my testimony

**I felt like I needed to add an update to my testimony. I am still a believer 100%, but some things have changed.**

I'm not going to lie, it gives me a little anxiety posting this. Not because it brings up bad memories or anything, but because the truth of how I came to Christ is a little unbelievable. Six years ago I was shaken to the core, and everything I thought I knew was suddenly up in question. My reality suddenly expanded and then shifted. If I had not experienced it firsthand I don't think I would believe it either.  Throughout the years I have shared my story with a handful of people that I know online, but I never told many people in real life because they wouldn't believe me. So aside from the cliff notes version of "blah blah blah caught up in new age deception blah blah" I just kept it to myself and only shared with particular people that God brought into my life. I'm feeling this pull to share it publicly now, and it is my prayer that you will open your heart and mind and listen to what I have to say. 

I think it's time for God's people to witness to his power. 

Buckle up, here goes.

::Deep breath::

I grew up in a church. (I need to add that I am in no way blaming the church I grew up in for anything that happened. This needs to be said. And emphasized.) I went there every Sunday, Sunday night and Wednesday. All the gospel meetings and VBS and bible camp. I was baptized when I was 16. I believed Jesus was real and knew all the stories, but I didn't have a relationship with him. Church was more of a tradition than anything else. I really didn't want to go to hell. I don't think anyone was intentionally trying to scare me, but I definitely had a lot of hell anxiety growing up. I went to church for my whole life, but mostly because it's what I thought I was supposed to do. I didn't do it because I felt a connection. Worshipping God for ETERNITY didn't exactly appeal to me either. Why wasn't there just a button to opt out? Game over. That seemed fair enough.

I always believed that the spirit realm was not within our grasp. Demons had been real, but all that supernatural stuff ended in the bible times. So while my personality ate up the paranormal and loved scary movies and books, I never believed any of it was real. I owned tarot cards, had my palm read, went on ghost walks and owned a ouija board. Sometimes I did wonder why God made such a big deal out of not practicing sorcery and witchcraft if it wasn't real, but I guess I thought maybe he was just a control freak. 

Now my life continues to progress. I marry, have kids, live life. Blah Blah. Nothing changes in my regards to God. He's still there, and I'm still doing whatever I want and pretending like he can't see me. My life motto basically becomes do whatever you want as long as you aren't hurting anyone in the process. 

The closer I inched towards my 30s, the worse my PMS became. For a handful of days each month I was a raging monster, completely out of control, intent to destroy everything in my way. I have an addictive personality, I know this about myself. I didn't want to get prescribed any medications because I know if one pill makes me feel good, why stop there? If I had a script, I would have zero self control. So I looked into my natural methods of stress relief and decided to give meditation a try. What could it hurt, right? (That's some foreshadowing for you.)

I started meditating and I'd do it as soon as I woke up in the morning while everyone was asleep.  I've always woken up before everyone else. It was great, starting my day off with a calm, still mind. The more I practiced, the better I got. I couldn't believe that someone with such a hyperactive mind would have the ability to just shut it off. I never, ever, ever thought I was reaching out to the spirit world. I didn't think that was even possible. 

And then one day something happened. I was meditating and I found that spot of nothingness that I assume is nirvana, when suddenly this lightning bolt of pure energy shot up my spine and radiated through my brain and all down my body. It was the most beautiful thing I had ever felt. I had opened my third eye. I could not believe it. It was real! My mind was absolutely blown. This was amazing. I am prone to daily headaches and I have a little scoliosis that I often feel, but suddenly I was absolutely pain free. I could see auras around people and everything was suddenly more vibrant and the world was interesting in a way that it never had been before. Everything made sense. We were all connected and my life was again filled with awe and wonder, like a small child. I am not a naturally high energy person, and I felt superhuman.

I continued to practice meditation whatever chance I got. I couldn't believe how amazing I could make myself feel with my mind. I felt like I had unlocked a secret key to the universe. I thought I had suddenly discovered this ancient secret. I wasn't worried about anything bad. Everything melted away and only the now mattered. I felt like I lived in this magical world that not many other people even knew about. I felt powerful.  Suddenly the thought of God seemed unthinkable. God and Jesus seemed like the most close minded idea in the world. I decided there were no consequences for anything we did on earth, so it really didn't matter if we kept any kind of moral code at all. I believed that religion was nothing more than a way to control the masses and that we could do whatever we wanted with our lives because there would be no one to answer to when we died. There was no God.  

It sounds strange to acknowledge that suddenly everything I had ever believed had changed, but it was like a switch had been shut off. I even googled symptoms of a brain tumor because the things I was thinking and believing were so unlike me. It never even occurred to me that it might be the transcendental meditation. It felt like I was being reprogrammed, but I didn't realize it at the time. 

