Well, just looked at my stat counter, at the bottom, which counts viewers of this page, who are not my pc at home, or anyone at Gateway's Home PC. Got to a hundred. Not bad going, in my opinion.
I'm probably going to keep trying to write something useful in here every now and again, as well, like all of my other blogs I've done in my life, they keep my brain nice and ordered and keep my life from getting the better of me.
But, I'm going to have to change my reasons a bit. This is mainly because I'm leaving the full time Internship at Gateway, to look after my mum, and to give me a better chance of somebody wanting to switch houses with us.
Which is fair enough, I'd make that choice again and again, but yeah, doing so is gonna give me a lot less to think about. Whether working in the cafe, teaching me how to serve people who my nose thinks are unservable, to learning on very practical ways to live life as a christian in theology, and maybe, learning how to take myself a little less seriously, by working with Caleb, who will ALWAYS see when I do something stupid, and no doubt laugh about what I did.
But working as a carer with nothing else to distract me is going to be challenging in it's own respect. I mean, how else am I going to learn, serving every second of my life, and learning that I need to feel like i want to serve all the time... Monotony is a bitch, but I'm sure Steve's gift of the radio in the kitchen will be an absolute godsend.
So, less theological ramblings here from now on. more nitty gritty how I'm doing in my attitude towards serving, and stuff. I'll get that house looking shiny, Just wait and see. Don't expect and before and after shots though.
29 March 2010
14 March 2010
Head or Heart.
Tonight's been a tough one for me. Listening to peoples stories about their family lives, and their varying issues about it all. It got me thinking about my relationship with my Dad.
Basically, reading a book during the past week, (I think it was Dave Magill's) and it got me thinking about something. Basically, if I was walking alongside Jesus, what would it make me feel like? Would I compare myself to him and feel terrible, as I'm pretty sure most would comparing yourself to perfection. Or, something about Jesus' character would make you feel something different.
I'm guessing if you are standing alongside Jesus for that long, you are probably his follower, and the bible says that Jesus, and therefore God views his followers not through their sins, but away from them. In other words, when he sees you, he sees you as a sinless person. Now, I'm not sure if I am jumping the gun, but if that was the case, I think for me at least, it would mean that I am probably going to view myself through Jesus' eyes.
So, back to the start. Thinking about my Dad, have I really forgiven him? I mean, I say I have, and truly believed I had, but yeah, every time I mention him, it is still in my mind the imperfect dad. The sin always gets in the way for me. I know I shouldn't ignore the sin, but I know I should recognise that nobody is perfect... Even now I'm finding it difficult to see what my view should be. Basically, if i ever have to see him, I want to view him as a person, not as the sin.
I don't think I've got that far. It's another layer of forgiveness, and I'm not sure whether I'm ready to take that step. But my nieces birthday is coming up, the chances are I'm going to have to sort this out. I'm pretty sure I wont have a close relationship, and I think that this is going to be the elephant in the room, pretty much forever, no matter how much I don't want it to be. But what I do not want is to be fearful of approaching him, and having a conversation. I want to be able to see him, not this big wall of crap from what i view as my previous life.
Basically, reading a book during the past week, (I think it was Dave Magill's) and it got me thinking about something. Basically, if I was walking alongside Jesus, what would it make me feel like? Would I compare myself to him and feel terrible, as I'm pretty sure most would comparing yourself to perfection. Or, something about Jesus' character would make you feel something different.
I'm guessing if you are standing alongside Jesus for that long, you are probably his follower, and the bible says that Jesus, and therefore God views his followers not through their sins, but away from them. In other words, when he sees you, he sees you as a sinless person. Now, I'm not sure if I am jumping the gun, but if that was the case, I think for me at least, it would mean that I am probably going to view myself through Jesus' eyes.
So, back to the start. Thinking about my Dad, have I really forgiven him? I mean, I say I have, and truly believed I had, but yeah, every time I mention him, it is still in my mind the imperfect dad. The sin always gets in the way for me. I know I shouldn't ignore the sin, but I know I should recognise that nobody is perfect... Even now I'm finding it difficult to see what my view should be. Basically, if i ever have to see him, I want to view him as a person, not as the sin.
