As many of you know from my last thread, I have many issues which concern the paranormal. As mundane as they may sound to anyone reading about them, they're hard for me to discount. Believe me, I want to know for sure that it is really all in my mind and not real. I've had some experiences that are hard for me to ignore, and I'm starting this thread so I can talk about them.
This is not a thread that is about proving the existence of God, Jesus, Buddha, or whatever. I'm not trying to be a troll and just posting stories. I'd like to talk about these experiences that I've had and would like some objective feedback, because I really don't like believing that they are the result of something paranormal.
As some of you may know, I have issues with the so-called "unforgivable sin" in Christianity. This is because, as a teenager, someone told me that I should never commit it or I would be damned. At the time, I was suffering from Obsessive-Compulsive Disorder in the form of horrible, intrusive unwanted thoughts, and this person I decided to tell about them was a Christian (now I would label him a fundamentalist.) Of course, after he told me what the unforgivable sin was, it was all I could think about for years. I thought I was damned because the thought kept repeating in my mind, over and over again. Finally, one day, I gritted my teeth and said the words that he said I should never say or I would not be forgiven: "God and Satan are one."
After I said this, I presume I obsessed over it for a little bit and then forgot about it. Perhaps I was so involved in my OCD issues that the reality of what I had just said didn't sink in, and that my eternal destiny was sealed. I forgot about that memory for two years.
In the summer of 2004, in the midst of a health scare, I prayed to God for help. I had since gotten over my OCD repetitive thoughts by reading up on techniques to get rid of them, and had become an atheist. However, I was so freaked out about the health scare that a friend suggested I pray for help, so I did. In hindsight I shouldn't have, it was a weak moment.
Long story short, I got an "answer" to my prayer in the form of a strong coincidence (my friend Jennifer called me out of the blue while I was holding my cell phone in my hand with the number to the local ER dialed into it.) I then had the strength to tell her all about the health scare, to which she told me that she had gone through something similar. I ended up going to her house, where I told her about the prayer and she said that her calling me probably had something to do with my praying for help. She thought that God had her go through her scare so that she could help me with mine.
I started believing in God, but I wasn't really focused on the "evidence" I now had for the existence of God; I was still very much focused on that test coming back negative. However, I soon started having bad thoughts about God. These eventually brought back memories of the unforgivable sin, and I felt very guilty. One night, while I was at Jennifer's house, I thought to myself: "At least I've never said it out loud." And BAM...it was like a sack of bricks hit me, and my terror could probably rival that of an execution victim. I remembered that two years prior, I had said the words I was told not to say: "God and Satan are one."
For about a month, I was absolutely terrorized. I couldn't sleep; I would wake up in the middle of the night and immediately start obsessing. All I could think about was the fact that I was damned for words that I had said.
Then the following experience happened. I was sitting at my desk at work, most likely obsessing over Jesus, being damned, etcetera, when a voice (not inside my head) from inside me asked the following question: "Do you believe that Jesus was the Son of God?" For whatever reason, at the time I felt that I couldn't lie and say yes, so in my mind I said, "No." I then felt something leave me; the only way I can describe it is that my soul, or God, or whatever, departed me. I felt it lift up out of me, like I had just offended God and he decided to leave me at that point, and I felt extremely empty. I no longer felt terrorized about the unforgivable sin; I no longer felt "convicted" if you will.
That is an experience that I can't get over. I try to tell myself that it was all in my mind, but the truth is, I've had trouble feeling guilt over anything since that happened. It makes me worry that the experience was for real, and that God really did leave me that day when I told him that I didn't believe in Jesus.
If anyone has any sort of explanation for that happening, I would love to hear it. I really want to get over the idea that I've offended the Supreme Being and that I'm damned. I want to believe that God didn't leave me that day, but that my mind was playing a trick on me or something.
Thank you for reading.
This is not a thread that is about proving the existence of God, Jesus, Buddha, or whatever. I'm not trying to be a troll and just posting stories. I'd like to talk about these experiences that I've had and would like some objective feedback, because I really don't like believing that they are the result of something paranormal.
As some of you may know, I have issues with the so-called "unforgivable sin" in Christianity. This is because, as a teenager, someone told me that I should never commit it or I would be damned. At the time, I was suffering from Obsessive-Compulsive Disorder in the form of horrible, intrusive unwanted thoughts, and this person I decided to tell about them was a Christian (now I would label him a fundamentalist.) Of course, after he told me what the unforgivable sin was, it was all I could think about for years. I thought I was damned because the thought kept repeating in my mind, over and over again. Finally, one day, I gritted my teeth and said the words that he said I should never say or I would not be forgiven: "God and Satan are one."
After I said this, I presume I obsessed over it for a little bit and then forgot about it. Perhaps I was so involved in my OCD issues that the reality of what I had just said didn't sink in, and that my eternal destiny was sealed. I forgot about that memory for two years.
In the summer of 2004, in the midst of a health scare, I prayed to God for help. I had since gotten over my OCD repetitive thoughts by reading up on techniques to get rid of them, and had become an atheist. However, I was so freaked out about the health scare that a friend suggested I pray for help, so I did. In hindsight I shouldn't have, it was a weak moment.
Long story short, I got an "answer" to my prayer in the form of a strong coincidence (my friend Jennifer called me out of the blue while I was holding my cell phone in my hand with the number to the local ER dialed into it.) I then had the strength to tell her all about the health scare, to which she told me that she had gone through something similar. I ended up going to her house, where I told her about the prayer and she said that her calling me probably had something to do with my praying for help. She thought that God had her go through her scare so that she could help me with mine.
I started believing in God, but I wasn't really focused on the "evidence" I now had for the existence of God; I was still very much focused on that test coming back negative. However, I soon started having bad thoughts about God. These eventually brought back memories of the unforgivable sin, and I felt very guilty. One night, while I was at Jennifer's house, I thought to myself: "At least I've never said it out loud." And BAM...it was like a sack of bricks hit me, and my terror could probably rival that of an execution victim. I remembered that two years prior, I had said the words I was told not to say: "God and Satan are one."
For about a month, I was absolutely terrorized. I couldn't sleep; I would wake up in the middle of the night and immediately start obsessing. All I could think about was the fact that I was damned for words that I had said.
Then the following experience happened. I was sitting at my desk at work, most likely obsessing over Jesus, being damned, etcetera, when a voice (not inside my head) from inside me asked the following question: "Do you believe that Jesus was the Son of God?" For whatever reason, at the time I felt that I couldn't lie and say yes, so in my mind I said, "No." I then felt something leave me; the only way I can describe it is that my soul, or God, or whatever, departed me. I felt it lift up out of me, like I had just offended God and he decided to leave me at that point, and I felt extremely empty. I no longer felt terrorized about the unforgivable sin; I no longer felt "convicted" if you will.
That is an experience that I can't get over. I try to tell myself that it was all in my mind, but the truth is, I've had trouble feeling guilt over anything since that happened. It makes me worry that the experience was for real, and that God really did leave me that day when I told him that I didn't believe in Jesus.
If anyone has any sort of explanation for that happening, I would love to hear it. I really want to get over the idea that I've offended the Supreme Being and that I'm damned. I want to believe that God didn't leave me that day, but that my mind was playing a trick on me or something.
Thank you for reading.
