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 Pastor of Compassion Ministries
My Life Story
Ephesians 1:13 In him you also, when you heard the word of
truth,the gospel of your salvation, and believed in him, were sealed
with the promised Holy Spirit.
My life story is in that verse and I am so thankful to God for that. First, I heard the word of truth, the truth about Jesus. I grew up in a Christian home and heard that word from the time I was born. In my childhood, I was in church every week, I attended a Christian school and the Bible was read daily in my home. Into my teenage years I became a very rebellious son and didn’t want to hear it. It went in one ear and out the other. I was much more interested in the things of this world and gave that a lot of my attention.
After high school, not really knowing what to do, my father suggested I join the police service. I thought that was a good idea at the time and so I joined the Toronto Police Service as an 18-year-old civilian and became a Police Constable when I turned 21. I was part of a well respected profession and I guess I did my job okay, but along with it I also got into the party scene. That eventually turned me into a problem drinker and my binge drinking led to consequences both professionally and personally.
I married Cathy, my amazing wife, when I was 29 and we have two wonderful children, William and Stephanie. We put them in a Christian school as I knew that even though I wasn’t living for God, I wanted them to be exposed to the Christian faith. Well, my son Will gave his life to Jesus as a Grade one student. It was real as he remembers the day the teacher invited the students to give their lives to Jesus and he sure wanted to do that. That started him on a journey with God that soon had him praying for his mom and me when I would come home drunk and the arguing and fighting would start. In 2001 God answered Will’s prayers as it was in that year that God got a hold of me.
I was really reflecting on my life all around that time and in September of that year found myself training a young officer. We had a five week period of time where we went from call to call dealing with all the hurting people of this world. All the same people I had dealt with as a police officer on the streets of downtown Toronto for the previous 23 years, the alcoholics, drug addicts, runaway teenagers, family abuse victims, prostitutes, folks with mental health issues and so on, but for some reason my heart went out to them like it never had before. I had a care and compassion that I knew was not of me and deep down I knew God was opening my eyes to the reality of life and through it all He was convicting me of my own sin and selfishness. There was a particular defining moment on a call involving an alcoholic where I knew I was clearly hearing from God, that my life was truly changing and that not only was God saving me but He was also calling me. As the verse says, I went from hearing the word of truth, the gospel of my salvation, to believing it and that was only because of what God was doing. I started taking my family back to church and one Sunday the pastor read that verse and that was it, everything became clear. I knew that because of Jesus I had been forgiven, that He had died for my sins and I knew that I had been sealed with the promised Holy Spirit. His Spirit communicated with my spirit that I had become a child of God and I am forever grateful.
I retired from the police service in March of 2008 and in September of 2008 came on staff as the Director of Compassion Ministries. I thank God for saving me and calling me and allowing me to now use my experiences in policing to assist me in the work of the Lord.
Hope For Harvest
My hope for Harvest Oakville is that God will continue the work that He has clearly started, that many more lives will be transformed for His glory by the power of the Gospel, including the lives of the poor and broken, and that we would strive to be a humble people boasting only in what the Lord has done. It’s all about Him.
(905) 827-5295
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