THE PEOPLE OF BURY ARE DYING
AND NOBODY CARES !
In the November of 2005 I was walking home, it was late and I had been at a friends. As I past one house I noticed a small bottle on the floor being an avid footballer and an aged striker I lined up to shoot and fire the bottle along the pavement taking only a moment to celebrate my wonder goal.
As I did I heard a murmur from the doorstep of the same house I couldn’t see anything as it was set back and surrounded by a hedge, as I stepped in I could see the body of a man slumped on the step he had in one hand a can of alcohol and in the other a bottle of pills, it seems my football had been one of his discarded bottles. As I approached him he told me too ‘go away’, that he was killing himself and I could do nothing about it! As he said this he took some more pills and another swig of alcohol.
I asked his name and he wouldn’t tell me. Within seconds he collapsed on the floor and starting to scream, ‘I’m dying, I’m dying… please help me.’ His name is Dennis. As I looked around I could see the extent of his problem there was numerous cans and several empty pill bottles. I banged on the door of the house but no one came. I had no phone on me and I knew that on this street there was no phone box for a least a mile.
I knew I couldn’t leave him so I ran across the street and knocked on a few more doors, no one came! Then I came to another house there was a man watching TV I knocked on his window and asked for help as he got up he shooed me away then closed his curtains. ‘God…’, I thought ‘…will anybody help me.’ As I turned round to head back to Dennis a police car passed I ran down the road frantically waving, but they drove on.
I went back to Dennis he was semi conscious I decided to run to the pay phone I told him this and assured him that help was on its way. As I came back to the pavement the police car I had chased had come back. The police stepped out, I think he thought I was drunk he stood in front of me whilst his partner checked and confirmed that there was someone dying. I breathed a sigh of relief as the officers took over and the ambulance arrived. The policeman thanked me but as he said ‘wrong time, wrong place ’I thought no ‘right time… right place.’
I am a Bury boy; Kathryn and I grew up in Bury and have always lived here. God spoke to us in the year 2000 planting a seed in our heart to build something for Him in Bury. We always knew the town, the place but never the time. But now we did as I walked home I knew it was time and God spoke to me ‘THE PEOPLE OF BURY ARE DYING AND NOBODY CARES’, He whispered this to me. And Freedom was born!
Freedom is a community, a church. People from all walks of life that have discovered Jesus and the truth of His message, at Freedom you will find people with a story. They can tell you what being a Christian and knowing Jesus has done for them.
IT’S FREEDOM because we want to help people ‘live free’; Jesus said ‘He who the son sets free is free indeed.’ Freedom’s heart is to see and help people live life to the full. We are here to care for our town, to make a difference through what we do and say we are a community of people that have had our lives changed and want to pass that on.
FREE IS HOW WE’RE MEANT TO BE!
