I believe that some of us are called onto a path less traveled within the already narrow spiritual path – a unique path, perhaps just a narrow trail that is intertwined and winding within our somewhat unusual experiences and events in life. Sometimes it is only retrospectively that we can see the path we have traversed and can’t help but marvel at what God has done. At the same time, we can’t help but wonder what is yet ahead.
My spiritual path appears to have run in roughly eight-year cycles. The first two, I grew up as an atheist child and teenager in Czechoslovakia (now Czech Republic), at that time a Communist country, where few people were believers and church attendance was discouraged. Even my two years in Sweden and getting inadvertently confirmed at a summer church camp that my parents had sent me to – not knowing enough Swedish or about the Bible at the time to understand what I was doing – didn’t do much to change this.
God started working with me during the next eight years, at a very low point in my life, and called me to conversion through a non-mainstream church in Victoria, Australia, which provided me with a good spiritual foundation. God gave my life a hope and purpose, and connected me with a loving spiritual community, through which He also provided my wonderful life partner, Alex.
Eight years later, Alex and I got married and during the next roughly two eight-year cycles we worked side by side at the church headquarters in California, USA. While most others of our age group were raising families, our combined focus was doing God’s Work.
The next eight years found us back in the former Czechoslovakia, now the Czech Republic. In November 1989, Communism had fallen, so it was safe for me to go and visit in 1990. From this visit came the idea and desire, first on my husband’s part who is not Czech, of moving there to live. After three years of earnest prayer and seeking guidance, when our work for the church in California was coming to a natural end, this desire came to fruition. God had placed us in a little village close to a small town, which was a big contrast to having lived in the very urban Los Angeles area.
A year after we left the USA, a significant earthquake shook the LA area. Later that year, our church too was shaken through a massive change of direction and teachings initiated by the leadership. Understandably, this caused great trauma for many and resulted in a major split. In his mercy, God had moved us to the edge of the storm, so to speak, though of course, we couldn’t totally escape it. Yet, the Czech Republic was a definite refuge and also an opportunity to get to know other Christians. They included Seventh Day Adventists with whom we fellowshipped in a home church, and Catholics, several of whom we got to know as personal friends. These experiences taught me to be less judgmental of those with other spiritual views, but rather appreciate them for who they are, even if I don’t agree with all that they believe.
When my mother unexpectedly passed away in early 2001, another turning point came and a new cycle started. For some months before then, we began to sense a leading to return to Australia, but the specific destination only crystallized when we learned of my mother’s passing. It became obvious to come to the state of Queensland to be available to my now widowed father, who was in his late seventies.
We were at an age when it was difficult to get into the Australian job market after so many years away, but six months later, a lovely door opened to teach English in Korea. For nearly four years we taught at a Christian university south of the capital, Seoul. After that we spent another year in Saudi Arabia — a very strict Muslim country, where women have a lot fewer rights than their western counterparts take for granted, though this is ever so slowly changing.
While overseas, during our years in Korea, we were privileged to be able to come home twice a year to spend time with dad, which was a good transition to eventually returning and staying for good. This was a slightly shorter cycle of six years, when we were exposed to members of yet other Christian groups, as well as Buddhism in Korea and Islam in Saudi Arabia.
We have now been back from teaching overseas for seventeen years – since 2007. I have been privileged to do spiritual work full-time on the home front, having my own writing ministry (that had in part overlapped with Alex’s writing ministry) – for which God has miraculously provided financial means. It has also been a time filled with accomplishment and growth in insights and wisdom through a formal study course as well as personal wide reading.
During the first eight – another time cycle – I had completed an MTh, been introduced to Catholic spirituality – both through reading and on the ground – and further broadened my perspective by being exposed to Christian meditation and Buddhism. I created several websites, wrote/co-wrote and published a number of spiritual books, as well as compiled and published books featuring my father’s art, photography, and Czech poetry.
For a short period, I had reconnected with my old church through one of its numerous offshoots that resulted from the split almost twenty years prior. This was like one last visit to the old spiritual home, the purpose of which had been accomplished. I spent time with old friends, briefly reconnected with others, and learned what yet others have been up to, or that they died. It was like leafing through an old album and then closing it again for the foreseeable future and returning to the present. Yet, I am very grateful for the 25 or so years of active involvement during my early to middle adulthood. It gave me an excellent spiritual foundation to then go and build on further.
