My Story

I was born in Scarborough in 1973 and my wonderful parents are Frank and Joanne. For those of you who know them, you can see already how God was working in my life by blessing me with such great parents. I had a great childhood. My parents are always supportive of anything I do. Even to this day we are very close.

When I was in grade 2, I attended Cedar Drive Public School. After about a year of going there, my Mom decided to go back to work because they felt we needed two incomes (and I could eat a lot). So I started going to daycare that was run at the school by the Y.M.C.A.

One of the people working at the daycare attended Bendale Bible Chapel. We became good friends. Her husband was a drummer in a Christian rock band and we attended a few of the concerts.

God was working in my life even when I didn’t even know it.

When I was in grade 4, we decided to move to Malvern in a development called Empringham Drive. Well, the daycare worker knew of a young couple who was also moving there. So we made a point to go over and introduce ourselves. Well this young couple was Dean and Cindy Westacott and a wonderful friendship started.

Now at this time my parents where talking about taking me to church which was good timing because I was wondering about Sunday school. I remember hearing about it from some of my friends who attended and thinking who wants to go to school on Sundays when we are already go 5 days a week. Well Mom explained it to me that Sunday school is where you go to learn about God.

Now we checked out one church and we liked it but we thought we’d check out some others before deciding on one. At that time, Dean and Cindy invited us to Bendale for a barbeque. So we came. The people were so welcoming and so nice that we decided that this was the church for us.

Now at this point, I thought that you go to church and learn about God and Jesus and others in the Bible, therefore you must be a Christian. Wrong!

I’ve been coming to Bendale for about 20 years now but in those 20 years there was a gap when I stopped coming. Not because I didn’t believe in God, but I was working on weekends which made it hard to come on Sundays. I did still come to events on Saturdays. But eventually that stopped too.

Even when I started working full time I still did not come back at first because I was too busy partying on weekends and waking up on Sundays just did not happen. But I’m not going to get into that.

A few years went by and I still kept in touch with Dean and Cindy as well as the Schulz family who used to come here. I was very good friends with their oldest son, Dave, who also attended the same high school. I used to go to their trailer every so often on weekends at Joy Bible Camp but this one particular invitation was my wake up call.

There was a concert that weekend. A Christian rock band called Guardian was there. It was there that I met Andrew, Tamara, Todd and Chuck who are now some of my dearest friends.

At the show, a member of the band gave a devotional. I can’t remember word for word now in what he said but I do remember this: He said something like, “Why do we always ask God to show us his love for us? How often do we show our love for him?” I do strongly remember my reaction to that question. It was this feeling of God slapping me right across the face and yelling WAKE UP.

Now it didn’t happen right away but soon afterwards I started going to Drop In and some youth events. This gave me more insight on what I was missing. After talking with my new friends and Dean and Cindy, I gave my life to Christ. God used these guys in a big way.

Out of all the talking I did with them, they showed me that it takes more than just believing. You need that personal relationship with Jesus and so I asked Jesus for that relationship. And when I did that it was like a giant weight was lifted off me. The feeling I got I can’t explain but it was wonderful.

Now I really had a test of faith just a few months after becoming a Christian but first let me tell you about the retreat I went on.

It was my first youth retreat as a Christian. This was a great trip with all my friends who helped me come to the Lord. There was great fellowship and worship that I was right into. It was a very emotional weekend. And what made it that much better was that my dearest and closest friend who is like a sister to me was there too. So to share that weekend with her meant the world to me because she means everything to me.

Now here is the test. During that weekend, Dad was not feeling well at all. He was having chest and lungs pains that I was not aware of. So on Monday our doctor told him to go to the hospital to get it checked.

I still went to work and told my parents to call me so I knew how they made out. Well the call was something I did not expect and hope to never get again.

It was Mom asking me come to the hospital because the doctors thought dad had cancer. That hit me like a ton of bricks and I asked how can this be happening after that great weekend I had? But never did I turn from God through this. I turned to Him and man did that help.

After Dad went through tests on how to treat this, a miracle happened. The spots on his lungs that I saw on the x rays originally, were going away. The cancer was gone and the doctor couldn’t explain why. Perhaps it had been a bad case of pneumonia, but I believe that it was cancer and that God intervened. From that I learned how important prayer is and how powerful it is.

I love serving the Lord. I’m at Bendale more than I’m home. I’m now involved with Kidz Klub because I love kids so much and hopefully one day I’ll have my own. I’m also a leader at One Way Inn. The OWI did so much for me that I had to be there because I like to see the OWI do the same for others as it did for me. I also help with the Men’s breakfast because fellowship is so important to me. I’d like to take this opportunity to thank my dad for enabling me to be so involved in service, by always picking me up afterwards – which is no small trip since we live in Whitby now.

So looking back, I can see God working in my life and preparing opportunities for me to serve Him. As you see how God has worked in my life, preparing me to this point, I hope that you can also see how God has been working in your life. You may be looking for a relationship with Jesus Christ or you may want to strengthen the relationship you already have with Him.

- Steve Richardson