Chapter Two; MAKING THE SPIRIT REAL part six

Other adherents will offer this option to me, “If you only would trust your heart, then you would know that God is real.” To this I say, “I have followed what I felt was the Lord's leading in my life for many things as surely as you feel that you are now.” This also includes for family, friends, in jobs, relationships, where to go for trips and much more. There is not a single area that I didn't try to “bring under” the power of God. Even my marriage. But the facts of reality must be faced and there is no reason to hold on to ideas that continually show themselves to be invalid and even harmful to follow.
During times of prayer, devotion and faith, I had many good times and made great friends. But I will leave discussion of that for another time and place. One highlight I want to touch on is prayer. Prayer seems to be central to almost all faiths; so I feel this is a crucial area to write about. As far as I know, there is no religion that doesn't, at some point or in some way advocate prayer. Therefore, this is the reason I am picking this as a common thread that runs through all faiths worldwide. I was a “prayer warrior” as the term is used. I prayed before every meal, in public, in private, with friends, with family, and everywhere. Who knows how many people I may have offended by my display of piety. I felt it was the right thing to do. Sometimes an older person would say to me when I was leaving a restaurant, “how refreshing it was to see a young man praying in public”.
Both The Navigators and COPWOC encouraged a good prayer life. With The Navigators, it was more of a prayer diary or prayer list, faithfully kept; plus taking time out once a week to focus your prayer life. For me, I usually took Saturday morning at a park or a restaurant. I liked parks more because I could actually walk around while I prayed. It was quite structured, as well. I would normally take about five minutes per topic and continue throughout the hour. I would use Bible verses. [I assume this was done to remind God what he said and let him know that I knew he could answer my prayer.] I used a standard opening, praising God and all his wonderment ; then for my friends and the family; spreading and sharing the Gospel of Christ. I also took a few minutes to pray for the government and work and all the things that affected my life. While this was normally done alone, a friend or two of mine would often go to the park. We would pick out different sides to “stake out” so we wouldn't interrupt each other or get distracted by talking about things.
By the height of my prayer life, I was probably praying about four to five hours a week, which to me was just part of the 16.8 hours I owed God for a tithing of my time. After all, if all things were from God, time definitely is one of the most valuable things that God can give us. So, I gave back to God time he gave me. This may be why I find the time spent in worship and prayer so wasted. Even if you,re reading a comic book, I feel you are better using your time, than wasting it on a God that can do nothing for you.
After I spent my hour praying on Saturday, it was usually time to have a meal. When I was attending Kansas State University, we often had weekend get together that included grilling and games of either volleyball and/or Frisbee. Saturdays were pretty fun days, normally speaking. It sure was a point of secret pride, when I mentioned that during my quiet time I received a certain insight from the Lord. Being able to share a spiritual message was vital to being in the loop of The Navigators group.
With COPWOC, [Cathedral of Praise World Outreach Center, Oklahoma City, Oklahoma], the focus of prayer was more like the way that you prayed, having a prayer language, speaking in tongues, creating an actual prayer closet so you could be left alone while you prayed. Of course the content was important, but not as important as letting the Holy Spirit move you to follow its lead in your prayer. The prayer language was one that was not needed but greatly moved you into the higher levels of the pentecostal and fundamental churches. I attended the A.C.T.S. Group at COPWOC and before the Monday night service, they had a smaller meeting of the more devout. This was where people could show their stuff. I quickly found out that my way of praying was something that made me stand out. I was able to clearly think and speak the dogma of calling down blessings and binding the various spirits that we tended to bind with our ineffectual words. It was always odd to me to bind spirits, such as fear, weakness, timidity, pride, along with the spirits of cancer, mental illness and other actual sickness that needed medical help, not a prayer. But I believed, so I did it. After all, if you believe, you'll believe just about anything. I guarantee that if the President of the Mormon church or the Pope of any other charismatic religious leader said they saw their dead brother turn into a wolf, their follows would believe them. But if Alvin, the Poncan Indian says it, people think he is nuts. I see both ideas, again, equally valid.
It is not something that I really supported, but having people pray for the sick was often painful for me to watch. I would, of course, pray for the sick. But I couldn't ever get over the idea that God made doctors for a reason. While prayer is OK, the best medicine is a reliable treatment from proven methods. God can do His healing anyway he wishes. I would never encourage anyone to leave the treatments of their doctors for a healing of the sick by prayer. Even the theology of that idea is weak, because the faith of both the one healing and the one receiving the healing “must” be strong to accept it, according to the dogma. To me, that left too much to risk.
