Jesus cleanses scientist’s sins

B felt neglected and alone as a boy. This led him to search for meaning and purpose through idol worship and the occult. While this made him feel more accomplished than others, it also made him feel more isolated. As B humbled himself to review his life, he began to repent of his sinful choices and forgave those he held grudges against. B has begun a journey of being renewed by the Holy Spirit. Praise God!

(See Chinese versions: 简体中文 > 耶稣洁净一位科学家的罪 | 繁體中文 > 耶穌潔淨一位科學家的罪)

I was brought up in an unchristian home yet both my parents are still together.  

My father had his own business and my mother supported both his business and the home chores. Often, my parents would have people over for dinner. I felt my parents were quite popular and I was proud of them.

I have an older brother and younger sister. My brother and I got along well in the early years, but we fought as young children and had an emotional split that never really got resolved inside me until after I became a Christian. My sister and I only connected better after I left home. 

Emotionally, I always felt quite disconnected growing up and spent time alone a fair bit. From a young age, I did not have many responsibilities. I was free to explore my surrounding bush areas near where I lived. I would run, walk, ride, or play basketball behind our house freely. I walked to school by myself a lot of the time and suffered some early rejection events at school during the early years.

I sense I have been trying to gain attention all my life. However, this often has been by acting out or being rebellious.

On the outside, most people would say I had a good childhood. I started dinghy (small boat) sailing at the age of 10 and traveled to Argentina, Belgium, and France for races. I was interested in surfing, martial arts (karate), painting, and woodwork at school. I did pretty well in my grades, overall scoring enough to do science (geology) at university. 

There is some pride in me that my upbringing was a good one.

However, although my mum and dad provided materially, I lacked spiritual richness. 

I felt unloved when my mother didn’t follow up on the emotional problems I had in my early life. I also developed anger and rejection issues.

One was when my mother sent me from the dinner table without eating because I had a fight with her over dinner but without closure. The second was the relationship break-down between my brother and me.

Anger was the only emotion I expressed strongly, although I didn’t show many other emotions that I also felt.

A lack of nurturing and love has been evident in my life. 

About a year after leaving home, I got involved in the occult through meditation (breath and visualisation), then I practiced yoga and meditation and read many new age books.

I found a job teaching English in Japan for one and a half years. Before returning to Australia, I bought a book on Buddhism and purchased a couple of Buddhist statues back in my home land. I attended a few Buddhist chanting services over the next few years and practiced some of the techniques. 

I believe this study of Buddhism made me moody and prideful in character – I developed a ‘I’m better than others’ attitude.

Through all this idol worship, I feel I developed some lazy habits. These include not learning and applying myself to new things. I also developed two strongholds; the first is that “I have to do it on my own” and the second is that “people can’t be trusted”. 

I developed many negative attitudes about people through believing such lies. A stronghold of loneliness gradually developed as I sought to self-isolate. I can also be a little bit controlling. At the same time, I had many thoughts that I’m not good enough. 

I became a Christian when I finally trusted in the worthiness and truth of the Bible and when I realised that God was active and true in my life. 

A dedicated Christian man taught me biblical truths after I heard Vision Christian radio with many personal testimonies. My wife and I came to know the Lord at the same time.  

Since becoming a Christian, I have had a co-dependent problem with food for a number of years. I tend to over-eat and eat as a way to comfort myself. This has caused me to experience shame before my family and self-condemning thoughts and emotions. (I am now living a life laid down for God with regular prayer and fasting.)

My wife heard about Love the Lord and we felt it would be help to have fellowship and finally heal for the gospel work to come. 

We finished the 16-week course and both individually signed up for a renewal prayer session. 

Prior to the renewal prayer, I felt God tell me to make this the last deep personal deliverance session to set me free from my strongholds. Future deliverance would continue if I made sure I am being responsible to control my spirit.  Over the weeks leading up to the prayer session, I felt God call me to Him to make changes in my character and to bring fresh change to my family.

I felt God lead me into a week-long fast.

Just prior to the fasting, I had a three-day long prophetic dream that indicated that I would be leaving my family in three years-time and go somewhere I didn’t want to go. The Holy Spirit comforted me through the three-day dream. 

Interestingly, the Holy Spirit has not left me since the dream and I now hear His voice and instruction every day. Praise God!

Through the prayer sessions, I was encouraged to share my thoughts and got to understand myself better by listening to the Holy Spirit as well as input from my prayer counsellors. I also experienced deliverance which included:

• Repenting of participating in an ungodly personal development course called Landmark, where we were told to ‘cancel’ ourselves. I felt oppression lift off me as I repented. Something seemed to leave from my head and I felt more faith.
• Repenting of reading ungodly new age spiritual books. Similarly, oppression lifted, it was as if something came out of my ear.
• Repenting of worshiping Buddhism with a couple of wooden and stone Buddha statues I bought myself. The prayer counsellor pointed out to me that there may be a generational idolatry that passed down to me through my grandmother, who was from Burma. This combined repentance and cutting of spiritual ties lifted spiritual oppression from me very evidently.
• Repenting of two spirits working in my life since I got into the new age, namely the spirit of debauchery and spirit of false christ — probably as a result of an out-of-body experience (astral projection) I had in 2001. The prayer team helped me break them off. I felt like I got my life back as they departed and I saw the Holy Spirit put a large sealed door over this event in my life. Praise God!
• Forgiving my parents for conceiving me while drunk in my parent’s car. (This can lead to irreversible fetal alcohol syndrome in some cases.)
• Forgiving my mum for not responding satisfactorily enough to the molestation I had experienced from an older boy, for shaming me about pooing in my pants, taking away my favourite toys without asking, not giving me what I wanted at Christmas time, humiliating my dad for being drunk, and pulling out a knife on my dad half-jokingly.
• Forgiving my father for forgetting to say goodbye to me as he drove off to work one day. I also forgave him for not showing enough interest in my life, for not talking much to me, giving me pornography, running our dog over, and spanking me without connection. 
• Forgiving my brother was the biggest area of freedom I received. I forgave him for not being there with me when he left for school and not continuing a friendship after we had a big fight. He was special to me and I didn’t like it when he was absent from me. I didn’t feel as protected and safe. 
• Forgiving my auntie for holding me down in the living room floor to kiss me against my will, and my uncle for blasting me with anger because I left a job early at a young age.

After the prayers, I feel a little free-er from self-judgements such as “I’m stuck, I’m bad, I’m going to die.” 

Through the course, God has helped me clarify these judgements and has shown me that I can forgive. As a result of the renewal prayer, I spoke frankly to my parents on the phone about a few issues I wanted to understand better and I also shared the gospel with them. These forgiveness issues were raised during the renewal prayer.

I am feeling kinder and trying to show more love and closeness to others and towards the Lord. I have been hearing more clearly from the Holy Spirit and feel God has been saying things like He has known me all of my life and it’s time to really stand up and ‘go’ in life.

I have since started becoming more responsible at home and dealing more actively with my children and communicating with them more.

My marriage is also on a better footing because I’m paying some more attention, though I must be more loving, says the Lord to me (and in scripture). I believe I must show manhood love and strength through Christ to my wife.

I feel I am still facing a need to fast and pray to be fully delivered from debauchery (and gluttony) and food related obsessions. However, on this topic, I feel closer connection to the Holy Spirit’s work in my life. 

There are still some unforgiveness and anger issues still working in my general life but I am changing with the wonderful help of the Holy Spirit. I am hearing more clearly from the Lord.  I pray for the continuing renewing of my mind and help from the Lord to encourage me to do battle in my mind. 

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