I don't think I've got that far. It's another layer of forgiveness, and I'm not sure whether I'm ready to take that step. But my nieces birthday is coming up, the chances are I'm going to have to sort this out. I'm pretty sure I wont have a close relationship, and I think that this is going to be the elephant in the room, pretty much forever, no matter how much I don't want it to be. But what I do not want is to be fearful of approaching him, and having a conversation. I want to be able to see him, not this big wall of crap from what i view as my previous life.
12 March 2010
TEEEEEESTIMONY
Hey, my name is Joe, and I’m an Intern at Gateway Church, and I’ve been asked to write my faith. To be honest, my explanation for my faith is so firmly wrapped in my story, I may as well make it easy for myself and write the two as one thing.
Basically, my faith in God started growing in a part of my life where everything was going wrong. I know many people who would say that I believe in God as a crutch of some sort, but the evidence I found of God was more than just my own mind playing tricks on me.
I think that my life has essentially been witness to other peoples problems. I don’t think until recently I’ve done anything stupid or intentionally hurt people. On the more recent note I could have looked after my mum better, but that’s about it. I guess I should start, then.
Oh, and just a warning, if your expecting a light hearted read, probably best not to read the next sentence.
When I was about 3, my dad was accused of sexually assaulting my 8 year old cousin. Of course, I didn’t know all this at the time, as I was 3, but yeah, that’s a start to it all. My cousin Andrew loved my Dad, and although this happened, they were on really good terms, and stuff. My dad wasn’t sentenced, obviously I don’t know that much information, but I know he was viewed innocent.
So, as you can see, my childhood was normal. Well, for me, it was normal, for a long time. Nothing out of the ordinary happened, I enjoyed my childhood. I was probably a bit too shy, not anti social, but yeah, I found it hard to make friends, and I think the worst I got was a few choice nicknames off a few bullies. Nothing bad. I was enjoying life.
The first thing I realised, which started to change that, was my mother throwing my dad out. Apparently, they had argued for a long time, but none of us kids had realised, at all, that they weren’t doing so well. My dad says they split up because of finance, and my mum says they split because of him mentally abusing her.
My dad is in a wheelchair most of the time. He has some sort of physical condition (I never cared to ask) which means that he can’t walk for long periods of time. He’s also got pretty severe epilepsy, which led to numerous times us kids playing pranks on him, switch his newspaper for a kids play book when he was having a fit, and when he came out of it successfully convincing him that he was reading it. And tying his shoelaces together. There's also a good story about my older brother, who at one year old, was taught to say “Daddy Fit” if mum wasn’t in the room when he went under. When this eventually did happen, Ben not only did this incredible thing of crawling across the hall to alert mum, but also crawled around dad, who was on the floor fitting, moving all of the stuff that could have injured dad, like his tea cup, and stuff. He moved them, then alerted mum. Impressive.
So back to the mental abuse. Basically, Dad would force everybody to do loads of outdoor activities, or play musical instruments, or do other stuff. He made everyone do that stuff, and then moaned about the fact that everybody could do that stuff, and he couldn’t. he made mum out to be the bad guy somehow, and he kept going on about how unfair it was, and he basically used his disabilities as an excuse and as a means to wear mum down.
So, dad was gone, and mum, who was his carer, realised that she was free of that job as soon as he had left. Of course, she had been looking after him for a long time she didn’t have any real experience doing anything else, and her own health had started to get bad, so she ended up being a shut in.
But she just stop doing anything. Mum’s always been pretty good with computers, and so sooner or later, she decided that she still wanted to help people, just not dad. So she set up an internet help room, for people with mental illnesses, on a program called Paltalk. As she had issues mentally herself, she quickly realised the best way for her to help herself was to find people online who were going through similar issues as her, and talking about what helps them, and stuff.
But of course when you become friends with people, you start to feel a passion for helping them. She opened her house a few times, letting people from online become lodgers, and it did help, I guess, she got a few very close friends, but of course with anyone, people do have their secrets. It just really does suck for mum that most of the people that she helped had the same secret.
The first Lodger she took in was a person called Simon. Simon, out of everyone who she let in, was different. He was just a guy with a few mental issues. He acted around 15 years old, when he was double that, and he was childish, stubborn, very hard work, a pain in the arse, but still a good friend to mum. He was quite a character. When mum told him he wasn’t allowed to drive he jumped in the boot, and stayed in there until we got home. When the kitchen wasn’t tidy, he’d go psycho. One point he made my brother eat his dinner, after Simon has finished spitting in it. Hey ho, that’s Simon, he’s a lot better now, with a wife and kids down south, doing better, but yeah, we knew what we were getting ourselves into when we took him.
