Trevor Bendrien – Child of an immigrant prisoner of war, to Businessman & Musician
Businessman & Musician with the Power Praise Band
Trevor's Background
My name is Trevor Bendrien, and I’m from a village called Queensbury, England. You might have heard of it, being world-famous as the highest village in England. With the highest school and the highest church in England. We also have the Black Dyke Band, which is the world champion brass band. Road Studs and Cat’s Eyes were invented by Percy Shaw, while he drove through the village on a foggy day. Crippen the murderer, who murdered his wives and broke them up in the cellar and he went to school with a gunman.
I came from a notorious village with some notorious inhabitants.
My father was a prisoner of war, and came from Prussia. Which is an area north of Poland, which is now part of Russia. He met my mother who snuck him food, when he was in a camp in Halifax. Prisoners were used mainly as labourers in Agriculture, and later he started helping on her farm due to labour shortages.
Then he started working as a brick boy, a laborer, in the day time. He got a job at Mackintosh’s coal industry at night, making chocolates and falling asleep. He managed to get a little farm, and managed to get up to two thousand pens and a hundred-fifty pig in his spare time. He did that for seven years, until he established himself and built a company. He wasn’t there much as a father, but worked really hard and expected the family to do the same.Â
Growing up I’d been sent to Sunday school but had ever thought much about church or God.Â
The Next Chapter
We started to make furniture when I was seventeen. I left school at the age of sixteen and started in the company. From being twelve years old, I was always going there to join them, stripping things down, rebuilding, doing what needed to be done. It was natural to me and the business grew. We made commercial furniture and worked with Morrisons, Norwich Football Club, Universities and Mercedes.
Later at a Ceildh dance I met Helen Walker, and after 6 months we were married on a snowy day in February. Helen was a Christian and regularly attended church, while I went horse riding instead.
For our honeymoon we borrowed a boat, and a big car to pull it and went to Windemere. Whilst there we visited Ulverston, Helen noticed there was a church meeting and she wanted to attend. So I agreed. During the service they were singing happy songs, not like the ones I’d heard at Sunday school. Trevor Dearing started speaking, and something changed in me. I asked God to prove himself to me in a way that made sense to me. Â
It got interesting when we coming home with the boat, and trailer, and we’re traveling down the M6. Helen shouted, “It’s overtaking us!”
I looked, and there was a big truck overtaking us. The driver looked a bit worried and in front of him, a wheel was going down the center lane of the M6!
I realised that the wheel had come off the boat trailer. It was going about 70 miles an hour, down the center lane of the M6. I very carefully got onto the hard shoulder. Got out of the car and walked down the M6. When I got to the central reservation (safely), I picked the wheel up that after rolling, along had stopped. Right underneath it was a wheel spanner wrench. I thought it was a silly place to leave a spanner wrench in the road. I picked it up and put it in my pocket, and then went back to the boat trailer. I had the wheel in my hand, and the front is stuck on the studs.
This was extensive and I wanted to strip the hook off from the axle. There wasn’t a spanner wrench to fit. I got the tool kit from the car, same thing, not a spanner to fit. Oh well, I’ll drive to the nearest town and buy something. I picked my jacket up and put it on the side of the road, and I noticed a spanner. I pulled it out of my jacket pocket and it fit. I striped the hook down, and we drove home.
The Miracle Spanner
It was about a fourth night later, when I was repairing a machine in the furniture factory. There was a nut and I got a spanner, but it didn’t fit. I got another spanner wrench and it didn’t fit. I finally found thirty of them.
Then it dawned on me, that I’ve got the spanner! The one I used on the boat trailer wheel, and it fit all the nuts and bolts. I thought, good grief this is too powerful, this is too awesome for me. God had proved himself to me, in a way that I could truly understand. Stood there surrounded by spanners, God had provided in the central reservation of the M6 the one I needed.Â
I thought, I need to avoid churches. This was too powerful for me.
During a road trip the following year, we were passing a little church. We some time to kill, so we decided to go in. When we walked in, they were singing the exact same songs that we sang a year earlier. I felt comfortable, and there wasn’t a blinding light or a life-changing experience. I had changed, I wanted God to be part of my life.Â
I used to run a Folk Club, and spent a lot of time as part of the Folk community. I got fed up of dashing out of church to get to the Folk Club. So I decided to stop going to the Folk Club, and continued making changes.
Instead of going to Morris dancing practice, I made Bible study night. I played in a Celidh dance band and we were the top-notch. The rest of the band decided to give up, so I stopped all the things that I have done before. Everything was replaced by the things of God.
Clarity when Reading with Dyslexia
A year later, I was challenged to go back to church in the village where I lived. And after some time I was asked to speak at the service.
So I went to the service and read the Bible and spoke. My mother was on the back row, she didn’t know whether to be proud of ashamed at the beginning. She didn’t have a clue, what had happened to me. She just knew I was different.
I read the passage from the Bible, I was going to speak about. As I’m Dyslexic, I’d never read well and my mum was worried. After I’d finished I’d never read that well.
Becoming a Christian, helped me get over the problem with the dyslexia. I’ve been able to read the Bible. From then on I went to read more and more books.
Protection from an Explosion
We had some decorators rebuilding the outside of the furniture factory. It was back in the days before foam rubber became fire retardant. The decorators decided to burn the old paint off the doors.
While they were burning the old paint, it was time for the tea break. They left the paint burning, and then the room where the foam was stored started burning. Within seconds, the whole place was burning.
One of the workmen came running into my office. He shouted “The foam store’s on fire”!
They said they’d called and the fire engine’s on the way. I ran down into the area. I was about ten yards from the door, that was wedged open in front of me. Beyond it there the fire was raging.
Then it dawned on me, we kept the gas bottles for the forklift truck in the foam store.
Suddenly there was an explosion.
All I could see was a white light, that was absolute! It was so intense and the noise was overwhelming. Then there was a silhouette in front of me.
Being brave as I could be, I turned to them and I said “Come on, let’s get out of here.”
When I got to front of the factory, I was looking out to see him. Thinking it was one of the guys that worked for us. That he would be injured, but there was nobody there.
Once we were allowed back in the building, I went back in. Between the explosions, a piece of wood was blown off the side of the door. The door in between was closed, the piece of wood came right through that door. It was stuck out just about head level.
If that door hadn’t closed, that piece of wood would have come straight toward me. Jesus had been there to protect me.
It all happened on a Friday at lunchtime. I was speaking on a Sunday morning. God spoke to me clearly, into my spirit that He was there.Â
God is Interested in You
Life went on with Helen and our beautiful children. Life had it’s ups and downs. Not everything has been easy.
Some people think that when you’re a Christian, everything becomes perfect. I didn’t get mad at God, when the business went bankrupt. I’ve had lots of challenging experiences.
I would say, that if you think that God’s not interested in you, you’ve made a big mistake.
He’s interested in every aspect of your life, and he wants you to be blessed. He wants to look after you.
It doesn’t necessarily mean that you won’t go through hard times. It does mean that whatever times you go through, He is there to help you and to comfort you. He will be close to you, and be a friend.
Because quite often when everything disappears, you just need a friend. And a friend is someone you can talk to in the time of need. To tell them your deepest, innermost thoughts and feelings. And you can do that with Jesus. You can tell him your innermost thoughts and feelings. He understands and He will come alongside you and help.
