60 seconds from atheist to believer.
I was an atheist.
The testimony Raymond Davis
In Germany as a teenager and later in the military,
Christians would come up to me and start talking to me about God/Jesus, and I
would ask them if He was real. They would say, "Yes." I would say to
them, “If he is real you have 60-seconds to have Him appear, if He appears I
will believe.” Of course He never appeared!
While living in Frankfurt Germany, I read Eric Von Daniken's
book, Chariots of the Gods. As a young teenager it made an impact on me, and I
quickly believed Eric’s theory to be the right stuff. In 1978, we moved to the
New Cumberland Army Depot near Harrisburg, PA where I met a man from Guam who
became my martial arts instructor. He is a very highly respected person and had
attained a very high level of "enlightenment." He was able to do
unbelievable things in the physical and spiritual realm, of which I began to
follow. One of the strangest things he did was stand in the middle of the floor
with his hands out to his side and no one could move him. He “became an iron
beam” he would say.
By the summer of 1992, I was teaching martial arts in
several locations, working in a top secret job and considered myself an atheist
acquainted with the spiritual realm. I was quite happy with my understanding of
the universe and money was something I had plenty of. One of my favorite toys
was a car stereo that I purchased in 1984 that cost me about $8,350.00 (adjusted for inflation) I loved
music whether classical, rock, techno, jazz, yes, even country.
My commute was 35 minutes from Harrisburg to the U.S. Army
War College in Carlisle. One day I just could not listen to the stereo anymore
so I began to read poetry. Amazing what we do driving. I had memorized a large
part of the Declaration of Independence, the Gettysburg Address, and about 30
poems within a few months. One day I forgot my poetry book, and I looked around
the car to see if there was anything I could memorize. I saw a booklet on the
back seat that was left in my car from my wife’s catholic church. Not liking
religion, but needing something to memorize, I started memorizing what seemed
to me to be a poem, but was really a song, “How Great Thou Art.”
With the radio off while I was driving home, I began to
memorize the song and when I read the verse:
And when I think, that God, His Son not sparing; Sent Him to
die, I scarce can take it in; That on the Cross, my burden gladly bearing, He
bled and died to take away my sin.
I said out loud, “Why would you do that?” and for a split
second I thought, why did I just say that and to whom am I speaking?
(What happened next is difficult to place into text or
speech. All I can say is that God is not constricted to linear time. Several
things happened simultaneously and something that would take you, and I several
seconds to say and do took Him a split second. Think of it as 60 seconds in 1
second?)
Then suddenly I heard an audible voice come from the back
seat area of my car which amazed me. The voice said, “Because, I love you.” As
I heard the “B” sound in the word “Because” I felt something get out of my body
and take a position in the air between my head and the side window. I knew it
was there, but I could not see it. I was never aware that I had anything in me,
but I felt it get out of me and place itself right next to the left side of my
head. I was slightly startled by the audible voice but more so by what just got
out of me. Even though I could not see it, I knew it was there more than if I were
standing in front of you with my hand on your shoulder hearing you speak back
to me while looking into your eyes. Something I just can’t explain.
At the same time that I heard this audible voice—time and
space changed. During the time it took Him to say the word “Because” audibly,
He spoke three sentences directly into my mind and showed me two things. All
during the time I heard the word “Because.” And there was no confusion.
In my mind I heard Him say, “I Am the God of Abraham, Isaac,
and Jacob”... and I thought... you are the Jewish God but at the same time as I
know he was the Jewish God I knew the he was not Allah, Buddhism, Hinduism, Mormonism,
Shintoism or any other god. It was as if there was a line and on top of that
line was one name. The name of the Jewish God, the one true living God and
under the line was the longest list of all the other gods which were not the
one true living God.
Then I heard Him say again, in my mind… “I Am, who stretched
out the heavens.” And all of a sudden I was no longer in the car. I was suspended
in space in pitch black darkness. I could not feel and pressure on my feet. I
was in the middle of nowhere, no light no anything out in the space I was
looking. And then suddenly, way out in front of me as if someone huge pulled
out a vast never ending blanket from an unseen box. The lights continually very
rapidly expand beyond my ability to see where they ended… I saw the stars/galaxies
going out away from me as if someone pulled them open like a blanket. I was
amazed! It was the most beautiful thing I have ever seen! I watched this for
what seamed 12 to 15 seconds.
And then suddenly I was back in my car, driving on 81 with
the spirit next to my head. I was the shape and size of a baseball. And then God
spoke in my mind again, “I Am,” right over the center console an oval hole
opened up. I looked down into this hole and about an eighth of a mile away I
see them. Three men hanging on crosses. They were up on a slight hill from a
road which went from north to south. To the north I could see the beginning of
a town and to the south just land no houses. There were people standing on the road looking
up at the men hanging on the cross. Immediately I began to know that this was
Jesus the Son of God, that He is God, and that He was dying on that cross for my sins. The holiness which came from
Him up into me through the hole was indescribable and my physical being was being
overwhelmed. There was so much information mixed with holiness coming through into
my very being I began to pass out.
