It’s been almost ten years since the incident in the garden, and time has healed and revealed much—but I’m speaking for myself. I feel like an explanation would be beneficial to help people understand why it all happened, for the healing of others, and to rebuild trust. For I imagine there are still people out there that wonder what, truly, happened. Why, regrettably, did I attack my friend?
Was my crime the product of a mental illness? Or was something else going on?
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First, I’d like to tell you about the crime so you know what happened. After that I’ll tell you how the mental health field diagnosed me as mentally ill. I’ll share with you my problems with this diagnosis. Then I’ll tell you my belief about what happened. As we draw to a close I’d like to bring you to a place where you are thinking about what the mental health field says about the crime I commit, versus what I believe. Then I’ll close.
The Incident in the Garden
July 8, 2017 was not only the worst day of my life, it was most likely the worst day of my co-worker’s—the man I attacked—life, one of the worst days for the lives of my family, one of the most unexpected days for my other co-workers, a scary day for the community, and so forth.
What happened?
Without getting too thorough, on the morning of my crime, while at the marijuana garden I worked at, I came to believe that I was here to become the sacrifice for the sins of the world. I believed that I couldn’t kill myself, because that would be a sin. Therefore, I thought that the heavens were going to let me know how I was supposed to die.
As the morning progressed, I thought that the heavens let me know (through various means I imagined) how I was supposed to get myself killed. This was what I thought came to me in the end: I was supposed to stab my co-worker in the heart, killing him—but he wasn’t going to die. I believed that the Holy Spirit was going to resurrect my co-worker, and he would be fine. Before my co-worker was resurrected though, my other co-worker would see what happened, and stab me in the heart, killing me.
It sounds offensive. It sounds obscene. How can I believe such a ridiculous thing?
This is where it becomes impossibly complex for me to share with you how I came to be in this state of mind. To see and understand how I came to be in this position, to even do a minced amount of justice, we would have to go ten-ish months back when I encountered the real living God. From there we would have to go over the miracle I witnessed that sparked my journey to learn the truth about who God is, who I am, and what’s going on in the world. We would have to examine all the otherworldly phenomena I experienced that shaped my worldview as I sought to understand the truth. There’s so much. We absolutely would have to factor in my encounter with Satan, passing the threshold into heaven, witnessing the Kingdom of God, and so much more. And that’s just a sub-par overview of my journey. Then we would have to look at my life and all those influences that shaped my beliefs about reality—my family, the public school system, the entertainment industry, my friends, and so forth. After we realize that that is not enough work when it comes to determining why a person believes in what they do, we would have to think historically and trace where my beliefs come from throughout time. Who influenced who? What influenced society? Where did my beliefs come from historically? Just thinking about that amount of work makes me want to puke. But, if you want to give a fair and balanced assessment you must include all the things that influence a person’s beliefs.
That’s too much work for this journal entry. And there’s more about the day of the incident that you need to know.
After I came to believe that I was here to be the sacrifice for the sins of the world, at first, I wasn’t going to do it. Then, I thought I received a word from above about the consequences that would result depending on what I chose.
I thought it came to me from above that if I refused to go through with it, hell was going to overrun the earth. Satan, demons, darkness, war, madness, and chaos would spread over the earth annihilating everything.
I was struck numb when I imagined this.
But then, it came to me that if I did go through with the act, not only would my co-worker be resurrected, but the miracle of his resurrection would be the story that led the world into faith in God. Faith in God would lead to global healing and world peace. And the Kingdom of God would come into being on earth.
The choice, then, was up to me. Hell… or the Kingdom of God.
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Even with all this before me, I still leaned towards not going through with the act. I’d never hurt anyone in my life, and I couldn’t think past having to stab someone in the heart.
I didn’t want to. I didn’t want to. I didn’t want to.
But then the vision of hell would trample through my mind. Every time I saw this hellish world, my refusal loosened up, and I found myself leaning more towards, reluctantly, going through with it.
I didn’t want to, but what if I didn’t? Could I live with knowing my refusal unleashed hell on earth? With everyone, and everything, being destroyed? I imagined I'd die too, but my death didn’t bother me. I worried about everything and everyone I loved—which was everything and everyone.
