HIS UNSEEN PRESENCE

I have previously written several blogs related to some pretty bizarre experiences I have had on my daily, (well, nightly) 10 mile bicycle excursions.

Anything and everything from the apparent kidnapping of a woman by a man driving a semi-truck to an angel walking down a nearby sidewalk to a woman standing in ornamental garden of a bank with her dog, and singing the most ethereal song ever sung this side of ‘Kingdom Come’ to an emaciated mini-Doberman tied to a light post to a kitten sitting on the three foot tall concrete base of a similar light post to a strange guy in a front yard who, when he saw me, ducked behind a tree to a vagrant who appeared out of nowhere and asked for a cigarette, (and was quickly informed that yours truly didn’t smoke) to a young fellow with a cane who claimed to have been just released from the county jail, some ten miles distant, and doing his best to navigate his way home; (whom I subsequently picked up, and drove to his house having first taken my bicycle home, and retrieved my automobile).

I have long since quit pedaling a bicycle. It simply wasn’t good for my health. You see, I had gone over the handlebars five times over the course of a few years, so I decided to retire the contraption.

But not to be defeated,… well, allow me to postpone my train of thought.

Pt. 2

But allow me to keep you in suspense a bit longer. For I believe a bit of background color would be helpful to expand on my most recent experience(s).

As my wife and I drove towards our local “Chili’s” to “grab a bite” today, I began to tell her about the circumstances I have not yet related to you. After pulling into the parking lot, we stepped out of the car, and the pungent scent of cigarette smoke assaulted our lungs. I can tell you that I have rarely, if ever, smelled such an amazingly powerful, and lingering odor. Of course, we immediately looked east, west, north and south to determine the source of the “ambience.” But though we noticed a couple of cars to our left and right, there was not a biped (or a quadruped for that matter) in sight.

A few hours later, and after we had returned home, I had just been across the street talking to my neighbor. Suddenly, my wife stepped out the front door holding my cell phone. She held it up, and as a result I told Frank that I needed to go. Walking across our cul-de-sac, and halfway across my yard, I suddenly detected the scent of perfume. Again, I looked around my immediate environment, and saw what I had seen hundreds of times; rose bushes on my right, and a palm tree on my left; (neither of which were capable of emitting this type of fragrance).

It seemed odd that I had been exposed to two very similar experiences, but very different fragrances, and without any visible origin, in one day.

Pt. 3

Were you and I sitting across from one another I would say, “Thank you for your patience” (and) “I hope my previous illustrations provide a bit more understanding and clarity than you might otherwise have gleaned from what I am about to share with you.”

It would be helpful if I told you that after landing five perfect “Peter Pans” on the asphalt over the course of three or four years, I traded in my bicycle for the equipment with which I was born; one very adequate leg, and one which had suffered a melanoma, and resulting surgery, and an ankle which was full of metal; the result of a short fall off a long ladder.

I had been walking in my neighborhood and two or three other adjacent neighborhoods for a couple of years. But whereas, I generally pedaled each morning from 4am-5am, I have made a practice of walking out the door on my daily trek around 5am, and returning before the sun lit the horizon.

The sameness of my exercise routine diametrically changed about a month ago.

I had walked about 600 yards from my house to one of the two entrances to my neighborhood, turned left onto the sidewalk that borders a four-lane highway, and continued to walk facing oncoming traffic.

Pt. 4

After having walked an additional 50 feet, I sensed an… overwhelming Presence, (for lack of a better characterization).

I immediately looked behind me. It is amazing to me that at my age, and as poor as my cataract-laden eyes are in the daytime, that my vision seems crystal clear after the sun goes down, and I am enveloped by darkness.

There was no one behind me. At least no tangible, fleshy, visible person who might be seen and touched. Now, I looked in the direction of traffic. The roadway stretched to the horizon. At the moment the nearest headlights were easily a mile away, and not a soul inhabited the sidewalk ahead of me.

Within seconds what I have described as “The Presence” dissipated, and my sensibilities returned to normal. It was once again as it had been before. I continued my morning walk navigating my way along the sidewalk, and after about ten minutes I crossed the four lanes of traffic, and entered the neighborhood where I most often walk.

Having finished what I came to do, I re-crossed the four- lane highway, and began walking back the way from whence I came.

And now, I found myself approaching the spot in which my sensibilities had been so aroused. And now, He (or it) came crashing down upon me… again! And again, I looked behind me, and again, there was absolutely nothing there!

Pt. 5

There was just such an unseen, though almost tangible PRESENCE which almost drove me to my knees! The sole thought, no, sensation which enveloped me at that moment was the realization that Moses must have felt very much this way, as he met with YAHWEH on Mt. Sinai. (And lest anyone pose the question, I’m certainly no Moses).

