My testimony—Before Christ

Who has believed our message? And to whom has the arm of the Lord been revealed? Isaiah 53:1

I ran across this verse earlier this week and it hit me—the prophet was lamenting the seriously insignificant number of souls who simply heard the good news of God’s love and as a result embraced it in faith. To top it off, it seemed Isaiah was also expressing the sad fact that even when the Lord went further in His pursuit of people’s souls by “revealing His arm” (a metaphor for His intervening power), again, very few grasped the significance of His overture and then nonchalantly turned back to their own deal.

I had been one who heard the message…and scoffed. For years I scoffed those who conveyed this message—although internally I questioned, I prayed, I sought. I would listen to George Harrison singing “My Sweet Lord” as I hid away in my dark bedroom lit only by a red candle, and I’d whisper, “Come into my heart NOW!!” Nothing.

And yet, Someone was quite aware of my search despite my outward disdain.

And then one night He revealed His arm…

It was a snowy night late in January of 1972 after a high school basketball game. My date and I planned to go to a party, but he took a detour to a park where he showed me two joints that he wanted to share with me. I was game but told him that they would likely have no effect on me—I’d smoked pot eleven times before without any noticeable results. (Have I ever mentioned that one of my quirks is an OCD tendency to count things?) He assured me that these were different—they were laced with opium.

When we got back to his car after puffing them down to nothing, I said to him, “I told you these would have no effect…” And then my words echoed back at me, again and again.

As he drove to the party, I was in a virtual echo-chamber. I could see nothing but flashes and sparkles. He commented to me as he was driving, “That tree just turned into a pinecone.”

Unconcerned about having a hallucinating chauffeur driving me around the streets of our town, I replied, “Give my regards to its mother.” I was too busy in my echo-chamber to give much thought to safety.

And then a series of hallucinations happened that resulted in a type of “line in the sand” between the Lord and me. First, as I looked out of the big windshield on that dark January night, I saw my mom’s loving face filling a brilliant blue sky. I was horrified, realizing that I was breaking all of her rules, potentially hurting her very deeply. Then her face was gone, and I saw the dark expanse of the starry heavens and thought, “God can see me!” so I ducked below the dashboard in an attempt to hide from the Almighty.

What happened next forever changed the way I viewed Jesus. Immediately I was at my trial on Judgment Day (not a popular topic in the particular mainline denominational church I attended). I was about to be sentenced to Hell by a raging jury; they shouted at me with faces filled with fury, pounding their fists. I stood with my head hung down knowing I deserved no mercy. And then Jesus approached. He was robed in white with a gold cord around His waist and radiated golden liquid love. He first turned to the jury, raised both hands and then lowered them in a gesture of silence. Begrudgingly, the jury quieted as the Lord turned to me.

I will never forget the love I saw in His face as He gazed into my eyes while speaking to the jury. “This is My own dear daughter whom I love very much. She wants to be with Me. I think she will.”

With that, the hallucination/vision faded. I was back in the car, in a vehicle driven by someone who had just smoked the same stuff I had—and I was very aware of the dangerous position I was in. But a deep sense of peace and God’s protection came over me as I said to myself, “I’ll be a Christian someday.”

© 2015, Dorothy Frick, and updated 2017 and 2022.