Angel Of The Presence

I talk with Father Carel-Piet van Eeden who is a priest in South Africa who wrote the music for In the Hands of God. We talk about the Song 'The Angel of the Presence' and who is the Angel of the Presence. I also play the song at the end of the interview: "Angel of the presence, be with us I do pray. Let your wings enfold us, embrace our souls today. The world seems lost in the shadows,
we need your help to guide us, with the light of spirit, that heaven does convey."

Transcript

A very big aloha from Maui.

I'm Reverend Cindy Palos and this is When Spirit Speaks.

Spirit Speaks has started with the idea of joining together in communion of sorts,

In communication with my dear friend,

Father,

Pharrell Pete Van Eden with two E's.

This is South Africa,

Who's got so much exciting news going on.

And we've been basing it on some of the words and what we've been creating with a new album,

Soon to be out called In the Hands of God.

And as Father knows,

I sit down and I meditate every day.

And then of course,

This all kind of evolved after the passing of my sister,

Pam,

And with words I posted and Father so kindly was able to put music to.

It's so interesting,

Father,

How just that simple act of kindness has blossomed and grown into this beautiful garden,

Which is now this lovely CD and album that's going to come out.

It made such a huge difference in both of our lives and in others as well.

Definitely.

And the beauty of it is,

It's not just words and music,

It's a real story and it's a real message because I think we were both blessed to listen at that time and see the journey that it took us on.

That quite amazing journey.

And every step of the way,

You've been there,

Very supportive.

We've developed a very interesting way of being able to communicate with 12 hour time differences through a lot of Facebook Messenger and WhatsApp and words and emails back and forth.

And now it's finally coming to the point where the first day of spring,

When Spirit Speaks will be the first single that's released and that will follow up so that I'm hoping that the actual album will be out in my sister's birthday,

April 18th.

Meanwhile,

You're going through this amazing time yourself of a lot of things blossoming in your own life with your work with the Benedictine,

The white robe monks of St.

Benedict.

That's the one.

That's the one.

Yes.

So the day though,

I wanna talk with you about we've been covering different words of the songs and this just comes from spirit.

And so sometimes I really don't delve very deeply into what's behind the words.

And I thank you for this gift of being able to spend more time in contemplation and diving deeply into the words that are there.

Now,

The angel of the presence came to me and truthfully the words are more of the words that not all the words made it into the actual song.

Yes.

But I'm gonna read them if it's okay with you and then we'll go into a little bit of what,

Even in Wikipedia,

I looked up with angel of the presence and I was amazed by what have you ever,

I mean,

I didn't know some of the history even of what the angel of the presence says.

It says from Wikipedia,

The angel of the presence is refers to an entity variously considered angelic or else identified with God himself.

The phrase occurs in Isaiah 63,

Nine,

Which states that throughout history of Israel,

God has loved and been merciful to that nation and shared in his distress with saving Israel with the angel of the presence.

Now that I never had an idea about.

They explained the term in most explicit language as the reference to God,

Not an ambassador,

Not an angel,

But the Lord himself saved them.

And the angel of the presence explains to Moses in the history of Israel,

It depicts this entity as one of God's special agents and does not provide him with a specific name.

And the Testament of Judah state that he has received blessings from the angel of the presence.

The book of Enoch,

Four angels that stand before the Lord of spirits are given as Michael,

Raphael,

Gabriel and Fanuel and according to the book of Angel,

Fanuel is also sometimes known as the angel of presence.

So that's all news to me.

Had you heard of any of that?

No,

Not really.

And it's quite a fascinating thing.

I mean,

Like you said,

We didn't delve into that.

And what's beautiful is these songs are not planned.

Right.

The words just come.

So then finding the meaning at the links is a beautiful journey.

And you have a lovely,

Lovely idea that came to you about,

First,

We were gonna try to find a boys choir.

Yes.

And then with the opening,

You heard it.

You actually heard it as that,

Or then with the COVID-19 it's like,

Well,

What do we do to find the boys choir?

It's all what if we reach out to the Pope and I know they have a choir in St.

Peter's.

It's like,

And then I looked for another group,

But they were completely,

Everything was shut down right there.

