Tag Archives: divorce

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An “Angel of Light”

Glowing White Ball by Sirus183 on DeviantArt

An “Angel of Light”

James R. Aist

And suddenly an angel of the Lord approached him, and a light shone in the prison. (Acts 12:7)

I was 19 years old, a college student and very naive and ignorant concerning spiritual matters and the Word of God. In my frame of reference at that time, anything supernatural was assumed to be of God.

Now, please keep in mind that I was fully conscious and aware during the entire supernatural encounter I am about to share with you. One Sunday afternoon, I was alone in my apartment praying earnestly to God for His guidance concerning a major life decision that I was about to make: should I pursue marriage with my girlfriend of two months or just move on when she returned to finish her college degree elsewhere? I wanted very much to continue pursuing this relationship and marry her. While I was standing at the kitchen stove cooking a snack and praying passionately to God about this, I suddenly felt an invisible force pulling on me, weakly at first, but then stronger and stronger until I could no longer resist it. Then, my entire body fell limp, and my upper torso was held upright (i.e., levitated). I was literally pulled down the hallway to the other end of the apartment by this force, with my lower legs and feet dragging along the floor. When I arrived at the doorway to my bedroom, the force released me, and I slumped to the floor sitting upright, still unable to move of my own accord. Then, I saw, out of the corner of my eye, a bright, round, white light about the size of a volleyball. This light was situated at the juncture of the wall and the ceiling. Next, my gaze was turned fully toward the light, and a voice from the light spoke clearly into my mind. It said, “She believes in God. It’s OK to marry her. When trouble comes, I will take care of it.” Finally, my strength slowly returned to me, and I was able to stand and walk.

Believing that this strange and bizarre response to my prayer was of God, I acted on the message I was given and eventually married my girlfriend. The marriage seemed to be going well for a while, but, gradually, trouble began to creep in, and it became clear, eventually, that it was necessary to dissolve our marriage.

Not long after the divorce was finalized, I met a Christian woman, and soon we were married. One night, in a vision, God called me to become a student of the Bible, and we have enjoyed many, many years of faithful marriage during which time we have, together, grown greatly in the knowledge and admonition of the Lord.

In retrospect, I have been able to more reliably understand the message given to me by the “angel of light.” Yes, it was a message from God in answer to my prayer. In that message, God did not instruct me to marry my girlfriend. He simply said that it was OK for me to do it (After all, she believed in God, and I really did want to marry her). Then He went on to prophesy that a) there would be serious trouble in the marriage, and b) He would take care of the trouble. And, here’s how God took care of the trouble: first, in His written word, He provided me biblical grounds to divorce my first wife; and, second, He gave me a godly, Christian woman to replace her. And this is how I know, in retrospect, that the encounter with the angel of light was from God and not from Satan: only God would take care of the “trouble” in such a way!

To read more of my articles on biblical topics, click (HERE)

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God Remembered!

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God Remembered!

James R. Aist

“I will compensate you for the years the locusts have eaten…” (Joel 2:25)

The trail of this testimony began when I was forced to accept the fact that my first marriage, which produced three wonderful and dearly beloved children, was soon to end in divorce. I was especially concerned about the eternal destiny of my children, so I went to my “meeting rock” under an oak tree at the edge of a small woods behind my house to meet with God about it. I sat down on the rock and began to cry out to God on behalf of my children. I didn’t try to hide anything. I confessed that I had not fulfilled my biblical responsibility as spiritual head of the household, and, consequently, my children seemed to be headed in the wrong direction, spiritually. At that time I had little positive influence on them, and I confessed that, through my own negligence,  I was not in a good position to lead them spiritually and teach them about the things of God. I told God that if my children were going to be saved, He would have to step in and, somehow, make up for my negligence and do whatever it takes to save them. Then, with Joel 2:25 in mind, I pleaded with Him to do it.

Several years passed, and God responded gloriously to this prayer. I was attending the Full Gospel Businessmen’s Fellowship International Men’s Advance at Lake George in upstate New York. One day when they were immersion baptizing in the lake, I stepped forward to be immersed by Pastor Don Yarborough. We had never met, and he knew nothing about me. As I approached him in the water, he just stared at me straight in the eye with a blank look, and kept staring. I thought to myself, “That’s strange; he doesn’t seem to even see me coming.” Finally, as I drew near to him, he reached out his hand to me, we shook hands, and I introduced myself. Then he said that something very unusual had just happened; it had happened only once before in his ~20 years of baptizing people. He said that as I was approaching him in the water, he received a prophecy for me, in the form of several Bible passages from both the Old Testament and the New Testament. They all had to do with the head of the household being saved and all of his family with him. He then proceeded to share with me all five of those Bible verses. When he had finished with that, he gave me the interpretation of the message: “God wants you to stand on and hold fast to these biblical promises, which he is confirming to you and your children.”

