So, I've started trying to go to a local church?

[Neogaia777]

I started last Sunday, and went again this morning, and something happened?

A guy came in during the middle of the service, and sat in front of me, etc. He wasn't the kind church people would normally probably want or expect, etc, but that also seems to be my kind of specialty sometimes also, etc.

So when there was a short pause in the service, I said hi to him, and asked him his name real quick, and shook his hand, etc, before going to pay back attention to the service again, since it was only a short pause, etc. He was not very clean or anything, so my first thought is that he just came in from off the street. He also was able to try and tell me something about him staying at the local mission sometimes real quick, and I was able to tell him real quick that I had stayed and the mission in the past also, but we both had to go back to paying attention to the service, etc, and I noticed he had trouble just sitting, or staying still, so my first thought was drugs, or maybe some kind of being uncomfortable, or maybe having anxiety/restlessness issues also, etc, problems which I sometimes have also, not the drugs issue anymore, but "everything else", etc.

After the service, he got up to leave, and I had to get up quickly to follow him, etc. I have to walk to church, as I don't have a car, or driver's license, and so I went out of church quickly enough to catch up with him, and asked him if he would walk with me for a bit, and he agreed, etc.

I found out he was homeless, and was staying sometimes at the mission, and sometimes on the street, or in a tent that we sometimes call "tent city" around here also, which is place that a lot of homeless stay around here, and is an area that I am familiar with, etc.

So, I had him walk with me, and he told me he was trying to get off drugs and get clean, etc, and that he had an appointment at a rehab center soon, etc. Now, I've kind of been there already, or was in his shoes in the past already, and so I was able to tell him about that, and some of my testimony, etc, my problem was Marijuana though, but it got me into a lot of trouble in the past before it became legal here in my state, etc. Anyway, I had him walk with me to where I knew there was a picnic table, and sat down and talked with him about these things, and was able to also encourage him to get clean, and a little bit about some suggestions about how to get off the street, etc, and he thanked me for it, and I think was very, very grateful for it also, etc. Also told him that I bike around town a lot or quite a bit, and that if he saw me, he had my permission to stop me if he wanted to for a bit, and also told him that I would be trying to go to this church every Sunday if I could now, and that he could see or meet me there if he ever wanted to come back as well, etc.

Anyway, finally the last part about it that I wanted to get to here, etc. I suspected that this meeting was one of those kinds of things that was meant to happen, or that had already been predestined from before the beginning of time (by God) already, as I experience these kinds of things a lot, to the point to where it's kind of obvious to me when it's happening by now, etc, but that's not the strange thing or strange part that happens to or with me sometimes, etc.

But the strange part about is, is how afterwards, or sometimes even during sometimes, I will get a feeling, or a flash/picture of having seen myself doing this before, etc, and most of the time I am 100% aware that I have seen it before, and there is zero doubt about that, etc, and I am also 100% certain that it was in a dream that I had had before, etc, and that's the strange part about it, etc. The predestinating thing/part is not really that strange to me anymore, but getting a revelation that I had already seen it or already been through it before, but it was in a dream that I had had before, still is sometimes, etc. It feels very, very much like deja-vu, only I'm certain of it, and am not ever "not certain of it" ever, etc, and I am always certain that I had seen it in a dream, or had dreamt it before, etc, and that's still strange to me, but happens quite to me quite a bit sometimes, etc.

Anyway, just wanted to share this, and wasn't sure where to put it, etc.

If you have any comments about this, then feel free to leave one, etc.

God Bless.

 

[Neogaia777]

I started last Sunday, and went again this morning, and something happened?

A guy came in during the middle of the service, and sat in front of me, etc. He wasn't the kind church people would normally probably want or expect, etc, but that also seems to be my kind of specialty sometimes also, etc.

