The Sun Ain't Gonna Shine Anymore

Dreadful grammar, classic Neil Diamond song particularly in the original version by The Walker Brothers. Not a manufacturer of potato crisps, nor of a famous scotch whiskey, but the jokey nickname ascribed to two of my friends who though sharing the same surname are unrelated. John and Philip are they, and the first coining of this particular name-pairing was many years ago at an old rectory in Warwickshire, where they were mistaken as siblings while staying with another mutual friend at a bed and breakfast there- while I opted for the rather cheaper option of my cousin's spare room in the county town.

The occasion of this trip to Shakespeare's county was not a bardic pilgrimage to nearby Stratford-on-Avon, but the shared blessing of the famous Stoneleigh Bible Week at the huge National Agricultural Centre twixt Coventry, Warwick and Leamington Spa. For a decade, these were the highlight of the summer for around thirty thousand Christians from all over the world, attending to share in vibrant, joyful worship and listen to often dynamic, sometimes life-changing but always helpful preaching and teaching from many of the big names on the "charismatic scene", including the founder of Newfrontiers (or New Frontiers International as it was then known), Terry Virgo. Many would even claim with fervent belief- and who am I to doubt them- that by God's amazing grace, they were !healed at Stoneleigh. Books, music and testimonies still bear witness to the power of God working in them at these significant occasions in the life of the late twentieth century church.

The fact that enjoying such wonderful Christian fellowship for six days also meant enduring floods, heatstroke, the pungent aroma of cowpats from the recently vacated cattle sheds where meetings were held, and a long queue for early morning showers while camping, never seemed to put many of these happy, clappy souls off. However, with a couple of exceptions I and my friends much preferred our home comforts and a decent cooked breakfast before launching into the satisfying spiritual and physical exercise of the day ahead.

Many friendships were no doubt forged at Stoneleigh, many happy times remembered, many the seed of spiritual growth planted in hungry, holy hearts. But life is about endings and beginnings, change and growth, no less for the Christian than for any other soul. The Bible Weeks are no more-though some might think this owed more to a massive hike in site fees by the Royal Agricultural Society around the turn of the century than any wider move of the Holy Spirit. Nevertheless, that same Holy Spirit lights a fire which can appear spontaneously, marvellously and spectacularly even when the sun isn't shining, whether you're in a cow shed or comfy bed.

You wouldn't know it in most churches in Britain today, but this has been the week when Christian believers say "Happy Birthday to Us"! Pentecost, celebrated last Sunday but originally observed fifty days after the Jewish passover, is generally recognised as when the church came into being, when the promised "comforter, advocate, helper", depending on your translation of the Greek paraclete came down from Heaven to birth and a movement which would move and shake the world for ever was born. When people start hearing and comprehending in their own language words audibly spoken in a dialectical form otherwise quite alien to them, something quite remarkable and surely of God is going on. What Babelfish and Alta Vista among others still sometimes hilariously fail to do in the 21st Century, the Holy Spirit of God could accomplish effortlessly in one memorable gathering in 1st century Jerusalem. People could hear and understand the very word of God in their own tongue, whatever it might be- but the paradox is that such a divine occurrence almost defied description. Even the learned Dr Luke, saint as he is to us now, struggled to give full expression to the mystery and wonder of this fabulous event in his account of the happenings in the second chapter of the book of Acts. Simile and metaphor instead came into their own, as talk of tongues of fire, rushing winds and descending doves excite the imagination of the modern reader and filled the hearts of the Jerusalem hearers.

This was the party to end all parties, bringing the best present of all to the ecclesia and new life to the assembled believers and astounded observers from every corner of the ancient world. What a pity then that modern man seems to so neglect, even doubt, the power and meaning of that great event, promised to the motley crowd of disciples and followers just days earlier by their saviour as he left them in his earthly form.

So much of society today and worst still even the church, seem to treat Pentecost, or Whitsun as it is also traditionally known, as little more than another day, whereas in reality it is one of the great Christian festivals. For the Holy Spirit it is which breathed life and still does into all the great teachings, doctrines and truths of the Christian faith. He- for the Spirit is regarded as a person as much as Jesus- it is that I believe enables me to write these words which express something of the hope and faith I have, and why I write it-even if this last fortnight, my own spirit has been willing to "blog", but my tired flesh has been too weak! And so as we approach another Sunday of celebration, when the church remembers that great mystery which is the union of God in three persons, Father Son and Holy Spirit, we pray, Come Holy Spirit

DREAM, DREAM, DREAM
Another great song from the sixties, especially in the Bobby Gentry and Glenn Campbell version with its wonderful harmonies. By gum, I must be in nostalgic mode today. Perhaps it's got something to do with the return of a grand old name of the airwaves, Big L- Radio London-, which is now back on Medium Wave. No, it's not a dream: they are there, mabye not always loud and clear but on the air nonetheless, through a clever way of avoiding the UK broadcasting acts which prevent them being either landlubbers or broadcasting the ocean wave for more than 28 days at a time.
Although the studios are in Frinton on Sea- once famed for being the town with no pubs- for no logical reason other than the rosy glow of reminiscence (Frinton has a big place in the heart of pirate radio lovers, or is that lubbers?)- the transmitters are based in Holland, which in itself is another memory of the pirate days of yore.

