A Dragon Quest
My Grandmother, Spiritual Lineage, and Dragon Guidance from Across the Veil
One of the ways I seek discernment is by listening to the insights of gifted psychic mediums. I don't regard these readings as absolute truth or unquestionable prophecy. Rather, I receive them as invitations—symbols, images, and possibilities to hold alongside my own intuition and experience.
Over time, I have found that meaningful guidance often emerges not from any single reading, but through the unexpected convergence of inner experience, synchronicities, relationships, and life itself.
What follows is one such journey.
It began unexpectedly in June 2022 and unfolded over the course of a year, eventually leading me to discover something I never anticipated: the spiritual home of my grandmother—a woman I barely remembered—and, through that discovery, a deeper understanding of my own spiritual lineage.
I share this story for several reasons. It is part of my own ongoing transformation. It is an invitation for others to pay attention to the subtle ways life sometimes speaks through coincidence, intuition, and relationship. And perhaps most importantly, it offers one person's experience of how meaning can emerge when we become willing to follow a thread whose destination we cannot yet see.
The Chance Encounter
In early June 2022, Chris and I took a short getaway to California's Central Coast. One evening we visited “Lights at Sensorio” Bruce Munro's remarkable outdoor light installation. Earlier that day, while wandering through the nearby town of Atascadero, we happened upon a small metaphysical shop offering psychic readings and energy healing. The shop was closed, so we continued on with our day.
Later that afternoon, after returning to our hotel, Chris unexpectedly tweaked her back. The pain was severe enough that she could barely move. Remembering the shop, we decided to call and see if the owner might be available.
A few hours later we met Tiffany.
Chris received an energy healing session that brought her significant relief. Afterward, I stayed for a brief psychic reading. At the time, I expected little more than an interesting conversation. I had no idea that this simple appointment would become the beginning of a journey lasting more than a year—a journey that would reconnect me with my grandmother, introduce me to a spiritual lineage I never knew existed, and ultimately lead me halfway around the world.
One moment from that first reading has stayed with me ever since.
Several psychic mediums over the years had mentioned the presence of a "little Japanese lady." I had always assumed they were referring to an ancestor from generations past. It never occurred to me that the person they were describing might be my grandmother, who had died when I was five years old and whom I barely remembered.
That possibility would slowly unfold over the months that followed.
The Dragon Appears
Dragon Figurine on the front porch of the Airbnb in Joshua Tree.
Over the next several months, my attention turned to other things. Much of my energy went into launching the Spiritual Life Foundation while Chris and I traveled to the Big Island of Hawaiʻi and began planning a retreat to Joshua Tree and the Integratron.
The Hawaiʻi trip was memorable in many ways. I came home with a growing sense that life was unfolding with an unusual coherence, though I couldn't explain why. One evening, I had a vivid impression of the Integratron, which inspired me to organize a retreat to Joshua Tree later that fall.
By early September, I scheduled another online reading with Tiffany. I didn't have a specific question in mind. I simply asked, "What is it that I need to hear from Spirit?"
This second reading deepened several themes that had quietly emerged during our first conversation.
First, the image of the dragon appeared for the first time.
Second, Tiffany described my relationship with the elderly Japanese woman in a way that felt surprisingly personal. She mentioned a photograph on a fireplace mantel, a detail that immediately brought my grandmother to mind. Although I had been only five years old when she died, I began to wonder whether she—not some distant ancestor—had been the "little Japanese lady" mentioned in earlier readings.
Finally, another unexpected thread emerged. Tiffany sensed a connection between my grandmother and a Buddhist tradition, encouraging me not to force the pieces together but simply to allow them to "weave and integrate" over time.
At the time, none of these images made much sense.
Looking back, I can see that the journey had quietly begun.
Following the Thread…
After sharing the September reading with my sister, she recalled that our grandmother belonged to what she described as "Buddhism with a twist." She couldn't remember the name of the religion, but she did remember that it welcomed people of other faiths. She also remembered inheriting our grandmother's gold cross.
It wasn't much to go on, but it was the first tangible clue that my grandmother's spiritual life might be more complex than I had ever imagined.
A few weeks later, while attending our Joshua Tree retreat, another curious moment occurred. My friend Gayle noticed a cement dragon sitting quietly on the front porch of our Airbnb. It was the only distinctly Asian image anywhere on the property. Under ordinary circumstances, I probably would have walked right past it. Instead, after the recent reading, I found myself smiling.
The dragon had become more than an image from a psychic reading. It had become a symbol that caught my attention wherever it appeared.
