Some musings

CIGARETTES, SINGLES AND SIPPING TEA WITH IAN BOTHAM – SIGNS OF A WELL SPENT YOUTH!

The County Ground at Taunton – before the ground’s redevelopment

Yesterday, after a frenetic eighteen days of T20, the domestic cricket season returned, albeit briefly, to the calmer confines of the four day county championship. As I watched the livestream of the afternoon session between Essex and Somerset I was taken back to childhood summers in the late 1970s when I would watch the match shown live on Sunday afternoons throughout the months on BBC2. Each week as 2pm approached I would position myself in front of our black and white television hoping as the familiar title music began that there would be a shot of the three church towers that, being in close proximity to the ground, were always shown when the game being televised was from Taunton.

The matches shown were part of the John Player League, which itself seems odd in this day and age when tobacco companies are no longer allowed to sponsor the sport. But things were different in the 1970s. Back then as well as Benson and Hedges also giving their name to the 55 over knockout completion that took place in the early part of each season. cricketers were more likely to be photographed smoking a cigarette than agonising over the details of the diet they were following to maximise their fitness!

A photograph of Ian Botham smoking – famously taken after his heroic innings against Australia in the Ashes Test at Headingly in 1981

As I watched Sir Alistair Cook move steadily towards yet another hundred, I noticed that Essex were scoring at a rate of 3.68 runs per over and I mused to myself how that probably wasn’t all that different to the run rate in those limited over games I watched as a boy. The John Player League was made up of 40 overs a side and I remember how a total of 160 was considered a decent score and if teams were to reach the giddy heights of 200 they were deemed to have performed exceptionally well. And so, like the scores of 250 plus and the attendant run rates of more than 12 an over that are sometimes seen in todays twenty over games, I did something else that couldn’t have been dreamt of in my youth – I ‘googled’ Somerset’s run rate for the John Player League in 1979. That they won the competition that year by scoring an average of just 4.25 runs an over is remarkable enough itself, but what makes it more astonishing still is the fact that Somerset’s victorious double winning side included the likes of both Viv Richards and Ian Botham both of whom are remembered for their prolific scoring.

Clip of a John Player League game from 1983. Somerset needing just over 4 an over to beat Warwickshire with a seemingly world weary Vic Marks at the crease.

Dull though this statistic might seem to some, I shared it on a couple of cricket related Facebook groups and received numerous comments which suggested that that I am not alone in harbouring fond memories of watching the JPL on Sunday afternoons. And these recollections prompted more of my own. At the time my Dad was a curate and, as the games were scheduled to finish at around 6.40, he was never around to see the final overs of the game as he’d would have needed to leave home before 6pm in order to get to Evensong in good time. One of his parishioners though was a particularly keen follower of cricket and, arriving at church rather later than my father, would often be able to update him on the score.

The parishioner in question must have learnt of my interest in cricket as on a couple of occasions he was kind enough to take me to Taunton to watch Somerset play. He was a Vice President of the club, a class of membership that allowed him, and his guests, to sit in the elevated area of what then was simply the Pavilion. I remember feeling particularly honoured, and really rather important, to be afforded the opportunity to sit in the cinema style seats that allowed you to view the game from high up behind the bowlers arm. It was from there that I once saw the South African all rounder Mike Procter hit the Somerset slow left armer, Dennis Breakwell, for six successive sixes across two overs for Gloucestershire. That whoever was captaining Somerset that afternoon gave the elf like Breakwell that second over seems somewhat brave to me now but at the time I was simply thrilled to be watching one of the great allrounders of the day in action.

And it was over the top of that same Pavilion that I remember the aforementioned Viv Richards hit a massive six in what was one of the first John Player League game I actually attended at Taunton. I forget now who it was against but I remember sitting on the grass where the Somerset stand is now located and seeing, if memory serves me right, the great man take 34 off a single over, a feat that I seem to recall was achieved by another player that same day at another ground! Over the years the county ground at Taunton has, of course, been developed, and so over time the Pavilion became the Old Pavilion and more recently it was knocked down and replaced by the new stand that now bears the name of Marcus Trescothick, a Somerset legend who was possibly still in nappies the first time I ever saw Somerset play live in 1977. That was a game at Clarence Park in Weston-super- Mare played against Northamptonshire and I remember David Steele, England’s hero of the previous years Test series against the West Indies, fielding just in front of me as Brian Rose began the innings which would end with him scoring 205, his highest score in first class cricket.

Another childhood memory was autograph hunting. As a boy I used to pore over the sports pages of newspapers that in those days had full reports of every county cricket match. And there were pictures too, pictures I used to cut out and glue onto sheets of paper that I kept in ring folders, and organised into sections, one for each of the 17 first class counties that existed at the time. This treasured possession would then accompany me to games and, loitering close to the pavilion, I would hold it open in front of passing players in the hope that they’d sign the photographs of themselves in action.

As all self respecting schoolboy should, I also had an autograph book too, reserving several of its pages for England players who, in the days before central contracts, would regularly turn out for their counties in between Test matches. I remember asking John Emburey to sign when Middlesex visited Taunton. Noticing the heading I’d given the page in which I’d asked him to sign, the right arm spinner was initially hesitant to put pen to paper as he’d yet to be selected for national team. I assured him though that he soon would be and he must have believed me because he duly added his autograph to that of David Gower and others of his ilk. Within a week he was playing Test cricket!

Another favourite of mine to have players sign was a book I had been given as a Christmas present. Together with sports journalist Dudley Doust, ‘The Ashes Retained’ was written by Mike Brearley the former England captain. It was a memoir of the Ashes series played in Australia during the winter of 1978-79. Having joined the long line of adults and youngsters who wished to acquire the autograph of arguably the greatest captain England has ever had, I eventually made my way to the front of the queue and proffered Mr Brearley my copy of his book. Interested in what I thought of it, he asked me which chapter I had enjoyed the most. ‘Rags to Riches’ I answered without hesitating, referring to the chapter detailing Derek Randall’s 150 in the second innings of the the fourth test played at Sidney. To which I was somewhat embarrassed to hear one of my then heroes inform me that that was the only chapter in the book he had had no part in writing himself! Despite my faux pas, however, that giant of the summer game was still gracious enough to sign the title page.

‘The Ashes Retained’ was also the focus of a contact I had with another icon of English cricket – the late, great Bob Willis. Warwickshire were playing Somerset but Willis wasn’t playing. This wasn’t because his run up was longer than there was room for on what was then and still remains a relatively small ground but rather because he’d apparently not made it to the ground in time for the start of play. As a result he was sat with spectators in the stand and seemingly had been enjoying a glass or two of the locally produced liquid refreshment. He was in the mood to chat and as I showed him the book he delighted to inform those around him of how it held within its pages a picture of him batting, something which, having taken the book from me, he turned to and proceeded to proudly display to anyone and everyone who was in his vicinity.

Those were formative days for me, days that instilled in me a love for the game that has stayed with me until now. Interestingly to me, despite the slower run rates that were the norm in those days, I nonetheless remember the games being just as exciting as those played today. How I used to love watching the likes of Vic Marks and Phil Slocombe scampering between the wickets to take a quick single as they inched Somerset towards what today would be considered a modest total to secure a win for the home side. And though I have thoroughly enjoyed being at Taunton this year to watch the likes of Banton, Smeed, and Kohler-Cadmore belting the ball to all corners of the ground, I sometimes wonder if the matches that took place all those years ago were more more enjoyable than those today. If so, perhaps it’s because the scoring of runs was more difficult back then that the games thus seemed more compelling.

That the playing field on which the battle between bat and ball took place was more even is without doubt, for how else could the same format have produced both Viv Richards 34 from a single over and the astonishing bowling figures of Brian Langford, another Somerset player who, in a match against Essex in 1969 ended with the incomparable figures of eight overs, eight maidens, no wickets for no runs! Or maybe it was because each of those one day games in the 70s and 80s was an occasion, one that, rather than being concentrated into an amorphous few weeks, came along at intervals throughout the season, offering contrast to the longer championship games.

Furthermore, though still limited in overs, those Sunday afternoon games were long enough to require those watching to set aside a day, or at least a half day, if they wanted to enjoy them properly. They offered a genuine break from the everyday unlike todays T20 games which are frequently squeezed onto the end of an already busy day and not infrequently necessitate a rush from work if one is to make it in time to see the opening over. Irrespective of whether one watches the games at the ground or online, the ubiquitous coverage of every game, though wonderful, can at the same time be a little exhausting.

Now that their is a dearth of meaningful cricket in August, I consider myself fortunate to have grown up when I did, able as I was to spend my summers watching the game I have grown to love. During my early teens my Dad was ordained and we moved to Taunton. Living now closer to the ground I was able to seemingly spend my whole summer at the county ground, cycling there early on match days complete with my packed lunch, the latest Playfair Cricket Annual and just enough money to treat myself to a Slush Puppy if the weather was hot and sunny – which in those days, of course, it always was.

For one glorious week though things got even better when I was able to dispense with my cheese and pickle sandwiches having been asked by a friend if I’d like to help him operate the mobile scoreboard Somerset use to employ alongside it’s permanent static one. The normal operators were unavailable for some reason and my friend and I were given the temporary honour of pulling the levers that changed the numbers on the metal boxes that attached to the scoreboard’s frame. While today’s modern electronic scoreboards may be less cumbersome than those used in the past I’m not sure they are any more efficient at conveying the actual score – and what is absolutely certain is that the way they do so in far less romantic than their mechanical predecessors.

But it wasn’t just being able to stand on the roof of the scoreboard and watch the game by gazing over the top of that part of it that use to fold up that made the job so thrilling. More than that we were allowed to go to the pavilion during the lunch and tea intervals and sit in the same room as the players were eating their cucumber sandwiches!

I hope such opportunities remain for youngsters today because, though we may not have been on the same table as he was, I can’t help thinking that life doesn’t get very much better than when you get to take tea with Lord Ian Botham!

That close encounter with ‘Hero of Headingly’ is something that I will never forget. I wonder if he remembers it too!

Other cricket blogs:

To read ‘Bazball, Bazchess, Bazlife’, click here

To read ‘Online criticism: it’s just not cricket’, click here

To read ‘Cricket: It’s All About Good Timing’, click here

To read ‘A Tale of Two Tons’, click here

To read ‘A Somerset Cricket Players Emporium’, click here

To read ‘A Cricket Taunt’, click here

To read ‘Scooby Doo and the Mystery of the Deseted Cricket Ground’, click here

To read ‘Brian and Stumpy visit The Repair Shop’, click here

To read ‘A Cricketing Christmas Carol’, click here

To read ‘At Season’s End’, click here

To read ‘A Historic Day’, click here

To read ‘On passing a village cricket club at dusk one late November afternoon’ click here

To read ‘Cricket – through thick and thin’, click here

To read ‘A Song for Brian’, click here

To read ‘I’ve got a little CRICKET list’, click here

To read ‘My love is not a red, red rose , click here

To read ‘Stumpy – a legend reborn’, click here

To read ‘A Cricket Tea Kind of a Day’, click here

To read ‘A Day at the Cricket’, click here

To read ‘The Great Cricket Sell Off’, click here

To read ‘How the Grinch stole from county cricket…or at least tried to’. click here

To read ‘How Covid-19 stole the the cricket season’, click here

To read ‘Life in the slow lane’, click here

To read ‘Frodo and the Format of Power’, click here

To read ‘If Only’, click here

To read ‘Eve of the RLODC limericks’ click here

To read ‘It’s coming home…’, click here

To read ‘A Song for Ben Green’, click here

To read ‘Enough Said…’, the last section of which is cricket related, click here

A Jack Leach Trilogy:

To read ‘For when we can’t see why’, click here

To read ‘WWJD – What would Jack Do?’, click here

To read ‘On Playing a Blinder’, click here

To read ‘Coping with Disappointment’, click here

And now a couple of cricket blogs with a theological flavour

To read ‘Somerset CCC – Good for the soul’, click here

To read ‘Longing for the pavilion whilst enjoying a good innings’, click here

TRUE TO WHO?

‘This above all: to thine own self be true,
And it must follow, as the night the day,
Thou canst not then be false to any man’

Polonius to his son Laertes: Hamlet, Act 3, Scene 1

Though it is now over 400 years since Shakespeare said it first, it’s still being said today. I heard it again this week, perhaps you did too – that ubiquitous call to be true to oneself.

Of course those who urge such a way of life cannot really mean it since to do so would be to ignore the internal contradiction of their own advice since any protestation by another that I should act in such a way is itself a call for me to act in accordance with their will and not my own. Furthermore, if they are honest, those who advocate such a philosophy would surely limit the extent to which they would wish me to follow their advice for surely they’d have a different view if my being true to myself meant I acted in ways that were contrary to what they deemed acceptable. That, I guess, is why one who was first heralded as brave and courageous for being true to himself could subsequently be forced to resign his job when that same motivation caused him to act in a way that was considered ‘unwise but not illegal’.

The thing is that to follow one’s heart is, for me at least, a bad idea because all too often my heart is not how it should be. Just as my thinking something doesn’t necessarily make it true, so my feeling something doesn’t necessarily make it right. To believe otherwise would surely be the height of arrogance. The reality is that being true to myself will frequently mean my acting falsely towards others, and my being kind to myself will result in my being mean to those around me. And so that other modern adage that asserts that we should first look after ourselves is revealed to be nothing other than a veil to conceal our true desire to put others second.

That’s why, rather than looking inside of ourselves to determine what is true and then imposing that on those around us, we need to look for truth outside of us and then seek to conform to that objective measure of what is right and wrong. Only then will we not fall foul of our ‘deceitful and desperately sick’ hearts.

And as we seek to do that, we may just find ourselves being found by the only one who, ‘though being in very nature God, did not consider equality with God something to be used to his own advantage’ but instead ‘made himself nothing by taking the very nature of a servant’.

And then, as we discover the one who was the truth, the one who, unlike any other, could justifiably follow his heart, we will see how he did just that by being kind, not to himself but to us as ‘being found in human form he humbled himself by becoming obedient to death – even death on a cross!’ [Philippians 2:6-8].

