A story was told on Unsolved Mysteries in February, 1997 of a 24-year-old Christine Skubish and her 3-year-old son, Nick, who went missing off Highway 50 in the Sierra Nevada Mountains in California, outside of Placerville.
She was expected by her friend to arrive at their house on Monday, but now it was Wednesday morning. Her stepfather, Dave Stautzenbach, received the call from the friend and then called the police to file a missing person report, while he started checking the local hospitals along the route that Christine would have traveled.
Christine’s aunt, Karen Nichols, recounts a strange dream that included Christine and Nick. Chris Putman, in his book The Supernatural Worldview, interviewed Karen and got the truth of her story. We all know that television sensationalizes the truth into their fictional version to draw viewers.
Karen is a born again Christian, and had repented from being involved with the occult many years ago. She did not seek these dreams about Christine and Nick. They came to her and were used to save Nick’s life. While many discredit anything supernatural today, God still visits people supernaturally.
While I was in Africa, I got to experience first-hand how natural it is for the natives of Africa to experience dreams and visions. I had several personal experiences where the gifts of the Spirit, as defined in the Book of Acts, demonstrated themselves while I was dealing with persecution and government investigations and conflicts among the preachers. Africans accept the supernatural, because they have experienced it. Westerners deny it, because they have never encountered it in a modernized age. But if you go back to the early days of America, you will read about the supernatural as natural in America.
I have Cherokee and Irish in my genetics. Both have histories of dreams and visions, and sensitivity to the spirit world around us. My Mother was 50% Indian and 50% Irish, and told about some very real visitations from the spirit world during her childhood and young adult years. She even saw my Dad appear to her above her bed while praying one night, two years before she died. He was smiling at her as if he was assuring her she would see him soon. I have had several dreams and visions of the Lord down through the years. I even was privileged to see my personal guardian angel above my bed as I was praying one night. He was smiling at me. I have been visited by angels in the flesh, who were there and then they were gone, with nowhere for them to hide from my view.
Old time preachers, who used to pray for hours, and fast for days at a time, were accustomed to having dreams and visions and visitations from angels and the Lord. Could it be that we have become too engrossed in operating the church as a business, and busying ourselves with the technology involved in spreading the Gospel, that we spend that much less time in prayer and fasting, and have fewer and fewer visitations from God? To the point of having to make up stories about how “God showed me”, or “God spoke to me”, to gain a following?
The fact of the matter is that dreams and visions were a major part of the early church; and I am talking about the church right after Jesus ascended to His Father in the Book of Acts, and for the years after that with the Early Church Fathers.
The Bible prophesied through Joel 2:28 that young men would see visions, and old men would dream dreams. Yet where are those experiences in the church today, without those who claim that God is showing them something every five minutes? All of our personal experiences with God have to line up with what was experienced personally by those recorded in His Word, or they become suspect. There is a lot of ‘suspect’ out there today in the Name of Christ. (Jesus said all that is said and done in His Name will not enter into Heaven).
Karen Nichols saw inside the car of Christine and Nick. She saw Christine trying to communicate with her about Nick. There were several witnesses who saw an apparition beside the road pointing to the scene of the accident, verified by a police officer. Christine’s body was inexplicably preserved from flies and insects, even though she had been dead for five days in over 100 degrees heat. Nick was able to survive without food and water for five days in the same heat; and he saw at least three angels, with one up by the road and two by the car, as figures of light.
The officer investigating found the butt imprint of Nick where he had been sitting on a Bible story spread out on the back seat of the car. There was a tennis shoe up by the road where Nick had tried to climb to find help and then had returned to the car to be with his mom. His clothes were neatly folded on the front of the car, where he had stripped to deal with the heat. (Did Nick or the angels fold his clothes?). Again, Christine’s body was untouched by flies and crawling creatures of death after five days in 100 degrees heat.
Karen prayed all the way of several hundred miles, trying to spot something along the side of the road to find Christine and Nick. She testified that she ‘felt’ Nick was alive, and then she lost that feeling for a few minutes, then she felt he was alive again. She prayed in tongues for most of the trip, asking for God’s angels to protect and help Christine and Nick. She heard a male’s voice pray inside her head as she was praying in tongues, asking for the Blood of Jesus to cover Christine and Nick and to send God’s angels to surround them.
Nick testified that he had died in the wreck and had seen Jesus and His angels, who told him that he couldn’t stay and that he had to come back. He knew the angels were with him at the car and one was up by the road. He was only 3 ½ years old at the time and yet he recalled all of these details about the wreck accurately.
When Karen could no longer ‘feel’ Nick, he had died. Then when he returned, she was able to ‘feel’ his spirit again.
The spirit of man is eternal, and outside of this body of flesh has capabilities that far surpass anything we can experience in this life. God enabled Christine, at the time of her death, to communicate via dreams, to Karen and others who saw her apparition alongside the highway, that her son needed help.
Karen was able to pray in the Holy Spirit, who was able to pray instead of her, and together with her, as the Greek translates (Romans 8:26), for the Blood of Jesus and the angels of God to minister to Christine and Nick.
Christine’s body was untouched by death until they found her. Nick was transported to the hospital and nursed back to health, where he recounted about seeing Jesus and His angels in heaven, and the figures of light by the car and up by the road.
Hebrews 12:1 says, “Therefore, since we are surrounded by such a huge crowd of witnesses to the life of faith, let us strip off every weight that slows us down, especially the sin that so easily trips us up. And let us run with endurance the race God has set before us.”
The next time you become discouraged about God not answering your prayers for the salvation and restoration of your loved ones, remember God’s Holy Spirit prays through us according to the Will and Timing of God, as we continue to yield ourselves to prayer.
The next time you become discouraged that God doesn’t love you, and is mad at you for your sins and rebellion, remember that God’s Love for you surpasses all human understanding, and that even if you are without human understanding and help, God sees you and sends angels to minister to you, fighting against even the dark angel of death, while using others to intercede for your salvation and deliverance.
He will never leave you nor forsake you. He loves you enough to die for you and to give you strength to walk above this world as you reach for Him. He is not far from any one of us, “If we SEEK and FEEL after Him.” Acts 17:27
Asking God to cover your loved ones or yourself with the Blood of Jesus, as well as thanking God for His Holy angels to surround us and keep us and protect us each day, is very powerful in the spirit world. The demons fear and hate the Name, the Word, the Blood, the Spirit of Jesus Christ, and His Holy angels. (James 2:19)
You can read about Christine and Nick by clicking these links.
http://unsolvedmysteries.wikia.com/wiki/Christine_Scoobish
http://articles.latimes.com/1994-06-14/news/mn-3969_1_dead-mother