Facing the Canon with Tim Saiet

[Music] hi I'm Jay John welcome to facing the cannon and I'm delighted today to be interviewing my friend Tim say it hi team IJ John good to see you great to see you too well I want you know the viewers to get to know you a little bit so tell us a little bit about your journey in life you used to be a commando in the Marines I did when I was 17 I joined the wrong Marines and stayed in there for just about six years travelled all over Norway mountain artic warfare I was up at four five commando in Scotland training to live and fight the Russians in the 80s at minimum million men on the border of Murmansk in 2000 VARs so if the Russians that have come over I probably would have dug a hole and hidden my yeah so that was our job so that was hard was it it was very cool it was tough I mean the life of a real marine is is I was told that when you pass out a training you're in the one to one percent of Fitness in the country so you've got to maintain that fitness day in and day out and it's quite a battle to try and stay at that fit but when you go on exercise you realize why carrying heavy kit so but it's a tough job but there's a lot of masculinity and chest banging in there which is if you can put up with that it's a great life so you signed up for how many years I signed up for three years but you can give 18 months notice after that so you have to do a minimum of three and then you give 18 months notice and you can get out after 18 months right so what did you do after that well because of my experience in skiing I decided that I wanted to sort of can because in the Marines I was training instructors how to live and fight and train the men so we used to go out to a place called rookin in Norway and trade a month before deployment and a month after deployment and trained military ski instructors so it seemed an obvious progression to get out and get into the ski industry I did my first season in aviemore I did five seasons in the Marines and then nine seasons as a professional skier when I got out the wrong reeds Wow a lot of fun a lot of fun a bit of an adventure an adventure but it's a bit nomadic you start thinking you know where am I going and east living for the seasons a little if the snow is not good it can it can affect everything I think I was asking myself you know do I want to do this all my life living such a nomadic lifestyle especially not a local Austrian or local Frenchman you are an invited guest for the winter and then they like it when you shove off so word I went skiing once tempted you yeah and I was doing quite well on the nursery slope yeah and getting more confidence yeah and then this four-year-old little kid that was absolutely amazing just stopped in front of me so I try to avoid this little kid and then twisted my knee and it kind of didn't recover for a good year one of those things it's a risk I've lost my way now yeah shame it's a great holiday to have well what do you do after that well I was some during the time in my summer period I was living in Jersey and I banged into an extra marine he was a hobbyist as a he used to do magic and card tricks and he said to me look you know because I did get that like mathematical tricks and I was very proud of my mathematical tricks I've been doing them for years I had a collection I was showing them to him and he said to me that's absolute rubbish you need to be doing sleight of hand with skill so he showed me and it was absolutely like a massive iOpener for me to see someone with skill yes so I pleaded with this guy to teach me all he knew and then when he taught me all in you he said look I need to send you to one of the best in the world and he sent me to a guy called Steve Johnson who lived in Jersey and Steve basically told me to get lost for three months he didn't want to speak to me didn't want to talk to me and I pleaded with him and he said there you can come with me but I iron my shirts polished my shoes and carrying my case yes and he tormented me he gave me a hard time for about two years and basically he taught me everything he knew and then he said to me if you want to get better you need to go to America so I worked a season in Aspen in Colorado at the time I'd been accepted for the British telemarketing which was a a new type of skiing at the moment it's they're looking at it at the moment possibly for the Olympics yes but I was one of the founders of racing in the country for that and I was training in Aspen with some of the US Ski Team out there and doing magic and learning magic with some very good guys and then I moved to Los Angeles and performed at the Magic Castle in Hollywood which is the the mecca for for magicians right and yeah there's a lot of fun Wow now tell us how does your journey of faith fit into you the Marines and then post and marine time and your season doing magic when did you discover faith I think that's I I didn't come up at grow up him one of those Christian families i i sometimes wish I did and then I sometimes think well I'm glad I didn't because it gives me value to my test me that I've had some sort of background but I was one of those boys that went to Boys Begay and absolutely loved it what was interesting was they used to give a sunday-school but I loved being in the main church