So when there was a short pause in the service, I said hi to him, and asked him his name real quick, and shook his hand, etc, before going to pay back attention to the service again, since it was only a short pause, etc. He was not very clean or anything, so my first thought is that he just came in from off the street. He also was able to try and tell me something about him staying at the local mission sometimes real quick, and I was able to tell him real quick that I had stayed and the mission in the past also, but we both had to go back to paying attention to the service, etc, and I noticed he had trouble just sitting, or staying still, so my first thought was drugs, or maybe some kind of being uncomfortable, or maybe having anxiety/restlessness issues also, etc, problems which I sometimes have also, not the drugs issue anymore, but "everything else", etc.

After the service, he got up to leave, and I had to get up quickly to follow him, etc. I have to walk to church, as I don't have a car, or driver's license, and so I went out of church quickly enough to catch up with him, and asked him if he would walk with me for a bit, and he agreed, etc.

I found out he was homeless, and was staying sometimes at the mission, and sometimes on the street, or in a tent that we sometimes call "tent city" around here also, which is place that a lot of homeless stay around here, and is an area that I am familiar with, etc.

So, I had him walk with me, and he told me he was trying to get off drugs and get clean, etc, and that he had an appointment at a rehab center soon, etc. Now, I've kind of been there already, or was in his shoes in the past already, and so I was able to tell him about that, and some of my testimony, etc, my problem was Marijuana though, but it got me into a lot of trouble in the past before it became legal here in my state, etc. Anyway, I had him walk with me to where I knew there was a picnic table, and sat down and talked with him about these things, and was able to also encourage him to get clean, and a little bit about some suggestions about how to get off the street, etc, and he thanked me for it, and I think was very, very grateful for it also, etc. Also told him that I bike around town a lot or quite a bit, and that if he saw me, he had my permission to stop me if he wanted to for a bit, and also told him that I would be trying to go to this church every Sunday if I could now, and that he could see or meet me there if he ever wanted to come back as well, etc.

Anyway, finally the last part about it that I wanted to get to here, etc. I suspected that this meeting was one of those kinds of things that was meant to happen, or that had already been predestined from before the beginning of time (by God) already, as I experience these kinds of things a lot, to the point to where it's kind of obvious to me when it's happening by now, etc, but that's not the strange thing or strange part that happens to or with me sometimes, etc.

But the strange part about is, is how afterwards, or sometimes even during sometimes, I will get a feeling, or a flash/picture of having seen myself doing this before, etc, and most of the time I am 100% aware that I have seen it before, and there is zero doubt about that, etc, and I am also 100% certain that it was in a dream that I had had before, etc, and that's the strange part about it, etc. The predestinating thing/part is not really that strange to me anymore, but getting a revelation that I had already seen it or already been through it before, but it was in a dream that I had had before, still is sometimes, etc. It feels very, very much like deja-vu, only I'm certain of it, and am not ever "not certain of it" ever, etc, and I am always certain that I had seen it in a dream, or had dreamt it before, etc, and that's still strange to me, but happens quite to me quite a bit sometimes, etc.

Anyway, just wanted to share this, and wasn't sure where to put it, etc.

If you have any comments about this, then feel free to leave one, etc.

God Bless.

The picture that I saw afterwards was of both me and him being at that same exact picnic table, in that same exact time/place having the exact same conversation that we had, or were just having, etc. And it was a lot like an actual memory, or actually was an actual memory, or happens in the very same exact kind of way that a memory is recalled, etc, except it was in a dream that I had had before that previously, or prior to that, etc, and I'm 100% certain/aware of it/that always when it happens, and there is absolutely zero doubt about that, etc. Not much you can really do about it afterwards, or after that though. Other than just noting it or taking a mental note of it as being interesting, etc, and just moving on after that though, etc. Until the next time it happens again anyway, etc.

God Bless.

