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Thursday's Child
It was 12.20am on Thursday 4 June 1987 - 23 years ago this week. I was kneeling on the carpet in the front room of Grays Pentecostal Church's manse.
The pastor, John Harland, had been helping me for three months to get to this point. And now I prayed a prayer that he'd encouraged me to write myself, that expressed my desire to put my life firmly in the hands of Jesus Christ.
I still have that bit of scraggly paper somewhere upstairs. It represents the most significant signpost of my life - the passing from death into life, from darkness into light, from captivity into freedom.
But Jesus had been working hard to get me to that point - my good mate Malc Makinnon had been praying for me since his own conversion in 1985 - and he's been working hard ever since to take me beyond it! I'm saved, and I am being saved, and I will be saved. I'm an ongoing work of art - a living sculpture - being constantly worked on by my Maker.
 Three days later, on the Sunday, I was baptised by full immersion in water by John and Malc with seven 'baptism candidates' downstairs in the lower hall at Grays Pentecostal Church where they had a walk-in baptistry. It was an incredibly powerful moment in my life - the symbolism of entering the watery grave and emerging to a new life, mirroring the resurrection of Christ. Valerie Diver played 'Jesus Breaks Every Fetter' on the piano and everyone sang along as I came out of the water.
My mum and dad were there to witness the outward sign of my coming to faith, my confession of faith, and my testimony of my journey into faith. That lunchtime, as we tucked into our Bernard Matthews generic roast, I warned my dad that I'd be telling my story.
"Well, that's alright son, it's as if you've been a drug addict or anything like that!" he cheerily - and confidently - said. I gave my mum a quick glance, because she knew the truth.
"Well, actually dad," I falteringly began, "I have..."
"Oh," he responded, slightly aghast. But this was quickly followed by, "But you're all over it now, what what!"
 That evening he said, "Well done!" after I had told my tale of art student excesses, drug addiction and new age weirdness from boarding school to art college to fringe theatre in Brighton (right) to being of-no-fixed-abode in Cornwall to 'coming to my senses'.
Somehow, Jesus - who knows each one of us long before we become conscious of that fact - had steered me through all that spiritual deception into the clear light of his day. And although it felt like I was choosing him, the truth is, I was already chosen by him!
This doesn't mean life suddenly loses all its problems - indeed, in some respects quite the reverse occurs, because one's woken up to the truth - we're in a war and, as Bob Dylan sings, "There ain't no neutral ground".
John 8:32,36 says, "You will know the truth, and the truth will set you free... So if the Son (i.e. Jesus) sets you free, you will be free indeed".
I am just one of millions who can testify that Jesus Christ is - to use Doubting Thomas's words - "My Lord and my God".
How about you?
I'm now 23! My friend Steve Morley was 23 just last week. Happy Re-birthday, Steve.
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Tim Harrold, 02/06/2010 |
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