I saw no way out. I had to surrender. And, last, but probably the most important influence that led me to go through with it, was my faith in God.
Faith in God is good, vital even—but faith in something that you believe is from God, when it’s not, can be disastrous.
I believed that I was here to be the sacrifice for the sins of the world was a word from God. I believed that the consequences that were revealed to me about what would happen if I did or didn’t go through with it came from above. Ultimately, I believed God was in control—and I had faith that if I did go through with the act, then everything He showed me would come true.
Global healing. World peace. The Kingdom of God would come true.
In the end, I acted on behalf of what I thought was the greater good. I surrendered my fear. I surrendered my heart and mind. I surrendered my life. And I trusted that everything I had seen had come from God, and He would see everything through.
I trusted God—but it wasn’t God.
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I was wrong.
What Happened?
So where do we go from here? Even the police, after I was arrested and they saw the security footage of the fight between me and my-coworker, told me that it didn’t look like I wanted to do it due to the fact that my initial movement towards my co-worker with the knife was really slow.
It was clear to everyone murder wasn’t in my heart.
After being interrogated, everyone could see something else was going on.
So, how do we conclude what caused me to commit the crime?
In cases like mine, today, much of the world turns towards the mental health field to determine what happened. Thus, I’d receive a psychological evaluation.
The Mental Health Field and Its Diagnosis
The doctor's objective was clear. Determine whether or not I was mentally ill and if my crime was the product of a mental illness.
The psychologist asked his questions over two lengthy conversations and attempted to gather information about my past, what happened leading up to the crime, the crime itself, and how I was doing after.
I answered the psychologist's questions to the best of my abilities, not hiding anything, knowing I was there to share the truth. Knowing that as long as I shared the truth, even if I was diagnosed mentally ill, that the truth would come to light eventually.
The truth would set me free.
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Over time the doctor would determine that I was mentally ill, specifically, bipolar. My crime would be determined to be the product of a mental illness. My lawyers and I agreed that I would plead out “guilty except insane” (GEI). Instead of going to prison I was sent to Oregon State Hospital. And it’s now on my record that I am permanently mentally disabled.
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All of it. Everything I went through. Insane.
So what do I believe? Do I toss out my encounter with God as a figment of my imagination? Do I reduce my fight with Satan to a voice in my head? Do I renounce witnessing the Kingdom of God and the fact that God revealed to me that it is here, now, growing within all things as well as will one day burst free and push out all darkness and evil from the face of the earth?
Not at all. Not even close. Not even a smidge.
My Main Problems With the Mental Health Field
The way I see it, there are two major problems with the mental health field. The first problem has to do with the fact that the mental health field does not know what causes what it calls “mental illness”—which means that anything can be causing people to struggle mentally. And the second problem with the mental health field has to do with the fact that it’s restricted to a scientific worldview. A scientific worldview that, due to its limitations, must reject spiritual realities.
When you combine these two problems with the mental health field you get a worldview that is not only strictly scientific, but one that also ostracizes spiritual realities. Case in point—my case in point. The last psychiatrist I had that read my book, when I asked him what exactly was mental illness in my story, his response was, “All of it.”
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When you’re in my position—having encountered supernatural beings, witnessed abnormal things, encountered spiritual realities, and so forth—you expect these kinds of responses from the mental health field. It’s not a matter of what the doctor personally believes, either, for some may even believe in spiritual things. But the fact of the matter is that the mental health system has been set up in a way where even if a psychologist, personally, believes in supernatural realities, they must stand upon empirical evidence and the system to have a legal and legitimate practice.
Thus, there’s a wall. A wall between the mental health field and spiritual realities. Between the mental health system and the truth. A wall between the mental health field and what really happened with me.
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Here’s What I Think
How did I find myself believing that I was here to be the sacrifice for the sins of the world? I learned right away in the garden when the incident took place that it wasn’t from God. I also won’t rule out the devil having a voice in the incident, though I am not sure he was literally in the garden with me that day. Without a clear understanding of what happened, then, where do we go from here?
Whether the devil was in the garden with me that day, or I came to believe that I was the sacrifice all on my own, I think of it like this: I was mistaken.
It’s a simple answer. And it’s a simple truth. I was mistaken.
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And it was from believing in this mistake that I acted.
