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BEN'S DEMON'S
Eighteen year old Benjamin Farnsworth walked through the giant glass and brass doors of the Hong Kong Shanghai Commercial Bank without hardly attracting a glance from the uniformed doorkeepers. Ben was rather scraggily dressed, but now-a-days a lot of rich European teenagers tried to affect that wasted, bummed-out look. Hardly anyone in Hong Kong could equate a young white teenager with being a penniless street bum in Hong Kong. But Ben was penniless. He was also motherless, fatherless, without any form of passport or visa and living with Hong Kong street gangs. If the guards could have peered behind Ben's large sunglasses they would have been shocked to see that both of his eyes were black and blue and almost swollen shut. For that matter, if anyone had closely looked at his face, they would have seen that it was cut-up and that his jaw was swollen too. But no one had been paying the right kind of attention to Ben for a long, long time. The Chou-Lin Street Gang that Ben had taken refuge with, after his escape from Uncle Hobo's Macau Victor Camp were teaching their white boy a lesson. For not only was his face a mess, but under his clothes, his body was a mass of bruises. Ben was going to beg for the gang and prostitute himself at the Islands gay clubs or they were going to kill him. Ben walked straight toward the bank's elevator, inside, he was just one of many going up. Amongst the 10 or so passengers Ben noticed a Caucasian couple with their young son."I rebuke you Satan, I rebuke you Satan" Ben whispered to himself under his breath Ben could feel the demon of jealousy creeping up inside of him as he looked at the young couple with their son. He could hear the seductive voice of Satan filling his mind with demonic temptations and making him wish that he would have had a Mom and a Dad like that boy. "The kid was probably about twelve or thirteen", Ben thought, "just about the same age I was when the Devil first got into me." As Ben remembered that time at The Heavenly City School in Japan, the demons began dancing around in his mind, just like they always did, to flood his consciousness with the horrors of how evil he was, and the horrible memories came back. "Ben! Benjamin!! Are you daydreaming again? " Auntie Sari roused the freckle-faced adolescent from his reverie by grabbing a handful of the boy's hair and shaking him in his seat till she brought tears to his eyes. "What did Mama Madia say in her letter about Daydreaming?" she demanded. "That it was bad?"Ben offered. "Bad?" she said sarcastically, as if he had failed to answer the simplest question in the world. "It's not just bad ,Benjamin, it's the greatest time- wasting trick that the Devil has!. Now what were you daydreaming about?" "I dunno, nothing really" Ben weakly replied. "Nothing!!" Auntie Sari spat the word out as she slapped his mouth, "Nothing but a lie Ben!-- That's all I am hearing, isn't that right?" "Yes Auntie Sari"Ben sobbed. Suddenly Sari appeared to soften and sitting down on the bed, next to Ben's chair, she took Ben in her arms and pressed his face to her small bosom., "Ben, honey" she whispered, "I really love you. Don't you like Love-Up times with Auntie Sari?" Engulfed in Auntie Sari's motherly sexuality, Ben nodded an affirmative yes. "Don't you want to be part of the Honesty Revolution and wear your Green Shirt like a good soldier of King Jacob?" Ben knew the only answer was yes, and he nodded again. "So, honey please be brave, and tell Auntie Sari what you were daydreaming about". "I,--I was thinking about who my Mom was and why she left the Family and---and my Dad and wondering why I never get to see him,. I just was hoping I'd get to see my Dad cause he told me last year at his Christmas call I was going to get to be with him. And then..." Sari interrupted Ben by putting a gentle finger over his mouth. Sari straightened up her short pudgy frame and patted Ben on the head, "Ben, you've been a brave, honest soldier of King Jacob" she said, beaming with joy, "You've been able to get the darkness out to the light so it can be exposed and delevered. The demons really like to hide, but God likes to expose them and drive them away! Isn't that wonderful?" Ben didn't know if it was wonderful or not. Ben didn't even understand what Auntie Sari meant, nor did he have time to ponder it, because as she spoke, Auntie Sari had removed all her clothes and was climbing into Ben's bottom bunk bed pulling the boy after her. As two other boys nonchalantly played guitars on one of the other bunks in the boys dorm, Sari snuggled up to Ben. "Ben" she said as she pressed her breast into the 12 year-old's mouth, "I am the love of God for you and God want's to reward you for being such an honest and brave soldier in Grandpa Jacob's army." Ben would understand Auntie Sari better tomorrow.