Oddly, my public display of belief was put to the challenge when I was in the Army. In the chow hall, several other men knew I was a devout Christian who would pray before they would eat. The first one or two things they would say following prayer, would be about how they had just met a girl and had sex with her. Or, they would use curse words about a topic they were discussing. I felt that this was a horrible witness for Jesus and wished they wouldn't even pray before they ate. I never had the courage to speak to them about this issue. Who knows, they may have done it just to offend me. I would never do that personally. I may think to myself, “I hope the food isn't so bad you have to pray you survive the meal.” I have been known to make the “raspberry” sound if I happen to catch people doing that. But that is more out of reflex, not really trying to make fun of them.
Part of my prayer lifestyle included writing down what I was praying for and then writing the results of that prayer. I kept extensive prayer lists with dates, people, names and needs. Like I said earlier, I spent an hour every Saturday, for years, going to a “quiet place” to pray , in addition to the daily prayers I did throughout the rest of the week. Unlike when a person had a need and you or a person may sympathetically say, I'll pray for you, and then not. This was something I asked many of my friends about, at that time. Most agreed they had failed to actually follow up and pray. My answer was, why wait to pray later, take them by the shoulder or hand, bow your head and pray right there on the spot. Wherever you find the need to pray, make the time to pray. That was my modus operandi. I found that doing this not only showed the person I actually meant what I was saying, but it also usually made them feel a bit better. It gave me the right to ask about the topic of the prayer, next time I saw them, if they didn't bring it up. Most of the time, they didn't bring it up, because prayer doesn't work.
The guilt I felt, over seeing a person with whom I promised to pray for and failed, too soon went away. If for some reason I was not able to pray, I would write it down and add it to my list. Some things were easy to have an answer for: jobs for friends, someone needing money for a conference, car needs to be repaired. To be honest, if you're are praying for things that are common to have in our society, the likelihood for success is greater. People actually need things like jobs, cars, clothes and food. Other prayers were not so easy, such as: hoping that a family member would turn to the Lord; praying to have a girlfriend or boyfriend as the case may be, or, dealing with sexual temptation. I am sure many of you reading this have family or friends praying for you now. Or if you are a believer, you may be praying for someone to come to some sort of faith, more than likely, a faith similar to yours. But isn't that prayer just a selfish to make them be like you, instead of letting them be the person they want to be. Even if the person is on drugs and cannot function, you need to take care of them, not force religion down their throat. Ask any relapsed addict. They are just as likely, if not more so, to blame God for their relapse than if they were treated in a reasonable method that allows for failure. They will blame God for failing them or blame God for letting them fall back. Then the likelihood of getting them back into your faith is all but gone.
Or if you have come out of the religious experience, you may have prayed for others as I have. Like me, I am sure they thought that the power of prayer would have some real effect in your life. As the list got longer as to what I was praying for, the answered side was very empty. I got to the point that I began to use hash marks to count repeated prayers to save space. Even with clear evidence in front of my face, of the ineffectiveness of prayer, I still held to my faith. The answered prayers must have only been about 15 to 20 percent on my prayer lists. [See comments on prayer in the Mormon Mission section]. Of course, some prayers I had no way of knowing if they were answered. But the ones I could find out, that is ask someone about, were well under the 50 percent mark.
I just concluded the possible answers that typical apologetic use to justify the failure of prayer to work. There is the “God did answer the prayer” answer, then the “God said 'no' to your prayer” answer and everyone's favorite “God said wait” answer to your prayer. It is really a no loss situation for God, with those answers. If only I could have those options when I was in college for my exams, I would have been the valedictorian.
One thing I would like to point out about my comments up to this point. What I have been talking about is the reflection of reality upon the cloudiness of religion and dogma. I often include the word Dogma and adherents for this simple reason. Many people say they don't believe in religion, but believe in God. They do not have a standard or regular church they attend or even want to attend a church, but have a societal view of the meme of the religion of their community.
Because of this, there will inadvertently come areas that can be attacked or seen as weak in my topic. This is, of course, expected and I do have any problem with that. I make no claim that what I am saying ties up all the loose ends that have taken thousands of years to develop. All I am saying is that if you are willing or able to look for the errors in the book, please continue that into every other book you would read or any other source of information you would allow the privilege into your mind. So feel free to rip my words apart if you feel the need, but be sure to use the same standard for reality reflection in your religious documents, too.

