To Hell and Back Part II: The Hell Experience

Jesus enters the Hell experience

During a cold, windy morning in Washington DC on the day of the inauguration, I helplessly tried to navigate through the large crowd of patriots moments before the ceremony was to begin.  In the shadow of the Washington monument, herds of people moving in different directions with unclear destinations in mind collided.  In the middle of this great collision, was no other than my small envoy and I.  In only a span of 20 seconds (for what seemed like hours), the great mass of people was paralyzed by the collision. And just as suddenly as movement ceased, a spurt of panic and fear broke out in the crowd.  Children started crying, men became angry, women started pushing, and a spirit of fear and torment swept through the mass of people.  In the middle of this chaotic terror, I located the peaceful voice of the Holy Spirit.  And He, as if we were in the palm of His hand, safely guided us through the horror to a heavenly perch above the tormented crowd.  Upon digesting those 20 paralytic seconds and how God provided guidance, it is evident that episode is a microcosm of what I and many Christians experience when they are living through the Hell Experience.  Continuing the series To Hell and Back, I will describe and detail the purpose of the Hell Experience.

So what is the Hell experience? The Hell experience is the aftermath of creating a great chasm between you and God as described in part 1.  Some of you who are reading this may be dealing with loneliness, sadness, frustration, anger, fear, resentment, sorrow, or regret.  As believers in Jesus Christ, we have a blood bought right to have life and have it abundantly.  That life is full of peace, joy, love, happiness, and a definiteness of purpose. Not knowing your purpose is a form of torment.  That means you are living in confusion.  Confusion is a tormenting spirit attached to your vision and faith.  That spirit tells you that you are not significant enough for God to have a plan for your life.  And that you are worthless and not good for anything.  You wake up day in and day out going to a job only because you have bills to pay, mouths to feed, and retirement to pay for.  This is the Hell experience.  You lay in bed every morning for an extra hour because that is how long it takes for you to remove the cloud of sadness and heaviness.  This is the Hell experience.  You feel incessantly lonely, think about being in a relationship with any remotely attractive person that shows you attention, or always avoid quiet time because of the barrage of negative thoughts that run through your head.  This is the Hell experience.  Many have accepted the Hell experience as the reality of life; in truth, it the exact opposite of life which death.  I remember vividly the quiet agony my soul endured during my Hell experience.  Every morning for two consecutive months, my mind was bombarded with thoughts of suicide, fear, hopelessness, abandonment, doubt, and rage.  I felt trapped, imprisoned, and tied up in the bowels of Hell. And to exacerbate the matter, God was silent to me; I could not hear His voice.  I was disconnected from God.  No praying.  No studying His word.  I lost all fruit of the Spirit.  John 15:3 says,”…apart from God you can do nothing.” God made that scripture a reality to me.  I experienced doing nothing for 21 straight days and very little for 3 months.  Those tormenting demons were granted access to me and had their way with me for a season.  I was like the rich man Jesus described in Luke 16:23-31. Let me highlight verses 23-26:

²³In hell, where he was in torment, he looked up and saw Abraham far away, with Lazarus by his side. ²⁴So he called to him, ‘Father Abraham, have pity on me and send Lazarus to dip the tip of his finger in water and cool my tongue, because I am in agony in this fire.’²⁵“But Abraham replied, ‘Son, remember that in your lifetime you received your good things, while Lazarus received bad things, but now he is comforted here and you are in agony. ²⁶And besides all this, between us and you a great chasm has been fixed, so that those who want to go from here to you cannot, nor can anyone cross over from there to us.’

This passage highlights the three distinct purposes of the Hell experience which are:

1.      Recognize the great chasm between you and God,

2.      Restore your taste for God, and

3.      Receive light to separate light from darkness.

As Lazarus received many comforts while living, comfort in my relationship with God became an illusion of deception which created a distance between me and God.  Like Lazarus, I craved a relief  that only a taste of the water of the Spirit can supply.   Unlike Lazarus’ experience, Jesus crossed the great chasm for me, gave me His light, and I overcame the Hell experience by His blood.   Let’s explore the three purposes of the Hell experience.