So it came down to you thinking of this beautiful young boy to sing the opening.

You wanted the sound of an innocent young boy to sing the opening words,

Angel of the presence,

Be with us,

I do pray,

Let your wings enfold us,

Embrace our souls today.

So give us a little bit of background on how you evolve that into what's on the album.

So yes,

When I read your writings,

The music just comes and it almost felt as if that was an opening to a song rather than part of the whole song.

And the music that I heard was two voices singing in harmony.

And so that's what we wrote down.

And we had that planned for a very long time.

And yeah,

As you said,

It was challenging to then find a choir to work with and to actually get that music down.

We even at some stage spoke about doing it electronically.

And my sister then reminded me that our cousin in the UK has a son,

Thiago,

And he loves singing and he loves God.

And so I reached out to Yolanda and she said,

By all means,

And we had a chat and I sent him the music.

And a day later we had about 40 takes that they had done.

Now what was interesting was it wasn't done in a studio.

We did it on a cell phone and the takes were done.

He was actually kneeling by his bed and praying and they recorded his pray.

And even after that,

I mean,

This is now a month plus later and he still uses that pray at night when he goes to bed,

Which is quite beautiful to me.

And then we sent it on and yeah,

I think it just formed a beautiful introduction.

It is beautiful and it holds the innocence.

Yes.

And with the help of Steven Malillo and his magical ability to create sounds that are from heaven,

He made it sound as if the boy was in church and praying.

And he,

Ideally you do not want a recording being done with an iPhone,

But I mean,

The way he was able to save that and enhance it and do it is really precious,

Absolutely precious and so perfect.

And when I wrote Angel of the Presence,

Be with us,

I do pray,

I didn't know any of the background I just talked about.

I just sometimes feel the angel of the presence.

And I didn't ever put a definition on it,

But I feel it.

But what I also feel when I feel the angel of the presence is this wonderful feeling.

It's so heavenly of the wings,

Especially in hard times,

The wings actually enfolding you and protecting you.

And that is what I started this,

The words out with.

And the next one is kind of really employ that same thought.

The world seems lost in shadows.

Of course,

This is all written in the midst of the COVID.

We need your help to guide us with the light of spirit that heaven does convey.

Of course,

This is spirit speaks and the grace of spirit was alive throughout this whole project.

And spirit was in this case,

I felt many times my sister coming through spirit.

Then the next one,

Again,

Carrying that feeling when the heart is weary,

When the burdens grow,

The angels bring such mercy with the blessings of a sacred rose.

And just a little description on that.

You know,

I've been very blessed to have a deep connection with Mother Mary and I pray to Mother Mary and I offer myself in service to her each morning in prayer and I have many times felt many miraculous things come through Mary's blessings.

One time my friend,

John had a stroke and he wasn't even aware he had the stroke,

But I saw him and his mouth was completely drooping.

I'm inside his eyes drooping,

He couldn't speak clearly.

I said,

You got to go to the hospital right away.

You have a stroke.

No,

No,

No,

Believe me,

You had a stroke,

You don't know.

So in the hospital,

In the emergency room,

I'm praying to Mary and the doctors do what they do in the hospital and the beeping and the things.

And I'm gonna say,

Well,

He's had a stroke.

We're gonna have to test.

We're gonna have to admit him.

A lot of times this is just the start and there's gonna be even more.

And this is very,

Very dangerous and I'm praying and praying,

You know,

Okay,

After an hour there in the emergency room,

Praying all this time,

I look at him and he completely was restored.

His eyes back to normal,

His speech is back to normal.

He's not anything with his mouth drooping.

And I said,

John,

You know,

You're fine now.

And so the doctors come in and said,

Look,

He's recovered.

And they said,

Well,

No,

No,

That doesn't mean anything.

We're gonna put him in and we have to do tests.

This is probably just a prelude and he'll probably even get a worse,

You know,

Stroke.

And we said,

No.

And they even said,

They said,

You know,

Do you wanna see in the morning him dead because you didn't admit him to the hospital that you're gonna be responsible for his death?

Well,

You know,

I don't believe that.