 

[Neogaia777]

The picture that I saw afterwards was of both me and him being at that same exact picnic table, in that same exact time/place having the exact same conversation that we had, or were just having, etc. And it was a lot like an actual memory, or actually was an actual memory, or happens in the very same exact kind of way that a memory is recalled, etc, except it was in a dream that I had had before that previously, or prior to that, etc, and I'm 100% certain/aware of it/that always when it happens, and there is absolutely zero doubt about that, etc. Not much you can really do about it afterwards, or after that though. Other than just noting it or taking a mental note of it as being interesting, etc, and just moving on after that though, etc. Until the next time it happens again anyway, etc.

God Bless.

It never happens before, etc, except for in the dream, etc. But even if you could recall it before, how would your mind be able to pick it out or recognize it as being from before, when it hasn't actually happened yet, etc? That's why I think it always happens after, etc. The recollection of it, etc.

It's strange, etc. But also like I said, there's not much you can usually ever do about it ever, etc, other than just trying to make or take a mental note of it, etc, but which most of the time is forgotten after that anyway, until it happens again, etc.

God Bless.

 

[Unqualified]

Maybe Jesus did that to you. Kind of like a calling I’ve done it before. Good for you! Jesus is for the homeless too. I’m like the homeless representative a t my church, though never been. Just making them comfortable and stay for the whole service. Some just want order and no loose ends. He wants a better life for stragglers.

 

[RandyPNW]

If you have any comments about this, then feel free to leave one, etc.

God Bless.

Deja Vu experiences are common, and result, I think, from a defective brain cell, or something like that. The illusion is created that something never experienced before did happen before. It does seem very certain that it did happen, but it's just a defect in your brain's operation.

At the same time, everything we do in the Lord has a sense of destiny to it for the simple reason that God did predestine us to be created and to experience Him. So the things we do have form a kind of "Intelligent Design" to it, and do not seem surprising in light of God's control in our lives and the purpose it appears to show.

I don't think everything is pre-planned, or there wouldn't be free will. God is, I think, big enough to manage an open system without ever being surprised. He knows every possibility and will navigate every choice to conform to His ultimate plan. We can be cooperative or we can be a problem. If we are cooperative we will have obtained virtue, since we are truly choosing to do good.

 

[Neogaia777]

Deja Vu experiences are common, and result, I think, from a defective brain cell, or something like that. The illusion is created that something never experienced before did happen before. It does seem very certain that it did happen, but it's just a defect in your brain's operation.

At the same time, everything we do in the Lord has a sense of destiny to it for the simple reason that God did predestine us to be created and to experience Him. So the things we do have form a kind of "Intelligent Design" to it, and do not seem surprising in light of God's control in our lives and the purpose it appears to show.

I don't think everything is pre-planned, or there wouldn't be free will. God is, I think, big enough to manage an open system without ever being surprised. He knows every possibility and will navigate every choice to conform to His ultimate plan. We can be cooperative or we can be a problem. If we are cooperative we will have obtained virtue, since we are truly choosing to do good.

You're not listening.

So I'm just going to give you a "friendly" for now.

God Bless.

 

[Neogaia777]

Bump.

 

[Grip Docility]

You're not listening.

So I'm just going to give you a "friendly" for now.

God Bless.

I believe in Angels, I believe in Jesus, I believe in Life after Death, I believe sentient evil exists! I believe in the Father, Son and Holy Spirit…

I believe in Heaven, I believe in Sheol…

And…… I believe that Jesus Christ has prepared you as His Gospel Workman… and that special moment was guided by Him. He prepared you to be there for that special soul.

All Love to you in our Amazing Lord God, Jesus Christ!

 

[bbbbbbb]

Deja Vu experiences are common, and result, I think, from a defective brain cell, or something like that. The illusion is created that something never experienced before did happen before. It does seem very certain that it did happen, but it's just a defect in your brain's operation.

At the same time, everything we do in the Lord has a sense of destiny to it for the simple reason that God did predestine us to be created and to experience Him. So the things we do have form a kind of "Intelligent Design" to it, and do not seem surprising in light of God's control in our lives and the purpose it appears to show.