Recognizing the great chasm:

Separation from God

A prideful and haughty spirit comes before destruction and fall (Proverbs 16:18).  Spiritual pride is dangerous in that we grow numb to our distance from God.  The greatest cost of the great chasm is that there is no authentic intimacy with God.  Your relationship with God is based upon obligation, routine, and ritual.  If you were honest with yourself, you are bored with God.  You are more concerned with your appearance and maintaining a good image. You honor God with your mouth, but your heart is far from Him (Isaiah 29:13).  What does this look like?  You serve God because you said you would do.  You can always be counted on by church members, co-workers, or your family because you are a man or woman of your word.  In your heart, you are frustrated by the huge void in your spirit that no amount of deeds can satisfy.  You are so busy fulfilling the words of your mouth that you have stopped living by the words that proceed from the mouth of God. At this point, you have lost the fear of the Lord and evil now has permission to visit you.  Proverb 19:23 is a contra-positive of this truth, “The fear of the Lord leads to life, and he who has it will abide in satisfaction; He will not be visited with evil.” Therefore, when you are visited with evil such as relationship strife, a lack of growth in business or career, or depression it is evident you have created a chasm between you and God.  You become aware of this chasm when the truth of the word of God contrasts your torment in the Hell experience. God spoke His truth to me through silence, brokenness, and frustration.  Those results are not in line with His promise to the righteous.  At my lowest moment, I realized the torment of Hell was because I had missed God and created a chasm between him and me. God uses low points and torment to show you the great chasm (e.g. Job’s experience).

Restoring your taste for God:

Remember the drink Jesus offered the woman by the well?

The rich man in hell so desired to taste the cool and refreshing water.  That dynamic of taste is the essence of why anyone can end up in going through the Hell experience.  The reason I (and the rich man) experienced the torment of Hell because I lost my taste for God.  How did I lose my taste for God? I did that by desiring things not in God’s will or timing.  Psalm 34:8 says, “Oh, taste and see that the Lord is good.” How does one taste God? We taste God when we pray, read and obey His word, fellowship with other believers, share our faith with unbelievers, and obey God’s voice.  We also taste God when we honor Him by operating in our purpose and calling.  We stop tasting God when we avoid prayer, disobey His word and voice, avoid our purpose, date at the wrong time or the wrong person.  Eventually, as a result of our decisions, we don’t see God the goodness of the Lord.  We see the loving judgment of the Lord; the tough love that any good father gives to discipline his child. I remember the long uphill journey in restoring my taste and affection with God.  I set small goals in daily reading and prayer.  I had to resist condemnation in feeling bad for praying for a few minutes and reading a few lines of scripture.  It was so difficult reading the Bible.  The words did not speak life to me during this phase of restoring taste.  But, I persevered and believed God would reward me with intimacy with Him.  It took months.  The reason restoration of intimacy with God took months was not a matter of time, but of deliverance.  I had to separate truth from lies and light from darkness.

Separating light from darkness:

Truth is the light of His Word breathed into our minds. Jesus has separated us from darkness.

