Dermot's Story
Hello, my name is Dermot, I am married to Ann my wife for 17 years, and we have 3 boys, Stephen, Wayne, and Ben. Now I want to tell you about my past life, I grew up on a farm in the country with my father, mother, grandmother, two brothers and one sister. We were a very close family, we did everything together. From the age of 10 we went to mass every morning at 6am. When I was 18 I went to work with a neighbour who owns a haulage company, I worked as a helper on the trucks, I love to travel and we drove all over as part of the job.
On the 31st January 1979 my world was torn apart, I can remember it as clearly as though it was yesterday, we were on a delivery run to Omagh in Northern Ireland when the driver got a phone call for us to come home. On the way home I noticed that the driver (Oliver) was very quiet, this was not like him, he was always joking and good for a laugh. As we got closer to home I noticed that his hands on the steering wheel were shaking, so I asked him if he was ok, he started to say that my mother had taken ill and was in the hospital, but he couldn’t get the words out properly because of the emotion he was trying to control. You see the phone call he received informed him that my mother had actually died, God bless him he was trying to protect me from the news until I was at home with the rest of my family.
My mother was walking to the local school to collect my sister when she had a massive heart attack and died immediately. Our family was devastated and I couldn’t accept the fact that my mother was gone forever, I was angry with God, with the Church for letting my mother die. Within 12 Months my grandmother died, from then on I started to lose faith in God and the Church, and would only go to church once every two weeks, then once a month, and soon only at Easter or Christmas or special occasions.
In 1983 I met Ann, we were going out together for four years before we got married. In 1988 my dad was taken into hospital for tests, the family was informed that he had cancer and had about six to eight months left to live. Ann was expecting our first son Stephen around this time, so I didn’t tell her my dad was dying. In September Stephen was born, I was so happy and also very sad at the same time, I was gaining a son but losing my father, but I was glad that my father had seen his first grandson before he died in January 1989.
Ann started to go to
Emmanuel
Community
Church with her sister Katie who was a born again Christian. Ann would come home from the church all happy and content saying that the singing (worship) was lovely and the preaching of the bible was very good, my only comment to Ann was “If she was happy going to that church, then that was ok with me”. Ann didn’t put any pressure on me to go, but after a couple months I decided one Sunday morning to go along with Ann, what a surprise I got! It was so different to what I was used to in the church I was brought up in, the worship songs had such depth and when the Pastor (Peter Lynch) whom I had known years before, started to preach the Gospel in a way that I could understand,
On the 7th of January 2004 I was returning from Shannon to Dublin with a loaded 40 foot truck, it was late at night, the truck went out of control and crashed through a large road sign and railings, I thought I was going to die, when I opened my eyes I expected to be covered in glass and cut all over. But there was not one mark on my body, I couldn’t believe I was still alive, I should have been killed, and the lorry was wrecked and unfixable. I spent a few weeks thinking about how I escaped unhurt, “Why am I still alive” I started to think that somebody up there was watching over me !!! Peter and Philomena called around to my home one night to see how I was after the accident. I was feeling down and sad, Peter said to me that it was the hand of God on my life that saved me from being killed in the accident. What a mighty God he is, at the end of the night Peter, Phil, Ann and I stood up, held hands, prayed thanking God for his protection on my life.
On Easter Sunday night 2004 I was in church with Ann, Peter was explaining about the death of Jesus Christ, how He had suffered and was crucified on the cross for our sins, at that moment I felt very emotional and began to cry as I realised there and then that Jesus had died on the cross for me and my sins and at that moment I gave my heart to the Lord.
It is now several years since that wonderful night that changed my life, God is real each day, helping me in every situation and circumstance that is presented to both myself and my family. I’ve made so many new friends from many different walks of life who like me have come to know a living God who is able keep us every day of our lives.