Rather, then, than following our own hearts, we would do well to follow the only one whose heart is as it should be.

For as surely as night follows day, as Jesus Christ is true to himself, he cannot be false to any man.

To read ‘In Loving Memory of Truth’, click here

To read ‘The Sacrifice of Isaac – Law or Gospel?’, click here

To read ‘Water from a Rock’, click here

To read ‘The Resurrection – is it just rhubarb?’, click here

To read “Suffering- A Personal View”, click here.

To read “Why do bad things happen to good people – a tentative suggestion”, click here

To read “Luther and the global pandemic – on becoming a theologian of the cross”, click here

To read ‘T.S. Eliot, Jesus and the Paradox of the Christian Life’, click here

To read ‘Real Power’, click here

To read ‘Foolishness – Law and Gospel’, click here

To read ‘The Promise Keeper’, click here

To read ‘The Rainbow’s End’, click here

To read ‘True Love?’, click here

To read “Hope comes from believing the promises of God”, click here

To read, ‘But this I know’, click here

To read ‘I’ll miss this when I’m gone – extended theological version’, click here

To read ‘On being confronted by the law’, click here

To read ‘The “Already” and the “Not Yet”’, click here

To read ‘Rest Assured’, click here

A HISTORIC DAY

SATURDAY 6th MAY – 7.30 AM

Things that will surely happen today. Not necessarily in order of importance:

The coronation of King Charles III
The completion of Tom Kohler-Cadmore’s maiden century for Somerset.

Huge crowds have been gathering over night with thousands of people now lining the streets of Taunton all hoping for a glimpse of TKC as he arrives at the CACG this morning. The 28 year old who has spent the last decade waiting to begin the job for which he was born is expected at the ground sometime before 10am and will later don the ‘Pads of Tibial Protection’ and take up the ‘Bat of Abundant Power’ before being crowned with the ‘Helmet of the Glorious County of Somerset’

The inclement weather has not dampened the spirits of those eager to be a part of what will be a truly historic day. One ardent Somerset supporter who had driven his tractor all the way from Nempnett Thrubwell spoke of the relaxed atmosphere amongst those who had spent the night together on Priory Bridge Road. ‘Today is a day to put our differences aside’, he said clutching a pint of Thatchers Haze. ‘We’ve seen Wyvernists and Dragonists laughing together – no longer arguing over the correct nomenclature of Somerset’s world famous and much loved mascot Stumpy. Today’, he concluded, ‘is all about the cricket’.

Of course there have been some who have expressed concern over the ‘Pledge of Allegiance’ that is set to be a part of todays proceedings. A small minority of those who watch Somerset seem reluctant to commit to the team when results don’t go as intended but it is expected that the vast majority of fans will willingly affirm their undying loyalty, not just to Kohler-Canmore, but to any who have the honour of wearing the shirt emblazoned with that four-legged and two-winged maroon coloured mythical beast.

It’s sure to be a memorable day.

SATURDAY 6TH MAY – 2.01 PM
one minute after a ‘reign’ delayed start of play.

TKC hits his first ball of the day for 6 and completes a brilliant first century for Somerset. No doubt the first of many!

SATURDAY 6TH MAY – 6.30 PM
at close of play

I first watched Somerset back in 1977, in a game against Northants played at Clarence Park in Weston-super-Mare. I remember David Steele fielding just in front of where I was sitting and Brian Rose making his way to 205, a score that turned out to be his highest in first class cricket.

Today I took my grandson to his first cricket game, also against Northants. At 18 months old he is somewhat younger than I was and it’s possible that he was more interested in where Brian the club cat lives than watching England stars of the calibre of Jack Leach and Craig Overton. Furthermore, despite my going to some trouble to explain to him the details of how you can be given out LBW, his favourite bit of the evening session that we attended may have been the opportunity he was afforded to splash in the puddles he found in the family stand.

Even so, if he is asked in years to come whether he remembers Coronation Day, I hope he’ll reply ‘Ah yes, that was the day I first watched Somerset’

Other cricket blogs:

To read ‘A Tale of Two Tons’, click here

To read ‘A Somerset Cricket Players Emporium’, click here

To read ‘A Cricket Taunt’, click here

To read ‘Scooby Doo and the Mystery of the Deseted Cricket Ground’, click here

To read ‘Brian and Stumpy visit The Repair Shop’, click here

To read ‘A Cricketing Christmas Carol’, click here

To read ‘At Season’s End’, click here

To read ‘On passing a village cricket club at dusk one late November afternoon’ click here

To read ‘Cricket – through thick and thin’, click here

To read ‘A Song for Brian’, click here

To read ‘I’ve got a little CRICKET list’, click here

To read ‘My love is not a red, red rose , click here

To read ‘Stumpy – a legend reborn’, click here

To read ‘A Cricket Tea Kind of a Day’, click here

To read ‘A Day at the Cricket’, click here

To read ‘The Great Cricket Sell Off’, click here

To read ‘How the Grinch stole from county cricket…or at least tried to’. click here

To read ‘How Covid-19 stole the the cricket season’, click here

To read ‘Life in the slow lane’, click here

To read ‘Frodo and the Format of Power’, click here

To read ‘If Only’, click here

To read ‘Eve of the RLODC limericks’ click here

To read ‘It’s coming home…’, click here

To read ‘A Song for Ben Green’, click here

To read ‘Enough Said…’, the last section of which is cricket related, click here

A Jack Leach Trilogy:

To read ‘For when we can’t see why’, click here

To read ‘WWJD – What would Jack Do?’, click here

To read ‘On Playing a Blinder’, click here

To read ‘Coping with Disappointment’, click here

And now a couple of cricket blogs with a theological flavour

To read ‘Somerset CCC – Good for the soul’, click here

To read ‘Longing for the pavilion whilst enjoying a good innings’, click here

And finally some related posts that are not to do with cricket:

To read ‘General Practice – still a sweet sorrow’, click here

To read ‘Professor Ian Aird’ – A Time to Die?’, click here

To read ‘I’ll miss this when we’re gone’, click here

DEATH – MY FIRST AND LAST

‘Mortui vivos docent’
(The dead teach the living)

You never forget your first.

His was the last bed on the left, at the very end of the ward. As a medical student, he had been allocated to me at the start of my first clinical attachment and it was up to me to get to know him and familiarise myself with his treatment. He didn’t say much. Maybe that was because of the no doubt awkward way I spoke to him as I dutifully asked him how he was each day and tried to prepare myself for the questions that would later be asked of me on the weekly teaching ward round.

Or maybe it was because he recognised what I hadn’t, that he was becoming increasing frail and was no longer able to do what once he could. Maybe it was because he was aware of what I was not. Maybe it was because he knew he was dying.

And so it was that when I arrived one morning at his bedside with all the paraphernalia necessary to take his blood, I was surprised to find his bed empty. After waiting the few minutes it took to establish that he wasn’t visiting the bathroom, I asked one of the nursing staff where my patient was and was rather taken aback to be told that he had died in the night.

Thinking back it seems foolish now but I don’t think I’d appreciated then that medicine couldn’t always make people better and that even those in hospital sometimes died. Over the ensuing 35 years I have of course realised the truth, the lesson of that autumn morning in 1987 being repeated with disturbing regularity. Perhaps it needs to be because, though I hope I’m not as naive as I once was, I sometimes wonder if medicine and the world in which I practice it, is. Perhaps more so than it was back then.

Now don’t get me wrong medicine should indeed make every effort to alleviate suffering and prevent untimely death, but to imagine that it will be wholly successful in such endeavours is simply unrealistic. Furthermore, busying themselves in trying to do the impossible, those charged with delivering healthcare won’t have time to do what medicine actually can.

But even though I played no useful part in his final days, at least my patient died in a bed on a ward where those looking after him weren’t too busy to notice. In that respect he was fortunate, receiving what some are now in danger of missing out on.

Writing in the BMJ this week, one time GP, John Launer, reflects on the decline of the NHS that has taken place over the last decade. As one who is getting older he says ‘I’m frightened that I’ll end my days on a ward where the staff, however hard they try, won’t have the time or resources to give me the care I need, either to cure me or to relieve my passing.’ [John Launer’s full article can be read here]

These are sobering words – words which, as well as his own fears describe the real death experiences of far too many others. And something needs to change if it’s not to become the experience of far too many more. We need to recognise that the NHS is becoming increasingly frail and is unable to do what once it could. We need to be aware that the NHS is dying. And rather than allowing those in power to complete a DNAR form without consulting with those who love it most, we need to start caring for it better.

What then must be done. First, and perhaps foremost, investment in the NHS is undoubtedly required if it is become once more what it was before, somewhere where one could have confidence that you’d be treated well, not only as a patient, but as an employee too. Only then will there be the workforce necessary to deliver the care that is required.

But equally important will be to recognise that death is not avoidable and that irrespective of how many pills it encourages us to pop, medicine will never be able to give us the eternal life it persists in trying to deliver. Furthermore, we need to stop compounding the suffering that some people experience by slavishly trying to prevent what has, for them, already become both inevitable and imminent. Manage this and not only will many be spared an undignified end but those we need to be there to tend the sick will find they have time to do what really needs to be done and, what’s more, be able to do it well.

Best of all, when our time comes we too may be afforded the very great privilege of being allowed to die, not on a trolley in the corridor of an A&E department, nor indeed in a bed on a hospital ward, but in our own homes surrounded by those who we love, and are loved by, most.

Because for my last death, such would be the one I’d choose.

John Launer’s BMJ article can be read here

To read a review of Dr Lucy Pollocks excellent book entitled ‘The Book About Getting Older – for those who don’t want to talk about it’, click here

CRICKET – THROUGH THICK AND THIN

This week a really good thing happened to me and, as with most really good things in life, it had something to do with cricket. It came at me out of the blue and, though it will have gone unnoticed by most and been considered of little significance by the few who were aware of it’s occurrence, it was still enough to put a spring in my step and a smile on my face. It wasn’t able to take away the unhappiness that has, for far too long, been a part of my life but, and here’s the thing, even that circumstance’s pervasive sadness did not lessen the pleasure of the good thing that took place.

And so I was reminded once again of what I have been taught many times before – that happiness and sadness coexist in our lives. We must not wait for every sadness to end before we allow ourselves to be happy nor imagine that we won’t be unhappy simply because there are things that make us smile. Paradoxically, we can be happy and sad at the same time. Life isn’t merely about being happy. We can smile – even as we cry.

Last weekend as Somerset performed disappointingly against Nottinghamshire I was reminded of something else. As wickets at Trent Bridge fell, for me at least, with alarming regularity, I was out walking. As I strolled the countryside surrounding the small Devonian town of Silverton, my route took me through a country churchyard where it was brought home to me that not everyone is fortunate enough to still be able to enjoy the game I have loved watching since I first saw Somerset play in 1977. Furthermore, inside the church itself, as I saw the list of men who had given their lives in two world wars and read of the former vicar who, along with his wife, lost all five of his children before they reached the age of 22, it was all too obvious that many people have far bigger things to worry about than the batting technique of Somerset’s top order.

Cricket then is just a game. A wonderfully enjoyable and thoroughly satisfying game, but a game it none the less remains. And it is meant to be enjoyed as such. Paradoxically, though it matters hugely to me, in many ways cricket doesn’t matter at all. The result at least surely doesn’t. And for this reason it can, and should, be enjoyed even when the outcome is not the one that we would wish for.

For me watching county cricket has long been more enjoyable than watching Test Matches and international games. This is because of the greater connection I have with those players who, without central contracts, turn out regularly for their local team. Though life has a habit of sometimes getting in the way and prevents me from attending as often as I would like, I am fortunate to live within ten miles of Somerset’s home ground and have, therefore, been able to spend many happy days over the years enjoying the view from the boundary at Taunton. I watch wanting, not just the team to do well, but individual players to do well because, as part of Somerset CCC they are people I care about, irrespective of whether they’ve grown up in the club or been adopted by the county from elsewhere. In a way they are like family to me. What they most certainly are not, are employees, contracted merely to make me happy and worthy, therefore, of being discarded the moment they don’t deliver.

Which is why when players underperform I won’t disparage them but rather continue to hope that they will one day come good. As one who wouldn’t make it to the middle without tripping over my batting pads, I’ll leave criticism to those who can offer it both constructively and with compassion. I’ll enjoy celebrating an individual’s success and, when they fail, share a little of the disappointment that they also will undoubtedly be feeling. Too many seem to think that it’s OK to publicly rubbish those who are endeavouring to do their best, forgetting that these are people who, like everyone else, have feelings too. And, what’s more, they are somebody’s child and neither do their parents benefit from having their offspring publicly vilified.

As one who daily experiences the sadness of loving somebody for whom every day is difficult, I know the importance of sticking by those who find themselves struggling. I know how those for whom life is hard need the support of those who are supposed to be on their side. And I know the difference it can make to people if they are ever to come out the other side. Because although cricket is just a game, life is not.

So as in life so too in cricket – happiness and sadness coexist. I will enjoy hundreds by Tom Abell and James Rew and smile as quick runs are scored by tail enders. And when the opposition end the day on 302-1, rather than pouring scorn on the bowlers, I’ll endeavour to enjoy that too.

Because though, perhaps, a little sad, I’m happy that I’m still alive to do so.