In Genesis 1: 3-4, ” Then God said, ‘Let there be light’; and there was light. 4And God saw the light, that the light was good; and God divided the light from the darkness.” After God rekindles the flame of His light in you, He then shows you how good the light is.  You begin to see the light of His calling, the glory and richness of his promises, and His power.  Ephesians 1:18-19 says, “the eyes of your understanding being enlightened; that you may know what is the hope of His calling, what are the riches of the glory of His inheritance in the saints, 19 and what is the exceeding greatness of His power toward us who believe, according to the working of His mighty power.” I remember when my eyes of understanding were enlightened.  I regained a sense of direction and purpose.  I regained a passion for the will of being accomplished in my life.  I regained a disdain of evil.  At that moment of enlightenment, darkness was exposed.  Any and all activities were questioned and rectified by His light.  God gave me the power to discern darkness even when it was clothed in light. Relationships out of His will or out of place were immediately dealt with.  Did I say relationships?  When His light was revealed concerning the darkness of relationships, I experienced a great resistance from Hell. Soon, I realized that relationships are access points for the amplification of demonic activity.  See, it was a relationship that was caused me to cry, “It is finished!” I was on a path of destruction on my own, but the relationship served as a catalyst. On the outside it looked good; a man of ambition, big hopes, and dreams who loved God. She was smart, beautiful, church going, educated, and active in her community. She was only missing God’s blessing, but I figured that would come in time once God got in line with my will (I made myself lord of my life).  The darkness of the deception was masked by the mirage of light I projected.  When God’s light of truth hit me, the truth of the relationship was unmasked. I used that relationship to mask the greatest form of darkness; I was empty, lonely, and unsatisfied with God. Once that darkness was exposed, I was ready to begin the journey out of the Hell experience.

As I am writing this, I can see millions of people who are empty, lonely, and unsatisfied with God.  They mask in many ways.  Some mask it by marrying.  Some mask it with sex.  Some mask it with alcohol. Some mask it with work.  Some mask it with busyness. How do you mask it?  These people are preachers, businessmen, students, husbands, wives, politicians, and maybe you.  It saddens and angers me.  I pray that God will prepare their hearts to receive the fullness of His love again.  If it is you, then stop hiding behind your mask, be humbled, and allow God to minister to your heart.  He did (and continually does) it for me and will do it for you.  As you allow God to cleanse your heart, He then prepares a way out of the Hell experience and back into His promises.  In the next post, I will share the path that Jesus paved with His blood out of the Hell experience.

Until next time, keep fighting for your dream!

Recalling Love on Valentines Day

Well, it is February 14th 2o09…the day of love.   I was about to post my next writing on the topic, to Hell and Back Part 2: The Hell Experience, but I decided to give hell a break in lieu of love.  Don’t worry, I will post next week sometime.  Go ahead and sign up for the e-mail notification on the right panel of the page so you know when I post something new. At any rate, I know V-day can stir many different emotions such as excitement, anticipation, joy, sadness, loneliness, regret, etc.  V-day can take us down a warm and fuzzy memory lane or a Nightmare on Elms street.  Whatever the case, realize the love that you have shared can never be unshared.  The love you’ve experienced ultimately shaped your life.    In the end, God will work that experience (good, bad, or crazy) together for your good, if you all His love to work in and through you.  Therefore, in today’s post I will share two entries; one by myself and another entry composed by my brilliant baby sister.  In reading these entries, I want you to recall love in two ways.  First, I want those who are single to recall the love they shared that did not turn out the way you may have wanted.  I challenge you to have a positive view on the remnants of love that your former lover left in you.   If you don’t have closure or are healing, then allow those words to be medicine for your soul.  Second, I want those who are married or in a relationship to recall the romantic expression of love for your mate as discussed by my sister. Enjoy and happy V-day!

“The Love God Left in Me Courtesy of You”

The love God left in me courtesy of you took me a year and seven days to find. One year to realize it exists and seven days to find. I have yielded in my heart that I still love you and will always love you.  It is not a love that requires reciprocation.  But rather, a love that celebrates the brilliance of how God masterfully crafted you. Not your fleshly or obvious attributes, but His image in you that peeks out like the rising sun on a cool summer morning.  That living image of God in you is what I cherish most and hope will emerge more and more as time with Him erodes the residue of innate sins of being born human.

In seeing you as a precious creation of God, I repent of mistreating you–of leaving you with the residue of anger and bitterness.  I hope that God has cleansed you of the stains I’ve left.  I pray He has washed you with the precious love He left in me courtesy of you.

I see now that, through God, you left love in me.  The love you left in me that reminds me that I am not alone; that being uniquely graced with so many talents is not a curse but a blessing.  The love you left in me helped me to see who I am and who I am not.  The love you left in me opened my heart to the protective covering of God from abusers.  The love you left in me guided me to therapy that released pain and tears totaling a score and three years.  The love you left in me is leading me to perpetual green pastures where my talents are nurtured, true friendships await me, and is ordained with pastors who truly love me.

