The New SSS Blog

Touched - Chapter Two

Draft of September 3, 2026

The Light of God Evangelical Church was located in a plain, functional, metal building in the countryside southwest of Edmonton. Its tenets were conservative but its services were designed to appeal to younger adults, with modern Christian band music taking the place of the more traditional organ or piano and choir. It was Peter’s place of worship.

Peter had called the pastor soon after his experience, and set up an appointment to meet that afternoon.

The pastor, Clinton Stark, was a fit, athletic man in his early forties. In high school he’d been one of the best long-distance runners in Alberta, and he had maintained his love for running. His blonde hair, cut medium length, had just begun to thin, but his face had retained a boyish handsomeness. Keen, alert eyes, colored an unusual shade of light blue, were his most prominent feature.

Peter arrived at the church at two in the afternoon, and Pastor Stark showed him into the office. The office was modern and comfortable. Hundreds of books lined three of the four walls, and their smell pervaded the room. Peter sat in a comfortable leather chair while Pastor Stark sat in a more modern office chair behind his desk.

“So, Peter, what brings you here this afternoon?”

Peter knew his experience would be difficult to explain. He’d thought carefully throughout the morning about the best way to describe it. In the end he’d decided on the simplest plan – a straightforward telling of what he’d perceived.

It needed a prologue, though. An introduction. Otherwise, Peter was worried that he’d sound kooky, or be disbelieved, or taken for someone seeking attention.

So Peter began by describing his upbringing, his family background, his long commitment to the church, his job as a woodworker, and his longstanding practice of morning meditation and prayer. When he was finished with this, he read the expression on Pastor Stark’s face: ‘And?’

“This morning during my meditation something extraordinary happened, unlike anything I have ever experienced,” Peter began. “I want to describe it to you, but before I do you need to understand that I am being one-hundred percent accurate and honest. As odd as what I’m going to tell you may seem, it happened, just the way I’m going to tell you it happened.”

Pastor Stark listened as Peter described his experience, slowly and in detail.

When he finished, Peter said, “I’ve meditated for many years, and I have in the past found myself in states where strange thoughts and sensations arise. But I’ve always known that they came from being in meditation. What happened this morning was completely different.”

“How so?” Pastor Stark asked.

“Even when I’m in deep meditation, or deep prayer, I know on some level that I’ve created that state, that I’m in control of it. This morning, I wasn’t in control. I didn’t cause what happened to me, it came ....”

“Yes, go on.”

“It came from outside me. Something took control of me. Something was inside me, searching, rummaging through me. For that time, there was no me. At least there was no conscious me. Yet I wasn’t unconscious, I remember how it was.”

Peter paused.

“Then at the end,” he continued, “I was given absolute bliss, felt a oneness with the world, a joy I couldn’t have conceived of. It came from something or someone able to take over my mind and my body, completely.”

“And what do you think it was?” Pastor Stark asked the question gently.

“I’m not crazy, Pastor, I’m not, but … I think it was God. I think I was touched by God. He examined me, all of me, all my soul, from the basest parts out to the most advanced, and then he showed me a small bit of the ecstasy and rapture of his heaven.”

This was not the first time Pastor Stark had spoken to a congregant who believed they had been visited by God, not just in a spiritual, metaphysical sense, but in reality. It put pastors in an uncomfortable position. Pastors wanted their congregants to feel the love and power of God within themselves. They wanted the word of the Lord to touch them. But Pastor Stark knew from experience that the handful that believed as a real, tangible fact that God had spoken to them were typically troubled souls, often with mental health conditions.

He hoped that wasn’t the case for Peter Ladouceur. He didn’t know Peter well, but nothing in what he did know about Peter suggested such instability. Peter’s recitation of his experience was unlike any Pastor Stark had ever heard, so matter-of-fact and descriptive. It seemed to Pastor Stark that Peter had come to him in part because the experience had shaken and frightened Peter. Peter wasn’t here to announce himself as God’s new agent on Earth; Peter was here because he needed guidance on handling an experience that troubled him.

“How do you feel about it?” Pastor Stark asked.

“I don’t understand why this happened to me. I’m no one special. Why would God choose me over all the other people in the world? What am I supposed to do now? Do I have some duty to reveal it to the world? Revealing things about myself is not something I like to do. Maybe God picked the wrong person.”

Pastor Stark knew that the chances that God had overtaken Peter’s body were infinitesimally small. Not zero, but not likely. He had many of the same questions as Peter. Why someone in my congregation? Why someone so soft-spoken and reserved? Pastor Stark had no idea what to tell Peter, yet he knew he must tell Peter something.

“Peter, I’m in an on-line group of pastors in Alberta. With your permission, I’d like to share your experience with them – not using your name, of course. I’ve never had a congregant come to me with a recitation so detailed, so real. I’d like to hear if any other pastors have heard of anything similar. It would help both of us to understand how to move forward … how God would want us to move forward.”

“That’s OK with me. If someone else has experienced this, I’d like to know.”

Me too, thought Pastor Stark.

“In the meantime,” Pastor Stark continued, “know that everything that happens is a part of God’s plan. Your experience is part of that plan. So rest easy in that comfort. What happened to you was meant to happen.”

“Thank you, pastor,” Peter said. “I believe that, too.”

They shook hands. “If you leave me your number, I will call in a few days to touch base.”

Peter gave Pastor Stark his number. “I appreciate that, Pastor. Thanks again for seeing me.”

“I’m always here for you. Go in peace with God.”

Peter stood and left Pastor Stark’s office. Pastor Stark turned to his computer and logged into his Alberta pastors group. In a new message, Pastor Stark recounted what Peter had told him in as much detail as he could recall, and asked two questions – had others had congregants tell them of experiences like this, and did any of them have advice as to what to say to Peter.

When Pastor Stark hit the “send” icon, his message became the first recorded instance of a phenomenon that would shake the world.