Like so many others, I came from a broken and dysfunctional home. My father divorced my mentally ill mother a few years after my younger brother Jon’s birth, but not before inflicting deep psychological and emotional wounds through verbal, physical and possibly sexual abuse, thereby providing the fundamental doorways of demonic access into my life, even as a helpless and innocent child. In hindsight, I suspect he, or a caretaker, did the same to my brother.
Unfortunately my mother, due to her low tolerance for stress, chose to raise me while entrusting the care of my brother to her mother, who became the legal guardian until he reached adulthood. However, due to my grandmother’s close proximity, my brother and I spent a lot of those formative years developing a deep bond which has never been shared with any of my other family members or relatives. There were long periods of time where we did not have the opportunity to spend time together, owing to the fact that he sometimes stayed with my grandmother’s sister, though living in the same state as us, it made it difficult to see one another, other than the occasional visit.
As the years went by, symptoms of the abuse started manifesting, though I was completely ignorant of the source. The anxiety, fears, insecurities, low self-image, emotional instability and extremes first arose during pre-adolescence, and became an integral part of my existence.
School was a miserable chore. Being weak and socially insecure transformed me into a lonely outcast, immediately registering on the radars of bullies desirous of compounding my fractured and wounded soul. Physically unable to protect myself and emotionally vulnerable, I withdrew deeper and deeper into my tightly spun cocoon and, which, to a limited extent, operated as buffer against the abuses and rejection of my peers. On the other hand, this further isolated me and decreased the possibility of establishing any genuine friendships; further entrenching feelings of anger, resentment and hatred that violently swirled and roiled within.
The strong negative emotions of hate, anger, depression and an utter sense of powerlessness were my constant companions growing up. At the age of eleven, I regrettably chose self-mutilation as the primary outlet for releasing some of the violent pent-up emotional pressure. At one point, the pocketknife I intended to use to cut myself with folded on the little finger of my right hand, superficially embedding itself. After showing it to my mother, it was promptly removed, without any probing questions or seemingly much concern from her. The scar remains to this day.
On a more positive note, my brother and I did manage to make a friend from school. Jason was the only significant friendship that I had during those turbulent adolescent and early adulthood years. Over time, I got to know his family and younger siblings well. Jon and I often took turns (competed might be a better word) having him as an overnight guest. That friendship did help ease my loneliness and pull my out of my unwanted seclusion.After entering my teenage years, I immediately became addicted to alcohol, following in the footsteps of my father, after getting drunk on some wine coolers that I obtained. Enjoying the escape it provided, I quickly took advantage of every opportunity to acquire it from that point on, becoming what is known as a “periodic drinker.”
Also, with puberty in full swing and powerful hormones raging, I dived into pornography and indulged in very dark and perverted fantasies. On one occasion, Jason and my brother attained a suitcase full of soft-core pornographic magazines while on a trip. An addictive personality and the constant entertaining of dark, turbulent desires are the key ingredients for a recipe for disaster, a fact later to be realized.
During the middle of my teenage years, my brother and I dabbled in Satanism. We purchased copies of Anton Szandor LaVey’s infamous book “The Satanic Bible.” It did not satisfy my spiritual hunger as he did not even believe in Satan or demons as real spiritual beings only as “archetypal images.” Furthermore, he only believed in impersonal “forces” in the universe that were responsible for any successful magical, ritualistic, or ceremonial endeavors. I was looking for something real and he was not it, though I did enjoy reading many of the statements written therein.
As I continued my moral and spiritual downward spiral, I rebelled against all authority. At the age of sixteen, I moved in with my brother and great aunt, as I could not stand to live with my mother any longer. She lived a fair distance away from my home town, which temporarily pacified my desire for “freedom.”
Sadly, the person renting the downstairs building from her was only too happy to provide me with all the alcohol I desired. That year was filled with drunken episodes and eventually heavy drug use which left me hospitalized in a psychiatric unit for a month. After my release, I went to live with my grandmother back in my home town until graduating high school by successfully completing the GED equivalency test.
Living in one of my grandmother’s rentals with my first cousin’s boyfriend, totally unsatisfied with all my efforts to fill the inner void in my heart thus far, I descended into hard-core Satanism. I made several blood pacts dedicating myself to Satan body, mind and spirit in return for demonic power. This resulted in severe demonization (i.e. the demons were able to manifest at will; taking control of my body and speaking through my vocal cords).
In honor of Satan, and to spite my aunt, I sacrificed her favorite cat by hanging it. That, and defacing my grandmother’s rental with inverted pentagrams (two points up with the goat head inside). In response, my grandmother had a police officer escort me out of her rental, which she was legally able to do as I was not a paying renter. She never reported the killing of her daughter’s cat.
Eventually my grandmother, out of the goodness of her heart, supplemented my disability income so that I was able to live by myself in a modest one bedroom apartment. This, however, was not what I needed. She was enabling me to continue on with my diabolical activities, reinforcing my rebellion against God and hatred of mankind.