I don't think everything is pre-planned, or there wouldn't be free will. God is, I think, big enough to manage an open system without ever being surprised. He knows every possibility and will navigate every choice to conform to His ultimate plan. We can be cooperative or we can be a problem. If we are cooperative we will have obtained virtue, since we are truly choosing to do good.

I am quite convinced that prophetic events do occur on a personal, human level. As an example, I had a recurring dream for many months, or perhaps well over a year. The details were quite explicit and centered on my walking along a street in an unfamiliar city, turning the corner and finding myself on a street with a roof over it from buildings on both sides of the street. I thought it was just a weird product of my imagination because there are no such roofed-over streets, or, at least, I had never encountered any. One day I found myself in China in a city in inland China with a Chinese translator. We had eaten supper and were walking along a typical street. We turned the corner and there was the exact same covered street I had been seeing in my dream for months. I literally pinched myself to see if I was just having the dream once again, but I was quite awake and it was not a dream. Since then I have never had that dream again, although I have experience other recurring dreams which come to pass exactly as they were in my dreams.

 

[RandyPNW]

I am quite convinced that prophetic events do occur on a personal, human level. As an example, I had a recurring dream for many months, or perhaps well over a year. The details were quite explicit and centered on my walking along a street in an unfamiliar city, turning the corner and finding myself on a street with a roof over it from buildings on both sides of the street. I thought it was just a weird product of my imagination because there are no such roofed-over streets, or, at least, I had never encountered any. One day I found myself in China in a city in inland China with a Chinese translator. We had eaten supper and were walking along a typical street. We turned the corner and there was the exact same covered street I had been seeing in my dream for months. I literally pinched myself to see if I was just having the dream once again, but I was quite awake and it was not a dream. Since then I have never had that dream again, although I have experience other recurring dreams which come to pass exactly as they were in my dreams.

Yes, things like that have happened with prophetic implications. But sometimes things like that happen just as a way of God saying, "Hello."

For example, God blesses me with giving me a particular sign pretty regularly. It's just His way of letting me know He's there and watching. I love that!!

I can't really say what the significance was in your particular situation. But it seems pretty clear that God did it for some reason?

 

[bbbbbbb]

Yes, things like that have happened with prophetic implications. But sometimes things like that happen just as a way of God saying, "Hello."

For example, God blesses me with giving me a particular sign pretty regularly. It's just His way of letting me know He's there and watching. I love that!!

I can't really say what the significance was in your particular situation. But it seems pretty clear that God did it for some reason?

Thanks. I agree. I have stopped attempting to look for a specific meaning, but take it for what it is - God's way of saying hello.

 

[Reasonably Sane]

Deja Vu experiences are common, and result, I think, from a defective brain cell, or something like that. The illusion is created that something never experienced before did happen before. It does seem very certain that it did happen, but it's just a defect in your brain's operation.

At the same time, everything we do in the Lord has a sense of destiny to it for the simple reason that God did predestine us to be created and to experience Him. So the things we do have form a kind of "Intelligent Design" to it, and do not seem surprising in light of God's control in our lives and the purpose it appears to show.

I don't think everything is pre-planned, or there wouldn't be free will. God is, I think, big enough to manage an open system without ever being surprised. He knows every possibility and will navigate every choice to conform to His ultimate plan. We can be cooperative or we can be a problem. If we are cooperative we will have obtained virtue, since we are truly choosing to do good.

Though I agree with much of your premise, I'll clarify where I "may" differ by using the dream example: I believe most dreams are merely my brain's hard drive "defragging", but I believe visions are real.

So deja Vu events "may" be as you describe them sometimes, and sometimes they may be more. And really, only the person experiencing them can tell the difference.

 

[bbbbbbb]

Though I agree with much of your premise, I'll clarify where I "may" differ by using the dream example: I believe most dreams are merely my brain's hard drive "defragging", but I believe visions are real.

