Still Quarrying: When The Bell Rings.

Over the last few years, I’ve spent a bit of time in the Beatson cafeteria.  It’s a good place to have coffee, read, and await my chauffeuse to bear me home in her motor car.  (I’m not driving at present.  Concentration a bit suspect.)   From time to time, you hear a bell ringing.   Installed for those who have completed their treatment it sends out a message:

 

Ring This Bell 

Three Times well.

My treatment’s done,

This course is run,

AND I AM ON MY WAY!

 

The cafeteria is usually crowded so the sound of the bell is greeted with applause, cheers and hugs.  And a wide smile, and sometimes tears, from the patient looking forward to better days.

 

I heard the bell a week past on Monday and it occurred to me, nor for the first time, that as things stand, I will never ring that bell.  There is no absolute cure for Multiple Myeloma although in in my case I have been assured that as long as I continue with the chemotherapy and other medication the disease can be considered to be under control.  

 

It sounds a bit morbid, but it is not unusual for people to have medical conditions that require them to be on life-long treatment.  My mother was diagnosed with angina in her mid-fifties which remained with her until her death at age 88.  As with many things what matters is how we respond to the challenges that fall to us, making adjustments to lifestyle and aspiring to be content. 

 

When the bell rings I’m reminded of the words of the Apostle Paul in his letter to the Christians in Rome.   After a heavy theological discourse Paul shows us how it must all be put into practise.  In the midst of a scattergun list of practical application he writes:

 

‘Rejoice with those who rejoice; mourn with those who mourn.’  (Romans 12: 15)

 

I suppose there was a time when I would have thought it more difficult to mourn with those who mourn.   But experience has taught me that it can be more difficult to rejoice with those who rejoice.  When someone is being blessed in a way that is eluding you  it can be very difficult to connect with their spirit of rejoicing.  But like so many things when it comes to a Biblical quality of life, we are persistently called to aspire to those things that are best for us and for those around us.  That needs help as Paul learned when he prayed continually for healing from pain and did not appear to be receiving an answer.  God’s word to him was:

 

‘My grace is made suffient for you, for my power is made perfect in weakness.’  (2 Corinthians 12: 8)

 

The bell may never ring but the Gospel rings our with promises that will never fade.  

 

Still Quarrying: Fresh, Green, Proclaiming.

 Here’s a thing.  What is the connection between Hercule Poirot and Psalm 92? 

 

Yesterday one of my morning psalms was Psalm 92, a song of praise to God for His love and faithfulness, His creative power and His sovereignty in a world where wickedness seems to have the upper hand.  The psalm ends with an assurance that those who are faithful to God will show signs of His rule in the here and now:

 

‘The righteous will flourish like a palm tree,

they will grow like a cedar of Lebanon;

planted in the house of the Lord,

they will flourish in the courts of our God.

They will still bear fruit in old age,

they will stay fresh and green,

proclaiming ‘The Lord is upright,

He is my Rock, and there is no wickedness in Him.’ (vv. 12-15) 

 

What caught my attention particularly was vv. 14-15:

 

‘They will still bear fruit in old age,

they will stay fresh and green,

proclaiming ‘The Lord is upright,

He is my Rock, and there is no wickedness in Him.’

 

I had a birthday the other day which brings me within one year of the biblical ‘three score years and ten’.  So, it was good to read that as far as God is concerned we are never over the hill, passed it, burned out.  To the end of our lives, we ‘bear fruit’, we stay ‘fresh and green’, we continue to serve by proclaiming the great truths concerning God and His ways. 

 

These assurances were still glowing within when we went to see the new Poirot movie, ‘A Haunting In Venice.’  (Kenneth Branagh as Poirot will never surpass David Suchet in my eyes but it’s always good to have your prejudices challenged.). Poirot has retired and is living very privately in Venice.  He has taken great steps to avoid being drawn into further detective work even to the extent of hiring a bodyguard to keep people and their problems at a distance.   But there would not be a movie if this remained the state of affairs and very soon we see Poirot drawn into the work that has made him world-famous.  

 

That’s the only spoiler you will get.  But it was good Saturday afternoon entertainment and remarkable to me that there was a connection with Psalm 92.  In the end Poirot bears fruit in old age, shows himself to be fresh and green, and is ultimately fulfilled in the work he was destined to do.  

 

There have been a few challenges for me in retirement, not least the continuing treatment that leaves me below par for half the week.  But more that anything is the absence of preaching.  It is not something that can readily be put into words, but colleagues will know what I mean when I say that you are never more fulfilled when out of your reflection on God’s Word a message emerges which you are called to deliver to God’s people.  This is not to say that it comes easy.  There are battles to be fought in the preparation and in the very act of delivery but the fulfilment in the end is beyond anything else in human experience. 

 

When this is no longer a regular part of your life there is a sense of incompleteness at the centre of your inner being.  So, it has been a blessing recently to have the opportunity to preach in our parish church, Renfrew Trinity, and a few weeks ago in St. Andrew’s Trinity in Johnstone.  And I am looking forward to the couple of gigs I have in the diary.  It’s good to be still involved even if in a limited way.  And to do so in the assurances that come from Psalm 92 that I can bear fruit in old age, stay fresh and green and proclaim what I know to be true concerning the God and Father of our Lord Jesus Christ.