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The next day, Ben walked silently into the dimly lit Shepherd's Den and sat down in the swivel-chair in the middle of the room, as he had been told. Never, had he been in the company of so many leaders at once, at least never by himself, alone. It made him nervous. "Do you know why you are here Ben?" The french accent was coming from directly behind him. He turned to face Uncle Jaziah. "No Sir" Ben replied to the mushy-faced, non-de-script Frenchman. Before Jaziah could respond, a female voice interrupted "You're here because we love you Ben." Ben turned towards another french accent, this one coming from Jaziah's mate, Auntie MarieLamb. Her deep socketed eyes radiated such intense concern for Ben, that he instantly knew he was in big trouble. "You know," MarieLamb said as she bent over to put her face next to the boy's "Father Jacob love's you even more than we do. Do you believe that Ben?" Ben nodded, as he looked past Auntie Marie's face to her large breasts that had given him such comfort during Love-Up times. "But as many as I love I rebuke and chasten" Uncle Barry shouted behind Ben's left ear as he simultaneously whirled the boy around to face him. "Grandpa say's ‘You let the devil in and I'll beat him out of you' --Do you like to play Footsie with the devil Ben?" Barry spoke the words with such intensity that the veins on both sides of his neck and his temples popped out. Ben had seen this transformation of Uncle Barry before, in Family meetings, when Barry was reading a rebuke from Grandpa or Mama Madia. During these sessions Uncle Barry's usual calm demeanor metamorphosed into such raging intensity that sometimes Ben thought the vein's in Barry's face were going to explode. Barry would rant and rave on the stage like a madman and often jump off the stage into a group of adults or teens and single someone out for a special rebuke or pull someone on stage for a public exorcism or corporal punishment. Now, Ben sat, not twelve inches away from Uncle Barrys contorted visage. Barry's bulging, red, face glowered behind his little wire-rimmed glasses as he screamed at Ben:. "Auntie Sari told us all about your little daydream fling with the devil. Well, buddy boy, your pusillanimous little devil has really exposed himself this time and we are going to drive his hell out of the camp of the Lord! You understand me?!!" Ben nodded in open-mouthed horror as Barry rose and backed away from him. Under Barry's hate- filled gaze, Ben began to tremble involuntarily . As he sat there trembling in silence Ben heard the door open and close behind him and a voice say,"Hello Benjamin!" Ben immediately recognized it as Auntie Sari's and he turned toward her hoping to find Auntie Sari coming to his rescue. One look at her dashed all his hope. Whatever closeness she showed to him yesterday during their Love-Up time had completely evaporated. She was once again the cold distant leader who acted as Grandpa Jacob's and Mama Madia's personal liaison to the Family. "Benjamin" she said primly, "I've got a personal letter for you from Grandpa Jacob." As Sari removed the typewritten letter from it's manilla folder, the other leaders took it as their cue to sit down. Sari sat directly in front of Ben on a high stool and Barry, Jaziah, MarieLamb and three others sat on folding chairs in a circle around Ben. In the back of the room, almost in shadow, Aaron, one of the first Japanese disciples, quietly put his camera to his shoulder to video-tape the event for Jacob and Madia Schieskoff's viewing pleasure. Sari began to read Grandpas letter in her prissy-crisp voice: "Benjamin, we want you to know that Mama Madia and myself really love you and are praying for you and your deliverance. We want you to be part of this great Family but we will not tolerate a little, selfish, doubting, demon in our midst! You know that I will not tolerate a demon in my own Granddaughter Beanie and I certainly will not tolerate one in you--Is that clear?" "Well," Sari paused in her reading, "is that clear Ben?" Ben nodded "Yes ma'am!" Sari continued reading, "I hope and pray Ben, that you do not end up in permanent isolation from the Family like my granddaughter Beanie