A seemingly small but significant incident, no doubt divinely inspired, led me to realize around March 2014 – at the start of another time-cycle – that I needed to move on. The church has progressed over the years, but in a lot of ways remained the same, and I was no longer on the same page. A book I was lent, Life in the World Unseen, a mediated work by Anthony Borgia, widened this gap even more. It indirectly led me to mediated messages in two volumes, Angelic Revelations of Divine Truth, published by Foundation Church of the Divine Truth and focusing on the importance of Divine Love for salvation.
Mediumship was something I was uncomfortable about due to past teaching and conditioning, but the contents really resonated with me and made sense. I kept reading and summarizing the information, much of which is on this website. I also connected with a number of the Divine Love community followers in Australia.
A couple in Melbourne became for a short time my mentors. They looked at my website as it then stood and encouraged me to share it with one of the Trustees of the Foundation Church of the Divine Truth — FCDT (a sister organization of which is the Foundation Church of the New Birth — FCNB.)
In early October 2014, I contacted the FCDT and applied for membership. This had been a definite turning point. It included developing a number of special friendships, being affirmed and encouraged in my God-given gifts, most of which I was aware of, but not fully, involvement in church projects, and more. In 2015, I had completed the ministerial training course of the church and am now an ordained minister. In 2018 I was asked if I would consider becoming a Trustee of the church and I accepted.
I sense myself growing in the Divine Love and being used by God in a new way with people feeling and responding to the Love within, as well as recognizing and appreciating my God-given gifts, insights and wisdom.
I am continuing to write books and articles and add to my website. I am also the co-editor of the church’s newsletter that is serving the whole Divine Love community. I had attended five Divine Love retreats in the USA and one in Canada, and assisted in organizing the last three. I keep in email contact with a few community members, sharing insights, providing encouragement, and/or answering questions. I participate in two weekly Zoom discussion/prayer groups.
Over the seventeen years that we have now lived in Queensland “in retirement”, we developed a lovely relationship with my aging father. We worked together on publishing his art, photography and poetry. He was in excellent age physically and mentally till the age of 95. He kept fit, had few aches and pains, and was still able to drive his Mazda 3. The following year was a hard one as he caught a urinary tract infection and had six short stays in hospital as a result of falls and other issues. He bounced back to some degree, but never fully recovered. He could no longer drive and needed more help at home, which was provided through Blue Care services and ourselves.
While he still did relatively well for his advanced age, he grew frailer and cognitively weaker. He started having more falls and was getting disoriented in previously familiar places. His last fall in his home at night in September 2022 landed him in hospital. After a week of ups and downs, his time had come to leave this world. He never wanted to reach 100 and he didn’t. Alex and I visited him the last night at the hospital after what was a farewell phone call. He died the following day.
After the funeral and a period of grieving and physical unwellness, I started going through his house, getting it ready for sale. We were wondering what to do with the inheritance proceeds – invest in a newer, better quality home that would need less maintenance, remain in our own home and upgrade it, or …? In the end, we felt to stay in our home would be the best. Then around Easter in 2023, we had a meeting with a solicitor at the nearby Renaissance Retirement Village. As we were walking through the village and talking to some of the residents, the idea and desire emerged to live there. There was a waiting list, but for us, things moved fast. We speeded up getting my dad’s home ready for sale, which occurred on June 30. With sales contract in hand on June 10, we applied for one of the available villas and were accepted. On August 1, we had the keys, and by the end of September, we moved in fully.
The whole process of selling my dad’s house and investing in Renaissance was a series of miracles and amazing circumstances. We are now at the start of 2024 and feel reasonably settled, though still adjusting – which is understandable and normal. We are looking forward to getting our own house for sale as soon as possible, but now in our seventies, our energy is not what it used to be. However, with the many miracles and interventions that we have seen, we have every reason to believe that we’ll continue to be led and helped.
My intention for the rest of my life – whatever time I have left – is to help bring Love and Light into this dark world, and help people as I am able. And I look forward to one day reaching the Celestial Spheres of untold happiness and wonderful service and growth opportunities. I am also looking forward to seeing this earth finally at peace and in harmony with God — with no more hate, anger, killing, destruction, hunger, sickness and other forms of suffering. I don’t know when either one will happen, but both are a true hope and vision worth holding onto.
© Eva Peck, 2015, 2018, 2020, 2024
For Some Reflections along my spiritual journey, click here.
Coming: During this new chapter of my life and another time cycle starting in 2022, I would like to document my life experiences under the title Divinely Led. It may eventually become a book but for now, I want to create a section on this website showing how my life has been led and guided on numerous occasions. A preliminary contents page is here.