This is the place where members of the congregation write about their faith, and the difference it makes to their lives.
Terry Cudbird writes:
For me coming to faith has been a journey. I know that for some it is an event at a particular time but my experience has been a process of discovery which has lasted most of my life. Like many of the long distance walks I have done it has included rough patches when I have not known where I was going. Now I believe I am getting somewhere. Sometime in May I hope, God willing, to walk into Lourdes and finish my circumnavigation of France. I am not sure I have arrived at so definite a statement of my Christian faith, but I definitely feel a sense of coming home. The following well known lines of T S Eliot from the end of the Four Quartets are ringing in my ears-
“We shall not cease from exploration
And the end of all our exploring
Will be to arrive where we started
And know the place for the first time.”
I have a sense of returning to where I started but through God’s grace with a new understanding.
To come to faith you have to feel that the question of whether God exists and what He might want for you is important in the first place. There are probably many people who are too distracted by other cares to give the matter a passing thought. I acknowledge that I was lucky in my upbringing. My parents took me to church and sent me to Sunday school. My father was a Quaker and my mother an Anglican so they compromised by going to the local Methodist church. I was encouraged to discuss religion at home; it was something to be taken seriously. At 13 I was confirmed as an Anglican but that was by no means the end of the story, perhaps only the beginning. There were ways in which Christianity was presented to me which made me deeply unhappy. Like a lot of young people I went through a period of intellectual questioning and rejection of “churchy” behaviour. And then in my middle years I started to re-examine my thinking and occasionally sit in a pew at the back and listen. A few years later I moved to Oxford and after a period of visiting different churches came to St. Nicholas. Why St. Nicholas – partly because of a neighbour who attended 8am Holy Communion and another neighbour who spoke warmly of the way Tony had handled her husband’s funeral. The welcome was friendly, I felt at home with the style of worship and I stayed.
So why and what do I believe now? It would be impossible for me to present all the arguments for the existence of God in a few sentences. Suffice it to say that I don’t believe that faith in God is incompatible with all that science has taught us about the origins of the universe and of life on earth. Dawkins may be a brilliant scientist but I think he missed the point in trying to reduce God to a statistical probability. For me we would not be here without a guiding hand. I see so much in the glories of nature and the beauty of art and music which speaks to me of God’s supreme creative power.
If you accept there is a God, I suppose the second question would be why Christianity? I am certainly no expert on comparative religion. All I have done is sit in a few sacred places of other religions when I have been abroad and read a few books. I am not one to say that everyone else has got it completely wrong. There may be some way in which God will one day reconcile all faiths to himself which we cannot yet understand. Now we see through a glass darkly but then face to face, as St. Paul said. For me Jesus Christ is simply the fullest and most convincing revelation of God’s truth because uniquely he is God with us, who shared our life and offers us the way to something better through his sacrifice on the cross. Christianity also offers us a very tough ethical standard which constantly challenges us. The most unconvincing part of The God Delusion is the chapter which suggests that man is becoming more moral and enlightened all the time. It made me wonder where the writer had been for the last 100 years.
With due respect to many distinguished biblical scholars I can accept that the main lines of the Gospel stories are true. There are some aspects which many of us who have been trained to examine evidence critically find a bit difficult. I have got to the point of saying – Lord, I believe you have given us a unique revelation which changes my life. There are some mysteries that I do not understand. Maybe I will one day. I take them on trust. After all I take on trust what a lot of human experts tell me that I cannot possibly verify for myself. Why shouldn’t I take your word on trust too? I was trained as a historian and for me the most powerful working out of God’s purposes is the history of the Early Church. The transformation of the Apostles in the weeks after the resurrection is something extraordinary and it changed the world for ever. Despite its many imperfections the church has been a community of believers which has built on that initial momentum. The world would be the poorer without it.
In the end faith is about a personal relationship with Jesus that has grown and that it would now be difficult to do without. You have to actively seek Him and to work at making that relationship grow. It won’t come easily. But that’s true of anything which is really worthwhile. You have to keep searching even in those times of spiritual emptiness when you feel God is just not listening. Jeremiah 29.12-13 “When you call to me and come and pray to me, I shall listen to you. When you search for me, you will find me; when you search wholeheartedly for me.”
What has helped me on the journey so far?
Taking time whenever possible to be still with God and making sure my mind is centred on Him when I pray. Sometimes our prayers can be too wordy. Silence is golden.
Being part of a worshipping community where we support each other is very important too. And this is most evident in the Eucharist where together we share the Body and Blood of Jesus Christ. One of the most moving celebrations for me was when a group of us met in the small chapel at Launde Abbey and we passed the cup to each other in a circle, addressing each other personally. Someone said to me “Terry, the Blood of Christ keep you in eternal life.” Suddenly I realized – this is for me and for us together.
There really is so much spiritual food in this wonderful sacrament and it is good that we perform it in different ways, both for the whole community and for a few who want time for quiet and reflection at 8 a.m. I really would commend this latter service and in particular the opportunity to say together Cranmer’s prayer “we do not presume to come to this your table, O merciful Lord,” which speaks so movingly of our unworthiness and God’s grace. Sometimes when I kneel at the altar I think of this wonderful gift Jesus is offering us, Himself, and how we don’t deserve it. How can we throw it back in his face by turning aside?
Lastly for me being a Christian is about how we treat each other both in our own community and in the wider world. It is really all about kindness, consideration and respect. So easy to say, so hard to carry into every part of our lives but with God’s help “Yes we can!” We have Christ as a model, in the words of that wonderful hymn, the Servant King.
I hope these reflections may be helpful to friends at St.Nicholas. And to anyone outside the church I would say – don’t be put off by what others may have told you or by what you may have read in the papers or seen on TV. Make the effort to seek out Jesus Christ. It is worth it!
And Ali Hale writes about
A couple of months ago, I left my full-time job in technical support to start my own one-woman business, Aliventures. I write regularly for a number of websites, getting paid per article, I do an occasional magazine piece, and I create websites for small businesses and individuals. One of the things I love most about freelancing in this way is that I get to work with a lot of different people – and I’m always encouraged when someone writes to say that they enjoyed one of my articles, or that their website is just what they wanted.
Another huge plus for me is that I can serve God in my working life – and prioritise the values that matter to me as a Christian. In technical support, the company’s bottom line was often all that seemed to matter: now, I can go the extra mile to make sure someone is delighted with the service I offer them – even when that means putting in a few extra hours.
I’m also able to devote a proportion of my time to serving God’s purposes by using the gifts He has given me – the same gifts I use in my paid work. For example, I have created a couple of free websites for Christian groups. These are Micah Mobile Ministries, a charity aiming to give a Bible to every home in Cornwall, and the St Nicholas Church Holiday Club website. I enjoyed making both, and update Micah’s site monthly for them. I’ve also written and edited some pieces for Micah’s printed publications.
To me, this is like tithing a percentage of my time rather than a percentage of my income (which is rather uncertain at the moment!) I have often felt guilty that I have not regularly tithed to the Church – and by offering my writing and website services for free, I feel I go some way towards making up for this. Anyone on a low income, perhaps students depending on loans but with a little extra free time, could do something similar.
I’m glad that God’s given me the ability to write easily, and to understand technical subjects – and I’m also glad that I can use these gifts to serve Him. Your gift might be teaching, gardening, painting, administration, public speaking, or almost anything. Whatever the skills you use in your daily work, there’s almost certainly a Christian or community group who would be able to benefit from them.
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