I grew up not believing in God. Things were as they were merely by chance was the way I saw it. The Bible was just a book of stories meant to explain the inexplicable and as far as spirituality was concerned, I believed in none of it. When you died, you died. End of story. No ghosts, no spirits and the things that went bump in the night were the results of natural causes.
All of that changed in my early twenties when I had, what most people would call, a supernatural experience. The nature of that experience is not important to the object of this book so I will just say that I had my eyes opened to the very real existence of an evil force at work in this world. Knowledge like that can be very depressing on a young person’s outlook on life if they are unaware of a force for the good that is working to counter it.
Having become aware of a spiritual nature at work in life, I began to look into the many spiritual and religious groups there were..and there are plenty. I researched them enough to be able to at least distinguish between their various beliefs; how they did, or did not harmonize with one another.
I have since found and will try to show you, that the Creator I talked of earlier has always made sure that the truth about himself has always been known. Also, the truth about creation; the existence and explanation of evil; his solution to it; the nature of humanity; life, death and the hereafter, have all been delivered to us, down through the ages, very much intact. How was that done??
What I am about to say is going to alienate part of my reading audience, many people of other faiths and even those who hold no faith; however, let me ask you this...can there be more than one avenue of truth; if so, then how many avenues are there...and how do you know who is right when there is a difference in what is believed? Look at the variety of beliefs in all the religions and faiths of this world. Are all of them right? Give me just a little more time here and I believe I will be able to prove my belief in a pure channel of truth. You will be able to see that thread of truth as it winds its way down through the span of history, from the beginning. As you follow that thread you will also find that the God I am talking about here is not the author of confusion; humanity does a good enough job at obscuring their own personal beliefs without having to bring God into the picture to help.
There are plenty of disagreements among the wealth of knowledgeable minds of this world, but the information necessary for the healthy growth of human nature, both physically and spiritually, is easily found and has been handed down through the Judaeo-Christian chain of events to the present day.
There, I have said it...now, give me the opportunity to show you why I am so confident in making that statement. Before we are through you will be able to see that connection for yourself.
Two thousand years ago Jesus proved that life is not a popularity contest when the “religious” people he was trying to enlighten ended up handing him over to the civil authorities to be crucified for no better reason than they felt threatened by his clear understanding of God and by his popularity with the people of their culture. Some of those who claim to be followers of God can be very vicious at times. That viciousness is an undeniable part of our rebellious human nature to those things we should be doing, but which we have a tendency to avoid and explain away because they would require too much self-sacrifice; a “crucifixion of the flesh” you might say. We hate to be wrong and will go to many extremes to justify ourselves in the light of what is right, even to the point of killing those who bring that light to us. It is sad, but it has always been true.
Let me assure you that what I am going to share with you on the history. mechanics and physics of this world and the universe around us is easily verifiable. However, written history and scientific research is not always complete; there are gaps that sometimes call for intelligent speculation.
There have been moments when I have been tempted to throw up my hands and walk away just as Pilate did after he asked Jesus what truth was but fortunately, the nagging unknown has kept and will continue to keep bringing me back to my Creator and persisting until I learn what I need to know.
Again, we need to start at the beginning because there was a beginning before the beginning we are familiar with.