Other cricket blogs:

To read ‘A Tale of Two Tons’, click here

To read ‘A Somerset Cricket Players Emporium’, click here

To read ‘A Cricket Taunt’, click here

To read ‘Scooby Doo and the Mystery of the Deseted Cricket Ground’, click here

To read ‘Brian and Stumpy visit The Repair Shop’, click here

To read ‘A Cricketing Christmas Carol’, click here

To read ‘At Season’s End’, click here

To read ‘On passing a village cricket club at dusk one late November afternoon’ click here

To read ‘A Song for Brian’, click here

To read ‘I’ve got a little CRICKET list’, click here

To read ‘My love is not a red, red rose , click here

To read ‘Stumpy – a legend reborn’, click here

To read ‘A Cricket Tea Kind of a Day’, click here

To read ‘A Day at the Cricket’, click here

To read ‘The Great Cricket Sell Off’, click here

To read ‘How the Grinch stole from county cricket…or at least tried to’. click here

To read ‘How Covid-19 stole the the cricket season’, click here

To read ‘Life in the slow lane’, click here

To read ‘Frodo and the Format of Power’, click here

To read ‘If Only’, click here

To read ‘Eve of the RLODC limericks’ click here

To read ‘It’s coming home…’, click here

To read ‘A Song for Ben Green’, click here

To read ‘Enough Said…’, the last section of which is cricket related, click here

A Jack Leach Trilogy:

To read ‘For when we can’t see why’, click here

To read ‘WWJD – What would Jack Do?’, click here

To read ‘On Playing a Blinder’, click here

To read ‘Coping with Disappointment’, click here

And now a couple of cricket blogs with a theological flavour

To read ‘Somerset CCC – Good for the soul’, click here

To read ‘Longing for the pavilion whilst enjoying a good innings’, click here

And finally some related posts that are not to do with cricket:

To read ‘General Practice – still a sweet sorrow’, click here

To read ‘Professor Ian Aird’ – A Time to Die?’, click here

To read ‘I’ll miss this when we’re gone’, click here

STUMPY – A LEGEND REBORN

So with his transformation complete, Stumpy has this week exploded back onto the stage of world cricket having spent the winter months pumping iron and pounding the treadmill. The much loved, but oftentimes, bungling figure of fun has reinvented himself for the 2023 season and now manifests himself as a finely tuned athlete with a steely determination to win.

No wonder then that Ladbrokes have said today that they are no longer accepting bets on Stumpy winning the annual Mascot Race, held each year on T20 Finals Day. The announcement came after scurrilous claims made by his arch rivals, Lanky Giraffe and Caesar the Lion, were finally shown to have no basis in truth. The pair had suggested that Stumpy’s rippling physique may not have been solely down to his efforts in the gym but results,made public today, of the urine test taken by Stumpy, have have completely exonerated Somerset’s favourite mythical beast of disputed nomenclature*

The new Stumpy has also been credited for being the principle reason for the success of Somerset’s bid to secure the services of both Cameron Bancroft and Matt Henry for the upcoming season. The antipodean pair have both stated that it had been a long held dream of theirs to work with Stumpy and so, when they were offered the opportunity to partner alongside one who now is so clearly dedicated to total body fitness as well, they jumped at the chance to sign for the club.

But it’s not just a leaner Stumpy who has emerged this week. It’s seems he’s meaner too. Admitting that Stumpy has indeed taken on responsibility for first team fitness, Somerset’s chief executive said he was unable to confirm or deny claims that three of Somerset’s most senior squad members were seen quivering with fear outside Stumpy’s office having been summoned there for apparently showing less than 100% commitment in a recent training session.

Gordon Hollins also refused to be drawn on allegations that one player was reduced to tears after receiving a dressing down by Stumpy for buying a sausage roll from a local branch of Greggs. The player, who was on his way to the ground last week, has not been named but the individual in question, believed to have been a former teammate of Somerset legend Marcus Trescothick, is reported to have commented that ‘It was never like this when Banger played!’

Stumpy, who was unavailable for comment this afternoon, will continue to be highly visible on match days. As well as retaining his traditional role of posing for photographs with youngsters, he is also expected to support those providing security to the rowdier elements of the crowd who gather in the Somerset Stand.

It’s not only rival mascots, therefore, who had better watch out!

*Arguments rage over whether Stumpy is a dragon or a wyvern. My advice? Don’t get involved!

How the transformation took place!

Other blogs featuring Stumpy:

To read ‘Scooby Doo and the Mystery of the Deseted Cricket Ground’, click here

To read ‘Brian and Stumpy visit The Repair Shop’, click here

To read ‘A Cricket Taunt’, click here

To read ‘A Song for Brian’, click here

To read ‘My love is not a red, red rose , click here

EASTER DAY FOOLISHNESS?

In recent weeks I have, on more than one occasion, made something of a fool of myself. Perhaps you’ve noticed! I hope so, because that was at least partly my intention when I donned a pink wig and went public with my ludicrous attempt at singing. By that, and other nonsensical endeavours, I wanted to gain your attention so that I could make you aware that there is a GP post up for grabs at my place of work. It’s important for me that people know this because it’s important for the practice that the position is filled. As such I suppose you could say that, by acting in ways contrary to social norms for the greater good of the organisation in which I work, I have been a fool for East Quay Medical Centre.

But important though it is for any potential new doctor to be aware of our job vacancy, the truth is that there are other news stories that are far more important for people to be aware of. For these continue to be difficult days, not only at an international and national level, but at a personal level too. For some these days are particularly dark, and for some the future looks darker still.

And so, rather than being a fool for East Quay, I want, on Easter Day to follow in the footsteps of the apostle Paul who, on account of his willingness to suffer for the sake of the gospel, once described himself as a ‘fool for Christ’ [1 Corinthians 4:10]. Now don’t get me wrong, I don’t expect to be persecuted for writing this in the way that Paul was, but being open about my faith in God and my desire to follow Jesus is something that some consider inappropriate in the public square and may cause one or two others to roll their eyes and consider me something of an embarrassment. But like Paul, I am not ashamed of the gospel believing it to be the power of God for salvation for all who believe. [Romans 1:16]. Furthermore it is what gives me a degree of resilience in my every day struggles both at work and in my personal life. It gives me both some perspective on the here and now and some hope for what will one day be.

So what exactly is meant by the ‘gospel’, a word that simply means ‘good news’? This is an important question to ask because the gospel is something that is often misunderstood, even by those who regularly attend church. Too many confuse the law with the gospel and end up believing that, to be right with God, they need to keep all of his commandments and only by being sufficiently successful in that endeavour will they earn their way into heaven. Now don’t misunderstand what I am saying here – God’s law is good and we should indeed strive to keep it, but the gospel is the good news that God has done something to rectify the situation when we inevitably fail to do so.

Even so, many of us do seem intent on living a life of continuous struggle. GPs perhaps, particularly so. And so, not content with trying to satisfy the just requirements of God’s law, we burden ourselves further by attempting to present ourselves as better than we really are to our patients, our colleagues and those whose love we crave. We live in a world that constantly demands that we are awesome. And what a burden that is for those of us who know how far short we fall, who have given up pretending that we can cope and who recognise our weakness and our need for help.

With this in mind I have noticed lately a tendency for some to encourage friends who are facing great difficulties with the words ‘You’ve got this’. I don’t doubt that such expressions are well intentioned but I wonder how they are received by those who feel lost, confused and powerless, those who feel out of control and are all too well aware that they haven’t ‘got it’ at all. At such times, rather than being told that we can do what we know we can’t, how much better it would be to hear that what we need to do has already been done for us by somebody who really can?

And that, in short, is the gospel. The good news is that God has done what we can not.

But what exactly has God done? To some the answer may sound like more foolishness, at least it did to those who, back in the first century when Paul was writing, considered themselves wise. But as the apostle wrote back then, ‘the foolishness of God is wiser than men, and the weakness of God is stronger than men’ [1 Corinthians 1:25]. What Paul was referring to was the cross on which Jesus was crucified. For this was an act that, despite its apparent foolishness and weakness was the means by which God wisely chose to show his strength. For violent and bloody though it was, the crucifixion of Jesus Christ was the means by which the penalty that was rightly ours was paid. It was on the cross that a righteous God’s need for justice was satisfied, and our peace with God was secured.

On Easter morning though we remember that, having died on Good Friday, Jesus rose from the dead thereby proving that his death was sufficient to fully pay the debt we owed. It proves that there really is no condemnation for those who trust in Jesus.

The law then reveals to us what God demands – demands that we cannot keep however hard we try. In contrast, the gospel tells us that despite our sinfulness, God loves us, and sent his son into the world to save us. The gospel is the news that by living a perfect life, Jesus kept the law that we could not, it is the news that a great exchange has taken place such that we are robed in Christ’s righteousness even as our sinfulness is laid on Jesus, it is the news that, as Jesus allows himself to be crucified in our place, bearing there the punishment we deserve, we are counted right with God.

Some will indeed say this is foolishness, but it is through such apparent foolishness that I believe we have been redeemed and a great salvation has been secured, one that, as well as guaranteeing the forgiveness of our sins, promises a future devoid of sickness, sadness and death. [Revelation 21:4]. And won’t that make our on call days more manageable!

How then should we respond to this good news. A story Jesus once told might help. This is what he said in Luke 18:10-14.

“Two men went up into the temple to pray, one a Pharisee and the other a tax collector. The Pharisee, standing by himself, prayed thus: ‘God, I thank you that I am not like other men, extortioners, unjust, adulterers, or even like this tax collector. I fast twice a week; I give tithes of all that I get.’ But the tax collector, standing far off, would not even lift up his eyes to heaven, but beat his breast, saying, ‘God, be merciful to me, a sinner!’ I tell you, this man went down to his house justified, rather than the other. For everyone who exalts himself will be humbled, but the one who humbles himself will be exalted.”

Jesus is describing two types of people. The Pharisees were the religious types who prided themselves on how well they kept the law. The one spoken of in this story seems particularly pleased with himself and clearly thinks God should be impressed with him. In contrast the tax collector, one of that group of people hated even more in Jesus’ day than they are in ours, recognises his sinfulness and, rather than trusting in his performance, appeals instead to God’s mercy and his willingness to forgive. When Jesus says it was the tax collector who was justified, he is using a word that means that it was he who was counted right before God. And so you see what Jesus is saying – since nobody but Jesus himself was truly good, it is not by keeping the law that we are saved. On the contrary, rather than reaching a certain level of awesomeness, it is by humbling ourselves before God, by recognising our weakness and our need for mercy, that we are reconciled to the God who really does love us in the way we all so long for.

I for one am pleased that this is the case because I haven’t got what it takes. The truth is I haven’t ‘got this’ – but I am glad that God has. Perhaps you will consider it foolishness on my part, but rather than pretend that I can cope, I am content to leave things in the hands of the one who really does know what he’s doing. This of course doesn’t mean that everything in this life will necessarily work out the way I would like, after all, as the old hymn goes, God works in a mysterious way his wonders to perform. Even so, in difficult days it helps me to know that, because he is good and because he is strong, what God ultimately brings about really will be for the best, irrespective of how unfathomable current circumstances might sometimes be.

And I hope this might help you too. For God can be trusted and those who do will surely find the foolishness of God really is wiser than the wisdom of man. God really does ‘have this’ and he has you too – safe in his everlasting arms.

Postscript:

If you have read thus far, I am (a) surprised [I believe the expression is TL:DR – Too long: didn’t read] and (b) grateful. Thank you.

I am aware that this has been long but some things need more than the length of a tweet if one is to have any chance of conveying their importance.

I am also aware that there will be some, perhaps many, who will consider what I have written as naive, irrelevant and perhaps even offensive. If that is you I trust you’ll accept my words as a genuine attempt to explain things I hold to be of first importance for us all to know and understand. If, as a doctor, I genuinely believed I had a life saving cure for your terminal illness, you’d consider it cruel of me if I withheld that treatment from you even if you didn’t share the belief in its effectiveness. So consider me foolish by all means, but I hope you’ll not consider me unkind in writing as I have. If one can not write of these things at Easter, then when can one write of them?

For all that however, I hope that will be those who agree with what I have written and, rejoicing with me at the news of Jesus’ life death and resurrection, know that this news is simply too good not to share.

Irrespective though of what you believe I nonetheless wish you all a very Happy Easter.

Other specifically Easter themed blogs:

To read ‘What becomes of the broken hearted? Sorrowful yet always rejoicing on Palm Sunday’, click here

To read ‘Why do bad things happen to good people? Sorrowful yet always rejoicing on Good Friday’, click here

To read ‘Was it not necessary that the Christ should suffer these things? Rejoicing, though temporarily sorrowful, on Easter Day’, click here.

To read ‘The Resurrection – is it just rhubarb?’, click here

Other related blogs:

To read ‘Rest Assured’, click here

To read ‘On being confronted by the law’, click here

To read ‘The “Already” and the “Not Yet”’, click here

To read ‘The Sacrifice of Isaac – Law or Gospel?’, click here

WAS IT NOT NECESSARY THAT THE CHRIST SHOULD SUFFER THESE THINGS? REJOICING THOUGH TEMPORARILY SORROWFUL ON EASTER DAY

Happy Easter!

It was Good Friday, but now, as surely as day follows night, sunshine follows rain, and the seemingly dead rhubarb plant in my back garden will soon burst into life and provide the principle ingredient for a fruit crumble, it’s Easter Sunday. A day to both remember and celebrate the most significant event in history, a source of hope powerful enough to sustain us through even the darkest of days.

Because Jesus is alive!

But perhaps you’re not so sure. If not, then you’re in good company, because one of Jesus’ disciples wasn’t convinced either.

Though he often gets a bad press, I’d like to put a word in for ‘Doubting Thomas’ and say how grateful I am to him. Why? Well simply because he reassures me that people in first century Jerusalem were just as unlikely to believe a story about a dead man coming back to life as they are today – unless, that is, the evidence was convincing.

Which it was, even for a dyed in the wool sceptic like Thomas who could not help but come to believe the seemingly unbelievable when he came face to face with the resurrected Jesus. Because with the scars that the nails had made in Jesus’ hands plain for him to see, Thomas believed, on the basis of the evidence, that Jesus really was risen from the dead.

My faith, therefore, is in part, based on Thomas initially doubting and wanting evidence before believing. He demanded the evidence we all need if we are to put our trust in Jesus. As such, we can believe without seeing, because Thomas couldn’t believe until he did.

So thank you Thomas!

Like Thomas, we too have good reasons to believe in the resurrection and can put our trust in Jesus, confident that he is in control today, every bit as much as he always has been.

Because despite what some people think, that God has always been in control is abundantly clear when one considers how the plan of salvation worked out exactly as he intended.

The death of Jesus was long predicted.

