Tag: Jesus

Christianity

What is your purpose?

Posted on by David L'Herroux

Sometimes, if I ever drive past a cemetery, I don’t think about the people who are buried there but about the purpose buried there. How many songs went unsung? How many poems and stories went unwritten? The truth is, many people leave this world not knowing or realising their purpose. And today, many more are also living without knowing or realising their purpose. Many people simply do not know that God breathes purpose into every living thing, and He has also breathed purpose into you and me.

For me personally, I discovered my purpose when I rededicated my life to God. I did not yet know what God’s plans were for my life, but I knew I had a purpose. It took me many years to discover God’s plan, but because I knew He had a purpose for me, I was just as content back then being a janitor as I am today being a CEO.

So, how do you find your purpose?

Don’t confuse plans with purpose

The definition of purpose is, the reason for which something is done or created or for which something exists.

The definition of plan is a detailed proposal for doing or achieving something. An intention or decision about what one is going to do.

We all have plans for our lives. Someday I will do this or someday I will do that. That is not your purpose; those are your plans. And all our plans are meaningless if we do not understand our purpose. God first puts a sense of purpose into our heart. We might not know what the plan is, but He will use our lives, our natural gifts, and our sense of purpose to help move us into His plan.

If we knew the plan in advance, we might run away

In the Bible, God gave Joseph a clear purpose. Joseph knew through dreams that he was to be a leader. He did not know that to get to that point, he would face rape allegations, prison and isolation. If God had revealed the plan up front, he might have run in the opposite direction. But through all of those trials, God was shaping Joseph, making him ready for the plan of leadership

It’s not about you

When God started to reveal His plan for my life, I began to realise His plan was not about me at all. It was about Him using me to reach others. God wanted to take my passion, my gift, my sense of purpose and use them all to bring about His plan in my life and also help to release that in others’ lives. So many Biblical characters were used by God to bring about change for others. Mary was handpicked to deliver a messiah who would save the world. Paul was given the task of leaving everything behind in order to carry the message of salvation all across the Middle East. They were not ‘special’ people. They simply knew they had a purpose, and they allowed God to use them (and their gifts) to bring about His plan.

Can I encourage you today that you have a purpose. Everything God creates has a purpose, and we each have a job to do. If you do not feel that you do, ask God to plant His sense of purpose into your life. He might not show you what is ahead, but when you know deep down that you have a heavenly purpose, everything in your life will change.

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Christian Media, Christian Radio, Christianity, Devotional, Evangelism, Faith

What will be your legacy?

Posted on by David L'Herroux

In the 1980s, I attended some of Billy Graham’s meetings as part of Mission England.

At the time, I was struck by how much preparation, and particularly prayer, went into the planning and execution of these events. The Billy Graham Evangelistic Association had a structure which was modelled around prayer and the Word of God. This was a structure that Billy had used with his own family. His son Franklin recalls that as a child, their days started and ended with family devotions, and Franklin credits the longevity of his parents’ marriage to the fact they read the Scriptures together every day.

As news broke recently that Billy had gone home to be with the Lord, news sites across the world told the story. For younger audiences who did not know who Billy was, his story was re-told. Even here in the UK, our major news and radio channels covered his passing, and for me, it was remarkable to see the amazing legacy that Billy Graham had left behind.

Billy was very much the ‘front man’ of his ministry, but it was not something he sought or chased after. His message was always faithful to the Gospel, and he used every opportunity to tell people about Jesus.

He started his ministry on radio, and by the end of his life, by preaching in auditoriums, stadiums and travelling globally, millions had been won to Christ, not just through his direct ministry but through the ministry of those who had come to faith because of attending a Billy Graham event. George Verwer, the founder of Operation Mobilisation, was one of them. He accepted Jesus Christ as his saviour at a Billy Graham crusade, and years later, his ministry has impacted the lives of many, many more around the world.

In many ways, this was a revival that we never really called a revival. We tend to see revival as being an experience of the manifest presence of God, which compels people en masse to turn their hearts to Jesus. This is what happened throughout Billy’s ministry.

During Mission England, I saw it with my own eyes as thousands streamed to the front to accept Jesus into their lives, filling the front and the aisles. How we long to see this again!

