St Peter's Friars pilgrimage along St Cuthbert's Way

As May was ending, St Peter's Friars took to an ancient path; exactly which roads and turns were once trodden by this Celtic Saint isn't clear some 1400 years later.
Our plan was to take 4.5 days to walk from Melrose to Lindisfarne. I took the train down to Tweedbank, meeting a French Canadian couple between Glasgow and Edinburgh, and walked the serene half hour distance to our meeting point. Glyn and Cerys poised with rucksacks, rollmats and camping kits that dwarfed my backpack. a quick catch up in a cafe, a cross dispensed and we were soon off up a steadily steep hill Eastward.
at the cleavage of our first significant hill I stopped a chap coming up the hill behind us. I presented a cross to him explaining that Jesus presented himself to people as a stranger and that as a stranger I wanted to offer him a cross. He indicated that he already knew Jesus, we spoke for about an hour and despite our doctrinal differences his gentleness overshadowed all frustration, before parting I had the honour of praying for him.

A mile or two through some wooded curves in the path, my boots plainly not so well worn in and already developing a blister, we came beside a river where Cerys boldly offered a lady a cross. Perplexed by the natural invitation to receive a gift or an unfamiliarity with the personal significance of a wooden cross she was nonetheless disarmed by our companion's kind offer.

The weather was persistently sunny and humid so as we continued along the river I was already sore and wayning so soon into our journey. It was an ambitious first day and unfortunately we had to rest some 6 or 7 miles into our first leg. A taxi took us to a place where we could continue our path; Glyn and Cerys particularly enjoyed the alliterations of 'Aye' from our driver. Already well versed in Scottish conversation I had not even noticed. Choruses of  'Aye' would become an anthem of trek. Needless to say, our driver too was given a cross.

Our last two miles gave us few aquaintances but as we entered Jedburgh my friends were to be freshly greeted with Scottish kindness as a local chap in a van pointed us to our campsite along a gorge. After distrupting our campsite owners from their sunday night in we began to pitch camp, our tents unravelling, I see our new neighbours getting twitchy in their campervan and I wonder if they are concerned we will distrupt their idyll. The lady, named Kathleen asks us if we would like a cup of tea. Such kindness. I begin to partake in what Glyn and Cerys have already reported- the welcome and hospitality they have received has been such a blessing. We are on this walk in the hope of meeting God in a new way in a new place and sharing the hope we have and so much of what we have experienced is the kindness of others.

G&C head off for the shops and hitch hike with a French Chap, the unusual becomes so naturally experienced on these sorts of excursions. We become completely available to interuptions; human and miraculous that fatigue of fresh blisters, sore shoulders and aching hips become souvenirs of a day well spent.

We slept well every night, night 1 was surprisingly comfortable for my first night. We returned Kathleen's mug with a cross in it. The chap who was walking Land's End- John'O'Groats had headed off up the road we had come down and we were soon packed up for the road to Kirk Yethom. The copses and fields of this leg were stunning; rustic woodlands and wild flowers reminding me of childhood. These small collectives of trees sheltered us from the intermittant rain and sun of the morning. It was quite late in the morning that we ran into a couple from Kings Lynn who asked us to pray for their friend Julie who recently lost her daughter of 33. They warmly received a cross each, we exchanged notes on our respective adventures and proceeded between more fields on hills. Well into day 2 and my feet are quite sore from the weight of my bag and the sorer blisters. Despite my concerns, I did not have to miss any further sections of our walk and the pain eased as we got more used to walking and the hills became less frequent.

Late afternoon we came to a village where a lady in her garden spoke of having lost her husband and that she regularly met people like us passing through. We came to the end of the village and I spotted a Church building that looked a bit different 'Ohhuh' I exclaimed, they also had a cafe and it began to rain so we made the decision to pop in for a drink. other customes shuffled about to make room.

As the cafe emptied we spoke to the proprietors, of their vision to renovate and make this special building into a place of worship along this historic way. Margaret prayed for our various ails and I told her how special I felt this building was- old and new. A welcome break and time of fellowship.

