life

Letters to a Sister: 14

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Letter 14

Do you ever have those weeks when everything seems to go wrong? I don’t mean in a funny, laugh about it afterwards way, but in a depressing, wondering why I bother way? I guess that’s just part of life, a ‘down’ that allows us to have ‘ups’. This week two friends have died. True, both were old, but that doesn’t make it any nicer really, just less shocking.

It brings back lots of memories of when Dad died. I’m not sure I’ve ever really talked to you about that time, everything was such a muddle, so much to organise, both of us worrying about Mum. We never really sat down and talked did we.

I was in such a bad place while Dad was alive, really angry with the world. I was having headaches all the time and not knowing why, felt stressed and was finding work/family a lot less fun than I had thought they would be when I was 12! I had sort of given up on God a bit, decided I would ‘go it alone’, see how I got on. I didn’t get on very well actually.

Then, when Dad was diagnosed with cancer, I somehow got this feeling that it was my fault, a sort of punishment for giving up on God. It sounds silly now, if it was someone else saying this I would have all sorts of sensible things to say to them, but at the time, that’s how I felt. And it was horrible.

Cancer is a horrid disease. It kind of ‘eats’ people. When the nurse told me that Dad wouldn’t recover, that it was just a matter of time, I set myself a challenge. I would watch him die. I figured that all my life, Dad had taught me about God, had claimed that He was always there, helping Dad through life. I decided that during life, you could fool yourself into believing something like that. But death has a horrible honesty about it. If God was real, He would be there at every step while Dad died. If He was just in Dad’s head, a fabrication to make life easier, then as he died this would be evident. You can’t pretend when you are dying. So I watched.

I saw the cancer destroy Dad’s body, saw him become weaker and more in pain, fed up with all the medical intervention, exhausted by what the disease was doing to him. And I saw him change.

At the beginning, as the disease began to take hold, Dad complained all the time. He told me about every ache, every loss of appetite, every sleepless night. To be honest, I got a bit fed up with him (as I said, I was not in a good place.) Then gradually, as his body got weaker, I saw him draw closer and closer to God. His conversation changed. Instead of talking continually about his health, the latest ache and pain, he talked about what he had read in his Bible, some new insight that he had found. He laughed again, was excited about what he was discovering about God. I felt that I was watching him become less physical and more ‘soul’. It was as if his spirit was taking over.

Dad never wanted to die, he fought it until the end. But I can honestly tell you, he died a good death and God was there, every step of the way. Dad taught me more about God in his dying than all the sermons during his life. His cancer was horrid, a particularly painful type. But he died the beginning of January and at the end of December, just days before he died, he told me he had just had the happiest Christmas of his life. Like I said, you can’t pretend when you’re dying.

When Dad did die, when we were burying his body, on a suitably grey wet day  (though not ‘Dad’, not his spirit, I had watched that getting stronger and stronger until he finally left his body) that was when I realised that I could not have caused his death. Death is too big, nothing about me would result in that.

Perhaps I needed to feel like that, to have that nasty patch in my life, to make me see clearly again. I don’t know. All I can tell you is that for me, it was all the ‘proof’ I needed. And of course, the good thing about coming back to God is that He makes it so easy, it’s just like turning around really. And I haven’t regretted it since. I’ve had some knocks in the last few years, life has sometimes been less nice than I hoped. But I can never again doubt that there is a God. Or that He cares.

Take care,
Anne xx

Letters to a Sister : 11

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Letter to a Sister 11

Returned home from Brazil on Wednesday. Was a night flight, so very confused time wise.