Way back in the Garden of Eden, God promised that a saviour would one day come who would crush the head of Satan, even as he himself was struck on the heel [Genesis 3:15]. Further prophecies of the one who would defeat Satan as he himself suffered occur repeatedly throughout the Old Testament, one of the best known being that of Isaiah who, writing in the eighth century BC, describes how a ‘suffering servant’ would be ‘pierced for our transgressions and crushed for our iniquities’ [Isaiah 53:5].

Furthermore, as Jesus himself said, the whole of the Old Testament is about him [Luke 24:44]. How so? Well by virtue of the fact that many of the incidents recorded for us there are themselves pictures of what Jesus would achieve on the cross. A good example of this being the story of Abraham and Isaac that was written more than a thousand years before the crucifixion.

Like Jesus, Isaac, was a willing sacrifice offered by a loving Father. Like Jesus, Isaac carried the wood on which he would be killed to the place of his execution. And like Jesus, Isaac, also on the third day, came back from the dead too.

Because when God decreed that Isaac be killed, he was as good as dead. And so, when three days later God told Abraham to kill a lamb instead, Isaac, as the writer of the letter to the Hebrews explains, was figuratively speaking, brought back to life. [Hebrews 11:18]

And of course, the lamb is a picture of Jesus too. Like Jesus who, as he hung on the cross was adorned with a crown of thorns, the lamb was found with its horns caught in a thicket. And like Jesus who died as a substitute for others, so the lamb died in the place of Isaac.

And if that isn’t enough for us to see how God had predetermined the events of the first Easter, notice that it was to Mount Mariah that Abraham took his son. This hill is the one that hundreds of years later Jerusalem would be built on, indicating that the events of both Genesis 22 and Good Friday occurred in very close geographical proximity. Which is surely not a coincidence!

[More on this can be read here – and thoughts on how another Old Testament story points forward to Jesus can be found here]

The New Testament also confirms God’s sovereignty over all that took place. As had been predicted by the prophet Micah, [Micah 5:2] a baby boy was born in Bethlehem. But this was no ordinary baby – this was God taking on human form. ‘The Word’, as John describes Jesus, ‘became flesh and dwelt amongst us’ [John 1:14].

Directed to do so by the angel who told him that ‘he [would] save his people from their sins’ [Matthew 1:21], Joseph named the child Jesus, a name that means ‘God is Salvation’. Then wise men arrived. They came bearing gifts, one of which was Myrrh, a resin commonly used in the preparation of the dead for burial – a singularly odd present for a child – unless, that is, the reason for his being born was so that he would one day die.

Jesus grew up and, as he began his public ministry, he gathered around him his twelve disciples. They were eyewitnesses to Jesus’s many miracles. They saw how ‘the blind received their sight, the lame walked, [and] lepers were cleansed’ They watched as ‘the deaf heard, the dead were raised up, [and] the poor had good news preached to them’ [Luke 7:22]. All these things had been previously prophesied in the Old Testament.

But it wasn’t just Jesus’ miracles that amazed the disciples. They were amazed by his teaching too. And so the penny eventually dropped and the disciples finally recognised that Jesus was the Christ, God’s chosen king.

No sooner had they done so, however, Jesus told them how he ‘must suffer many things and be rejected by the elders, the chief priests and the scribes’. Furthermore he explained how he would ‘be killed, and after three days rise again.’ [Mark 8:31]

And so, determined to do what was always his Father’s will, Jesus ‘set his face to go to Jerusalem’ [Luke 9:51], fully aware of what lay ahead for him there. In the Garden of Gethsemane, he was ‘distressed and greatly troubled’ [Mark 14:33] at the prospect of his being crucified, so much so that he sweated blood [Luke 22:44], a medical phenomenon known as ‘hematohidrosis’ which can occur in those suffering extreme levels of stress.

With his soul ‘sorrowful unto death’, Jesus asked, if it were possible, for the cup that he was about to drink to be taken from him. But the cup he was referring to was the cup of God’s wrath, and Jesus knew that, if he was to save others from having to drink it, he would have to drink it himself.

And so, sticking with the plan ‘that the Christ should suffer these things’ [Luke 24:26], Jesus finished his prayer by asking not that his will would be done, but rather God’s will would be done.

Then Judas, one of the disciples, betrayed Jesus into the hands of the religious leaders who were intent on getting rid of him. Falsely accused they found him guilty of blasphemy and handed him over to the Roman authorities who had the power to sentence him to death. And despite recognising Jesus’ innocence, that is precisely what Pilate did when, fearing the crowd who were baying for Jesus’ blood, he showed himself to be the weak leader he was by handing Jesus over to be crucified.

All this might look like God was no longer in control – but the truth was quite the opposite. Because though he was ‘crucified and killed by the hands of lawless men’, Jesus was ‘delivered up according to the definite plan and foreknowledge of God’. [Acts 2:23].

When Caiaphas, the high priest that year, had said ‘it is better [that] one man should die for the people, not that the whole nation should perish,”’[John 11:50], he was only thinking in terms of political expediency. But unbeknownst to him, he was being used by God to prophesy how Jesus’ death would be for the salvation of God’s people.

God, you see, was still very much in control of events, so much so that Jesus, died exactly when the ‘Lamb of God’ was supposed to die – at Passover. And this despite the fact that Passover was the one time those plotting his death wanted to avoid him dying! [Matthew 26:4-5].

Jesus had allowed himself to be arrested and said nothing to prevent himself from being sentenced to death. And so, as was always the plan, Jesus was led out to be crucified and was nailed to the cross on which, three hours later, he died. But even here we see that God was still in control – for it is Jesus himself who determines the moment of his death.

After several more prophecies are fulfilled, Jesus finally declares, ‘It is finished’. This is a statement that refers, not to his imminent death but rather to how he had completed the work he had come to do. Only then does Jesus bow his head and allowed himself to die. Only then does Jesus, a man who was totally in control of his own demise, give up his spirit. [John 19:30]

So at just the right time [Galatians 4:4] Christ Jesus came into the world to save sinners [1 Timothy 1:15] – and ‘at just the right time, whilst we were powerless, Christ died for the ungodly. [Romans 5:6].

But that wasn’t the end, for the one who had the authority to lay down his own life, also had the authority to take it back up again. [John 10:17-18]

And so on the third day, just as he had predicted, Jesus, at just the right time, rose from the dead, his resurrection proving his sacrifice had been sufficient, that the penalty for sin really had been fully paid.

And Jesus was then seen alive, not only by Thomas, but by hundreds of others [1 Corinthians 15:6]. As such we can be confident that there is ‘therefore now no condemnation for those who are in Christ Jesus’ [Romans 8:1], for those who look to Christ for forgiveness and accept him as both their Lord and Saviour.

When times are hard it’s good to know that God is just as much in control today as he was in bringing about our salvation. And it’s good to know too that ‘he who did not spare his own Son but gladly give him up for us all’ will surely ‘work all things for good for those who love him and are called according to his purpose’. [Romans 8:32, 28].

This doesn’t mean that everything in this life will always go the way that we would like, but it does mean that, however unlikely it may currently seem, God will bring an end to all that is wrong with the world in which we currently live. Furthermore, notwithstanding the size of the task in hand, he will also complete the good work that he has begun in us, the one that sets out to make us how we were always meant to be. [Philippians 1:6]

That job will not be finished until the day that Jesus returns – but when that day does finally arrive, oh how great our joy will be.

The Bible says that ‘faith is the assurance of things hoped for, the conviction of things not seen’ [Hebrews 11.1]. But that doesn’t mean that faith is blind. On the contrary, my faith depends on the compelling evidence for the historicity of the empty tomb, the credible eye witness testimony of those who saw Jesus after he rose from the dead, and the authoritative word of the one who spoke the universe into existence.

And so, in a world where life for many continues to sometimes be hard, I am confident that God is still very much in control.

And that’s why I’m rejoicing, though temporary sorrowful, this Easter Day.

*****************************

Easter Morning. The tomb is empty and Jesus is raised. Obviously.

I say obviously because it never could have been any other way. Some people have a problem with that – they say irrational things like ‘Dead people don’t come back to life – that’s simply impossible’. But the Bible says just the opposite, the Bible says it was impossible for Jesus to stay dead!

‘God raised him up, loosing the pangs of death, because it was not possible for him to be held by it.’ [Acts 2:24]

Granted, the dead rising to life again is not a common occurrence. But if the rationale for you not believing in the resurrection of Jesus boils down to, ‘It can’t happen, so it didn’t happen’, then you are not being intellectually honest with yourself, drawing your conclusions on preconceived assumptions which are not based on fact. For it’d only take a resurrection to happen once for you to have to change your point of view.

At the end of a lecture he had given on the reasons for his atheism, noted philosopher Anthony Flew, was once asked the question, ‘But what if Jesus was raised from the dead?’. ‘Well,’ he replied ‘If Jesus was raised from the dead, that would change everything’. His response was consistent with his lifelong commitment to go where the evidence led, a commitment that would, a few years before his death in 2010, ultimately lead to him coauthoring a book which was entitled ‘There is a God’.

It was the apostle Peter who made the above statement regarding the impossibility of Jesus staying dead. It is interesting to note the change that had occurred in Peter since Good Friday. After Jesus’ arrest he had been running scared, denying to everyone that he had ever even known Jesus. But here, on the day of Pentecost, just seven weeks later, he stands and publicly proclaims, to a crowd of thousands, the reality of the resurrection. The reason for the change in Peter isn’t hard to find:

‘This Jesus, God raised up,’ he says, ‘and of that we all are witnesses.’ [Acts 2:32]

Like Anthony Flew, Peter had followed the evidence.

The evidence for the resurrection is well documented. For those who are interested more can be read here and here.

But why was it not possible for Jesus to stay dead? This is a philosophical argument and is based on the nature of death and the underlying reason for it. We tend to think that death is normal – the inevitable end to the wearing out of our bodies after long years of use or, alternatively, the tragic result of some violent insult, overwhelming infection, or malignant growth, something that our bodies cannot withstand. But the Bible says that there is a more fundamental reason for why we die. And that, it says, is sin.

Death is not part of how things should be – rather it is a travesty, the consequence of the presence of the wrong that is in the universe, the penalty for the sin of which we are all guilty – myself more than anyone. An awareness of this opens the door to our being able to better understand how Peter can make his assertion that it was not possible for Jesus to stay dead.

It is because Jesus was sinless, that death could not hold him.

If we struggle to believe anything about the Easter story, it shouldn’t be the resurrection of Jesus – that bit stands to reason. The amazing part of the story is that he ever died at all. That the author of life should die is a great mystery – but die he unquestionably did. As it is for his resurrection, the evidence for Jesus’ death is overwhelming, even being attested to by a paper published in the Journal of the American Medical Association in 1986. You can read it here.

So what then was the reason for Jesus’ death? The answer to that can be given in one word: Love. The love he had for those he came to save, those he was willing to lay down his life for, [John 10:15], those for whom his death would bring eternal life.

The reason that Jesus’ was born in the first place was ‘to seek and save the lost’ [Luke 19:10]. As the apostle Paul once wrote, the ‘saying is trustworthy and deserving of full acceptance, that Christ Jesus came into the world to save sinners’ [1 Timothy 1:15].

Jesus knew this and understood that the salvation he had come to achieve would be realised through his death. ‘The Son of Man must suffer many things’ he said, ‘and be rejected by the elders and chief priests and scribes, and be killed, and on the third day be raised.’ [Luke 9:22)]. That is the reason why, when the time of his crucifixion drew near, Jesus ‘set his face to go to Jerusalem’. [Luke 9:51].

Jesus went to Jerusalem on purpose, with the expressed intention of dying there.

But why did he have to die? More than that, why did he have to be killed? Why couldn’t he have simply slipped away quietly in his sleep at a ripe old age? The answer to that question is that ‘the wages of sin is death’ [Romans 6:23]. If justice is to be upheld, sin must be punished, and the penalty for sin is death.

We all want to live in a just universe – we cry out for justice when we see others maltreated especially when that injustice is particularly great or when we find that it is we who are the ones who are experiencing the injustice. The only time we are unhappy with justice is when we are the those who are guilty! I believe speeding drivers should suffer a penalty but many were the excuses I had for why I shouldn’t have had to attend the speed awareness course I was invited to not all that long ago!

God is, by his very nature, holy. He is perfectly right, perfectly just. And if he is to remain just, His standards must be he upheld. We, on the other hand, are not what we should be. We know, if we are honest, that we don’t live up to our own standards, let alone those of a holy and righteous God. Therefore, since as has been already been said, the ‘wages of sin is death’, we have a problem. We all deserve death, myself included and, unless a suitable substitute can be found, we face the prospect of experiencing that punishment ourselves.

But this is where the bad news of the law of God becomes the good news of the gospel. Because, not only is God holy and rightly angry at injustice, he is, at the same time, merciful and gracious. God gave his only son to be a penal substitute, one who would act as the wrath absorbing, justice satisfying, atoning sacrifice for our sins.

One who would gladly take our place and suffer for us the punishment we deserve.

At this point it is important to remember the mystery of the Trinity. God, though one, is three persons. We are not, therefore, seeing here a loving Jesus who absorbs the wrath of an vengeful despotic God. On the contrary, Jesus is himself fully God even as he is fully man. And the Father and Son, along with the Holy Spirit are one. As the Father loves the son, so the son loves the Father. Therefore, the death of Jesus, planned and agreed by all three persons of the Godhead before time began, and pointed too throughout the Old Testament [see for example here and here] reveals a loving Father every bit as much as it reveals a loving son,

The Old Testament prophet Isaiah had, some 700 years prior to the crucifixion, prophesied how God would one day lay on Jesus our sin and punish him in our place:

‘But he was pierced for our transgressions; he was crushed for our iniquities; upon him was the chastisement that brought us peace, and with his wounds we are healed. All we like sheep have gone astray; we have turned, every one, to his own way; and the LORD has laid on him the iniquity of us all.’ [Isaiah 53:5-6]

Jesus, because of his love, both for his Father and for us, willingly took on our sin and died in our place so that we need not suffer that punishment ourselves. He was put to death so that ‘whoever believes in him should not perish but have eternal life.’ [John 3:16]

‘For our sake [God] made [Jesus] to be sin who knew no sin, so that in him we might become the righteousness of God.’ [2 Corinthians 5:21]

That is, God treats Jesus as if he had lived like us so that he can justly treat us as if we had lived like Jesus. This is what it means to say that God loves us. It’s not that he thinks everything about us is just peachy, but rather that he treats us well despite how little we deserve his kindness. He loves us, not because we are lovely, but because he is loving.