My brother was locked up in CYA (California Youth Authority) for a number of serious crimes. One of which was breaking his girl friend out of Juvenile Hall. Even though my brother was the only one I truly loved, I only wrote him once or twice during the three or so years he was incarcerated.
Jon was released to a half-way house after he had served his sentence. I talked with him on the phone a few times before he left prematurely to go and live in one of my grandmother’s rentals. In so doing, he knowingly broke the law. He only had a few weeks to go but apparently could not wait to leave and had no intention of adhering to any probational rules.
He managed, with his resourcefulness, to obtain a canister of potassium cyanide, a highly poisonous substance. A few weeks later, the police found out where he was staying, and attempted to arrest him. Rather than go back to jail, he ingested some of the poison, dying almost instantly, his body falling down the stairs. Unbeknownst to me, that was the purpose of the poison. He was depressed before he was incarcerated, but his years in jail greatly magnified it.
His body was taken to a hospital and hooked up to various medical apparatuses intended to keep his body alive. But since he was brain dead, we told them to “pull the plug.” That date is forever stamped in my memory: July 28th, 1995.
I was totally devastated by his suicide but numbed enough by the anesthetic of shock to get through the funeral without completely “flipping out.” For the first couple of months, I put my occult activities and aspirations on hold in order to absorb the tremendous impact of his untimely demise. Gradually, the shock wore off, replaced by the full weight of grief and fierce rage over his tragic death.
Resuming my occultic activities with a vengeance (i.e. Ouija boards, seances, channeling demons, demonology, reading occult literature, demonic manifestations and phenomena), I funneled my energies into a deeper exploration of the demonic realm in order to achieve a cathartic release through supernaturally punishing and destroying those I hated, especially Christians.
Jason, my best friend, and ironically a Christian, participated in seances in which I would call up the demon of my choosing to manifest through me and speak to him and answer his questions. He also spent the night on many occasions where we would spend many hours playing Dungeons & Dragons, which was a strong obsession of mine, second only to actual occult activities and supernatural demonic phenomena.
Another friend of mine was present when I summoned a powerful demon to become my new spirit guide. My lust for power was causing me to stand on ever-thinning ice. There was a lot of demonic activity in my apartment. This included such things as cold spots, gentle breezes with windows closed, temperature drops, shadowy apparitions and various odors. Also, we were bitten, pinched and touched by unseen spirits at times. My place became a haven for many demons of various kinds arriving from the surrounding areas and beyond; usually exuding their evil presence at night.
Jason met a woman online from Canada who he ended up marrying. That was one reason, though certainly not the only, that he turned his back on me, permanently ending our friendship. My other friend, who had participated in a lot of my occult activities and experienced a number of supernatural manifestations with me, suddenly cut off with me too.
That, in conjunction with my brothers death, through me into a major mental and emotional tail-spin. It took a large amount of energy to keep myself in check. I made the decision to purchase a gun and go on a murderous rampage, killing as many as possible before being killed. I attempted to buy a gun through the legal route, but was unsuccessful due to my FBI record. I was guilty on all counts but the charges were summarily dropped and was never convicted due to the loving providence of God, otherwise I would be rotting in a federal penitentiary right now.
Wanting to glorify Satan in my killing spree, I received two tattoos from a professional tattoo artist. One was of a inverted pentagram on the palm of my left hand. The second one is a picture of Baphomet, a widely used Satanic symbol by Eliphas Levi, who is considered one of the master occultists of all time.
Fortunately, God used all of those painful and traumatic events to penetrate my black, rebellious heart with His Truth. Over the next few weeks, I considered the fate of my eternal soul. Realizing that if I died, I would go straight to Hell and it would definitely not be enjoyable nor would I rule with Satan for the rest of eternity. Instead, I knew it would be an agony of such magnitude that it would make all of the painful experiences of my life rolled into one pale in comparison in just the first moments of an eternity of absolute and utter separation from God! Even though those thoughts filled me with fear, I stubbornly refused to turn my life over to God.
It turns out that in my attempt to acquire a gun through the black market my life was threatened at gun point. In my car, in the middle of the night and parked in a bad neighborhood with three drug dealers/addicts as passengers, I made a bargain with God saying, “If you get me through this, we will see.” He did get me through that incident but still I did not commit my life to Him until they came to my apartment one day in the early morning falsely accusing me of theft. They were just looking for money so they could get high. That was my breaking point. Having no money, I lied and told him I would get it so that he could come back later and collect it.
I drove to my grandmother’s house and shared the dangerous incident with her, frightening her. But, much to her credit, she stood by me. I stayed with her for a few weeks seriously contemplating Heaven and Hell and the obvious need to fully commit my life to God.
On July 28th, 1996, the first anniversary of my brother’s tragic suicide, I talked with a Christian who I had scorned and rejected. After talking to him, without any prompting from him, I decided to completely surrender my life to Jesus Christ. God miraculously took away the grief over Jon’s death and it has never returned. I did not actually say what Christians refer to as the “sinner’s prayer” until two days later.
