My Journey of Faith

The following was a speech prepared as a testimony delivered at Wilmington Community Church on Sunday the 9th of November, 2025

I’m the only child of two immigrants.

My dad came from Sri Lanka, a Hindu who loved to drink and bet on the gee-gees.

My mum came from Vietnam, by way of Paris, a lapsed Catholic.

They divorced not long after I was born. My dad’s drinking got the best of him.

I didn’t understand faith as a child.

But when my mum’s mental illness flared up, I’d stare out the window on the tenth floor of our block of flats and pray to a God I didn’t know, to save her.

He didn’t.

When I was sixteen, I left home and moved around a fair bit.

In the second house I lived in, I stayed in an attic room run by the mission leader of the local Mormon church.

Two female missionaries visited and asked if I wanted to learn more about the Bible, which I agreed to, but it quickly became clear I was more interested in them than in the book.

During that time, I met two teachers who would change my life: John, a music teacher, and Sarah, who taught geography.

John gave me a stable home while I finished my A-levels.

Sarah became like a second mum, taking me to social-service appointments, helping me manage a difficult relationship with my mum, and encouraging me to keep studying.

They were quiet Christians.

They didn’t preach; they lived their faith.

Looking back, I believe God was already working through them.

Some years later, in my mid-thirties, I went on a journey of self-discovery, maybe really a search for God.

I travelled across Asia for four months, visiting temples and holy sites in Sri Lanka and Vietnam.

Just before I left, Sarah was diagnosed with stage-four glioblastoma, a brain tumour the size of a golf ball.

When the consultant told her the news, she took her husband outside and said, “This must be God’s plan.”

I’ll never forget that.

Her calm, unshakable faith marked me more deeply than any sermon or scripture ever could.

She died six months after I came home.

I loved that woman more than almost anyone, except my mum.

Even before I believed in Jesus, I carried her faith inside me.

From seventeen to twenty-four, I was an everyday drug user and drinker.
During those years, my god was drugs and alcohol.

At twenty-four, I went to my first AA meeting and heard people talk about a Higher Power.

The idea that something greater than myself could remove my addiction made sense.

I didn’t believe in God, but I could believe in something bigger than me, because my way clearly wasn’t working.

At twenty-five, I wasn’t fully sober yet, but I was trying.

I took a training course with the Youth Offending Team in Bromley because I wanted to help kids who’d been excluded from school.

There I met a young woman, a youth minister in training.
We started dating, and she introduced me to church.

When she returned to Birmingham, I visited her there. Her dad ran a Bible college, and we went to many churches full of ideas new to me, like speaking in tongues.

I’ll be honest: I didn’t enjoy it.

I was in love, but I found a lot of judgment and gossip.

When the relationship ended, I finally got sober at twenty-six.

I came back to London with two bags and not much else, but I kept going to a local church.
That’s where I met a wonderful minister called Jay.

The church was traditional, but I kept going because of Jay.

One afternoon, over a cup of tea, I told him I didn’t feel part of it all.

He smiled and said, “Mike, that’s fine. God is everywhere.”

And I felt free.

I wouldn’t go back to church for another seven years.

When I came back from Asia about six years ago, I started a new business and threw myself completely into work, which became my god.

As COVID unfolded, I started searching for a deeper understanding of faith.

Then, on a Good Friday, alone in the office, a voice came to me.

I believe it was God.

It said, “It’s time to give your life to Jesus.”

I called my friend Terry, who’d become a Christian himself, and told him what had happened.

He said, “Cool. I’ll put the kettle on.”

I went round to his house, and he put his hands on me and prayed.

With my eyes closed, I felt warmth move through my whole body and saw a blinding white light.

In that moment, faith stopped being an idea.

It became an experience.

But there was still one piece missing, and that’s where you all come in.

I didn’t have a regular church, and I’d made work my god.

Many of you know my friend Dan.

About a year ago, he invited me here to see a play, a one-man show about a man imprisoned for his faith.
It moved me deeply, and I felt the Spirit here.

Not long after, Dan and I were at an Open Heaven service, and he asked about my mum, knowing how difficult our relationship had been.

There were long periods where we didn’t speak, and it always made me sad.

Dan suggested I do a Sozo healing prayer session.
I put it off for months, then finally met with Joy and Mary.

It was one of the most profound spiritual experiences of my life.
I cried, shared things I never thought I would, and saw my mum in a completely different way.

I saw myself as a child, and her not as the woman who hurt me, but as a woman tormented by demons.

It filled me with compassion and healed an anger that had lived in me for decades.

That healing changed everything.

This August, I turned thirty-nine.
For the first time since I was sixteen, I spent my birthday with my mum.

My journey of faith hasn’t been a straight line, but that’s why I wanted to share some of the twists and turns along the way.

I’m truly grateful this church has given me a home.

My story begins and ends with my mum -

the woman I prayed for as a boy,
forgave as a man,
and who God taught me to love again.

Thank you.