Colin Mason's earliest memories are of fear. Home meant violence, not safety. There was sexual abuse. There was the steady drip of racism in the world outside. And there was a father whose cruelty had no bottom. When Colin was 13, his father told him he should kill himself, because nobody wanted him.
When his father emigrated two years later, the beatings stopped. But the wound did not. Colin carried it into adulthood, unsure of who he was or whether he mattered.
A Door He Almost Did Not Walk Through
Church had given Colin no reason to trust it. He had once been thrown out of a cathedral choir after he stood up against the discrimination he saw. So when a family member invited him to a small Christian house group, every instinct told him to say no.
He went anyway. And that night, in an ordinary front room, he met the presence of God. What won him over was a Person he could not explain away. Soon he joined a church, responded to an altar call, was filled with the Holy Spirit and baptised.
The Memories That Came Back
Meeting Jesus did not erase Colin's past overnight. If anything, it opened the door. Memories of the abuse he had buried for years came flooding back, and he found himself sobbing for hours at a time. This was slow, honest work of healing, walked out with pastoral support and Christian counselling.
The breakthrough came with a single realisation. "Forgiveness is not excusing the offender," he came to understand. "It is choosing freedom for myself." As he forgave his father and the others who had hurt him, the bitterness that had been poisoning him lost its grip.
From His Pain to Their Hope
Today Colin and his wife sit with people carrying the same kind of wounds he once carried, offering counsel to survivors of trauma. He helps them see God as the One who longs to redeem their pain. The boy who was told nobody wanted him now spends his life telling others they are wanted, and that the God who healed his broken heart can heal theirs too.
