Staying alive - John Delaney

'As I peered under the branch, I saw an enemy soldier lying on his back, with his weapon pointed at me and ready to fire. I took a step back and raised my rifle, but the range was too short and there was no room to aim. I fired...' At 19, John Delaney was a tough, highly-trained ParaBat - a member of the elite South African Parachute Battalion - who had fought bush wars in Namibia and Angola. The impulse to fight, to demand respect, even to kill, burned strongly within him. Back in civilian life he was a man without boundaries.
The girls, drinking, drugs and brawling failed to mask his emptiness. 'I had not died as a soldier. I didn't know how to live...but I didn't want to die.' When he discovered Jesus, with the help of Christian friends, his life was transformed. 'I had come home. The fight was over at last,' John recalls.
'I had thought religion was shut up in churches. Now I was experiencing the power of God. Today John is truly alive, a soldier for his faith, working with AIDS victims, street children and the poor.