At the airport, I decided to change my Duolingo app from Portuguese (no longer needed) to Japanese. Unfortunately, the only Japanese that Duolingo does is for Japanese people who want to learn English. So the lessons taught me how to say “boy”, “milk”, etc. As my English is already fairly good, it wasn’t particularly helpful.
However, I had not realised this until I had actually downloaded that bit of the app. All the instructions were now in Japanese. I had no idea how to get back to the menu bit of the app. I spent ages pressing random things in the hope I would return to the menu page.
Finally gave up and went in search of a Japanese person. Found a Japanese man hiding behind a newspaper in the lounge. Explained my problem (which he seemed to find amusing.) He then had a look at the app, spent a long time exploring the lessons, said they were very good, but was also unable to find the menu bit. Am suspicious that he was just pretending to be Japanese, was probably a Korean spy or something. I still cannot use the app.

Was pleased to find house still standing when we returned. Two boys (who are really men, but they will always be boys to me) had cleared away all evidence of wild parties and all my animals were still alive. There is a suspicious smell in the utility room but I cannot find the corpse.

The kittens are thriving. They’re still all living in the garage. They are named after my childhood favourites: Milly Molly Mandy (favourite book when I was three) and Mary, Mungo and Midge (favourite programme when I was three.) We gave Mary away and she is now called Minerva, which kinda fits with the theme.

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Mandy was born first. She is Molly’s only kitten, is bigger than the others and clumsy. I think she may be special needs – has bit of a ‘vacant’ expression.

 

 

 

 

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Mungo will be the house cat. She is very friendly, has long soft fur and purrs really loudly.

 

 

 

 

 

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Midge is the boy. He has wiry fur, attacks everything (have big hopes for him as a mouser). He also has this annoying habit of pouncing on your calves as you are about to leave the room and running up your leg. Painful if you are wearing shorts.

 

 

 

 

They are all pretty much weaned. Milly and Molly are driving me bananas (they’re in season again and desperate to go out and find a man.) They will be taken to the vets and spayed on Monday.

One chicken had gone broody when we got home. The boys had removed the eggs but she had collected six (a days worth) and decided that was enough to make a nest with. I turfed her off and took away the eggs (otherwise all the other hens will go broody too. I really do not need more chicks.) She was very cross and swears at me now whenever I go up to see them but I am unrepentant.

The ducklings are all full grown and beautiful. A real mix of colours (so those ‘pure’ silver call ducks I bought at the country fair were clearly not especially ‘pure’! Not that it matters, they’ll all just live on the pond.)
They are all still living in the aviary, when I get time I’ll clip their flight feathers and then let them onto the pond. Once they have learnt the pond is their home, it doesn’t matter if the feathers regrow and they start to fly, they still stay around the pond and garden and Kia helps me round them up each evening and put them back on the pond.

The ducks on the pond seem okay, though some are getting old now. The two black ones have white feathers coming (the duck equivalent of going grey.) I’m not getting any duck eggs because the horrible rats are back in force. Really need to get those cats back outside.

Take care,
Anne xx

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Letters to a sister 9

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Cassie (black labrador) died last week. I couldn’t write about it at the time, was too busy crying. She was old for a lab – 14 – and she was losing the feeling in her back legs, pooped without knowing it and her sight and hearing were pretty much gone. I didn’t mind clearing up after her, I owed her that much, she has given the family so much joy over the years. And until recently she has seemed happy enough. She mainly slept but so did the old cat and they snuggled together in her bed, so she had company, she still got excited at meal times and once a day she would go for a plod around the garden. But then she stopped wagging her tail and began to seem frightened by things, so it seemed kinder to let her go. Horrible decision. I had so hoped I would just find her dead one morning but in the end we felt it was time to take her to the vets, to put her to sleep before her life became a torment of fear at not seeing and unhappiness if I didn’t clean up her bed fast enough.

Although I knew she was ready to go, that it was the kindest thing to do, it was still hard, I still cried most of the weekend. It also makes me look harshly at life when someone/something I cherish dies. What is the point of it all? Life is so short, such a brief time of healthy happiness before we all decline, what is it that keeps us going? Why do we strive so hard to stay alive? And how will I cope when/if I lose those closest to me?