Around the time that Simon left, Dad had got himself into a bit more trouble. Basically, when he moved out, the council re-housed him to a Hostel in Acomb. We visited him every weekend and went to school straight from his place on Monday morning. My mum was pretty good when it came to the children, she tried her absolute hardest from us getting used as a weapon in their divorce. We saw him as much as we wanted, and him being the strict one meant that a weekend a week was just enough for me.
After a year of being kicked out, however, my dad was accused, yet again, of sexually assaulting an 8 year old boy. The boy in question was the youngest person living in the hostel at the time, and he made the allegations after being left in the room for 25 minutes with Dad.
My opinion of whether he did it is different from my brother and sister. They believe his innocence, Me, and my mum, believe he is guilty. When I was on my way to a long weekend holiday in Scotland, the courts told us that they agreed with me and mum. Not only was that the worst holidays I’ve had, it also made mum go into a mental breakdown, and me and by siblings start to argue.
By that time, Iain and James were living with us. Being two guys from the chat room, compared to Simon, I thought they were pretty alright. I instantly attached to James, of which I gave him the nickname Mark, while my brother became best friends with Iain.
I realised that it was a lot easier just to hang around with Mark than anyone else, because for once, I found it easy to talk to him, and he said that I reminded him of himself when he was younger, but yeah, I spent at least 3000 to 4000 hours alone with him, which was worrying, as every now and again, he used to let me sleep in his bed and he asked leading questions, like whether I knew how to masturbate and stuff. As a 13 year old, I thought that was probably out of order, so I told him quite politely to shut up. Being what I call the least successful paedophile I know, he did.
My mum’s mental health was pretty shocking, but Iain became her rock. They were really close friends. Mum realised that Mark used to treat me better than the other two kids, and that led to loads of arguments, of which a lot of them I was there to hear. I didn’t see them because I ran upstairs and slammed the door, and read books to distract me. Mark got kicked out for taking me to a 15 movie at the cinemas, it was one straw too far. I even vaguely remember thinking it wasn’t even a good film.
After that, things started to pick up for a bit. Apart from my sister, who thought that she was being neglected, because I had Mark and Ben had Iain, she did some light drugs, a lot of alcohol, and lied to her hearts content, but yeah, I view that as normal teenage behaviour. I was doing pretty well, although I was a major part of trying to hold my mum together.
My dad eventually was released from prison, and my brother and sister were allowed to see him, as long as they were supervised by someone other than dad at the time. Iain stepped up to the plate because mum couldn’t stand the idea of being in the same room as him.
This lasted for ages, which was OK, I guess. Of course, I didn’t see him; I found it too hard to forgive him, after lying to me, and well, doing all that stuff. I’ve spoken to him once since being in prison, but that is it. My dad also had the habit of spoiling Ben and Vicky, and of course I didn’t get anything. Dad viewed it as “Why should I give him anything if I don’t get to see him.” I thought along the lines of emotional blackmail, them coming home with new games and stuff, while I was getting nothing just because I couldn’t take away my views or morals. Mum couldn’t help make up the difference because dad had left her with all the debts, too.
Vicky’s behaviour steadily got worse, so much so that my mum flipped, and hit her, thus giving Vicky the weaponry against mum she desperately wanted. Vicky wanted to move out no matter what, and being 16 at this time, mum wouldn’t let her. So Vicky got hit, and then told the council, and eventually, they gave her a place to stay. The police were involved, Everyone who was in the house gave a statement, including Iain, about how mum treats us all and stuff, and the police found mum was a good mother, but it was best to let Vicky have her own place.
But, this one action alerted the social services about Iain. It took them a while, but they finally arrested Iain. What for? Have a guess. He was told by the social services at the time that if he didn’t go with the police, we would be taken away. Mum, of course pleaded with him to go with them, telling Iain that he can get help, and she’ll back him. She had no idea about Iain being a paedophile until then, and she didn’t believe the police until she had heard the charges, and the evidence. (Iain was found guilty of sexually assaulting and taking pornographic pictures of over 40 children, 2 of which I will talk about later.)
