EXECUTING JUDGMENT

For if we would judge ourselves, we should not be judged.

1 Corinthians 11:31

How I got to be sitting in the police chiefs office tripping on acid is the exterior heart of this story.
But I will begin by approaching its interior heart.

The year was 1985, and the Lord had two years earlier broken me of seeking the love of woman
outside wedlock. The story of that, in the mostly destroyed book of poems, A Fire In The Lake, tells of
His using a woman (did He use Delilah of old?) to effect great change and devastation in me. From
the last lines of the last poem:

My adventure and song are finished.

If I sing and adventure again
it will be as one raised from the dead, Heaven-sent.
For she who stripped me utter was Gods instrument.

This adventure was the odyssey of an occultist-poet warrior-priest who fell from his Master's
presence into the abyss in the human heart, and found himself in the archetypal heartlands of humanity
a waste and howling wilderness where he began to search for the way back. He could not fathom the
cause of his fall there was no fault in the Master and he could not see the snare of deception he had
been taken in, and the demons wasted no time in seeking to kill his will to live. The song was the
story of all this, as well the ontologic-erotic unions with the women he met, for such only kept him aloft
over the seething abyss and the gnawing hunger of dread Thanatos lurking therein.

A brief word about the occult: its root meaning is hidden (from view), concealed, covered over,
coming from the Latin occulere; in medicine it is used as in the terms occult blood in the stool, or
occult carcinoma. I use it in a neutral sense, not specifically referring to demonic practitioners (as
common usage does) unless so indicated. The term occultist-poet may also refer to the spiritual
activities of a saint. The prayers (and prayer warfare!) of a saint as well as the spells of a sorcerer are
both in the realm of the occult hidden from human eyes! or so is my use of the word in these
writings.

Back to 1985. A year earlier, in the summer, I sent my daughter to visit her mom in NYC, and I went
up into the mountains a remote area in the wilderness of the southern Catskills to fast and pray.
After two weeks I became discouraged and came out. This whole business of fasting was at the center
of the snare, erected on a foundation of spiritual ignorance, but I could not yet see that. He nonetheless
heard my cries, the One who watches over His children, and was preparing a terrible deliverance,
snatching me before I plunged over the edge. But that is another story, too far ahead!

And so I went about my life in the small town of Woodstock, New York. Like a lion caged, tormented
by its wardens, I went. The cage was my sins keeping me from the air of Heaven my spirit longed to
breathe and the keepers malign spirits. My closest friends knew I belonged to Christ, as did most of
the town, for I would write in the local paper under the nom de plume Steve Levin about my
adventures in drugs and love, and also of my true but lost Love. In Toleration City I was accepted and
loved; in those days I spoke for myself, not for Christ, although it was clear for whom my heart longed.
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I say I was caged a prisoner as I didnt know how to escape: repentance supposedly required a long
fast, which my distorted faith would not sustain. And even when I did fast well, I did not have the inner
stability of a sound faith. I must have fasted and failed some hundreds of times. It was when, some
years earlier, eating had become sin to me, that I with grief forsook the Way.

My 5-year-old cub and I came to Woodstock from NYC in 1978. I had just wrapped up publishing
and distributing a journal, The Lightning Herald: Un Journal De Potes Terribles, and wanted a simpler
life for us both, she now of age to go to school. So we settled in, the town receiving us warmly. I did
free-lance child-care work (having good human services references from NYC), and then was a
Teaching Assistant in a special-needs school.

I continued to write my book. I sought out the local seers and leaders among the Christians, desiring
insight into my condition, which no man could speak to, and so I remained aloof from the churches, due
to the kind of life I lived, and the heart I had. From a letter to the editor of Woodstock Times in 1979,
when Dylans newest record came out:

To the Editor:

Why I just broke my record of Dylans Slow Train Coming: it aint that I dont love ya, Bobby, and it
aint that I dont think youre true, its that I dont want to hear none a that stuff till that train done come
and stopped. Maybe youll tell me, Now is the day, and this is the hour, but I heard them words before,
I even read em in the Bible, but I also read about a kingdom that cometh in power, and not in word,
and that aint here, not by a long shot.