and hearing the pastor preach even as a little boy I still loved listening to this guy speak it was a Methodist Church in the Wirral and that was about it I didn't have any more contact with a Christian faith I joined the Royal Marines I used to only go to church at weddings there was a lot of weddings we went to in uniform or I'd go at Remembrance Day but I used to write on my dog tags TV and a lot of the guys used to have their blood group if they got shot on their arm and CV on because you had to have your blood group and your religion so all of us thought we were CV yeah absolutely none of us had a clue what CV meant but there was something burning inside of me because I've been in about two weeks and they have this massive Christmas party at War Marines a commando training centre down in Devon and the sergeant says we said we needed a Royal Marine to vote a recruit to volunteer to read out of the cow service so I just my hand up it's so unlike me today it and I end up getting up and reading in front of hundreds and hundreds of people but on the Monday the sergeant said who was that idiot that got up and spoke at the carol service and I said it's me and they had this massive water tank which was frozen over and he said I'm gonna teach you for doing volunteering he said get in that tank and tell me how thin the ice is in the middle I said but I know how thin the ice is sergeant he says you don't know till you're under it now get out there so I got out and got absolutely soaked freezing calories in curries in cold and but something inside me I actually felt actually I did the right thing and that was like I was I've been punished for doing some good yes and there was like a rejoicing I didn't know what it was at the time but didn't get involved with church at all and then lived the showbiz lifestyle I was partying drinking hard spending a lot of money earning a lot of money at the time I became the magician for a store football club yes I did 14 or 15 four seasons for them then I was Warner Brothers a nice international well different movie companies I was the magician right and then like their residents yeah they'd have a movie premiere and they'd rather than do their parties they would book me to do the movie studios yeah and we would do a deal that I could do the VIP party because the premiere is not the one to go to it's the party yes I mean the premiere is great but the party is fantastic so I said look I won't charge you if I can get in bring friends to the premiere and do the party after and it was fantastic and then I got him with the Bernie Eccleston's company called me and asked me if I do the paddock Club at Formula One and then I got involved with McLaren and Williams and did magic for them so I was doing magic in all different and amazing places and I I got my big break from Paul Robinson from neighbours who I believe is it's still on it at the moment and I was doing a charity event for sticky-fingers which was Bill Wyman's new restaurant in London yes and they had all the neighbours a lot of the neighbors cast in EastEnders cast and there was a woman that who managed all these people so Paul Robinson that I perform some tricks and he said to this woman there was three magicians and he said you need to sign this guy up she said I don't work with magicians you know and he said look you need to sign him up so she said would you like to would you like to come on board so I they took me on I went from nothing to go to movie premieres on the arms of some of these the girls and yes I live with a guy of home in a way but a turning point for me was he was on about 10,000 pounds a week in 1990 four or five and he would come home crying yeah we live together and I would say to him why are you crying and he said I don't know there's a there's a hole there's something missing and I said to him you've ruined it for me I wanted to be famous and have lots of money and be on TV you're famous you're on TV you've got lots of money and I said in your crying if you're crying what hope what chance have I got sure so it's like the bubble burst so I started thinking well what is the meaning of life what is the meaning life and I I carried on and then one day I just I thought I need to start I was driving past churches and thinking I haven't got a clue what these mean Methodist Baptist and someone asked me questions and I felt really stupid yes so I thought I need to do a course on it because in the forces you do a beginner intermediate so I'm gonna do a beginner course so I knocked on a church in Windsor it's the perfect church he had an ex-marine chaplain who was attached to the church vicars dream you know I said higher I had a Mercedes at the time I was doing it about a hundred thousand pound a year and I said to the guy I said look yeah I'm a single fella if you've got any courses on God I've done courses in the marine courses on ski done courses imagine you've got any courses on God did he laugh and he said yes I was delighted he said we've got one tonight called the Alpha course I said how much is it he said it's three I said them don't you get a meal he said yes I'm a bachelor I don't like cooking he said you get a meal are there any chicks and he said there's loads of lovely women you'll love it yes so when I turned up it was