Chapter One; TWO WORLDS CONVERGE part three

In both of science and religions areas of my life, I have many more experiences that added to both my understanding of the natural world and understanding about Christianity and religion. In high school, I was fortunate to take almost every science class that was offered. I even became a science proctor, [that is a teacher's aide or assistant]. The classes I took included: General Science, Biology,(two years) Chemistry, Astronomy, Physics, and Zoology. The only two classes I didn't take that I could have were Geology and Botany. During my time of taking all that science never was the concept that science was incompatible with religion come up. Of course there was the part in Biology about the disproving of spontaneous generations using the concepts of frogs being “made” from mud and that rotten meat produced maggots. But through careful study and experimentation these concepts which were in support of creation soon were proven incorrect. Frogs hibernate in the lake and stream beds and come out n the warmer weather and if you keep meat covered and flies away from it, it will rot but no maggots will be produced since the flies cannot lay their eggs in it.




It was during this time, Easter of 1982, when I became what some call “born again” or “saved”. A person I met invited me to their church and I decided I wouldn't mind going. The pastor’s sermon stirred me deeply. I felt that while Jesus was hanging on his cross he was thinking of me personally and gave his life for my actual specific sins. It was the emotional appeal of the message that moved me more than the logical presentation of the evidence. I mean, after all, there really wasn't a logical appeal to the sacrifice of Jesus. It did really strike me as reasonable plus I did have a motivating desire to posses the “insight” that my other friends from church had. It was about time I got me some Jesus in my life to.

It was truly a euphoric feeling. I felt that a sacrifice like that from Jesus was enough to make me believe in Him and accept Him as my personal savior. While it was by no means a straight path forward in my religious education, I was certainly on the way. No hard proof was offered for my conversion. I accepted the anecdotal story as sufficient proof for me to accept this story as totally factual and reliable as any other fact in the world. After all, these people couldn't all be wrong, could they? There were so many of them.

I was in high school at the time I was saved. As I said before, I took most of the science classes that were offered. For 13 consecutive weeks, while studying physics, our class would go to the library every Friday and watch the most amazing science show I had seen: Carl Sagan's Cosmos: A Personal Journey. Until this point, none of these concepts had been presented in such a clear and understandable format. In addition to science in the classroom, I attended field trips to the Kansas Cosomosphere, Wichita Omnisphere, Lake Afton Planetarium, Kirkpatrick Planetarium and other museums. This all comprising a strong background of the natural and physical world.

It was during my junior year in high school that I helped to start the science club. All my friends were either science or math geeks. We spent much of our free time talking about science and matters of logic and reason. I even bought and read the CRC Handbook of Chemistry and Physics, 62nd Edition, for leisure. Those familiar with the book should have seen me lugging that book around. But, reading that book, I learned about some of the similarity of the chemical structures and the process of naming molecules. Also , I learned about some of the characteristics of the elements and so many more concepts.

A humorous view of the world was disguised as a science-fiction radio play, in The Hitchhicker's Guide to the Galaxy, by Douglas Adams. That made for some great thinking while listening to the radio, alone late at night, at the age of 13. Adams had the knack for making the reasonable seem curious and the unusual seem common in his stories.