Although I have some memory of the pre-67 pirates- Harold Wilson's Marine Broadcasting Offences Act silenced most of them in August of that year- for me the golden age was the early seventies, especially of Radio Nordsee International who sent me my first ever "QSL", or acknowledgement card. I've very fond memories of lsitening to them in the garden shed in Feltham of a summer school holiday afternoon, which I guess was the closest I ever got to a "shack" back then. I listened in practically every day as I recall,sad radio anorak that I am.

RNI too have had their try at being legal and yet still being all at sea, but so far at least have not followed Big L on the sea path over to Holland. However, they are coming through with a weak but interference-free signal here in Eastbourne, where I am sitting once again mid-afternoon though this time with four walls around me rather than weatherboard-style painted timber. 1395 is worth a try if you are in Eastern England or anywhere in Europe, though with only 20 kW being pushed out of Holland it's hardly a powerhouse.

For many of a generation just before me, this might seem like the fulfilment of a dream, with a station they loved so much back in those halcyon, hopeful days of the sixties kissing the eardrums once again. But how will Big L fare in an age dominated by big names, like G-Cap and Clear Channel? They might have one for the moment, but whether they can keep their bank balance in the clear remains to be seen.

ANYWAY
You may well be wondering by now why I have called this blog by the title its got. I wish I could offer a clever answer to that, but the simple one is it was the best I could come up with when I started it way back last August! If anyone can come up with a new title, whether quirky or conventional, I'm open to suggestions! However, it does tend to reflect a word often seen in my e-mails, and maybe in my conversations as well. I've got the mind of a grasshopper, which loves jumping from one topic to another, in case you hadn't noticed. "Dream..." was supposed to be telling you about my illustrated nocturnal narrative of early this morning, where I suddenly found myself back at Stoneleigh, but rather lost though desperately trying to get out of the camp by checkout time at the end of the Bible week. Though I had been there many times during the week, I could not for the life of me find the tent or other accommodation I had been in throughout the week, and I was worried about the consequences about not being able to find my way home. Ooh, watch out Mark, you're nearly into another song there, with Jon Anderson lurking in the corner with a little help from Vangelis.

What does it all mean? You tell me: I'm no Daniel nor a Joseph, who were the great interpreters of the dreams of even a pharoah in Biblical times. Was it Joe or was it Dan- ashamed to admit I forget for the moment- who stuck his neck out to tell the great one what his strange visions of cows both thin and fat meant? There you go you see, bovine imagery again and more of Stoneleigh? Or am I lost? Don't think so, but I hope my dream doesn't mean I am in for a lean time of it, anything but.
As a friend remarked to me this morning, yes it has been a tough year for me with all that has happened, but I feel that with the Spirit's help and my all too muddled prayers, things are starting to come together. I should not say too much here, perhaps- it's been Christian Aid amusingly counting their chickens in their advertising theme this Christian Aid week, along with a few moo cows too- but next week I have an interview with another Christian organisation I am quite keen to work from and from whence come many other prestigious names.
I'm feeling that I am finally "back home" in Feltham, even though I'm still a bit clueless at what to do with my home here by the coast. These occasional excursions to Eastbourne are very enjoyable. And, though I've dreamt about her alive from time to time recently, even dear Mum is now back home as we have collected her ashes. Somehow about me right now, despite the indifferent weather which still makes summer seem a long way off at times, I am at my most vital again, enjoying life and its social opportunities, and hopefully at last making the most of my abilities. As long as no thin cows are lurking behind the next bedhead....

