10. A Rise to Peak Fitness.

Why I had to Switch Churches in 1990.

Between 1975 and 1989, I spent nearly 15 years attending Bracknell Baptist Church. As I said last week, I never sat well with its practical sermons that leaned more on capitalism than on Jesus Christ, even though our senior pastor, Ben Davies, taught salvation by faith in Christ only and the truthfulness of the believer's eternal security.

As more and more graduates filed in during the late eighties, our church building couldn't accommodate the growing congregation. Each Sunday, it spilt into the adjoining meeting room. That means there was a large number of people who partook in the service without facing the front platform. Eventually, we moved to the assembly hall of Garth Hill School. This hall had a larger capacity than the original church building, and we met there for several years while funds were raised to buy the adjoining land next to the church and to build a new meeting venue with a vision of 1,000 seats.

Hence, Sunday by Sunday, sermons were more about money than about Jesus Christ. The verses of Scripture used were mainly from Malachi 3:8-12. Here, if a person or family does not tithe, then they are under a curse for robbing God. And here was the only Scripture where testing God was permitted. Tithe, and God will bless us financially. It was hardly short of the Prosperity Gospel, a heresy often pushed by American televangelists such as Kenneth Copeland and Oral Roberts.

The necessity to tithe, although still voluntary rather than compulsive, made me feel placed under the Law rather than acting under grace. Little wonder, as Malachi 1:1 specifically stated that this Old Testament book was addressed to Israel only, and not to the Church, nor to any of the Gentiles. Hence, over time, I began to feel spiritually hungry, even to the point of practising something akin to the occult. No, not the Ouiga board, but by making a paper pyramid on the exact scale of the Great Pyramid of Egypt, and testing whether it has power to sharpen a razor blade when placed inside, or to turn milk into edible cheese. Oh, if only I knew how to rightly divide the Word of Truth! I wouldn't have gotten myself into this mess.

Before the end of 1989, I decided to leave Bracknell Baptist Church with its obsession with unbridled capitalism. Several months elapsed without any church attendance. Then, in the summer of 1990, one of my friends, Tim Kingcott, invited me to Ascot Baptist Church. I attended an evening service, and I liked it straight away. Its pastor, Barry Buckingham, was enthusiastic about Jesus Christ, his death, burial and resurrection, and that was the tonic I so desperately needed. Immediately, my dabbling with pyramid power ceased.

Hospital Radio Presenter (see below).

The Change of Churches in relation to Work.

Having lost my job at the British Aircraft Corporation, renamed British Aerospace, in 1979, I was unemployed for over a year. In those days, I attended Bracknell Baptist Church. I spent much of that time visiting our local Jobcentre, and indeed, I have found one or two dead-end jobs where I certainly wouldn't want to spend the rest of my life. One of those jobs was at Nurdin & Peacock's, a wholesale warehouse on the edge of Reading. I was there for two months in early 1980.

However, in those days, I was driven by envy of the graduates who attended our church, and with secure, high-tech jobs and a stable income, they were okay with tithing. One graduate, married and with a high income, even judged me for making a stand against tithing. At Nurdin & Peacock's, I was very unhappy. Little wonder that a furious row with the foreman led to my dismissal. Perhaps this graduate was right after all. My inability to hold down a job might be part of the curse of Malachi.

However, during my time at Nurdin & Peacock's, a middle-aged female was passing through, possibly one of their customers. A complete stranger whom I had never spoken to before, turned to me and asked, You're a Christian, aren't you? Despite how I was feeling, I confirmed to her that I was. This was just the encouragement I needed. It's known as the word of knowledge, one of the gifts of the Holy Spirit.

However, after my dismissal from the warehouse, my housegroup leader, frustrated at my failed work life as an employee, encouraged me to go self-employed. Immediately, I liked the idea. I already had some experience in painting and decorating, having painted interior walls with emulsion during the period of unemployment. However, the painting side of the business struggled through its first winter, that of 1981. This was due to a combination of a lack of customers, poor weather for exterior painting of door and window frames, slow work and a lack of proper income. I need to branch out to a far more stable source of income. Domestic window cleaning was the answer.

I went canvassing around the housing estates. I aimed for four streets, one for each week of the month. I managed to collect a small number of clients from all four streets. Thus, I combined domestic window cleaning and decorating, providing a more stable income.

Over the months covering the next two years, I picked up more and more clients in all four rounds. Gradually, each street per week became two, then three. There was no more room for painting and decorating. Instead, window cleaning became my full-time job, stabilising my income and covering the whole working week. I kept this job for the next 35 years, and retired in 2015, at age 63, mainly due to failing health.

Leisure Activities.

In 1981, Tim Kingcott was the crew leader at Radio Heatherwood, an in-hospital broadcasting station tucked away in a large closet under the maternity wards. Run by the League of Friends, each evening, a different crew runs the station. Ours was the Friday crew. 

I joined the Friday crew under Tim's invitation, and each of us went out to the wards to collect requests for each patient's favourite music to be played. Also, each of us had a turn to present. Although officially known as presenters, we called ourselves jocks, short for disc-jockeys.

I concentrated on the maternity wards, both pre- and postnatal. At first, I was assigned just thirty minutes at the console, later extended to a full hour. When Tim had to leave due to his full-time work as an accountant, I took on the mantle of team leadership and, with God's help, led the team to be one of the most popular among the inpatients.

I presented on the Friday crew for five years between 1981 and 1986. On one occasion, I even wore a tie, and this was captured on camera. However, during my time there, the League of Friends announced that there was a shortage of funds, and no one had in mind to close the station. As the 1986 Bracknell Half Marathon was approaching, I set off to persuade my customers to sponsor me to raise funds for the hospital station, as it was run entirely by charitable donations.

In April 1986, I completed the half-marathon, a distance of 13 miles (21 km) in less than two hours, rather slow for men's athletic standards, but successful. I raised enough funds from my sponsors to help sustain the radio station. The completion of half marathons, and I did several of them, led to the sport of triathlon, swim-cycle-run, three disciplines in one race. In the autumn of 1986, after finishing with Radio Heatherwood, I joined Thames Valley Triathletes, based in Reading, and trained to full peak fitness.

1986 Half Marathon.

I also competed in triathlons around Southern England. Venues such as Reading, Eastbourne, Winchester, Essex, Swanage, and other venues drew my competitive attention. Most of these venues involved train travel and overnight hotel stays.

It was while I was in my seven-year of TVT membership that I changed church. This included the period when I had no church to attend. When I eventually started attending Ascot Baptist Church, the set-up was quite different to what it is today. Barry Buckingham, along with his two deacons, Bill Hopkins and Les Draper, wore suits and ties, and each sat at either side of Barry as he stood at the bulky, wooden pulpit to preach. Furthermore, several men wore ties in the mixed congregation. Rather than graduates, Ascot attracted a group of undergrads from Holloway University, a few miles down the road, in the Egham area.

Today, Ascot Life Church has its Sunday morning service at the Paddock Restaurant at the Ascot Racecourse. We moved to this venue in 2013, when our own building, now called The Life Centre, was too small to accommodate the growth of the congregation. Although there is no senior pastor, the church is led by three elders. Two of them are young enough to be my grandsons, and the third is the son of Les Draper, and closer to my age.

Footnote: Last week, I asked whether I had a supernatural vision while I was at work. But I had so much to narrate about this week that I have deferred that to next week.

