The Craziest Experience of My Life

I never thought I would be the one writing about a supernatural experience like some weirdo from an "aliens are real" show, but here goes.

So before I really get into this story I think it's important to share a little bit of my past to those who don't know me.  I grew up in average midwest conservative churches, the kind that disdainfully refer to anyone who claims any kind of supernatural experience as a "holy roller".  I went to college for engineering but found myself enjoying philosophy and math classes most because I was good at anything involving logic and theory.  I worked in aerospace for almost four years but quit two years ago in order to travel and do full time missions because I found it more fulfilling.  Anyway, I have never before claimed to have heard the voice of God but I have had increasing faith and even though I have always had doubts I can honestly say I have always looked back and saw that following God in my decisions had definitely always worked out in my best interest.

One week ago today I was lying on my bed in a slum hotel in Kolkata India with a raging fever.  It was the middle of my 5th day of fasting, by far the longest I had ever gone in my life without food.  Lately I had been focusing hard on what Jesus calls the greatest commandment "Love God with all your heart, soul, and mind" in a very practical way by praying and fasting.  The main focus of my prayers was to be closer to God but that evening I had also prayed for a revelation.  It would take a long time to explain everything about what led up to these prayers and why I had a fever so I'll just go back to me lying on the bed.  Suddenly I slipped into a kind of dream but I was still conscious.  God started speaking to me in the 'dream' but as He did I would open my eyes, prop myself up on my pillow, and write everything down in my journal.  It felt so crazy.  I don't think I was literally in Heaven (I haven't ruled that out either though) but I felt the presence of God just as strongly as I think it would be in Heaven.  I actually have felt the presence of God before, in fact quite often during worship services, but it was always just a temporary feeling, all of which felt like minuscule brushes with God compared to this.  It's really hard to try to put into words.  Have you ever thought about what it would feel like if you died right now, met Jesus face-to-face and immediately found out that Heaven is real, Jesus is real, and Christianity actually had it right?  You would feel an overwhelming sense of joy that for some reason you were chosen and now you had eternal awesomeness to look forward to.  That is how I felt in that moment.  Near the end of it in my head I said to myself, "All this time I wasn't crazy, God is real and He was guiding me and now that I'm here with Him it all makes sense."  Anyway, I'm having a really hard time putting it into words but it was a real encounter with God, the kind you read about in the Old Testament, the kind that turns people's lives around 180 degrees.

I guess you could explain it away in a lot of ways, after all my fever was very high and I was pretty delusional after fasting for 5 days, but I have absolutely no doubt in my mind that God took me into his presence and spoke to me.  As proof, in my journal is a list of 8 revelations from God, written down as they were given to me.  Some are very personal and some of them are embarrassing so I won't share them all but I will share the first one at least.  I'll have to write a separate blog about it though since this one is already too long.

Well that concludes this blog for today.  It is a mess of a story and has no plot or punchline or moral (other than maybe "seek God and you will find Him") but it happened to me and it was really weird and also life-changing so I thought I would share it as best I could.  I haven't really started to process it yet, what it means or how it's going to impact my future since i am just now getting over the sickness; maybe someday it will be a neat little condensed story that leads to something else and I'll write another blog about it then.