did. Some have suggested that we should just send you back to your demon-possessed grandmother and let you die with her when God destroys that filthy Babylon whore, America, but your father pleaded that we have mercy on you. So Ben, if you have any love for your father, for this great Family, or for me, God's Prophet and Mama Madia, you'd better get the victory and get rid of those little demons or God help me, you will have hell to pay!" "Now Benjamin" Sari said, in her most ostentatious voice, as she ceremoniously returned the letter to it's folder, "leadership is having to take a lot of time on your case, which is really upsetting both Grandpa and Mama, because of how much time the devil is causing us to waste. You know, the devil just loves to gets us sidetracked and off the wonderful wall of worldwide witnessing, so we pray the you see the seriousness of this situation and really co-operate with your exorcism and get rid of your demons immediately!" With those words, Sari leaped off her stool and rammed her finger in Benjamin's face, shrieking at the top of her lungs, "I adjure thee in the name of King Jacob, demons, tell us your names!". With that, all the leaders jumped off their chairs and putting their hands on whatever free spot they could find on Ben's body they all began to shout at once for Satan to reveal himself in Ben. After almost five hours and much prayer and rebukes later, all Ben had been able to confess to was wanting to see his Dad. "You little, filthy, demon-dreaming liar" Barry screamed, coming to the end of his patience. "Wanting to see your Dad is just the tip of the iceberg!--We all know that you ‘Want' to see your Dad - We want to know ‘Why' you want to see him?" "Because I love him?" Ben said. "Love?" MarieLamb said in her weak, syrupy-sweet voice, "If you really loved your Dad you wouldn't want to see him because you would cause him to come down from the wall of doing his important photo work for Grandpa and Mama." Then, Jaziah chimed in with his thick french, accent, "Yes , zo what you have Ben is a demon of doubt because you are doubting zat your Dadee should not be working for Grandpa--You are doubting zee Jo-Letters and your are doubting Jesus because He said to forsake your parents" "And", Barry yelled as he revealed to Ben a fresh insight: "You've got a demon of Destruction!--Cause you'd like to destroy Grandpas work by interfering with your fathers important job!" "Confess your demons, Ben and get rid of them right now!" Sari said as she grabbed Ben on both sides of his head and began to shake him violently--"CONFESS NOW! IN THE NAME OF KING JACOB!" "You've got ta-ta-two demons Ben, da-da-do you understand me?" Jaziah stammered, almost beside himself with quivering emotion "You are na-na-not a child of God! God iz not your Father you are a ba-ba-bastard child of ze Devil who has snuck into ze Family-- Get rid of your demons and become a child of God!" After hours in the hands of seven adults Ben was reduced to slobbering, teary-eyed, confusion--he was blubbering away when Jaziah jolted him to electric awareness by soundly slapping him three times across his face as he intoned: "In the name of Father Jacob, and of Mama Madia and the Family Of Love." Jaziah's blows had left Ben's cheeks a glowing crimson and a trickle of blood was running down the right side of his mouth. "God does not give a sheet about your crocodile tears!' Jaziah screamed at Ben "He wants you to confess your demons right now!- -Get down on your face before God and get rid of your demons right now!" Instantly, Ben fell to his knees and began to call out to God to deliver him from his demons of Doubt and Destruction. "Louder, Ben" Uncle Barry encouraged, "say it loud enough so everyone in the School can hear you--Loud enough so Grandpa and Mama can hear you!!" As he complied, Sari opened the door that led to the dinning room so everyone could hear. With his hands lifted high, his eyes closed and screaming at the top of his lungs, Ben never noticed the video camera filming his confession to his demons and his pleas for deliverance. Aaron thought to himself as he zoomed in on Ben's teary-eyed face with snot running from his nose, "Boy, Father Jacob will love this one!"
