I woke in the middle of the night.
Thin ribbons of light slipped through the gaps in the blinds, casting a faint glow across my bedroom.
My hands were raised, frozen in place, curled like claws... and I was growling like an animal.
I was conscious, yet unable to control my movements.
That's when I realized I had lost possession of my body to a malevolent entity.
Fear gripped me.
I struggled to regain control, but it felt as though I were bound by invisible ropes.
Panic flooded through me.
Then, suddenly, a powerful upward wind appeared, and my spirit was lifted out of my body.
I saw an angel.
It arrived in the form of a great white cloud.
Its face resembled my mother's.
"Get out, Satan!" the angel shouted with tremendous authority.
It was my mother's voice.
Had her spirit come to rescue me?
I tried to descend, to return to my body, but the powerful wind rising from below wouldn't let me.
I screamed, but heard nothing.
There seemed to be no sound in the spiritual world.
At last, I managed to return, because I could see my bedroom clearly again.
Outside my body, I had been able to see much more.
Yet I could still feel the entity nearby.
Still there.
Still close.
Then another upward wind came—stronger than before—and pulled me from my body once again.
As a spirit, I found myself standing on my bed.
For the first time, I saw my entire body lying there before me.
The walls and furniture seemed to be made of dense mist, yet they retained their original colors.
Had I died?
Small black entities emerged from my body, spinning through the air like scraps caught in a whirlwind.
The wind carried them away until they vanished into the distance.
I stared at my body and thought, furious:
"That body belongs to God! They have no right to it!"
And so the battle continued.
The angel, the entities, and I were all fighting over my body.
"I have to get back!"
Finally, I reclaimed it.
I opened my eyes and drew a relieved breath.
It was over.
Then came the questions.
Had it been a dream?
Or had I truly experienced it in the spiritual realm?
How did one control the wind there?
How had the angel created the wind that carried the evil spirits away?
I called my mother and told her everything.
"Ana, it wasn't me," she said. "It was an angel taking my form."
"I was alone! Who else would have driven those entities away? Mom, if God and His angel hadn't removed that from me, how would I ever have freed myself?"
"Thank God," she replied, "because He protects us even while we sleep."
We said goodbye, and I hung up the phone.
Thank You, God, I thought happily.
Then another angel spoke.
"The form and the voice were your mother's."
The angel showed me a vision of the one who had come as a cloud.
And then it continued:
"So that you would know beyond any doubt that you were saved because of the prayers your mother offered for you. It was a prayer stored in the spiritual realm, and it manifested when the moment came."
"Amen."
I never knew prayers could be stored, I thought, filled with wonder.