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Next Week: With faith in God, a life of cleaning windows was much more than mere ladders, a bucket, and a chamois.

9. A Lifelong Effect in Misinterpreting Scripture.

It wasn't all my fault.

After my father ripped his own KJV Bible into shreds and binned it, I bought two new versions: a new KJV and a Revised Standard Version  (RSV). Reading the Bible was frequent, and my knowledge of its contents gradually grew. However, a failure to rightly divide the Word of Truth (2 Timothy 2:15 KJV) led to a life without real peace and assurance of salvation. This was not so much my fault in its entirety, but the failure of the church pastor, elders, or fellow brethren to show me the right way. After all, the Ethiopian eunuch needed the tutelage of the apostle Philip to help him understand the writings of the prophet Isaiah. Such tutelage led to the eunuch's conversion to Christ (Acts 8:26-40).

I have already explained what it meant to "divide the Word of Truth" in my previous blogs in this testimony. Using a cake illustration, it needs to be "cut straight" into slices before consumption. That is exactly what the word "divide" here means. To cut straight into sections.

Thus, in the spring of 1975, I began to attend Bracknell Baptist Church. The pastor, a strong-minded Welsh extrovert named Ben Davies, used the Gospel of Matthew as his favourite text for preaching. His sermons were practical rather than theocratic and were delivered in an authoritative tone. That is, "You heard my message, now apply it." This was also known as mechanical preaching.

Hence, between the years 1975 and 1989, although I attended both the morning and evening Sunday services, along with the Wednesday evening prayer meeting, I never quite sat comfortably at Bracknell as I did in St Jude's. Neither had I experienced lasting peace in my soul with definite assurance of salvation.

This was because Matthew's Gospel (along with Mark and Luke's Gospels) contained the Sermon on the Mount, and an in-depth exposition of the Law of Moses. For example, just being angry with someone without a valid reason is murder, and simply calling someone a fool is in danger of hellfire. And looking lustfully at a woman is committing adultery in the heart. Furthermore, it is more difficult for a rich man to enter Heaven, and one must sell all his possessions, take up his own cross, and follow Jesus for eternal life. Also included is the need to tithe, and fasting is added to prayer. Furthermore, one must forgive the wrongdoer to be forgiven by God, and one must endure to the end to be saved.

All these make up the Gospel of the Kingdom, an earthly kingdom promised to Israel. The nation of Israel is the future Bride of Christ; they are the people of God. This is where dividing, or cutting straight, the Word of Truth, comes in. This may surprise you, as it did with me when I first found out. We are not the Bride of Christ. Israel is the Bride of Christ. We are closer, more intimate. We are the Body of Christ, with Christ himself as the head. From his brain, his spiritual nerve system conveys signals of love directly to each believer. And from his heart, his lifeblood flows directly into each one of us. This Free Grace slice of the cake is set apart from the Kingdom Gospel slice, even though both are God-inspired Scriptures of the one Bible.

Here is a good comparison. I remember our wedding day. It was a moment of both nervousness and joy. She stood by me, I made my vows, she made hers, and we joined as one in holy matrimony. But in life, we are still two separate people. But at my birth, I was born with both my arms and legs. I didn't ask any of my body parts to marry me! As the Body of Christ, we believe in the Gospel of Free Grace. I'm aware that I have already said this, but I love repeating it. In this Gospel, advocated by the apostle Paul, one has to accept as true the death of Jesus Christ on the cross to pay for all our sins, and his burial to prove that he truly died, and on the third day, he rose from the dead, and can save everyone who believes. Once saved, he could never be lost again, as Christ paid for all his sins, past, present and future. He is sealed with the Holy Spirit unto the day of redemption, a guarantee of eternal life.

Indeed, Once Saved Always Saved (OSAS) was advocated by Ben Davies and his deacons; in reality, by mixing the Kingdom Gospel with free grace, I didn't benefit from this sweet truth, despite convincing myself of its truthfulness as well as standing up to anyone who denied OSAS in favour of the idea that salvation is forfeitable. To sum up, I didn't sit that well at Bracknell Baptist Church.  In addition to this, with the arrival of graduates taking up high-tech employment, the church's appearance began to fit the description: The Tory Party on its knees.

During my latter years at Bracknell, a building project was launched, as the number of people began to overspill the main sanctuary and into the adjoining meeting room. Thus, emphasis on tithing and double-tithing was delivered from the pulpit. I felt ill at ease. The main text of Scripture was Malachi 3:8-12, and according to Malachi 1:1, this book, like all the others in the Old Testament, was addressed to Israel, and not to the Church. I felt that the need to tithe placed me under the Law; thus, material and financial blessing from God was earned rather than from free grace already paid for by Christ, his death and resurrection. At the end, I had to leave Bracknell Baptist Church altogether, and I was without a church to go to throughout 1989, into 1990.

The new building, known as the Kerith Centre, is named after the brook Kerith flowing through the ravine in Israel, east of the Jordan River. It opened in 1989 to house the renamed Bracknell Community Church. It is a smaller version of the 7,200-seater Willow Creek Church in Chicago, whose senior pastor, Bill Hybels, knew Ben Davies personally. The Kerith Centre houses 1,000 people.

The old 70s-style Baptist Church co-existed with the Kerith Centre for a short while until funds were raised to demolish the old building. In its place, the K2 was built to house children's meetings during the Sunday services and for midweek meetings. The K2 was named after the world's second-highest mountain, located in the Himalayas, near Mt. Everest.

The Kerith Centre, Bracknell.

In 1990, I joined Ascot Baptist Church under the recommendation of Tim Kingcott, a close friend of mine. At the time, the pastor was Barry Buckingham, now deceased, and his two deacons, Bill Hopkins, who now lives in Florida, and the late Les Draper.

Work and Leisure.

As already mentioned in weeks past, my first job after leaving school in 1968 was an apprentice wood finisher, although the training fell short of a proper apprenticeship. For example, after five years, I still wasn't qualified to spray colour a cabinet. Skilled finishers such as Alf Earl never wanted to pass their skills to the next generation. In 1973, I took on the post of a pool attendant in Reading, where life-saving qualifications were required. After four months, I returned to factory life, but this was very different to the first. At Bardens, the precision engineering workshop specialising in ball-bearing races, I fitted in well as a machine setter/operator. It was here that my growing knowledge of the Bible inspired me to backpack the Holy Land in 1976, just weeks after flying the nest to set up my own home.

Then, just over a year later, in 1977, entrepreneurs such as Freddy Laker, along with his rival, Jetsave, opened the door for economy Transatlantic travel, and for the first time, fulfilled a dream of walking through an American street, swimming in the Great Salt Lake, and standing by the thundering Niagara Falls.

I was settling at Bracknell Baptist Church when, in 1977, not long after returning from America, Barden decided to close its Bracknell branch and move to Plympton, just east of Plymouth in Devon. I, along with most of the other workers, was made redundant.

Soon after, I settled at the British Aircraft Corporation in Weybridge, Surrey. It was the largest company I had ever worked for, with all of its buildings on the site of the disused Brooklands motor racing circuit. While I was there, parts of the original racetrack could still be seen. The job I had was very similar to Bardens', but more challenging, as I learned to machine-shape parts of the aeroplane, including the front wheel axle, with precision. I worked there for nearly two years, between 1977 and 1979. While I was an employee at the Corporation, in 1978, I flew across the Atlantic Ocean for the second time, with the intent of visiting the Grand Canyon. I ended up on an unscheduled hike to the Colorado River and back over two days.