At this point, mum closed our house from internet lodgers for good. And she also closed herself mentally from everyone else, shutting herself in, throwing her computer out of the house, and smashing it. After realising it still worked, she brought it inside again, and decided she’d go into setting up a help group for people who had been affected by sexual offenders.
So yeah, so far so bad. But, I want to stop here and say that from about when I was 14, Just after my dad was sentenced, I was going to a youth group. It quickly became the only place I felt safe, from all of the heart ache. It became a safe haven for me, that once a week; I could be myself and not be afraid. This building I’m in as I’m writing this is in the offices above the room where I had forged to many happy memories. I’d finally been able to make friends, which I’d say probably was help due to the practice I got with Mark. All of the time, I’d start dating a few people, then stop dating them, going to church, going to Sunday school and going to late night events, filling up my time away from home. I learned all about God, and faith, and I gradually managed to say that I knew a lot of Christianity. But I wasn’t a Christian. I can say that I started having faith there, but yeah, I even probably could have been saved, but I don’t know, just because you know about someone doesn’t mean you know them, right?
This is one last thing about the sad part of my life. This bit happened a few weeks before I was meant to be going to Soul Survivor, a Christian camp, with friends from the youth group.
Me and my brother, sharing a room, were arguing about everything that had happened to us. We essentially were stuck on dad’s innocence. I believed he was guilty, and my brother believed what his eyes told him, that he was innocent. But, at the same time, he believed Iain was guilty. I asked him “Why do you believe that Dad is innocent, and Iain is guilty!?”
He replied with the one sentence which is chilling me to the bones, and is making me cry as I write this. He said “Because Iain did it to me.”
He started crying. I went over to his bed, and I hugged him. We stayed like that for about quarter of an hour. I told him, after I felt like he could handle it, that he needed to go downstairs and tell mum, and I asked him whether he wanted to go alone or with me. He chose alone, and I let him go downstairs. His healing from what happened those years of knowing Iain came from telling people. He was a slave to the secret. Mum, I don’t think will ever recover, or heal fully. Especially as she now views Iain as two different people, as a safety trigger in her head. She cannot join Iain, her best friend, with Iain, the paedophile.
So, with this, and along with Jenny dumping me a few days after, I went to Soul Survivor in the worst mental state I could possibly imagine. But yeah, I talked about knowing of God? Well, at soul survivor, I started to know him.
The first night, in true soul survivor style, 100s of people came to know Jesus, and 100’s of people were healed from suffering, sometimes in big ways, sometimes in small ways. Standing there, seeing over 10 thousand people praying for each other in the big top, I saw the expectation that God was going to do stuff. But what I saw happen in that tent, could not just happen from expectation alone. I saw people speaking in tongues, I saw people crying, others shaking, and a few people reminding me of my dad going in an epileptic fit. From talking to these people the morning after, I knew they had been changed by God, not just having a mass fit, or anything. I believe that it was God, because I also felt it.
The first night, Mike Pilavachi calmly asked people whether they would want to become a Christian. At the time, I did, definitely want to become a Christian, because I’ve been around Christians long enough that they talk about a loving god. I wanted to know this loving god, and more importantly, I wanted to know that he can remove my pain and tell me that everything was alright. So, I went to the front.
I was fine for a while. I saw two of my friends there too, one of which was making the same commitment as me, the other supporting him. I stood next to them. Then, I started crying.
All of the pain, I had felt, came into plain focus. I could see it all like it was happening at the start, I could feel the searing pain of it all, not the dull thumping pain I felt before going to Soul Survivor. But this time it was different. It was essentially, God trying to take them off me. I held on to the pain for as long as possible, because that’s what I thought was my definition. I thought that the pain I had felt was what it meant to be me.
But, I let go. I believe that Gods strength was just a bit stronger than my will. I felt peace, in a long time, knowing that I didn’t have to deal with this crap. And yeah, I felt like I was loved. Whether you view that as God, I don’t care, because although God was silent on me at that time, people noticed at how I had changed. How I continue to change.
Away from Soul Survivor, I have heard God’s voice, in my head, (Wow that sounds crazy, but it’s true) just nudging me on what to do with stuff, how to make decisions. It’s different from my conscious, but yeah. As with all of this stuff, I do find it hard to explain.