And how great is that love with which he loves us. We cannot conceive how vast that love is.

‘For as high as the heavens are above the earth, so great is his steadfast love towards those who fear him; as far as the east is from the west, so far does he remove our transgressions from us’ [Psalm 103:11-12]

‘In this is love, not that we have loved God but that he loved us and sent his Son to be the propitiation for our sins.’ [1 John 4:10]

‘The wages of sin is [indeed] death, but the free gift of God is eternal life in Christ Jesus our Lord.’ [Romans 6:23]

‘And this is eternal life, that [we] know…the only true God, and Jesus Christ whom [he has] sent.’ [John 17:3]

This then is how God loves us. Jesus death is not just a sign of God’s love, it is an act of love too, one that achieves our salvation. One that achieves our rescue. Imagine I’m walking along a river with my wife Kaye when I turn to her and say, ‘Darling, I love you – so much so that I am going to throw myself into the river to prove it’. Imagine then that, having made my declaration, I promptly proceed to do as I said I would and subsequently drown. My actions would show me to be, what is commonly known as, an idiot! Imagine now that, whilst we are walking, Kaye slips, falls into the river and begins to drown. Imagine then that, because of my great love for her, I jump in to rescue her but lose my life in the process. In such a scenario I would have acted out of love and demonstrated my love by my actions, by what I had done, by what I had achieved. I would have done a loving thing, but one that is no where near as loving as that which was done by the son of God who, of infinitely greater worth than I, died for those who were only deserving of death.

God then, in the death of his beloved son and at great personal cost, rescues us from himself so that we might enjoy knowing him forever whilst no longer having to live in fear of his righteous anger towards us. God’s justice was satisfied by his wrath being directed toward another, toward Jesus, the one who willingly absorbed it all for us on the cross. So completely did Jesus’ death pay the penalty for our sin that there is now no longer any of God’s anger left over to be directed at us. That is what is meant by Jesus’ death atoning for the sins of those he died for. That is the meaning of ‘propitiation’ in the verse above. God hasn’t merely laid aside his anger at sin only for it to rise up again at some later date – on the contrary, it has gone for good, even as it was fully poured out on Jesus.

That is why Jesus, as he hung on the cross, cried out ‘My God, my God, why have you forsaken me?” [Mark 15:34]. Remarkably God was turning his back on the son he loves so deeply in order to save we who have ourselves turned our back on God. And it why the apostle Paul can write that ‘There is therefore now no condemnation for those who are in Christ Jesus.’ [Romans 8:1]. All condemnation towards those whose only hope for salvation lies in Christ is gone! The job of satisfying the requirements of the law and, thereby, maintaining God’s justice, even as he forgives we who have sinned and deserve death, is complete. As Jesus died he said ‘It is finished’ [John 19:30]. He wasn’t talking about his life, rather he was talking about his work of atonement. And he was right, the resurrection on Easter morning proving that his sacrifice really was fully effective in paying the price for all that we have done wrong. God’s grace really is completely sufficient, even for those of us who consider ourselves to be ‘the chief of sinners’. [1 Timothy 1:15]

Rest assured, knowing God for all eternity will not be dull like some people imagine. We have all had moments in our lives when we have experienced something truly beautiful – a glorious sunset, a magnificent Mountain View or perhaps waves crashing powerfully against a rocky coastline. These are awesome sights, ones to be fully enjoyed. But they are only a faint echo of what we will one day experience – they will pale into insignificance when we see God face to face. God will then dwell with [us], and [we] will be his people. He will wipe away every tear from [our] eyes, and death shall be no more, neither shall there be mourning, nor crying, nor pain anymore, for the former things [will] have passed away.’ (Revelation 21:3-4).

Seeing God and experiencing that future new creation will be infinitely more satisfying than the happiest times this world has to offer, better even than Easter Day. And the prospect of that future joy might just be enough to sustain us through the saddest times this world affords – days like Good Friday.

Easter morning – the tomb is empty and Jesus is raised.That’s good news – but not unexpected. It was always going to happen.

It was Good Friday.
But now it is Easter Sunday.
Obviously.

Happy Easter.

*****************************

Postscript.

If you have read thus far, I am (a) surprised [I believe the expression is TL:DR – Too long: didn’t read] and (b) grateful. Thank you.

I am aware that this has been long but some things need more than the length of a tweet if one is to have any chance of conveying their importance.

Related blogs:

To read ‘What becomes of the broken hearted? Sorrowful yet always rejoicing on Palm Sunday’, click here

To read ‘Why do bad things happen to good people? Sorrowful yet always rejoicing on Good Friday’, click here

To read ‘The Sacrifice of Isaac – Law or Gospel?’, click here

To read ‘Water from a Rock’, click here

To read ‘The Resurrection – is it just rhubarb?’, click here

To read ‘A Christmas Countdown – Complete’, click here

To read “Suffering- A Personal View”, click here.

To read “Why do bad things happen to good people – a tentative suggestion”, click here

To read “Luther and the global pandemic – on becoming a theologian of the cross”, click here

To read ‘T.S. Eliot, Jesus and the Paradox of the Christian Life’, click here

To read ‘Real Power’, click here

To read ‘Foolishness – Law and Gospel’, click here

To read ‘The Promise Keeper’, click here

To read ‘The Rainbow’s End’, click here

To read ‘True Love?’, click here

To read “Hope comes from believing the promises of God”, click here

To read, ‘But this I know’, click here

To read ‘I’ll miss this when I’m gone – extended theological version’, click here

To read ‘On being confronted by the law’, click here

To read ‘The “Already” and the “Not Yet”’, click here

To read ‘Rest Assured’, click here

WHY DO BAD THINGS HAPPEN TO GOOD PEOPLE? SORROWFUL YET ALWAYS REJOICING ON GOOD FRIDAY.

Why do bad things happen to good people?

If there was ever anyone in history who knew the answer to this age old question, then surely it must have been Barabbas. Barabbas was a murdering insurrectionist [Mark 15:7], one who, along with others, was in prison and under sentence of death on the day that, despite his innocence, the Jewish religious leaders were calling for Jesus to be crucified.

It was the feast of Passover and a custom of that time allowed the Roman governor to release a prisoner according to the wishes of those attending the festival. And so, having found no basis for the charges against Jesus, but wishing to appease an increasing hostile crowd, Pontius Pilate asked those gathered which of the two prisoners they wanted him to set free.

And, stirred up to do so by the chief priests and elders, the answer the crowd gave him was ‘Barabbas’.

‘Pilate said to them, “Then what shall I do with Jesus who is called Christ?” They all said, “Let him be crucified!” And he said, “Why? What evil has he done?” But they shouted all the more, “Let him be crucified!”’ [Matthew 27:22-23]

And so it was that when three men were later led out to be executed, Barabbas was not one of those numbered among them. But Jesus was – just as Isaiah had predicted hundreds of years previously. [Isaiah 53:12]

The two criminals who were crucified alongside Jesus may have been Barabbas’ fellow insurrectionists, receiving the death penalty that, guilty of the same crimes, Barabbas had been sentenced to as well. Be that as it may, what we can be sure of is this: that on that first Good Friday, an innocent Jesus was nailed to the cross that had previously been prepared for a guilty Barabbas.

Jesus took Barabbas’ place that day, bearing the punishment he deserved. Jesus suffered for Barabbas – so that Barabbas didn’t have to.

Why then do bad things happen to good people? If someone had asked that of Barabbas, watching perhaps what was taking place that day, perhaps he’d have answered like this:

‘So that good things can happen to bad people’.

Because as darkness covered the land for three long hours that afternoon, [Luke 23:44] the worst possible thing happened to the best person that ever there was.

And a murderer went free.

Vitally important for us to recognise though, is that Barabbas escaping death and being set free is a wonderful picture of the gospel, the good news by which we too can all be saved.

All of us are guilty of something, and all of us, therefore, have a price we ought to pay. But whilst the Bible rightly tells us that ‘the wages of sin is death’, it goes on to declare that ‘the free gift of God is eternal life in Christ Jesus our Lord’ [Romans 6:23]

So it wasn’t just Barabbas whose place was taken by Jesus on that first Good Friday. Jesus hung on a cross as a substitute for all who, confessing their sin, gladly accept the forgiveness that was secured through Jesus’ sacrificial giving of himself.

If then we accept it, Jesus’ death pays the penalty for all our wrongdoing too, atoning for our sin and, by satisfying God’s need for justice, sets us free from the fear of death.

Which is why the words spoken by those in the crowd that day have far greater significance than they intended. After Pilate famously washed his hands and declared himself innocent of shedding Jesus’ blood, the people said to him

“His blood be on us and on our children!” [Matthew 27:26].

Whilst those who had called for Jesus’ death meant nothing more by their words than to merely accept responsibility for what was about to happen to him, to have Jesus’ blood upon them echos the events of the Passover, the very event they had come to Jerusalem to celebrate.

The origins of the Passover are found in the book of Exodus, when the Hebrew people were slaves in Egypt. Back then, as an act of judgement on those who were oppressing his people so badly, God sent ten plagues, the last of which would result in the death of the first born son in every household in the land.

But to avoid this fate falling on his people too, God told the Israelites to slaughter a lamb and then daub its blood on the frames of the doors to their homes. This would identify those households that contained God’s people and ensure that, when the angel of death arrived, he would, on seeing the blood, ‘pass-over’ them and spare their inhabitants his deadly ministrations.

The events of that fearful night were highly significant in the history of Israel, and so it was that it was remembered annually. But the real significance of Passover was what it pointed forward to, to the events that were even now being played out as Jesus was being sentenced to death.

For five days earlier Jesus had entered Jerusalem and, like the many, many lambs that had arrived in the city with him, he had come in order that he too might be slaughtered – not in remembrance of events long past, but in final fulfilment of them. Previously recognised by John the Baptist as the Lamb of God who would take away the sin of the world [John 1:29], Jesus came to die, not for his own sins, for he was sinless Son of God, but for the sins of the people, for those who, with his blood upon them, would thus be spared the judgement they themselves deserved.

For God, on seeing the blood of Jesus that would figuratively cover them, would thus be able to justly ‘pass-over’ the guilty because their sin had already been paid for.

By saying ‘may his blood be on us’ the crowd were, therefore, not only admitting their guilt in calling for Jesus to be crucified, but also unwittingly acknowledging their need to avail themselves of the benefits that his death would bring about.

And their words also display the extent of God’s mercy, mercy so great that it extends even to those so scornful of his love.

Why then did this bad thing happen to Jesus – not just so a good thing could happen to Barabbas, but in order that a good thing could happen to all who, having opposed him, deserve nothing but condemnation. I include myself in that number. As such a bad thing happened to Jesus in order that a good thing could happen to me.

As a schoolboy I recall singing the old Easter hymn, ‘There is a green hill far away’. Perhaps you do too. Don’t make the mistake though of thinking that it’s a children’s song – it’s not. Because a bad thing happened to Jesus so that a good thing could happen to you as well. Do you remember the words?

‘There is a green hill far away,
outside a city wall,
where the dear Lord was crucified,
who died to save us all.

We may not know, we can not tell,
what pains he had to bear,
but we believe it was for us
he hung and suffered there’

Besides Jesus ‘there was no other good enough to pay the price of sin.’ But paid it he did. And so on Good Friday, whilst mourning the fact that our sin necessitated his dying for us, we can look forward to celebrating his resurrection on Easter Day, the rock solid proof that his sacrifice was sufficient to secure our salvation.

And that’s why, even on this most sorrowful of days, there remains a place for rejoicing.

*******

One Maundy Thursday, some years ago, a good friend of mine hesitated to return my good wishes for the upcoming Easter break because, he said, he understood that Good Friday was a day for Christians like me to be miserable. It got me thinking to what extent he was right.

Paul, writing in his second letter to the Corinthians, describes Christians as, ‘Sorrowful yet always rejoicing’ [2 Corinthians 6:10]. If such a paradoxical existence was the reality for Christians back in Paul’s day, it is surely no less true a reality for Christians living the 21st Century. The name we give ‘Good Friday’ is itself a paradox – for how can we apply the adjective ‘good’ to describe the day of Christ’s crucifixion?

But whilst it is a day on which Christians should grieve over their sin and what Jesus had to suffer as a consequence in order to secure their redemption, it is at the same time a day for rejoicing in the triumph of his sacrifice as we anticipate and remember his subsequent resurrection from the dead on Easter Sunday.

‘Sorrowful yet always rejoicing’ – it was the experience of Paul and it was the experience of Jesus himself the ‘man of sorrows’ [Isaiah 53:5] who, despite being ‘very sorrowful even to death’ [Matthew 26:38] in the Garden of Gethsemane, nonetheless endured the cross ‘for the joy that was set before him.’ [Hebrews 12:2].

Suffering, then, is not the end of joy – it can even be the passage to joy. It’s not a contradiction – but it is a paradox! A paradox that the second of the two criminals who were being crucified alongside Jesus, understood. Here is a man who is about to die the most painful of deaths and who knows he is totally undeserving of salvation. But not only does he still ask to be remembered by Jesus, he does so when the one he is asking is hanging on a cross and about to die too! Hear his remarkable request.

‘Jesus, remember me when you come into your kingdom’ [Luke 23:42].

Unlike the religious rulers, the Roman soldiers and the other criminal who was being crucified that day, the second criminal didn’t see Jesus’ death as a sign of defeat. He continued to speak of Jesus as one who was coming into his kingdom. For him Jesus’ death didn’t mean an end to all the kingdom and salvation talk. In stark contrast to those who mocked Jesus who were looking to him for a salvation FROM death, the second criminal saw that the salvation Jesus was bringing about was one that was brought about THROUGH death.