British Aircraft Corporation, Weybridge.

Like at Clarke's, the public swimming pool, and Bardens, at the British Aircraft Corporation, I didn't hide my Christian faith there either.  But still not properly dividing the Word of Truth, the lack of assurance of my salvation began to suppress my keenness to share the Gospel, as I did with greater enthusiasm before. Furthermore, there were young men, fellow employees, who out-argued me to the point that I couldn't give an adequate answer.

Then, in June 1979, I lost my job at the Corporation (which by then was renamed British Aerospace) due to a serious machine error which probably cost the business thousands. The next 14 months, I lived on Unemployment Allowance as I tried to look for work and, at the same time, sustain myself. I was against any idea of the Bank of Mum & Dad, and to be fair, Dad in particular was also against that idea.

Spiritual testing came during this period of unemployment. The trip to Israel in 1976, along with the two trips to North America, rapidly receded into the past. The money dwindled, but the energy bills kept dropping through my door. One morning, the electricity bill dropped through. I wasn't able to pay it. So I laid it flat on the kitchen worktop, and I prayed over it. The next morning, an envelope dropped through. The sender was anonymous, but the contents of the envelope were a cash sum which matched the payment demanded by the bill.

And so, living was scarcely above the breadline during those fourteen months. However, our current church housegroup leader, who, in 1980, ran a high-tech job agency, helped me in setting up my own self-employment business. At first, it was painting and decorating people's homes. However, the business struggled through its first winter, and so, the birth of domestic window cleaning. The business was still ongoing by 2015, when I sold it to a fellow window cleaner and retired at 63, due to deteriorating health, after 35 years of self-employment.

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Next Week: Did this Window Cleaner receive a life-changing supernatural vision?

8. The Effects at Work and Leisure Activities.

 How a Victim of Intimidation Became a Source of Power.

The social structure of Britain in the 1960s was quite different to what it is at present. The class structure was more rigid, and corporal punishment existed in homes and schools. In turn, there was a respect for authority to the point that some school students were terrified of male teachers who wielded the cane. No pupil would dare answer back to a teacher. At home, it was Dad who gave me my share of whacks, mainly for answering back when rebuked. To him, this was not cruelty. It was part of growing up and learning respect for others.

However, at secondary school, I was wise enough to avoid physical chastisement, even if I received my share at the joint infants/junior school. During physical education classes at our secondary school, the boys were split from the girls and combined with boys from another class. From time to time, someone would forget what day of the week it was and leave their gym kit at home. Without an appropriate excuse, such as a doctor's note, the boy was subjected to several strokes, administered with full strength, with the sole of a plimsoll across his buttocks in front and in full view of us all. Each boy's reaction differed. I knew two who just screwed their faces and took the punishment without showing any emotion or tears. But one in particular burst into tears midway through, and pleaded loudly to stop. But the master didn't until the appropriate number was delivered. 

It was this type of scene that stuck with me for life, reminded me what day of the week it was, and made me remember my gym kit. Yet throughout secondary education, I just managed to avoid corporal punishment altogether.

With such an upbringing and what I had seen, I entered the world of work with very low self-esteem. Hence, pushing a broom across the floor each morning wasn't shocking or humiliating at all. Rather, this was something to be expected. In addition to that, I absorbed teasing and smut without any reaction. And the culture in that all-male environment revealed much. That is, with only around twenty employees in the entire furniture factory, many were suffering from low self-esteem, including post-War trauma. I became a pawn or a footstool on whom others used to lift their own egos. I was still working there when, as Christmas 1972 was approaching, I was converted to Christ through the meeting of the Children of God cult in London.

All the other employees were taken aback by my new faith, as I was open about it and never kept it hidden or a secret. With one employee, war veteran Alf Earl, my testimony brought out the worst in him, denying his existence because of a vulgar lack of physical evidence. Other employees showed respect, albeit grudgingly. I was no longer the helpless pawn. Rather, I seemed to have some power residing within me.

However, in 1968, a few months after leaving school and working at the furniture factory, I joined Bracknell Athletic Club and took part in track running in the summer, and cross-country foot races in the winter. However, this didn't erase any of the mockery I had to endure at work. Rather, participation in the sport only added to it. I remained a member of the club for two years, from 1968 to 1970. After 1970, I "returned to the world", as my coach, the late Mike Marlow, puts it.

At 16, (centre), I was a member of BAC in 1969.

However, in 1972, shortly after arriving home from Spain, my first holiday abroad without my parents, I became a member of the Reading Life-Saving Club, based at Arthur Hill Pool in Reading, a large town eleven miles from Bracknell. I attended until the spring of 1973. What we did was exactly what it said on the tin: rescuing a distressed person in deep water by various methods of towing, according to a given situation. This included the extended-arm tow for calm and cooperative victims, the cross-chess tow in rough water, and the chin tow for the violently panicking individual. We also learned the Silvester-Broch method of resuscitation, along with mouth-to-mouth (both of these are now obsolete). Alongside in-water rescue exercises and dry land resuscitation, we also learned A Level human anatomy, especially of the respiratory and circulatory systems.

During these Wednesday evening sessions in 1973, I never kept my faith in Jesus Christ a secret, but I was quite open about it. Through this, I discovered two or three other believing members who have linked their life-saving sessions with their faith. Here, the atmosphere was very different from the furniture factory I was working in. No teasing, no smut, I was treated equally to other members, and there was little or no low self-esteem that had a hold at the factory. By Christmas of 1992, the same time I met the COG movement, I took the Bronze Medallion qualifying award exam, consisting of all three: an in-water rescue demonstration, a demonstration in resuscitation, and my knowledge of human anatomy. I passed the threefold exam, and I was awarded a bronze medallion.

Possessing the medalion has opened the door to becoming a pool lifeguard anywhere in the UK. In May 1973, I left the furniture factory after I was offered a post at the Central Pool in Reading as one of the four patrolling lifeguards during the weekends, and with just one other person during the school term week. It was at the Central Pool that I had to go through in-water rescue exercises under a tall, muscular and bearded duty manager, Mr Birch, whose height dwarfed all of us. A few weeks later, I was transferred to Arthur Hill, where I first trained, and I was the sole attendant of the pool during the working week.

From the post of a lifeguard, by the Autumn of 1973, I switched jobs again. I accepted a job offer at Bardens, a precision engineering factory specialising in ball bearing races. These are the two rings where the solid steel balls roll. I was there from the Autumn of 1973 to the Autumn of 1977, four years in all. The workforce was of both men and women, and a very different atmosphere from that of A.G. Clarke's Furniture. There was no smut, no dirty language, and teasing was light and occasional. Also, a hot drinks vending machine was installed on the shop floor. Attached and facing the street, the management office housed male employees dressed in their business suits, a contrast to our white overalls and a visible manifestation of our class-divided society.

As I learned to use the micro-gauge, I quickly became known throughout the company for my Christian faith, as I insisted that Jesus Christ is the Son of God and that salvation is found by believing in him. During lunch breaks, I made my way upstairs to the open-plan office and testified there, too.

It was while I was at Bardens that I first attended St Jude's in Brixton. Meanwhile, my knowledge of the Bible grew, both the Old and New Testaments. And one location of note was Jerusalem, a location with which Jesus was familiar. He credited the city as that of the Great King. He was crucified there, buried nearby, and on the third day, he was resurrected, proof that he was God, and that he paid for all our sins, opening Heaven to us. 

