Friday was my last day in Thailand and Bill and Susie took me to see some of the sights in Chiang Rai. The first place we went is the City Navel Pillar. Google the name and read the brief description from Wikipedia. (my blogs are long enough). The site was interesting and contained some history, which I love. It was also sad. It was sad because it showed the efforts of human beings desperately trying to get to God all the while oblivious to the reality that God already came to man. People have placed colorful ribbons on all of the pillars. They buy flowers to lay before the gods. The spirits are supposedly drawn to color and aroma so these people bring items in an attempt to draw spirits and receive blessing. Around this pillar are various vendors selling items that people can purchase and leave on the altar for the gods to keep.
As we walked to the other side of the hill and viewed some other temples, we saw some statues and dragons and such. As I looked at some of the faces on these statues, I said: "they look demonic". Bill replied: "they ARE demonic".
I felt sad and angry at the same time. As I walked around these objects, I remembered something Matt Geppert said to me as I made a pitiful attempt to walk around Angkor Wat in Cambodia. As I was getting discouraged because I was physically unable to walk through the whole structure, Matt encouraged me by saying: "Raquel, you brought the presence of the Lord to Angkor Wat. The Ark is parked". He was referring to the Ark of the Covenant. When a person is saved and has the Spirit of God in them, they bring the Spirit of God wherever they go. The group of us were not just sight seeing. We prayer walked and brought the presence of God to that place.
Apparently, that was just an appetizer. I could never have imagined what I would see at our next stop.
After stopping for the imperative iced coffee, they took me to a place called The White Temple. When you drive near the place, it looks spectacular. It's huge. As the name would imply its sparkling white - all of it. It looks like something from a children's fairy tale - you expect a queen or princess to come out in regal attire.
It is a temple and also a tourist attraction and there were a ton of people there. When you first walk in it still looks pretty. The grounds are impeccably kept and the setting is park like. They had two white arches over two walkways and I noticed a ton of shiny silver things hanging off the ceiling. I found out that each silver ornament was purchased by someone and a prayer request was written on it and hung on the lattice. There must have been tens of thousands of them. Shiny silver ornaments hanging off bright while structures. As we walked further, we noticed more and more of these. We witnessed people buying new ones and putting their prayer requests on a tree and praying to the gods.
All of this was surrounding the main temple. We had yet to go near the main temple and you had to pay to do so. After paying for the admission ticket and walking in the main section, we had to take off our shoes to continue the journey.
We walked in and got in line to enter the temple and that's when I saw the reality of the place. Surrounding the temple were the most gruesome, ugliest, horrific sculptures I have ever seen. Skulls, demons of every kind, monster looking heads. At the gate leading up to the temple were two huge creatures, one with a sword in his hand and his finger pointing at the folks entering. There were twisted tree limbs that had tormented faces carved into them. The worst part for me was the hands. They had thousands of hands reaching up from the ground - representing tortured souls trying desperately to escape eternal hell. Everything I saw had been painted white, yet it was the darkness thing I have ever experienced.
I was overwhelmed with the evil around me. I literally felt like I was standing at the gates of hell. I probably was. Inside the inner temple there was a statue of a buddha and people were kneeling and burning incense. I didn't look too long. On the walls of the inner temple, they had more gruesome paintings. The one which stood out to me was a picture of the burning towers of the World Trade Center and a demon was coming out of the black smoke from the fire. Accurate depiction.
As my eyes took in all this evil, there was only one thing I could say. I just kept saying the Name that is above every name - Jesus. It was the only thing I could say that could overcome what my eyes were seeing. I then remembered the story that Amy Smith shared with the church about why she wrote the song "Matchless". She had been in a temple in Thailand and was overcome by the darkness she experienced. She began to call the name of Jesus and through that experience she wrote that song.
I was glad I had something to sing. For the rest of my time in that place, which was not long, I just kept singing "matchless is the Name that covers me..."
As we left, I told Bill and Susie that the day before when they took me to that restaurant with such a spectacular view of the mountains, I felt like they took me to heaven... and today, they took me to hell.
But I was glad they took me and you should be glad I am telling you about it. Why? Because it is real. Our enemy is real. The enemy wants to keep as many people as he possibly can from having a relationship with Jesus and being saved and eternally secure. One of the main ways he accomplishes his goal is through deception. He deceives people with religion. He deceives folks by making evil look like its beautiful. He deceives people by causing them to believe if they just do a few spiritual acts... burn incense, go to church, tithe, sing, kneel.... if they just do enough good things then they are fine. Tragically, the people who buy the lie become one of the thousands of hands reaching up from the fires of hell longing to be rescued from the torture.
I will not post the pictures on this blog site, but I wish everyone could see what I saw, especially the sea of hands. It might just be the wake up call we need.
Visiting the White Temple in Chiang Rai, Thailand gave me the tools to be a more equipped prayer warrior. I will be praying for all those within the grip of the enemy. I will be praying that their eyes will be opened and they will see beyond the white wash to what is real. The Bible says that Lucifer was the most beautiful angel. The Bible tells us that he masquerades as the angel of light. So it's no surprise that the enemy would take what is evil and paint it white and cause it to look amazingly brilliant from a distance. As the church, it is our job to expose him. It is our job to let the truth shine forth and dispel the darkness.
Just as we were called out of darkness and into His marvelous Light, so we must also call people out of darkness with prayer. Let's get serious about this so that there may be less hands looking to be lifted out of hell and more hands raised to Jesus in worship.
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