It was a story that remained with me. I purchased various versions as I came upon them, including the books, the audio books, the TV show and movie. I seriously doubt that if it hadn't been for his tangential humor, I may not now look at things as oddly as I tend to do now.

Unbeknownst to me, these two world views would not agree with each other. I felt at the time, like I am sure many do, that these two world views were totally compatible with each other. Nothing in my religious education was clearly stated as being at odds with the world of science. The same can be said about my science education. We live in the physical world. What could be incompatible with the ideas of the God that made The Universe and the science that explains it?

In college I didn't study too well, on my first attempt. After three semesters, I found myself out of school and needing a job. This opportunity lead me to the Air Force. I did my job skills test and scored high. I decided I wanted a vocation that would provide me with a skill after I got out of the service. So, I selected a plumbing job. It was actually the job that had the highest score requirement and would allow me to start right away without a college degree or spending months in training.

After going through basic and advance training, I was stationed at Tinker AFB, near Oklahoma City. This is where my intense Christian training began, with a Christian group called The Navigators.

Being a typical 19 year old airman, away from home, with plenty of money, I had enough free time to do other things. I had a few girlfriends; went out with the guys; went to concerts, and did my job. One Monday in the summer of 1985, there was a knock on my door. Two young men stood in my doorway and asked me about my relationship with Jesus. The first question they asked, was, “If you were die Today, do you know for sure that you are going to heaven?” [Where was my knowledge of logical fallacies then?] I said yes. I did know and that I would go. So began my association with The Navigators. From then, on every Tuesday at the base religious education building anywhere from two to twenty people would gather to sing some songs, have a Bible study, and then go out to eat. [I think it is vital that an organization have food at their gatherings in order to get followers.]

During this period, I learned much about Christianity and memorized many scriptures. I must have gone to at least a dozen conferences and retreats, in a three year period. Some were as far as 600 miles away. My primary church at that time was the Air Force Base Chapel. Most of us, in The Navigators group, attended the Chapel, too. Even though the group was made up of enlisted and officers, we had the overall connection with Christianity, and the fraternization policy was largely overlooked. There were even enlisted and officers dating in the group. After a year or so, our Navigator leaders advised us to go to our home churches off base. The reason, for this, was to be an influence in our home churches. I guess it seemed that we were becoming too much of a click. But, looking back, it seems that they were trying to spread their influence to more denominations and infiltrate, looking for people that might be willing to take a leadership role in the various denomination. The main slogan is, “To know Christ and to make him known.” So, each man or woman was asked to work with three other men. One would be his mentor; one would be his peer and one would be his student. This involved an elaborate structure of different areas; each under a higher leader until reaching the district level, to the head of The Navigators, who at that time was Lorne Sanny.

I met several Christians who referred to The Navigators as a cult. Their term, for what they called what they did, was “sheppardship.” To be quite honest, decisions usually quite personal, such as: who to date, where to work and what to buy would often come under the discussion of The peer or mentor, if not a small group of fellow Navigators. Just like Jeff Sharlet describes in his book, The Family, these discussions were about how to make Jesus more real in your life and to pray without ceasing. The purpose was to bring more men into the group. Women were welcome, but not that common. The nickname for the group of guys I ran with was The Neverdaters, as a play on the name of the group The Navigators. Few of us ever had girlfriends or dates. The mere logistics of getting a girlfriend in the group was a wrenching process. You couldn't go out as a single, one-to-one, male-to- female, for the first few dates. Outings had to be group dates. Keep in mind, we are referring to adult men and women, in their early to mid-twenties. Yet the restrictions we placed upon ourselves were worse than what most parents do to their Junior High and High School children. Man what a happy group.

