Our Stories

Alan and Jacquie

We have been a part of Doncaster Evangelical Church since before our marriage.  Then later as we began, and expanded our family we brought them into the fellowship going through crèche and Sunday School whilst joining in with the various youth and family activities.

Our testimony and experience has been that the church has always been welcoming and supportive to families.  As a family we have enjoyed the different activities which have helped our children to develop their own confidence and enjoyment in both church life and in the world around them.  We have many fond memories of time spent with our extended church family, on holidays, days out and special events.

The fellowship has always encouraged our family to understand the importance of the Bible as God’s Word.  It encourages us to realise that God has shown amazing love to us.  Doncaster Evangelical Church continues to support our family as we welcome and teach the next generation the amazing truth “that God so loved the world that He gave His only Son that whosoever believes in Him shall have everlasting life” [John 3:16].

Janet

I don’t know how I reached forty without thinking about God but I did.  In fact I didn’t start thinking about God, rather God got into my thinking.

It all started with my questioning myself asking ‘Was this it? Was this all there was?’  I somehow felt my world was very limited and there was something I wasn’t seeing; a feeling that there was something right in front of me that I just wasn’t getting.

While chewing these thoughts over I also had an overwhelming urge that I needed a Bible; a recurring thought was that everything I needed to know was in there.  Looking back I see God was dealing with me the way He knew to get my attention but it was still a drastic step for me to take it further.  I was not brought up in church and neither was my husband’s family so this was going to have an impact on him as well.

The route I took to finding Doncaster Evangelical Church is a little meandering but thankfully this is where I nervously walked in by myself all those years ago.  Over the following months, through hearing and having the Scriptures explained, I began to learn about God, Salvation and Eternity.  I also began to realise that it was only through Jesus’ death on the cross that I was saved and how once I had accepted Him what a continuing personal relationship I was entering into.

During all these years my husband has come to church with me but it was not until recently that he too accepted Jesus as his personal saviour.

DEC is more than just our church, it is our extended family.  A large kaleidoscope of people with a myriad of personalities who somehow seem to support, encourage, laugh with, cry with, and love each other more than any family I have known.

Hannah

I come from a Roman Catholic background, my family and I attended church on a regular basis and when I grew up I married my husband who was also Roman Catholic and we still continued going to church.  It wasn’t until I was in my forties that I started to question my standing before God and this began to trouble me.

Up until then God was a very distant person for me and whilst I believed in him my prayers were always directed to Mary and ‘the saints’.  I believed in Jesus too, that He died on the cross to pay the price for sin but I never equated that to me.  Instead, as I had been taught, I went to confession where I was given absolution and then my penance was to say a few prayers.

It got to a point where I realised that I wanted a Bible and didn’t know where to get one.  Then when I heard about The Gideons Society I contacted them and they brought one to my house.  I started to read the Bible and it was then I discovered wonderful truths that contradicted many of the things I had been taught, for example that Jesus is the only Mediator between God and man; than no-one can come to God but by Him; that Jesus paid the price in full for all my sins and the sins of all who believe and trust in Him because He suffered and died on that cross for that purpose.

It sounds as if this was a quick process for me but it was a few years before I knew that I had to leave the Roman Catholic Church and go to a Bible believing / Bible teaching church.  That was Doncaster Evangelical Church where my husband and I are still active.  It’s been over 25 years now and all I can say is that my life has been truly transformed and I thank the Lord every day for my salvation.

John

Of course I’m a Christian!

I always thought that I was a Christian and if you had asked me at any time before the end of 2015, I would have said just that.  “Yes, I’m a Christian.”  This is my story as I told it at my Believers Baptism.

“Most of you here will know me as I have been attending church with my wife, Janet, on and off for the last 16 years.  I had always managed to stay on the edge, not really taking in the messages I was hearing but as I’m standing here now before you I guess we have to say that something must have gone in.

I was listening to Gareth preach one Sunday about not taking the last steps – accepting Christ as my saviour – in case it might just change things and you were happy with your life as it was.  I realised that I was not risking taking that step and it seemed that Gareth was not only talking about me but to me.

After that sermon I spoke to Gareth and accepted Jesus as my Saviour and well, here I am, finally.  Thank the Lord.”

It’s easy to go through life thinking you are a Christian but it’s not until you attend a church like DEC where the Bible is preached and taught and you start to read the Bible for yourself that you actually realise that you’re not.  Oh and by the way I was 71 years old when this happened!

Christine

Looking back, and knowing what I know now, it seems strange that I was teaching others about the Christian faith before I really understood it myself…

I was first taken to Sunday School at the age of three at a Methodist Church near Leeds and as I got older started going to church twice on Sundays.  Both my parents went to church and they encouraged me to read the Bible from an early age, I had my own children’s Bible reading notes from the International Bible Reading Association.

