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The Brief Background
I want to share with you all something I feel is very important and if correct will force you to make a life changing decision. However, if you think after you have read this that it is a result of madness then so be it, but at least you will have made a choice.
I suppose I grew up like most people believing something existed that created everything we all see and I termed it God. I thought Jesus was a baby born in a stable and we did plays at Christmas to celebrate this (so that parents could come and watch and say ‘look how cute they all look dressed up as wise men’ and other characters).
I did not like any sort of authority hence I was expelled from my senior schools and ended up in the care of the local authority. Girls were just one big ego trip and the more girlfriends (of course they had to be in the ‘In crowd’) I had I thought my peers would accept/like me more. I could go on and on about what a selfish person I was forming into but I will not bore you with the details.
On the evening of the 24th Dec 1994 Mark (a friend) and I went on a journey to South parade pier (In Portsmouth) to Nathan and Angie’s our dealers to score some pot. Anyway to cut a long story short we all got stoned and Nathan gave us a Christmas present as he termed it of dried magic mushrooms which we all ingested. I then had the most incredible/surreal experience which lasted about 6 hours. The first thing I remember noticing was the fact that I perceived Mark as Jesus, he was just sitting there smiling and I felt warmth and a sense of peacefulness coming from him. Nathan I thought was the devil (sorry Nathan) he was hectic and kept trying to get me to drink cider putting it to my lips and was generally in my face. I then noticed the sound of the music, one moment it was peaceful, mellow and I loved it the next moment it sounded evil, dark and I found it frightening. The music kept going from horrible to lovely and I have no idea how long this lasted for. I remember looking at a book of illustrations that belonged to Nathan and the same thing started to happen again, one drawing would look beautiful and peaceful, another drawing would look evil, horrid and frightening. I think it was about 3am Christmas day when we decided to leave on our bikes and ride back to Cosham. Again the same sort of thing happened. I had to ride towards the light and be following Mark. I lost sight of Mark a few times and became extremely frightened then all of a sudden he would be there again with a peaceful air about him which calmed me down and I felt safe. I remember getting to Hilsea lido and feeling safe as I was riding towards the motorway lights. This was the theme of the whole evening, Light and darkness, good and evil, scared of the dark, secure in the light.
We then arrived home and I put the television on and I think showing was the news or a film and some people were carrying a coffin. I started to think to myself that I had died and I was choosing between Heaven and Hell. As the camera was panning slowing from the floor to a shot to reveal the occupant of the coffin I was terrified and would not look, then all of a sudden I felt peace and courage and I looked to discover it was not me. I then took a deep breath felt peaceful, turned to Mark and said “Goodnight” and went upstairs to bed.
I then awoke the next day and was numb for about two days thinking about what had happened over and over again. I kept saying to people I have experienced God and told them the story. I then never thought about it anymore.
The Good News
In January 1995 I went travelling to France with friends of mine, Mark Grima and Paul Reid. I took a copy of the New Testament with me for the simple reason it had an inscription written on the inside to my daughter, so I took it for sentimental reasons. We were travelling on bikes and sleeping in a tent. Eventually after a few days we arrived at a place called La Haye-du-puits and found a disused railway station. The building had a door we could lock using our bike lock, a table, room to put our tent up inside and also store our bikes. On the first or second night I cannot remember exactly I started to read the gospel according to Matthew. It blew me away here was a man called Jesus claiming to be God and offering forgiveness of sins and eternal life. As I was reading it I felt myself feeling convicted for the things I had done, the reasons why I was the way I was, an offer of forgiveness for what I had done and a purpose to my existence. It’s hard to put into words exactly what I felt all I know is I loved Jesus and wanted what he was offering. I said a prayer along the lines of ‘Jesus if you are God I want to believe in you please forgive me for my sins and prove to me without doubt that you are God and you are there.’ That night I had a dream of approaching a white figure, bending down on my knees and the figure putting a ring on my wedding finger. In the morning I literally felt like a new person, forgiven and swept clean of all the crap I had done in my life and I had strong sense of purpose that I never had before. I told Mark and Paul I was born again which was a bit of a shock to them but they could sense I was a different person. Paul Reid then told me that he was also a Christian and very backslidden and what had happened to me had given him a real boost and confidence to talk about his faith. Mark said he also believed in God but never mentioned being Born Again.
