Sometimes I Feel Like I Don't Know

"Sometimes I feel like I don't know,
Sometimes I feel like checking out,
I want to get it wrong,
Can't always be strong,
But love, it won't be long...."

Ultraviolet, from the album Achtung Baby, by U2

Sometimes circumstances, situations and actions (my own and others) combine and great a situation which can only really be described as a dead-end. Situations where, whatever you do, you know that the only possible outcome, even if it is the right and proper outcome, is going to cause pain, hurt and difficulty. And you know that rightly or wrongly, some of that pain and hurt is going to land on your door.

Sometimes you work yourself to the bone, you pour blood, sweat and tears into resolving a situation, you work through the process, you bring others with you, but deep down you know that all you are doing, all you are achieving, is to minimise the pain and hurt that are going to come out of, that nothing you do is going to take that away.

"When you can't see the way out, try looking up!" goes the old saying - but you have. You've prayed, you've sought God's will, you've listened, you've handed things over to him, you're sure you are handling things the way he wants, but at the end of the day, you know that, for someone, somewhere, this is going to hurt.

Maybe this isn't an experience you share, maybe its just me. Maybe its a weakness in my faith, or just something I don't fully understand yet (after all, one of the reasons I write this blog is as a recognition that there are things that are beyond our easy comprehension, that somethings are a mystery we don't and never will fully comprehend, even as we wrestle and struggle with them).

Then again, although it may be presumptuous of me, perhaps in those moments and at those times, perhaps it is through these kind of "no win" scenarios that I can catch a glimpse, just a tiny, insignificant glimpse of how it is for a loving Father to send his only Son to the cross. My hope, my prayer is that I too can pray the prayer "Not my will, Lord, but Yours be done" - and that while I do so I will join with the cry of the church over the ages "Come, Lord Jesus!"

I Can't Live With or Without You

Its been a while since I wrote a blog. Amongst many other reasons, one of things that stopped me was a holiday. A week spent in a charming part of Wales with my family, accompanied by sheep (lots of them), by falling water (falling from the sky and in some of the most spectacular waterfalls around), and of course, by steam trains. 

Rather a lot of our holiday was spent riding on, looking at, waving to steam trains. Well, I do have two train mad sons, and I can admit to being something of a steam-railway geek myself. And in fact, my wife isn't far behind in the steam-train geek stakes either.... and we were staying in a cottage just 2 mins walk from one of the Stations on the Talyllyn Railway - so not surprisingly we spent a lot of time there... 

The railway itself is delightful - it travels from the coast up into the mountains, and in the process crosses some fantastic countryside and scenary. But most interesting for me is that the railway is run almost entirely by volunteer members - all the drivers, firemen guards, station-masters, blockmen (that's "signalmen" on most railways) and even their very own Thin Controller are volunteers, giving incredibly generously of their time, effort, and money to keep the railway operating in a manner as close to its original Victorian conditions as possible. And as whole, these volunteers are fantastic. They are doing what they love, yes, but doing it in such a way as to be inclusive, welcoming, helpful and friendly to the visitors - doing it in such a way as to share their love of the railway, of the locomotives and the rolling stock, of the stations and the route, with those who come to share. Watching these disparate individuals, from all walks of life, coming together, working together, sharing and having fun with each other and with the paying visitors, you could see a real sense of community - and that, more than anything else, is what is slowly but surely converting my wife and I into real steam-railway geeks!

And as I watched, I couldn't help compare the volunteers I saw with the many fantastic volunteers who give so selflessley to the church I'm part of, who work together, in community, to spead the good news they have found, to welcome, to help, to include those currently outside the community of the church - those who see the church first and foremost as their family, the place they are called to be. And I am proud to be one of them - to be in the place, in the community that God wants me to be in, even when its difficult. 

Because being a community is difficult. Whether its a community of railway volunteers, or a community of believers, living and working closely together is a challenge. Whilst we were in Wales, I overheard conversations between volunteers - conversations about budget and finances, conversations about "leadership issues", conversations about "the way things used to be" - conversations which I hear, day in, day out, as I go about the business of being part of a church. The kind of conversations which exasperate, which frustrate, which make me want to stamp my feet, throw my toys out of the pram, and disappear into the sunset, never more to have anything to do with those people. 

But I can't, because this is where God has placed me, and this is where he has placed all those other wonderful, frustrating, confusing, helpful, painful, beautiful, lovely people. People who he loves, just as they are. Maybe there are times when I feel I can't live with them, but if He, the One who knows them better than they knows themselves can not just live with them, he can love them enough to die for them, who am I to question his choice?