So deja Vu events "may" be as you describe them sometimes, and sometimes they may be more. And really, only the person experiencing them can tell the difference.

I agree that most dreams can be the brain's hard drive "defragging" but I also have difficulty in understanding how it is that I can have regular dreams of a very specific nature such that I can easily recall their precise content, even though that content makes no sense to me at the time, and then to have the specific aspects of that dream play out in reality in my life.

 

[Neogaia777]

I talked with a friend of mine about this, and he told me about some dreams/experiences he's had, and in one that he told me was, well, a while ago now at this point, when he was a lot younger, etc, and he and some friends were riding ATV's on some friends property, and right before one of his friends went by him on an ATV and turned real hard, he, in that moment had a vision that afterward he knew he had seen in a dream, of him grabbing his friends handlebars as he went past him, but that he didn't grab in that moment, and as his friend went past him, and turned real sharp, his friend wrecked, and hit his head hard on a rock, but he was wearing a helmet, and it cracked the helmet, and knocked his friend out, so they took him to the ER when he came to to get checked out, and he had a mild concussion, but the Doctor said he would be dead and would have died if he didn't have that helmet on, but my friend saw a vision of him grabbing the handlebars that he recalled in that moment that afterward he knew he had saw in a dream, but that he never forgot after that, because he always wondered what might have happened had he grabbed the ATV in those moments, etc. Luckily his friend had a helmet on though. But if he hadn't, he would have died, and my friend thought that if he would have acted in that moment based on what he saw in that moment, if things would have turned out differently, etc. He never forgot it because he could have, potentially at least, maybe saved his friends life, if his friend didn't have that helmet on, etc.

I wonder if God will show us some things like this sometimes maybe, etc?

Where a life could maybe be potentially at stake maybe, depending on how we choose to maybe act or not act sometimes maybe based on what we can see sometimes in moment maybe, etc?

Kinda scary in that case if you ask me.

God Bless.

 

[RandyPNW]

God even gives "visions" of a sort to children. 2 major impressions that have stuck with me lifelong. These were way back in the late 50s or early 60s.

1) My brother and I were church kids, and we were playing with a pagan kid in the basement of our parents' friends house. Then I caught a vision of spiritual compromise in my brother, playing with this pagan kid, and I walked to the stop of the stairway in disgust and shouted down to them, "God and Jesus are coming, and there's going to be a whole new world!"

2) I was perhaps in 3rd grade elementary school and was playing with the pagan children on the field during recess. My side was much stronger than the side we were opposing. The game was, both sides would charge each other and take captives until the largest army won.

Well, my side, being stronger, began to take all of the captives, but to my consternation all of the children on our side, taken captive, kept defecting to the losing side. At that moment, it's like God revealed to me--the pagan world chooses to go the wrong way, to the losing side. Accept that reality in your life.

Now these are simple "visions" or visual lessons. What matters is what God is *saying to you on the inside,* and not on the fact it is a vision or makes you a visionary or prophet. It is what the word of God is saying to you that matters, and is the only thing that determines its spiritual value or not.

But I agree--I love the strange, miraculous way God sometimes operates. These are not "coincidences"--they are divine "acts of providence" to show us He is there and with us. And it is difficult to compare with one another because God has made us each unique.

 

[The Liturgist]

I agree that most dreams can be the brain's hard drive "defragging" but I also have difficulty in understanding how it is that I can have regular dreams of a very specific nature such that I can easily recall their precise content, even though that content makes no sense to me at the time, and then to have the specific aspects of that dream play out in reality in my life.

