- Let's talk about religion while we're here.
And I want to get back to your policies
in the House of Lords.
How did that happen for you?
Because I don't think you grew up with it.
- No well I didn't really,
although at boarding school there was chapel,
I mean I was aware of the Christian faith.
I had an aunt who was a missionary actually,
and she tried to have some influence,
but she'd been a missionary in Kenya
and in Nepal and leper colonies and those things like that.
I didn't see her that often,
and she was considered
by the rest of the family
as a quirky person sort of thing.
- She'd giving you a Holy Bible, I think.
- She did, yes, that's right.
And the verse inside of it was,
I think Psalm 119 verse 18,
"Lord open my eyes
"that I may behold wonderful things
"in your law."
And as a child,
I used this leather bound Bible.
It was a valuable possession.
I didn't read it except for this verse.
And I never quite knew what it meant,
but there was that prayer.
"Lord open my eyes that I may
"behold wonderful things in your law."
And that's what he did,
he's been opening my eyes ever since.
And I can behold wonderful things in his law.
So I sort of grew up just I would say like anybody else.
All right, except I was an island
but worldly thing in the 60s.
You had the promiscuity coming along, drugs,
thankfully I never really got involved
in early drug days.
Certainly, my father was an alcoholic,
I started drinking a bit, but actually
I had a very good piece of advice by a commissioner.
In the city, you had these commissioners,
they used to be ex-army,
and they used to have these uniforms
and used to be messengers around the city.
There was a chap called, Sergeant Simmons.
When I was in my early 20s
and I think he saw me coming
in with a hangover one day.
And he just said,
"Michael, just let me give you a word of advice."
He said, "Just stick to beer, avoid the spirits,
"stick to beer."
And I thought, that's good.
Somebody gave me a piece of advice.
Nobody else gave me anything like that.
And it really stuck, and I thought
okay, I can see the danger, I've got the danger
in my history.
And that's what I did,
And I think that actually
helped me a lot during the 20s,
my 20s when I wasn't a Christian.
- In the late 60s when it was all kicking off in London.
- Absolutely.
- What do you remember about the late 40s
50s, 60s, in London?
Like what comes out?
It was hard times for the city.
- Yeah, well, I was born in '44,
but those days, and I didn't live in London.
Then we lived in Berkshire
but there were hard post-war days
and Britain was paying back debt to America.
And it was a hard time, rationing still went on,
but in a way there was still that,
I wouldn't say purity but there was a simplicity
of life and the family life and those values were still
there in society.
Whereas when you get to the 60s
with particularly the pop culture
and this sort of liberalisation
and this gradual acceptance of whatever goes.
This philosophy, I always used to think,
"Just do whatever you wanna do,
"just don't hurt somebody else."
However you define that.
But that sort of culture started developing.
So I was by myself.
So I was walking as an island.
So actually, when I got married at the age of 30
and that sort of changed our lives and moved outside.
And then the first baby came along when I was 35.
And it was at that point I became a Christian,
which was a bit of a Damascan Road experience.
- How did that happen,
'cause that would have been the last thing we would
have ever predicted that happened
to Michael Farmer at that time.
- No, that's right.
Well, I used to, there were a number
of things that happened.
We lived in the fields,
we had a house out in the fields
in Buckinghamshire and just cutting the grass,
going for walks, just what I would call creation.
You call it nature.
This, the rhythm of it, the cycle,
the fruitfulness of it,
seeing the apples on the apple trees,
seeing the wheat grow every year,
seeing the harvest come, seeing the seasons change.
That was a big slow influence coming in that
one was thinking about what is this place?
The stars in the sky, the moon, the sun.
What am I?
This conscious human being, which is hugely complex.
The whole place is hugely complex.
We're only finding out how complex it is today.
And yet it works.
It works.
It's extraordinary,
I had that sort of going on in my head the whole time.
I suppose the exposure, the Psalms say,
"The heavens declare the glory of God."
There is this speech that pours out from creation
to every human being.
No matter what language you speak,
you understand it.
And nobody has any excuse, it's there.
And I think that was pouring in on me.
And then we had the first baby,
and I was thinking,
"Who's this, who is this person?"
And it was just this new baby being formed,
this new human being coming from sort of nowhere.
And that was really another thing.
And there were a couple of other things,
local minister of a church, quite some way away
he knocked on the door one night and he said,
"My name's Nick Maloney
"and I've just come to see how you are."
We've been there a few years and nobody else
ever knocked on my door.
We were right outside,
"Come and have a cup of tea."
And we got to know him a bit
and he never mentioned God,
but I thought afterwards well, nobody else has ever knocked
on the door and asked us how we are.
And then there was somebody
we were trying to help
who was having difficulties in their marriage.
And my wife asked our doctor actually,
"How can we help?"
'Cause we didn't know how to help.
And I don't think he was a Christian,
but the doctor who was an old man,
he said, "Try and encourage her to mix with people
"who go to church."
And I came back from work from the city.
I said, "What?"
Try and encourage her to mix with people
that would go to church.
That's a very funny thing to say.
And then I thought well, actually,
they'll probably try and be kind
they'll probably try and help her.
I said, "That's probably pretty good advice actually."
And there were these sorts of things going on,
which then comes a dramatic moment.
So it is a Damascan Road experience.
Basically in the middle of the night,
just heard one word which was Michael.
- Just clear.
- Clear, it was quite clear,
it was just Michael.
And all I said, I didn't have any choice was,
"Yes, Lord."
And in front of my eyes was Jesus Christ
as the Son of God.
It was this sort of white knowledge certainty,
Jesus Christ, the Son of God.
And I thought, "This changes everything."
This just changes everything
I have to find out, I have to learn who is Jesus Christ?
What does this mean?
I thought well I better start going to church.
I thought I'd better start reading the Bible.
I have to find out,
I have to learn.
And I would say that when asked about this,
if you want convincing that this was the Lord speaking,
when I was thinking I have to go to church.
You know what thought next came into my head.
When you go to church, don't let them make you treasurer,
you have to learn.
And guess what they did?
I went to this little church nearby,
and yeah it was a little church.
Here I am, doing reasonably well in the city.
"Michael, would you like to be treasurer?"
And before I knew where I was,
I was in a teaching church
in the city of London as well.
And one learns as a Christian,
you never cease learning about God.
He is beyond learning.
So you're always on that journey.
(upbeat music)