Television personality David Harper considered himself agnostic when he began investigating Christianity after his daughter became a Christian and overcame debilitating depression.
Raised in a non-religious household, Harper was born right into a family he describes as having “high morals” rooted in secularism and shaped by a culture that usually portrayed faith as intellectually weak.
“God never played an element,” Harper told The Christian Post about his adolescence.
What began as a research project examining the evidence for God culminated in Harper falling to his knees sooner or later and fully accepting Jesus.
Best known for his work as an antiques presenter for the British Broadcasting Corporation, Harper became a Christian last yr, and his latest book, The God Conundrum, chronicles his 11-month investigation into the historical and scientific evidence for God’s existence.
“In the start, I wasn’t intending to write down a book in any respect,” Harper stated. “But then, about three or 4 months into my private research project, I noticed I used to be writing a book.”
‘There’s nothing we are able to do for you’
Harper’s spiritual journey began after his daughter, Hetti, embraced Christianity and underwent a dramatic spiritual transformation. Hetti, who’s now 30, became “exceptionally depressed,” particularly after she left home across the age of 20 and moved to London.
For years, Harper said his daughter struggled with mental health and self-harm. And although she tried taking antidepressants and attending therapy sessions, she continued to sink into despair.
“Nothing worked for her,” Harper recalled. “And she was effectively told, not in so many words, ‘There’s nothing we are able to do for you.’ And it was advised that she search for something spiritual.”
The father felt uncertain about find out how to help his daughter, but he was encouraged when Hetti told him she was going to church and was considering becoming a Christian.
While Harper didn’t consider himself a believer on the time, he was glad to see his daughter pursue a path that appeared to make her glad.
“And I watched and monitored her for 15 months, and the changes in that girl were mind-boggling,” the writer said. “I heard her laugh and giggle, and I remember considering, ‘I didn’t think I’d ever hear that again in my life.’”
‘Leaning towards Jesus’
After she accepted Christ, the daddy said he noticed a joy burning brightly in her eyes that hadn’t been there before. Her physical health improved, and her chronic pain progressively subsided.
“And for the 15 months that I used to be watching her, I now know I used to be leaning towards Jesus myself,” the writer said. “I believe He was knocking. Things were happening.”
During the 2024 Christmas season, the observant father decided to analyze his questions on Christianity after a visit together with his daughter, by which they attended church and discussed Jesus. Something had sparked a change inside his daughter, the daddy reasoned, and he desired to learn more.
Harper said he sat down one afternoon aspiring to spend a number of hours researching what he initially thought was a straightforward query: “What is it about Christianity that transforms people?”
“I assumed I’d find the reply in a number of hours before tea time. Then I used to be just engrossed,” he said. “This journey began then and continued without stopping, seven days every week, for 11 months.”
For months, Harper studied arguments for the existence of God, scrutinized evolutionary theory and examined historical claims surrounding the resurrection of Jesus.
Writing the section of the book about Jesus and the resurrection took him six weeks, the writer recalled. In working on this a part of the book, Harper got here to what he described as an “academic” and “mental” decision to just accept the existence of a creator and the reality of the resurrection.
“If the resurrection was true, then every thing is true. And I assumed, if the resurrection is true, then Jesus is God,” he reasoned. “And so, I checked out the entire investigations and a couple of,000 years’ value of the most effective claims against it, and no person has been capable of debunk it.”
Even after he accepted the mental arguments for Christianity and acknowledged the resurrection of Jesus as a historical fact, Harper sensed that something was still missing.
Gradually becoming a Christian
“I didn’t have what I’d later describe because the 18-inch drop — the thought process in your brain that something is correct, that something is true,” he said. “I didn’t feel it in my body, in my soul, in my heart.”
As he began experiencing intense emotions — sometimes feeling waves of joy or anguish that he couldn’t explain — Harper realized that he was progressively becoming a Christian. The idea caused him to suffer panic attacks, as he feared ridicule from his colleagues or relations.
Despite his doubts, the writer found that he couldn’t erase Jesus from his mind. A turning point got here when he recalled a video of Christian apologist John Lennox discussing a formerly depressed student whose life was modified by Christ. The story about Lennox’s student reminded Harper of his daughter and the best way Christianity had impacted her life.
“The memory of that video hit me like a steam train,” the born-again Christian said. “Because I noticed, though I had amassed all of this evidence, the true evidence that Christianity is true is the transformation within the soul of an individual.”
He realized that the reply had been “staring him within the face” for months, years even, but he had just missed it.
“It was at that moment that I noticed: It was Jesus Christ who had literally saved my daughter’s life,” the Christian writer stated. “I just fell to my knees and realized, at that moment, it was Him — it was Jesus.”
Harper said his wife, who had all the time identified as a Christian but wasn’t super devout, has grown closer to God since her husband’s conversion. But not all reactions to the writer’s conversion have been warm.
Some of his colleagues will refuse to have interaction with him on the subject, while others have accused him of “Bible-bashing” when he’s attempted to debate the evidence for a creator. Harper said that his newfound faith doesn’t appear to have resulted in any major skilled consequences, but twice, he has had directors advise him to “calm down” references to Christianity during television appearances.
Still, he insists he would fairly endure pushback than return to the person he was before, who didn’t truly know God.
“I needed to pretend to be confident more often than not with my TV work when, under the surface, I used to be not feeling so confident and never feeling very glad,” the BBC TV antiques presenter explained.
Faith, he says, has smoothed his life. He now looks at nature and sees an intentional design fairly than an accident. He also not fears death, as he believes within the promise of an afterlife.
“It’s not that I would like to die. I would like to live so long as I can,” Harper said. “So I believe I’ve been given a job. I actually feel that my job now could be to inform people concerning the truth that’s there, and it’s quite simple to know, but I’m not afraid of the day that we’ll all face.
“Because I actually imagine that day is something which is wonderful,” he added. “And in order that fills you with joy.”
As for the book’s audience, Harper hopes that fellow believers will find it useful and learn things they didn’t know concerning the lifetime of Jesus and other topics.
“But I suppose initially, when I noticed I used to be writing a book, it was for people like me — confused, distressed about life generally, not knowing what the aim and the meaning of life was, all the time trying to find answers,” Harper said.
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