Tick Tock
Minister's Letter: March 2023
Dear Grace Church,
From this Friday to next Thursday we will be away on holiday in North Wales. Exotic I know. Alan Woodley, a dear friend of Grace Church Montrose and partner in the gospel will be preaching on Sunday morning. If there are any pastoral needs while I am away, please do contact one of the elders. If there is a particular emergency, I will have my phone with me. We look forward to being back with you all for the Good Friday service and the rest of the Easter Weekend.
This morning I wound my Grandfather Clock for the first time. It’s an eight day clock, so the weights inside the main body must be wound up once a week or the clock stops. Tadhg joined me and was captivated by the process. He stood still with eyes wide open in awe as I rewound the weights, set the strike and reset the clock face to the correct time. He was enraptured.
This was the same experience I had three decades ago when I went to Birr, in the middle of Ireland. The same clock Tadhg now stood in front of, is the same one my Granddad opened up to me, explaining how it worked and showing me how to look after it.
Inheriting this clock and seeing it in my own home is special to me but it is also tinged with sadness.
It was always his treasure and pride
But it stopped, short, never to go again
When the old man died.
My Grandparents both died in 2021, less than three months apart from one another. Due to a number of complicating factors, the clock only made it across the sea two weekends ago. The clock had become neglected in the last few years as my Granddad’s health declined. I’m not sure when it last chimed in Birr. My parents brought it to a clock specialist in late 2022. He was amazed it survived the journey to his shopfloor due it its condition and my parents doing everything you should not do when moving a Grandfather Clock.
He lovingly restored the clock, carefully taking it apart, strengthening its integrity and touching it up. But more than that, he explored its history. I had never considered its life before it came to my Granddad’s hallway. It was not bought on the day he was born but has a story which goes back long before him. As far as we can tell, it was made as far back as the 1840s. And its next chapter is just inside the door of our home in Montrose.
There is right and wrong. God has made clear what it true, good and whole and also what it false, evil and corrupt. But we live in the world as it is, not the world as it will be. In the world as it is, there is often much grey. Not that there isn’t right or wrong, but so often we find right and wrong in the same action, the same situation and the same person. We live in this tension every day. Does the good outweigh the bad?
My Granddad made some decisions in his last few years which caused deep hurt to a number of people. So when I look at the clock, those precious memories standing transfixed next to my Granddad are real but confused as they mix with more recent painful ones. I smile truly and widely but at the same time my heart is heavy. How do we process these contradictory emotions, especially when they happen at the exact same time?
Living in a world pockmarked by sin is hard. I know I’m stating the obvious but maybe it’s a reality we try to avoid by placing situations and people in easy categories. Again, God makes clear what is good and what is evil. But those are so often present in the same heart. The church in Corinth are described by Paul as those who are “sanctified” (1 Cor. 1.2) yet not much later in the same letter, he calls them “worldly” (1 Cor. 3.3). We live in the world as it is, where we see the firstfruits of the new creation blossoming, but they grow in a field of weeds.
I don’t have an easy answer for how to live in this tension. And if I did, I’d be wrong. We need wisdom. We need to seek wisdom through God’s word and by the Spirit, pleading to our heavenly Father. We should seek advice and counsel from those we trust. Sometimes accepting that the answer in one situation is not the same in another. Accepting that sometimes we will make mistakes but God’s grace is abundant.
As I hear the clock chime, my heart is sore and happy. And I long for the time when the world pockmarked by sin is healed by the one with nail marks in his hands. When the world as it will be comes into full flower.
Until then, each week I’ll wind up the clock and teach the boys to do the same.
In Christ,
Ciarán R. Kelleher
March Treat
With Easter just around the corner, here is a powerful reminder of the power of the gospel.