full of all these old grannies you know and I thought he lied to me but actually they were just they were amazing yeah and I went on it every week I had every argument in the book and I thought they're really pathetic and weak because no one would argue with me because I like debating but what they were doing was letting me have my say and then I I thought we should watch the video of this church called Holy Trinity Brompton in London and I saw all these lovely girls on it I thought I'll go there yes so you know I was in the world and that's when I was thinking and I arrived there and everyone looked really happy going in and I thought okay I'll go in and then when I went in they they were very very happy and positive and I thought oh they're a bit like they are a corporate trade show and they're trying to sell you some right so maybe they're trying to sell me something so I'll just be careful and then when I went in as soon as they started I realized it wasn't like a normal organ they had this full band singing there was this big picture of Jesus in the back and they had all their arms in the air and I thought these guys they really mean this stuff and then I started crying so I thought they've drugged the water or they've drugged the tea I thought you know yeah something not right here because I've got nothing to cry for very happy cry through the service left I thought I'll go back next week but I won't drink anything and then I went back the following week tried again to the whole service and I just kept feeling this like aching and pain and longing in my heart to go back and it was like I thought this is this is a place I need to be there's no why but I need to be here and I continued and did the Alpha course again at Holy Trinity Brompton my life has never been the same since it's been absolutely unbelievable it's not been easy no but I found myself I've dealt with some of the stuff in the past that held me back pains and aches heartache I've answered a lot of questions I've got more questions yes I've never been so high sometimes I've never been so low when I see other people suffering and but my own family and friends thought I'd gone mad thought I joined the Moonies literally I had people at the Magic Circle where I was a member avoiding me thinking I'd gone mad that you'd become a religious nonsense oh yeah yes but actually what's funny with my friends in the ring said mate were absolutely delighted for you go for it one of our own is joined the church yes they loved it I got all the support from them you then started working for Alfa how did that happen well it was it was just a progression really they started saying to me would you do the odd speaking and events doing some illustrations with your they saw I had a skill set sure then they they realize I was used to communicating so what a natural thing they also I start playing guitar that well we're sure of people but the only platform I had that was open at the time was in the prisons so I sort of cut my teeth on those poor fellows and ladies and the prisons are yes but actually they're very patient and very kind because you can make all the mistakes you want and they just don't care yeah they're so glad that you've gone in and it was the real place of grace and I so I sort of went in there and got more and more involved and then eventually I was thinking about being ordained that sort of was a question that came up right and and they offered me a job to run alpha for forces with another guy at Holy Trinity Brompton which was a dream job for me at the time because I loved that church I my heart was there I was sort of you know my faith was born there and that was to work with Paul cowling that was with Paul cow who was on Newsnight day who's night on the TV the fantastic jaws right and Paul has been a friend and an amazing mentor for me you know he's bad with the ups and downs he's bad with the you know the growing because when you come from a forces background you know you can have the greatest heart in the world but then sometimes this inappropriate comment will come out because your forces you know every other word is a swear word barbers guys and you know you try and bury it and there's suddenly it'll come out and Paul a girl yeah it's okay it's a shame you know I know because it was like that for him in the beginning and then slowly they just goes away and fades away but he understand the forces men tality he was the perfect person for me to work for you then got ordained in the Church of England I did I went to study in Oxford at Wickliffe Hall so you've been a reverend for how many years yes about two and a half years nearly I got ordained at st. Paul's Cathedral and then a guy called Mark mellow issues a vicar at st. Paul's in Ealing offered me a job very exciting and I went to work for st. Paul's running the men's ministry and evangelism for Mark at the church and one of the things I know you've been trying to do is communicate Christianity using your talents and your skills or from all those years practicing illusion yes so now what would you say to people who might object to the use of the word magic or illusion well I think they're right to question anything which might have you know some mystery about it it's good for us to question my first thoughts