My 1st Gospel Journey
This Sunday on 25/6 for the morning Eucharistic celebration The Celebrant was Rev. Fr Angelino Vas, the Gospel reading was from the Gospel of Matthew 10:26-33. The Gospel was as usual a small passage of about 5 minutes, but my experience this time was a little different one. The Gospel reading began and after the first few verses, I felt like being drowned in a cinematic experience of the verses being read. I was having some visual effects of the same. The experience goes like this.
During the first few verses Matthew 10:26-27 “So do not be afraid of people. Whatever is now covered up will be uncovered, and every secret will be made known. What I am telling you in the dark you must repeat in broad daylight, and what you have heard in private you must announce from the housetops. These were as usual as I normally hear. Then it began.
Matthew 10:28 Do not be afraid of those who kill the body but cannot kill the soul; rather be afraid of God, who can destroy both body and soul in hell. I don't know why but I was like taken where I could see believers being tortured, some being killed mercilessly. I could hear screaming. I could feel some, not like actually feel the pain but the feel of my fingertips being pierced with some pins, like I was being tortured not the pain but a feeling on my fingertips and the fingernails being plucked out. Again not the pain but a sensation on the fingernails being pulled up. My heart was beating vigorously when I actually saw a dark blood red color place and fire all around. The place had a very dry and lost feeling, a feel of no hope, dryness, heat and I just felt to sit down.. I think maybe because of some persecutions of the believers going around in some countries, so maybe. (But it did feel like I experienced a difference between kill the body and kill both body and soul. The body was fine with a sense of hope that one day it would end, but the other was with no hope of ending.)
Matthew 10:29 For only a penny you can buy two sparrows, yet not one sparrow falls to the ground without your Father's consent. Now everything vanished and I saw myself as a small kid playing around trying to catch sparrows and I even made friends with some. We got tired playing and I sat down to rest and they came to rest on me. I was happy. I actually felt the happiness in my heart. The depressing, hopeless feeling vanished and I was smiling (which I understood later)
Matthew 10:30-31 As for you, even the hairs of your head have all been counted. So do not be afraid; you are worth much more than many sparrows! Now I saw myself combing my hair and after applying some gel to set my hair, I saw my hands and it had 3 hairs. Again this repeated but this time 5 hairs and the next time 10. Then I didn't even cared to count them as there were some and I felt a headache to count. I thought about counting the number of hairs on my head, just the thought was enough for me to feel dizzy. I was like my heavenly Father knows the exact number of hairs on my head, he knows each time when a single hair falls. I was feeling a headache to count my fallen hairs and here my heavenly Father has the exact number. Suddenly I snapped into reality and I felt like I was being made to look around and see that it was not me alone cuz as the verse read 'you', it meant for all who were hearing it. (So this meant for all the congregation who heard it.
So that much love has our heavenly Father for us.)
Matthew 10:32-33 “Those who declare publicly that they belong to me, I will do the same for them before my Father in heaven. But those who reject me publicly, I will reject before my Father in heaven." Now here I felt it was cheating cuz you would only declare publicly if you are a follower of Christ or you're a Christian. So what about the other religious people. Would Jesus deny them? I was like I have friends of other religious backgrounds, that would be cheating. I was sad about it when I heard these words “Those who love me will obey my teaching. My Father will love them" Then the voice further explained me that to publicly declare is to publicly do what Jesus taught us to do & not doing is publicly is rejecting.
Then the cinematic experience ended with the reading of the Gospel being completed. The total time taken to read the Gospel passage was around 5 or less than 5 minutes, but I felt it was like hours as each scene was like a movie and I was experiencing each and evert thought and feeling during the reading of the passage.
When each verse was read I was going through every detail as written, with no fast forward rather after every verse there was a long pause for the movie and the reading would resume only after my short movie ends. I thought I must be dreaming and I must have skipped a few verses. So I checked about the same at night and I was surprised to see that I had not missed a single verse, not even a fullstop.
The experience was exactly as I have briefed. I have tried to portray my experience in words as much as I could. But the actual journey is beyond my description.
When I came home I was still in a state where I couldn't understand the incident so I recollected the verse that I heard in my movie i.e “Those who love me will obey my teaching. My Father will love them" So I searched for the verse in the Bible and I did find it written in John 14:23. Now I had no doubt about the reality of my experience. It was an experience that I never ever had before and I'll never ever forget. Even while I was writing my experience a verse from the Bible was continuously coming to my mind Jeremiah 33:3 “Call to me, and I will answer you; I will tell you wonderful and marvelous things that you know nothing about." I experienced a wonderful and marvelous thing that I knew nothing about.