I can't pinpoint the particular day I made contact, but this thing had begun to speak to me in my mind, and it tried to convince me that it was the *real* me, and that 'Deanna' was nothing more than my bad habits and memories. It told me in order to fulfill my highest potential and really be free, I had to kill 'Deanna' off and let the real me take over. I can remember being alone that day and crying and screaming in my kitchen floor and the thing told me, "I know it hurts. I know it's painful but you MUST do this. This is the real you, and the pure and true form of you, and you must destroy this part that is holding you back."

I've always had a rich internal life and I'm used to having a constant monologue going on in my head, so none of this was really going on in the outside world, aside from the random weird comment I would tell Peppy. 

Sometimes after I meditated I would be in this trance. Like, I would be totally out of it. One day I was sitting on the ledge of the bathtub and I looked up into the mirror and the eyes that looked back did not belong to me. It was the scariest thing I had ever seen. When I finally got the courage to look back up, my eyes were there again. But I don't think I was supposed to catch whatever was there looking out.

After I saw those eyes I really began to ask myself how the things I currently believed contradicted with what I had been taught my entire life. Whatever was in my head was very manipulative, and it tried many different angles to get me back on track. It began new tactics, like yes, there was a creator, but not a personal one. For about a month I believed that humans were aliens and we were sent to earth as punishment. Another month I believed I had been reincarnated multiple times. Looking back, it seems so unreal, but this was 100% reality for me at the time. I understand that some of you might want to assume I was having some kind of psychosis, but the bible does say that satan disguises himself as an angel of light. 

I still didn't believe in God. It just didn't make sense to me, but I was filled with this sadness that I couldn't explain. One night I lamely prayed something like, "God, I don't think you are real. But if you are, I need you to show me. If you reveal yourself to me, I will follow you forever."

The very next morning I was going about my business getting ready to go somewhere, when this massive rush of power and love came over me. I fell on my face bawling and I knew God was real. It was immediate. There was no doubt at all. This was so unlike the third eye opening. This was the pure love of God rushing through me. God was real. Jesus was real. The Holy Spirit was real. I lay on the floor crying, feeling his power and love for what felt like hours, but might have only been minutes. I had felt evil, and he let me feel truth. It still took months to wrap my head around what happened. I think about a verse in the bible where is says Mary treasured these thoughts in her heart, and that's what I did too. I treasured them and tried to figure out what it all meant. I told Peppy that either I was going crazy, or that Jesus was real and he will have a personal relationship with us if we allow it. 

I began reading my bible for the first time in my life and realized there were so many things that I had thought were biblical, but were actually just traditions made by men. The scales had fallen from my eyes and I finally saw the truth. Even now I feel like Indiana Jones, searching and digging deeper each and every day. 

You will know the truth, and the truth will set you free. John 8:32

This happened back in 2015. We live in a world that seems so distant from 'bible times,' but God is still the same. Evil is the same. Spiritual warfare is real, and satan will try every tactic to deceive you. Sorcery and witchcraft are real. And if I contacted the spirit world accidentally, imagine just how dark sorcery can be when you search it out with evil intent. I know the occult is more prevalent in this world than people would believe. From children's shows to commercials to songs on the radio, it's everywhere. 

I am eternally grateful to the Lord for delivering me from that. It was like the Matrix, once you take the pill you cannot go back. I don't want to go back. Almost six years later and I am a new creation. I do not even recognize person I used to be. Many people in my personal life don't know the extent of my testimony because they wouldn't believe me. They only see the change in my life. The cognitive dissonance is real. We believe in a God, and yet we deny his power. But God does not change and we cannot place him in a box. 

Not everyone has a supernatural conversion, but I kind of wish they did. 

Being a christian does not mean I am perfect. Far from it. It means that I know I need a savior. I need Jesus each and every day. I cannot do this life without him. I tried for 30 years, and I won't spend a moment longer not having that friendship with him. People will laugh and mock. Who cares? It's probably providental that I've never really cared what anyone thought of me. Every single day we are one day closer to the end of this generation. One day Jesus will be returning and I cannot wait to see him face to face. People need to realize that there is so much more going on than what we can see at face value, but the distractions are everywhere to keep us from seeing what is real. Life is stranger than you could ever imagine. What we see is only the very tip of the iceberg. 

There may be people who made it to the end and are left with a bad taste in their mouth. They might be thinking I'm being blasphemous, or that there is no way something like that could ever happen. If you are in this category, I humbly suggest you pray that the Lord opens your eyes to the workings of this world. Or come talk to me. Obviously I couldn't type out everything I experienced or it would be a book. There are some things I'm using discretion over in this blog post, because I don't want to cause any upset feelings.

Do you not know? Have you not heard? The Lord is the everlasting God, the Creator of the ends of the earth. He will not grow tired and weary, and his understanding is unsearchable. Isaiah 40:28