I have to do some research and looking at it is I'm using a skill and my hope is that I'm honoring God by using a skill but if you look in the dictionary the word magic talks about the occult but it also talks about people that use skill to illustrate and perform yes one of the things Jesus did is he could have done miracles everywhere he went but he didn't sometimes he did a miracle sometimes he told the story and sometimes he taught and he used to know what to do at certain time so sometimes I teach sometimes I do realist ray shion's using my background which I glorify God in every way for and I make it very clear these are just tricks and sometimes I pray for God to heal people so Jesus says be like me and do what I do and basically I play the hand I've been given yes and do what I can you know I try and encourage people to use their gifts more and I've tried to lay it down many times but I feel the Lord saying to me I want to use it but be very clear why you're doing it let people now assure them reassure them really that it's just tricks it's just skill well could you show us a few of your little illusions now I'd like to do in a little effect for you they're talking about the feeling you get when you encounter God as a sense of the supernatural or wonder what I try and do is appeal to people's wonder to get them to get in touch with that feeling of God's awesomeness so I like to illustrate that for you okay I got one of these which is a classic sick bag I didn't actually take these off a plane right I bought these so I want you to just have a little look at that yes you've seen one of those before I have a few times and I've got a little cup here which I will place onto the tape okay there although I've never used one of these eyeballs but occasionally I've taken it out just in case yes I did see a youtube click of a clip of a poor girl on a flight on one of those but it went upside down it was all fold air okay let's not get so I got some milk here yes I'm going to place the milk inside the bag not all of the milk because I don't want to fill the bag up okay so let's just do this very very slowly as we pour that in like so I just don't want it to go in too far there that should about do it there I guess she's gonna pour the remainder into there so you can see it's going in right and we'll put that here now the idea is most most entertainers who would try and do something either make the bag disappear or try and change the milk into something wouldn't be good if I could change into something like cheese that more amazing if I showed you that the milk is absolutely disappear now actually that is very good because I did see you pour it in if you've bit singaporean that's to it so that's an illusion that that's an illusion so the idea is that you saw you saw something going in you saw something happening but what you saw was exactly what happened think about what you believe thinking question about the things you see because the greatest thing that we can do in in the Christian faith is get people to ask questions go on just another religion one more he's illustration of the of the heart and you can imagine that this is this is my my first relationship I was actually on a date my first date this is true I was 12 years old she never turned up two hours I waited I say embarrassed I couldn't tell my dad when I got back but he found that eventually anyway but he still left a little scar on my heart and another time was when I got out the forces I had a little job and I worked very very hard but my heart wasn't in it and I did quite well so they ended up not needing me sacked me and it is my first real sense of injustice and a rejection and rejection many times so these were broken relationships then I had so much hopeful in the beginning and I could go on and on I mean you know what I mean you know the story we we meet people all the time and what what people tend to do is they tend to take these sort of pieces to the doctor run they say look doc you know I'm not feeling well I'm depressed and down but it's probably because they've got a lot of brokenness or brokenness in their heart and the doctor says well I'll give you tablets all the tablets do anam it up they numb the emotions so what I did is when I went to these people like the doctor I realized that I wasn't getting anywhere and I resolved just to just to seal my heart and just put it in like a box and I and I live for a few years with a really hard heart I was hard-hearted and then I realized that what Jesus does is he he comes upon you and you're in your heart he lives within your heart and then there's this little Ernie some of it you know about and some of it you don't know about it happens unconsciously your memory start getting healed your the disappointments the sting of them doesn't seem to hurt so much the regrets go and he takes them away and that you suddenly less burdened and you feel like you've got new life and bit by bit what happens is your heart get slowly and completely restored and that's a little illustration I use for the heart how did you do that you're very skillful and talented and I mean the power of those three illusions it's quite potent but for a lot of us though Tim you know we don't have your skills I wish we could do it yeah and what would