Having done some backpacking across Europe, especially Italy, I wanted to visit Jerusalem and see the city for myself. By then, I had moved from St Jude's to Bracknell Baptist Church in the late spring of 1975. This was the result of the 1974 Greenbelt Festival, where some friends in St Jude's met some from the Baptist Church, and even in my absence, I was the subject of their discussion.

Bracknell Baptist Church in the 1970s.

Returning to Bardens, by 1976, I was ready to take off to the Holy Land for a three-week holiday. However, the knowledge that I was travelling to the Middle East on my own has stirred astonishment throughout the workforce, both on the shop floor and in the offices. I became "the talk of the town".

However, a year earlier, in 1975, I had changed churches. Under the recommendation of my friends in St Jude's, I walked into this odd-looking building next door to the college in late spring of that year. At the time, the Reverend Ben Davies, a super extrovert, short in height, bearded, and slightly plump in his body build, was regarded as the senior pastor. Under him were four deacons: Dave Prior, Bob Wilson, Alan Lloyd, and Sidney Stevens. As I write this, all four have passed away, although Ben is still alive and has moved back to his homeland, Wales. For the first time, I noticed an adult baptistry built into the church, surrounded by columns which also held up the marquee-like roof. After watching several baptisms taking place there, I too asked to be baptised.

Before the ceremony, Ben wanted me to be approached by three of the four deacons. For the following month, I was to have lunch in the homes of Dave, Sidney, and Bob. This was for each to independently assess whether I was truly converted to Christ and qualified for baptism. All three separately gave their verdict. I was genuine.

That summer of 1975, I stood on the platform to give a brief testimony to the watching congregation. Then, fully clothed, I lowered myself, along with Ben, and he dunked me underwater. Splash! And the symbol of a new life begins.

A year later, in 1976, marked another major turning point. Since the end of 1972, my conversion to Christ has started a rift forming between my parents and me. It accumulated with my father tearing up his own KJV Bible into shreds and binning it in front of me. That Bible sat in his bookcase, untouched since around 1954 or 1955. When I took it out to study and became familiar with it, this nominal Catholic and agnostic was clearly annoyed. And also, I was an embarrassment to his mates, especially on the Creation/Evolution debate.

And so, the time arrived for me to fly the nest and set up home for myself. I was 23 at the time, and two years too young to rent a one-bedroom apartment in Bracknell. But I was just old enough to rent a bedsit at a newly built estate of Birch Hill. I accepted their offer after submitting my work reference. This bedsit was to be my residence for the next 26 years, the launching pad for self-employment, for world travel, our wedding, and also the birth of our first daughter.

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Next Week, Details of Christian growth at Worship, Work, and Leisure.

7. Knocker Men.

During the Months at St Jude's Anglican, Brixton.

I attended St Jude's Church in Dulwich Road, Brixton, mainly between late 1973 and 1975. This, as I emphasised, occurred due to coming across a magazine, Buzz, while searching for a Children of God colony that was recently set up, so I was directed to Railton Road in South London, where I came across, by chance, St Jude's Infant/Junior School.

At St Jude's, I allowed myself to be "deprogrammed" from the beliefs and teachings of the COG cult, and I felt loved and accepted at St Jude's. They described themselves as a "live" church, as opposed to a "dead" church, the latter of which stuck rigidly to its Anglican liturgy in its services, including praying for the Queen, offering virtually no fellowship, and having congregants return home soon after the service ended. I felt discouraged from attending such a church. Especially with the doctrines of David Brandt Berg, whose "Revolution for Jesus" is still fresh on my mind.

Although St Jude's (and most other churches) failed to "rightly divide the Word of Truth (2 Timothy 2:15), I could see their sincere love and belief in Jesus Christ as their Saviour. Dividing the Word means "cutting straight" like a knife through a cake, cleanly separating the whole into two or more parts. Hence, by failing to understand that the Bible has portions written for different people, at different times, and even at different places, meant that I found the "peace which passes all understanding" virtually impossible to attain. Instead, there were times when I had doubts about my salvation, I was prone to worry, and I suffered from an inferiority complex. Having lost my girlfriend in 1972, I wondered whether I would ever marry and raise a family.

So, what do I mean by "cutting straight"? Simply recognising that the Law of Moses, including the Ten Commandments, was given exclusively to Israel. Furthermore, the Decalogue was given to reveal the ten segments of the sinful nature that lies in every human heart, and the need for a Saviour. In the New Testament, the words spoken by both John the Baptist and Jesus himself are, Repent, for the Kingdom of God is at hand. This Kingdom, addressed only to Israel, was meant to be an earthly Kingdom, with Jesus Christ reigning from the throne of his father David in Jerusalem, if Israel accepted him as their King. Instead, the nation rejected him and nailed him to a cross. 

The crucifixion, burial, and resurrection of Christ from the dead ushered in what Paul called "the Mystery", which is the Gospel of free grace of eternal life. This is a free gift from God given to everyone who truly believes, and once received, the believer will never be lost again, for he is sealed with the Holy Spirit and kept by God until the day of redemption. This is the present Church Age, which is mostly for the Gentile world (non-Jews).

This wonderful knowledge was kept from me for many years, actually decades, and no doubt, there were always Christians who, over the centuries, lived and died without fully knowing this truth. But that doesn't mean that they were never saved. I, for one, was an example. I was saved in a pub in December 1972, but the knowledge of "cutting straight" didn't come until 2025. That is a wait of over half a century!

I attended St Jude's until 1975. But to show up at each service, I had to board a train at my hometown of Bracknell for London Waterloo, then travel by tube to Brixton. This became a burden, especially if there are many other churches in between. Those at St Jude's also realised this. 

Then, in 1974, some of those at St Jude's spent a week at the first Bible Week festival held in the Midlands, the Greenbelt Christian Festival. This was the forerunner of the Dales Bible Week, based in the Yorkshire Dales, and later, the Downs Bible Week, based in the South Downs in Sussex. The two I attended were Stoneleigh Bible Week near Coventry, and Spring Harvest, the latter a festival held at the Butlin's Holiday Camp, Minehead in Somerset. All the others required camping.

Greenbelt 1974 was the initial festival held near Ketley, Shropshire. Apparently, my friends at St Jude's camped near some young people from Bracknell Baptist Church, another "live" church, this one in my home town. Although I wasn't there myself, I became the key subject of the discussion that took place between the two groups.

Greenbelt Bible Festival, 1974.

However, despite the "nuisance" train journeys, St Jude's became my home church, and as I have already said, I was treated kindly. In addition to the Sunday services, I also attended Saturday Bible study and their fellowship meals. This was the advantage in those days of living with my parents. Each week, I paid Mum 50% of my wages for food and keep. The rest was mine for both saving up and pocket. Hence, these train trips were within affordability. In 1973, I saved up enough for a backpacking trip to Italy, where I stood on the rim of the crater of Mt Vesuvius and walked the streets of Pompeii.

I also bought myself a HI-FI unit with its two speakers. With it, I began to purchase Gospel music. In those days, they came either on vinyl or on cassette tape. Since I didn't have a record player in those days, I settled for the cassette tape. One cassette was the one I liked most of all. It was Come Together, by Jimmy & Carol Owens, and released in 1972. I also had other cassettes by the same singers, Tell the World, Show Me, and If My People. These recordings featured the singer Pat Boone. Another cassette I had was Scripture in Song, by David and Gale Garratt, and Praise the Name of Jesus, a music album also by David and Gale Garratt, with bird tweets in the background. These cassettes I still have to this day, but long in disuse.