While the men involved in The Family are usually older, I could definitely see parallels between the two groups. I do wonder how much time these men in The Family actually spent trying to study the Bible, as opposed to just “knowing Jesus.” It can be a very scary thing, following the Bible to get your beliefs, but to leave the Bible behind and become a “follower” of what you think Jesus is, only to become disconnected from reality. Could also be their goal? Nothing a person can say or reveal to the “followers” of Jesus , that would have any weight with how these groups perceive the reality of the world, are able to change their beliefs, though they will say, every step of the way, is all part of the will of Jesus. That is to say that their beliefs will overcome the facts of reality.

My “home” church was the Lutheran Church Missouri Synod. I began going to that church in Midwest City, OK. However, it didn't seem to fit in with my view of how I now understood scriptures. The dogma of that church seemed to misinterpret the Bible, according to my beliefs about what the “facts” of scripture taught. I spoke to the Pastor. He confirmed my perception and soon was looking elsewhere. I felt there was a clear case for salvation, to be assured, but the Lutheran Pastor told me that a person was able to loose their salvation. I felt this was in error and used my scriptures to support my side; just as he used his scriptures to support his view. In the end, I chose a different Church to attend.

While I was going through my issue with the LCMS, most of my Air Force friends began attending the Covenant Community Church, located about 21 miles away from the base. I attended that church a few times, but didn’t feel like I fit in. On the other hand, I liked the local Christian Rock radio station, KOKF. Their songs and programs captured my attention and personal perspective. This was part of my self-imposed, separation from the secular world.

One time, KOKF had a contest. I called in with the correct answer and won the prize. When I went to pick up my prize, (I do not recall what it was), the General Manager, Greg Griffin, said I had a good voice. I asked him if I could volunteer, should they need help. He agreed. I began the next weekend as a prayer counselor and assisted the on-air DJ. This radio station was affiliated with a pentecostal church and I started attending that church's singles group. Soon I was attending the church's regular Sunday services that hosted the singles group. One could say at that point I was deeply involved with religion and moving up fast.

I was soon engaged with my full duties in the Air Force and going to the far side of the city to do my radio shift, on the weekend. During this time, my “home” church became the pentecostal mega church, Cathedral of Praise World Outreach Center. The pastor, Ron Dryden, owned the radio station. It made sense to make it my weekly spiritual home. I really enjoyed the people at the Cathedral of Praise World Outreach Center and quickly got involved, where I was growing in standing and respect. I am certain, if circumstances would have been different, I might be writing a Christian book instead of an atheist to me Today. I am quite pleased to be writing what I am.

The church encouraged speaking in tongues, or a prayer language [a biblical loophole for speaking in tongues], as well as spiritual and physical healing and all manner of expressive worship to display the power God really manifested in the actions of the people. Dancing in the isles was as common as getting a hamburger at McDonald's. It was not the Holy Spirit that moved the people though; it was their desire to be a follower of Jesus and express what they felt was his power in their life. Each Sunday, the service went through very predictable cycles. After the time passed for the service to start, the “worship leaders” [aka singers] would grab their specifically colored mic and begin to sing. One used a tambourine while the musicians accompanied them. The words of the music would politely be put on the overhead screens for those that didn't yet know the words. Normally, by the second verse, people would begin dancing in their aisle with neighboring congregates. Soon, one or two people would slip out and go up to the front of the auditorium and begin dancing. There seemed to be a hierarchy of dancing. Certain people had an implicit leadership role; they would dance out in the open first, then others would follow. Rarely during this time would anyone bother to speak in tongues, which occurred after the music began to slow down. One of the church leadership would take the stage for announcements or some sort of greeting, “in the Lord,” as they would say.

When I spoke in a “tongue”, it was not under the power of the Holy Spirit. It was to be like the other people in the church whom I associated with. Peer pressure was a powerful thing in this group. The sounds, the colors, the lights and the feeling of being together for the glory of God is a powerful feeling. It is a delusional feeling, but a good one none the less. I remember recalling trying not to sound like the other people that repeat the same sound over and over again.

“Everyone can tell that isn't really a language of any kind,” I would think to myself. I at least made sure my speaking in “tongues” sounded somewhat like a language.