Let's start at the Beginning...

I have been advised to attend the Living Theology Today for about 4 years. This year I finally got round to looking into it, applying, and now here I am writing a reflective journal about it. They say change is inevitable and I guess I was prepared for the change in my new found wealth of theological knowledge. I wasn’t however, prepared for a change in me. I hadn’t even considered how this course would impact my faith. Seems silly really looking back, but I guess there are no hard and fast rules that to study Theology, one must have a faith, belief of some kind. After talking to people at the study day, hearing their excitement of the course, their anticipation of what would happen, where it would take them, where God would take them. I started to wonder if I’d made the right decision. Should I really be here? Am I really the right person to be on this course? Luckily I didn’t have much more time to think about it, Sunday, Monday, and Tuesday came and went. Wednesday was here and somehow I’d managed to read the 16 pages suggested. My stubborn ‘righteous’ self drove to Durham and took a deep breath before entering the library, late again… I had prepared myself to be challenged by people’s views, to disagree at times, to be enlightened to new thoughts. But I had no idea how this might impact my faith. My relationship with God has been a little strained of late, the loss of my job, family issues, bereavement, etc all added to my ‘issues’ with the Big Guy. I guess this is no different to the pattern of my life. Relationships with people are often like roller coasters, happy and healthy one minute, unhappy and in need of TLC the next. I didn’t think much more about my relationship with God. At least not until Wednesday. I loved the session led by Anne. I love art and I loved picking out what parts of the paintings I felt important, what I liked, what I didn’t like.

One of my favourite paintings was 'The adoration of the shepherds by Rembradt (or one of his scholars... 1646) But I was a little annoyed that there wasn’t even a mention of the text that we’d had to read. The 16 pages I’d read and taken notes of whilst burning the midnight oil, during my lunch break, over tea before I left for Durham. I had found the text rather confusing, filled with lots of big words (or small as ‘logos’ has only 5 letters!) that didn’t make sense. Analogies of eagles that didn’t relate well to me. I had hoped to discuss it together. But later that evening, as I planned my Bible study for the youth group the next day, it all started to become clear. I began to see the bigger picture. This LTNE wouldn’t just be confined to Wednesday nights at Durham, it was going to spill happily into other areas of my life, into other parts of myself. The study was one of many studies entitled the Story of Christmas. Study one: In the beginning… I laughed inwardly to myself. What a chump I’d been. Writing my notes I added my own thoughts of Jesus being there before time, as discussed by John in his Gospel. That Jesus was so great that before he was even born he existed. The importance of ‘Logos’. The importance of God. I realised that God was there, that he always had been. That unlike others when a relationship had broken down of become distant. God was there; loving me, supporting me, and guiding me. This great being that I needed, wanted, was here in my life, for always. Just as Jesus had been for the world.