My faith is wrapped around my past, just as much as a dust bin surrounds the rubbish inside. My faith has made me stronger, and more secure in who I am, more certain on where I will be going, and passionate about helping people. I know the one and true god, and I also know that he knows me better than I do. He knows who I will become, and I’m glad I can trust him.
Sorry this was so long.
Basically, my faith in God started growing in a part of my life where everything was going wrong. I know many people who would say that I believe in God as a crutch of some sort, but the evidence I found of God was more than just my own mind playing tricks on me.
I think that my life has essentially been witness to other peoples problems. I don’t think until recently I’ve done anything stupid or intentionally hurt people. On the more recent note I could have looked after my mum better, but that’s about it. I guess I should start, then.
Oh, and just a warning, if your expecting a light hearted read, probably best not to read the next sentence.
When I was about 3, my dad was accused of sexually assaulting my 8 year old cousin. Of course, I didn’t know all this at the time, as I was 3, but yeah, that’s a start to it all. My cousin Andrew loved my Dad, and although this happened, they were on really good terms, and stuff. My dad wasn’t sentenced, obviously I don’t know that much information, but I know he was viewed innocent.
So, as you can see, my childhood was normal. Well, for me, it was normal, for a long time. Nothing out of the ordinary happened, I enjoyed my childhood. I was probably a bit too shy, not anti social, but yeah, I found it hard to make friends, and I think the worst I got was a few choice nicknames off a few bullies. Nothing bad. I was enjoying life.
The first thing I realised, which started to change that, was my mother throwing my dad out. Apparently, they had argued for a long time, but none of us kids had realised, at all, that they weren’t doing so well. My dad says they split up because of finance, and my mum says they split because of him mentally abusing her.
My dad is in a wheelchair most of the time. He has some sort of physical condition (I never cared to ask) which means that he can’t walk for long periods of time. He’s also got pretty severe epilepsy, which led to numerous times us kids playing pranks on him, switch his newspaper for a kids play book when he was having a fit, and when he came out of it successfully convincing him that he was reading it. And tying his shoelaces together. There's also a good story about my older brother, who at one year old, was taught to say “Daddy Fit” if mum wasn’t in the room when he went under. When this eventually did happen, Ben not only did this incredible thing of crawling across the hall to alert mum, but also crawled around dad, who was on the floor fitting, moving all of the stuff that could have injured dad, like his tea cup, and stuff. He moved them, then alerted mum. Impressive.
So back to the mental abuse. Basically, Dad would force everybody to do loads of outdoor activities, or play musical instruments, or do other stuff. He made everyone do that stuff, and then moaned about the fact that everybody could do that stuff, and he couldn’t. he made mum out to be the bad guy somehow, and he kept going on about how unfair it was, and he basically used his disabilities as an excuse and as a means to wear mum down.
So, dad was gone, and mum, who was his carer, realised that she was free of that job as soon as he had left. Of course, she had been looking after him for a long time she didn’t have any real experience doing anything else, and her own health had started to get bad, so she ended up being a shut in.
But she just stop doing anything. Mum’s always been pretty good with computers, and so sooner or later, she decided that she still wanted to help people, just not dad. So she set up an internet help room, for people with mental illnesses, on a program called Paltalk. As she had issues mentally herself, she quickly realised the best way for her to help herself was to find people online who were going through similar issues as her, and talking about what helps them, and stuff.
But of course when you become friends with people, you start to feel a passion for helping them. She opened her house a few times, letting people from online become lodgers, and it did help, I guess, she got a few very close friends, but of course with anyone, people do have their secrets. It just really does suck for mum that most of the people that she helped had the same secret.
The first Lodger she took in was a person called Simon. Simon, out of everyone who she let in, was different. He was just a guy with a few mental issues. He acted around 15 years old, when he was double that, and he was childish, stubborn, very hard work, a pain in the arse, but still a good friend to mum. He was quite a character. When mum told him he wasn’t allowed to drive he jumped in the boot, and stayed in there until we got home. When the kitchen wasn’t tidy, he’d go psycho. One point he made my brother eat his dinner, after Simon has finished spitting in it. Hey ho, that’s Simon, he’s a lot better now, with a wife and kids down south, doing better, but yeah, we knew what we were getting ourselves into when we took him.
