Can you remember an occasion when you went somewhere or read something to which you felt an immediate positive reaction which you have never forgotten?
Many years ago I went into a small building with white washed walls and thatched roof, surrounded by a flower-bordered graveyard, in a small Cornish village called Come to Good. It is one of the oldest Quaker Meeting Houses in the United Kingdom, built in 1710 when Quakers were being persecuted for their faith.
Inside there are plain backless wooden benches under a beamed roof. It is a place of silence, where those who attend meetings share silent worship with inner reflection and communal stillness, occasionally broken by a participant feeling inspired to speak.
The silence of the place and its simplicity gave me a strong sense of its power to calm me and enable me to feel God’s presence. Because of the nature of the worship, it was as if anything spoken in that place was directly inspired by God.
Significant places are not necessarily churches or other specifically holy sites.
My first journey abroad was a school trip to Switzerland in 1953 when I was twelve. Last minute travel problems in France had caused us to have to travel by sea to Holland and then to Switzerland by train.
We arrived in Bern in the early hours of the morning feeling tired, achy and irritable. To our delighted amazement we were shown to a terrace on the station overlooking the sun rising over the Jungfrau. Small tables with red and white checked cloths were topped with freshly baked warm rolls, Swiss butter, black cherry jam and coffee. I felt restored, refreshed and joyful and I can still be uplifted by that memory.
Of course we read of many holy places in the Bible, some of which you may have visited. We are especially aware of the significance of particular places at this season of Lent, leading to Holy Week. For those who are experiencing the Retreat at Home, there may have been some reflections on Bible passages you have considered.
Places, whether in reality or on the page, don’t always inspire us with their beauty or their calming influence. The story of Jesus in the Garden of Gethsemane, with his closest disciples, is one of my most cherished Bible passages. It is because Jesus’ desperate pleading to be released from the dreadful events that he knows are coming is so human. We can identify with him; surely we have prayed similarly to God when we have been faced with really difficult times in our own lives. I find it so encouraging that on occasion I have felt, to a much smaller extent, something like Jesus felt.
The challenge for me then is to say as Jesus said, ‘God’s will be done’ and then to pray for the strength to bear it.
When we consider places and events in our lives which have produced a lifelong memory, we may reflect on the effect of those memories on our growth and development as individuals and Christians. The experiences may be seen as ‘God Moments’ when we recognise God’s gifts to us and his abiding presence in our lives.
This week you might look back on a memory you have treasured for many years. Or you might even experience some place or event which you feel for you will be a special lifelong memory.
Happy Memories
Pip