JUST AFTER his fortieth birthday Steve Wyke's life hit the buffers.

“My life started to go downhill after my first marriage broke up. I got into drink and drugs and felt terrible for the way I wasn't being much of a father to my children.

“I remarried, but had big monetary problems and health problems, including chronic asthma and Hepatitis B and C - which I got through injecting heroin.”

One day, Steve felt so desperate he told his brother he was ready to do something drastic to turn his life round. His brother felt that he would do better if he could get help outside their home town of Northampton.

“One of his friends had a brother who was an outreach worker in Nottingham. This guy had been a biker and an alcoholic. He'd become a Christian and was now a changed man. He was married with kids, but he was willing to take me into his own home to do a detox. I was in such a state I couldn't imagine having the will or energy for detox. But hearing a tape of his testimony made hope fl are inside me and I gladly agreed to go.

“By the third day without drink and drugs I was very poorly indeed. I knew I had two choices: to get hrough the rest of the pain in my body, as it went into spasms of withdrawal, or leave quickly and find some drugs. I didn't really know anything about God but during the third night I felt so bad I cried out 'If there's a God, come and help me out!'”

The power of the Holy Spirit fell on Steve. His body stopped hurting at once. Tears poured out of his eyes, with a sense of trapped emotions being released. Something – Someone - deep inside assured him that he would get through. Along with this was a sense of feeling right - joy and peace flooding him. “I hadn't been feeling right for a long time. It felt wonderful. When my new friend came down in the morning, I told him something really strange had happened in the night: I didn't know what it was - but I knew I was going to be OK! He explained: 'that was the Holy Spirit!'. I was so ignorant of spiritual things that I asked him: 'What's that all about, then?'. So he read me Psalm 40:

I waited patiently for the Lord; He inclined to me and heard my cry. He drew me from the miry bog, and set my feet upon a rock making my steps secure. He put a new song in my mouth, a song of praise to our God...Blessed is the man who makes the Lord his trust.

When he finished reading, Steve asked him 'Is that true, what you've just read me?' When he nodded, Steve cried out: 'Well, I want that!' and gave his life to Jesus.

After that - and for the 16 years that have followed – Steve says everything was different.

“The way I thought and acted towards other people; what I wanted to do with my future – I was a totally different man, determined to sort out the terrible mess that was my life”.

He booked himself into a rehab in Surrey. Soon afterwards, very thin and poor in health, he moved into one of the Jesus Army community houses in Northampton.

“It took a year before I was fit and that first year was tough, but I felt all right in myself. As people prayed over me and supported me, I regained my weight and my self-worth.

“Because of my own experience of God's forgiveness and complete change of my whole life, I've been able to help to sort many of my mates out and I now look after a community house in Northampton. One of the best things that's followed is the way my relationship with my kids has come together again. I let them down so badly because of the way I was, but they've given me a second chance to pour my life into them.”

Steve's son Thomas was only four when his parents split up. Now Thomas is 17, has recently taken covenant as a church member and works alongside Steve as his apprentice in the church building firm.

“My relationship with Dad is a good one. He's genuine. He's straight to the point and I admire him and respect him,” explains Thomas.

“As a kid, I used to stay with Dad on Thursdays and Fridays. At school so many people were happy playing on their computers and trying to please their friends but I could never get into it. Drink and drugs never appealed: I've seen a lot of people very messed up and even the ones who seem happy in it – it doesn't amount to much.

“Deep down I always believed there was a God and I knew there was more to life than just going to work and then dying. I found sitting in church meetings boring - but staying with Dad I saw people working things out together and living for a cause. Every day something seemed to happen that gave me more understanding of God through my everyday experience of life. When I was 15 I decided to be baptised.”

Steve looks at building the church with a bricklayer's eye:

“I'm a foundation guy. I believe we need to build our foundations well and our young people are the stones for that foundation. They need to be trained, as we were trained, in all the ways of love, understanding, caring, loyalty and in expressing themselves.

“Because I was unfaithful, the value of faithfulness is something God has worked deeply in me. Faithfulness and cause-consciousness – something worth living for - the vision to be a man that reaches the goal to achieve in God. We've got to know that we're unstoppable, believe it, and get on with it.

“My understanding of where we're at and my motivation keeps me young. I enjoy working with young people because they're quick and they work things out quickly. I'm 56 but I'm a young man because I only started living at 40! I don't look at young men and think they're running faster than me. I'm running fast - they've got to run faster than me and take the church further!”