This is their website and page if you wish to visit:

https://www.facebook.com/coffeeshopmorebattle/

https://www.gofundme.com/improve-coffee-stop

By the end of this second day we were very tired and it was a struggle to go the last few miles into Yetham and out the other side. The village reminded me of a village in North Norfolk or perhaps it was more to do with the exhaustion of a similar walk in my teens. I became short tempered as my digestion protested alongside my feet and hips. We finally arrived at the Youth hostel in Kirk Yethom and my patience has long since subsided. The full depth of my character has drained out of me and all I can offer the dutch women relaxing in the kitchen is 'Sorry, but I cannot stand here any longer' I would shortly return, boots off with 2 crosses and an apology. These ladies were no offended and apparently were far more acquainted with long distance walks than I was (One reported that she annually partakes in a 4 x 50 mile a day march in Amsterdam- I was was undone).

The Chap who signed us in was enthusiastically offered a cross too to which he replied 'No thank you very much, I will save my own soul', startled I replied 'OK!' and wondering whether I or he was supposed to be embarrassed. I am still unsure as to whether he had understood that his soul was on my proverbial checklist. If so I am still the worst kind of evangelist who has failed to secure any souls for Jesus. I cannot save his soul nor did I intend to.

I also offered a younger chap a cross. He had a sharp mind for the local geography and had recently experienced too much rain attempting the St Cuthbert's way as a camper. He explained in one conversation that his communication skills were a problem so as I offered him a cross and he didn't immediately take it I put it on the side for him to decide if he wanted it. I could have easily felt insecure after my recent awkwardness with the other guy but I knew this was a whole other apprehension.

The next day, yet more beauty in varied forms met our gaze. Glyn lays a cross on the path which we later learn was collected by a guy who caught us up on day 4.

Late morning we're gaining on an American couple who have just entered a woods in front of us, as we cross the stile they reemerge in the opposite direction and ask us 'do you know the way?' I gesture to the flourescent arrrows and lead them on. as we come the end of these woods, I realise that I have something else to tell them. 'We're on a pilgrimage and we're giving out crosses along the way, I just want you to know because you just asked us the way and we believe that Jesus is the way.' stunned the pair accept the cross but decline the offer of prayer. I perhaps was more brazen because they were American and walking an ancient pilgrimage, to me the truth seemed so simple and obvious to share with them, so I did.

We decide to take an early lunch break and then meet a couple from Chester, it turns out he is minister of church which used to host a project I once ran and that we had met several years earlier though I had not recognised him with his shades on.

Glyn gave a cross to a farmer who crossed the fields on his quadbike, he responded very positively to our message, we then crossed a wet and wearying moor in drizzly windy conditions. we had now been walking a long while after our lunch and still had no concrete plans for the night. Nearing our last mile before Wooler we met a former scoutleader who directed us to a youth hostel, we gave him a cross and offered prayer.

We managed to secure beds at the second youth hostel and enjoyed fish and chips before returning to the common room for a bit of route planning. Our company was in a duo of cyclists from Bradford and a mother and daughter enjoying a break from the daughter's job in the forces, all warmly accepted a cross each before we left the following morning.

As we passed through the main throng of the village I spoke to the local vicar, offered her prayer as I commended her for wearing her collar for everyday errands like food shopping. Glyn spoke to a blind man who knew exactly the wood of the cross and spoke to various others before we were in frieds and moors again.
We climbed one of the last hills before the cave of St Cuthbert and found an injured sheep which for lack of signal and data meant I had to trot to the nearest house and request the visit of the appropriate farmer. It seemed that there was so little to be done for this sheep as we feared it would not make it.

At the cave it was clear that quite a thing had been made of the site and that it was an attraction to many pilgrims, we took time to have lunch before Glyn led us in a reflection beneath the trees, finally depositing some crosses for passers-by.

Over the very next hill we caught sight of the sea some 4 miles and one last exchange before we crossed the A1 and East coast rail line. A guy was taking a break outside a house he had been renovating for the last 4 months. I gave him a cross and he accepted prayer as he and his girlfriend had recently broken up, he asked me if the cross would bring him luck. Keen to catch Cerys and Glyn up, who were now out of sight, I responded that I would pray it will.

My penultimate give-away was a 'you matter' card given to me by a friend from Whiteinch church, a chalk drawing with the word 'Justice' written and a wooden cross. I prayed for redemption in the life of a man who confided in me that his holiday was really a get away as he and his wife considered the future of their marriage. Of all the people I met this was the most moving and timely exchange as there was a true sense that God wanted to interupt his situation with hope and encouragement.



We were met with Helen and Denise the night before, enjoyed yet more fish and chips and good fellowship, so close to our journey's end and yet had to wait for midday to cross the sands from Beal to Lindisfarne. My boots got wet so we paddled and let the first of the walkers across the causeway that day.

