Emily
I lay slumped against the wall right next to the glass sliding doors as endless tears streamed down my face. My eyes remained glued to the trees at the glen, watching as their leaves and branches swayed gently in the wind and became golden under the light of a new sunrise.
I could not tell for sure how long I had been standing here like this looking out at those trees, but time did not matter at all. All that mattered was that I could not stop wishing that they could somehow become the answer to the anguished litany inside my soul or that the wind could just as easily carry away the torment.
But I knew that it wasn´t going to happen and, in a sense, I guessed I thought I deserved it. Why should someone like me, one who had allowed her insurmountable selfishness and pride to hurt her family the way they had, deserve compassion and forgiveness?
I knew deep down somewhere that this line of thinking was wrong and that it was dangerous. But for the life of me, I could not stop punishing myself. I had been trying unsuccessfully to diminish the pain by invoking God, by forcing myself to remember the wonderful reflections I had been led to through this amazing experience, but nothing seemed to help. Not the memories and not the desperate attempt to remember the smiling faces of the Three.
"Why do you keep fighting my dear Emily, you piece of scum, you know you are no good to anyone, so why continue to fight," a very dark and evil voice softly whispered next to me. I closed my eyes in reaction, desperately wishing this presence could simply go away. But no matter what I did, the voice never went away and it had been incessantly doing this for the past several days. I knew exactly who this accuser was and what it wanted but that knowledge did not help nor did it make it go away.
"You should just give up, you miserable sinner. Go down and just let your friends know you wish to stop all this. After all, who are you kidding? There is no redemption for you."
"No! I will not! And you are wrong, God loves me," I responded to the voice in a desperate attempt to be brave and determined.
My accuser laughed evilly, and the awful and chilling sound resonated in my room.
"No, no, you are wrong my dear because God hates sinners. If He loved them, He would not have sentenced Adam and Eve, right? And let´s face it, Adam´s and Eve´s sin was much less serious in His eyes than yours. So no, God could never love a waste of space like you."
The words speared my already bleeding soul because despite my best efforts they still found rich soil inside me. All my fights thus far had been grounded in the belief that despite what I was and who I was God could love me. But what this being was telling me threatened all my newfound beliefs, and I did not know how to combat that. The truth was, I still grappled with the fact that God could love and forgive someone like me.
"Do you know to whom trash like you belong?" the voice continued. "To me, that would be your answer, my dear Emily. God has neither the patience nor the time for a pathetic error like you, so He gave you to me." Chilling laughter again erupted.
"No," I whimpered, "I belong to God!"
Once more the evil laughter rose from this malevolent being and froze me to the bone for I knew I was at the end of my tether here.
In a last desperate attempt, I closed my eyes and began to pray with all my heart, hoping God would answer and help me combat this evil. I don´t think I had ever prayed more earnestly, to be frank, and as I was doing so I became aware of a gentle warmth inside, as gentle as the fluttering of a butterfly´s wings, but very much there. However, it was not enough to drive out the darkness in me.
"Oh, my sweet, sweet Emily, you are so wrong. All sinners belong to me, especially those who are so hideous in God´s eyes that He cannot stand to look at them anymore. You, my dear Emily, are an error of God´s Creation and as such should be eliminated. Your family, friends and especially God would be better off without you. So, go, tell your friends you are ready to quit, and come with me. I have a special welcome for you."
Things suddenly became too much, and just as if my soul were a badly shaken soda can, my torment bubbled over like a corrosive poison until I couldn´t take it anymore. I crouched down where I was, covered my ears, and began to pray out loud, begging for God´s Mercy. At the height of it all, I yelled, "Please, help me!"
Right then, the sound of the voice ceased – in fact, all sound ceased completely – and when I opened my eyes, I saw that an impenetrable darkness had surrounded me. What´s more, I realized then that my body felt completely weightless and that I was floating. However, this knowledge - far from generating anxiety – made me feel at peace.
I was so completely and utterly at peace that no matter how hard I tried, I could no longer remember why I had been so tormented, and I no longer cared. All I knew was that I wanted to remain here and that my prayer had been answered.
All of a sudden, I began to hear the wind again, and although I was startled at first, I soon became soothed by the gentle sound of it and the warmth as it moved around my body. My mind then remembered this wind, its music, and its gentle touch, and I knew at that moment that there was nothing to be afraid of.
"Emily", I began to hear coming from the wind and my heart filled with joy and fire in response to this gentle and loving summons. "Emily" I heard again, and I answered, "Here I am Lord," in a voice that communicated my relief and the gentle emotions within me.
As soon as those words left my mouth, a drastic change took place, and I stopped floating. I could not tell where I was because I was still surrounded by darkness, but that did not matter to me.