you say to us who you know we long to be able to articulate yes you've just articulated but we don't have these skills I love can I share a couple of things then on that first of all I believe everybody has an evangelist in them so you can talk to anyone you like and all you have to do is get someone they like say tell me how you became a Christian and they light up and they can't wait to tell their story yeah so I say to everybody who I know say look everybody should have a 45 second two-minute or four minute testimony a 45 second would be were what how was life before God what happened and how is life now and and then that would be at a bus stop anybody can do that you rehearse what was life like without Jesus what happened absolute what is he like now and then the four-minute one I was selling a car once and I had these two guys coming to get a curry with me and I said the guys coming to pick up the car were counting the money this is a four to four minute testimony they said well how's that I said watch this so he came in so I said so so what do you do for a living and he said and I said I bet you don't know what I do for a living he said what you do what you do and I told him I said I'm a vicar well accurate because they don't know cure it men thought so and I knew he'd asked me so I was just counting ray said what what what what made you do that then and I sort of gave my friends a little wink I said the four minutes because he can't go anywhere because I was counting his money you know so I stopped counting the money I shared my testimony then I started counting them me and it's just knowing where people are and just sharing your journey it's not always the Holy Spirit's job to bring them to faith so everyone I think should have their own small testimony of what Jesus has done and if they don't think their testimony is very powerful don't worry about it leave that to the hearer and practice it and also have 45 minutes of someone else's testimony that sure that you know has got a powerful testimony but here's something really helpful that people can do and I say I've got here a million this is a million pound note and you could very easily take a ten pound note out or a 20 pound note if you're with some friends yes and you could say what's the myth you know we would love a million pounds or a million dollars but you could say somewhat what's the million dollar question and the million dollar question is where we come from why are we here and where are we going I think that's the that's they are the big importance questions of life probably another question big one would be is there a god and is he for us absolutely is he for absolutely but certainly why we here now why we're here we can go on and talk about that but that's a great question to open a conversation and the next thing you can do is you can talk to them about your money saying look you could write on a piece of paper and say this money here I've just written ten pounds but it doesn't mean anything but this is real money what gives it its currency is the fact that the government backs it and that's what I feel about Jesus well I have a life with him he backed me now I do an extra bit would you like to see it gone okay you've got to hold this you've got to hold that right right I'm going to just give this a little fold yes and change that right in front of your eyes okay to a sort of 20 how did you do that now watch carefully okay that was a completely different a completely different note yeah because the other one was counterfeit yeah well this is a counterfeit you science counter yeah see it doesn't exist at all it's completely gone you see what I always say to people is if someone offers you a way out a way of hope and it's not Jesus question it find out if it's counterfeit find out if it's real because from my experience the only thing that offers a real transformational change in anyone's life is the Christian faith see we're the only faith that promises that you'll know where you go amusingly yeah in the other faiths they say well you'll have to find out when you get there yes I'd rather not know when I get there I'd like to know now I know if we are followers of Jesus we're all witnesses and we need to learn how we can convey and communicate that message but then some of us in the church are called evangelists and both Tim and myself we are evangelist endeavouring to proclaim it as best as we can with the skills and talents that God has given us and we want to encourage you to do the same as well but as you can see Tim does have a an amazing talent and creativity and if you would like to invite Tim to your church or to your conference then please email him at tim dot say it at Philo trust calm and I know that he will prayerfully consider it Tim it's been a joy to talk to you and it's been oh it's always fascinating seeing the illusions and we hope that your just keep being magical in the way that you communicate the greatest news that's available to people in the world today

Channel: Facing the Canon

Views: 3,775

Rating: 4.826087 out of 5

Keywords: facing the canon, j.john, interview, jjohn, j john, philo trust, philo, trust, christianity, Jesus, Lord, God, Holy Spirit

Id: lQwcm-L_vAI

Length: 29min 42sec (1782 seconds)

Published: Wed Dec 14 2016