I look at the elderly people we cook for on Fridays. Most of them were married, had children, jobs, hobbies. Yet now, for the most part, they live alone, they cope with everything by themselves as their bodies deteriorate and everything gets harder. It seems to them like yesterday that they were vibrant, powerful in their own life, now they are becoming more and more dependent on others. How does that feel? How will I cope when that happens to me?

Maybe we are not meant to look ahead too far. If we trust in God (and deep down I do, I just have blips every so often, times when it all seems a bit scary ahead) then perhaps trusting him is all that matters. We do not know when or how our life will end, only that it will and that was always part of the plan, an intended consequence of having lived. Perhaps it is the now that matters, rather than the past or the future.

I know that what is in my past is finished, that those things I am proud of are not important anymore, that the things I did wrong have been forgiven. The future is a void, I cannot even predict what will happen this afternoon, in the next hour, I can only make a good guess and plan accordingly. But now, this actual moment in time, is mine. I can decide what I will do, how I will act, think, behave. And because I do not know what will happen in the next hour, what phone calls I might receive, accidents or happy surprises, then the most sensible thing would be to rely on God.

We are on a timeline, we can see the past, live in the present but the future is invisible.
(As an aside, did you know that the chinese language actually shows this in the words it uses. So the future is ‘behind’ you, because you cannot see it. It is like sitting on a train looking backwards. All the words relating to past are in front, before, you and all the words relating to future are behind you. I love that language!)
However, God is outside of time, above the line if you like. He can see my past and future and present all at the same time. So surely it makes sense to ask him for help when I live my present, to ask for his guidance as I stumble through this bit of life, doing the best that I can.

I guess if I am honest, I don’t really know what ‘the point of life’ is, especially when I get to the really tough, lonely bits of it. But God does, I really do think he has a plan and so I will just trust him on this one. I will cry for my dog, because I miss her, but I will know that her life (and mine) are not futile. There is a point, I just don’t know it yet.

Take care,
Anne xx

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“I don’t have to go to church to be a Christian.”

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“I don’t have to go to church to be a christian”

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     Sometimes, people ask, “Do I have to go to church to be a Christian?” The short answer is clearly, “No.” I am a Christian, I have a relationship with a living God and if I were stranded on a desert island or in a country that did not allow churches, then I would still have that relationship with God. I would still be a Christian. However, the answer is not complete if left there.

     I think we first need to think about why you might ask that question. Imagine a teenaged boy describing his friendship with a girl. What if he said, “She invites me round and I go because she cooks nice food. But I tell her before I go, ‘I will come but we’re not going to talk’, so I don’t have to speak to her when I’m there. She doesn’t seem to mind.”? Frankly, that is appalling! We should not treat other people like that! Now compare that to how you might be treating God. Understand this, God likes you. He wants to have a friendship with you. That involves some effort on both sides.

     Maybe we first need to think about what is a Christian. What makes someone a Christian? “Ah,” you might say, “Well, I believe in God.” Let’s look at that for a minute. I have been reading the book of James in the Bible. I love that book – he is so rude to people! I’m sure you know that Mary gave birth to Jesus (what we celebrate every christmas) but you may not realise that after she had Jesus, she and Joseph then had other children. One of these was James. He grew up with Jesus and yet it is thought that for a while he didn’t believe that Jesus was special. There is even a story about Jesus preaching to people and his family coming to try and stop him because they thought he was crazy! That gives me hope, when I get things wrong I know that so did the people who wrote the Bible but they had a second chance at getting it right. Later, James did come to believe what Jesus was saying and at some point he wrote his book. In that book, he discusses what it means to be a Christian and he talks about people who say they believe in God. First he says, “Well done!”

     Few people would dispute that just as there are good things in the world, so too there are evil influences. In the Bible these are called demons or Satan. Now, when people tell James that they believe in God, he says, “Well done.” He then adds (a little sarcastically perhaps) “So do the demons!” You see, the Bible is very clear that these evil forces believe in God and are terrified of him because they recognise his power. Clearly demons are not Christians, so there must be more to being a Christian than just believing that God is real.

