8.0 Working for self
At that time my brother was out of work and Jock Macallion replacing windows on a council estate in Richmondsworth had offered us work. So hastily I handed my notice in and my brother began to work together again. This work soon how ever came to an end but we soon found work in a building site as carpenters. We were paid £10 a day, which was good money and this, lasted a few weeks. One day on the site the men laughed at me when I told them about the Lord Jesus Christ. It didn’t bother me but my brother for the first time ever stuck up for me and told them what I was saying was true.
45 The Morgan Sports Car
After this we decided we would have to earn money at welding and spraying cars. I had the equipment and know how so we hired a barn in Little Horward and set up in business. It was cold at that time of the year in January and so we heated the workshop with an oil burning stove called a “Salamander”. We were supposed to us heating oil or paraffin but we used old engine oil.
This heater we called, “Sally the oil burning goose”, because of the shape of the chimney. This was a dangerous heater as I shall now relate and I believed God delivered me for a catastrophe.
One day I had in the workshop a Morgan sports car, which was in for re spray. It was worth a £1000 (1972) . I was working alone preparing this car with old Sally burning away merrily but she began to bubble and spit. This meant water was in the oil . Normally when this happened we shut her down and re-light her but on this occasion she would not have it , She was so hot she erupted and oozed out gallons of hot engine oil which flooded the floor. This went up in flames. The flames leaped up to the ceiling burning the polythene ceiling stretched across the rafters. The fumes and smoke and heat were so terrific I cannot describe the event and terror I found my self in. What should I do ? What could I do ? All Alone in the middle of a field, in a wooden barn with, a pool of leaping flames just about to burn down the Barn and the Morgan car in side. My heart immediately motioned my soul to seek direct help from God. I had done all I could now I prayed aloud unto God for his intervention. I then left the barn with my back to it and my eye fell on an old damp tarpaulin big enough to unfold and us as a fire blanket. In I went using the opened tarpaulin as a blanket and threw it over the burning pool. The flame were put out and smoke filled the place. The flames reappeared a few time but I soon put them out. God had answered my prayer and the flame were put out. The barn was saved and our equipment. Here God gave me the wisdom and courage and initiative to apply a natural remedy to my dilemma. God had saved me yet again. Praise God.
About 15 minute later Mike West and his wife arrived and the knights for visit. They said I looked as white as a sheet. No wonder so I explained all that had happened. From that time Mr. Knight inquired about getting insurance against such accidents but the insurance company refuse it on the grounds it was too risky.
Shortly after this I decided I would have to look for another kind of work.
46 I Find Work In Lowestoft
I found a job advertised in a national paper working as a faultfinder at the Pye TV factory at Flee Lowestoft. This was in the summer of 1972 . I decided to take the job. I moved into a YMCA hostel leaving my home in Aylesbury and parents house. At the same time KK took a job at the same factory and both he and his wife moved to lowestoft for a short while. They eventually decided not to stay.
47 Elim Pentecostal
I felt very lonely but soon got involved in the Elim Pentecostal Church in the town. I visited the local Christian bookshop and ordered a book called the Sovereignty of God by Arthur Pink. It was soon made known amongst the young people that I was a Calvinist because the mother of one of the girls served me in the shop. I found this out one evening when I was attending a young peoples occasion and the girl ( about 20) said she thought I was a Calvinist as I had bought this book from b book shop. She then asked me directly saying was I a Calvinist. I said yes I believed in the sovereignty of God. She was the daughter of one of the senior members of the Elim Church. Her response was YUK ! and she turned around and walked away. I certainly felt hostility then. I decided I would speak to the elders of the church about some of the things I had learned but the idea of God choosing some and leaving others was not received very well. The thought of Particular Redemption was also rejected.
Whilst at the YMCA I became very lonely and wake with a bad taste in my mouth. My mouth in fact tasted like the inside of a zoo keepers boot. This was a saying of Mike West. I decided to treat my self and ended up very ill. I began to take Andrews lived salts and at first this was very refreshing. It was so good I began to take it all the time until one day at lunch I had stomach pains and when I tried to eat a salad then pain increased intensely. This set off a reaction, which lasted months and ended up me being treated for duodenal ulcers.
I remember speaking to on the workers at the Lowestoft factory about Jesus Christ. I had told him all have sinned and come short of Gods standard. He did not accept he was a sinner as he had lived a good life and loved football. He asked me how going to a football match could possibly be wrong in the eyes of God and I gave a quick retort saying the scriptures say, “go not with a crowd to do evil.” I was thinking of the football hooligans but at that he said I was ridicules.
I the summer holiday I returned to Aylesbury and decide to apply for a Job as a television service engineer in Tring. This was at Mr. C. J. Ward & Son.