The original album of Come Together.

Knocker Men.

One afternoon in 1974, I had just completed my morning shift, and I was at home with my father, who was already annoyed with my new faith. Himself a self-confessed agnostic, he still believed that the Roman Catholic church was the place to be for any religious veneration. His biggest headache I created for him was my abandonment of Darwinian Evolution and all the science and university graduations that went with it, to embrace Divine Creation with the worldview that the heavens and the earth, and all life on it, were created in just six literal days, as recent as 6,000 years ago. This alone has created a chasm between Dad and me. Especially with any hint that the Dinosaur and Mankind co-existed.

That afternoon, there was an unexpected knock on our front door, and when Dad answered it, he saw two young, smartly dressed men, of about my age, standing at the door. They identified themselves as Jehovah's Witnesses. For my father, this wasn't his first encounter with them. When I was little, Dad had a discussion with a couple of Witnesses while we lived in Pimlico. From them, he was given a King James Bible, complete with cross-references and even the date on which the events took place, dating back to 4,004 BC.

But Mum shouted angrily at him, If you have these two in again, I swear, I will divorce you! Mum was nominal rather than devoted; she still had an unwavering loyalty to her Catholic faith, a promise she made to her mother shortly before emigrating to England from Italy in 1950.

However, during our discussion, I became friendly with one of them, Paul. We were both of the same age, and we had much in common. We both wanted to get to know God better. And so, he invited me to his parents' home, less than a couple of hundred metres from our home. Here, Paul had his mate with him, and they led me to a Bible study.

The Watchtower Society of Jehovah's Witnesses is another cult, like the COG. However, their chief heresy was their denial of the Trinity, and Jesus Christ was the Son of God, and not God the Son. That is, Jesus was a created creature, inferior to the Father, who has begotten him without a mother, and was given the name Michael before his incarnation. Hence, their use of the term, the only begotten Son. If Jesus wasn't God incarnate, then his role of Saviour was reduced to the point that salvation is earned by hard work. That is, door-to-door evangelism, separating the "sheep" from the "goats". Also, once saved, always saved is denied, and one's endurance is required to be saved. With the deity of Christ denied and reduced to an archangel who was impaled on an upright pole, and not crucified, man is left to be his own saviour.

During the discussion, I instinctively stood up for the Trinity, and without any training or tutelage, I managed to defend the Trinity. Neither side was convinced, and the argument ended in a tie. They would not accept the truth of the Trinity, and I refused to accept Christ as a mere archangel. That is, until Paul's father arrived home. He didn't throw me out. Instead, he completely demolished me in his attempt to convince me of his denial of the Trinity, and our discussion ended.

But I took home a couple of Watchtower books. One of them was The Truth which Leads to Eternal Life. This was the book used in initial Bible studies for conversion. As I read it while alone in my bedroom, Dad came in with a strong rebuke, saying that in no time, I'll be converted to a Jehovah's Witness. With that in mind, he took the Bible I was reading, the very Bible given to him by a Jehovah's Witness when I was little, and in front of me, he tore it to shreds and binned it.

I was almost paralysed with shock! But I said nothing. Instead, I bought a new Bible for myself, a Revised Standard Version for easier reading and understanding. I also bought a beautiful black leather-bound King James Bible, and with this, I could compare text in different versions. The leather-bound Bible had a central cross-reference, an Index to the Bible at the back, along with a Concordance. Finally, a series of maps completed the book. To me, it was a treasure.

Another book I felt compelled to buy was Nestle's Interlinear Greek-English New Testament. The discussions I had with the JW included John 1:1, which in the KJV, reads, 

In the beginning was the Word, and the Word was with God, and the Word was God.

The Watchtower Society had its own version of the Bible, The New World Translation. In it, John 1:1 reads, ...and the Word was a god.

Also, with their denial of the Holy Spirit as the third Person of the Trinity, and depersonalised as a mere active force, he was written without capitals in the NWT. Thus, I felt that the need for the Interlinear Greek-English New Testament was a necessity, and with it, I managed to learn how to read basic Greek.

The study made an impact on my life, and furthermore, on my colleagues at work. In the spring of 1973, I terminated my employment at A.G. Clarke's furniture factory to take on employment as a lifeguard at the Central Pool in Reading. However, by autumn, I switched to the Barden Corporation, a factory specialising in precision engineering. On the shop floor, I began to make an impact on my work colleagues, and the office staff did not escape, either.

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Next Week, how my testimony made an impact at work.

 

6. An Encounter During a Storm?

What was life like inside a cult? 

I couldn't say exactly when I found myself standing in front of St Jude's Primary School on Railton Road, Brixton. But I say a good several months, maybe even approaching a year, after my first encounter with COG at the Strand. Yet even as I sat in the primary school hall, with a magazine on my lap, I recall that rainy night I met these two young men who approached me to ask what I thought about Jesus Christ.

Most would have responded that this was none of their business, and quickened their footsteps to widen the distance between the enquirers and the enquired. But not me. Instead, feeling downhearted and wanting some attention, I responded positively, and I was converted to Christ in a pub.

As I sat on the chair and waited for the show to begin, I read the main article in the Buzz magazine, and I felt nostalgic for that fateful evening. However, I was curious to read the main article with a title that put in a clear rebuke to the statement: David "Moses" Berg was the "David" fulfilling the prophecy of Ezekiel 34:23-24, which reads:

And I will set up one shepherd over them, and he shall feed them, even my servant David; he shall feed them, and he will be their shepherd. And I, the LORD, will be their God, and my servant David a prince among them; I, the LORD, have spoken it.

The real David here could well be the resurrected king of Israel, the youngest son of Jesse, who reigned around 1,000 BC. But the writer of the article attributed him to Jesus Christ himself, after his second coming, to reign on his father David's throne in Jerusalem. But one thing is certain: this character was not David Brandt Berg!

As the number of his followers grew, David "Moses" Berg began to see himself as a kind of Messiah. He laid down strict rules for all his disciples. In my day, there were several sources of literature, all authored by Berg. One was titled Letters from a Shepherd, and on its cover was a shepherd's staff held in front of a distant range of high mountains. This presented a vastly different environment to the disused factory in Bromley, let alone the slums of London's East End! 

Then there were the Mo Letters, ot tracts handed to the public. On one of them was a line drawing of a young, naked female, apparently a seamstress, condemned in Hell, forever operating a sewing machine without producing anything. Her well-rounded breasts were specific in detail and beauty. Yet, I was convinced that this was created by a genuine man of God and must never be questioned.

A play with words was another feature in Berg's tracts. In one of them, he gave vivid details of the word "hole", from the recess in the Earth's crust filled with the ocean, to the female genitalia and its function. More emphasis was given to the latter than the former. He then transliterated "Hole" to "Holy", and then went on about the Holy Spirit. By believing that the author was close to God's heart (but not as a messiah), I absorbed everything he wrote as authentic and Biblical. Berg's use of the female genitalia to emphasise the Holy Spirit was pointed out in the Buzz article, and having possessed the original tract, slowly, a light began to shine within my soul, exposing the deception.