I believe that there were prayers and the prayers worked and they got really upset.

And after that happened,

I bought a rosebush to marry.

$29,

It was like this much.

Now the rosebush is nine feet high now and wider than,

It's like about four feet wide.

This is like four years later and it's still providing me roses almost every day.

I call the rose bush free.

So just that's a backstory that the blessings of a sacred rose,

Right?

Long story short,

That's the blessings of the sacred rose.

These times have changed our lives.

We need more faith each day with God's presence there inside us to guide us on our way.

And,

You know,

These times have tested us,

Father.

I mean,

These have been,

You know,

I mean the hardest times that I can imagine.

And it really,

Again,

This is was,

You know,

The title in the hands of God,

Because in these times it's like,

Well,

I can't do anything about this at this point.

It's in the hands of God.

So that's again the faith there and God's presence.

And that presence of the God again is,

It's the angel,

That's the spirit,

That's the energy that I'm feeling.

And then I go back to the angels.

Heavenly angels surround us.

We are not alone.

Turn all worries over to the Lord and let his will be done.

And I think that's probably the hardest thing to do at any time is just say,

God's will be done.

And it may really be not what we want at all.

As many times it isn't,

But it's all you can do.

And then I go back to the course,

When the heart is weary,

When burdens grow,

Angels bring you mercy with the blessings of a sacred rose.

Then I go back to the Holy Garden,

Because that's such a beautiful place I've been in spirit to.

There is a Holy Garden,

A place of peace where you can go,

You can turn within and dwell there and find the blessings it bestows.

And that's a place I go to in meditation.

Then we go petals of the sacred garden fall.

Again,

That's the petals falling,

Which is the blessings and bring blessings here.

The spirit lifts you up when the angel presence appears.

So that's the long story short on the angel.

And then you brought this very heavenly music to it,

Which I felt was perfect,

Very uplifting.

Can you tell me what occurred to you and creating the music on that and your feeling of the angel,

The presence?

So it's,

Yeah,

It's a very interesting song.

It's quite different to the other five that we did.

In the sense that it has the opening with the child and then the middle part where Darlene comes in and she brings a beautiful message of peace and of the angels and of hope.

And for me,

There are always angels around us.

We just forget to sense them and to open our eyes and actually our ears to listen for their messages and to see how we are really protected.

And the protection isn't always physical.

People still get hurt,

Even though they are angels around them,

But their soul and spirit,

Those are the things that are protected.

And it's a big message for a lot of people.

And for myself is that God doesn't promise us physical safety.

We are going to get sick.

We are going to go through challenges.

I mean,

This year with the lockdowns and stuff that we did have,

Have been harrowing for many,

Many people.

And we were never promised to be free from that strife.

We pray and we ask the Lord to keep us safe from it or keep us away from the strife,

But it does happen.

And we believe that there's lessons in that for every single person.

But the message that we have is that we are still enclosed in those wings of the angels,

That we are not alone,

Even though we sometimes feel that way.

And so that was the message of the song.

And the end with the petals from the sacred garden,

The music changes yet again.

So it moves out of the somber begging of our soul into the joy of the petals falling and creating this lovely image for us.

And the reminder that the angel of God and the angel of the presence is always there and God is always there.

That's so beautifully said and that of course is what's so key is remembering to remember,

Being able to pray and meditate and go to that place and find that peace and that sacred garden inside.

And in this last year,

It's interesting how many people did turn to prayer and meditation,

Looking for answers.

And many people got very angry as well and doubted as happens in any disaster,

How could this happen?

It always comes back around to what happens to anyone going and suffering.

It's one of the age old questions.

If God is good,

If God is there,

How could he let this happen?

And when we look at the huge staggering numbers of death and what people went through and some families losing almost all of their family members,

When people really are hurting and looking for answers inside.

And this is one of the big,

Big challenges that we see.

And when people come to you,

As I'm sure they must in this time,

How do you tell them about this,

This hard situation?

We don't know why this is happening.

We don't know what God's plan is.

And that is extremely uncomfortable and hurtful for us not to know why everybody is hurting so much and why people are dying.

