I took this photo a week ago on a visit to a building called The Lighthouse in central Glasgow.  I took it from the top of a sprial staircase (I think it was 132 steps) just as someone else was taking a photo looking up.  Roughly half way up/down is the friend who was visiting me.

My final reflection in yesterday's evening service used this metaphor - one I find helpful for theolgoical reflection, for thinking about faith development and for life itself.

So here, lifted from my script, is what I said...

I like to imagine myself as the person on the staircase, travelling a one way journey through time (usually I see it was upwards but I don’t think the direction is important).  The trajectory is a spiral, reflecting the cyclic flow of season and years, with familiar markers such as birthdays or anniversaries, but always, always moving onwards, and never able to go back.

At the start, looking up, the journey head cannot be seen, at least beyond the first bend, and it appears enormous.  During the ascent it is possible to pause, to find oneself in a place that is both familiar and unfamiliar – immediately above a significant landmark, and, now, looking back down seeing it differently from a new perspective.  And one can look upwards, seeing that there are more uncharted spirals ahead, realising that the very real present moment will take on a different perspective when at some future point, it is viewed retrospectively.

We can only ever see from where we are now, a mixture of looking back at what once was so incredibly intense and now is dimmed and softened by distance; and looking forward perhaps catching glimpses of possibilities but thankfully unaware of what actually might lie ahead.

Sometimes it is only this looking backwards that enables us to detect the hints of God being at work in the situations that prompted our questions or doubts.  Sometimes it is only retrospectively that we can make any kind of meaning, recognise the moments of goodness or the signs of hope.  Sometimes, in the reality of dark and frightening present realities, it is these backward glances that give us the courage to take the next step, trusting that the God who shared with us in the past still does so.

As I near my five year anniversary of diagnosis, I can look back and see how far I have come, grateful for those who have shared that journey, and I can look forward, albeit with chastened optimism and realistic expectations, to a future in which God will continue to work with me for good.

My prayer for all us of is that God will continue to work with us in our personal quests for meaning.