He saw that Jesus’ death was not the end of Christ’s kingdom, but rather its beginning.

This is a profound truth – one that we would do well to try and grasp.

Far then from simple, the second criminal’s faith was one that was truly remarkable. And we should not be surprised therefore when, as a result, Jesus responds to his request with these words:

‘Truly, I say to you, today you will be with me in paradise’ [Luke 23:43].

Jesus saw in the second criminal somebody who got it! Somebody who trusted the power of God despite seeing what, to unspiritual eyes, was nothing but weakness. Somebody who saw victory where most saw only defeat. Somebody who understood the paradox of Good Friday.

That suffering is not irredeemable,
That sorrow is not incompatible with joy and
That even the darkest nights can be followed by the brightest days.

‘Sorrowful yet always rejoicing’?

It was the experience of Paul. It was the experience of Jesus. It was the experience of the second criminal. And it will be our experience too.

Some of us are sick. Some of us mourn the loss of loved ones. Some of us worry over our future. Some of us have experienced great tragedy in our lives – some recently, others longer ago but who still feel the pain of it just as keenly as if it had happened yesterday.

There is indeed much today for us to be sorrowful over. Some Christian types can sometimes well meaningly suggest we should always be happy. ‘Smile’, they say, ‘Jesus loves you’. But though they are right to proclaim the truth that God really does love us, they are wrong to suggest that we should never be sad, for even the eternally happy God knows what it is to cry. [1 Timothy 1:11, Luke 22:62]. Even Jesus wept at the tomb of his friend Lazarus, his grief no less intense for knowing that he would soon bring him back to life. [John 11:35].

Perhaps, then, even God knows what it is to be sorrowful yet always rejoicing.

So it’s not wrong to be sad, it’s simply normal. The Bible never tells us to masochistically rejoice about our suffering. But it does tell us to rejoice in our suffering.

Because despite our sorrow there is still much for us to rejoice about! We truly are loved with an everlasting love, a love that transcends our current struggle, a love that means that we too can be sorrowful yet always rejoicing.

As we suffer we can rejoice because of the Gospel. The good news is that Good Friday was followed by Easter Day, that on the cross Jesus died for our sins, bearing the punishment we deserve, and that when he rose from the dead Jesus proved the sufficiency of his sacrifice. By it we are justified, counted righteous, declared to be ‘not guilty’.

Some of us grieve over our unrighteousness and can not even lift our eyes to heaven. We beat our breasts and cry out, ‘Have mercy on me, a sinner’ [Luke 18:13] But because of Jesus’ work on the cross on our behalf we are made right with God – regardless of our current situation.

Not because of our worth – but because of his grace.
Not because of what we do – but because of what he did.
Not because we are lovely – but because he is loving.

So, if you’re sorrowful today, remember you’re not alone, God weeps with you. And know that, because of Jesus, his life, death and resurrection, ‘Weeping may tarry for the night, but joy comes with the morning.’ [Psalm 30:5].

It’s Good Friday – but Easter Sunday is coming. Because of what took place over those two days nearly 2000 years ago, we can know real forgiveness for all those sins that we so bitterly regret, no matter how great they might have been

But if that were not enough to rejoice over this Eastertide, we can also look to the future with a certain hope. Suffering is all too real today but the day is coming when God ‘will wipe away every tear form [our] eyes, and death shall be no more, neither shall there be mourning, nor crying, nor pain anymore, for the former things [will] have passed away.’ [Revelation 21:4]

‘So we do not lose heart. Though our outer self is wasting away, our inner self is being renewed day by day. For this light momentary affliction is preparing for us an eternal weight of glory beyond all comparison, as we look not to the things that are seen but to the things that are unseen. For the things that are seen are transient, but the things that are unseen are eternal’. [2 Corinthians 4:16-18]

Oh that we would all be granted a faith like that of the penitent criminal who was assured of things hoped for and convinced of things not seen. [Hebrews 11.1] Oh that in the sadness of the nighttime we would all be able to look forward to the joy that comes with the morning. [Psalm 30:5] And oh that we would all believe that, irrespective of how things seem, God is doing all things well [Mark 7:37] and will one day ensure that everything is as it should be.

It’s Good Friday – but Easter Sunday is coming.
I pray that we would all know happiness this Eastertide – even those of us who are sorrowful.

Especially those who are sorrowful.

To read ‘What becomes of the broken hearted? Sorrowful yet always rejoicing on Palm Sunday’, click here

To read ‘Was it not necessary that the Christ should suffer these things? Rejoicing, though temporarily sorrowful, on Easter Day’, click here.

To read “Why do bad things happen to good people – a tentative suggestion”, click here

To read, ‘All’s Well That Ends Well’, click here

To read “Luther and the global pandemic – on becoming a theologian of the cross”, click here

To read ‘T.S. Eliot, Jesus and the Paradox of the Christian Life’, click here

To read ‘Real Power’, click here

To read ‘Foolishness – Law and Gospel’, click here

To read ‘The Promise Keeper’, click here

To read ‘The Rainbow’s End’, click here

To read ‘True Love?’, click here

To read “Hope comes from believing the promises of God”, click here

To read, ‘But this I know’, click here

To read ‘I’ll miss this when I’m gone – extended theological version’, click here

To read “Suffering- A Personal View”, click here.

To read ‘On being confronted by the law’, click here

To read ‘The “Already” and the “Not Yet”’, click here

To read ‘The Sacrifice of Isaac – Law or Gospel?’, click here

To read ‘Rest Assured’, click here

WHAT BECOMES OF THE BROKEN HEARTED? SORROWFUL YET ALWAYS REJOICING ON PALM SUNDAY.

As I walk this land of broken dreams
I have visions of many things
But happiness is just an illusion
Filled with sadness and confusion

So sang Jimmy Ruffin – back in 1967. But as he sings, and ponders, the fate of the broken hearted, he never once mentions the shedding of tears. Which suprised me at first – until I thought about it for a while and I remembered that not all the broken hearted can cry.

Over the years I was a GP, there were a number of patients who came to me because, despite their sadness, they were unable to cry. On such occasions I tried, and largely succeeded, in resisting the urge to recommend that they watch ‘Lassie Come Home’! This is not because of my doubting the film’s effectiveness in the treatment of Keratoconjunctivitis sicca (dry eye syndrome), but simply because, if my attempt at humour had produced the wry smile I’d desired, my patient would only be left even more incapable of producing the tears that they were hoping for!

Unlike my emotionally disadvantaged patients however, crying is something that comes all too easily to me these days. Maybe it’s because the optimism of youth has given way to the realism of late middle age that I feel the inherent sadness of this ‘vale of tears’ more keenly now, or perhaps it’s just that, as the years roll by, I’m becoming a sentimental old fool. Either way it seems to me that Abraham Lincoln was on to something when he said,

‘In this sad world of ours, sorrow comes to all; and to the young it comes with bitterest agony, because it takes them unawares. The older have learned to ever expect it.’

Leaving aside the reasons for my own sometimes melancholy mood, what is undeniable is that there is a lot of sadness about. And irrespective of its cause, be it the consequence of global events, some more local concern, or the personal difficulties experienced by a single person, the unhappiness is always felt at the individual level, and so, even for those whose own lives are devoid of difficulty, there remains the sadness of those whom they love, those whose broken hearts continue to break theirs.

What, I wonder, is to become of them?

But what has all this got to do with Palm Sunday, the day we remember Jesus’ triumphant entry into Jerusalem. Well simply this – despite it being a day on which many took to the streets in jubilant celebration, Jesus, the one who was described by the prophet Isaiah as ‘a man of sorrows’ [Isaiah 53:3], saw fit to weep.

‘And when [Jesus] drew near and saw the city, he wept over it, saying, “Would that you, even you, had known on this day the things that make for peace! But now they are hidden from your eyes.’ [Luke 19:41-42]

So what was going on – why was Jesus weeping whilst so many were celebrating his arrival as the long expected Messiah. From the verses in Luke’s Gospel, the answer is surely tied up in the fact that those who were witnessing his arrival were somehow blind to what was really going on. And this was just as much the case for those who were welcoming him with joy, as it was for the religious types who were there demanding that Jesus rebuke his followers for hailing him as their King.

To take that latter group first, it is perhaps easy to see what they were missing, namely that Jesus ‘Truly…was the son of God’, which was exactly what one centurion recognised him to be when, five days later, he watched him die a long painful death whilst nailed to a cross.

Their failure to recognise him was all the more tragic given how Jesus had fulfilled the many Old Testament prophecies regarding the Messiah, prophecies with which, since they were their nation’s spiritual leaders, they should have been familiar. Not least amongst those prophecies was the one, the fulfilment of which, they were even then witnessing. Because Jesus’ humble arrival in Jerusalem on the back of a donkey, had been foretold hundreds of years previously by the prophet Zechariah.

‘Rejoice greatly, O daughter of Zion!
Shout aloud, O daughter of Jerusalem!
Behold, your king is coming to you;
righteous and having salvation is he,
humble and mounted on a donkey,
on a colt, the foal of a donkey.’
[Zechariah 9.9]

But what of the excited crowd who greeted Jesus with shouts of ‘Blessed is the King who comes in the name of the Lord!’? What were they missing? Well simply the nature of his kingship. They were expecting Jesus to lead them to victory over the Romans who at the time were occupying their city. But Jesus was not that kind of king for on that first Palm Sunday, like the many Passover lambs who would also have been arriving and would, like Jesus soon be slaughtered, Jesus entered Jerusalem as the Lamb of God, who would take away the sins of the world.

Yes, he was on the way to the throne but, but the throne to which he was heading was a heavenly throne. And the route he was taking would first have to take him to a cross where, having been ‘despised and rejected by men’, he would be ‘pierced for our transgressions’ and ‘crushed for our iniquities’. For, just as Isaiah had predicted centuries previously, it would be by carrying our sorrows and bearing our griefs, that Jesus’ chastisement would bring us peace. [Isaiah 53:3-5].

But the cheering masses were blind to the fact that it was through a display of apparent weakness that peace with God would be won.

And so Jesus wept.

Which is astonishing isn’t it? Think about it for a minute.

Despite these being the very people who had, and would reject him, despite them being the ones that would first bay for his blood as they shouted ‘Crucify, crucify him’ [Luke 23:21], and then undertake to drive those cruel nails through his hands and feet, Jesus still wept for them.

That the sovereign king of creation should weep such tender hearted tears of mercy for those who wished him dead is indeed astonishing. Furthermore they reveal Jesus to be a king like no other, one who, even in the final moments before his death, still prayed for his executioners with the words, ‘Father, forgive them, for they know not what they do’ [Luke 23:24].

I for one am glad that God is as tender hearted as he is almighty – it gives me confidence that, as well as being mighty to save, [Zephaniah 3:17], he is one who will not break a bruised reed or quench a faintly burning wick [Isaiah 42:3]. For as one who is desperately weak and oh so in need of rescue, that is exactly what I need him to be.

Not for nothing have some likened Jesus to those pictures we sometimes see of heavily armed soldiers carrying a tiny baby from the wreckage of a collapsed building. For that is what he’s like – only infinitely more so.

Of course Palm Sunday wasn’t the only time Jesus shed a tear. John 11:35, the shortest verse in the Bible, tells us that ‘Jesus wept’ at the graveside of his friend Lazarus, thereby making it plain, not only that Jesus really was ‘acquainted with grief’, but that our tears are also appropriate in such circumstances.

So then what does become of the broken hearted?

Is their only comfort to be found in seeing Jesus as a miserable messiah who knew what it was to be unhappy too? Not at all! Because Jesus is serious about our joy, and will do whatever it takes to bring us to his Father, the infinitely happy God ‘in whose presence there is fullness of joy’ and at whose right hand there are ‘pleasures forevermore’ [Psalm 16:11]

That’s why Jesus went to the cross, to reconcile us to God by paying there the penalty for all our sin. Enduring the cross rather than enjoying it, Jesus suffered there ‘for the joy that was set before him’ [Hebrews 12:2]. Weeping may indeed tarry for the night but, irrespective of how long or dark that night might be, we can sure that, because of Jesus’ death and subsequent resurrection, joy will come in the morning [Psalm 30:5].

And so the very real sorrow that we experience today needn’t stop us from simultaneously rejoicing in the anticipated joy of tomorrow. Though sorrowful, we can be always rejoicing. [2 Corinthians 6:10]

Which brings me to an incident recorded for us in Luke Chapter 8. On Palm Sunday Jesus wept whilst all around him were rejoicing, but here we read of those who, though appropriately sad, were told by Jesus not to weep.

Jairus, a ruler of the synagogue, had come to Jesus because his 12 year old daughter was close to death. He implored Jesus to come to his house hoping no doubt that Jesus would perform another of his miracles and restore the girl to health. But having been delayed on the way, news comes that the child has died. When he finally arrives, Jesus enters the house with Jairus, the child’s mother and three of his disciples. Everyone is weeping and mourning and it’s then that Jesus tells them not to weep, claiming that, despite evidence to the contrary, the girl is not dead but only sleeping.

Jesus’ words seem laughable and not a little insensitive given the circumstances – but he says them nonetheless. Had we been there we might have been tempted to suggest to Jesus that now might be a good time to ‘weep with those who weep’, something the Bible itself commends. [Romans 12:15].

But had we done so, Jesus would perhaps have reminded us of the words he’d previously said to Jairus when first he heard that his daughter had died: ‘Do not fear; only believe, and she will be well’.

But what exactly was Jesus asking Jairus to believe? Was Jesus advocating a view that is not infrequently heard today that if you somehow muster up sufficient belief in something you want to happen, that thing will magically materialise? I don’t think so. Rather I think Jesus was urging Jairus to believe something that was, and is, objectively true – that Jesus is God made man, that he is the one who has authority over death, the one who, having declared himself to be ‘the resurrection and the life’ [John 11:25], proved the truth of his claim by raising Lazarus from the dead.

