06/23/2024
SEVEN-YEAR-OLD MELANIE’S
NEAR DEATH EXPERIENCE
“SUPERNATURAL JUSTICE”
Seven-year-old Melanie loved being in her babysitter’s home, just down the street from her house in Calgary, Alberta.
When her babysitter’s family moved, Melanie felt terribly sad, since she loved the family like her own. Losing her babysitter left Melanie lonely —and vulnerable.
After she noticed activity going on over at the babysitter’s former house, precocious little Melanie marched right over and knocked on the door. When a man named Rodger (not his real name) opened the door, she said, “Hi, I’m Melanie. What’s your name?”
Rodger invited her in and explained he had just moved from New Zealand.
Melanie recalls, “I continued to visit Rodger and the men who lived with him. Rodger gave me lots of attention. He was fun, and he wrestled and tickled me, and I really liked him. I trusted him.”
Innocent seven-year-old Melanie could not have known this taxi driver from New Zealand was actually a pe*****le, grooming her.
“One day I remember he made me toast with jam, and he made a great deal of it. I remember he said you had to put the jam right to the edges.”
“The jam must have been drugged, because the next thing I remember, I was up in his room with another man. I was wearing a pretty dress. I remember saying, “Oh, this dress is so pretty. Can I take it home to show my parents?”
“No!” they both exclaimed emphatically. It was a negligee, but I didn’t know that. They were both kneeling in front of me.”
The abuse that followed was a horror that brought Melanie to the edge of death. Mercifully, God took her out of her body and comforted her.
“What I remember was being up above in the dark,” Melanie recalls, “looking down at two men discussing whether I would live or die.”
As Melanie’s spirit floated up above the scene, she suddenly realized Jesus was standing beside her.
“I really knew nothing about Jesus except what my babysitter told me. My parents had not taken me to church. But I intuitively knew exactly who this was: This was Jesus, and in His presence, I felt safe and loved. I had been scared in the dark, hearing the men talk about whether I should live or die, but now with Jesus I felt safe.”
“He said to me, “Don’t worry. You’re going to be okay.” And it felt like He infused me with a peace or protection of His love, because I went right back to being that happy little girl.”
“Sadly, what happened is I was brutally r***d. Before I left, Rodger told me, “If you say anything to your mommy or daddy about today, your daddy is going to kill me, and then he will go to jail, and you’ll never see your daddy again.” I never told my dad.”
Several days after this horrific event, a friend invited Melanie to her church. In Sunday school, they explained that Jesus came and died in order to forgive us all and guide us through life.
“If any of you want to let Jesus in your heart, raise your hand,” the teacher said. Melanie jumped up, hand in the air. Jesus was wonderful —she knew Him —the one who loved her most; of course she wanted Him in her life.
A nice couple started taking Melanie to church with them for the next seven years.
During that time, Melanie heard a verse that struck her, and she memorized it, “Even though I walk through the valley of the shadow of death, I will fear no evil, for you are with me.” Psalm 23:4
When she got older, she tried to press charges to protect other children, but international law did not allow it. God had protected her mind and soul as a child, but the trauma had to be dealt with as Melanie became a young adult.
“I battled sexual compulsions constantly growing up, but I didn’t know why. It started the day of the r**e, along with horrible thoughts that would invade my mind.”
“I was in therapy in my twenties, and I had been praying for God to heal me, when one night I had a vivid dream. God spoke to me in the dream.”
“Jesus said, “Come with me.” First, He brought me into the house where the abuse happened. As we were passing in the hallway, there was a man in a chair with drug paraphernalia on the armchair, and he was high.”
“Looking forward on my left was the entrance to a bedroom, and there was a bright light shining out of it. Jesus said, “Yes, you were hurt in there, but you will never remember! I covered you.”
“Then in the vivid dream, God showed me that in the spiritual realm, the men who r***d me were being held hostage by a powerful demon and just as much victims of evil as I had been, and he wanted all of us set free.”
After years of spiritual growth, professional therapy, and healing, Melanie finally felt free.
Decades after the incident, she came across Rodger’s email. Although reaching out to an abuser can be dangerous and is not advisable without counsel from a professional, Melanie wanted justice. She wanted God’s justice —that Rodger would be set free of the evil that harmed her as a child.
“I told him how Jesus had died to pay for our sins —to forgive us all for our wrongs. I told Rodger that Jesus loves him, and that He will heal Rodger and set him free, just like he had done for me.”
“A few years later, Rodger [emailed and] thanked me and told me he had accepted Christ as his Savior and was now following Jesus. He asked me if I would I forgive him for hurting me. I said, “Of course.” (WOW)
Melanie’s forgiveness offered to her perpetrator can only be explained as supernatural, not what people naturally do nor would be expected to do.
When Melanie first told me the story, I felt intense emotion, thinking how I might feel if what happened to her had happened to my own daughter.
I would want justice my way. She believes God wanted her to forgive, for her own sake, but also for God’s justice to be done —for evil to be conquered in Rodger’s life.
Although Rodger would have a long way to go to become the man God intended him to be, that’s how God’s hidden justice works —overcoming evil from the inside out.
We demand justice be done whenever we are wronged or when we hear of horrific abuse, such as what happened to Melanie.
Our innate desire for justice comes from God. Can you imagine the evil God sees daily across the globe?
The prophet Hosea captured a snapshot of that when he wrote, “Hear the word of the LORD, . . . ‘There is no faithfulness, no love, no acknowledgment of God in the land. There is only cursing, lying and murder, stealing and adultery; they break all bounds, and bloodshed follows bloodshed’” (Hosea 4:1-2).
God has witnessed and continues to witness every single act of evil ever committed. It angers God, and his love demands justice.
~John Burke