Around the time that Simon left, Dad had got himself into a bit more trouble. Basically, when he moved out, the council re-housed him to a Hostel in Acomb. We visited him every weekend and went to school straight from his place on Monday morning. My mum was pretty good when it came to the children, she tried her absolute hardest from us getting used as a weapon in their divorce. We saw him as much as we wanted, and him being the strict one meant that a weekend a week was just enough for me.
After a year of being kicked out, however, my dad was accused, yet again, of sexually assaulting an 8 year old boy. The boy in question was the youngest person living in the hostel at the time, and he made the allegations after being left in the room for 25 minutes with Dad.
My opinion of whether he did it is different from my brother and sister. They believe his innocence, Me, and my mum, believe he is guilty. When I was on my way to a long weekend holiday in Scotland, the courts told us that they agreed with me and mum. Not only was that the worst holidays I’ve had, it also made mum go into a mental breakdown, and me and by siblings start to argue.
By that time, Iain and James were living with us. Being two guys from the chat room, compared to Simon, I thought they were pretty alright. I instantly attached to James, of which I gave him the nickname Mark, while my brother became best friends with Iain.
I realised that it was a lot easier just to hang around with Mark than anyone else, because for once, I found it easy to talk to him, and he said that I reminded him of himself when he was younger, but yeah, I spent at least 3000 to 4000 hours alone with him, which was worrying, as every now and again, he used to let me sleep in his bed and he asked leading questions, like whether I knew how to masturbate and stuff. As a 13 year old, I thought that was probably out of order, so I told him quite politely to shut up. Being what I call the least successful paedophile I know, he did.
My mum’s mental health was pretty shocking, but Iain became her rock. They were really close friends. Mum realised that Mark used to treat me better than the other two kids, and that led to loads of arguments, of which a lot of them I was there to hear. I didn’t see them because I ran upstairs and slammed the door, and read books to distract me. Mark got kicked out for taking me to a 15 movie at the cinemas, it was one straw too far. I even vaguely remember thinking it wasn’t even a good film.
After that, things started to pick up for a bit. Apart from my sister, who thought that she was being neglected, because I had Mark and Ben had Iain, she did some light drugs, a lot of alcohol, and lied to her hearts content, but yeah, I view that as normal teenage behaviour. I was doing pretty well, although I was a major part of trying to hold my mum together.
My dad eventually was released from prison, and my brother and sister were allowed to see him, as long as they were supervised by someone other than dad at the time. Iain stepped up to the plate because mum couldn’t stand the idea of being in the same room as him.
This lasted for ages, which was OK, I guess. Of course, I didn’t see him; I found it too hard to forgive him, after lying to me, and well, doing all that stuff. I’ve spoken to him once since being in prison, but that is it. My dad also had the habit of spoiling Ben and Vicky, and of course I didn’t get anything. Dad viewed it as “Why should I give him anything if I don’t get to see him.” I thought along the lines of emotional blackmail, them coming home with new games and stuff, while I was getting nothing just because I couldn’t take away my views or morals. Mum couldn’t help make up the difference because dad had left her with all the debts, too.
Vicky’s behaviour steadily got worse, so much so that my mum flipped, and hit her, thus giving Vicky the weaponry against mum she desperately wanted. Vicky wanted to move out no matter what, and being 16 at this time, mum wouldn’t let her. So Vicky got hit, and then told the council, and eventually, they gave her a place to stay. The police were involved, Everyone who was in the house gave a statement, including Iain, about how mum treats us all and stuff, and the police found mum was a good mother, but it was best to let Vicky have her own place.
But, this one action alerted the social services about Iain. It took them a while, but they finally arrested Iain. What for? Have a guess. He was told by the social services at the time that if he didn’t go with the police, we would be taken away. Mum, of course pleaded with him to go with them, telling Iain that he can get help, and she’ll back him. She had no idea about Iain being a paedophile until then, and she didn’t believe the police until she had heard the charges, and the evidence. (Iain was found guilty of sexually assaulting and taking pornographic pictures of over 40 children, 2 of which I will talk about later.)
At this point, mum closed our house from internet lodgers for good. And she also closed herself mentally from everyone else, shutting herself in, throwing her computer out of the house, and smashing it. After realising it still worked, she brought it inside again, and decided she’d go into setting up a help group for people who had been affected by sexual offenders.
