This is how my Dad tells it:
One night in January 1983, through a friend who was receiving
counselling help from someone who turned out to be involved in black magic and
was a witch, our lives and the lives of our two young sons were threatened.
I had no more believed in evil spiritual powers than I had believed in God
but now all my old certainties were suddenly gone - I was confronted with
the reality and I didn't know what to do. I didn't know how to protect my
wife and family against what I knew was supernatural evil and I was afraid.
Slowly throughout the next day, I began to reason that if there was a power
of evil, then there must be a God. Somehow I needed to ask this God for help.
That evening, I said to Jean, "You know, if we're saying that we do believe
in God, I'm sure we don't need to get the house exorcised. I'm sure the Bible
says that if we ask anything in the name of Jesus, God will do it." Jean,
who'd only ever known me as an atheist, was amazed. "How on earth do you
know so much about the Bible?", she asked. I didn't know - it must have
been all those years in Sunday School.
We went into the room where the threat had been uttered only the previous
night. We didn't even know how to pray - we just said "God, please get rid
of everything evil in this room in the name of Jesus, Amen"
As we said "Amen" there was a feeling like a huge weight suddenly lifting
not just from me but from the room. Then the whole room filled with a
beautiful presence - that even I knew was God. It was so tangible that I
felt that I could have leant over backwards and I would have been held up.
It was so overwhelming - I couldn't even speak normally. I could only
whisper to Jean "Can you feel that?", and she smiled and said "Oh yes".
Then an amazing joy began to well up from deep inside me until I felt
that I was overflowing.
Suddenly all fear was gone - I knew that I had met Jesus and nothing else
mattered. Next day at work, I told everyone who would listen what had
happened - I was so thrilled at what Jesus had done for me and I didn't
want anyone else to miss out as I had done for so long.
That night our friend rang to urge us to get the house exorcised. We told
her that didn't matter any more, we'd met Jesus, and she went very quiet.
But six months later she came to stay with us. On the second night she
asked "How can I have Jesus as my Lord and Saviour?" We explained that
all she needed to do was ask Him to forgive her for all the wrong things
in her life and to clean her up inside, and to take charge of her life
from now on. She knelt down in the room where only a few months earlier
she had been passing on a death threat to us, and committed her life
to Jesus Christ.
I was so overwhelmed that this God whom I had rejected, had not rejected me.
When I needed him he didn't decide I was too late - I'd had my chances and
I'd blown them - he just picked me up and forgave me and rescued me!
A few weeks later as I was in bed with 'flu, I found myself going back
involuntarily over my life - even remembering things from years ago that
I had long since forgotten - and realising how many wrong things I had
done and thought and wished and felt! I was in tears as I saw it all
clearly for the first time and realised the awfulness of all I had
previously suppressed or blamed other people for. But each time as I
asked Jesus to forgive me, I experienced a deep assurance that I was
forgiven, and a real sense of being cleaned up. I felt free and it was
a great feeling!