We moved to Doncaster when I was thirteen and I continued to attend church twice a day for services and stayed for the Youth Group meetings.  It was a full day.  I also became involved with Sunday School when at age fifteen I wanted to earn a badge for the Girl Guides which involved community service, I didn’t realise how much I was going to enjoy the work.

A couple of years later I was asked to join a group of young people, led by a Local Methodist Preacher, which travelled to different churches and helped to lead services.  This was when I really began to think what Christianity was all about.  The act of leading prayers, studying the Bible more intently and preparing talks led me to realise that I had to take my relationship with God more seriously.

Around this same time I also attended several evangelistic events (usually led by students from Cliff College) and it was at one of these events that I became convinced that I needed to make a commitment to Jesus, which I did.

Looking back, and knowing what I know now, it seems strange that I was teaching others about the Christian faith before I really understood it myself but I am sure it was part of God’s amazing plan and so everything worked out well.

Asa

I was raised in a Christian family by a loving mum and a crazy, loving dad.  I’ve always believed in God but for most of my life I never knew Jesus as my Saviour, and I didn’t have a relationship with the God that I claimed to worship.  I had heard the saying, ‘just because your parents are Christians doesn’t make you a Christian’ so many times, but it took me a few years to realise that’s exactly what my mindset had been and I didn’t truly know the meaning of that saying in my heart.  As I came into secondary school, I would often say things or laugh at things that did not honour The Lord due to social pressures and trying to fit in with the world around me.

Then in the summer of 2021, my friend Rufus, invited me to go with him to Compass Christian Camps in the Lake District.  I didn’t really know what to expect but in my pride I thought I wouldn’t benefit much from the teaching.  I was so very wrong.  Seeing the way the people there would act and speak, it made me realise that I wanted what they had, which was a true Christlikeness and firm relationship with God.  I’m happy to say I have made lifelong friends there over the years.

The Lord gradually took hold of me and began to reveal to me what a sinful mess I really was and my need of a Saviour.  When I was around 14 years old I accepted Jesus Christ as that Saviour, knowing that He had died for my sins, nailing them all to the cross and loosing me from the chains of hell.  He has given me a new heart and a new life with the desire to follow Him for as long as I live.  The Holy Spirit had to convict me of my sin, but I can rejoice, knowing that I don’t have to bear that sin anymore as Jesus is my great redeemer and I hope to grow closer to Him every day.

So today, I can rejoice in the knowledge that I have been reconciled to God and I know He walks with me and gives me the strength for each day and is always there to lift me when I fall.  As the prophet Jeremiah writes in Lamentations;

“The steadfast love of the LORD never ceases; His mercies never end; they are new every morning; great is His faithfulness.” (Lamentations 3v22-23)

Paul

I was lying in bed one night feeling very guilty about something I’d done that day.  I was about 10 or 11 years old.  I was wretched and ashamed.  I prayed, ‘Dear God, if you’re real, please forgive my sins.  Please Jesus, come into my life and save me’. 

Before I’d even finished praying, the crushing feeling of guilt disappeared!  Gone.  I felt re-born.  I knew from that moment that I’d been forgiven by God and that Jesus would be in my life forever.

Of course, without me properly realising it, God had been patiently calling to me before.  I had been told the stories about God and of Jesus all my life.  My mother’s faith was strong and she loved to tell her children about Him, the things He’d done and what He could do for us.

So, I knew why I was feeling awful about doing wrong and, more importantly, what I needed to do to get right with God.  I knew my need of a Saviour, and of a Saviour who loved me, even though I didn’t love Him.  I knew He was called Jesus, but I’d never made it ‘personal’.  I knew about Jesus, but I didn’t know Him.

That night in my room, I was finally honest with God and called out to Him to help me.  It was a cry from the heart.  Looking back, that night was the crucial starting point.  I now had a ‘father-child’ relationship with God.  I was His and He was mine.  He began to teach me and show me how I needed to change, in fact, to be transformed.  There was no going back.

I am 59 now.  God has been faithful to me despite my lack of faith towards Him.  He has ‘directed my paths’.  He has corrected me when I’ve been stubborn and guided and encouraged me when I’ve felt like giving up.  He provided me with a godly wife, two delightful children (and children-in-laws) and meaningful work.  I know the power of God in my life, and I know what He can do with the unlikeliest of materials!

If, like that small, sad boy in his bedroom all those years ago, you feel you need your sins forgiven, then don’t be afraid, acknowledge you’re a sinner, believe that Jesus died for you and call out to God.  He is ‘faithful and just’ and will save you, too (1 John 1:9).