Last week, as we heard the news of Billy’s passing, I thought of Mark 4:8-9, where Jesus tells the parable of the sower: ‘Still another seed fell on good soil. It came up, grew and produced a crop, some multiplying thirty, some sixty, some a hundred times.’ If anyone’s life produced a ‘hundredfold’ crop, it was Billy’s!

There is much we can draw from the example of one man’s life. We might never reach millions with the good news of Jesus, but each of us has a circle of influence. We might never be a Billy Graham in terms of numbers, but we can each reach people we know. We all have a story to tell, and even the way we speak and live our lives can be a powerful testimony to a world looking for answers.

And we can pray! We can pray for the people we might never meet or reach, and a life soaked in prayer can reap so much.

Can I encourage you today? You might never speak in an auditorium of thousands or have a public ministry, but you can make a difference to one person by sharing with them the love of Jesus.

Let our legacy one day say that we were men and women of God who shared the Gospel with all who ‘had ears to hear’.

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Christian Media, Christian Radio, Christianity, Devotional, Faith, Forgiveness

How to have hope

Posted on by David L'Herroux

Our country has been rocked by a terrorist attack.

Although I am from France, I have lived here for more than 40 years, and my wife and I raised our family here. The UK is our home.

I was in France in November 2015 when terrorists attacked Paris. I was in the middle of an exciting week of mission at my brother’s church, and we were seeing incredible miracles, lives set free, and people commit their lives to Christ.

We were full of excitement at what God was doing, and then we heard the horrific news. Our hearts were broken, just as they are today, for the people of London, for all those who have been injured, for all those who have lost someone.   

We have seen some incredible acts of bravery, a MP who fought to save the life of an injured police officer, doctors, nurses, police and ordinary members of the public who have put their own lives at risk to help protect ours.   

We are so thankful to live in a country that is able to respond quickly and with deep compassion in the face of a tragedy.

As Christians, we sometimes wonder what to say in the face of such a terrible situation. But on the Sunday morning after the attacks in Paris, our church in France took great comfort from God’s Word in Psalm 37:

Do not fret because of those who are evil
or be envious of those who do wrong 

Be still before the Lord
and wait patiently for him;
do not fret when people succeed in their ways,
when they carry out their wicked schemes.  

The salvation of the righteous comes from the Lord;
he is their stronghold in time of trouble.
The Lord helps them and delivers them;
he delivers them from the wicked and saves them,
because they take refuge in him. 

Let us always go to God’s Word for our answers. His Word (John 1:5) says that the darkness in the world will get darker, but that darkness will never extinguish light. In fact, that light (His light) will continue to shine brighter, and the darkness CANNOT overcome it. 

That is where I get my hope.

Let’s pray with passion for our world and all those who are suffering and grieving today.   

And may God’s light, His inextinguishable light, shine ever brighter in the middle of the darkness we see.

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=8si6voeqHdk

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Christian Media, Christian Radio, Christianity, Devotional

The power of telling your story.

Posted on by David L'Herroux

I believe that we each have a story to tell, and I think it is important that we are ready (at any time) to tell it, both in words and in the way we live our lives.

In Mark 5, the story is told of Jesus healing the daughter of Jairus. She had been very sick, and as the daughter of a religious leader, it is likely she would have been well-known in her community. But as Jesus arrived at her home, it was too late. She had already died.

All around and inside the house were mourners, people yelling and crying about the loss of this little girl. Jesus was confronted with the reality and finality of human death. He immediately told all the mourners to leave the house, and then he took the girl’s hand and restored her back to life. And then in a puzzling verse, Jesus told the family to ‘tell no one’. It was not just a suggestion, it was a command.

In other parts of Scripture, we are told about the power of testimony, so why would Jesus command the family to keep quiet? I read this story again recently, and I believe there is a simple answer. As Jairus was the leader of the synagogue, he and his family would have been well-known and respected in the community. When Jesus arrived at their home, the house was already full of mourners, so the locals already knew that she was dead. So when Jesus brought her back to life, there was no need to tell anyone. She was a living, breathing testimony. She was the story.

Saint Francis of Assisi once said: ‘Preach the Gospel, use words if necessary.’ Many have debated this saying, but personally, I believe it means that when we have been transformed by the power of God, our lives are a walking, living testimony. We can use words to tell our story (and it is important to do so), but the words need to be backed up with evidence of a life which is changed. We can all debate words and philosophies and theology, but no one can argue with a story and a life which has been transformed.