And all we can do is try and show compassion and we can remain faithful that there is reason for all of this and it's not a human reasoning.

And that is a big thing for us.

We try,

We feel our pain and our despair in ego.

And that is what then almost cuts us off from God.

So the counseling that I focus on a lot is just remember the roots,

Go back into yourself and listen and you'll find something there that reconnects you.

If you open yourself up and it is difficult,

It's one of the most difficult things to do when you are going through pain,

When you are going through heartache.

We see so many families dying and it's family groups that pass away and the people around them are hurting big time.

And how do you then tell that person,

Yes,

But God still loves you.

It's easy to forget that part.

And that's where we then just say to them,

Be quiet.

Or scream,

Whatever works for you.

But in the screaming and in the silence,

There is God because God is everywhere and has never forsaken you.

And that's a big thing for me to try and get over to people.

Every morning when I say mass,

It is one of the biggest things that I pray for is that the light that we share gets shade with everybody who needs it,

With the album as well.

That it's my daily prayer that it's easy to record an album and it's easy to put it up on a shelf somewhere.

But that was never the goal of what we wanted to do.

The goal of the album is to shine light where people are filled with darkness and sadness.

And so hopefully we can help people through that by the words,

By the music and by the messages that we share.

And yeah,

That's basically the counseling we do is just trying to show people that there is still light even if they don't feel it at the moment.

You know,

As you were speaking,

I thought about how our friend,

Steven Malillo was able through his music to capture the parts that kind of touch my heart and bring me to tears sometimes is when while the music is rising and going upwards,

There's also sometimes that crossing point right in the middle,

Where it's going down and you feel that cross in your heart.

And it's that moment that carries an understanding both the anguish and the glory.

Yes.

And very hard to put that in words,

Very hard to express that,

But in music and the way he created the music for this,

You feel that,

You know,

That pain and at the same time,

That hope.

I let a very dear friend of mine hear this who I hope produced many albums with and he lost a cousin of hers a year ago.

And he was listening.

I was very nervous about her listening because she's gotten four,

No six Grammys.

And,

You know,

This was the first project in a long time without her.

So I'm going,

I don't know what's gonna happen.

When she listened,

Right?

And he called me up and she was in tears.

She was crying.

She was crying.

She says,

This is so beautiful.

And it immediately,

I felt the spirit of my cousin present when I was listening to these words and I'm feeling chicken skin here.

I mean,

Because,

You know,

That's what you and I have felt sometimes.

If we listened to some of that music,

We would just it would bring tears to us.

And that was so powerful that indeed it wasn't just you or me because we're very involved in this project but it was someone else who didn't know what was behind it that was able to feel that.

And I think I can't help but think of the cross.

You know,

You have the power of that cross that light and the vertical and the energy of spirit but also the cross across the horizontal line and your heart right there in the middle you have the energy of spirit and man,

You man,

Spirit and man always bringing together some of that energy that you feel when the two energies are crossing,

Right?

And I've heard a beautiful description of the pain that you described now.

It's called exquisite pain.

Ah,

I might have to write a poem about that father.

And because in the most painful times,

There is such beauty if we can see it,

If we can stay back out of the pain and we can see that,

Yes.

It's not something that I think that's where people become martyrs is in embracing that exquisite pain.

Well,

I've always wondered about that martyrdom,

You know,

And I've always wondered again,

I'm sure people have it's like,

How do you get to that point where you have that much kind of faith and that much trust that you understand that,

You know,

Throughout time?

How and what and why people had to go through that,

You know,

It's so expressive of what happens when people who are sometimes in control don't understand or fearful of the real power that's much more powerful than they are and then try to limit it because they're threatened by it in many ways.

And unfortunately it also brings up from many why religions are so involved in even in their own religion creating pain throughout history,

You know.

And that's probably a subject matter we'd have to go into another time because I mean,

How many people have died in the name of Christ,

You know,

By people in their own churches sometimes we can't even begin to understand that,

Right?

But it's a powerful one.

I mean,

Even if you go back to St.

Francis and what he had to do to really stand up to create his own group.

And I'm sure you and your group have had to stand up for what you believe in and it's beautiful to see you succeeding and creating a new way for people to be embraced with that love of Jesus Christ.

