consequently were away from the family home most of the day. David and his brothers were left to a great extent to fend for themselves. Boys will be boys, and in their harsh environment it was not long before David was playing truant. Time went by and his appearances at school became less and less frequent. By the time David was 14 years of age he rarely attended school at all. He was a tall well-built lad who appeared older than he was, and eventually he became part of a group of teenagers who were known as ‘no goods’ in the area. If ever there was trouble David would be there in the thick of things. Stealing cars and joy-riding were activities that took place on a weekly basis. David thought there was nothing like the excitement of stealing a car with his mates and driving to Southport at high speed. On one such occasion the car he was in careered off the road and ended up in a field. David and his friend were badly cut and bruised – they were fortunate to escape with their lives.
By the time David was 15 he was well known to the local police and had been in court on numerous occasions. The day eventually arrived when he was sent away to a correctional institution for a number of months. When he was released he merely picked up his old lifestyle, but now with the reputation of being a really bad lad.
One day, however, things changed dramatically.
‘It was really strange, Derek,’ David told me. ‘I was walking along with me mate, just talking about this and that and planning our next bit of mischief, when I suddenly felt a really hard slap to the side of my head. It really hurt. I looked at my friend and said, “What was that for?” I was just about to fetch him one back when I realized that he couldn’t have done it because he was too far away from me. He’d stopped to light a ciggie and I’d carried on walking, so he was a few yards away.
‘We carried on towards me other mate’s house, but when he asked me in I told him that I was going home. I needed to have a good think. For some reason that slap around the head affected me more than any copper yelling at me or any court of law sending me down.’
Over the next few days David told me that he had stayed in and pondered on his life. He realized that he was not happy at all with his lifestyle and in fact was beginning to feel rather ashamed of himself and the things he had done. He began to look at things from the perspective of those who had suffered because of his actions – the owners of the cars he had stolen, the people whose lives had been affected by his crass and sometimes cruel behaviour. He began to feel deeply ashamed.
‘There was nothing I could do to make things better for them, Derek,’ he told me, ‘but I made a pact with myself that I wouldn’t knowingly cause hurt or harm to anybody else.’
David turned over a new leaf. He had lost his opportunity of education by now, for he was 16 years of age, but what he did was find himself a job in a local factory. He started earning a regular wage and mixing with a different group of people socially. He left his old life behind and became a worthwhile member of the community. ‘I’m not saying I became a pillar of society, mate,’ he said, ‘but at least I could look myself in the eye and wasn’t dodging out of the way of the coppers!’
David continued to work at the factory. He became a supervisor – a position he still holds – and he has now married and has children of his own. ‘And I make sure they keep to the straight and narrow,’ he told me with a twinkle in his eye. ‘It’s funny, y’know, Derek! If I hadn’t had had that slap around the ear that day I don’t think I’d have stopped what I was doing. I’d just have carried on and ended up being a real no-hoper. Who d’you think it was?’
I smiled. ‘That was your guardian angel,’ I told him. ‘A life of crime wasn’t meant for you. You weren’t meant to waste your time in prison. You had far more to offer than that. In your old life you wouldn’t have met your wife and you wouldn’t have brought your children into this life. You were made to change your ways so that you could meet your destiny!’
There have been many occasions when people have related to me that they have felt that they have been prevented from being involved in an accident or harmed in some way by an unseen force. These are examples of spiritual intervention – those times when it is absolutely evident, without a shadow of doubt, that something or somebody has stepped in and saved us from a dangerous or even fatal situation.
It has to be understood, though, that spiritual intervention can only take place when an injurious event is about to take place that is not on our designated pathway, i.e. is not part of our destiny. If we have chosen to undergo an experience then that event will take place, and nothing and nobody, neither in the physical nor spiritual world, can alter that fact. As explained earlier, we have to meet our destiny in order to achieve soul growth.
There are times, however, when we can be in the wrong place at the wrong time and it is then that our guides, protectors and family members in spirit are allowed to intervene in order to prevent either physical or psychological harm from happening to us.
It may be on the pathway of one person to experience a fatal accident, for example, but not on ours. This is the reason why you read in newspapers of accidents where people ‘miraculously escaped’. It is simply the case that whilst one person had chosen to experience that method of passing back to the world of spirit, the other(s) involved had not.
A typical example of spiritual intervention took place in my own and Gwen’s life a little while after my mother-in-law, Joanie, passed on to the world of spirit. Gwen and I were preparing to go on a journey which involved driving along quite a large section of the M6. We had been on our journey for no longer than a few minutes and were stationary at a set of traffic lights when the car’s engine cut out. No matter what I did, that car was just going nowhere. Ultimately, the garage had to be called out and the car towed back for investigation. An examination of the vehicle could give no particular reason for the engine’s refusal to start, but it did uncover a major mechanical fault. If Gwen and I had undertaken that journey it was inevitable that an accident would have occurred that would have resulted in either serious injury or a fatality. As soon as I heard the mechanic’s report, I knew that spiritual intervention had taken place and I also felt sure that Joanie had more than a little to do with that intervention!
I do not think that any of us will forget 7 July 2005 – the day when London was almost brought to a standstill by the horrific suicide bombings on the city’s transport system. On that day I was travelling to London with Gwen to attend meetings that day and the next. We had elected to fly down from Manchester airport to Heathrow on the 8.30 a.m. flight, so were unaware of what had happened until we actually landed at Heathrow some time after 9 a.m. The airport was in uproar with people trying to get transport into the city. The underground trains had been suspended – due to ‘an electrical problem’ we were told at the time – and consequently the queues for taxis were enormous. We were more than grateful that a car had been arranged to collect us from the airport. It was only when we climbed into the back of the car that we learned from the driver the true horror of what had taken place during the brief time we had been in the air.
It was a very long slow drive into London along the M4, but as we drew closer to the city on the A4 the traffic became lighter and lighter – a phenomenon we had never experienced before. However, the traffic travelling in the opposite direction was almost gridlocked, such was the desire of people to put as many miles as possible between themselves and the horrors that had so recently taken place. The police were advising people not to travel into London if they could possibly help it, but we had no option. Even though by now all our meetings