When Jesus healed a blind man in John 9:13-25, the Pharisees questioned the man to ask how this had happened. They wanted to debate theology with him, but he simply replied: ‘I was blind, but now I see.’ Who can argue with that?!

We all have a story to share. Some may have been healed and set free or restored. For others, it may be that they were aware of God’s presence in a difficult time, but I believe we should always be ready to demonstrate and tell our story.

Here are some practical ideas:

Tell the truth

This might seem obvious, but it is important to not tamper with or change the details of the story. It can be tempting to add (or take away) details, but in doing so, we can remove all the power. Tell your story and allow God to add power to your words.

Tell your story in chapters

Imagine your life story as a book – full of different chapters. You do not have to tell the full story, but you can share different chapters at appropriate times. Depending on who I am speaking to, I use different ‘chapters’ of my testimony. Sometimes I will share the story of how I, as a rebellious young man, came to England and met God powerfully. Or I might share about the time we had no money or petrol in the car, but we prayed and God provided in a miraculous way. Or, as I have shared here, I might tell the chapter when we lost our son Jamie. You do not have to tell the whole story. The individual chapters can be just as powerful.

Some stories don’t end well

In 1988, a few weeks before we lost our son Jamie, our friends’ daughter Sarah was taken very seriously ill with meningitis. I will tell her story in a future blog post, but God stepped in and healed Sarah in a miraculous way. A few weeks later, we lost our son, and it led to many questions about why God would heal one child and yet take another. Even though our family’s story did not end the way we wanted it to, it is still a story of God’s amazing provision and faithfulness. Even if your story did not conclude the way you wanted it to, you can still tell of how God sustained you in the difficult times.

The enemy will try to stop you.

I believe the enemy knows the power of testimony. The original Hebrew root of the word ‘testimony’ means to ‘do it again’.  In other words, when we share our testimony, we are literally encouraging others to believe that God CAN ‘do it again’. The enemy will try to quench the power of stories, and he will try to stop you from sharing yours, but when you tell your story, you are saying to the world ‘God is alive and He is at work in my life.’ There is huge power in that.

I believe that God wants to ‘do it again’. Do you have a story to share? Why don’t you start to tell it?

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At UCB, we love to hear your stories. If UCB has helped you in some way (either through something you have read, heard or watched), we would love to hear from you. You can fill in the form below and one of our team will contact you for more information.

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Christian Media, Christian Radio, Christianity

How to be a good leader

Posted on by David L'Herroux

As the UK welcomes Theresa May into the top job at Number 10 (and she assembles her new team) I have been thinking this week about what makes a good leader.

We are all leaders of one kind or another. You do not have to run a country or a big organisation to be a leader. You might lead a group at church, you might be the leader in your home. Nearly all of us have the capacity to lead, and there are some good principles about leadership qualities in Psalm 15. However, I think the way Jesus lived His life gives us the best model of how to be a good leader.

Jesus wasn’t self-promoting

As leaders we can sometimes fall in to the trap of thinking we are better than others. Sadly some leaders have achieved their position by self-promotion and by dishonouring others on their way to the top. But Jesus never promoted Himself. He did not have to. His good works were so obvious that others talked about Him, and news about him spread quickly over the whole region of Galilee (Mark 1:28).  

Jesus was all about relationships

Jesus knew how to assemble a good team, but unlike selecting a new Cabinet, He did not always pick people with experience and the right skills. The disciples were a mixed group of individuals from very different backgrounds. Jesus was more concerned about relationships and about releasing people into their full potential. True leadership should be relational, not transactional. In other words, leadership is not about what I can get from other people but about the relationships and the people I can develop. I believe a strong leader builds a good team in order to eventually release them to go into all the world (Mark 16:15).

Jesus knew who He was

Jesus knew who He was. He wasn’t threatened by others or insecure.  We have to get our ultimate security from who we are in Christ, not in our job, in leadership, or our position in life.

Jesus wasn’t afraid of confrontation

Jesus wasn’t afraid to deal with issues as they came up. He confronted the Pharisees, and in one very famous scene, overthrew the merchants’ tables in the temple. As leaders, we should not be afraid to confront issues, but at the same time, we have to be discerning about the issues we do confront. It is easy to confront the wrong thing, so we need to know when to speak and when to remain silent.

