Taking the first step

This is my last post on taking the first step.

This morning a story about a very, very small step.

 When my children were in their first years I read bible stories from the Arch book series.

One particular night I was reading the parable of the rich man and Lazarus the beggar to my son Mark. He was six years old. At the end of the story Lazarus is in heaven and the rich man in hell.

I noticed that Mark was sobbing. Had I dramatized too much? I asked him was he crying because of poor Lazarus the beggar. "No Daddy". Well was he crying because the rich man was going to hell? "No Daddy". Well what's the problem? "I'm crying for me Daddy I don't want to go to hell!"

Well that's smart thinking for a six year old!

I saw a God given moment and immediately prayed that Mark might receive Jesus into his heart. Right there on my knee my son, at six years old, made a very small childlike step of faith.

This year he turned forty. He is a captain in industry, runs his own company, but is still taking steps of faith every day.

Have you made your first one yet?

They took the step together

Taking the first step together.

Max Carter is a long time friend of mine (if forty years is a long time). We both lived in England.

Like myself, Max was expelled from School: (he from Ormskirk Grammar and me from Nelson Grammar School) Ah, what troves of untapped brilliance were wasted!

At the age of twenty three Max was persuaded by his praying mother to attend a special outreach meeting put on by the Ormskirk Anglican Church.

Max knew he was in the danger zone and succeeded in blocking out the message preached by a fervent Church Army evangelist.
When the last "Amen" had been said, Max took his young wife by the hand and bolted for the door. However, Ken the preacher overtook him and was waiting to shake his hand.

There were no preliminaries. "Max" said Ken "Have you ever considered  accepting Jesus Christ as your personal Saviour?"
"Many times" came the glib reply. "Then why not tonight? pressed Ken.

Many years later Max told me it was like a tiny filament of hair, so light yet so strong, preventing him from making that step. Ken asked the same question a second time, and suddenly Max blurted out "O.K. Ken. Let's do it."

That night Max made his first step. Joan, his wife, made it with him. That two step has lasted nearly fifty years.

 In a few weeks time Max will be doing a few breakfasts on this site. Stay tuned.

Taking the first step

Today I want to go back a few years to my Alma Mater in England.

I did my post secondary education at the College of the Venerable Bede in Durham City.

Undoubtedly my favourite lecturers were Paddy McDermott, the college chaplain and G.N.G.Smith who was a professor in classical English.

Both had formidable intellects.
Professor Smith (affectionatley known as Ganges) would sometimes say: "Think, gentlemen, THINK"

All his life Ganges had thought, and when he was in his fiftieth year he could think no more.

He had reached the ceiling of his reason and was trapped.
Where was he to go?

It was then that he made his first small step of faith. He became as a little child and trusted in the person of Jesus Christ.
Immediately he passed through the ceiling of reason and entered a room of limitless proportion.

He would tell us poor, pea brained students that, after making that first step of faith, everything began to make sense again.

And how far was that step? About ten inches long, from his head to his heart.

Taking the first step

Taking the first step.

Stan Belcher worked with me for a short time in evangelism. We were doing a gospel campaign on the Golden Mile in Blackpool, England.

Stan had a checkered past. In the 1950's he and others had robbed a bullion shipment at Heathrow Airport. Later he was arrested and did some hardtime in Wandsworth prison  in London.

Being bored, Stan asked the jail guard for a book to read and added that he would prefer a murder, a good mystery or a horror story. Ten minutes later the guard pushed a Bible through the bars and said:
"Read that. There's the murder of Jesus Christ written in there, the horror story of your life and the mystery of how God could love someone like you!"

Stan read the New Testament from cover to cover and in his prison cell made the unthinkable step of turning the reins of his life over to God.

 He became a model prisoner and,when I met him  after his release, was keeping young people enthralled with his story.
Amazing! That first step in prison took him from a gold bullion robber to a preacher on the Golden Mile. 

You never know where the journey of faith will take you.

The all important step is the first step.

Our theme for the week: "Taking the first step."

Someone once said "There are a million ways to Christ but only one way to God and that is through Christ."

 This week I will give some short stories of men who I have met over the years and will tell how they made that all important first step to Christ.


John Fuller was my vicar from St Philip's in Nelson, England where I grew up. Vicar Fuller had a false leg. When he sat at tea while visiting our home, he would pull up his trouser leg a little. There it was, with a shoe and sock attached. It was a metal leg with many round holes in it.


Vicar Fuller had once played rugby for Wales. He had felt the call of God in his life but enjoyed his sport more than the prospect of ministry. In his first international match against France he was carried off the field unconscious with a shattered right leg.

He awoke in hospital with a cage over his feet and his leg amputated beneath the knee. The Spirit gently spoke to John Fuller's heart and said "John I can use you better with one leg than ever I could with two." John Fuller's first step to Christ was a hop.


He hopped  right into the will of God and became a preacher.
And what a preacher! Long John Fuller. He was the best vicar I ever had.