Deacon Sarah 

There has never been a “crash, bang, wallop” kind of moment in my life where God has revealed something awe-inspiring or amazing, but there has been a quiet and growing sense of God being alongside me in my life for many years now. I want to encourage you, if that is also your experience, that our stories are just as worth sharing as those who have more dramatic conversion or encounter stories.

I grew up in the Church of England, although my mother came from a Baptist background and my father’s family were Methodists for many generations. The local church in the village was where we worshipped, and I remember Sunday school there, as well as being asked to read the lesson and being an altar server eventually.

My real personal commitment to God through Jesus didn’t become real until I was in my middle teens, when going to church and the words we spoke really began to mean some- thing. By the time I went to university, I was hungry to know more, to experience more and to be with people who knew Jesus more closely. Thank goodness for the little cell groups that met in my hall of residence, and for the Christian Union Friday nights, and for the new Christian friends that I met as I studied for a theology degree.

Unfortunately, by the time I finished that degree, in 1995, I had lost that sense of wonder and closeness with God, and I felt that I had spent so much time studying God and what people said, thought, understood etc about God, that I had lost sight of God. I spent a few years then away from the church, and probably away from God, until a good friend invited me to her church, and the whole family went along. It was a wonderful step back into my life of faith, and my relationship with God was rekindled. Of course, God had been there all along!

God surprises me often with what I call God-incidences and I am writing this today, having just this morning coming across the gratitude journal that I was keeping in 2010 when I cautiously sent an email to my Superintendent asking for a conversation about a Note to Preach. Instead of inviting me to chat, he sent the Note straight back by email and invited me to the next LP meeting! I only found out about my father’s Methodist roots when I told him what I had done. My route to ministry and ordination has been winding and somewhat slow, but I am content to say that God has been in every part of it, and that God has guided the path so that the experiences I have had along the way have been valuable teaching for me.

My “faith picture” is that of a rollercoaster, because whatever happens in this life, I am secure in the knowledge that I am strapped in safe and secure by Jesus, and that through all the twists and turns, the highs and the lows, God is there, and I am known and loved, just as you are.

January