Jesus knew when to stop talking.  

When facing the toughest test of His life, standing before Pilate, Jesus did not speak. He was being confronted with vile, untrue allegations and was being mocked, but He chose to remain silent. Sometimes we feel the need to defend ourselves, and it is true that sometimes we do need to speak up and stand for what is right, but we must also learn when to remain silent. Sometimes saying nothing at all is the best thing we can do.

Jesus was compassionate

Jesus met many sick and dying and distressed people, and His heart was always filled with compassion for them. I think compassion has to ‘possess’ us. We need to feel compassion for those around us: dream it, live it, and experience compassion in all areas of our lives. It is easy to become hardened to the things we see around us, but Jesus’ life was all about compassion, about seeing the needs of people and releasing them into freedom.

The UK is in a time of unprecedented change, and with a new Prime Minister and Government in charge, we need to keep the leaders of our country in prayer. My personal prayer for Theresa May is that God would bless her and that He would enlarge her capacity for peace, compassion, care, love and mercy.

I pray that as the government leads our country into an unknown future, that God would give our leaders wisdom so that together, we can stand united once again.

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Christian Media, Christian Radio, Christianity, Devotional, Evangelism, Faith, Healing, Hope, Miracles

Look to the future – what do you see?

Posted on by David L'Herroux

Over the last few weeks, I have been spending some time with God, seeking the way forward for UCB as a ministry. I have been rejoicing about the past and those who have gone before us, but also rejoicing about the many lives which have been changed and transformed by the power of God’s Word.

I recently met with a group of UCB supporters and shared what I see for the future. I want to share the same message with you and give you a glimpse of what I am seeing today. It is a glimpse that came from the challenge Jesus gave to his disciples when He said to them: ‘Lift up your eyes, and look at the fields and see how white and ready they are for the harvest’ (John 4:35).

Instead of looking at the gloom and despondency and brokenness that is in our world today, God wants us to see what He sees.

Here is what I see.

I see God turning the hearts of a godless society back to Himself.

I see a church living and operating in the power of the Gospel.

I see our government, our laws, our society being reshaped by the truth of God’s Word.

I see family units coming together into the knowledge and the transformation of God’s power, from the toughest parts of the cities to the most rural parts of our country.

I see every generation, should it be young or old, knowing their worth and experiencing value and a purpose for their lives.

I see people standing for what it is true and becoming intolerant for all the right reasons – intolerant of wrongdoing, intolerant of injustice.

I see people getting ready to answer God’s call like they have never done before. I see people standing together totally united for their cities and not afraid to say ‘We are the Church’.

I see the Church mobilised to take the Gospel to the towns, villages and the cities, making disciples and being totally committed to what God has called them to do.

I see changing statistics: relationships being restored, addictions broken. I see miracles to be the order of the day in the life of our society because the Church is acting like true light and salt like never before.

I see an army of young people having visions, and I see older people, instead of being put ‘on the shelf,’ having dreams like they have never had before, supporting and standing with the younger generation.

I truly believe and see a day coming when God will pour His Spirit upon all flesh. I see the young and the old, the children and the grandparents lifting the banner of victory, looking at their society and truly believing that God has a message of hope, and using every means possible to lift up that message of truth.

You might say ‘Dave, you’re living in cuckoo land, you’re dreaming!’

But I am seeing only what Jesus spoke of to his disciples, and I am saying that it is time that we lift up your eyes from the negative, from the oppressive, from the depressive, and recognise that the fields are white for harvest.

And therefore it is time. I believe that we as a ministry, and you as partners and supporters, must actually start to switch on and see what God wants us to see.

And let’s believe that the enemy will not have the upper hand.  He may think that he has the best strategy – to steal, to kill, to destroy – but the verse does not stop there because Jesus says even to us today through His Word that He came that we might have life – and not just life, but life to the full (John 10:10).

I strongly believe we are moving into an unprecedented hour and that we as a ministry need to be ready like never before. We need to be ready for people to be resourced and helped in their faith. And we need to be ready to resource the church, for I believe they will not be able to cope with the amount of people who will be coming in.   They need to have reliable content.

There is a saying in media that ‘content is king’. This means that all our strategies are of no use if our content – if what we write or share on air – is not good. I believe today, though, that God is turning that around and saying: ‘The KING is the content.’