Wow! Through this prophecy, God had just told me that all of my children will be saved. Clearly, this was God’s response to my prayer, at the “meeting rock”, for their salvation! Needless to say, I was a “happy camper” the rest of that afternoon.

I didn’t say anything to any of my children about this glorious promise at that time, because I didn’t want to risk getting in the way of what God was going to do or how He was going to do it. After all, I had given the salvation of all of my children over to Him to take care of, and I meant it.

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The Promised Witness Shows up

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The Promised Witness Shows up

James R. Aist

“The Spirit himself testifies with our spirit that we are God’s children.” (Romans 8:16)

This encounter happened in the mid-1980s, when my first wife and I were struggling with the ramifications of an impending divorce. For me, these were times of incredible stress, anxiety, sadness and depression. I could see my most cherished dreams – dreams of a lifelong marriage, a stable and lasting family life, and three children brought up to know and love God – I could see all of that disintegrating before my very eyes. And there wasn’t anything I could do about it. I had already tried everything I could think of, to no avail.

It was when I was at my lowest point, crying out for relief from the stress and confusion, that Satan literally spoke into my mind one day, as if he were sitting on my left shoulder. He said words to this effect: “Jesus isn’t the son of God. You don’t really believe that he is, do you? Look at how much stress that’s causing you. Why don’t you give up on that and just go along with the flow? That will make things a lot easier for you.” And he repeated the same message. But, when he would say this to me, something glorious would happen. As if He were an angel sitting on my right shoulder, the Holy Spirit would simply speak into my mind saying, “Remember what I told you when you were saved: ‘Believe that Jesus is the son of God. Don’t ever let go of that; it’s the most important thing you have.’” When this back and forth, spiritual battle for my soul between Satan and the Holy Spirit was over, I was still holding on to my faith in Jesus, and Satan was defeated. Praise be to God!

I found out later that this witness of the Holy Spirit was a direct fulfillment of Jesus’ prophecy in John 15:26, “When the Counselor comes, whom I will send to you from the Father, the Spirit of truth who goes out from the Father, He will testify about me…” And Romans 8:16 says “The Spirit himself testifies with our spirit that we are God’s children.” That witness of the Holy Spirit was the only thing that got me through that dark and sinister time of intense, diabolical testing. What’s more, that witness of the Holy Spirit helped me hold on to the only real friend I had at that time, Jesus Christ. I believe that Proverbs 18:24 is speaking of Jesus when it says “… there is a friend who sticks closer than a brother.”

The lessons I learned from this encounter with God and the devil are these: When everything and everyone else has failed you, remember that you still have Jesus; He is all you need to see you through; and, the Holy Spirit will ensure that Jesus will remain your friend no matter what, or who, attacks your faith (Romans 8:38-39).

Of course, these lessons apply only to those whom God has saved. Have you let God save you yet? If not, what are you waiting for? He’s waiting for you!

(To read more of my articles with a biblical theme, click HERE)

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What Biological Theories of Homosexuality Cannot Explain

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What Biological Theories of Homosexuality Cannot Explain

James R. Aist

(Note: References are cited by number in parentheses and appear at the end of the article)

“Truth is not arrived at by wishful thinking or vacuous argument. It comes, instead, by careful examination of factual evidence.”

Since the early 1970s, gay activists have increasingly claimed that they were “born gay” and that, therefore, they could not change even if they wanted to. By repeating this claim over and over again for decades now, gay activists have managed to win over a large percentage of heterosexual “believers” to their cause, without any substantial basis in fact to validate the claim that they were “born that way.” “Born gay” is, in fact, a hoax of mammoth proportions. Therefore, it is necessary to examine carefully the facts concerning the origins and development of homosexuality to see if there is any truth at all to the “born gay” claim. Most of the relevant information can be grouped into two main categories: biological theories and social and environmental influences. The critical question is whether homosexuality is already determined at birth by biological factors and is immutable (unchangeable), or develops later as a result of post-natal experiences and influences during childhood.

There are several social and experiential factors that have been shown to play an important role in the development of homosexuality. Let’s take a quick look at a few of these post-natal factors, which cannot be explained by biological theories:

Childhood sexual abuse has been shown to be associated with the subsequent development of homosexuality in adulthood. Whitehead (8) lists eight relatively recent studies demonstrating this association. For example, in the article by Zeitsch, et al. (10), childhood sexual abuse was associated with an approximately two to three-fold increase in homosexuality in adulthood.