Then came the conversation that changed everything.
A few weeks after returning from Joshua Tree, my sister and I visited my uncle in Sacramento. He was in the early stages of dementia, but I hoped he might remember something about my grandmother's spiritual background.
For years, I had vaguely assumed she might have been a Nichiren Buddhist.
"Oh no," he replied. "That was the old man..." referring to my grandfather.
"She belonged to... what was the name of that church?... that church..."
He couldn't remember.
Fortunately, one of my cousins was there.
“Gedatsu Church,” she said.
I had never heard the name before. I asked her to spell it.
Curious, I immediately searched for it on my phone and discovered the Gedatsu Spiritual Center just outside Sacramento.
The drive home felt different.
Only weeks earlier, I had known almost nothing about my grandmother's spiritual life. Now I had the name of her religious community and a place I could actually visit.
For the first time, this no longer felt like an interesting series of coincidences.
It felt like the beginning of a search.
Discovering Gedatsu …
After returning home, I immersed myself in learning everything I could about the Gedatsu Church.
Until a few weeks earlier, I had never heard its name. Now I found myself reading its history, exploring its teachings, and trying to understand the spiritual world that had shaped my grandmother's life.
I learned that Gedatsu is one of Japan's newer religious movements, founded in 1929 by Gedatsu Kongo following a profound spiritual experience. In the United States, there are only three centers—in Sacramento, Southern California, and Honolulu. I was surprised to discover that the Honolulu church was only a short distance from my son Paul's home.
As I continued reading, what struck me most was not the history, but the spirit of the tradition.
Rather than claiming exclusive truth, Gedatsu encourages respect for all religions, recognizing that each seeks to serve the well-being of humanity in its own way. Its practices emphasize harmony between the visible and invisible worlds, reminding practitioners that those who have passed on remain connected to those who are still living.
That vision resonated deeply with me.
It didn't ask me to abandon my own spiritual path. Instead, it seemed to affirm something I had been discovering throughout my own journey—that wisdom often grows through honoring multiple traditions rather than choosing between them.
Then I remembered something Tiffany had said during the September reading:
"...weave and integrate... that's what your ancestors have done. There has been a weaving of traditions and cultures... and now your generation is bringing them together."
Those words took on an entirely new meaning.
For the first time, I began to wonder whether my own spiritual journey had not developed in isolation.
Perhaps, in ways I had never recognized, I had been participating in a story that had begun long before I was born.
I found myself asking a question that had never occurred to me before:
Could the grandmother I barely remembered have quietly influenced the spiritual path that eventually led me into ministry and beyond?
A New Way of Seeing…Dragons…
As my research continued, I found myself drawn to the dragon in Japanese tradition.
Before this journey, I had never paid much attention to dragons beyond their occasional appearance in temple art. Now they seemed to appear everywhere I looked—not because they had suddenly emerged, but because I had begun to notice them.
As I read more, I discovered that in Japan the dragon is often associated with water, life, protection, and the unseen forces that sustain the natural world.
One discovery especially captured my imagination. While reading ”A Benzaiten Pilgrimage”, I learned that the dragon frequently appears alongside Benzaiten, the goddess associated with flowing water, music, beauty, wisdom, and the arts. In Enoshima, dragons are woven throughout the shrines and even the lamp posts that line the bridge to the island, serving as guardians of a place long connected with Benzaiten.
I also discovered dragons throughout Kyoto, including at Kiyomizu-dera Temple. Around the same time, I happened to watch an NHK documentary, “The Dragon: Deity of Water, Protector of the Capitol.” It felt like another thread weaving itself into the story.
Before long, I had assembled a growing collection of photographs, articles, and notes about dragons in Japan.
Without consciously planning it, I had also begun creating a new travel dream.
I wanted to return to Japan—not simply as a tourist, but with fresh eyes.
I had the growing sense that this journey was still unfolding.
The Dragon Comes Home
Over the New Year's holidays, Chris and I traveled with friends. As our conversations turned toward recent adventures, I shared the unfolding story of my grandmother, the dragon, and the Gedatsu Church.
Like many good friends, they were naturally curious.
Within minutes, they were searching online and stumbled upon an archived message from the Sacramento Gedatsu Spiritual Center. It was a 2014 talk by Rev. Kazuo Yamada entitled The Sacred, Mysterious Power of Water.
As we read together, I was immediately struck by a familiar theme.
Rev. Yamada described the dragon as a sacred being associated with water and as a servant of Benzaiten, the goddess who nurtures the flow of life through water, music, literature, beauty, and culture.