I can never forget and I smile every time the memory of the experience comes to my mind.
During the first few verses Matthew 10:26-27 “So do not be afraid of people. Whatever is now covered up will be uncovered, and every secret will be made known. What I am telling you in the dark you must repeat in broad daylight, and what you have heard in private you must announce from the housetops. These were as usual as I normally hear. Then it began.
Matthew 10:28 Do not be afraid of those who kill the body but cannot kill the soul; rather be afraid of God, who can destroy both body and soul in hell. I don't know why but I was like taken where I could see believers being tortured, some being killed mercilessly. I could hear screaming. I could feel some, not like actually feel the pain but the feel of my fingertips being pierced with some pins, like I was being tortured not the pain but a feeling on my fingertips and the fingernails being plucked out. Again not the pain but a sensation on the fingernails being pulled up. My heart was beating vigorously when I actually saw a dark blood red color place and fire all around. The place had a very dry and lost feeling, a feel of no hope, dryness, heat and I just felt to sit down.. I think maybe because of some persecutions of the believers going around in some countries, so maybe. (But it did feel like I experienced a difference between kill the body and kill both body and soul. The body was fine with a sense of hope that one day it would end, but the other was with no hope of ending.)
Matthew 10:29 For only a penny you can buy two sparrows, yet not one sparrow falls to the ground without your Father's consent. Now everything vanished and I saw myself as a small kid playing around trying to catch sparrows and I even made friends with some. We got tired playing and I sat down to rest and they came to rest on me. I was happy. I actually felt the happiness in my heart. The depressing, hopeless feeling vanished and I was smiling (which I understood later)
Matthew 10:30-31 As for you, even the hairs of your head have all been counted. So do not be afraid; you are worth much more than many sparrows! Now I saw myself combing my hair and after applying some gel to set my hair, I saw my hands and it had 3 hairs. Again this repeated but this time 5 hairs and the next time 10. Then I didn't even cared to count them as there were some and I felt a headache to count. I thought about counting the number of hairs on my head, just the thought was enough for me to feel dizzy. I was like my heavenly Father knows the exact number of hairs on my head, he knows each time when a single hair falls. I was feeling a headache to count my fallen hairs and here my heavenly Father has the exact number. Suddenly I snapped into reality and I felt like I was being made to look around and see that it was not me alone cuz as the verse read 'you', it meant for all who were hearing it. (So this meant for all the congregation who heard it.
So that much love has our heavenly Father for us.)
Matthew 10:32-33 “Those who declare publicly that they belong to me, I will do the same for them before my Father in heaven. But those who reject me publicly, I will reject before my Father in heaven." Now here I felt it was cheating cuz you would only declare publicly if you are a follower of Christ or you're a Christian. So what about the other religious people. Would Jesus deny them? I was like I have friends of other religious backgrounds, that would be cheating. I was sad about it when I heard these words “Those who love me will obey my teaching. My Father will love them" Then the voice further explained me that to publicly declare is to publicly do what Jesus taught us to do & not doing is publicly is rejecting.
Then the cinematic experience ended with the reading of the Gospel being completed. The total time taken to read the Gospel passage was around 5 or less than 5 minutes, but I felt it was like hours as each scene was like a movie and I was experiencing each and evert thought and feeling during the reading of the passage.
When each verse was read I was going through every detail as written, with no fast forward rather after every verse there was a long pause for the movie and the reading would resume only after my short movie ends. I thought I must be dreaming and I must have skipped a few verses. So I checked about the same at night and I was surprised to see that I had not missed a single verse, not even a fullstop.
The experience was exactly as I have briefed. I have tried to portray my experience in words as much as I could. But the actual journey is beyond my description.
When I came home I was still in a state where I couldn't understand the incident so I recollected the verse that I heard in my movie i.e “Those who love me will obey my teaching. My Father will love them" So I searched for the verse in the Bible and I did find it written in John 14:23. Now I had no doubt about the reality of my experience. It was an experience that I never ever had before and I'll never ever forget. Even while I was writing my experience a verse from the Bible was continuously coming to my mind Jeremiah 33:3 “Call to me, and I will answer you; I will tell you wonderful and marvelous things that you know nothing about." I experienced a wonderful and marvelous thing that I knew nothing about.
I can never forget and I smile every time the memory of the experience comes to my mind.
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