The above-mentioned literature was available to the public, but there was one that was kept strictly within the organisation. And that was The Revolutionary Manual. This was a booklet containing "classes", again authored by Berg. Studying this, one gets the impression of a radical form of orthodox, or mainstream Christianity. The first lesson was about salvation by free grace, and very unusual for a cult, Once Saved Always Saved was advocated. The second class was about being filled with the Holy Spirit. The third is about the Bible being the inspirational Word of God. Others followed, one about forsaking all to be Christ's disciple, another on street witnessing, another on daily tasks. Scripture references were sprinkled liberally within the text, and the new recruit was quickly brainwashed by the cult, believing that this organisation was setting out to achieve what the churches had failed in their mission over the centuries.

St Jude's Primary School, Railton Rd, Brixton.

The danger with this radicalisation was that there was no rightful dividing of the Word of Truth, as Paul instructed Timothy (2 Timothy 2:15). The mixing of Salvation by free grace through faith in Christ Crucified, and Discipleship, which was voluntary service to Christ's ministry. This led to a two-tier salvation. A believer who hasn't forsaken all, although he has eternal life, will still be shut out from the glorious New Jerusalem described in Revelation chapters 21 and 22. Instead, he will spend eternity free from Hell but still with regret. A "limited torment". Also, to note, there was no Communion, no Lord's Supper, nor any doctrine of the Trinity or other key Christian doctrines. As already mentioned last week, any contact with the home family was forbidden. Also, nobody claimed any property as their own. Instead, everything was equally shared by all in the colony.

Hence, in the decades that followed, I questioned my salvation and wondered whether I was really saved. Those were the years when I lacked the "peace that passes all understanding". Mixing free grace with the conditions of discipleship made evangelism very difficult, thus compounding the problem when I read about or hear sermons on the Great Commission.

How Buzz began the road to Delivery.

On that Saturday evening, whilst I was waiting for the show to begin, I was reading the main article featured in that particular edition of Buzz, a magazine published by the Church of England, and found by random on one of the unoccupied chairs in the school room. It just lay there and was ignored by others assembling in the room. It was as if whoever placed it there had the foreknowledge that I would turn up while trying to find a COG colony at Railton Road.

However, by reading and digesting the article, a ray of light shone within, indicating that David "Moses" Brandt Berg was not the supposed messiah he claimed to be. What if he wasn't after all? Would I accept the mainstream church as of God, after vigorously denouncing them over the past months?

This was difficult to accept. However, some lads of my age, including the Youth Leader, welcomed me with open arms. Each one spoke kindly, as if each had a genuine interest in me and my affairs. However, in response, I railed at them, accusing them of being "milk and water Christians" and having no idea about discipleship. Yet, even from Scripture, they showed me where I had gone wrong. Furthermore, I saw agape love in them, and, shown to me. I was taken aback. Then, one of them asked if I would like to go to his home nearby. When I said that I wasn't local, he offered a bed for the night. This kind of hospitality I was already used to, after sleepovers at Sandra's, the family home of my ex-girlfriend.

These people were of St Jude's Anglican Church at Dulwich Road, which was across a housing estate from Railton Road. Even from Railton Road, the steeple of the church could be seen. I recall my first visit to one of their evening services. As I sat through the liturgy, I, at first, felt embarrassed. I was taught by COG to despise such a place. And so I did throughout the months past. Yet, they accepted me for who I was, and for an Anglican Church, the minister, Dennis, believed in the Eternal Security of the Believer, as the COG members did. This alone helped me to settle in, and I made St Jude's my regular church, even if it meant a train from Bracknell to London Waterloo, then by tube to Brixton. Because of the travel, I could only attend the evening services.

St Jude's Anglican Church, Brixton.

Sadly, although the building is still there to this day, it ceased to serve as a church in 1980, and later was used as a furniture warehouse. The attendees of St Jude's then merged with nearby St Matthew's Church, on Brixton Hill.

One Stormy Night...

During childhood and adolescence, I grew up as a fan of the Dinosaurs and Darwinian Evolution. Before my conversion towards the end of 1972, I had always rubbished religion and any ideas of Divine Creation. As a boy, I took out the double-page colour illustration of an ancient jungle featuring a Brontosaurus from the Look and Learn, a weekly periodical published for schoolchildren, and taped it on the wall immediately above my bed headboard. Even after my pub conversion, I still heartily believed in Evolution, and the theory that Dinosaurs existed over 60,000,000 years before the advent of mankind.

One evening, I was alone in the house, as my parents and younger brother all went out for the evening. By then, I was already attending St Jude's. I was alone, and outside, a thunderstorm rolled. This was a good opportunity to read my father's Bible, and, curious, I turned to the very beginning, to the first chapter of Genesis.

I read the first three chapters, while mentally, I was begging Adam and Eve not to eat the fruit from the Tree of the Knowledge of Good and Evil, and to try to be like the gods. My tension turned to disappointment when I read that they did eat the fruit. I looked up into the living room, where I was sitting. Although I couldn't see or hear him, I felt as if the Lord was standing right there, in front of me. He was offering me a choice. Either believe what I have just read, or carry on believing in Evolution. Which will I choose? There was no middle ground.

Without hesitation, I immediately believed the Biblical record as history. From that moment, I repudiated all theories of organic Evolution and embraced Divine Creation, the Fall, and the Noachian Deluge.

Little did I know back then that this was another major turning point. It has opened the door to a higher level of education and to future opportunities for World Travel, including the Holy Land.

However, this was also the cause of a widening family split.

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Next Week: Drifting from family life, and a shocking incident.

5. A magazine on an unoccupied chair.

The Next Day, and the Months that Followed.

Unable to sleep in an unusual environment, I was lying on one of the mats assigned to me in a row of mats lined side by side in the canteen of a disused jam factory, just two blocks from Bromley North terminus station. As the night gave way to a weak December dawn, gradually, a mural of the Pied Piper began to consolidate on the wall nearest to where I was sprawled. 

As I stared at the motif, my mind went back to the last 12 hours or so. I recall approaching the Lyceum Ballroom just off Waterloo Bridge. The humiliation I felt when I was turned away by the two doormen, and then encountered these two young men on my way to Sundown's, a nightclub on Charing Cross Road. With these two guys, I boarded a train at Charing Cross Station to Bromley North. When we arrived at the factory, I saw the placard fixed on the front facing the street, bearing the words,

For God so loved the world, that he gave his only begotten Son, that whosoever believeth in him should not perish but have everlasting life. John 3:16.

Over the door was a smaller glass panel. On it were childish lettering: Children of God.

By full daylight, we were all told to arise and get ready for breakfast. We lined up to receive our plates from the kitchen hatchet, like at any works canteen. Two men were in front of me in the queue, and they turned to hug each other. Then, one of them, a tall individual with the name Vessel, embraced me.

Something happened in me. I have never been hugged in my life, neither by my parents nor any of my friends. Yet this stranger hugged me. What is this new faith all about? Could Vessel see me as someone of worth?

However, after breakfast, I was preparing to return home when Paul and Corinthian stopped me, and insisted that I remain. But they didn't bank on my determined character, which I developed while working in a rough-and-tumble, all-male environment of a family-owned furniture factory. 

The reason why I had to return home was that, had I stayed, my parents would have reported me missing, and the police would have gotten involved. I had already spent one unscheduled night away, and that wasn't the first time, as sleepovers at Sandra's home in Wimbledon happened frequently.

