The Prophecy and the Living Waters
I never thought I would become a believer in God. At nineteen, I was spiraling into a deep, depressing darkness, questioning my very existence with the haunting thoughts of suicide. In 2001, I entered a Christian IRC chatroom and asked what happens if you end your life. A stranger messaged me with words that felt like they were pulled from another world: "What man would go to the depths of darkness to find the light? But a man without knowledge?"
He followed with a prophecy that would define the next few years of my life: "You are going to go through a deep walk with Jesus, possibly with drugs." Immediately after reading those words, a presence of glory filled my room. It felt like a river of life—pure love, peace, and joy—flowing through the atmosphere for forty-five minutes. This supernatural manifestation surpassed every natural sensation or pleasure I had ever encountered, leaving a mark on my soul that nothing has compared to two decades later.
The Vision of the Dragon
Despite that encounter, I fell into a dangerous habit of inhaling "duster" (compressed air). During one aggressive blackout on my office floor, I saw a vision that perfectly mirrored my spiritual state. I was a miniature boy with a silver helmet standing on a fragile wooden bridge stretching over a pitch-black valley. On the side of the bridge sat a frightening red and black dragon, fifty times larger than I was, looking down with evil eyes.
I didn't realize then that the vision was a roadmap of the coming storm. I began isolating myself, listening to dark, blasphemous music that fueled a hatred for a God I claimed didn't exist. I believe the isolation, depression, drugs, and music created an order that opened spiritual doors to a darkness I wasn't prepared to handle.
The thief does not come except to steal, and to kill, and to destroy. I have come that they may have life, and that they may have it more abundantly.
Into the Occult: Praying to Death
For some time, I drifted far away from the light. My mind was filled with something very wicked as I became open-minded to anything occult. I started dabbling in weird beliefs to tap into the supernatural realm, and my personality changed drastically. I arrived at a point where I hated my life and became fully convinced that suicide was my only path to freedom.
I began praying to an "Angel of Death," regularly speaking to this fallen entity as if it were a friend. I was deceived into believing the lie that this power would give me the strength to end my life. I would feel evil entities inside my body, sometimes "controlling" my movements as I walked in public. It felt like I was watching my body from my mind, a hollow observer in a life that was no longer my own.
The Suicide Tightrope
My life became a mission of self-destruction. I figured the easiest way to die was through the cans of compressed air, knowing full well the risks of "Sudden Sniffing Death Syndrome." I would inhale until I passed out, wake up with a bleeding nose, and repeat. I was playing Russian roulette with my life nearly every single day.
I began midnight driving while high on inhalants, preparing to crash my car. Yet, in those moments when I was ready to crank the steering wheel into a concrete wall, I would feel a tiny, powerful "tingle" of love in my heart. It was God "bugging" me. Even as I hardened my heart and told Him to let me die, His grace kept me invisible to the police as I sped recklessly through the night, seeking an end that wouldn't come.
Where can I go from Your Spirit? Or where can I flee from Your presence? If I make my bed in hell, behold, You are there.
The 60-Pill Miracle
I eventually turned to hard drugs—snorting crushed pills and taking large quantities of hallucinogens daily. I wanted to die, so I didn't care about overdosing. I reached a breaking point where I wrote a letter to God saying, "If you are real, please help me," while simultaneously praying to the devil for the power to kill myself.
I went to the cabinet and swallowed about sixty pills—a lethal cocktail of uppers, downers, and anti-depressants. I lay in bed, wrote a song called "My Funeral," and went to sleep. Eight hours later, I woke up. Incredibly, my body had rejected the pills before they could fully dissolve. I should have been dead, but I was kept alive by a hand I wasn't yet ready to acknowledge.
The Threshold of Eternity
The second major attempt was the most terrifying. After taking twenty sleeping pills, I felt my spirit "flickering" like a light switch in and out of a place where time did not exist. I saw a faceless, tall demonic spirit pacing in my room and heard the terrifying, tormented screams of a realm beyond the living.
This experience immediately put the fear of God in me. The God I didn't believe in—and even hated—suddenly became the only reality that mattered. I was terrified of judgment and realized I had passed a point of no return. I survived that night with a slow heartbeat and a shattered mind, but the internal "light switch" had been flipped: I now knew God was real.
He brought them out of darkness and the shadow of death, and broke their chains in pieces.
A Miracle in the Crash
I tried to change, entering rehab and even spending two weeks in jail for shoplifting, but I kept falling back. One winter night, I totaled my car on the highway, spinning out at 70mph and facing oncoming traffic. I jumped out just moments before another car hit mine head-on. My friend, who was still in the car, was spared without a scratch.
Standing outside in the cold, the shock triggered the beginning of a living nightmare: non-stop panic attacks and disassociation. For a month, I couldn't sleep alone. I felt like a numb dream, consumed by doom and fear every waking moment. I thought I had permanently damaged my brain, and I cried everywhere I went. I was at the end of myself.
Deliverance at Resurrection Life
One odd day I went to church alone out of pure impulse. I sat in the back, shaking. The Pastor got on stage and said there were people who needed healing and deliverance from past addictions. I felt the Holy Spirit grab my heart and pull me forward. I wanted to see God's power in more than just words.
As he laid hands on me, the Lord’s power hit me. I fell to the floor and cried as the weight of three years of darkness was finally lifted. Jesus saved my life that day. The panic attacks were cut off by a divine barrier. I realized that no person or man-made remedy could save me—only the touch of the Living God.
20 Years of Grace
Twenty years later, I am still a believer in Jesus. I am not a religious man; I am a Bible-believing, praying man. I’ve made terrible life choices and messed up many times since that day, but God has never abandoned me. I’ve learned that feelings are flaky and don't dictate truth, but His presence is the only thing that is real.
My words only lightly outline the torment I went through, but they also point to the "Awesome Glory" I hope everyone will seek. The blood of Jesus covered me and pulled me from the pit. I am only alive today because of who the Lord is and His incredible goodness.
But you, O LORD, are a compassionate and gracious God, slow to anger, abounding in love and faithfulness.