I sat quietly for a moment.
For months, I had been following dragons through psychic readings, synchronicities, and my own research. Now, unexpectedly, those same symbols appeared within my grandmother's own spiritual tradition.
The threads were beginning to converge.
I soon learned that Rev. Yamada served at the Gedatsu Spiritual Center in Sacramento—the very community where my grandmother had worshipped. The more I learned about the Center and its sacred grounds, known as the U.S. Goreichi, the stronger I felt drawn to visit.
At that moment, the next step became clear.
I needed to go to Sacramento.
The Dragons Finds Companions
February 2022
As I shared my story with friends, something unexpected began to happen.
Rather than ending the conversation, the story seemed to awaken something in them as well.
One afternoon, I was catching up with my friend Don Houston. In retirement, Don had been exploring digital storytelling and showed me a project he was creating. One of the central characters was loosely inspired by me—a person awakening to a deeper reality and beginning to experience the world differently.
Then he showed me the artwork.
Dragons emerged from ancient trees. Another figure, inspired by a mutual friend, appeared as a Japanese woman playing the shamisen. In the final image, my character wasn't fighting the dragon or fleeing from it.
He was leading it.
I stared at the screen for a moment before asking,
"Have I ever told you my dragon story?"
"No," Don replied.
I shared the unfolding journey, and afterward he simply smiled. Later, when I asked how he had come to create those images, he said they had arrived unconsciously.
"I was originally going to have your character confront the dragon," he told me. "Then something changed. I realized... no. He leads the dragon."
His words stayed with me.
Perhaps this journey was never about overcoming the dragon.
Perhaps it was about learning to walk with it.
A few weeks later, while talking with my friend and poet Brynn Saito over Zoom, I shared the same story.
As I spoke, Brynn turned toward a print hanging on her wall. At first glance, I thought it might depict Benzaiten. It wasn't, but the conversation reminded her that she had written about Benzaiten in her poetry exploring the feminine lineage of her own family. She also mentioned that "the water goddess" appeared in the opening poem of her forthcoming collection, Under a Future Sky.
Again, another unexpected thread appeared.
It seemed that conversations about my grandmother and the dragon naturally led to conversations about ancestry, the feminine, and the stories that quietly shape our lives.
The journey was no longer unfolding only within me.
It had become something shared.
As winter gave way to spring, another opportunity appeared.
Chris and I were planning a trip to Honolulu to visit Paul and Amelia.
For the first time, I realized there was a Gedatsu Church there as well.
It felt like the next step in the journey.
Soon afterward, another friend, Kit Nishiura, shared a dream.
In it, I was wearing robes that reminded her of a Buddhist teacher while speaking to a gathering of people who leaned forward, trying not to miss what was being said.
When I told her about my search for my grandmother and the Gedatsu Church, she immediately felt the dream somehow belonged to this unfolding journey.
Whether the dream meant exactly that, I cannot say.
But I found it meaningful that, independently, people close to me were beginning to reflect back themes that seemed connected to the path I was walking.
Visiting the Hawaii Gedatsu Church
As our trip to Honolulu approached, I found myself thinking about the Gedatsu Church there. During the week before our visit, I even began dreaming about it.
It seemed like the right time to go.
On our last full day in Hawaiʻi, Paul and I stopped by the church, hoping someone might be there.
To our surprise, four people welcomed us: Rev. Kazuo Yamada, Mrs. Yamada, the caretaker of the property, and a visitor named Masako. Fortunately, Masako spoke both Japanese and English, helping bridge the conversation.
After introducing ourselves, I explained that I was a retired United Methodist pastor. Then I told them my unusual story—how a series of psychic readings had led me to rediscover my grandmother and, eventually, to the Gedatsu Church.
As I spoke, Rev. Yamada's face lit up.
Without saying a word, he hurried toward the sanctuary and returned carrying two small cards—one for Paul and one for me.
Through Masako's translation, he explained that the Japanese character on the cards represented the dragon.
For a moment, no one spoke.
I remember simply standing there, taking it all in.
Of all the symbols he could have chosen, he had placed the dragon into our hands.
It felt less like proof of anything than a quiet affirmation that this unlikely journey had somehow led me to the right place.
We spent the next hour talking about the church, its history, and its traditions. They generously shared English-language materials and, with warm enthusiasm, encouraged Paul to become involved with the Honolulu congregation.
When Mrs. Yamada learned that Paul lived in Kaimukī, she smiled and explained that Gedatsu once had a congregation there.