Divorce during childhood has also been shown to be associated with the development of homosexuality in adulthood, as evidenced by homosexual “marriage.” For example, men whose parents divorced before their sixth birthday were 39% more likely to “marry” homosexually than peers from intact parental marriages, and the figure for men whose cohabitation with both parents ended before age 18 years was in the range of 55%-76% (4). In a related study, Wells, et al., (7) found that cohabiting with two heterosexual, non-biological parents until the age of 16 was associated with a two-fold increase in homosexuality in adulthood, compared to cohabiting with both biological parents.

Urban versus rural environment. Whitehead and Whitehead (9) pointed out that the percentage of homosexuality in males reared in urban environments is 3.3 times that of males reared in rural environments, while the corresponding factor for homosexuality in females reared in urban environments is 2.3 times, indicating a very strong influence of the urban environment, as opposed to the rural environment, on the development of homosexuality.

Homosexual parents. Schumm (5) found that adults with a homosexual parent are 12 to 15 times as likely to self-identify as homosexual or bisexual as are adults without a homosexual parent, which indicates that post-natal environmental factors associated with having a homosexual parent (such as having a homosexual adult role model and unequivocal acceptance of homosexuality in the home) can play a major role in the development of a homosexual orientation. These results confirmed those of an earlier, much aligned (by gay activists), meta-analysis conducted by Cameron (3), and they suggest a very powerful post-natal influence on the development of homosexuality.

Therapy and Counseling Influences. Aist (1) reviewed and summarized some of the published information on religiously mediated and secularly mediated change in sexual orientation from homosexual to heterosexual. Numerous studies have shown that both religiously and secularly mediated change in sexual orientation occurs in highly motivated, dissatisfied homosexuals at a rate that is comparable to the success rates generally achieved by therapists and counselors for psychological disorders and behavioral problems, such as alcoholism. And many studies have found that, for the most part, these are long-term, stable shifts in sexual orientation. In fact, many ex-gays have been happily married with children for several-to-many years. What is the significance of these results relative to the claim that homosexual people are born gay? First, they confirm that pre-natal influences, including genes, do not dictate sexual orientation, because very significant change in sexual orientation has been achieved through therapy and counseling. Such change would not be possible if sexual orientation were fixed at birth. And second, the fact that therapy and counseling are successful at a rate that is comparable to the success rates generally achieved by therapists and counselors for psychological disorders and behavioral problems, such as alcoholism, confirms that any predisposition to homosexuality that may be present at birth is so weak that it can be nullified by subsequent intervention. Socarides (6) put it this way: “As psychoanalysts and psychotherapists, we are treating obligatory homosexuality successfully, changing sexual orientation from homosexual to heterosexual. Such a change would be unthinkable if there were any truth at all to the organic or biological or hereditary causation of homosexuality.”

It is virtually impossible to envision how prenatal mechanisms could explain these post-natal associations of increased or decreased homosexuality that correlates with social and experiential factors. But it is easy to envision how these factors could account for the two-thirds or more of post-natal influence on homosexuality that is revealed by the results of twin studies (2).

References Cited:

  1. Aist, J. 2012. Homosexuality: Good News!(click HERE)
  2. Aist, J. 2014. What Twin Studies Tell Us About Homosexuality: Nature vs. Nurture (click HERE)
  3. Cameron, P. 2006. Children of homosexuals and transsexuals more apt to be homosexual. Journal of Biosocial Science 38:413-418.
  4. Frisch, M. and A. Hviid. 2006. Childhood Family Correlates of Heterosexual and Homosexual Marriages: A National Cohort Study of Two Million Danes. Archives of Sexual Behavior 35:533-547.
  5. Schumm, W. 2010. Children of Homosexuals More Apt to be homosexuals? A Reply to Morrison and to Cameron Based on an Examination of Multiple Sources of Data. Journal of Biosocial Science 42:721-742.
  6. Socarides, C.W. 1995b. Exploding the myth of constitutional homosexuality. Narth Bulletin, Vol. III, Number 2, pages 17-18.
  7. Wells, J.E., et al. 2011. Multiple Aspects of Sexual Orientation: Prevalence and Sociodemographic Correlates in a New Zealand National Survey. Archives of Sexual Behavior 40:155-168.
  8. Whitehead, N. 2012. Book Review of Simon LeVay’s Gay, Straight and the Reason Why. (click HERE)
  9. Whitehead, N. and B. Whitehead. 2012. Chapter 2. The genetic implications of SSA population percentage. (click HERE)
  10. Zietsch, B., et al. 2012. Do Shared Etiological Factors Contribute to the Relationship between Sexual Orientation and Depression? Psychological Medicine 42:521-532.

(For more articles by Dr. Aist on homosexuality, click HERE.)