I was surrounded by a bunch of wacko’s who were praying in what I would call ‘tongues’, eyes closed, and hands stretched out towards the group of us standing in the middle of their circle. They started saying things about us that I hadn’t told them, doing what they called ‘prophecy’, what I considered fortune-telling reserved only for people that operate cult-like-demonic-practices from the basements of their homes for a certain price. I was freaked out, swearing to myself that these guys were embracing the darkest side of the ‘the force’, casting some kind of spell on me.
It was the summer of 2006 and at the end of it I left with a lot of questions. The main thing I wanted to know more about was praying in tongues. These guys claimed that God gave them their own prayer language and that the Spirit muttered things that even they didn’t know about, but at the end of their prayers they were so full of peace. Being a religion and philosophy major in college I thought this stuff was merely reserved for the pages of the Bible. I had no clue that legit Christians still did this stuff today.
My Holy Spirit heebie jeebies were grounded in a spirit of fear, driven by the fact that I knew absolutely nothing about what I had encountered. And it wasn’t because it was evil… it’s because I had never been taught anything about the manifestations of the Holy Spirit. I don’t blame my parents. I don’t blame my friends. I don’t necessarily blame the church body that I grew up in. I don’t know who to point the finger at, really. I just know that I had more questions than I did answers.
I came to terms with the fact that heebie jeebies were normal, especially when I knew nothing about what I had encountered. Fortunately, my curiosity was so provoked that I was determined to find answers.
I started with the Bible.
