Last night, Trinity Cheltenham was packed with over 500 people from around the town and region, who were there to listen to the amazing story of Ian McCormack, otherwise known as ‘The Jellyfish Man’. Ian’s story is one of an encounter with God whilst clinically ‘dead’, his coming back to life, and the way the events of that single night changed his life – forever.

Whilst he was travelling around the world, sleeping on beaches, surfing and trying to ‘find himself’, Ian went night-diving in the sea off the coast of Mauritius. As he swam in the ocean he was stung five times by box jellyfish. Normally one sting alone takes just 15 minutes to kill a man, and so unsurprisingly Ian was taken to hospital and pronounced clinically dead shortly afterwards. He tells of how he went through a ‘death’ experience lying in the hospital bed, of having an amazing encounter with God, and his coming back to life a changed man with a faith that totally altered the course of his life.

Ian is now an ordained pastor, and travels the world telling people of his amazing story.

Neil Bennetts, one of Trinity’s Pastors, said afterwards, “It is clear that so many people today are still very interested in spiritual matters and what it means to have faith in Jesus Christ. We have been astounded by the number of people who have come to this event. We regularly run the Alpha course here at Trinity, and over recent years we have had thousands of people who have come on one of these courses to ask the hard questions of life. If this evening is anything to go by, we should have a very large course next time.”

Cleeve School student Emma Broome brought her philosophy class from school to hear Ian speak: “It will be really interesting to hear what they all thought of it when we get back to lessons later this week,” she said.

The next Alpha course begins on Tuesday 19th January.

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Photos by Jonathon Watkins www.photoglow.co.uk