     Think about when your computer freezes. Something has gone wrong, nothing works properly and pressing ‘escape’ or ‘control and delete’ makes no difference. Sometimes, the only option is to shut it down and restart. Well, that is what becoming a Christian is. It is realising that we’ve made a mess of things, something is not working properly and we need to restart. You have a ‘restart’ button, you just need to ask God to press it for you! It really is that easy.

     There is nothing that you can do to make things right with God, you are not big enough, clever enough or good enough. So God did it all. He became a human (in the form of Jesus) and he died and was separated from the God bit of himself, which means that we don’t have to. Jesus rose up from the dead (what we celebrate at Easter time) to show that he is stronger than death, that everything is sorted out for us. We just have to ask God to press that ‘restart’ button to set us right.

     Actually, this can be quite hard to do. We like to be in control, we like to think that what we do makes a difference, that somehow we can become good enough for God. Well, I have to tell you, the Bible is very clear, there is nothing that you can do to be acceptable to God. You are not good enough. So God did it for you. You do have to be prepared to accept that gift though, you do have to want that ‘restart’ button to be pressed. If life is going well for you, that can be a bit scary. We are worried that it means loss of control, that we wont be ourselves anymore. Let me remind you of what I said at the beginning: God likes you. Really, he does! He doesn’t want you to become a different person, just a better version of yourself.

     You don’t have to be a ‘bad’ person to need God. Everyone needs him. I have travelled to lots of different countries, met rich people and poor and I can honestly tell you, people are people wherever you go. I have stayed at the Savoy Hotel and been driven to St James’ Palace in a fleet of silver mercedes to have dinner with Prince Charles (this is due to who I married, nothing to do with me, in case you are mistaken into thinking I am great in any way.) I have also stayed in a mud hut in Zambia with a couple who were HIV positive. I have visited China, Singapore, Dubai, India, Italy, America and most of Europe and there is one thing that I can tell you. People are the same. They might be culturally very different, but deep down, we all want the same things, we all love, we all have fears, we all make a mess of things. We all need God. It is that simple.

     So, what comes next? After we have admitted that actually we might not be perfect and we want to include God in our lives, what do we have to do now? Well, you do not have to do anything (including go to church.) However, if you really have ‘restarted’ (and not just said the words to yourself as a sort of magic chant or insurance policy), if you really do want to include God in how you live, then that will make a difference to how you live.

     A baby is alive after he’s born, but he doesn’t grow into a healthy child and adult unless he eats and exercises. So, just as we need to spend time with people and chat with them to develop a friendship, so too we need to spend time with God. No, this still does not have to involve going to a church! We chat with God by praying (saying things to him, either out loud or thinking them in our heads.) We listen to God by paying attention to our consciences, reading the Bible (where he has given us lots of hints about what he is like) and by listening to other christians. Ah, now we get to the church bit. How can you listen to other Christians, hear their story and share yours, if you never meet any?

     It is a bit like supporting a football team. I can say I support Crystal Palace. I can buy a scarf that’s the right colour, I can check the results in the newspaper, I can even watch a match on television. But it would be hard for that knowledge to touch my emotions. However, if I attend one of their games, if I stand with other supporters and cheer when they score, then just the volume and shared excitement will begin to affect me. I am helped along by other fans’ enthusiasm and I actually feel part of what I say I am involved with. It is hard (and a bit boring) to be a football fan in isolation. It is the same with being a Christian.

     “What constitutes a church?” you might ask. Does it need to be in an Anglican Church building or does the church that meets in my local school count? Well, if we look back at the Bible, a ‘church’ was actually just a group of people who believed the same thing. The first Christians were actually thrown out of their synagogues (the equivalent of our church buildings) and tended to meet secretly in houses. A church is not the building, it is the people. Sometimes buildings can be helpful. I cannot stand in a huge cathedral like St Paul’s without thinking about God, all the architecture has been designed to make me feel like that. However, the building is not essential. Three people meeting in a field to talk about God, to pray and study the Bible together; that is a church.

