Allen was a professional rugby league player, but fell into a world of heavy drinking, drugs, violence and organized crime. In and out of prison, something had to change, and in 2013 Allen had a dramatic encounter with Jesus Christ and became Born Again.
What was it like, having put your extraordinary story onto paper, reading it back to yourself?
Very humbling. I received the final manuscript when on retreat in the Welsh Valleys. I was in a little room like a prison cell with absolutely no reception when I somehow got the email. It was incredibly surreal. Even though I knew it was about me, it felt like I was reading about a different person. Some parts made me weep with gratitude and I realised just how far God has actually brought me.
The book covers many extremely personal details concerning your past life. It is very brave to put them out there for everyone to read about. Does this make you feel vulnerable?
Very. I feel apprehensive about how people will receive certain elements of the book. The aim is that my life will give others hope. The worst thing would be if all my horrible experiences were for nothing. I couldn’t stand it if those years were wasted.
You’ve lived a life and experienced things that most of us couldn’t even imagine. In Taming of a Villain you’ve shared many shocking things, revealing to readers an explicit level of detail. Why was it important to you to share all this?
I believe it is important to be transparent with people, and with God. Sharing everything with the writers was part of a healing process. It took a whole year just to get the first three chapters. The issues around my mum were enormous. But I want to give others strength, who have bottled things up for a lifetime, to open up and share, and these details also help others understand why I was the way I was.
How did the idea of writing a book come about?
I was asked to give my testimony in a church where a journalist then asked to write an article about it for a blog. A Scottish publisher then saw the blog and contacted the journalist about creating a book. It took a long time for me to reach a point where I could really talk about everything in enough depth for this. I had a wall up. But then on retreat one day I had a powerful experience with the Holy Spirit and suddenly I couldn’t stop talking about it and coming up with ideas for chapter names. I could suddenly recite my whole life chronologically.
How can churches be better prepared to welcome and support those who may have come from shadier pasts? Who may still be searching or who may even have found Christ, but still struggle with ties to their past and find it hard to change old habits?
In my experience, everyone initially comes around you in love and it’s a happy time. But as time progresses and you try to grow in faith you can wind up struggling along on your own. You have to be surrounded by quality people of God. The religiousness of church can be a barrier for others coming in and I was avoided by many. I needed so much support with things like budgeting and learning to pay my bills and earning money legitimately. At the beginning, bills, fines and food were paid for me by the church.
I would ask the Church to remember to love your neighbour. People coming from backgrounds similar to mine are hurting and can be untrusting. They need seasoned and disciplined Christians who can cope with the roller-coaster of supporting these people. I would say a church needs a good discipleship program, but what we really need is to continually be shown the love of Christ, to find our identity in Him, and to be delivered out of the darkness.
What does life look like for you now that you’ve come out the other side of all that darkness?
I pinch myself every day to check it’s not a dream. Violence now disturbs me. I can’t swear. I love being a father to my 3 kids, guiding and nurturing them and watching them grow. Being able to live free in the grace of God is absolutely amazing. All the rubbish and pain and trauma from past years is just gone. I am open to God’s will as I move into the future. I hope to marry one day. I now work for the railways, and a flexi contract allows me the freedom to go where I need to when I feel called to.
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