A few hours spent on the Holy Isle were greatly enjoyed, still with a sense of returning to an England of my childhood; phoneboxes and nearly pedestrianised lanes. I noticed a girl with bright clothes and decided she should receive my vinyl heart decoration, the final item to offer and just moments before I would begin a journey with Helen to Tweedbank station.

Well I never...

Tonight I witnessed something I cannot remember experiencing before and I was so awed to be part of it.

I have a few friends who sometimes pray 'Lord, if I never receive anything or hear from you again I will still be content'. I don't personally feel willing or able to pray this, but in the realm of tonight's events I gladly say that to have experienced this sign of God just once is enough for a lifetime.

I was at a collective meeting for a creative group within my Church here in Whiteinch. We listened to two songs and part way into the first, a fast moving song, I began to see a vision of a sketchpad with its leaves breaking away like sheaves of a book blowing in the wind each flowing out and screwing up into shapes like birds that took form and flew away from the book and as they became birds they rose vertically. I could not keep up with their number. The picture swirled into other shapes and pictures. I attempted to record the first I have described above, turning the leaf, I then moved onto a new sheet of paper to attempt to get down another picture that stayed in my mind.

The second song came to an end and I finalised my final touches to the second sketch. We begun to reenter the room.

I glanced to my right and Jinty appeared to have a very similar formation of three birds in coming off the page in the same direction and lifting upward in movement. I couldn't believe it, she had the same image and various themes of the vision I had had too. Hers differed in that the birds were made of paper and each bird had gradually more of its body coming off the page but her birds too were headed in an upward direction, also adding a multi- dimensional dynamic to it. I turned my sketch over to show the whole group that I had the same vision.

My own sketch wasn't immediately obvious but as we discussed our two pictures it became more and more clear that the Lord had spoken the same message to us both.

It was an en-awed moment and unlike hearing stories of a move of God or what God has done or shown for another person or stranger this was new territory, certainly for me. I am awed.

I continue to audaciously pray that God combines the creative and the prophetic in me, that an item I offer someone would be as though God had designed it for that person, because our God loves to give good gifts to His children, so why wouldn't he use me to be His hands; to incarnate His design.

I must add that although I have been sharing pictures and doing give-aways for years the use of my artistic skills has been all but sporadically utilised, it is unearthing a whole new way of relating to the Lord and redeems to years developing skills in art that long seemed irrelevant to my 'career' in community evangelism.

  

Barbarous Wilderness

In the recent past I found God was bringing me through a long season of brokenness into being an adult I had never known. It was wonderful and very exhilarating. I discovered new levels of boldness and courage; even optimism.
Certain events following my move to Glasgow have provoked the cynic in me. There are many uncomfortable truths that have been exposed and in an entirely new community I have seen new depths of human error in myself.
I want to explain one- criticising the church.
This was always a default for me since before I came to faith; Christians can and have always disappointed me. I now disappoint myself so I can only conclude that my expectations are too high and do not honour Jesus's 'come as you are' message.
I am aware that I am all too critical of myself: in a very raw and vulnerable stage of life. But criticising the church, the body, a person of faith or in my community or circle has been a problem for me for a long time.
I sensed it is time to stop and turn from this.


Another dilemma has been my for show Christianity which is anything but the internal 'i can live without Him' reality I have put on this winter. So much of my intimacy with God has been so dependent on my knotted and entwined connection to him through a ten year established community. In starting afresh and probably being emotionally floored by the past 6-9 months, December has been a month of saying and doing the least possible in order to keep on. The ways that I have felt most closely connected to God were either not yet established or too raw to revisit. I reached a point that I was walking a wilderness of my life without 'eating' and the doctor's staple, (the word) was my least desired snack or meal.
I needed to get some rest for my soul and some quality time with my God.
Patiently he has waited for me to come. Previous short-cuts are no longer an option, routines need to be written, certain givens have been re-evaluated and are pending. 5 months after moving I am still very much at the drawing board. Whilst I know my heart for God and his call for my life, I am still adjusting to an entirely new culture with new levels of unforeseen needs and I am all the less interested in putting a good face on it.
I see that God is faithful, I see that Jesus is the hope of this nation and I see that i still have little idea what part I can play in relating this hope to the wonderful people in this city and in Scotland.
At various stages in my life I have repeatedly had to learn that I am not responsible for resolving the aches and groans of our world. Yet with all this silence and feeling distant from God, I am convinced that I know him well and I may never have realised had I not found myself here in this quiet valley.