It aint no use for me to listen, it dont do nuthin for me except to break my heart, tear it between love
and my own integrity. Got I any integrity to speak so to you? My own peculiar path I walk, and if any
man on the earth can minister the spirit of Christ to me according to my needs, and the needs of my world
(is it not mine? am I not its poet?), him I will listen to. But dont you preachers come beatin a path to my
door if you cant raise the dead, heal the sick, and establish your kingdom of grace in full power, cause
Im sick of guilt-trippin spiels and words that break but dont quicken. Try to quicken the stones if you
will, but dont come knockin on my door, my heart is as hard as a diamond to anything less than the
apostolic reality, and I do make short work of preachers who come preachin anything less.

I dont reckon you to be preachin, Bob, but rather singin love songs, thats why I broke your
recordrather that than my heart. An Ill go my own path through this bloody world, and know what
love I can, an maybe Ill see ya at the station. Oh yeah, an I got my own song to sing, an I know it
well.

It was intolerable to me that my consciousness should be that of a meat-head, someone with no

spiritual or psychic awareness, existing simply in the baser appetites, such as eating. This is why I got
high, so my heart would have a life in the realms of consciousness. Better to exist spiritually in the
outlaw regions than not at all! Better an outlaw than a meat-head! And so I lived my life, thinking
myself hero and anti-hero at the same time. For how it pained me to knowingly enter and function in the
realms of sorcery in disobedience to the worthy King I was sworn to serve. And in this darkness how
terrible the ontologic depths: once, while still in the New York, I saw in my own heart the reality of the
living dead and cried out in a poem, O zombie I! For such did I see myself to be (and mistakenly
believed): without the life of God, the living dead. To knowingly be such a denizen of the realms of
horror! But as I wrote in those days, Better terrible truth than none at all, or the usual hype and jive.

What if Dostoevsky
were a poet
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 after acid
in this day

what if Rimbaud
were alive today
in children of integrity
come what may

what if
Dylan
had a brother
who now took his stand

Un Pote terrible

A title I had given myself was just this, un Pote terrible, a new breed of being on the earth (not un
Pote maudit as some suggested I change the journals name to), for I loathed the term sorcerer yet
functioned in that realm. And hated the powers of darkness.

You who think to judge me, what option would you have had me take? To end my life? Or to exist
bereft of consciousness? Which latter would have been an intolerable form of death to me. I found no
help among the Christians. I sought the Lord with long fasts among wild dog-packs and bear in remote
wilderness. No! Better an outlaw than dead meat! My blood was too hot, and heart too engaged with
the worlds of letters and spirits and humans to lie down and die. I would live!

One of the poems of that time:

WOODSTOCK BREAKFAST

Never heard of it? Well, its

coffee & acid

lean and hearty fare

for those
with feet on the earth,
hearts in the tower
of vision

on this the dark planet.

Breakfast of fools
and champions.

But in 85 I was thinking more and more of seeking once again to walk with Christ. I may not have
talked about it much my friends in town were not interested in this but it was on my heart. When I
thought of my ongoing life without Him, and of my young daughter without a true knowledge of Him
from my heart to hers, I was filled with a quiet dread. One of the things I sometimes did when I felt my
mind filled with cobwebs, and my heart shallow and restless, was to take a hit of acid. And so I sought

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out two different friends to cop from. In case one was beat Id at least have the other, as I hated
expecting to trip, and nothing happening.

One friend was a street person with good connections, and the other a human services professional,
likewise with access to quality stuff. They both came through, and so I had two hits on me.

I dropped one in town, I think at my friend Karens house she like a sister to me, and a fellow poet
as that was where I often hung out, and from there I went to the village green, but when awareness
became as intense as a storm I realized I wanted to be somewhere more peaceful.

I drove home some three miles to Peter Pan Farm (the real name of the place in those days), and went
to a field near the cottage where my daughter and I lived. She was nearby with another family who were
friends of ours. I had bought a pint of muscatel to take the edge off, and sat in the field sipping my
wine, relaxing in the increasing awareness.