David-Blog21

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Christianity, Devotional, Faith, Forgiveness, Healing, Hope, Miracles

Learning to forgive yourself 

Posted on by David L'Herroux

I shared last week about the loss of our son Jamie and the way our lives as a family were changed forever. In the weeks and months after Jamie died, our pastor John Mosey was a wonderful friend. He helped us with the many practical arrangements, and he led Jamie’s funeral service, providing a great deal of comfort and support in a terrible time.

On Dec 21, 1988, in the same year that Jamie died, a Pan Am plane exploded over Lockerbie, killing everyone on board. John’s 19-year-old daughter Helga was one of the victims. I remember the day we received the news and I drove to John’s house. John and his family knew Helga had been on the plane, but John was on the phone in the hallway, trying to confirm some more details. ‘I am so glad you are here,’ he said. ‘You know what it feels like to lose a child.’

The circumstances were very different. Jamie had died from an unknown illness and Helga had been killed in a suspected terrorist attack. But now, in the same year, both families were facing the indescribable grief of losing a child.

News of the Lockerbie disaster was in every newspaper, and John became known at the time for saying he would forgive the people who had taken his daughter from them. Our family did not have anyone to forgive in the same way, but as the years went by and I continued to carry a great weight of grief, I wondered if I did need to forgive someone.

In April 2016, RT Kendall came to visit UCB. I spoke about his visit in another blog post, but I did not share at the time how much this visit impacted me. RT was filming a TV programme for UCB TV, but we asked if he would share something for UCB’s team leaders also.

RT spoke for a little while about forgiveness and encouraged our team to forgive those who had hurt them. He then said he wanted to pray for those who needed to forgive themselves. This was a very important moment for me personally, for although many years had passed since we had lost Jamie, I had carried a silent burden of guilt, wondering if I could have done more? Could I have spent more time with him? Could I have done things differently?

RT’s time with us and his powerful prayer was a moment of breakthrough in my life. Over the next few days, I began to realise that I felt totally free. By the power of God’s grace, I was finally released from a burden which I was never meant to carry. God had shown me that I needed to forgive myself.

I believe that God wants all of us to be totally free – to not carry guilt and shame from the past into our present lives. I thank God for sending Godly people into the ministry of UCB who can show us more about God’s wonderful healing power.

Jesus came to set the prisoners free. If we choose to accept it, we too can live in total freedom.

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Christian Media, Christian Radio, Christianity, Devotional, Faith, Hope

Living in the Green Zone

Posted on by David L'Herroux

This might sound like an unusual title for a blog post, but I will explain what the ‘Green Zone’ is in my life and why I believe it is important for every Christian to have one.

In my previous retail career, I used to travel frequently, often covering more than 70,000 miles in the car each year. Those were busy days, and I learned how to spend quality time with God ‘on the move’ while I was driving. We talk at UCB about having a daily ‘Coffee with God‘, but I learned how to do ‘Driving with God’! I would often listen to the Bible on those long journeys, or I would play worship music, but my focus was on spending time in God’s presence, which was very important in helping me get ready for the day.

These days I do not drive as many miles each year, but my diary is often full. However, in my calendar is what I call the Green Zone. These are blocks each day (usually mornings) which are blanked out in the colour green, and it is time that I purposefully make sure is not booked for anything else. The time is used differently every day: it is sometimes spent reading God’s Word or praying with the team, but the aim is always to welcome the real Boss into the working day! We are nothing without Him.

Many of us have busy lives with demands from work, family, and church, and it can be easy to let the small discipline of spending daily time with God slip. In my younger years, I would sometimes look at time spent with God as part of my Christian ‘duty’.  But although I now have the ‘green zone’, it is not a duty or a ritual in any way, it is just spending time with my Father and getting His wisdom for the day ahead. After all, if I didn’t see or speak to my wife for a few days, I would miss hearing her voice or having her presence in my life. I feel it is the same with our Heavenly Father; we need to hear His voice and experience His presence in our lives every single day. It has to become a lifestyle choice.

In Genesis, we see the first separation between man and God. Man was created to walk in unity with God, but when sin entered the world, their relationship was damaged. I believe the enemy knows that when we are in God’s presence, we flourish. It is where we get wisdom and strength and where we truly grow. If the enemy can stop or distract us from that time, he knows we will never truly grow. That is why this time each day is an essential, non-negotiable part of my day.