So yeah, so far so bad. But, I want to stop here and say that from about when I was 14, Just after my dad was sentenced, I was going to a youth group. It quickly became the only place I felt safe, from all of the heart ache. It became a safe haven for me, that once a week; I could be myself and not be afraid. This building I’m in as I’m writing this is in the offices above the room where I had forged to many happy memories. I’d finally been able to make friends, which I’d say probably was help due to the practice I got with Mark. All of the time, I’d start dating a few people, then stop dating them, going to church, going to Sunday school and going to late night events, filling up my time away from home. I learned all about God, and faith, and I gradually managed to say that I knew a lot of Christianity. But I wasn’t a Christian. I can say that I started having faith there, but yeah, I even probably could have been saved, but I don’t know, just because you know about someone doesn’t mean you know them, right?
This is one last thing about the sad part of my life. This bit happened a few weeks before I was meant to be going to Soul Survivor, a Christian camp, with friends from the youth group.
Me and my brother, sharing a room, were arguing about everything that had happened to us. We essentially were stuck on dad’s innocence. I believed he was guilty, and my brother believed what his eyes told him, that he was innocent. But, at the same time, he believed Iain was guilty. I asked him “Why do you believe that Dad is innocent, and Iain is guilty!?”
He replied with the one sentence which is chilling me to the bones, and is making me cry as I write this. He said “Because Iain did it to me.”
He started crying. I went over to his bed, and I hugged him. We stayed like that for about quarter of an hour. I told him, after I felt like he could handle it, that he needed to go downstairs and tell mum, and I asked him whether he wanted to go alone or with me. He chose alone, and I let him go downstairs. His healing from what happened those years of knowing Iain came from telling people. He was a slave to the secret. Mum, I don’t think will ever recover, or heal fully. Especially as she now views Iain as two different people, as a safety trigger in her head. She cannot join Iain, her best friend, with Iain, the paedophile.
So, with this, and along with Jenny dumping me a few days after, I went to Soul Survivor in the worst mental state I could possibly imagine. But yeah, I talked about knowing of God? Well, at soul survivor, I started to know him.
The first night, in true soul survivor style, 100s of people came to know Jesus, and 100’s of people were healed from suffering, sometimes in big ways, sometimes in small ways. Standing there, seeing over 10 thousand people praying for each other in the big top, I saw the expectation that God was going to do stuff. But what I saw happen in that tent, could not just happen from expectation alone. I saw people speaking in tongues, I saw people crying, others shaking, and a few people reminding me of my dad going in an epileptic fit. From talking to these people the morning after, I knew they had been changed by God, not just having a mass fit, or anything. I believe that it was God, because I also felt it.
The first night, Mike Pilavachi calmly asked people whether they would want to become a Christian. At the time, I did, definitely want to become a Christian, because I’ve been around Christians long enough that they talk about a loving god. I wanted to know this loving god, and more importantly, I wanted to know that he can remove my pain and tell me that everything was alright. So, I went to the front.
I was fine for a while. I saw two of my friends there too, one of which was making the same commitment as me, the other supporting him. I stood next to them. Then, I started crying.
All of the pain, I had felt, came into plain focus. I could see it all like it was happening at the start, I could feel the searing pain of it all, not the dull thumping pain I felt before going to Soul Survivor. But this time it was different. It was essentially, God trying to take them off me. I held on to the pain for as long as possible, because that’s what I thought was my definition. I thought that the pain I had felt was what it meant to be me.
But, I let go. I believe that Gods strength was just a bit stronger than my will. I felt peace, in a long time, knowing that I didn’t have to deal with this crap. And yeah, I felt like I was loved. Whether you view that as God, I don’t care, because although God was silent on me at that time, people noticed at how I had changed. How I continue to change.
Away from Soul Survivor, I have heard God’s voice, in my head, (Wow that sounds crazy, but it’s true) just nudging me on what to do with stuff, how to make decisions. It’s different from my conscious, but yeah. As with all of this stuff, I do find it hard to explain.
My faith is wrapped around my past, just as much as a dust bin surrounds the rubbish inside. My faith has made me stronger, and more secure in who I am, more certain on where I will be going, and passionate about helping people. I know the one and true god, and I also know that he knows me better than I do. He knows who I will become, and I’m glad I can trust him.
Sorry this was so long.
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