The years that followed were very emotional. The Lord had restored my life and I was in fresh, close communion with Him. I praise Him for His saving grace and power. Of greatest influence in my life at that time (apart from the Bible) were the following books: J.I. Packer's "Knowing God", A.W. Tozer's "The Pursuit of God", and Martyn Lloyd Jones' "Exposition of Romans". I began to soar. My walk with God was thrilling beyond description; hours of blissful communion in unhurried prayer; hours of soaking in His Word; hours of wonderful meditation and memorisation; I had come into communion with my living God, as my grandfather had so many years before.
A deep desire began to grow within me, to be involved with the church. I had disgraced myself at our family church and had not been back for a few years. Now I desired to go back and be restored to those dear brothers and sisters in Christ. Charleen and I eventually left the coast after 3 months and came back up to Gauteng to stay in our caravan on our parents' farm. From there we became seriously involved in our family church. We were restored and brought new enthusiasm and life to the church. I led the singing with my guitar very enthusiastically every week for over 7 years. At the request of the elders, I began to preach in 1998 and learned under their supervision for those 7 years.
God had radically changed my life and I was a different person! I was getting out of bed at 5:00 every morning and spending 3 hours in prayer, singing, memorisation and study. During my days I was reading book after book, summarising some of them with pencil and paper. I still have hundreds of pages of handwritten notes from those years and the blessing of that time is still with me. (Not much has changed, except, I now use a computer for my notes, and because I do so many midweek meetings, I often get home too late to get up regularly at 5:00)
Being so fervent in my study of the Word, I noticed that I was only studying what appealed to me and realised I needed to apply myself to a systematic study of Christian doctrine. I enrolled with a man in the Johannesburg area and sat under his teaching in Systematic Theology for a year in night classes. This involved thousands of kilometres of travel over that year, but I was unstoppably enthusiastic. I then signed up with the Bible Institute at Kalk Bay and began their Diploma in Christian Ministries. By God's grace, I met Dr. Tim Cantrell on the internet and he graciously permitted me to study Biblical Counselling at Christ Seminary where he was then lecturing. After that, Dr. Wayne Mack came to South Africa and I studied his Master's curriculum in Biblical Counselling at the Grace School of Ministry in Pretoria.
Over the time since the Lord has taken hold of my life and radically changed me, many things that happened; too many for me to describe here. I have left out whole phases of my life, such as the way in which I became involved in the world of addictions. That is a whole story on its own. But, empowered by passionate desire for the gospel of Jesus Christ and for the Lord of the Gospel, I have been involved in preaching in many churches and venues, including street preaching and evangelism, prison ministry, youth ministry and work with addicts. I've been on the internet, in newspapers, magazines, radio and television. While I am nothing, Christ is everything and He has rejuvenated me. He has foreknown me, predestined me, called me, justified me, is sanctifying me and will glorify me. May it be obvious through this testimony that this is what God has done in me. Christ is everything to me and I am devoted to preaching the gospel of His grace.
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