The wind began to move faster and feel stronger around me but the presence in it did not change and the love it communicated strengthened my heart.
"Emily" the voice called again, and my answer was not only ready, but it was eager this time. "Here I am Lord!"
"See," the voice said and as the word was uttered the wind stopped entirely, and huge columns of fire sprang forth around me from below. The heat emanating from these pillars, although intense, did not scorch me but rather warmed me like the rays of the morning sun, and although imposing and powerful they did not scare me but rather brought a smile to my lips. I still knew Who was within.
"Reach out your hand Emily and take from My fire," the voice instructed, and I did as I was told without hesitation. I had finally acquired the trust of a little child.
As my hand neared the fire, I was able to grasp how impenetrable the darkness beyond it was since even with the light it was not pierced. I pondered on this for a second, but my curiosity was soon forgotten when my arm penetrated the fire. A gentle warmth enveloped my limb and soon spread throughout my body, bringing with it a nice tingling sensation.
I stayed with my arm immersed all the way to my shoulder and I would have kept on going if the voice hadn´t told me to stop. I immediately pulled back and would have retreated completely if again the voice had not told me to keep my arm in.
I felt a bit worried that I had probably overstepped the boundaries but to be frank, the sensations that had coursed through me had been so strong and pleasant, and I had felt so at ease, that my heart had made me ignore reason. However, the voice spoke again to soothe me.
"Open up your hand, Emily, and allow the fire to sit on your palm," the voice instructed.
I did precisely as told even though I did not understand how I was supposed to grab fire. To my shock, the column before me split along the length of my arm to reveal seven tongues dancing right on my palm.
As I stared at the flames, I began to hear the wind again and I felt a gust passing over my extended arm and hand, stirring the fire even further. Then, my jaw dropped when I saw the tongues begin to move around my palm until they made a rosette figure with a central flame surrounded by the other six. It was, to say the least, beautiful and awe-inspiring and it instantly struck a memory deep within my mind of another rosette I had once seen as a little girl. A stray tear rose up and then spilled down my cheek in reaction to the bittersweet memory.
Suddenly, the rosette began to rise from my palm, and as it did, powerful gusts of wind passed around and through the columns of fire until they became thin tendrils that began to weave themselves until they formed a mesh-like pattern around the rosette, almost as if they were protecting the figure at the center. I was overcome by the otherworldly display before me, my earlier pain all but forgotten in light of this magnificence.
When the rosette had reached almost the top of the dark space where I was, I became aware that a new sound, different from the one caused by the moving wind, had started, and when I paid attention to it I realized that it sounded a lot like a heartbeat. I looked around me to try and find what was causing that strange yet soothing sound, but there was only the darkness and the rosette surrounded by the mesh.
Just then, what seemed like a veritable shower of shooting stars emerged from the very center of the rosette and began to spread out through the darkness giving it the appearance of a gold mine, and as this happened I became aware that the heartbeat-like sound had increased in volume.
I looked up again in time to see what looked like a dove of fire emerging from the very heart of the rosette and descending rapidly towards me so that before I was able to even fully process what I was seeing, it had penetrated through my chest.
Pain unlike any I had previously felt burst through me and the most intense heat rushed through my bloodstream to every point in my body. However, the greatest pain centered in my eyes. Desperate to bring relief at least to my poor eyesight, I began to rub them and then opened my eyes.
To my utter disbelief, dry scale-like membranes began to peel off and fall over my arms and hands. And then, I brought my eyes up and released a gasp.
I found myself standing in a place that I could only describe as belonging to a fairy tale. From the vast plains of greenest grass to the bluest sky I had ever seen in my life, from the tallest and most beautiful trees to the immense variety of wildflowers that surrounded me, I could only think of a magical place.
However, what was most curious to me was the fact that I was able to distinguish all this despite the bright and blinding light that seemed to be coming from every blade of grass as if a thousand suns had been turned on. Then I discovered that this breathtaking effect was coming from how the light was reflected by millions of tiny dew droplets that clung to everything and anything. I had never seen anything like this.
Awed by everything around me and wishing to take it all in, I began to turn on my axis only to realize something peculiar about this place; there seemed to be no wind. There was no sound like there normally would be to hint at the presence of it and the grass and trees did not move under its flow. When this reality became apparent to me, I wondered if the rosette and the mesh of flames had disappeared as well, given that the wind and the columns of fire had.
It was then, as I looked for the rosette and the mesh, that I found the first exactly in the middle of this magical land as if it were the very heart of it. The mesh had disappeared.