Faith in such a one as Jesus is very well placed, as is clear from what happened next. Because Jesus then proceeded to take the girl by the hand and called to her saying, ‘Child, arise’. And as he did so, her spirit returned and she got up at once’ [Luke 8:54-55]

And what was true for Jairus is, I believe, true for us. We need not fear, confident that, if we believe in Jesus, ultimately, all will be well for us too

This is not to suggest that those with faith in Christ can expect a life of health, wealth and prosperity. Far from it – problems will undoubtedly remain. And for those who are persecuted for what they believe, their faith may make their life even harder. Even so, trusting in Jesus does nonetheless guarantee that even on the darkest of days and in the most desperate of situations there is hope, a certain hope, that God will one day keep his promise to wipe away every tear from our eyes and see to it that, as well as death then being a thing of the past, there will be neither mourning, nor crying, nor pain anymore. [Revelation 21:4].

What then becomes of the broken hearted? Let the psalmist tell you,

‘The LORD heals the broken hearted and binds up their wounds’ [Psalm 147:3].

And that is a hope in which we who believe can all rejoice – irrespective of whether, in our current sadness, the tears continue to flow or not.

Related blogs:

To read ‘Why do bad things happen to good people? Sorrowful yet always rejoicing in Good Friday’, click here.

To read ‘Was it not necessary that the Christ should suffer these things? Rejoicing though temporarily sorrowful on Easter Day’, click here.

To read “Suffering- A Personal View”, click here.

To read “Why do bad things happen to good people – a tentative suggestion”, click here

To read “Luther and the global pandemic – on becoming a theologian of the cross”, click here

To read ‘T.S. Eliot, Jesus and the Paradox of the Christian Life’, click here

To read ‘Real Power’, click here

To read ‘Foolishness – Law and Gospel’, click here

To read ‘The Promise Keeper’, click here

To read ‘The Rainbow’s End’, click here

To read ‘True Love?’, click here

To read “Hope comes from believing the promises of God”, click here

To read, ‘But this I know’, click here

To read ‘I’ll miss this when I’m gone – extended theological version’, click here

To read ‘On being confronted by the law’, click here

To read ‘The “Already” and the “Not Yet”’, click here

To read ‘The Sacrifice of Isaac – Law or Gospel?’, click here

To read ‘Rest Assured’, click here

THE NHS CONNECTION

Why are so many folk
On too long waiting lists
And why don’t ambulances come?
Why are there not enough
Nurses now working,
And why do the doctors look glum?
Could it be down to those who, though in power,
Simply do not have a clue?

We must retain the
NHS Connection
The doctors and nurses and you.

Today the NHS
Struggles to cope with
All that it’s asked to do
Still though it every day
Cares for the poorly
Though it is staffed by too few
But it’s still amazing, still worthy of praising
Give it the credit it’s due

We must retain the
NHS Connection
The doctors and nurses and you.

All of us under its care
To lose it would surely be tragic!

So then come gather round
All who desire
The NHS should remain
‘Care that is free at the
Point that it’s needed’
Let that be our refrain
Some say the answer lies in private healthcare
But I know they’re wrong, it’s not true

We must retain the
NHS Connection
The doctors and nurses and you.

Da-da-da-dee-da-da dum
Da-da-da-da-dee-da-da-doo

Kermit wasn’t available when this was recorded so I donned my most appropriately coloured jumper and stepped in at the last minute to take his place. Turns out it isn’t easy being green!

For other medically themed songs for which I take full responsibility, follow the links below. Audio versions are available for those marked with an asterisk. There are others, but these are the least worst!

We’ve got a brand new GP Vacancy*

GP, GP, We’re so in need of you*

Baggy White Coats*

East Quay Medical Conte Madness*

Working in a Healthcare Hinterland*

What A Wonderful Job This Can Be*

The Wild GP*

GP Kicks*

A Hard Year For Us All*

UNDER PRESSURE – HOW LONG FOR GENERAL PRACTICE?

Unhappy that you can’t get an appointment at your GP surgery as quickly as you’d like? If so, you’re not alone – because GPs aren’t happy about it either.

Why then do we find ourselves in this sorry position? Part of the reason is because, as has being recently reported in the press 1200 GP Practices have closed since 2015 leaving England with fewer GP surgeries than ever before. Furthermore, rather than the promised increase in the number of family doctors, the last seven years have seen the loss of the equivalent of 2078 fully qualified full time GPs.

And so, with a 7% decrease in the number of GPs coinciding with a 7% increase in the country’s population, the number of patients per surgery is consequently at an all time high. Add to this the increasingly complex needs of an aging population, the long waiting times for those needing hospital treatment, and the all too frequent lack of both sufficient community care and even basic medicines, and it isn’t hard to understand why the pressure on primary care services is higher now than it has ever been before.

It comes as no surprise therefore that the Health Foundation’s report on General Practice described the current pressures as ‘unsustainable’, resulting as they do in GPs and, no doubt, their clinical and non clinical colleagues, experiencing higher workloads, increased levels of emotional distress, and significantly lower levels of job satisfaction. Whilst I am fortunate to work in a wonderfully supportive practice, one that is able to mitigate much of the stress that the job entails, it nonetheless remains the case that we too have not been unaffected by the current crises, unable as we have been to recruit an additional doctor to cope with the extra 1500 patients we were forced to take on a year or so ago after a neighbouring practice in the town collapsed.

Elsewhere however, in practices staffed by those less fortunate than I, where the struggles are so much greater than those with which we have had to contend, the situation is even worse. And for some it has already become impossible with the future looking only bleaker still.

Yet more worrying though is the effect that all of this is having on those with genuine medical need. Because the Health Foundation also reported that half of all GPs believe that patient care is suffering. This is something that should concern everyone irrespective of their current health – and all the more so given how it seems likely that the situation will only continue to get steadily worse.

So how long will your local health centre survive? Who can say, but is it any wonder that, with the future of General Practice in doubt, too few are considering entering the profession and many who are already in it are now looking elsewhere for possible future employment.

As you’ll see below, I myself have been busy honing my skills as a DJ in the event of my needing to find an alternative form of gainful employment. In the meantime though, I’m just hoping that there’s still a GP out there somewhere who can refer me to a plastic surgeon with a special interest in the treatment of those with absolutely no sense of rhythm and an equally meagre level of common sense.

Now has anyone got any Flamazine they could let me have?

THE NHS CONNECTION
Kermit the frog wasn’t available this evening so I donned my most appropriate coloured jumper and stepped in at the last minute to take his place. Turns out it isn’t easy being green.

The lyrics can be found along with links to other ill advised attempts at singing by clicking below. You have been warned!

To read ‘With time running out’, click here

To read ‘Wither tomorrow?’, click here

To read ‘The NHS Emporium’, click here

To read ‘On Approaching One’s Sell By Date’, click here

To read ‘General Practice – is time running out?’, click here

To read ‘Friday, Bloody Friday’, click here

To read ‘On being overwhelmed’, click here

To read ‘On Not Remotely Caring’, click here

To read ‘Contactless’, click here

To read ‘An Audience for Grief’, click here

To read ‘Vaccinating to remain susceptible’, click here

To read ‘Eleanor Rigby is not at all fine’, click here

To read ‘The Abolition of General Practice’, click here

To read ‘General Practice – still a sweet sorrow’, click here

To read ‘The Life I Lead’, click here

To read ‘When “Good enough” isn’t good enough’ click here

To read ‘Something to reflect on – are we too narcissistic?’, click here

To read ‘Too busy to be happy?’, click here

To read ‘The NHS – the ‘S’ is for service, not slave’, click here

To read ‘On keeping what we dare not lose’, click here

To read ‘Bagpuss and the NHS’, click here

To read ‘Health – it’ll be the death of us. Is there institutional arrogance in the NHS?’, click here

To read ‘On being crazy busy – a ticklish problem’, click here

To read ‘From A Distance’, click here

To read ‘I’ll miss this when we’re gone’, click here

To read ‘Don’t forget to be ordinary, if you want to be happy’, click here

WITH TIME RUNNING OUT

Last night I watched ‘Living’, the recently released film, written and directed by the Booker Prize winning author of ‘The Remains of the Day’, Kasuo Ishiguro. Starring Bill Nighy and Aimee Lou Wood it is set in 1953 and charts the final few months in the life of Mr Williams, a senior bureaucrat in the London City Council.

In one particular poignant scene, Mr Williams, wonderfully portrayed by Nighy, considers how fitting it is that children who have been happily playing outdoors try to ignore their mothers when they are told by them that it’s finally time to come inside for tea. He contrasts their appropriate reluctance to accept that their fun is over with those other youngsters who, not a part of the games that are being played, watch sadly on and are therefore all too happy when at last the afternoon draws to a close.

In the film, Mr Williams’ reflections, all the more pertinent given the fact that he has recently received a terminal diagnosis, have an impact on how he approaches what little time he has left. As I watched, I couldn’t help thinking that, with just three years to go before I reach the average age at which a GP retires, I too have only a little time left. And as one who has long hoped that when my time came to retire, I would be sad to go, I was left pondering what needs to change if I, like those sidelined children, am not to spend the rest of my working life simply longing for it to come to an end.

Such considerations are not mine alone. This week, eager to stem the flow of senior doctors that are currently leaving the profession, the chancellor announced changes to the pension system so as to make it more financially worthwhile for them to stay in gainful employment. But what he and his colleagues in government seem to fail to understand is that, whilst perhaps not unwelcome, a few extra quid will not be enough to retain those who no longer derive the pleasure they once did from their work. This is, of course, a state of affairs which, far from being unique to those working in medicine, is replicated in other areas of the public sector. As such, those in power need to recognise that it is working conditions that are going to have to improve if large swaths of the workforce are to be retained.

There will of course be those who, considering it our duty to do so, say that those in positions such as mine should simply stop their moaning and get on with the task in hand. But before we bow our heads apologetically and nod along to their demands for greater altruism, perhaps those who insist that it is simply a matter of everyone working longer and harder should consider this: that the pleasure one gains from one’s work comes in large measure from being able to do that work well, a state of affairs that requires the necessary resources, both material and human, to be in place.

If then we are to accept a dispirited workforce who, dissatisfied by their achievements, are dutifully and joylessly going through the motions, we must accept too the poorer outcomes that will also be the effect of our acquiescence. Not only that, but we will have to continue to tolerate the inevitable continued exodus of those who, recognising how impossible their work has become, chose instead to look elsewhere to do what good they can.

When he retired in 2001, Tony Benn said that he was leaving parliament to spend more time in politics. What a tragedy it would be if, like him, those leaving medicine and other public services did so to spend the time they had left doing what they had found they could no longer do in their place of work.

Much, then, needs to change – and fast. Because it’s not just for me that time is running out.

‘Living’ is available now to rent or buy on Amazon Prime.

To read ‘Wither tomorrow?’, click here

To read ‘The NHS Emporium’, click here

To read ‘On Approaching One’s Sell By Date’, click here

To read ‘General Practice – is time running out?’, click here

To read ‘Friday, Bloody Friday’, click here

To read ‘On being overwhelmed’, click here

To read ‘On Not Remotely Caring’, click here

To read ‘Contactless’, click here

To read ‘An Audience for Grief’, click here

To read ‘Vaccinating to remain susceptible’, click here

To read ‘Eleanor Rigby is not at all fine’, click here

To read ‘The Abolition of General Practice’, click here

To read ‘General Practice – still a sweet sorrow’, click here

To read ‘The Life I Lead’, click here

To read ‘When “Good enough” isn’t good enough’ click here

To read ‘Something to reflect on – are we too narcissistic?’, click here

To read ‘Too busy to be happy?’, click here

To read ‘The NHS – the ‘S’ is for service, not slave’, click here

To read ‘On keeping what we dare not lose’, click here

To read ‘Bagpuss and the NHS’, click here

To read ‘Health – it’ll be the death of us. Is there institutional arrogance in the NHS?’, click here

To read ‘On being crazy busy – a ticklish problem’, click here

To read ‘From A Distance’, click here

To read ‘I’ll miss this when we’re gone’, click here

To read ‘Don’t forget to be ordinary, if you want to be happy’, click here

she’s the patient you don’t have anymore

she never came to see you,
never looked you in the eye,
she never came to tell you
how she hoped that she would die

she never asked for tablets,
never sought from you a note,
she never gave herself a chance,
she chose to stay remote

you’re not her doctor anymore
but don’t think you’re to blame,
you never even spoke to her
you never knew her name.

To read ‘together in line’ click here

To read ‘the wrong patient’, click here

To read ‘Desolation Row’, click here

To read ‘Beaten’, click here

To read ‘she’s the patient you still don’t know you have’ click here

To read ‘she’s the patient you don’t know you have’, click here

To read ‘Eleanor Rigby is not at all fine’, click here

Other less than prosaic pieces:

To read ‘Crushed’, click here

To read ‘A Silent Tear’, click here

To read ‘A Lonely Heart’, click here

To read ‘The Old Surfer’, click here

To read ‘I knew a Man’, click here

To read ‘Masked’, click here

To read ‘Patient’, click here

To read ‘Room Enough’, click here

To read ‘Old Hands’, click here

To read ‘Yesterday and Today’, click here

To read ‘Resting in Pieces’, click here

To read ‘Poor imitations’, click here

To read ‘Spare me a doctor’, click here

To read ‘If’, click here

To read ‘Smoke Signals’, click here

To read ‘Moving Closer’, click here

To read ‘Someone left a cake out in the rain’, click here

To read ‘At Land’s End’, click here

EQMC – WHERE MARMALADE SANDWICHES COME AS STANDARD.

Perusing the latest issue of the PJGP [Peruvian Journal of General Practice] this week, I came across an interesting study on the therapeutic benefits of a certain bread based snack. This was the abstract.

