Graham Denny

What a big subject!

 

I do not consider myself to be 'religious' at all. In fact I find a lot of 'religions' to be counter-productive and often hypocritical.

 

I am, however, a Christian.

 

In my youth I was very anti-church and everything religious. I would argue with anybody about the subject and ridicule those who had faith. I thought 'God' was something people made up to make sense of everything.

 

I didn't ask to become a Christian. I didn't expect to become a Christian. One day it just happened.

I'm one of those people who got 'zapped!'. I thought I was the only person it'd happened to at the time. But then I read of similar experiences throughout history, in every culture, going as far back as St.Paul on that famous road to Damascus.

 

Believe me - if you ever get 'zapped' (which for me was an audible experience I cannot recreate) you will know it, you will be unable to resist it and your life will never be the same.

 

I did however have to accept what had happened to me and try to make sense of this God and Jesus and all the rest, which in the space of one milli-second I changed from knowing it was all rubbish, to knowing it was actually (although I hated to admit it)...true.

 

I can't explain how but I 'knew' things I hadn't known before, I had a real hunger to find out more and things which mattered before (money, status etc) meant very little.

 

From the point of this 'conversion' I've turned life upside down. My biggest thrill in life, which fills me with excitement, is helping and enabling others. So any work I do for others is really a very selfish enjoyment for me.

 

 

 

 

I know religion, faith and all the rest are a real turn-off for many - so with BASIC - Business And Service In Christ - we just do it - we do the Christian work without the building or priest.

In fact, our workers are from many faiths, or often none - but in the sense of the first Christian church in The Acts of the Apostles, we are more of a church in the true sense than many buildings with a cross on their roof.

 

I learnt long ago to give in to the nudges, coincidences and 'God happenings' and to go along with whatever I feel called to do - however crazy, impossible or daft it may seem.

Thats why we have a Youth Worker in Felixstowe, a Food Bank, a real Community resource in BASIC Community Pop-up Shops which now extend into Ipswich. It's also why so many other initiatives have grown.

The seeds are being sown for the future and surely this is enough evidence to show that God is real, is alive and is still working in people's lives right now - even stubborn people like me!

 

If you are an atheist, agnostic or somebody who thinks it's just bizarre please read my book 'It's ALL about YOU!'

It's taken from a neutral perspective and I hope you will read it. Oh, and if you're not a Christian now - but you become one later please let me know!

 

Thanks :)

 

Graham