Speak Lord

Last week, I attended a humanist funeral. The celebrant reminded us that we would be focussing on the human without reference to religious or spiritual beliefs.  

Reflecting the memories of those who knew and loved the person who had died she paid moving tribute to him. She reflected that the world was changed through his life in countless interactions with others across eight decades. For him, the circle of life had reached its conclusion, yet he would live on in the memories of those who knew and loved him. We bade him goodbye, with thankfulness for his life.

Reflecting on this afterwards, I found myself thinking ‘I could do that!’ I imagined myself inhabiting a story of humanity which sees this life as all there is. It’s a story encouraging us to seek courage, goodness and love in an achingly beautiful, tragic world, to reach out in support of those who are weak and struggling, to face with resolve a death which is final. I imagined myself leading that funeral, bringing comfort and courage to the mourners.

And then I stopped short, surprised how easy it was to think myself into a way of viewing reality so very different from the story which guides my life. And then I wondered – does it matter which story we choose to live by as long as we inhabit it honestly and it helps us to ride the surf of life with courage and humanity?

But I realised that if God exists, then it does matter which story we commit to. And then I wondered what I might say to humanist friends to explain why I take my stand in the religious, and specifically in the Christian story.

 

I could point to the work of those scientists and philosophers who argue, as Roger Scruton did recently at the Edinburgh Book Festival that science is only one way of looking at reality. ‘The world,’ he said, ‘can be understood completely in another way which also has its truths which are not translatable into the truths of science.’ The world, Scruton insisted is a sacred place, touched by the presence of God.

Or I could point my humanist friends to books arguing that it is not irrational to believe in God and the uniqueness of Jesus, and to biographies of people who have moved from atheism to belief. I could even tell the story of my own faith, wavering but persistent. 

Yet I know you can’t prove God’s existence.

I had a sore head the evening of the funeral – perhaps due to the stuffiness of my office. I still had a splitting headache the next morning, and felt heavy and mentally sluggish. I was a little concerned, remembering my mini-stroke last November. Once again, I was confronted with the fragility of life, and with my own mortality.

‘Please help me, Father God,’ I said and that day a calm tide of peace swept over me, a deep appreciation of life, and that resolve to live ‘in the day’ which is always strongest when I remember how tenuous our hold on life is.

And that reminded me what I would say to my humanist friends. Simply ‘Listen!’

I believe there’s a voice speaking deep in our deepest selves. It’s a voice which calls us to beauty and goodness, to love. It calls us to become the people we were meant to be. It inspires creativity and wholeness. It’s a voice which if we listen, will draw us beyond ourselves. I believe the God who is present in the world is present in us. Our deepest self is a sacred place. The voice is the voice of God.

There’s a young boy in a Bible story who repeatedly hears a voice calling him. He assumes it is a human voice, until he’s advised to respond ‘Speak Lord, I’m listening!’

We explain the voice which whispers in our hearts as simply the voice of our own depths. Sometimes we act on it, while not acknowledging its source. Sometimes we drown it out with a Babylon of other voices, but the voice is not stilled.

Can evolution explain joy or wonder or music or love?

The voice calls us to a new story, not one of our own weaving, but God’s story, a story which does not end when the waves erase our footsteps on the beach. 

‘Speak Lord, I’m listening.’

(Christian Viewpoint column from the Highland News dated 28th August 2014)