After arriving at the condo of this Christian friend and his two roommates, I revealed my involvement in hard-core Satanism, sharing some of my occultic activities, and expressed my desire to fully commit my life to Jesus Christ. Feeling unprepared, they brought in two reinforcements.
The demons manifested in a rage, injuring one who attempted to restrain it. However, after much effort I was eventually able to say the name of Jesus Christ, asking Him to forgive all of my sins, come into my heart and make me a new creation. After a struggle, I was able to declare my full surrender to Christ and utter repudiation of Satan and his kingdom. However, no demons were cast out at the time, as they were unprepared and ignorant on how to accomplish it.
The next day all of us went to the mid-week service at a local church where I had an appointment to meet with the one of the associate pastors for prayer. The demons within me were enraged and frightened at this radical turn of events.
Before the start of the service, I happened to engage a Brazilian missionary in conversation. I commented on the prevalence of black magic and occultism in that country. This led to informing her of my desertion of Satanism and conversion to Christianity the day before. She promptly bound the demons, thus restricting their activity and forbidding any manifestation during the service.
After joining the service, I was seated between one of the men who had participated in the encounter the night before and his wife. After having been deserted by practically all of my other “friends,” this strong show of love and support from a group of Christians that I did not know deeply touched my heart.
I have no memory of what happened in the service or what message the pastor preached on. The Holy Spirit moved upon my heart causing me to hold their hands and weep. Other than that, there is little else I recall about the service.
After the end of the service, all of us congregated in an adjacent room for prayer with one of the associate pastors and a burly usher present. Even though he was not much more informed on the subject of deliverance (the Christian term for the casting out of demons), the Lord graciously set me free from a number of them with a negligible amount of violence or acting out.
In order to fully separate myself from Satan’s kingdom I knew I needed to “clean house.” That is, I had to remove everything in my possession that was evil and attracted, like a magnet attracts iron, demonic spirits to me. My music collection of black and heavy metal bands and other ungodly music designed to arouse demonic activity and inspire impure desires were destroyed. Pornography, black candles, incense and censer, black robe, jewelry, Dungeons & Dragons manuals and material were all put in trash bags and thrown in the dumpster. Unfortunately, I did not follow the biblical example of burning my occult books, but at least they were thrown away. All of my horror, fantasy and occultic books and movies went too. Last but certainly not least, all of my blood pacts were burned.
During the next few weeks I enjoyed my “honeymoon” with the Lord, unfortunately believing it would continue indefinitely. However, after it was over, the war with the powers of darkness began in earnest, catching me completely off guard. The demons have done everything they could to take my life in the ensuing years, but have been unsuccessful due to the loving and sovereign protection of Almighty God.
It is all-or-nothing with Christ. Without the absolute commitment to the Lord Jesus Christ and deep hunger to know Him, I would never have made it. That is how gravely serious this war is. My commitment has been tested to the extreme, but with the sustaining power and loving support of God, I am able to testify to the matchless grace and mercy of God to save to the uttermost.
Throughout the years, the Lord has matured me and helped me throw away a great deal of unwanted “baggage” from my past, setting me free from things I thought I would struggle with for the rest of my life. Self-mutilation, my primary outlet for dealing with inner turmoil and the painful issues of life for ten long years, vanished at conversion. The desire for demonic power and addiction to witchcraft also came to an end on that glorious day.
On Thanksgiving Day in 1998, I was totally freed from my dependency on alcohol. In fact, regardless of the level of stress I have been under since then, I have never had any desire to “escape” into the bottle. Furthermore, I quit drugs when I was Satanism and have never resorted to them since, as I did not enjoy its effects.
My health has greatly improved due to the breaking of my addiction to cigarettes. The desire has been so utterly removed that no amount of exposure to smoking causes me to stumble.
God has broken the pride that is so characteristic of those coming out of deep involvement with the occult and replaced it with a humble spirit and submissiveness to His will. He continues to mold and shape me into His image.
The Lord has taken away virtually all of my lust and, in time, will finish the job. He has called me to a life of celibacy, which I wholeheartedly embrace, having had no sexual relations since my conversion. Furthermore, I am called to be single, being married only to Him.
My heart, once so cold and calloused, has been softened and tenderized. He has replaced violent rage with gentleness, patience and longsuffering. He has given me a love for the unlovely and a passion to reach those trapped in Satan’s kingdom with the Light of Jesus Christ. I pray that my life and words will encourage those who are crushed by hopelessness, despair and in desperate need of comfort with the Good News of God’s love. My entire life I desperately searched for something real that would satisfy that deep, dark void my heart. I found it in a person. His name is Jesus Christ!
“For I am convinced that neither death nor life, neither angels nor demons, neither the present nor the future, nor any powers, neither height nor depth, nor anything else in all creation, will be able to separate us from the love of God that is in Christ Jesus our Lord.” Romans 8:38,39
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