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Once Ben got under the demon-hunting microscope of Auntie Sari, Uncle Jaziah and Uncle Barry, many other demons soon manifested themselves. Only a month later, another teen, Petra, wrote in her daily Open Heart Report that she had overheard Ben engaged in "foolish talking". She reported how Ben had been speaking to another boy about how he'd like to build a tree house and live out in the woods. Sari exposed the twin demons of foolishness and rebellion lurking under this desire. These demons took an eight hour deliverance session to get rid of. Sari told him "When we cast the demons of doubt and destruction out of you, they went out and got two more demons and came back to your heart because it was empty and wasn't full of Grandpas Words of Wisdom and Love." So, for the next three months Ben walked around with earphones on his head hooked up to a portable tape-recorder, listening to Grandpas Jo-Letters from morning to night. He was also placed on Silence Restriction and not allowed to talk to anyone except adult leaders. After that, Ben stayed free of his demons for two whole months, till one afternoon as he played a game of Goodmitton. (At Grandpas suggestion the Family had replaced the word "Bad"- The Prophet had wisely observed: "Why should God's kids play something that's Bad? So let's call it Goodmitton instead of Badminton, OK?") Ben got too enthusiastic about a game and actually tried to win rather that "just play the game" as Mama had suggested. The demons of competition and discord were found lurking in Ben's heart through this episode. This time, Sari had to conduct a public exorcism and flogging of Ben. "Public floggings and public exorcisms are great! They let everyone see what happens when you let the Devil in and also insure that no other teens follow a dandy-bad example." was the quote she read from Grandpa's Jo-Letter, "Punch The Devil". By the time Sari, Barry, Jaziah, and MarieLamb got through with Ben's public flogging and exorcism they really thought he had a complete deliverance. Ben was shaking like someone had plugged him into an electric cord. As Uncle Barry finished Ben's 20th swat, Ben fell on the stage floor vomiting uncontrollably. Sari was so happy, she said that with every retch of vomit she saw a demon come out! The dinning room was filled with nearly a hundred teens and about fifty adults. When Ben retched up his last demon, MarieLamb told everyone to lift their hands and praise the Lord and thank Father Jacob for deliverance. The whole Family was rejoicing and dozens of teens gave testimonies about their own deliverance. Sari said she was so thankful for everyones prayers that she proclaimed the next day a sleep-in morning and that everyone could spend four hours that night, instead of only two, with their sex-schedule partner. Sari later said that it just goes to show you how tricky people who are yielded to the devil can be, for it wasn't two weeks afterward but that Ben was fooling around with the devil again! Ben actually had the gall to write Sari and tell her: "Since I'm now free of my demons and delivered, do you think Grandpa would let me be with my Dad now?" None of the leaders could believe that the devil could be so bold. "If you're really delivered from wanting to destroy Father Jacob's work" Sari demanded to know, "Why would you want to cause your dad to come down from his great work on the wonderful wall of witnessing to spend time with you?!" Father Jacob said it was just a waste of time to do anymore deliverance on Ben. "Just put him in isolation away from the other kids," he ordered " cause one rotten apple will spoil the whole barrel. We'll let him stew in his own juices for awhile. He's gonna find out that crime doesn't pay." For the next four months Ben remained in isolation reading Grandpa's JO-Letters, praying, and confessing his sins on Open Heart Reports. On his fourteenth birthday, Grandpa and Mama graciously relented and let Ben out to be with the other teens. But instead of getting better Ben had only gotten worse and began acting goofy and saying things that just didn't make any sense. Finally, Ben was again brought before the entire Heavenly City School and Grandpa's transcript of his final session with his demon-possessed granddaughter Beanie was read to Ben and he was sent to join her in Macao as an incorrigible teen, placed in internal exile from the Family.
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When the elevator got to the bank's observation deck, Ben joined the throng of tourists who had come to view the city of Hong Kong from the tall skyscraper. But Ben was not interested in the sights. He was nervous, and he kept pacing back and forth, occasionally bumping in to one of the tourists as they took pictures. Ben had not slept in two days. The drugs he had gotten into with the gang and the prostitution they had forced him into had taken a heavy toll on Ben's already fractured personality. Ben's mind felt like it was on fire. He couldn't get rid of the demons anymore, they loomed up in him everywhere he went. Ben was so scared, he was trembling as he paced back and forth. There was only one way out. Ben knew it, and he was going to take it. Suddenly, Ben stopped his nervous pacing, he let out a long and loud shout and ran towards the decks low concrete guard wall. Leaping up on top of it, Ben paused for a second, then he threw himself off. Ben's body lay in the morgue for 10 day's before anyone came to claim it. His death never even made a blurb in the newspaper. When Father Jacob heard about it, Abrahim gave him a prophecy " So shall be end of all who no listen to thy Father. Tell teens! Tell teens! God angry! This one broke rules he think small but God say are big! Devil take him and kill cause he leave the mercy and love of Father Jacob." That night Jacob had Barry read the prophecy to the assembled adults and teens at the Heavenly City School. "And put the fear of God into em Barry" Father Jacob had ordered as he sent Barry off with Abrahim's prophecy. That's exactly what Barry did.
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