But this was one lesson I quickly learned at the COG cult, that David Berg has forbidden any contact between his followers and their families. This he has gotten from what Jesus taught in Luke 9:61-62:

And another also said, Lord, I will follow thee; but let me first go bid them farewell, which are at home in my house. And Jesus said unto him, No man, having put his hand to the plough, and looking back, is fit for the kingdom of God.

Learning these verses as a new convert was a shock, and has made me doubt the character of Jesus. Was he really the Saviour? Or does it involve work on our part, which is a natural human instinct?

However, COG's most centrally used verse is found in Luke 14:33. which reads: Likewise, whosoever he be of you that forsaketh not all that he hath, he cannot be my disciple.

This conveyed the idea that, because I decided to return home that Sunday morning, Jesus had given up on me and judged me as unfit for the Kingdom. Since I own things and have money in the bank, all these things that are rightfully mine must be given up and handed over to the cult, including my bank account. This is in accordance with Acts 4:34-35:

Neither was there any among them that lacked, for as many as were possessors of lands or houses sold them, and brought the prices of the things that were sold, and laid them down at the apostle's feet: and distribution was made unto every man according as he had need.

To rub it in further, the story of Ananias and Sapphira is quoted, threatening death to anyone who lied to the apostles, holding back some of their money, and declaring their full price (Acts 5:1-11). Indeed, the homeless tramp sleeping in the street is to be envied. He'll be the greatest in the Kingdom of God.

COG in the UK had two double-decker buses.

After arriving home, I started reading Dad's Bible, given to him by a Jehovah's Witness back in the fifties, when I was little. I studied the Gospels of Luke and John, and I couldn't understand the apparent contradictions between believing in him and the conditions of discipleship. And this was the error, possibly deliberate, promoted by COG. Not rightly dividing the Word of Truth.

Salvation by grace alone and discipleship are mutually exclusive. Salvation is a free gift from God to the believer through faith in the finished work of Christ on the cross. Discipleship, on the other hand, is a voluntary serving with rewards at the end. Eternal life is a free gift. Rewards are earned through faithful service. But the followers of David Berg didn't tell me that. Hence the confusion. Having "put my hand to the plough and looking back", I found it difficult to believe that God was interested in me.

In the weeks that followed, I journeyed to Bromley every week to be with COG's members. I was welcomed but not received as a member. However, my conversion began to have an impact on my work colleagues.

One morning in 1973, I brought in the Gideons' New Testament to work. It was a small pocket-sized book which I was able to keep on my person throughout. It was given to all of us at school, but it had been kept away until that morning. My foreman, Bill, the one who had put me in my place on the bottom rung, literally blushed when I showed him the book. He looked to be afraid of it. But I wasn't. Suddenly, it seemed that this small fry had achieved some power. Even Alf reacted.

One afternoon, we were discussing a documentary programme shown the previous evening on TV. It was about a 4,000-year old corpse of a Chinese preserved in ice, and remaining fully intact. Then all of a sudden, in front of me, he said, At least we know this Chinese existed. As for Jesus Christ, they never even found one of his b***s!

I gasped at such blasphemy, and apparently, the others in the workshop did too. However, the word of my conversion spread throughout the whole factory, and I was treated with greater respect. However, I wished that I responded with, Of course, they were never found. After three days, he rose from the dead. And his whole body was resurrected! How I could kick myself for remaining quiet, but I admit, I was frozen in shock.

For several weeks, I travelled alone to Bromley. Back then in the seventies, at weekends, trains were direct to Bromley North from Charing Cross. During the working week, trains bound for Bromley departed from Cannon Street. Nowadays, one has to change trains at Grove Park for the Bromley branch line.

One Saturday, I was told that either the whole colony or part of it had moved to a townhouse near Portobello Road in the Notting Hill area of Central London. I found the address and spent the night at the townhouse. It was during this time that I envied these people. They were the true disciples of Christ. I wasn't. They were to get glory. I was lucky if I was saved. Having grown up as a Catholic, understanding the love of God through free grace was already difficult. Indeed, God knows whose his favourites are. You must forsake all and be wholly committed to the group. Any affection for family members at home demonstrates a lukewarm form of discipleship Christ isn't interested in. It was here that I made up my mind to join COG as a full-time member.

Children of God colony in full morning praise.

The following morning, the leader of the colony appeared, a burly chap with a beard. After explaining how I felt about joining, he took one look at me and ordered me off the premises. An Englishman, he probably thought I was gay, and he didn't want my type to be around. So I went home.

However, on another Saturday, I walked through Leicester Square when I encountered some COG members at a stall, dishing out Mo Letters to the public. Mo Letters are literature written by David Berg, who was given the name Moses by the Children, after bringing them out of the USA with the conviction that God is about to destroy America. Mo is the shortened version of Moses.

After asking if they were still based in Notting Hill, one of them directed me to Railton Road, Brixton. I was instructed to find a house with a placard outside, addressing who they were. A tube train ride later, I alighted at Brixton, a terminus of the Victoria Line, and made my way through the High Street to Railton Road. I walked its length slowly and carefully, checking every house on this rundown street. No placard. Nowhere was one to be seen.

Eventually, I arrived at an infant/junior school at the far end of Railton Road, towards Herne Hill. Some young men were standing outside. I approached one, Chris, the youth leader, and asked him where the COG colony was. Next to him was David, a tall, lanky fellow who was to become my new friend. At my request, Chris gave me a look, then invited me inside the school. In a large room, chairs were arranged, theatre-style, and some young people were already gathering for a film show that was soon to begin.

There was one unoccupied chair, and I was directed to it. On it, as if by random, was a magazine. Curious, I picked it up.

The magazine was titled Buzz, and it was published by the Church of England. On the cover was a photo of two beautiful women. One was Faith, the daughter of David Brandt Berg. She is pictured saying to the other:

EZEKIEL 34 IS REFERRING TO MY FATHER.

At the foot of the cover, in smaller lettering, were the words,

The Truth about David 'Moses' Berg and the Children of God Movement.

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Next Week: Did the Lord visit me in our home lounge?

4. A Bible - In a London Pub.

A Recap.

In the last three blogs, I have shown what I believe in the Christian faith, my 20-year experience living in the fifties and the sixties, and also a brief history of David Brandt Berg and the Children of God movement. It was around 1970 or 1971, while I was still living with my parents, that I saw a school classmate with his wife and pushing a pram with their newborn, awake and waving his arms as babies do. This was between two and three years after I left school in 1968 to enter the world of work. This was the age when singleness was frowned upon, and courting couples, barely out of their teens, were commonplace in the High Street.

While I was at work at a family-owned Period furniture factory, in the wood finishing department, I was firmly put in my place. Each morning, I had to sweep the floor, and I had to endure smut and strong language that would have embarrassed the hardest trooper. Those five years followed my schooldays when I was under compulsion to dress smartly at weekends, while my colleagues enjoyed some dress relief in their casuals.

In the spring of 1971, I met Sandra at the Hammersmith Palais ballroom (which closed for good in May 2007). She was a little older than I was and wore glasses. I was surprised when she showed up for our first date outside the ballroom. For a year, we began courting, with marriage in mind, so that I could shed my single status and be on equal footing with the classmate I passed on the street. But at ages 18-19, I was still too immature to take on marriage responsibilities. I was more interested in Travel; she wasn't, and eventually we clashed. Then, in April 1972, after a disagreement, she terminated the relationship. That day, I boarded the train home from London. Alone in the off-peak carriage, I shed tears as the train sped. The crazy thought that I would spend the rest of my life as a singleton was very nearly fulfilled. I didn't pair up again with anyone for the next 27 years.

