Sadly, my earliest memory is of my parents fighting. At the age of three they divorced and I moved with my Dad to mid-Wales. My Mum eventually remarried and went to live in Buckinghamshire. My two other brothers came to live with us and although Dad did everything cheerfully for us, we all found it very hard only seeing Mum three times a year (in the Christmas, Easter and Summer holidays).

My Mum had become a Christian at 17 but had gone away from the Lord. Wonderfully however, she rededicated her life to Christ and began to help with the catering at Young Peoples Christian Camps each summer. We would go with her and would hear the message of the Bible that Jesus Christ came into the world to save sinners.

On the second of August 1977 at the age of 10, I received a Bible through the post from a great-uncle who was a Missionary living in Canada. When I received that Bible I knew I wasn’t a Christian and so I asked Mum (as she was doing the washing up that morning), what I had to do to become a real follower of Jesus.

She explained very simply that I needed to admit to God the fact that I was a sinner, then I had to ask the Lord Jesus to forgive me of all my sins and finally I needed to ask Him to come into my heart and be my Saviour. Immediately I went into the other room where I got down on my knees and prayed. A ten year old boy is well aware of his faults and failings. I didn’t need any persuading that I was a sinner in the eyes of God. How amazing though to realise that the Son of God was willing to pay for all my sins when He suffered and died upon the cross.

The only dramatic part of what happened that day was the suddenness of it all. In once sense I didn’t feel any different, but as I went out into the garden minutes afterwards I recall having a certainty in my heart that I was now a Christian and I would one day go to heaven.

My faith in Jesus Christ was severely put to the test one year and four days later when my Dad died of cancer. We were on a Camp with Mum when the news was broken to us on what was a beautiful August morning. After crying for what seemed like hours, I went outside and literally shook my fist at God saying, ‘Why did you take away from me the most important person in my life?’ How kind the Lord was to me that day. In that instant I felt as though the Lord said to me, ‘Andy, I’m your heavenly Father and I’ll never leave you!’

Much later I discovered the words of Psalm 68 verse 5 where it says, "A Father of the fatherless, a defender of widows, is God in His holy habitation". Twenty five years on, I can testify that He has been and continues to be such a Father to me. I am a wretched sinner deserving nothing from Him at all. I fail the Lord over and over again and yet He goes on loving me and caring for me. My greatest desire in life is that my four children and many others too, may come to know the life changing blessing of being a Christian.

For the last seven years I have been working for a Christian organisation called The Open-Air Mission which is dedicated to taking the Good News of Jesus out to where people are. If you would like to know more, have a look at our web-site: www.oamission.com