Suddenly, as if the volume had been turned up, I became aware of a harmonious melody that was as striking as it was weird given that it was composed of thousands upon thousands of child-like voices that were both singing and laughing all around me, communicating joy, warmth, and love. What was even more shocking was that I had the sensation that I was included in this melody as if I were a most important part of it even if I was not contributing to it in the least.
I had thus been musing on this new eventuality when what seemed like the brush from a butterfly´s wings moved over the exposed skin of my arms. As I looked toward the sources of contact I released a gasp when instead of a physical being I saw sound waves that emitted from a center point and spread outward, hinting at the presence of someone. I then looked further and saw that the same thing was repeating and that as the melody progressed more and more soundwaves moved from their central point to meet the others as they expanded. How they were able to expand when there was no wind was beyond me but at this point, I did not wish to question things.
I had been so engrossed by the beauty of what was happening that I became blinded to anything else besides. But when the soothing tune around me changed to an energetic and excited melody and when I began to see the waves becoming shorter in length and more frequent I knew something had happened. The fluttering over my exposed skin also changed and turned frantic and that was when my senses became tuned to the fact that the wind was back. It seemed these beings were responding with joy and ecstasy to the appearance of the wind. The trees and the grass waved back and forth as well under the influence of the strong, almost stormy wind.
My eyes moved to the rosette, and I saw that the wind had compacted into a thick see-through column around it, setting the flames dancing faster than they had originally been. Not only that, but the tongues lengthened and emitted powerful light that filtered through the column of air in stripes, resulting in the most breathtaking display I had ever seen in my life.
I released a gasp both in shock and awe. The rays of light had become like strings and each one had attached to every living being in that place, including myself, to connect us all to the rosette and each other. At that realization, tears sprang to my eyes.
"Emily" a voice called out. "I am in you and you are in Me. I loved you from the beginning and I will love you to infinity". I knew whose voice this was, just as I had known when it had told me to see, and that knowledge and the longing and love I heard in His voice made my heart squeeze hard inside my chest. "Never forget Emily" the voice continued, "that you are at the very center of My Love. Everything in Creation is meant to communicate that Love and to guide you to find Me. See, Emily. See My Love for you. See Me."
I knew the voice was coming from the rosette and this knowledge invariably led me to think of my friend Emmanuel. As that thought crossed my mind, I saw the tornado disappearing only to be replaced by a huge and thick column of bright-white light that swallowed the rosette and everything around me. I closed my eyes in reaction, fearing the intensity of the light, but as I did so, I heard the voice again.
"Never fear the light. Open your eyes Emily, and See".
I did as requested and when I saw, I stumbled to the ground from the shock.
The rosette had enlarged to almost human size and took on the most intricate pattern of a central ring connected by spokes to six petal-like formations while the petals themselves connected to one another as if on a Venn diagram.
From the central ring of the rosette, a fire began to emerge and ascend toward the sky, and within the fire, I saw the figure of a dove whose beak pointed towards the sky while its feet pointed towards the rosette. The dove seemed to be connecting the rosette to something else above it and I looked upwards to see what it was.
The moment my eyes laid on the figure at the very top, tears sprang forth and my heart squeezed tight. This was the Person with whom I had been angry for many many years, the one I had rejected over and over again, and the one I had wanted to hurt most with my rash choice. This was the Person I now knew and loved with my whole heart, even if I still acted stubbornly towards Him. This was God the Father.
He stood there, larger than life, clothed with what looked like a tunic made from light itself, and with His two arms stretched to either side of His body in welcome, as if He wanted to embrace all in one go.
I also noticed - although I could not fathom how I was able to make out His features as His entire being shone like the sun – that His eyes were bright and filled to the brim with infinite tenderness and that He was staring at me specifically as if I were the center of His world at that moment.
The next thing that caught my attention was that on His chest – right over His heart - stood a silver ribbon, exactly like the ones I had seen on Emmannuel´s body in my earlier experiences, with letters written in golden thread. He then moved His hand, took the ribbon, and placed it on the dove´s beak. The dove, in turn, changed directions and now pointing to the rosette with His beak, made the ribbon move until it reached the central ring in the rosette.
As soon as the ribbon entered the ring, and as the Spirit descended with it, the most marvelous thing happened and I saw as the two combined into a tornado of fire and wind until it cleared away to show the shape of a human baby. My heart immediately contracted painfully in my chest as I understood what I was being shown.
"What do you want me to understand from all this Lord? Why are you showing me all this? Does this change the fact that I damaged the lives of many because of how selfish I was? Does this change the fact that I do not know how you can even put up with me?"
As soon as those words left almost of their own free will, the darkness returned, so deep and so impenetrable, that I wondered if I had invented what I had seen. And yet the warmth within me - small as it might seem – made me know I had not imagined anything. Even if I could not yet understand how any of that changed anything.