1972 was the same year I flew out to Spain. This was the first holiday abroad without my parents. The original booking was with Sandra. But with our relationship terminated, I called my college friend, Andrew, to replace Sandra. I even shed tears in his presence. But he was pleased to accompany me, even if his fees were paid by him without any refund from Sandra's booking.

After we returned to the UK, we went our separate ways. That autumn, I joined Reading Life Saving Club, which met at Arthur Hill Baths and swimming pool (closed for good in 2016) and learned how to rescue a person in distress, human anatomy, and to practice resuscitation. By December, shortly before Christmas, I took the qualifying exam, consisting of both in-water and college theory on human anatomy and resuscitation. By passing the exam, I received the Bronze Medallion Award, which qualified me as a poolside lifeguard anywhere in Britain. In the spring of 1973, I left A.G. Clarke & Sons to take on a new post as a poolside lifeguard. At first, I was posted at Reading Central Pool, then afterwards, I was transferred to Arthur Hill's, the very place where I first trained.

Arthur Hill Baths, Reading. I trained in Lifesaving.

Interior of Arthur Hill's. Here, I was a Lifeguard.

The Pub on the Strand, London.

Despite passing the life-saving exam in Reading, at other times I felt sad and unfulfilled. Week by week, I spent Saturday evenings at various venues. These include Snoopys, an underground discotheque at Piccadilly Circus (now non-existent), the Empire Ballroom at Leicester Square (now a casino), and Sundown, a nightclub near Tottenham Court Station (also long gone). Then there was the Lyceum ballroom just north of Waterloo Bridge. Lately, I have been attending the Lyceum ballroom (now a theatre) due to easier access to Waterloo Station, just across the River Thames.

One wet Saturday, 9th December, I looked more like a drowned rat as my long hair was dripping wet. Dressed in a thick winter coat, I approached the Lyceum doors. Two doormen stood, one at each side. The slimmer of the two blocked the entrance by stretching his leg across the open doorway. The other, of a rounder build, told me to scarper. When I asked why, he pointed to a noticeboard which announced that no reason is given for refusing admission.

Feeling humiliated and embarrassed, I made my way back towards Trafalgar Square in the drizzle. My destination was Sundown's on Charing Cross Road, almost next to Tottenham Court Road station. With Charing Cross Station in sight, I was approached by two young men of approximately my age. One, a tall Caucasian named Paul, the other Oriental, who called himself Corinthian. They stopped me and asked me about Jesus.

At first, I resisted them, announcing that I was a Catholic. But they persisted. Perhaps in need of attention after my humiliation, I noticed a pub across the road and tucked away in a quadrangle near the Savoy Hotel. I invited these two in with me.

The pub was warm and cosy, the ideal retreat from the wintry weather outside. The two left me to buy the round of drinks. This was part of their mission: to rely on outsiders to sustain them. And that includes train fares. They were literally obeying what Jesus instructed his followers before dispatching them,

Take nothing for your journey, neither staves, nor scrip, neither bread, nor money; neither have two coats apiece. Luke 9:3 KJV.

Once seated in the pub, Paul pulled out a Bible, and a KJV at that. I was taken aback! A Bible in a pub?

I thought that the Bible had to do with church, not a pub. He then bade me to read verses from the Gospel of John, especially 3:16. He then turned to Revelation 3:20, which I felt was odd, for this verse didn't seem to fit with the others.

I momentarily looked away and towards the ceiling. I thought,

If I were admitted into the ballroom and did not meet these young men, I wouldn't have been shown these Bible verses. God is involved here, keeping me out of the ballroom.

At this very moment, I believed. God was involved here by using those two doormen at the Lyceum. At that moment of faith, I was saved from Hell, regenerated, and became a child of God destined for Heaven. Right there in a London pub. Paul then asked me whether I would like to ask Jesus into my heart in accordance with Revelation 3:20. I bowed and prayed what many would call the "sinner's prayer".

Paul and Corinthian thought that my prayer brought salvation. Indeed, I have read testimonies on how praying this prayer has changed many lives. But in truth, the prayer itself does not initiate salvation. To believe in Jesus Christ does. As Paul the apostle wrote to the church in Rome:

How then shall they call on him in whom they have not believed?

And how shall they believe in him of whom they have not heard?

And how shall they hear without a preacher?

And how shall they preach except they be sent? Romans 10:14-15a.

Here is the sequence:

A preacher is sent and preaches to the unsaved.

The unsaved person hears the Word of God.

He believes and is saved.

He can then call upon the Lord as a saved believer.

The case of Cornilius and his house was a classic case. While Peter was still preaching to them, suddenly the Holy Spirit fell on all of them in an instant. There was no "sinner's prayer". Instead, they believed without a word spoken, Acts 10. 

Paul and Corinthian referred to me as a Babe in Christ as we finished our drinks. They then began to introduce me to the Family, a group of Christian men and women living together as a community. With the help of photos of happy-clappy people, all around my age, I eventually agreed to go with them to the colony in Bromley. Fortunately, I had some spare cash, as the two admitted they had no means of returning.

We headed for Charing Cross Station, and I bought three one-way tickets to Bromley North Station, as instructed. We boarded the train, and soon afterwards, a large group of the Family began to fill the carriage before the train pulled out. A couple had guitars, and as they settled, they began to sing praises to God to the tune of the guitars. In a public train! I was astonished. I have always associated "religious" music with the church organ. But a guitar...

It looked as if I was the only "Babe in Christ" on that train. If so, then how did the rest of the Family get their tickets to board the train without the convert's money? The only answer I could think of was that they had return tickets already on them. If so, then why did I buy tickets for Paul and Corinthian?

After a fairly long journey, the train terminated at Bromley North Station. We all alighted and walked across a couple of blocks to what looked like an abandoned factory. On the front face was a large sign with John 3:16 on full display. Over the door was a smaller glass panel with childish lettering, "Children of God".

We went in through the reception room into the deserted workshop. It was here that the machinery making jam was located, but the chamber now stood empty. A corridor led into what used to be the canteen, a room almost as large as the shop floor itself. Unlike the main factory, this room was lively with men and women of my age, tables and chairs. At the far end was a group of hippies, around three or four of them, deep in sleep. Had they just flown in from California, then it would have been very difficult to imagine such a group on board a Silverwing transatlantic flight to the UK, dressed the way they were, and served by stewardesses. Such a contrast to flying back in those days. Very expensive, and sitting with posh, smartly-dressed ladies and gents.  They were left undisturbed while the rest of us sat around a table. From an adjoining kitchen, food was served.

Some time later, a row of mats was laid on the floor, each one side by side, dormitory-style and forming a row which took up the length of the room. I was assigned a mat, and I lay on it, fully clothed. Then it was lights out.

I slept poorly, as I usually do in a strange environment. As the new morning began to break, gradually a shape was beginning to appear on the nearby wall. Being December, it got light rather late, and the image took a long time to consolidate into an easily recognisable figure. It turned out to be a colourful life-size mural of the Pied Piper leading some children to a mountain. Back then, I never knew that the very dormitory I spent a near-sleepless night in was once rented out to a nursery.

In another sense, the Pied Piper was warning me of danger. But, of course, I didn't know that - yet.

Somewhere, totally out of our sight but not far away, the founder, David Brandt Berg, was committing incest with his own daughter, Faith.

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Next Week, the magazine will be on the chair.