keith

We utilized our knowledge of the heavenly mechanics to remain one step ahead in the weapons race. We were told it was a race created for the benefit of the people. Like every corporate conglomerate, though, we often realized an urgent need for expansion; with a change of venue here, and another tac there, we finally settled on Star Wars. Listen to the name and purpose of these words-Star Wars. Had we a motto for our growing madness, I think it would have said: bomb everyone who wants to bomb anybody-nuke the nukers. It was clear-cut that as a self appointed nation we alone would decide what's good and evil on this earth. For a better vantage point, for us to rule with an iron hand, we took our venerable war machine into the heavens-the very place that has the ability to provide peace on earth.

I must have been in a deep sleep. I was so involved in what I thought to be the purity of the academic study of physics and the history thereof, that I didn't understand our haste to be of a dubious nature. I got caught up in the arms race like most everyone else. When I opened my eyes and saw what I saw, I had to shake my head to clear it, and I said to myself, "Do nothing, you can't beat it." I was fearful. We had a bomb facing every direction, not only toward the enemy but back toward ourselves-dictating our actions. We were living in a false peace-aptly called a cold war. It was then I deemed the physics and war communities like unto a man who would enter a large populated room with a hand grenade. He would pull the pin and yell out "All right you so-and-sos, get down on your faces and shut-up." There would be compliance, then peace, but not heartfelt peace.

I couldn't find any compassion for academia. I blamed them. I hated them for what they were doing to me and our country. Whoa,-my legs wobbled from my thoughts. I fell to my knees. I considered myself to be like them and I couldn't do anything about it. In my heart I cried out to know Love. I could go nowhere. The heaviness of my understanding rendered me still.

My most valuable possession, the profound thoughts of the physical community that I believed could never be superseded, plummeted me into a place of melancholic void, a space with no life. Everything known about the heavens was being used to do injustice to man-and I bought into it. I felt that the totality of my being personified death. I was sore-afraid. This penetrating moment of understanding is what I call my great spiritual black out.

Seeing me in this most untenable state, my wife-to-be sought help. She joined a church. We were told to discontinue our living arrangement until we were married. This was the last straw. There couldn't be more. Devastated and alone-separated from life itself-I was unable to fully comprehend. What is going on, I thought? The very community that professed love was doing their best to break us up. I wanted justice. Revenge crept up inside of me. Those ... Christians were saying we were living in sin; what about them I thought. They were greedily protecting their way of life while the greater portion of the people on the earth were starving. Hypocrites!

Obviously, I couldn't go to the spiritual community. I had no personal relationship with God or them. My inability to see the light in the physical community kept me from any hint of refuge on this earth. I had no place to share my feelings. My depression became so great that I was afraid to die for fear of what forever might be.

O Lord, by these things men live, and in all these things is the life of my spirit: so wilt thou recover me, and make me to live. Isa. 38:16

I screwed up my courage, and proceeded to throw away all of my dreams. I quit work. I left home. I purchased a used copy of the King James Version of the Bible (because it was the oldest) and stormed off to be close to the sea. I armed myself with the destruction of Christianity-their own Words.

In my first attempt, I couldn't understand a syllable of the King James English. I had read a great deal of Shakespeare, but, there was no sense to be made of this writing. Could it be there was some sort of hidden code? (In retrospect, I was tenaciously clinging to my only understanding-even though I perceived it to have no foundation.) By the grace of God, I remembered I was told to "kneel and pray" before reading the book. I thought it was silly to get on my knees, (what could I do there that I couldn't do standing or sitting) but I did. "I don't know who you are God, and I don't know what to say, but if you're there please help me to understand." An awareness of something began to tug at my soul. It kept coming to my mind that I would hear the truth if I tried reading the Bible again.

Many times in the past, questions emerged from within me concerning how man came into being or what made the earth and the stars. In the academic disciplines I had read, the only answer that I could find was: it could have been this, or, according to an ancient writer if this were so, then maybe that happened. In the Bible, the first words said to me were God did it! I clearly understood what was said. I made a choice. Without question I believed for the first time. God took me to the beginning and started me in a direction I innately wanted to go-toward heaven. At that moment, one on one, God created for me the Heaven and the Earth.

My first reading of the Bible was very deliberate. It took six weeks. I stopped only for sleep and prayers of forgiveness for the things I had done. Most of my reading was outside, in a little clump of trees, close to the water, where I could be by myself. Nothing could have kept me from the truth that was unfolding. I had been unctioned to leave the darkness behind. From Genesis to the Revelation, the words of God riveted my soul with the wonder of creation and the knowledge of my wretchedness.

When I met Jesus, I could see myself as one who would throw dice for his garments, and stick a spear in his side to test if he were dead.

I finished the Revelation and immediately returned to the old testament. I sought to understand more of Christ and the Church through the relationship of Ruth to Boaz. When the awareness came, my whole being seemed to focus on our Saviour Jesus and his reasons for allowing the terribleness of the cross to happen. It was then I believed Jesus to be the Messiah. I came undone. I knew that every part of me was known. I felt naked. In my thoughts I was a drunk, a whoremonger, a murderer, a perverted soul with no right to life-Satan himself-and all the host of heaven was watching. The terror was more than I could bear. I cried for God to eradicate me from the earth, to send me to hell for the benefit of those I might endanger.

continued...