"It changes everything Emily, don´t you see? Are you so blinded by guilt and self-loathing that you are not able to see what I am trying to show you?"
"Lord, I will ask again, does that change what happened? Does it somehow respond to my earlier questions?"
"It does because it shows you that what the devil said to you is completely wrong. What you saw is only the beginning of the explanation of why I gave up everything, EVERYTHING, for all of you and you in particular. Why it was, has always been, and will always be worth My sacrifice. Love, Emily, pure and unchanging Love is the response. What you just saw was the beginning of that all-consuming Love. Does Love change the wrong choice you made or the consequences? No, but it explains why no matter how many mistakes you make you will always, always, be worth it. Now, let me show you more of My undying Love for you."
At those words a yearning unlike any I had known before flared up within me. A yearning for Love, a yearning for forgiveness, a yearning for redemption, a yearning for salvation, and a yearning for hope.
I wanted to find the final answer to why I had been brought to this amazing yet painful journey, and I did not mean just this particular experience but the whole thing. But most of all, I wanted to rekindle within me, or maybe simply find it again, the love that had been so much a part of me when I was a little girl. I wanted to be Loved by the One I had denied and rejected, I wanted to love those who were a part of my life in one way or another and I definitely wanted to spread this around.
I had no idea if I would survive, that much I was not sure of, but I prayed fervently that even if I was brought back to life with a lot of impediments, if I had to suffer in the flesh the repercussions of my wrong choice, I was willing, just as long as I had one more chance. Because at the end of the day, I wanted to return to the One from whom I had sprung – just like that baby I had just seen – but having at least returned a fraction of what He had given me.
Most of all, I wanted to be given a chance to help my family rise from and move above what had happened to me. I did not expect them to excuse me or forgive me but I wished for the opportunity to use this painful experience to pull through all hardships in life.
And I most definitely wanted to help all those who, like me, found themselves deep in a pit of shame, of regret, of pain, and of despair. No one and I mean no one, deserved to live a life thinking they were not worthy and that the only choice they had was to end their lives. So, I promised God at that moment, that if I was given a second chance at life, I would spend it using all the resources I had amassed throughout my successful career in helping those who found themselves buried in the darkness of their lives. I would not allow that hateful being to drag more people like he had me.
Without knowing why, at that moment the image of Abraham came to me most particularly, only this time intertwined with the wise man garbed in light who seemed larger than life itself, and I felt a pang within me. I wanted to see Him, I wanted Abraham to be the Person I spent some time with in whatever next step would come and I most definitely wanted to ask for His forgiveness. From all Three, I had been harshest with Him, just like I had been harshest with God the Father. Now, I wanted to embrace Him as my Father and tell Him I loved Him with my entire being.
I became aware of the fact that my feet felt the hard ground underneath them, and as soon as this dawned on me the darkness lifted to leave me standing in the most unlikely of places; the desert. I looked around me in all directions, but no matter how hard I tried, I could see nothing to guide me in this strange event. What was I supposed to do now?
I was about to take the first step towards what I assumed was the north when I heard steps behind me. I turned around and came face to face with a smiling Abraham, who was walking lazily towards me as if we were not in the dryest and hottest place on Earth. My face broke into a huge and candid smile regardless. I was more than overjoyed to see Him from all Three.
Without even stopping to think of my actions, I threw myself into Abraham´s open arms and it only registered later with me that He had anticipated my eagerness to be near Him so that He had opened His arms to me even before I had fully become aware of what I was going to do.
We stood there embracing in absolute silence as the hot wind of the desert blew around us and as sand was picked up with it. I did not care at that moment because at that moment I was sheltered in the arms of my Father. For the first time in my life, I knew and felt loved fully and without restraint.
"Abraham," I asked as I stared up at Him while I moved away a bit. "Where are we?"
"You already saw the beginning of the Trinitarian Love for Humanity. Now, it is time for you to understand the extent and depth of that same Love. You mentioned in your musings that you wished to understand why you had been brought here and why you had been spared despite what you did. Well, in this part of your journey, you will understand why by learning about the life story of Love itself."
I looked at Him with a question in my eyes but I did not voice it because I knew better than to rush Abraham. He would tell me when it was time for me to know.
Releasing a short but boisterous laugh, Abraham extended His arm to me and pointed towards the west of this enormous desert, pointing us in that direction.
"Come on my child. Let us both explore the depth of the Trinitarian Love that was most powerfully expressed through the life of ONE man. In Him converges the very history of Love."
After He had said this, Abraham began to walk and I followed Him knowing then exactly what I would be exposed to. I was going to learn about the life and death of Jesus Himself.
Excited and ready, I soon reached Abraham and walked side by side with Him.