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Statues and Spirits

MEMOIR PROJECT ROUGH DRAFT

Some quick background, this story takes place in 1977 at The Way College of Biblical Research, Indiana Campus, when I was 8. If you view the photos, in the blurry photo of me, I am standing in an outside stairwell leading down to the basement. On the inside of the wall right next to where I am standing is where the haunted crucifix stood. My wife thinks it’s no coincidence this photo blurred, but I know it was just the camera registering on the darkness behind me and using a slow shutter speed to compensate for the darkness.

Saturday morning cartoons in the Family Room came to an abrupt halt as Dale stepped in front of the TV and smashed the knob on the set to Off yelling, “Alright, I want to know what in the hell is going on here! Who is that is going around telling people that there are Devil Spirits in the statue room?” His face was scowled and his eyes were poignant and I was glad to see that he wasn’t looking at us kids for an answer because I would have been more afraid of his anger at that moment than I would have been of even the snarliest of Devil Spirits hanging out in the basement. Dale must have called a meeting because when I looked over my shoulder, all of the adults were sitting or standing, looking around the room, dodging Dale’s eyes with a guilty “not me” expression, waiting for someone to fess up for a crime they all knew they each had committed. Dale stood there waiting, cutting planets in half with his stare, letting the silence in the room compress into a loud torturous ringing in the ears until a low mumble stopped the walls from closing in.

Dale pounced, “What was that Frank?”

All eyes became spears and were poking into the flesh of Frank Butler who was seated in a corner of the room wearing a very grave look on his face, fondling the zipper of his jacket.

“Come on Frank, I want to hear this!”

Frank waited and thought for a moment before he answered. His tone was indignant and his face was perturbed like a man accused of a crime that he was purely innocent to the idea that it even was a crime, in fact he looked like he felt he was completely in the right for what he was about to say.

“Well,” his southern back hills accent drug the word out of his mouth very slowly and deliberately, “when I was down there last week, I saw something.”

“Well what did you see?”

“Well, when I was down there last week I got a really bad feeling so I started speaking in tongues and the more I spoke in tongues the more I began to feel like someone was watching me or something. I kept working but I couldn’t shake these feelings I was having and, well, anyway, while I was working, when the feelings became the strongest, I turned around and the eyes of the Jesus on that big crucifix that is propped against the wall were staring right at me like they were watching me. I walked across the room and they followed me, looking me right in the eyes the whole time. I yelled, ‘In the name of Jesus Christ get out of here!’ And then I took off and haven’t been down there since.”

A chill slithered down my back and trepidation crawled up my nose. I knew the crucifix he was talking about. One of the first things The Way had done was to round up all of the statues in the buildings and on the grounds and smashed the ones that they felt were the most Devilish since these statues were idols and behind every false god is a Devil Spirit, the rest of the statues they put in a room in the basement to sell off. My mom worked in this room pricing the statues and I had been down there to visit here and it never really struck me as spooky until now. The room was by a single bare bulb handing on a cord from the ceiling and the statues along the walls were hard to see completely but that particular crucifix stood out even in the dull illumination. It was centered on the adjacent wall to the left of the door and had a way of drawing my attention to it as soon I would enter the room. The crucifix was as big as an adult and looked very life like. Now one thing I never understood was how could we sell statues that we felt were so Devilish and try to save the world from the Devil at the same time. If The Way wasn’t so busy being hypocrites and trying to make a buck they would have smashed all the statues in the first place and I would be enjoying cartoons instead of watching Dale throw his hands into the air yelling, “I don’t believe this shit, you’re Way Corps and shouldn’t be falling for such simple tricks of the Adversary!”

But Frank jumped in, “Yeah but it says in God’s Word that behind every false God there is a Devil Spirit and there are an awful lot of idols down there and I don’t like it all that they are even in the same building that I live in.” A mumbling nod of approval circled around the room and Dale could tell his logic was outnumbered.

He regrouped his thoughts for a moment before saying in a tone that was warm and understanding, ” okay, who here believes that there are Devil Spirits in the statue room? Go ahead and raise your hands, don’t be afraid.”

One by one the room began to bloom with five fingered flowers until it was quite clear that every one in the room agreed with Frank. Us kids looked around at each other stunned, scarred and thrilled all at once. It was all too spooky to be real and yet it was more real than these pages you are reading right now. Right below where we were sitting was a room filled with ghosts (by our translation because technically we were not allowed to say ghost since a ghost was actually a Devil Spirit) and what could be more exciting to a child than a ghost story that we could see for ourselves.