     Some people might say they don’t need God, they are wrong. I think this is why Jesus talked about it being hard for a rich person to know God. When we are healthy and comfortable it can be hard to acknowledge that we need God, we think we are ‘okay actually’. Some people think they are too bad to know God, they are wrong too. God is able to press the ‘restart’ button for murderers, thieves, adulterers and even that nasty gossip from down the road! The Bible calls all that ‘sin’, but it’s not a word that tends to crop up at the dinner table so I have tried to avoid using it. None of us is good enough, certainly I’m not. That’s another reason for going to a church – it will help you to realise that you are not the only bad person who God likes!

    Have you ever read ‘Screwtape Letters’ by C.S. Lewis? If not, buy a copy. It’s a brilliant book, very funny but with some really poignant truths included. He talks about all the strange and ordinary people who attend church.

    “Ah,” you might say, “But churches are religious. I am a Christian but I don’t believe in religion. Religion just causes trouble, look at all the wars that have been started by religion.” You are half right. Religion does cause trouble. That is why Jesus did not start a new religion, he just pointed people to God. He refused to set down lists of rules, he just gave people principles to live by. When churches start making lots of rules, when they are more concerned with religion than with God, then they are missing the point. Christianity is meant to be about relationship, not rules.

     I am often told that “church is boring.” Yes, sometimes it is. If it always is, then maybe you are going to the wrong church. I would also ask you, when you go to church, what are you expecting to get out of it? If your answer is “nothing” then you are probably right, you probably will get nothing from attending. However, if you dare to go hoping that you might hear God speaking to you, then that is much more likely to happen. Sometimes it is something the speaker says, sometimes it’s something in the reading that week, or a hymn that’s sung, or even what the person giving out the hymn books says, but usually, if we expect God to speak, we hear him. I would also say that just like a growing baby, we grow in faith very slowly. Sometimes it is much later that we remember something that was said in church and it helps us. But if you weren’t there, you wont hear it.

     If church is a collection of people, then try to find a church which has people like you in it. If you are a teenager, try to find where other teenaged Christians meet. If you are a retired person, then try to find somewhere that older Christians meet. If a church caters for all ages that is wonderful but in my experience it is rare.

    Do we have to go to church on Sundays? I guess not. If you attend a school Christian Union or something similar, then that is really just another form of ‘church’. We are advised though that we need one day a week that we keep as a holy day, a day to rest and where thinking about God is part of our routine (I think God knew how bad we would be at including him, so suggested that it should become part of our schedule!) That is hard to do if we attend ‘church’ on a week day.

    What about other religions? To be honest, I don’t know. As I said, christianity is all about that ‘restart’ button, about including God in your life and having a relationship with him. I don’t know if people can find God in other religions. I do have a sneaky suspicion that when I get to Heaven there will be a lot of people there who I wasn’t expecting! Whether or not people have a relationship with God is between them and God.

    What about Hell? Again, this is something that I don’t know much about about. If being with God makes us complete and fulfilled then I guess Hell must be the opposite of that. Sometimes people ask about who goes to Hell and what about people who try but never knew God. I cannot say, that is between them and God. But the Bible is pretty clear that if people decide that they don’t want to include God when they are physically alive, then God will respect that after they have died. That’s what free will and choice is all about, even if it means terrible consequences.

    So, have a think and decide what you believe. If you haven’t ever asked God to press the ‘restart’ button in your life, maybe now is a good time to do so. There aren’t any magic words, God is God, not a genie in a bottle! You might say something like:

   “God, I believe that you are real. I know that I make mistakes and I’m sorry. Please will you forgive all the things that I’ve done wrong. Please be part of my life. I want you to be my God.”

    Then, you should tell someone. We are physical beings and telling someone will help you to believe what you have done and not forget about it. Then go and find some other christians! In England you could look for somewhere that runs an Alpha course (they tend to be churches that welcome new Christians.)

    Do you have to go to church if you are a Christian? Not unless you want to grow……