I dont remember when I first became conscious of it, but I sensed an evil spirit, and it did not go
away. This is one of the problems with these kinds of drugs they give you direct and immediate
access to the realm of spirits. Often I have no awareness of them at all I avoid like the plague even
any hint of such, but occasionally it happens. Once in New York I was on acid and interacted with this
man whom I sensed was into deep evil, and even after I left him a spirits presence I felt when near him
dogged me wherever I went, and I walked down the city streets, actually haunted. It is a terrible feeling
being in their presence, the foulness, the malignity, the horror that such an entity has a personal interest
in and direct access to my being. And one never knows what evil may materialize under their influence.
It is unnerving!

Some of you reading this will of course think me mad and given to hallucinations I expect that from
those with an anti-supernatural worldview but others of you will know I may indeed be speaking the
truth. And mind you, the genre of this piece you are reading is not fiction, but visionary adventure, non-
fiction. I mean, it happened as I tell it. Yes, my perceptions and understanding may be off in some
things, and that is a key part of the larger story, but you must judge for yourselves if I have my wits
about me, and see clearly in these things I say, or no.

I could not bear it, being vulnerable to a demon, and not knowing what might occur. It is not just a
static entity, emanating like a street lamp, but a being sworn to my destruction and under orders from
beings higher up, and answerable to them in their horrid cruelty, yes, even to their own and if we were
already in each others presence.I was not ignorant of the possibility of a direct assault upon me, and
what would be the outcome of that at best but me undone in a mental institution somewhere.

I could not endure this infernal creatures presence in my perceptual field, unpredictable and violent. I
had to take up a weapon against it, and there is only one place in all of existence where such are forged,
and available to those who know their proper use. Regardless of the grief that may follow the failure
I had no choice but to avail myself of the armory of Heaven, and get ahold of a Spirit-blade the one
issued to me I called Lightning Sword and go after this spirit. You attack one rightly and they flee.

And so, tripping, while I poured the wine out into the field, I went to my Lord, approaching the
presence of His majesty with these words, Lord Jesus, forgive me and cleanse me with Your blood.
He and I had been through this before, and we minced no words. His little brother come to Him in
desperation and repentance would be received. We knew each others hearts. (What I didnt know
and needed to know to walk what Isaiah called the highway of holiness I would not learn till I was as
good as dead, at the end of my own strength and wisdom. This would be some years away.)
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 The glory of my King flooded through my heart, and I was quickened with Power, the life of Heaven.
Against such no demon can stand. I turned to the demon and said, In the name of Jesus Christ of
Nazareth, and in the power of His Spirit who is the life of my spirit, I command you to go from me. It
was that simple. My words were as sharp and penetrating as a razor-edged blade, but such a blade as
would cut into spirits. (John Bunyan called such a weapon a right Jerusalem blade.) The spirit left,
and did not return.

I drew near to my Lord. It had been so long I was away from Him. What a joy to be approved and in
His favor once again! And so I remained a while, rejoicing. Then I received intelligence in my
understanding the Lord communicates with his people in various ways indicating a course of action
He desired of me, and the reasons behind it. I suppose I could also put it, this was my conscience, and
my intuitive grasp of the implications of my having taken the acid in light of my having made a
profession of faith in the town, however faulty my profession and life were. Even so, it is the light of
Christs Spirit that informs and quickens my conscience; He is the intelligence of my intelligence.

I saw how my friends could easily say, upon my speaking of my renewed communion with Christ,
Steve, that sounds great, but as I see it this communion with Christ is just a part of your acid trip.
You got any more of this great acid? And they could rightly say that, for it was in the midst of the trip
I sought and found Him, and the distinctions I would try to draw separating Him from the acid
experience would be but sophistries in their eyes, just clever words covering what they saw (or seemed
to see) was the truth of the matter. For everyone knows who is experienced with LSD that there are
many so-called Christ consciousness experiences folks have while tripping, and this would seem to
them but another such delusion, or peculiar subjective experience.

I saw I needed to do something to nullify the grounds for these conclusions. I would execute judgment
on the criminality of the act by turning myself in to the police, thereby condemning the having taken
LSD, while leaving my union with Christ inviolate and free from the impugnment of it being acid-based,
for it was in Christian respect of the law I judged myself a transgressor.