Can I encourage you to find your own ‘Green Zone’ each day? I believe that time spent with God will change your life. It will give you strength and faith for the day ahead and help you to understand God’s purpose for your life.

DL'H - Green Zone

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Christian Media, Christian Radio, Christianity, Faith, Forgiveness, Healing, Hope, Miracles, Spiritual healing

When trouble comes, will you stay the course?

Posted on by David L'Herroux

I am very pleased to hand the blog over to my friend Bruno Kondabéka this week. Bruno and his wife Joanne are great friends of our family and are also the pastors of Chichester Family Church.

Some years ago, their son (who was then 7 years old) was struck by a terrible illness, but God did something remarkable.

It’s an incredible story of God’s power at work. Bruno will share what happened next.

Bruno writes…

My wife Joanne and I have three boys, and as pastors of a church in Chichester, our lives are often busy. About two years ago, I was preaching a sermon series on the issue of suffering. I remember asking our church, ‘When trouble comes, will you stay the course?’ We didn’t know then that soon ‘trouble’ would visit our home and put our family to the test.

It began without any warning, when one day our youngest son Samuel started to feel unwell. He had a slight fever but didn’t seem too ill, so we gave him Calpol, and he stayed home from school for a few days to recover.

Five days later, Samuel started to get visibly worse: his temperature went up, and he was complaining that his head and neck were hurting, so we rang NHS Direct who advised we take him to the emergency doctor. On Sunday, the hospital checked him over, but they felt satisfied that it was probably a virus and in time it would pass. However, by the middle of the week, Samuel was still not any better, so we took him to our GP, and that’s when things became very worrying. Samuel was very agitated that day, which was not like his usual cooperative self, and he seemed to be in pain and was very confused. The GP rang the paediatric unit at the hospital, and the consultant suggested we take him straight there.

We were greeted at the hospital by the consultant and his team, and we started to realise that this was maybe very serious indeed. Again Samuel was very agitated and confused. He had become light sensitive, so he was sedated in order to calm him down so that he could be examined and given a CT scan.

After the scan, our son’s condition deteriorated rapidly. He was finding it hard to wake up, his heart beat was erratic, and he was not responsive to anything we said to him. The results of his CT scan were passed onto the specialists in Southampton Hospital, and because they were concerned with what they saw, they arranged for Samuel to be transferred by ambulance to the Paediatric Intensive Care Unit in Southampton. To stabilise him, he was put in a drug induced coma, and he was quickly taken to Intensive Care.

Samuel

After further tests, we were told Samuel had Meningoencephalitis – a very rare and potentially deadly infection on the brain, caused by mycoplasma (a cross between a virus and bacteria) which causes the brain to swell. As parents, our hearts were broken, and the tears flowed as we watched what was happening to our little boy, but we did what we could to hold on to God and to trust Him to take us through this.

I remembered that just a short time previously, I had asked our church family if they were able to ‘stay the course’ when suffering came, and now we were facing that exact situation ourselves. We felt all the emotions you could expect – we wept and we worried, but we were also encouraged by remembering words spoken over Samuel’s life when he was dedicated as a baby by our friend, Pastor Brian Downward, from Bournemouth. The words at that time were that God had a purpose for his life, and it was a good purpose. He was to be a man of God.

I was also aware that our friends in Angers, France, were holding a week of mission at their church. I lived in France for some years, and the church there had helped to sponsor me in my theology studies in South Africa. I had a phone call from David L’Herroux, who told us that the church wanted to pray for Samuel. David felt it was important that the church prayed together during one of their services, and so that night at 8.30pm at the hospital in Southampton, we connected by phone with the church in France (as David paused in the middle of his preach). We laid hands on Samuel as David prayed, and then because we were in the ICU and couldn’t make too much noise, I went outside the ward and continued to pray (with my arm outstretched toward my son’s bed), while the church prayed that God would heal Samuel. That day had been particularly hard as we watched the nurses struggling to get Samuel to wake up out of the coma – they were not succeeding. So, we were encouraged by this prayer and support, and it gave us courage to believe for a miracle.