"Deeper, deeper connection," she said, motioning downward with her hand.
Paul, having grown up as a preacher's son, graciously received the invitation while gently sidestepping any commitment.
We all laughed.
Masako proved to be an unexpected gift. Active in Honolulu's interfaith community, she encouraged me to visit the Sacramento Gedatsu Spiritual Center and introduced me to the name of Rev. Michaela Rodriguez.
Before leaving, I purchased some of the amacha tea used in their remembrance ceremonies. They also sent us home with Gedatsu Church bags and warm wishes for the journey ahead.
What had begun as a simple visit had become something much more personal.
As Paul and I walked back to the car, I turned to him and said,
"I just feel so happy."
It wasn't excitement.
It wasn't relief.
It was a quiet sense of homecoming.
Whether that feeling arose from memory, imagination, Spirit, or something beyond words, I cannot say.
But I left with the unmistakable feeling that my grandmother had somehow accompanied me on the journey.
Visiting the Gedatsu Spiritual Center in Sacramento
In April 2023, I contacted Rev. Michaela Rodriguez at the Gedatsu Spiritual Center in Sacramento to ask if I might visit and learn more about the community my grandmother had once called home.
We arranged to meet on May 31.
From the moment I arrived, Rev. Rodriguez welcomed me with warmth and generosity. As we sat together, I shared the unlikely story that had brought me there—my grandmother, the psychic readings, the dragon, and the many synchronicities that had gradually unfolded over the previous year.
She listened with genuine interest as we talked about the history and teachings of the Gedatsu Church.
At one point, she mentioned that she hoped she had offered prayers for my grandmother during the annual remembrance service, although she wasn't certain she recognized her name. Since my grandmother had passed away in 1964, I found that difficult to imagine.
A short while later, the senior minister, Rev. Akira Sebe, joined us.
After hearing my story, he paused thoughtfully and said he remembered hearing older members speak about my grandmother, though she had belonged to an earlier generation.
Again, I was surprised.
Only months later would I discover a recording of the church's 2022 remembrance service, where my grandmother's name was spoken aloud among those being honored.
It was another quiet thread woven into the journey.
After our conversation, Rev. Rodriguez invited me on a tour of the grounds.
Known as the U.S. Goreichi, the twenty-acre property contains gardens, shrines, memorials, and places for remembrance. I was especially interested in seeing the shrine dedicated to Benzaiten, whose presence had become increasingly meaningful throughout my research.
As we walked, I felt a growing sense of familiarity.
Not because I had been there before, but because the place somehow felt connected to a story I had been slowly uncovering.
Near the end of our tour, Rev. Rodriguez brought me to the Memorial Tower, where the names of past members are preserved.
She pointed out the memorial, and we began to leave. But something prompted me to ask if I could take one more look.
She smiled and said, "Of course."
I walked back toward the glass cases and began reading the nameplates.
They were arranged alphabetically.
I found the letter K.
And there they were.
My grandmother.
My grandfather.
Their names.
Their birthplaces.
Their birthdates.
Their dates of death.
I simply stood there in silence.
For the first time, my grandparents were no longer just names in a family genealogy.
They were part of a living spiritual community that still remembered them.
Nearly one year had passed since that unexpected psychic reading during a weekend getaway on California's Central Coast.
Over those twelve months, what began as a chance encounter had unfolded into conversations, friendships, research, dreams, synchronicities, and pilgrimages that ultimately led me to my grandmother's spiritual home.
Whether one sees these events as coincidence, intuition, divine guidance, or simply the mysterious ways life unfolds, the journey profoundly changed me.
I had not simply found a church.
I had rediscovered a relationship.
More than anything, I left Sacramento with a deep sense of gratitude—for my grandmother, for the people who had welcomed me so graciously, and for a spiritual lineage I never knew I had inherited.
The journey had come full circle.
Or so I thought.
Epilogue: The Journey Continues
As I drove home from Sacramento, I felt a deep sense of gratitude.
Over the course of a single year, an unexpected series of conversations, coincidences, friendships, and discoveries had led me to my grandmother's spiritual home. I felt more connected to her than I ever thought possible, and I carried with me a renewed appreciation for the spiritual lineage that had quietly shaped my life.
I believed the journey had come to its natural conclusion.
A few months later, during another reading with Tiffany, an unexpected message emerged.
She suggested that my journey with the dragon was not yet complete.
There was one more place, she said.
Japan.
At the time, I had no idea what that might mean.
I simply made a note in my journal and continued living my life.
It would be more than a year before I understood why those words mattered.