I was afraid of what might happen at the police station, but it was crucial I follow my conscience, and
maintain the integrity the credibility of my testimony of Christ. So I told my daughter I was going
into town for a while (it must have been 5:30 or 6 in the evening), and that I would see her in a while. I
said I was leaving the car, and walking. I walked because it was against the law to drive while under the
influence of drugs, and Scripture enjoins I should obey the just laws of the land. I walked the few miles
into town rejoicing, and also a little nervous at what might happen. I went straight to the station house,
which was on Tinker Street one of the two main streets in the village and asked the dispatcher at the
window if I might speak to the Chief (which is how we called him), who at this time was Richie
Ostrander. Chief Ostrander came and opened the door, and let me in, and invited me into his small
office. He said, How can I help you? He knew me from around town, had given a talk on police work
to the children in my special ed class, and I was on nodding terms with him. Part of my disguise as
high-flyin outlaw poet was to have my hair cut short in a military style, which I had often sported since
my days in the Marine Corps, and to officialdom I appeared Mr. Straight, compared to the long-haired
hippies in town.

I said, Chief, I have a confession to make. I took some LSD, and as Im a Christian I know its
wrong, and Im turning myself in. He asked, Are you on it right now? And I said, Yes. He said,
Excuse me a minute, and walked out of the office. I think he alerted one of his deputies to be at the
ready in case I were to go crazy. He came back in and sat at his desk across from the chair I was in. He

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said, What can I do for you? Do you want to go to jail? And I said, No. Are you carrying any of
the drug on you now? I replied, No.

I liked the Chief. He was gentle with me. I knew he went to the Methodist Church in town I had
seen him there when I visited that congregation. So I knew that at the least he had an understanding of
Christian thought. (I had seen a number of good men and later, women on the Woodstock police
force, where kindness ruled in their dealings with the people.) I knew he was puzzled as to why I was
there in his office. Chief, Ive turned myself in because Ive been talking about Jesus Christ to people
in town and I have tried to live the Christian life but I got depressed and discouraged, and reverted
back to my older ways, and took the LSD. I knew it was wrong, but I did it anyway. When I came to
my senses I asked God to forgive me, and He did. But I know I have lost my credibility as a follower of
Christ with some of the people in town, such as those I got the drug from, and others. So I wanted them
to know that I didnt look lightly on this that I have done, but knew it to be a sin in Gods eyes, and a
violation of the law of the land, and I have executed judgment on myself by turning myself in to the
law.

He said, You dont want to go to jail. Will you tell me who you got the drug from? I said, No,
Chief, Im not a rat. And these are just street users, not dealers. He said, Well, what would you like
me to do to you? And I replied, Let me go, and I will not do this again. I have learned a hard lesson.
I just needed to execute this judgment on my actions, for the sake of my testimony to Christ in town.

He asked, Where do you live? And I told him. He then asked, Does anyone else live with you? I
said, Yes, my 12-year-old daughter. Im a single parent. He said, Is she home now? And I said,
Yes. He asked, How will you get home? I said, Ill walk. Thats how I got into town. I like
walking.

He asked, Can I trust you to go home and not have any trouble? He could tell I was calm and
emotionally stable with him in the office (the Lords Spirit was the peace of my heart). He said, Ill tell
you what, Ill let you go home, but I want you to call me here in the station later this evening, and let me
know how you are. Will you do that? I said, I will. And thank you for your understanding.

I left the police station and stopped over at Karens house, looking for my street friend, as I had given
him the extra hit of acid once I knew the first one I took was good. When I saw him I said, John,
would you please do me a favor and give me that hit back? I know I gave it to you, but I really need it!

And so he did. As soon as I was out of his sight, and passing on the bridge over Tannery Brook, I
tossed it in the water. I didnt want his or anyone elses trip on my conscience. And I never took
another such drug imagine having to go through that again! With cause I could be thrown into an
asylum! And I would not trifle with God in this.

I was now free. Free to speak of my Savior without fear of the rejoinder that my faith and
experience of God was simply an extension of an acid trip. And I rejoiced in the wisdom and
graciousness of my Lord. I walked home with joy and peace in my soul.

This is one story from a visionary adventure, which still goes on twenty years later, part of A Great
And Terrible Love.