Tom Sawyer

Coragyps has a point.

I often get a sense of impending doom that something is about to go horribly wrong. It never seems to pan out, though, and I'm forced to admit that I'm actually just a little bit neurotic. I have no reason to disbelieve this guy in the pawn shop and his "divine experience", but it doesn't take into account that most everybody has the same sort of feeling and they rarely pan out into anything at all.

A much more conventinal explanation for this guy's story is that he saw these guys come into the pawn shop out of the corner of his eye or something similar (they were behind him when he turned around) and they looked to be up to no good, so his basic fight or flight response kicked in and told him to get the hell out of Dodge. As a fundy, he interpreted that sensation as the voice of the Holy Spirit. If he'd been a Raelian, it would have been an alien telling him. There's really nothing mystical going on here.

Gringo

I had a "divine" experience one time. A new preacher at our church who praticed speaking in tongues, interpretations, prophecying, as well as other gifts was having a Bible study for Revelation. At the end of the study, he called us to gather around and to lay hands on one another in prayer. Each person sat on this metal fold out chair, as the preacher and others laid hands on each person. The preacher told each indivdual being prayed for to declare what their prayer request was. Several people went ahead of me, and most of them claimed they could feel a strange warming sensation through the expereince. This, I admit built my anticipation and expectation, but for the most part, I thought the ladies were getting a bit carried away. When it came to me, the preacher asked me what I wanted prayer for and I responded for my doubt (I had just recently began reading the Bible in earnest and began finding how doubtful some things in it seemed). He told me to be prepared for I would never be the same. He grabbed my hands and the others laid their hands on my shoulder and back and head and began praying for me. I was silently praying myself. Suddenly, I felt electricity coming from the preacher's hands, it rose through my hands and up my arms, chest and head. Then, he released my hands and laid his hand on my chest; it felt like an explosion of electricty bursting into my chest. Meanwhile, he was praying and declaring God's Word, something similar to what happened to Paul with the scales on his eyes and how they were removed. Then, he told me that the Lord wanted me to praise Him. Then, I started saying, "Praise the Lord. Praise Jesus." Each time I said this, the feeling of electricty coursing through me intensified. I could hear a fluttering sound, which increased in rapidness as I said this too. Even after the preacher and my fellow congregation members let go, I still felt the electricty coursing through me. Eventually, the feeling faded about as quickly as it came. I asked the preacher if he felt electricty coming from his hands when he prayed for me, and he said yes. This force seemed very much external and not from any power of suggestion or persuation. Fellow lay people said that though they could not see my body quaking, that they could feel it quaking intensely and that it was scary. This experience was life changing; however, I started noticing that much of what the preacher did seem to be power of suggestion tactics. His prohecies were often wrong or so subtle as to be difficult to tell if it would ever be right. I believed we would see miracles (i.e., healing of my cerebral palsy cousin) if we would only believe, lay on of hands and pray for our brethern, but this didn't happen. I guess there mustn't have been two of us who believed. Finally, I became very suspicious that this preacher was just manipulating us for power and control, particular in the area of tithing, which he empahsised frequently. He had a back injury, and I believe I saw one of those things to provide electric impulses to his back in the parish one day. I thought for a while that maybe he used this or had a buzzer in his hand, but he and his wife did seem to believe these things themselves, besides that, he made such a stir as to get himself kicked out, so that didn't seem to serve his interest either. Besides that, I used a couple of different buzzers on myself and they didn't have the same effect. Many of the above things I witnessed and more led me to believe that he was just a mesmerizer, but the experience I felt seemed so real. I've heard and read others who had similar experiences in and out of the Christian faith (one lady was a hugging lady from India) featured on CNN. I've also reading articles about therapeutic touch that seemed similar. The Christian responses in that experiences outside the Christian faith are counterfeits of the devil. This experience I felt was powerful, seemed real, I haven't experienced anything like it before or since. I've read skeptic articles about therapeutic touch and they seem to gloss over the individual experience, which is so profound. Is there a scientfic explanation for how all this occurs if it is psyhcosomatic. Can we feel eletrical currents from one another's hands in specific circumstances? Was this mass hysteria, the supernatural or something else?

One of the last sane

I suggest this guy could smell the aggression in the pheromones of the three young men. He processed this at a subconscious level into a danger signal.

Or maybe, as Peteyh says, he saw them in his peripheral vision, detected menace in the way they moved, and again, processed that subconsciously.

[ July 30, 2002: Message edited by: One of last of the sane ]</p>

gilly54

The symptoms Gringo described are very similar to those felt by people who are having an anxiety or panic attack. Strange people touching you in a strange situation could have triggered it, even though consciously, you may not have felt threatened. These attacks are very common and much reported on in the psychological journals.

[ July 30, 2002: Message edited by: gilly54 ]</p>