The next 3 months travelling around France and Spain were absolutely amazing. God proved time and time again to me that he was there and very much in control. We had non-believers inviting us into their homes cooking us meals; we had single women picking us up when we were hitchhiking (think about 3 men unshaven and scruffy looking, would you pick us up?) on numerous occasions. We were always provided with access to clean drinking water. A guy named Bernard (Bless him), who was the manager of the garage near to the train station where we were staying, opened his home up to us, let us have showers, made us fresh coffee, cooked meals and gave us chocolate. After four weeks in the train station the Mayor of the town sent the police around to kick us out of the town. However, customers of Bernard said we could stay in their garden so we moved in with them. Again they cooked us huge meals and opened their lives up to us (Bless them). I remember Helen (Bless her) and her friend who lived in Coutances who gave us lifts to and from La Haye-du-puits as we used to go busking In Coutances. Again Helen and her friend opened up their homes to us, fed us and watered us. There are so many more things I could tell you about but you get the general gist. The Lord said “Do not worry about clothes, food etc...” and he proved to me without doubt that he is faithful to his word.
I will finish with one last story which will blow you away. When we were in Spain we ended up in the middle of nowhere and started to look for a place to camp, it was dark and we thought we had found a nice field next to a few old looking houses. We started to put the tent up. The next thing I remember is a door opening and a couple of people shouting and waving their fists at us. Reid, Thank God, could string some sort of sentence together in Spanish and explained we were Christians from England traveling around and we thought this was a good place to camp. Then the shouting stopped and they motioned us with the hands to follow them to their garage and said we could sleep in there. So we set the tent up and had a good sleep. In the morning we set out to leave and it was like a surreal scene from a film. Their whole family came out to see us off and gave us bags of fruit and waved us off (Bless them). Anyhow we had ridden about 10-20 miles away and then Paul Reid’s spindle broke on his wheel. We took off the wheel and I rode back to the house were we had stayed the night before. The Son opened the door and I pointed to the spindle and tried to ask for help. He then motioned me to follow him to a large barn. I followed him and then he pulled back the large sliding door and I could not believe my eyes it was full of racing bikes, laves, bench drills all sorts of tools. They were cycle enthusiasts! He took the wheel and repaired it there and then (Bless him). He then took me to his car and pointed in the direction I was going and I sensed he was offering me a lift so I said yes please. I took my front wheel off and loaded the bike into the back of his car along with Reid’s wheel and then he drove me back to Paul and Mark. This Blessing was a clear sign of Gods providence and blew us away. We spoke about this event for days praising God and we still discuss it to this day. This to me personally was absolutely amazing!
I pray that all reading this will be blessed and that the Lord God speaks to you in your own unique way. Amen.
I want to share with you all something I feel is very important and if correct will force you to make a life changing decision. However, if you think after you have read this that it is a result of madness then so be it, but at least you will have made a choice.
I suppose I grew up like most people believing something existed that created everything we all see and I termed it God. I thought Jesus was a baby born in a stable and we did plays at Christmas to celebrate this (so that parents could come and watch and say ‘look how cute they all look dressed up as wise men’ and other characters).
I did not like any sort of authority hence I was expelled from my senior schools and ended up in the care of the local authority. Girls were just one big ego trip and the more girlfriends (of course they had to be in the ‘In crowd’) I had I thought my peers would accept/like me more. I could go on and on about what a selfish person I was forming into but I will not bore you with the details.
On the evening of the 24th Dec 1994 Mark (a friend) and I went on a journey to South parade pier (In Portsmouth) to Nathan and Angie’s our dealers to score some pot. Anyway to cut a long story short we all got stoned and Nathan gave us a Christmas present as he termed it of dried magic mushrooms which we all ingested. I then had the most incredible/surreal experience which lasted about 6 hours. The first thing I remember noticing was the fact that I perceived Mark as Jesus, he was just sitting there smiling and I felt warmth and a sense of peacefulness coming from him. Nathan I thought was the devil (sorry Nathan) he was hectic and kept trying to get me to drink cider putting it to my lips and was generally in my face. I then noticed the sound of the music, one moment it was peaceful, mellow and I loved it the next moment it sounded evil, dark and I found it frightening. The music kept going from horrible to lovely and I have no idea how long this lasted for. I remember looking at a book of illustrations that belonged to Nathan and the same thing started to happen again, one drawing would look beautiful and peaceful, another drawing would look evil, horrid and frightening. I think it was about 3am Christmas day when we decided to leave on our bikes and ride back to Cosham. Again the same sort of thing happened. I had to ride towards the light and be following Mark. I lost sight of Mark a few times and became extremely frightened then all of a sudden he would be there again with a peaceful air about him which calmed me down and I felt safe. I remember getting to Hilsea lido and feeling safe as I was riding towards the motorway lights. This was the theme of the whole evening, Light and darkness, good and evil, scared of the dark, secure in the light.
