As the days passed, I became distracted with a class I had to teach. I truly enjoyed it and wondered if this could be my calling. I was not feeling Jesus’ presence with me as I had before. Doubts had once again begun to creep in. Then one night, on the year anniversary of the Waco, Texas disaster, there was a documentary on TV about it. They showed footage of videos David Koresh had made for the FBI.
As I watched, I got the impression he truly believed God talked to him and this really shook me up. Was I like him and simply going crazy? I had been journaling for the last month, as the newly ordained priest had asked me to do when I had first met with him, and I was supposed to be meeting with him again in a couple of days. As I read over what I had written I didn’t recognize myself. It sounded like a religious zealot or a crazy person had written it. I grew impatient with everyone around me, especially my children. (Children may be a blessing from God but they are also a torture test of one’s moral fiber!)
I began to think that my impatience stemmed from not being able to just totally believe everything, waiting for something else to happen, and fearing losing myself in all of it. I don’t drink much and never delved much into anything else because I didn’t like losing control of myself. I had a couple of times in my college years and didn’t like some of the things I had done. I still did not feel Jesus’ presence and feared I had begun resisting him, throwing up a wall against everything. When I went to church on Sunday and still didn’t feel him, I was disappointed. After communion, I made a special effort to overcome the barrier and sent out my love to Jesus. All of a sudden I heard inside my head a warm, masculine voice say “I love you.” It really caught me off guard and shook me up. It was the first time I “heard” a voice. I immediately threw up the barrier again. I wanted to think about everything yet had difficulty thinking about anything. I missed his presence.
That evening, after everyone had gone to bed, I turned on the TV and began flipping through channels. I came across a program that had a minister giving a talk. I decided to watch it because he was speaking about a passage in the new testament that I had just read, where Jesus expels a demon from a man.
The Pharisees tell the crowd who saw it that Jesus did this through the help of Satan. Jesus gives the speech about a house divided against itself and concludes by saying that people could say anything about him and be forgiven but they would condemn themselves to eternal damnation if they blasphemed against the Holy Spirit. I was never quite sure exactly what Jesus meant by that.
How does one blaspheme against the Holy Spirit? The minister’s explanation was that to blaspheme against the Holy Spirit was to deny or turn away from a calling from God. He said that the Holy Spirit carries the calling and to turn away from it was to turn away from the Holy Spirit and therefore imperil your soul.
Well, that shook me up quite a bit. By putting up a barrier to God, and not accepting what was happening to me, was I imperiling my soul? I decided to go sit outside and attempt to meditate. I focused on one star in the sky, emptied my mind, and concentrated on my breathing. All but that star became obscured, my mind was clear when a wave of feeling swept over me, and one message appeared in my mind loud and clear “Surrender yourself totally to me!”
I was shaken. Was that God speaking? I tried reaching out again with my mind and got the same response. I prayed and told God my heart, soul, and body were his but I wasn’t sure I could commit all of my mind.
The next morning I was troubled by the events of the previous night and I still had my doubts. As I kept going over everything, I remembered a book someone had given me about Medjugorje. It had a title similar to my “message”. I found the book and the title is “Abandon Yourself Totally to Me”. I sat down and began reading it.
I was shaken to my soul though when one of the visionaries recounted a message Mary had given her. It was the same as the minister the night before had spoken about. Almost anything can be forgiven if one repents, anything but blaspheming against the Holy Spirit which one did by rejecting or not accepting a call from God. Was this what I was doing or just using common sense? I was very upset.
My husband called just then and could tell something was wrong with me. I felt like I was losing it and didn’t know where to turn. I had not told him anything about what had been going on with me but now I told him some of it. We hung up, me not sure what he was thinking about what I had just told him, and I continued to read the book.
Mary spoke of how to pray to draw closer to the Father and Jesus, hear their call, and abandon yourself totally to them. I figured I would give it a try. I went to the children’s mass the next day. As soon as my knees hit the kneeler I was overwhelmed by Jesus’ presence. I felt a deep sadness in him and the calling again: a sense that God wants me for something but I still couldn’t totally commit to everything. I went early to school, before I had to pick up my daughter, so I could go into the empty church and pray.
I knelt there, my eyes closed, struggling with everything when with my eyes still shut I saw an inky blackness and a glowing straight line stretching endlessly in either direction with a tiny glowing spot on it. As I wondered what this meant I heard Jesus say that the line is eternity and the small spot is my life. He told me not to be so worried about that glowing spot but rather on the line, on eternity, and that his bond with us extended beyond our spot but also on either side of the spot stretching for all eternity.
At that moment the bell rang and I had to go get my daughter. Almost two weeks passed as I pondered everything. Then I watched a program on EWTN that had a man from Akito, Japan where Mary was supposed to also be appearing. He read one of the messages which spoke of a great worldwide catastrophe in which both good and bad would perish because of the evil and madness to which we have sunk. (Does that worldwide catastrophe in which both good and evil would perish sound familiar?)
Mary had stated that the only way to avert it was to pray, to believe and open our lives and hearts to God, to make a commitment to him. All of a sudden I knew that I could make that total commitment. I knelt down and told God I was his, totally and fully committed to him and I would follow his path for me no matter what. I felt as if a great weight had been lifted. I felt happy again and connected to everyone and everything around me.
That night as I prayed I had my eyes closed when I suddenly saw a winding path through the countryside in front of me. A hand was held out to me and a voice asked me if I was ready to follow his path. I said yes, took the hand, and stepped onto the path. The path went straight for a short way then turned at a right angle going behind a tree and a rock outcropping. I couldn’t see the path after the turn but could see it again further in the distance. I had only taken the one step when Jesus appeared on the path.
He held his hand out to me and said, “No regrets?” I answered, “No regrets.” and took his hand.