However, oddly enough, even after having experienced something I had never experienced during the course of my seventy plus years, I was unable to decide whether the agenda of this Presence was charitable, diabolical or neutral in nature. It was so singular, I simply had nothing to compare it to.

I have often told my friends and relatives that,

“I have experienced more miracles in my lifetime than anyone has a right to experience in ten lifetimes” (and) “I have no idea why God has chosen to bless me so, and grace me with such a wide range of miraculous occurrences.”

A son who was prayed over by a well-known evangelist, and whose eyes uncrossed within days. This same son who at about six years of age dreamed and described the dream which included a four-faced creature exactly like the one which Ezekiel saw in his vision, though he had never been exposed to that portion of scripture. An unseen hand the weight of which rested on my shoulder for an hour. What appeared to be a young man walking towards me in the wee hours of the morning, as I brought my bicycle to a halt at a stop sign, only to look left, right, left and to witness empty space where I had seen the man three seconds earlier. (It took me even less time to realize that I had been privy to the momentary appearance of a heavenly visitor)!

And the amazing series of experiences continued.

What might well have been a fatal accident when my wife slammed on brakes at an intersection, as a truck to our right stopped at a stop sign, but a straight ladder on top failed to stop, and bounced across two lanes of traffic. Had she driven out of a nearby gas station a few seconds earlier, rather than pausing and then pausing again, the ladder would have crashed through our passenger window and decapitated both of us! And so many other near incidents and accidents which might well have taken one or both of us out of this world.

Pt. 6

But to return to my account of what I have described as “The Presence.”

I have walked the same pathway out of my neighborhood, and onto the sidewalk which borders the four-lane highway, several mornings a week for the past several weeks, and I have found my way back into my neighborhood as many times as I have found my way out of it.

And almost without fail, as I reach that ethereal spot on the sidewalk, the Presence manifests itself (or Himself, as the case may be). And each and every time my emotions are affected in the self-same manner. I find my gait slowing. I feel my senses activated. I see. I hear. I touch. I taste. I smell. And though my five senses have been heightened, it is my “sixth sense” which is so diametrically impacted.

As you might imagine, I have often thought about this recurring series of “O Dark Thirty” experiences, and questioned whether the agenda of the Presence was, as I have previously inferred, charitable, diabolical or neutral in nature.

And after about two weeks of these Mt. Sinai-like visitations, it occurred to me. I looked forward to taking this particular pathway, and walking across the threshold of that Divine spot on the sidewalk.

And I knew. I just knew. Whomever or whatever I had routinely encountered along this same ten or fifteen feet of sidewalk meant me good and not harm.

Pt. 7

Of course, I have pondered the identity of the Presence, and have mused that He might well be an angelic visitor, much like the one I described earlier in this account. But then, I could not help but wonder whether He might well be Jehovah God, Himself.

However, it was only today, several weeks after I initially sensed the Presence that having told my wife about these recurring experiences she proposed a possibility which had not occurred to me.

“You know, Pastor Shoemaker once lived in that house on the corner, as you go out of our neighborhood” (and) “His house is only yards from where you always sense, well, whatever it is you are sensing.”

Paul Shoemaker was a good man. He was a humble man. He was a sincere man. He was a spiritual man. He was an impactful man. He was a loving, giving, caring man. He was a man taken up with destiny. He was a good father and husband. He may well have been the best man (along with my best friend and a recent pastor) that I ever knew.

Funny, when our daughter was four or five, she would often hear Bro. Shoemaker speak about Jesus from the pulpit, so often, and so much so that she figured this was his name. And she would sometimes greet this precious man in the lobby of the church with, “Hello Jesus!” (And while he was not Jesus, I think he was the next best thing). And who can say, the proximity of his home to that sacred spot on the sidewalk may well be more than a coincidence.

Only today I began to wonder whether for such an amazingly “God-soaked” man if God might have chosen that little spot on the sidewalk to be a “Joshua Chapter 4” type memorial to a life well-lived. For in this passage of scripture we find God’s admonition to the children of Israel to take up stones from the dry river bottom when He miraculously stopped the flow for the people to walk across. From that time forth when their grandchildren asked what the stones were for, they were told they were a remembrance to what their Lord had done on that memorable day. As I reflected on this possibility, I could not help but acknowledge the amazing things our Savior had done in the life of this solitary man.

 

But whether God, an angelic visitor, or a sacred memorial to a life well-lived, as I walk along that concrete sidewalk in the wee hours of the morning, I find myself looking forward to my momentary communion with one whose agenda for me is always good and never evil.

by William McDonald, PhD. Copyright pending