We then arrived home and I put the television on and I think showing was the news or a film and some people were carrying a coffin. I started to think to myself that I had died and I was choosing between Heaven and Hell. As the camera was panning slowing from the floor to a shot to reveal the occupant of the coffin I was terrified and would not look, then all of a sudden I felt peace and courage and I looked to discover it was not me. I then took a deep breath felt peaceful, turned to Mark and said “Goodnight” and went upstairs to bed.
I then awoke the next day and was numb for about two days thinking about what had happened over and over again. I kept saying to people I have experienced God and told them the story. I then never thought about it anymore.
The Good News
In January 1995 I went travelling to France with friends of mine, Mark Grima and Paul Reid. I took a copy of the New Testament with me for the simple reason it had an inscription written on the inside to my daughter, so I took it for sentimental reasons. We were travelling on bikes and sleeping in a tent. Eventually after a few days we arrived at a place called La Haye-du-puits and found a disused railway station. The building had a door we could lock using our bike lock, a table, room to put our tent up inside and also store our bikes. On the first or second night I cannot remember exactly I started to read the gospel according to Matthew. It blew me away here was a man called Jesus claiming to be God and offering forgiveness of sins and eternal life. As I was reading it I felt myself feeling convicted for the things I had done, the reasons why I was the way I was, an offer of forgiveness for what I had done and a purpose to my existence. It’s hard to put into words exactly what I felt all I know is I loved Jesus and wanted what he was offering. I said a prayer along the lines of ‘Jesus if you are God I want to believe in you please forgive me for my sins and prove to me without doubt that you are God and you are there.’ That night I had a dream of approaching a white figure, bending down on my knees and the figure putting a ring on my wedding finger. In the morning I literally felt like a new person, forgiven and swept clean of all the crap I had done in my life and I had strong sense of purpose that I never had before. I told Mark and Paul I was born again which was a bit of a shock to them but they could sense I was a different person. Paul Reid then told me that he was also a Christian and very backslidden and what had happened to me had given him a real boost and confidence to talk about his faith. Mark said he also believed in God but never mentioned being Born Again.
The next 3 months travelling around France and Spain were absolutely amazing. God proved time and time again to me that he was there and very much in control. We had non-believers inviting us into their homes cooking us meals; we had single women picking us up when we were hitchhiking (think about 3 men unshaven and scruffy looking, would you pick us up?) on numerous occasions. We were always provided with access to clean drinking water. A guy named Bernard (Bless him), who was the manager of the garage near to the train station where we were staying, opened his home up to us, let us have showers, made us fresh coffee, cooked meals and gave us chocolate. After four weeks in the train station the Mayor of the town sent the police around to kick us out of the town. However, customers of Bernard said we could stay in their garden so we moved in with them. Again they cooked us huge meals and opened their lives up to us (Bless them). I remember Helen (Bless her) and her friend who lived in Coutances who gave us lifts to and from La Haye-du-puits as we used to go busking In Coutances. Again Helen and her friend opened up their homes to us, fed us and watered us. There are so many more things I could tell you about but you get the general gist. The Lord said “Do not worry about clothes, food etc...” and he proved to me without doubt that he is faithful to his word.
I will finish with one last story which will blow you away. When we were in Spain we ended up in the middle of nowhere and started to look for a place to camp, it was dark and we thought we had found a nice field next to a few old looking houses. We started to put the tent up. The next thing I remember is a door opening and a couple of people shouting and waving their fists at us. Reid, Thank God, could string some sort of sentence together in Spanish and explained we were Christians from England traveling around and we thought this was a good place to camp. Then the shouting stopped and they motioned us with the hands to follow them to their garage and said we could sleep in there. So we set the tent up and had a good sleep. In the morning we set out to leave and it was like a surreal scene from a film. Their whole family came out to see us off and gave us bags of fruit and waved us off (Bless them). Anyhow we had ridden about 10-20 miles away and then Paul Reid’s spindle broke on his wheel. We took off the wheel and I rode back to the house were we had stayed the night before. The Son opened the door and I pointed to the spindle and tried to ask for help. He then motioned me to follow him to a large barn. I followed him and then he pulled back the large sliding door and I could not believe my eyes it was full of racing bikes, laves, bench drills all sorts of tools. They were cycle enthusiasts! He took the wheel and repaired it there and then (Bless him). He then took me to his car and pointed in the direction I was going and I sensed he was offering me a lift so I said yes please. I took my front wheel off and loaded the bike into the back of his car along with Reid’s wheel and then he drove me back to Paul and Mark. This Blessing was a clear sign of Gods providence and blew us away. We spoke about this event for days praising God and we still discuss it to this day. This to me personally was absolutely amazing!
I pray that all reading this will be blessed and that the Lord God speaks to you in your own unique way. Amen.
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