs a savior.  I placed my faith and trust in the Lord of Heaven, who died for my sins, who is the everlasting God.  I am now eternally forgiven, not because I am a good person, but because I trusted in Christ who who paid the penalty for sin I could never pay.  I became born again by His Spirit as the bible says will happen to those who believe.

One day I thought maybe I should write about my experiences in a small book so perhaps I might give it to someone who is being deceived by the things I have studied.  While I was pondering this idea I began to think about a man I had seen interviewed on some of the videos I have.  His name is Dave Hunt and I liked the way he spoke.  He seemed very logical.  So I decided to order one of his books.  The book was called “Occult Invasion” and I didn’t really know what the “occult” was or what the book was about, I just wanted to read one of his books.  When the book arrived and I read it, it freaked me out.  This book had everything I had studied and more!  It even had interviews of people I had listened to!  And the author came to the same conclusions I did about the subjects I studied!

Christ really did answer the prayer I had years before, and in fact, He still is today, revealing more of Himself to me as I read His Word and meditate on Him.

The following list below is what I was into.  I am listing them to show the reader that God does indeed answer prayer.  The ones with an asterisk in bold were the things I actually tried to do but couldn’t.  Looking back now I realize God was preserving my heart and mind through all of this.  Learning what is true, and keeping out what is false.

* Remote Viewing (Major Ed Dames)
* Out-Of-Body (Soul Traveler)
* Virgin Mary Apparitions (tried to contact)
* Tracker School Sweat Lodge (Shamanism)
* Photo-Reading Personal Learning Course
* Alpha Course Holy Spirit Weekend

Other topics

Alien Abductions
Anti-Christ
Catholic Saint Prophecies
Cattle mutilations and UFOs
Conspiracy Theories
Creation vs. Evolution
Crop Circles
Demons
Edgar Cayce Prophet
End-times, the anti-christ and the New World Order
Fatima prophecies
Feel heat on my body where someone else is hurt.
Freemasonry
Garabandal Spain and the apparitions
Gordon Michael Scallion prophecies
Janice Connell, author of many books on Virgin Mary.
Kathleen Keating and prophecies
“Mother-Earth” Gaia worship
Near-Death Experiences
New World Order/One World Religions
Nostradamus Prophecies
Paranormal Phenomenon, Ghosts, Entities
Possession and Exorcisms
Hundreds of Radio interviews of “spiritual people”
Reincarnation Memories
Rosaries and Scapulars
TM (Transcendental Meditation & Yoga)
Tom Brown’s Grandfather
UFO sightings
Wicca, witchcraft and the “god-force”
Wide-Angle Vision
The Power of Wishing

Looking back on my experience I was worshipping the true God in ignorance.  God sought me first and brought me to my knees so I could sincerely seek Him.  The Lord is seeking people to worship Him in Spirit and in truth.  I am eternally grateful to the Lord of Heaven for answering my prayer and saving me!

John 4:23-24
23 But the hour is coming, and now is, when the true worshipers will worship the Father in spirit and truth; for the Father is seeking such to worship Him. 24 God is Spirit, and those who worship Him must worship in spirit and truth.”

If you are not a Christian I would urge you to investigate the truth with an open heart.  If you do, the true God will reveal Himself to you.

Here are some ways to know if your heart isn’t open:

• if you are more interested in personal power or attaining wisdom so people can follow you instead of God then your heart is not open,
• if you are too prideful to admit some beliefs you have are wrong then your heart is not open,
  
• if you need more “evidence” God is real so you ask Him to appear in front of you to “prove it” then your heart is not open.  (God says there is enough evidence for anyone to believe).
• if you are sorry for your sins because you don’t want God punishing you..or in other words, you don’t like the consequences of your sins, then your heart is not open.  An open heart is sorry for offending a wonderful God who has given you life, air to breath, food, clothing, family, friends, a job, a house, strength, good health, eyes to see with, all the good things in life.  Would you be happy if something you did offended and hurt a loved one?  No, you wouldn’t.  Its the same with the Lord.  You should be offended at the thought that your sins offend this wonderful God who has lavished His goodness upon you.

The truth is we have all sinned against God and because of that we deserve to be in hell.  However God loves us and He came down as a man in Jesus Christ, He took the punishment you deserved on the cross, and rose from the dead.  What Christ did was a legal transaction.  He paid your fine in His life’s blood.  Now anyone who BELIEVES in Him will not perish but have everlasting life.  Believe He is the only way to save you from hell and cry out to Him in mercy and He will abundantly pardon you…forever.

If you do that today it will be the best decision you have ever made!

God will NEVER turn anyone away who seeks Him with all their heart and with all their soul.