And finally, I realize the love God left me courtesy of you left in me was worth the sacrifice of love I gave in concert with Christ.

“Valentine’s Day…It’s So Necessary” By Knatokie Marie Ford

Here I am…on the eve of the one holiday that so many of us singles tend to dread: Valentine’s Day. You’d think I’d be among the first to sound off with anti-Valentine’s Day rants; however, I’m going to surprise you and myself with what I’m about to say. The funny thing is, the simplest gesture spurred me to do this: a male co-worker gave me a hollow, chocolate dog inside of a little paper dog house that said, “You’re my top dog.” I COMPLETELY wasn’t expecting anything from anyone, let alone this person, so I was quite pleasantly surprised. And no, this was not his roundabout way of professing his undying love for me, but rather he was simply being thoughtful. He said that when he saw it, it looked so ridiculous that he just had to get it! But, I tell you, it sincerely warmed my heart to receive such a simple gift. It was so nice to be thought of.

Therefore, with this experience bringing somewhat of a “revelation,” I feel so strongly compelled to compose a rebuttal to my dear friend’s note: “Abolish Valentine’s Day…I love you 365 days a year.” There seems to be an ever-increasing opposition to Valentine’s Day…some think of it as just a commercial holiday…yet another plot to get folks to cough up a little dough. While this may be true to some extent, I’m here to tell you why Valentine’s Day is oh so necessary. You see, Valentine’s Day is the one day out of the year when a woman can have the audacity to not only HOPE but EXPECT to be romanced (aside from her birthday). And all you fellas out there who cry bloody murder at the thought of being “forced” to romance a woman on a designated day of the year, let me ask you this: how many times can you honestly say you’ve romanced your lady in the past year? Go ahead, I’ll wait while you struggle to remember. The bottom line is, WOMEN LIKE ROMANCE. Plain and simple. We like to see manifestations of a man’s adoration of us. You show me a woman who doesn’t like to be romanced, and I’ll show you a woman who unfortunately has had so little romance in her life that she’s convinced herself that not only does she not need it, but she doesn’t like it either. There is something that is innately programmed in women that makes us this way. Don’t blame me…that’s just the way God created us.

Now fellas, I’m gonna let you in on a little secret. Contrary to what you might believe, you don’t have to have a lot of money to romance a woman! Why, sometimes, the sweetest and most indelible romantic impression you can make is when you use a little creativity, which doesn’t require a lot of money. If you can show a woman that you not only listen to her, but that you are aware of her likes/dislikes…her wants/needs…her hopes/dreams…THAT my friend is priceless. Write her a poem…or if you’re not poetic…recite to her the words of her favorite love song. I’m telling you, one of the most romantic things a man has ever done for me was to surprise me with a picnic at a park for my birthday. He’d literally bought lunch meat, bread, and some cheap wine from 7/11. He also brought along a little boom-box that ran by batteries to play a cassette tape of love songs!!! That probably cost him all of $15 AT THE MOST, but look at the impression that left on me! The point that I’m trying to make is that you shouldn’t let the fact that you aren’t quite ballin’ just yet stop you from romancing that special someone in your life.

So, because I honestly believe that there are so many women who hardly, if ever, see a little romance, I say that Valentine’s day….IS SO NECESSARY!!

Now, for all you sista’s out there who may not presently have a man to romance you, don’t fret. You should get in the habit of “romancing yourself.” Treat yourself to a facial, or maybe even a massage…shoot, I have an appointment at 3:00 p.m. tomorrow for an hour long Swedish massage! Light some candles, put on some Sade, and revel in how glorious that bubble bath feels! Just because you don’t have someone in your life to do it FOR you doesn’t mean that you aren’t ENTITLED to it!

In closing, my charge to everyone is to let Valentine’s Day be the EXCUSE and not the BURDEN for adding a little spice to your life!

Keep fighting for your dream (even your dream of love ) !