Dale was a coach and a leader to these people who gave up their lives in the real world for the security of The Way Corps and now it was time for a half time speech to rejuvenate the team after a rough two quarters of play. “Alright, you can put your hands down. Now I know what the Word of God says about idols and false gods and that there are hundreds of them in the basement, but you are Way Corps and you need to start believing it. God gave his only begotten son to die on the cross so that we as flesh and blood could have the spiritual power that Christ had, in us. When you confessed Christ as your Lord and Savior you became imbued with the power of the Holy Ghost so that we as Way Corps have the power over the tricks of the Adversary. We as Way Corps are God’s most elite and spiritual-minded creatures on this earth and you all need to start practicing the power of Christ in you, your power of attorney over all the principalities and powers of this world. This campus was blessed and the Devil cannot touch us unless we fail to believe in His Word and allow Satan an open door into this campus. I’m going to pray and then I want all of you to speak in tongues silently when I am done and realize and work that power Christ empowered into you to be able to cast out Spirits so we no longer have to live in fear.”

Everyone’s eyes closed and the room became very solemn.

How do I know everyone’s eyes closed? Come on, every kid that is a kid always keeps one eye open or only closes the lids just enough so that they looked closed and the room can be surveyed secretly. Life is too short when your eight to sit and meditate over a few ghosts and not only that, praying was just flat out boring unless it got me toys. So as I looked around at the people, Dale began to pray.

“God, I want to tFrank you for giving us your only begotten son so that in this day and age we too can have the power to believe as Christ did and that we as your children can have the power to cast out spirits so we no longer have to live in fear and ignorance of the devices of Satan’s world in which we live. I want to tFrank you God for giving us, your believers, this wonderful campus so that we can go out into the world and speak your Word to others so that others may know the power of Christ also. God, I come to you now and bless this campus, your holy grounds, so that it can be free of the Devil’s dominion because Satan has no power here. Lord, (and here the tone of his voice became deep and powerful and commanding, yet very calm, capable of raising the hair on your arms) I COME TO YOU NOW AND CLEANSE THIS CAMPUS OF ANY SPIRITS OF IDOLATRY AND DECEIT THAT MIGHT BE HERE AT THIS TIME. IN THE NAME OF JESUS CHRIST I COMMAND YOU TO GET THEE BEHIND ME SATAN, YOU HAVE NO RIGHT TO BE HERE AND I COMMAND YOUR PRESENCE TO BE BOUND FROM THESE GROUNDS. I PLACE A HEDGE OF PROTECTION AROUND THEM AND THE PEOPLE WHO LIVE HERE GOD AND I CLAIM THESE THINGS IN THE POWERFUL NAME OF OUR RISEN LORD AND SAVIOR, IN WHICH ALL THE CREATURES OF THE WORLD MUST BOW DOWN AND WORSHIP, JESUS CHRIST. Amen.”

Only at times like these I have ever experienced such unity and focused energy among a group of people. A Spanish galleon loaded with gold could have sailed delicately on the air of the room at this time and despite the fact that I had the understanding of a child, I could not escape the power of this presence some call God. Dale’s voice sank the ship as the lids were lifted after a minute or two of deep meditation from speaking in tongues. “Ok everybody, God bless and I’ll see you all at lunch.”

The adults went back to work and us kids, well we instinctively huddled together and ran straight for the basement overflowing with carbonated excitement and supernatural expectations. On the way down the stairs Billy Gibson said his dad saw Jesus actually climb down off the cross and walk towards him and Kenny Cline said his mother saw the wounds in Jesus’ hands bleeding onto the floor causing our hungry little minds to salivate even more. We reached the open doorway into the statue room and the seven of us divided and stood on either side of the doorway and leaned in, holding on to the door jambs for a look at a real ghost in action. I reached in and turned on the light and there he was, Jesus, our risen Lord and Savior at his moment of death upon the cross. There he was, forsaken and alone, face turned our way, eyes rolled back into his head with a pleading look of agony pounded onto his skull under a crown of thorns. There he was bleeding and pallid from the misery of our sins that we would someday commit. There he was larger than life and now filled with life once again by spirits and specters that loom in dim-lit corridors. You could count the seconds till something supernatural would happen; he was so gruesome and pallid, there had to be a spirit living in him. Five. Four. Three. Two. One. Billy Gibson screamed, “His eyes moved!” We only looked at our Lord and Savior for an instant longer, but in that instant his eyes opened wide and his face contorted as if saying:

“THIS IS ALL YOUR FAULT AND I WILL GET YOU FOR IT!”

All seven of us screamed at once in high pitched shrills at decibels that only children can reach. Someone took off running and we all followed screaming and screaming and screaming and running and running and running through the basement maze we screamed and ran and did not stop until we reached the safety of the game room at the other end of the building where we hyperventilated out stories of what we saw, vowing never to go back into that room again.

Children are intelligent, honest and creative. Their stories may seem like wild fabrications of foolishness and ignorance, but before you accuse them of lying, and before you shrug off their answers of “nuh uh” when you tell them that what they said is untrue, take a look around and ask who is lying to who?

END
© 2007 Christian Cloud Abraham

Posted on March 7, 2007 in
Emotion: Fear, Type: Creative Nonfiction