I walked back to the ward and we continued to sit beside Samuel’s bed, and literally just 30 minutes later, we had the biggest surprise of our lives when Samuel just opened his eyes. He had been unconscious for 3 days. The nurses rushed to see him and confirmed he was conscious – they removed his breathing tube, and from that moment, he started to make a full recovery.

Samuel2

The next day, he was moved from the ICU, and 14 days later, he was discharged from the hospital. The neurosurgeon who had worked with Samuel took us to one side and said that although she was amazed at his recovery, we should also expect the worst, as there could be long term damage.

But just over two weeks later, Samuel was back at school part-time, and the following week, he went back to school full time. He will soon be celebrating his tenth birthday and has suffered no ill effects whatsoever.

Samuel3

We thank God every day for the amazing miracle he gave us for our son.

Family

David concludes…

Bruno’s story is a wonderful reminder to us that God is very much at work in the world around us. At UCB, I encourage the team to keep being expectant and believing for the impossible. We live in a world which is bound by fear, but I believe God wants to set us free in every area of our lives.  I trust Bruno’s story has encouraged you to believe for more. We serve a mighty God!

 

David-Blog9

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Christian Media, Christian Radio, Christianity, Faith, Miracles

If God has given you a dream, don’t give up on it

Posted on by David L'Herroux

I have recently been asked how I came to UCB. Where did this journey begin?

I want to share with you a few thoughts about the power of having a God-given dream. If God has given you a dream, do not give up on it.

I first came to the UK in 1973. I was a rebellious young man, running from the Christian upbringing I had been given. I wanted to strike out on my own, but it didn’t take long before I realised that I missed the precious atmosphere of God’s presence in my life. I went to visit my brother who was attending the Assemblies of God conference in Minehead. I had not planned to go to the actual conference – just to meet up with my brother – but I stayed for the meetings, and I had a powerful encounter with the Holy Spirit which changed my life.

After that experience, I put myself before God and asked Him, ‘What do you want to do with me? What do you want to do with my life?’ I felt God encourage me to believe for the impossible, and He put a dream in my heart of going all the way to the Boardroom. At that time I was a janitor, so I did not see how this was possible, but I began to seek God’s Word.

I believe God gave me insight into the verse in Genesis 1:28, where God said to Adam: ‘Be fruitful and increase in number; fill the earth and subdue it.’ For years, we have read this as a command to have children and populate the earth, but I believe this is also a command to be creative and fruitful in whatever we turn our hands to. By reading God’s Word, I began to develop business principles to live by, and over time, God allowed me to become very fruitful.

I started out as a janitor working for a national retail chain, and before too long, I became a warehouse manager, moving to store manager, until eventually (after 23 years), I became the Head of their national discount chain. God had truly fulfilled His promise to me to take me to the Boardroom. It wasn’t because I wanted the ‘position’ or the power. It was because I believed that God wanted me to be fruitful in what I did. However, I had to learn some painful lessons along the way.

In 1988, the business was going very well, and my wife and I had a good life, when very suddenly, we lost our 13-month-old son, Jamie. Our lives were devastated, and we cried out to God for answers, trying to understand what God’s purpose was. However, in years to come, God gave me a very powerful burden for the children and youth of the world. I had seen my own son die, and I couldn’t bear to see the young generation spiritually dead and eventually leaving this world not knowing Jesus as their personal saviour and friend.

Over time, God brought me into contact with the wonderful organisation OneHope, and eventually He led me out of the retail industry to work full time as a missionary with OneHope. Those were challenging times, but God was so faithful to our family.

I served in that capacity for five years, and then through a mutual friend, I was invited to a meeting at UCB. During my time in retail, the Welsh singer Bryn Yemm had sung in many of our stores. He was also a friend of UCB and had said to members of the leadership team at UCB, ‘You need to meet this French guy’. I was initially invited to share my testimony on air, and I had the opportunity to have coffee with Ian Mackie, the founder and at the time Chief Executive of UCB. Over a long period of many prayerful conversations with Ian Mackie, I eventually joined UCB, initially as a Trustee and then as Ministry Director. We were later able to merge OneHope UK into UCB.

And then in 2010, after many faithful years serving as the Chief Executive, Ian Mackie took on additional responsibilities with UCB International. This eventually led me to take on the role of Chief Executive.

There have been difficult times in our ministry journey, but God has been faithful to the dream He gave me in 1973. If God has given you a dream, be faithful to His Word and don’t give up.

 

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