Over a 600mile telephone line
I COMMITTED MY LIFE TO CHRIST...

When I was a child I went to Mottram infant school and sang in the choir at Mottram Church. Then the 60’s came along and it wasn’t so cool to go to church,
so I stopped going. However, I did feel that there was always someone ‘looking out’ for me during the next 40 years.
Not long after meeting Beryl,l she wanted to go back to church. Although I couldn’t understand why, I did start to go with her. The first thing that struck me was that the church was warm
and well lit but it was full of ‘happy clappy’ people.
I remember talking to the vicar’s wife one day and her telling me that she wasn’t religious and I found this very strange. It took me some time to work this out but the only analogy I can come up with is that every morning I religiously brush my teeth and have a shave. I don’t have to think about it.
It was the same when I was a child. It was a Sunday...so people went to church, there was no thinking involved.
But the people in this church had something other than a warm, well lit church: they had a relationship with God.
I kept asking Beryl questions and she tried to answer them.

THE CALL THAT
VERY NEARLY
WASN’T ANSWERED

My cousin is a pastor in the Shetland Islands and I would send him an e-mail with a one line question and he would reply with a thesis. I called him one Sunday night but the phone kept ringing and ringing. He eventually answered (I later found
out that he nearly didn’t answer). We chatted for a long time and in the end I ran out of questions. My cousin said, “Well,
what are you going to do? It’s decision time.” So, over a 600 mile telephone line I committed my life to Christ.
As soon as I’d put down the telephone it was as though a door had shut and I no longer recognised the person I had been. It felt like I had always been a Christian. My cousin said that I should tell someone straight away...but somebody I could trust. I called Beryl and she couldn’t believe it, even though she had been praying for me!
To consolidate my new found faith I attended an Alpha course at Mottram Evangelical Church where I am now an
active member: I run a midweek small group and helped in the kitchen at the latest Alpha course in February.
Now, I really get excited when I think that God has a plan for me.
Problems arise when He starts to reveal His plan because invariably it will mean getting out of your comfort zone and going into areas you are not happy with.

THE CALL THAT HAS
CHANGED MY LIFE
SO DRAMATICALLY

It happened when I took on the role of area co-ordinator for ‘Operation Christmas Child’ (known as The Shoe Box appeal). It meant taking on responsibilities that were uncomfortable to me but ultimately very rewarding.
I was fortunate to be part of a distribution trip to the Ukraine with the charity. This is the final stage of the shoe-boxes:
when they are handed out to children in orphanages, institutions and schools in deprived areas of the country. The
Ukraine has many children in these institutions but the charity is working closely with them and inroads are being made.

Martyn Catterall