After a few seconds the hole closed up, I stopped passing out
and I heard the rest of the sentence, “I love you.”
It was an unconditional
“I LOVE YOU”.
So He showed me all that during the time it took Him to say,
“Because.”
Now I have this spirit riding along with me, right between
me and the driver’s side window. I just heard God say to me audibly, “Because,
I love you.” I heard His voice in my mind, saw the creation of the universe and
saw Him dying on a cross. Now I know the holiness of what Jesus did for us on
that cross.
I knew that this love was unconditional. It was the first
time I had ever felt unconditional love. But out of my mouth, out loud, I say,
“But I’m stupid.” And I thought to myself, “Why did I just say that?” And
immediately I remember my mother saying to me in many ways over the years that
I was slow, couldn’t do what the other kids could do etc. etc. etc. But the
love would not go away, it was unconditional. I knew that God loved me no
matter what I could or could not do. And I thought to myself, “What do you
want?”
I knew that Jesus just paid for my sins and that He was
Holy; I wanted to give God something back. “What do you want?” I thought. I
thought I would give Him all my money… no response…He didn’t want that? I will
give You all my money and my house?...no response… He didn’t want that? I will
give You all my money, my house, and my cars?... no response. What do You
want?.... Me! I felt so unworthy. I knew at this point that Jesus Christ was
without sin, that He was pure and holy… Me? “Yes.” Me!
That would be like me giving you a dried up piece of grass
and you gave me everything you have. This was an uneven exchange.
And then in front of me I saw, as if on a flat screen tv something
I did on a cold winter day in Frankfurt Germany. A boy our age irritated me and
my friends, would not leave us along. My two friends grabbed him and while he
was bent over I kicked him in the chest, he fell to the ground and we ran off. Suddenly
I saw him with God’s eyes. The value! The value of a human being… we have no
idea. I jerked my head away from what I was seeing and if I could have I would
have crawled out of my seat belt out of the back of the car. I wanted to get away
from this sin, as far away as I could. I saw how valuable he is and I grieved
deeply and began to weep. I cried out, “O’ God, Please take this from him as if
it never happened.” I wanted this
removed from him so he could live his life as it never happened. And in my
spirit I heard, “Forgiven,” “Paid for.” And as if there was an audible clap the
screen then went up through the roof of the car and was gone. I knew it was
done with. The spirit next to me got out of the car and was now traveling right
outside the window. As if it did not want to leave, it wanted to see what was
going to happen.
And immediately the next image popped up in front of me. I
saw the face of a girl whom I can't remember. We mutually agreed to have intimacy. I had forgotten her, but when I saw her face
I saw how valuable and precious she is! She had no Idea… nor did I. Again I wanted
to get away from this sin and I jerked my head away and cried out “O’ God,
Please take this from her as if it never happened!” I wanted her to live her
life without this sin. “Forgiven!” there was a clap and the image went up
through the roof of the car and the next image popped up.
We have no Idea how many sins we commit. Hundreds of images
popped up, things you wouldn’t think are sins are sins. My heart was grieving,
I was asking for forgiveness… The images/sins were meeting forgiveness like
fanning the pages of a flip book.
Then the Lord said to me in my mind, “The way you are, right
now.” And I said, “But I have to change my language.” I used foul language on a
regular basis at the military basis I worked. And He said, “No, the way you are
right now.” And suddenly I saw a screen in front of me the left was all black
with a white “No” and to the right was all white with black “Yes.” And when I
saw this I leaped at the “Yes” with all my being with my spirit I could
actually feel myself leap to the “Yes.” And two things happened, first the
spirit that was outside my car traveling long side me began to leave—I sensed
it, as if I could see it go up and away from me back towards Carlisle. I could
sense it for about a half a mile, and then it just took off and I lost
connection with it. I knew that it was gone. It wanted nothing to do with what
was happening to me.
At the same time electricity touched the top of my head and
as a wave began to filter down through my body. When it reached my heart
another wave started at the top of my head. This continued on until I had four
waves going down through my body at the same time. When one would leave my feet
another would enter my head. I could not drive anymore, and I pulled over to
the side of the road. My body was shaking as if being shocked—but I felt no
pain. I began to cry, laugh, and sing songs I had never sung. I felt such joy,
such love, I was overwhelmed. This went on for an hour. Every time I would pull
on to the road it would happen again, and I would have to pull over. This was
the greatest day of my life. I couldn’t wait to get home and tell my wife. Oh,
the love, Oh He’s real.
When I got home my wife opened up the door and said, “Where
have you been?” (no cell phones at that time.) I grabbed her by the shoulders
and gently shook her and I said, “Honey, you have got to give your life to
Jesus!”
Her eyes opened real wide and she replied with a shout, “Of
course I have, I’m catholic. Who are you?”
I said, “No you don’t understand, you need to give your life
to Jesus!”
Five years later, Leah would have an experience which I find
incredible and wonderful that would accomplish the same for her as this
testimony has done for me: salvation and a personal relationship with the
Creator of the Universe, the God of Three Parts; Yahweh— whom we know as the
Father, the Son, and the Holy Spirit.