And your power and believing that beautiful things you say that Jesus never turned anyone away is so powerful.

It is,

It is.

And I had a discussion about that earlier today as well with people who come from the same religion but different sects if you want to call it that or different denominations.

And my father taught me one day,

He was asked to go to another denomination in the Protestant church.

And he asked the gentleman who wanted him to move over.

He asked him,

If I do not join your church am I then going to hell?

And the gentleman said to him,

No.

And my father's question from that was,

So then why are you still talking to me?

And that is such an important thing.

Now we have these different,

I call dialects of the same language.

We all speak the language of the Lord.

Yes.

And,

And I mean,

That's,

That's one of the songs also that we are going to discuss but we all speak the same language and it's just different dialects.

And there's a beautiful saying that says there are many ways up the mountain.

So all these different viewpoints that we have the challenge is to honor each of them while standing true to your own.

And for me,

I love being,

Well,

I focus on being open to learn from everybody because the way that I perceive spirituality and religion is not absolute because if it were absolute then we could read a rule book and follow the rules and then,

You know,

Meet God in the end of it.

And it's not that.

God is not such a linear entity or being that that we can put it down in words even.

And how do you describe feelings to everybody?

And how do you relay the feeling of the presence of the Lord to any single person?

We try.

And again,

I mean,

The album is a,

For me,

A modest attempt to try and explain what we feel and the way that you feel and experience God is completely different to the way that I do.

Yet we reach,

We cross somewhere.

And in that cross,

I mean,

When I have a down day you go up and we bring that,

That it harmonizes in the end.

And I think if people can start embracing that the world could be a much more peaceful and tranquil place.

Absolutely.

Amen on that.

And I have to say that,

You know,

I follow mystic Christianity and in my teachings I do on insight timer and app.

I realized so many more,

So many people still have issues even with the word God,

And they don't understand even how I'm expressing it because I'm not necessarily one way or another because I'm following what comes to me through spirit and through my experience with God.

And I know that I could reach more people if I just did mindfulness meditation probably thousands and thousands more,

But I can't limit it because my love for God is so great and I think that love joins you in me and is expressed through this music and this album that love of God is so great once you experience it that all you can do is keep trying to express it and share it with others.

And it's almost impossible.

That's what keeps driving me on to do more and more because it's inexpressible in a way.

But I think I have to thank you so much because you understood where many wouldn't and you were able to express it as well through your music.

And I really look forward to always talking to you because you enlighten me on many subjects and ways of looking at things I hadn't looked at before and explain some lovely experiences you've had.

So I just wanna thank you again.

I'm eternally grateful to you for the work you've done on this and also for the way we can share this time communicating what's going on inside with this process.

So the angel of the presence is there and it's alive and well,

And it's in the songs and music and it's also in your hearts and it's there for everyone anytime they open themselves up to it and need it.

There's that beautiful angel of the presence.

Definitely,

And I need to thank you as well for allowing me to be part of this journey.

I mean,

It's a dream that we discussed many,

Many years ago and finally it's here.

Well,

That's all the time we have for today but we'll continue the journey and looking forward to how it beautifully unfolds together with the grace of spirit and God,

A big Aloha and thank you,

Thank you,

And thank you.

Thank you so much,

My friend,

Have a beautiful day.

Thank you,

I will indeed,

You do too.

And what's left of your night.

Bye-bye.

Bye-bye.

Lord be with us,

I do pray.

Let your wings enfold us,

Embrace us today.

Embrace us,

Us today.

The world seems lost in shadows.

We need your help to guide us.

With light on the spirit.

Let heaven dance come to you.

When the heart is willing.

When the burden's drawn.

The angels bring such mercy.

With the blessings of a sacred rose.

Blessings of a sacred rose.

The angels all surround us.

We are not alone.

Turn worries to the Lord.

And let His will be done.

When the heart is weary.

With a heavy cross to bear.

The Lord will bring you mercy.

And remove all dark despair.

Pedals from the sacred rose will fall.

To take away your fear.

To take away your fear.

The Spirit lifts you up to the angel of the presence here.