A Cloudless Sky

Some recent mornings were clear, crisp and very, very cold. On one occasion I found myself walking to church, under an apparently cloudless sky. In fact I eventually spotted a mere handful of small clouds near the horizon to the south. Yet the general impression I had walking along was that there was nothing above me but atmosphere.

What a contrast to the lowering, threatening clouds that had hung over me for most of the winter on my route to church! This new experience gave me a sense of space and freedom that was a delight to the soul.

It also brought back memories. When training for the ministry back in the 1970's, I was in a college environment in the university city of Cambridge. Life among a bunch of theological students can feel very oppressive. You sense that you are living on top of everyone else and everyone else is living on top of you. It was a state of affairs calculated to change me from a model student into a rebel one. Yet, since I am very conformist at heart, I fit most awkwardly into the role of rebel. It all made for a miserable and confined feeling.

Then one day I went for a walk in Grantchester Meadows. Again it was a clear day, this time in early summer. In the spreading fields under an open sky, I felt like a different person from the one trapped wretchedly in the rooms and corridors and lecture theatres and dining halls of the academic institution. For one precious afternoon, I was free.

It gave me a great sense of spiritual kinship with King David in Psalm 18. This was penned on an occasion where God had "delivered him from the hand of all his enemies and from the hand of Saul". I love that psalm because it portrays the lengths to which God goes to help just one individual crying out to Him in trouble:

"In my distress I called to the Lord; I cried to my God for help. From his temple he heard my voice; my cry came before him, into his ears. The earth trembled and quaked, and the foundations of the mountains shook; they trembled because he was angry. Smoke rose from his nostrils; consuming fire came from his mouth, burning coals blazed out of it. He parted the heavens and came down; dark clouds were under his feet" (Psalm 18:6-9 NIV).

The happy result is seen in verses 16 and 19:

"He reached down from on high and took hold of me; he drew me out of deep waters."
"He brought me out into a spacious place; he rescued me because he delighted in me."

There is an extremely old verse version of this Psalm which I cherish. It renders this sense of freedom like this:

He brought me forth in open space,
that so I might be free;
and kept me safe, because He had
a favour unto me.

Thomas Sternhold, c. 1500-1549

In his letter to the Galatians, the apostle Paul had to reason with early Christian church members who were being influenced by misguided leaders. These men were trying to impose Jewish laws on them that they no longer needed to observe. "It is for freedom that Christ has set us free," Paul wrote (Galatians 5:1 NIV). In other words, the grace of Christ hasn't set us free from heavy burdens of law simply so we should go back to them again!

For all too many people today, though, the church has become oppressive. This may be because of various forms of abuse. It may be down to "heavy shepherding" where leaders intrude into the private lives of their members and dictate how they are to conduct their relationships or their finances. This domineering spirit is a denial of freedom in Christ.

Liberated from sin, death, hell and the fading Jewish law by the risen Christ, may we find the open spaces. By gentle, enlightened leadership, may we bring others into them too.