Revd Helen Writes …

 

  I was brought up in the Presbyterian Church. I drifted away, as so many do, in my mid-teens and I doubt if I went in another church, apart from the odd wedding or funeral, for about twenty years. I came to the Church of England entirely by accident because I was trying to avoid someone unpleasant. As it was Sunday morning, nothing much was open so I ended up going to church. I didn’t know anything about the Church of England at all. However something seemed to attract me and I went back the next week, and the next, and so on. Several visits later I decided to venture into the church hall for coffee after the service. After six weeks of standing in the hall with my cup of coffee, someone spoke to me and my life in the Church of England began.

 

  I can see something now that I had absolutely no idea of at the time. Despite all those years when I never ever went to church, I realise now that I never stopped being interested in religion and that I never stopped looking for something. The fact that it took me almost twenty years even to look in the right direction is partly because I didn't know I was looking for anything and partly because I went about it the wrong way.

 

  During the years when I didn't go to church I read widely but not wisely. I found there were all kinds of books which offered ingenious explanations for everything. Many have appeared since the discovery of the Dead Sea Scrolls; many have linked up with tales of the Knights Templars and the Turin Shroud and all kinds of other things. Some of the books are interesting and helpful. But there is also a steady stream of seriously daft books about Christianity. Fortunately for me, I found the way back to church more by accident than design. But I have always felt concerned that there may be people less fortunate than me who will not find the way back and who will end up stuck, believing bizarre theories or who may perhaps remain forever entrapped in somebody else's fantasy.

 

  Any one of us can be blind because they are looking in the wrong direction. I don't know how you stop being blind. I don't know how I stopped being blind. I only know that I did stop. I can remember sincerely wishing that I could believe again although I couldn't see how, with honesty and integrity, it was going to happen. I can only say that I suddenly realised it had happened and that it felt something like looking at one of those 3D pictures. You stare at it for ages and it doesn’t really mean anything and suddenly you find you can see the dinosaurs or the dolphins in the picture quite clearly. They were there all the time but you couldn’t see them.

 

  Statistics tell us that numbers of church-goers continue to fall, although at All Saints we have seen a gentle but steady increase throughout the last few years. We live in an age of faith but it is often a faith without shape or doctrine. It is one thing to be looking for God, but it is quite another thing to recognise that is what we are doing, whether it takes the form of consciously searching for something or just being vaguely interested. And, like me, anyone can be just as close to finding the reality of Jesus, once you glance in the right direction.

 

  And if we do, the reward that awaits us is the wonderful, amazing, never-failing providence of our living God. Jesus offers God's revelation, God's truth. He is the revelation of God in person and he offers love and life and belonging to everyone who will accept him. John chapter 1: verse 38 – When Jesus turned and saw them following, he said to them, ‘What are you looking for?’ They said to him, ‘Teacher where are you staying?’ He said to them, ‘Come and see.’ With love and prayers, 

​

Helen Kempster