UNDERNEATH THE SPREADING CHESTNUT TREE
Walmington on Sea calling... Do you know how it is when no matter how hard you try, you can't get a particular tune or sometimes the pictorial associations it brings up out of your mind? That's how it's been for me for much of May everytime I've walked under or driven past a fine specimen of Aesculus hippocastanum, I can't help but recall a classic episode of Dad's Army which was actually supposed to be set in this part of Sussex- even if it was mainly filmed in Norfolk! In my mind I'm singing those classic words, and seeing the great assemblage of immortal characters which made the wartime comedy so unforgettable and such a gem amidst the dross which passes for television entertainment these days. The latest offering from ITV1 is so crass it doesn't even merit a mention here.
I guess it must be the combination of the VE Day 60 celebrations and a particularly fine display of blossom by the horse chestnut this May which makes me think of that little love song. Apparently, according to no less a source than Time magazine, it was this song performed in a spontaneous "royal command" at a boys' camp (Scouts, maybe?) complete with actions which impressed George VI in those dark days early in the war. That was long before the US came in to join the fray, and set up their headquarters, along with the rest of the Allied Expeditionary Force, in the leafy glades of my native county. D-Day owes as much to the clay soils of Bushy Park as to the sandy beaches of Normandy, it's easily forgotten.

Chestnut Sunday on the 8th May celebrated the calendrical coincidence which brought the commemoration of the sixtieth anniversary of the end of war in Europe, and the annual celebration of the cheering sight which is Sir Christopher Wren's famous avenue of Horse Chestnut Trees in one of London's smaller Royal Parks. This year, my brother and I paid it a visit and great fun it is too. Though rain punctuated the latter part of the day, the parade of horses, vintage cycles and vintage military vehicles was witness by a splendid crowd and blessed by weather which showed the tres at their finest, as was the intention. I don't know about being in England now that April's here, but May has been a lovely one for tree huggers and historians alike, whatever the weather.

Horse Chestnuts also abound in another part of the Royal estate, this time in Windsor itself. Yesterday saw me taking advantage of the rare opportunity- only available on six days a year to the general public- to visit the burial place of Queen Victoria and Prince Albert, and to enjoy the relative peace of the sublime grounds which surround the mausoleum, surely one of the grandest Victorian buildings of all. It speaks of another age indeed, when at least on the surface, reverence and respect were the order of the day. It speaks also of the mere mortality of man, and yet of the fine things of creation and eternity which divine "digits" have designed.

Tony Blair, currently suffering from a slipped disc poor chap, has made the restoration of "respect" a key part of his post-election platform. It featured strongly in the Queen's speech, delivered on Tuesday at the State Opening of Parliament. I watched this spectacle with all its ancient splendour, pageantry and esoteric moments with a mixture of enjoyment and puzzlement. What on earth is the "Cap of Maintenance" all about? Despite the efforts of Huw Edwards and the excellent though soon departing BBC Political Editor Andrew Marr, I am still none the wiser.

Nevertheless, for all that some of the trappings of monarchy and state in Britain seem to fulfil no useful purpose, isn't that part of the elusive quality of "Britishness"? Whatever it is, I am somehow proud of it, and felt especially so yesterday when visiting Frogmore, or when traipsing past good old Buck House while in London on Wednesday, or visiting our National Archive- the former Public Record Office- for the first time the same day. We've much to celebrate, much to respect, much to commend, much to conserve. So why can't we get it right, why can't our young people go out on the streets wearing hooded garments without somehow being seen as a threat, or our war heroes walk the streets at night safe from the threat of gun crime or knife attack?

As in all things, of course, the media probably paints things much blacker than they really are. Despite that, there has surely been a loss of those fundamental virtues so much associated with Britain by our neighbours and visitors, and of which really we should be justly proud. Ask any foreigner what they find most quaint about British life, and like it as not you will hear "Queuing, politeness, a nice cup of tea".
And yet, even those who lived through the war supposedly to defend our freedom to enjoy such things seem to have forgotten this at times. Never mind the young losing their respect, what have the older generation done to conserve it. Yes, my friend Dave and I had to queue patiently and politely to get into Frogmore grounds, to the museum and to get our nice cup of tea yesterday-but we did so without complaining. Why should we, we were waiting for something well worth seeing, and as it turned out we were helping those less fortunate than ourselves by doing so (proceeds from yesterday's opening, ironically, were going to the Chichester Diocesan Association and the Sussex Deaf Association). Yet all around us, all I could hear were elderly people complaining about poor organisation, not enough catering facilities and having to wait too long. I appreciate the infirmity of a few maybe, but where is the blitz spirit of the rest? It's sad to see the generation that saw their own sovereign's home bombed and their daughter join the war effort unable to wait just a few more moments for a cuppa while they seem to forget they waited six years for peace. Is it our young that need educating, or our old. Or is it all of us? "Forgive us our trespasses, as we forgive those that trespass against us". Maybe what we really need to do is to learn once again, whether under a beautiful display of "candles" on the humble horse chestnut, or under the candles of a mausoleum altar, to remember the Lord our God. Respect Him,every day, and the rest should follow suit.