Now I'm 64! A birthday blog.

As a teenager I loved The Beatles and sang along with everyone else, ‘Will you still need me, will you still feed me, when I’m sixty four?’ I doubt that the Fab Four could even contemplate themselves what it would be like to reach such a milestone back then, although most of them do now. As for a young 14 year old, 64 was just a number, an age beyond my comprehension, an eternity away. But not anymore; the milestone has been reached. I am 64!

I’m grateful to God for the years that have passed, filled in so many ways with examples of his goodness, and panning out in ways I never expected or could have anticipated. There have been many good days, a few not-so-good days, but on the whole life has been kind to me and I have much to be thankful for; but now, with just one more year before ‘retirement’ (whatever that means and however it will look) I am more than ever conscious of my age, and thinking about how I want to spend the years ahead of me – however many I may be granted.

I’ve been drawn to start considering the ‘spirituality of ageing’, what it means to live these later years according to the agenda of God, meeting both the particular challenges and unique opportunities that growing old presents from the perspective of faith. There is not a lot written about it, and not much is taught about it in our churches, so I know there is a wide door of opportunity to teach on this subject. At the same time, I know I have to live it too, bringing God into the mix of my own life post-64. So I am learning firstly for my own benefit, but also secondly that I may help others in their later pilgrimage.

First up has been the question of how to prepare for ‘retirement’ since next year I will receive my State pension, and in theory can afford to slow down and take things a little easier. But how to do that when you are an active person, used to being on the go, and enjoying a broad field of operation? The picture that has come to me often is that of a Jumbo jet coming in to land. About 45 minutes out of London, and whilst we are still over Europe, the captain usually announces ‘we are beginning our descent’. You cannot bring a massive jet, with hundreds of passages and tons of luggage on board, into land without a carefully timed descent. Likewise, I have felt that as I approach retirement I have to begin slowing down now, gradually making an adjustment to my commitments and responsibilities, carefully letting go of some of my involvements so that it does not all happen in one go.

This transition is not easy and involves loss and grief. I have already given up my role as Pastoral Carer for MAF in Africa. Last week was my last trip to Singapore to be with my Mentoring Group. These involvements have meant a great deal to me, but I am aware that the time has come to give them back to God; he gave me these openings and now I offer them back to him, but it hurts. Other avenues of service have naturally come to an end, like the closure of Bawtry Hall where I have been involved for 20 years. There is a sense of a change of season in ministry, as well as a new passage of life.

I know from God that now is the time to be at home more, to travel less, to be available to my family, to care for my health, and to have more space in my life for God to fill. I have the sense that a ‘surprise’ awaits me, although I have no idea what kind of surprise! This year will be a year of slowing down, and then from March 2015 having a 3 month sabbatical. After that, who knows? I will still write, I will still lead retreats, I will ….. Well, that’s for God to direct, and I look forward to finding out in due course what he has in mind for me, even if there is a surprise element to it.

For the moment I am enjoying my birthday, feeling loved, and feeling blessed. With God’s help and grace I want to keep walking in his ways and doing his will. The words of Psalm 84 come to mind: ‘Blessed are those whose strength is in you, who have set their hearts on pilgrimage …. They go from strength to strength, till each appears before God in Zion (v5 and 7).’

Let the train take the strain?

Those who live in the UK will be familiar with this slogan advocating the benefits of travelling by rail, and normally it is true. I love train journeys, and often use the east Coast mainline to travel from Doncaster down to London, and then on the Kings Cross. On a recent journey I was all ready to leave home for the station when I realised I could not find my rail tickets. I knew I had them in my possession earlier in the week, so began to serach my bag for them, but to no avail. Puzzled by this unusual display of disorganisation, I asked Evelyn to help me look. She also went through my bag, but couldn’t find them; I checked my desk, my drawers, and other possible locations, but also to no avail. With time running out we decided we had better head for the station and explain what had happened, hoping they could issue a second set. You can imagine that by now ‘panic’ is the best word to describe my response, that and ‘anger’ – not at anyone else but as myself for my incompetency. You see I am always so well organised (I need to be given the amount of travel I do), and I did not like this display of inefficiency one bit. My blood continued to boil as we headed for the station, me at the wheel to make sure we got there as quickly as possible as I had a specific train to catch and time was running out. Once at the station I explained my dilemma at the ticket office, using my most plaintive manner, but without effect. I was told I needed to buy a new set of tickets (costing £70 on top of the original £50), with no refund for the lost tickets. With no alternative I bought the new tickets and after a short wait boarded the train to London, still in somewhat of a stew. After a minute or two to catch my breath I opened my bag just to check …. And almost straightaway found the lost tickets, hidden behind a brochure in one of my files. I had clearly put them somewhere ‘safe’, but that place proved to be too safe. Now I was angry with myself not just for my inefficiency, but also for such a waste of money. Two cardinal sins as far as my conscience is concerned. Two hours later I was in London’s Kings Cross station sipping a latte and mulling over this incident. Several things came to my mind. (1) We create our own stress, not because we make mistakes, but because we respond badly to certain situations. We get them out of proportion, as if it were the end of the world. So I lost my tickets – it’s not the end of the world. It wasn’t as if I had a plane to catch this time, buying a replacement was straightforward, and I arrived on time anyway, so why so much fuss? Easy of curse in hindsight. Most of us have a default position that says PANIC when things go wrong, but not many situations actually deserve a panic response. (2) It took the two hours of the journey for me to slow down, catch my breath and relax again. I was really annoyed with myself and my response, especially for bringing Evelyn into the orbit of my stress. Stress begets stress, doesn’t it, and for some reason we love to draw others into the realm of our distress. There is a perverse comfort in doing that, and it’s not something to be proud of. (3) The hardest thing was to forgive myself for my incompetency and waste of money. My internal critic is quick off the mark when I make a mistake like this, usually accusing me with words like ‘You stupid boy!’ (copied from Dad’s Army?). Eventually I came to terms with my fallibility, put it under the cover of God’s magnificent grace, and allowed myself to stop the self- reproach . But it wasn’t easy. (4) Such moments have much to teach us about ourselves, and our need to be perfect, or in control, or competent or whatever…. I guess they also serve to ‘prick our bubble’ in case we think we have reached some stage of spiritual perfection where we are beyond the reach of such immature emotional responses. They help us, and others, to see that we are still quite human and fallible, despite how God may use us, or how others may view us, or how we may present ourselves publicly. For those who are teachers, leaders, or in the public eye, it is the kindness of God that he occasionally humbles us less we become too big for our boots. Whatever our stage in life, pride remains our greatest and most subtle enemy, and humility our most loyal and closest friend. So that’s the story of my train journey, and one I hope not to repeat again. I’m down to London again next week, but it’s OK I know where my tickets are. I think.