Note that most filesystems do not have significant problems with fragmentation. The major high performance Linux and UNIX filesystems like ext4, ufs (ffs2 with soft updates), wapbl, XFS, JFS, JFS2, ZFS, btrfs, etc) do not usually even come with a defragmentation utility. Fragmentation is specifically a problem with the FAT filesystem, which lacks journaling; many journaling filesystems rearrange and reorganize their on disk data structures while running to optimize performance. And ZFS uses compression, snapshots and copy on write, and btrfs also uses copy on write, and these make the idea of fragmentation as a concept inapplicable, since the filesystem is mainly storing differential data between versions of the file, optimized via high speed real time compression to improve performance, so large areas of 1s and 0s are reduced to small areas, and the result is that the filesystem would actually perform worse if left in an unfragmented state.

 

[bbbbbbb]

Note that most filesystems do not have significant problems with fragmentation. The major high performance Linux and UNIX filesystems like ext4, ufs (ffs2 with soft updates), wapbl, XFS, JFS, JFS2, ZFS, btrfs, etc) do not usually even come with a defragmentation utility. Fragmentation is specifically a problem with the FAT filesystem, which lacks journaling; many journaling filesystems rearrange and reorganize their on disk data structures while running to optimize performance. And ZFS uses compression, snapshots and copy on write, and btrfs also uses copy on write, and these make the idea of fragmentation as a concept inapplicable, since the filesystem is mainly storing differential data between versions of the file, optimized via high speed real time compression to improve performance, so large areas of 1s and 0s are reduced to small areas, and the result is that the filesystem would actually perform worse if left in an unfragmented state.

Thank you for the helpful information. Being relatively ignorant of computer science, I find this helpful.

 

[The Liturgist]

Thank you for the helpful information. Being relatively ignorant of computer science, I find this helpful.

I also doubt our brain gets fragmented, as a neural network, but there is a view that it uses the time we are asleep to consolidate information; alas we don’t have a really good understanding even of how man-made neural networks such as Chat GPT work, let alone the human brain. But one thing we do know is that it does not follow the von Neumann architecture, in which the processors are separate from the memory, rather, each neuron both processes and stores information, so its more analogous in that respect to the networked architecture of a compute cluster, where each node (in a cluster, these are individual computers, whereas in the brain, these are neurons) has local memory, and operates on that memory directly, rather than a system like on a desktop computer or smarthphone or tablet or server, where you have a central array of RAM (random access memory) which is connected to one or more processors (or cores on a processor) with an interconnect (on the iPad and iPhone, the memory, CPU and long term storage is on a single chip, and the interconnect is integrated into that, which improves performance by reducing the distance the data must travel, but it is still separate), so if a processor, whether a discrete CPU on a gaming computer or high end server, or a compute core on an Apple M1 system on a chip, needs to retrieve information from memory, it has to send a request across the interconnect to the address of the memory which contains the information (these addresses are analogous to phone numbers; you might think of the CPU as dialing up a phone number to retrieve information from the person on that end, or alternately to tell the person on the other end to remember information, which would overwrite whatever they had been remembering previously), and wait for a reply, and this takes time. Modern processors do things to speed up this process and avoid wasting time waiting for information to be returned to them (various tricks where the processor will try to predict based on the program it is executing, in advance, which memory it will be accessing, and then retrieve that information and store it in its local cache in advance, although ironically some of these tricks were the basis for the infamous Meltdown and Spectre vulnerabilities).

 

[RandyPNW]

Note that most filesystems do not have significant problems with fragmentation. The major high performance Linux and UNIX filesystems like ext4, ufs (ffs2 with soft updates), wapbl, XFS, JFS, JFS2, ZFS, btrfs, etc) do not usually even come with a defragmentation utility. Fragmentation is specifically a problem with the FAT filesystem, which lacks journaling; many journaling filesystems rearrange and reorganize their on disk data structures while running to optimize performance. And ZFS uses compression, snapshots and copy on write, and btrfs also uses copy on write, and these make the idea of fragmentation as a concept inapplicable, since the filesystem is mainly storing differential data between versions of the file, optimized via high speed real time compression to improve performance, so large areas of 1s and 0s are reduced to small areas, and the result is that the filesystem would actually perform worse if left in an unfragmented state.