Belief.
For me, the problem came down to what I believed.
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How do we come to believe in something? That’s the question.
There were many things along my journey that influenced what I believed leading up to the incident. My encounter with God. Seeing a bonafide miracle. Receiving words from God through my mind. And so much more. All of these things shattered my previous somewhat agnostic worldview, and put me in a position where I had to come to believe in a new worldview—one where spiritual realities were true. As I attempted to find my footing, I became a mixture of true thoughts and false thoughts. All of which were mixing and mingling in my mind and forming a lens to view the world with.
I was trying to make sense of reality.
Eventually, when we combine everything that influences a person to come to believe in something (historically, educationally, spiritually, and the infinite other influences—an impossible feat), we find me standing in the garden, knife in hand, mistaken, and about to go through a horrific act.
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I, regrettably, attempted to go through with what I thought was for the greater good. I physically and probably emotionally wounded my friend. I scared my family. I damaged my friends' and the communities' trust in me. I was arrested. I spent over a year in county jail and a little over two years in the state hospital. And I was released back in 2020.
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All this happened because I believed in something that was untrue. I was mistaken.
My beliefs. Our beliefs. It all comes down to what we believe.
What Do You Believe?
What do you believe? I feel like it would be comforting for people to hear me say that I thought that I was mentally ill. If I was mentally ill then my crime would be the product of something that was wrong with me. I would be “broken” inside, and the crime I commit would have been caused by some kind of personal malfunction.
There’s comfort in the “mental illness” answer for two reasons. One, because there’s this idea that the problem has been solved. The problem is within me. And all we have to do is drug me to prevent the problem from happening again. And two, if you believe I am mentally ill then you can write off everything I experienced as insanity. No encounter with God, no miracle, no Satan, heaven, Kingdom of God, and none of the other experiences I went through. You can live as though these spiritual realities don’t exist.
It was all in my mind, see.
What do you believe? What we’re left with is this. Today, there is no known test, like a brain scan or a blood test, that can prove that I am mentally ill. There’s no test like this because there is no empirical evidence that there is anything wrong with me. In other words, if you tested and compared my body to anyone the world calls “sane,” you would find no difference between us.
Therefore, the difference between what I am saying and what the mental health field is saying comes down to this: belief.
The mental health field believes I am broken, in some way. They believe there is something physically wrong with me—most likely in my brain, they imagine. They believe that chemicals in the brain, genetics, trauma, societal factors, and other variables might sometimes cause people to “snap” and become so-called mentally ill. The mental health field believes in this.
But how do we know that what the mental health field believes is true?
I believe in a world where God is real, the Bible is the truth, and Jesus is God, Messiah, and King. I believe people are more than their physical bodies and we have a spiritual body as well. I believe the locus of the mind is in the spirit. I believe that the physical body influences the spiritual, and vice versa, and how this relationship operates is ultimately a mystery to me. I believe that there is more going on with people, especially in the mind, than reducing our thoughts down to physical and biological explanations. I believe that the incident in the garden happened because I was, simply, mistaken. I thought it was from God, I thought it was for the greater good, I thought things were going to be okay for everyone and the world. But my beliefs were mistaken.
I was wrong. I apologize, greatly. I was wrong.
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But does that mean I am broken?
What do you believe?
Conclusion
To close up, I hope what I have shared with you in this writing helps you understand a little better about what happened during the incident in the garden. I want to leave you with the understanding that even though the mental health field calls me mentally ill and they say that my crime was caused by mental illness—there is no empirical evidence that anything is wrong with me. They imagine that I am “broken” inside, but there is no proof.
This means that the mental health field not only might be wrong—about everything—but that I also might be right in saying that during the incident that I was, simply, mistaken. There are infinite things that influence a person to believe in something, all of which played a factor in why I came to believe that I was meant to be the sacrifice.
I was wrong. I was mistaken. But that doesn’t mean that I am broken.
Trust is built with transparency. I want you to know what I think. I don’t believe that I am mentally disabled. I don’t believe that I need to be drugged to maintain stability. I believe I have a sound mind. I believe I can live, without drugs, loving God and loving others in a healthy and harmonious life-giving way.
I hope you, thank God—whoever you are, will receive benefits from my words.