‘Until recently the use of marmalade sandwiches to mitigate the stress experienced by those working in primary care settings has been sporadic. Following last years revelations that the late Queen always carried such an item in her handbag in case of emergencies, we decided to investigate whether such provision impacted positively on the emotional well being of clinicians working in a Somerset medical centre where marmalade sandwiches are made readily available. We found that those working at the practice rated themselves as 74% happier than colleagues in a neighbouring practice and smiled for 81% of the day compared to the national average of 27%. [p<0.001]. We conclude that marmalade sandwiches should be offered twice daily to all in direct contact with patients and that those looking to work in primary care centres should limit there search to practices regularly providing such light refreshment.’

The sandwiches are made fresh daily and checked by our expert marmalade taster to ensure they are always of premium quality!

Coincidentally a job vacancy has come up at the practice where this study took place, the details of which can be found here:

https://www.bmj.com/careers/job/158777/salaried-gp-gp-partner-6-sessions-east-quay-medical-centre/

More about the practice can be found here

https://eastquaymedicalcentre.com/

You may also be interested to know that the practice can now be revealed as the one featured in the following stories based on Paddington’s recent visits. Those stories can be read here – all names have been changed.

A GP CALLED PADDINGTON can be read HERE

and

PADDINGTON AND THE AILING ELDERLY RELATIVE can be read HERE

All names have been changed!

The GPs and Practice Manager of EQMC – smiling after their daily intake of the feel good foodstuff.

Other unlikely tales:

To read ‘the day LITTLE RED RIDING HOOD got sick’ click here

To read ‘Mr Benn – the GP’, click here

To read ‘Scooby Doo and the Deserted Medical Centre’, click here

To read ‘Dr Jonathan Harker and the post evening surgery home visit’, click here

To read ‘Bagpuss and the NHS’, click here

To read ‘Jeeves and the Hormone Deficiency’, click here

To read ‘Jeepy Leepy and the NHS’, click here

To read ‘The Three Little GPs and the Big Bad Secretary of State for Health’, click here

To read ‘A Dream of an Antiques Roadshow’, click here

To read ‘Mr McGregor’s Revenge – A Tale of Peter Rabbit’, click here

To read ‘The Scrooge Chronicles’, click here

To read ‘Dr Wordle and the Mystery Diagnosis’, click here

To read ‘The Happy Practice – A Cautionary Tale’, click here

To read ‘The Three General Practitioners Gruff’, click here

To read ‘General Practices are Go!’, click here

To read ‘A Mission Impossible’, click here

To read ‘A Grimm Tale’, click here

To read ‘The General Practitioner – Endangered’, click here

To read ‘The State of Disrepair Shop’, click here

To read ‘And all because…’, click here

And finally, five sketches based on old Monty Python scripts:

To read ‘The NHS Emporium’, click here

To read ‘The Dead NHS Sketch’, click here

To read ‘Monty Python and the NHS’, click here

To read ‘The Four Clinicians Sketch’, click here

To read ‘Dr Creosote’, click here

EAST QUAY MEDICAL CENTRE – MADNESS

Here’s a link to a job advert:

https://www.bmj.com/careers/job/158777/salaried-gp-gp-partner-6-sessions-east-quay-medical-centre/

If, as Oscar Wilde might say, to embarrass oneself once may be regarded a misfortune, but to do it a second time looks like carelessness, what would it be if one were to do it a third time? Surely nothing short of madness. And yet here I am, making a fool of myself once again in the hope of attracting applications for the vacant GP post at East Quay Medical Centre in Bridgwater, Somerset.

This time however you will find me in a more reflective mood in what is my most intimate song yet. In it I draw back the curtain and reveal something of the personalities of those I work alongside. And below as a special treat is a picture of them all – who wouldn’t want to join a team made up of such (largely) beautiful people!

East Quay Medical Centre’s GPs and Practice Manager – January 2023

Last week I read of how Ed Sheeran wrote all the songs of his latest album in a week. Mr Sheeran is obviously something of an amateur when it comes to songwriting since it took me far less time than that to come up with this reworking of ‘Baggy Trousers’ by Madness. Of course there may be those who might think that such hurried composition is reflected in the quality of the piece, but they would be wrong, because it would have been no better had I spent all year crafting the lyrics.

The lyrics appear a little further down the page but here, as a test for your endurance, is a link to the song being sung. If it doesn’t work you can find the video in my Facebook page. Just search ‘Pete Aird’ and look for my severed head sitting in a pool of blood!

https://www.facebook.com/100028558551017/posts/pfbid023uWhVx5zcXjXrEom36eT9W84M9utBgZCVCcY68DdVx2kHmbiBC8wKxUgDbS9hg8Pl/?app=fbl

Here’s that link to the actual job advert again:

https://www.bmj.com/careers/job/158777/salaried-gp-gp-partner-6-sessions-east-quay-medical-centre/

And you can find out more about East Quay Medical Centre here.

http://www.eastquaymedicalcentre.com/

If you know anyone who might be interested in the post, do please feel free to share!

Links to other medically themed songs can be found at the bottom of this page!

EAST QUAY MEDICAL CENTRE – MADNESS
To the tune of ‘Baggy Trousers’

If you long to live the dream
Why not join our happy team
Do the thing you really oughta
Come and practice in Bridgwater
Every morning to start off we
Gather for a cup of coffee
Then prescribe our pills and ointments
In fifteen minute appointments

Oh what fun we have
Tim, he chairs the LMC
Not my cup of tea
I say rather him than me
Then there’s Sally who
Likes to swim, and run and pedal
Won for team GB
A golden medal

Be a part of a team winning
With Doc Power and Glendinning
They came good having unduly
Suffered when trained by yours truly
Nick this year’s our practice chair
P’haps that’s why he has no hair
Rachel wears the PM’s hat
Says her job’s like herding cats

Oh what fun we have
No one reads the college journal
Coral’s skittles Queen
Jess is taking leave maternal
Jen and Ali too
They’ve been with us for a while
Neither very tall
Both hail from the Emerald Isle

Dr Wood she likes to bake
Sometimes brings in homemade cake
And though she’s now well past thirty
Still, on call, she’s never shirty
Doc Aird’s not a pretty sight – a
Low down, no good, lazy blighter
He leaves much to be desired
Best to hope he’s soon retired

Oh what fun we have
Sometimes work it can be tricky
Still we do our best
Caring for those feeling icky
We’ve a vacancy
If then you’re ideally suited
To our practice team
Maybe you’ll be recruited!

EQMC, EQMC, EQMC,
EQMC, EQMC, EQMC
EQMC, EQMC, EQMC
EQMC, EQMC, EQMC,
EQMC, EQMC, EQMC

We’ve got a brand new GP Vacancy*

GP, GP, We’re so in need of you*

Baggy White Coats*

Working in a Healthcare Hinterland*

What A Wonderful Job This Can Be*

The Wild GP*

GP Kicks*

A Hard Year For Us All*

FOOLISHNESS – LAW AND GOSPEL

Over the last couple of weeks I have, on more than one occasion, made something of a fool of myself. Perhaps you’ve noticed! I hope so, because that was at least partly my intention when I donned a pink wig and went public with my ludicrous attempt at singing. By that, and other nonsensical endeavours, I wanted to gain your attention so that I could make you aware that there is a GP post up for grabs at my place of work. It’s important for me that people know this because it’s important for the practice that the position is filled. As such I suppose you could say that, by acting in ways contrary to social norms for the greater good of the organisation in which I work, I have been a fool for East Quay Medical Centre.

And so rather than being a fool for East Quay, I want now to follow in the footsteps of the apostle Paul who, on account of his willingness to suffer for the sake of the gospel, once described himself as a ‘fool for Christ’ [1 Corinthians 4:10]. Now don’t get me wrong, I don’t expect to be persecuted for writing this in the way that Paul was, but being open about my faith in God and my desire to follow Jesus is something that some consider inappropriate in the public square and may cause one or two others to roll their eyes and consider me something of an embarrassment. But like Paul, I am not ashamed of the gospel believing it to be the power of God for salvation for all who believe. [Romans 1:16]

Even so, many of us do seem intent on living a life of continuous struggle. And so, not content with trying to satisfy the just requirements of God’s law, we burden ourselves further by attempting to present ourselves as better than we really are to those whose love we crave. We live in a world that constantly demands that we are awesome. And what a burden this is for those of us who know how far short we fall, who recognise our weakness and our need for help.

And that, in short, is the gospel. The good news is that God has done what we can not.

The law then reveals to us what God demands – demands that we cannot keep however hard we try. In contrast, the gospel tells us that dispute our sinfulness, God loves us, and sent his son into the world to save us. The gospel is the news that by living a perfect life, Jesus kept the law that we could not, it is the news that a great exchange has taken place such that we are robed in Christ’s righteousness even as our sinfulness is laid on Jesus, it is the news that, as Jesus allows himself to be crucified in our place, bearing there the punishment we deserve, we are counted right with God. Some will indeed say this is foolishness, but it is through such apparent foolishness that we have been redeemed and a great salvation has been a secured, one that, as well as guaranteeing the forgiveness of our sins, promises a future devoid of sickness, sadness and death. [Revelation 21:4].

How then should we respond to this good news. A story Jesus once told might help. This is what he said in Luke 18:10-14.

Quote generally attributed to John Bunyan, author of ‘The Pilgrim’s Progress’

The evidence for the resurrection is well documented and a couple of links follow for those interested:

http://www.desiringgod.org/articles/historical-evidence-for-the-resurrection

https://biblicalstudies.org.uk/article_resurrection_anderson.html

To read ‘On being confronted by the law’, click here

To read ‘The “Already” and the “Not Yet”’, click here

To read ‘Looking back to move confidently forwards’, click here

To read ‘on the FALLEN and the FELLED’, click here

To read ‘Everything is alright’, click here

To read ‘Faith and Doubt’, click here

To read ‘On NOT leaving your comfort zone’, click here

To read ‘Water from a Rock’, click here

To read ‘The Resurrection – is it just rhubarb?’, click here

To read ‘The Sacrifice of Isaac – Law or Gospel?’, click here

To read ‘Rest Assured’, click here

To read “Why do bad things happen to good people – a tentative suggestion”, click here

To read “Suffering- A Personal View”, click here.

To read ‘Good Friday 2022’, click here

To read “Easter Sunday – 2021”, click here

To read ‘Real Power’, click here

To read “Luther and the global pandemic – on becoming a theologian of the cross”, click here

To read ‘T.S. Eliot, Jesus and the Paradox of the Christian Life’, click here

To read ‘True Love?’, click here

To read “Hope comes from believing the promises of God”, click here

To read, ‘But this I know’, click here

To read ‘I’ll miss this when I’m gone – extended theological version’, click here

EAST QUAY MEDICAL CENTRE – MADNESS

Here’s a link to a job advert:

https://www.bmj.com/careers/job/158777/salaried-gp-gp-partner-6-sessions-east-quay-medical-centre/

The lyrics appear a little further down the page but here, as a test for your endurance, is a link to the song being sung.

Here’s that link to the actual job advert again:

https://www.bmj.com/careers/job/158777/salaried-gp-gp-partner-6-sessions-east-quay-medical-centre/

And you can find out more about East Quay Medical Centre here.

http://www.eastquaymedicalcentre.com/

If you know anyone who might be interested in the post, do please feel free to share!

Links to other medically themed songs can be found at the bottom of this page!

EAST QUAY MEDICAL CENTRE – MADNESS
To the tune of ‘Baggy Trousers’

Oh what fun we have
Tim, he chairs the LMC
Not my cup of tea
I say rather him than me
Then there’s Sally who
Likes to swim, and run and pedal
Won for team GB
A golden medal

EQMC, EQMC, EQMC,
EQMC, EQMC, EQMC
EQMC, EQMC, EQMC
EQMC, EQMC, EQMC,
EQMC, EQMC, EQMC

We’ve got a brand new GP Vacancy*

GP, GP, We’re so in need of you*

Baggy White Coats*

Working in a Healthcare Hinterland*

What A Wonderful Job This Can Be*

The Wild GP*

GP Kicks*

A Hard Year For Us All*

ELEANOR RIGBY IS NOT AT ALL FINE

‘Eleanor Rigby
Picks up the rice in the church where a wedding has been
Lives in a dream
Waits at the window
Wearing the face that she keeps in a jar by the door
Who is it for?’

Eleanor Oliphant may be perfectly fine – but Eleanor Rigby is not. Maybe you’re not either. Because Eleanor Rigby is not alone – there are far too many like her.

It’s no fun to be lonely. It’s no fun to live by yourself and spend each evening trying to keep yourself busy in the hope that you can somehow forget how alone you really are. Sometimes though, you just can’t forget and it’s a job then to do anything at all.

The weekends don’t help. Rather than being something to look forward to, they serve only to heighten the sense of isolation that you feel as the long hours drag by with you seeing nobody from the end of one working week to the beginning of another. Hopes of ever meeting somebody and settling down seem like an unattainable dream.

And so, as the loneliness continues, the unhappiness grows. The more unhappy you become, the greater the anxiety you feel at what it would take for the sadness to end until you find, in time, that the more you long for the loneliness to end, the more you long to be alone. You wonder what the point of it all might be and conclude that there is no point at all.

Alone in your room, imagining the happiness of others, it’s easy to sing silently along to The Velvet Underground,

‘All the people are dancing
And they’re having such fun
I wish it could happen to me
But if you close the door
I’d never have to see the day again’

Antidepressants may be offered to you but they never really help. No substitute for friends, they’re not the answer – too often they just make you feel worse. Conceivably, talking therapy could help a little but, rather than the simple steps towards a better tomorrow that it was suggested they would be, each session becomes just one more thing to survive, just one more hurdle to overcome.

It’s hard to know what to do in such circumstances, not because you lack intelligence, on the contrary you have learnt well what the world has taught all too well, that isolation is good and that we all have to make it on our own.

And so, as I talk to such people, I sense them whispering, ‘I don’t know what to do’. And too often, like them, I find myself stuck, not knowing how to answer. When we eventually part, as I too abandon them to their solitude, their sadness surrounds me and increasingly it becomes my own. ‘

All the lonely people – where do they all come from?’

Loneliness, and the accompanying anxiety that is so often both its’ cause and effect, is a common problem and, to those who experience it, it is both crippling and overwhelming. And the problem is getting worse and will, I suspect, continue to do so for as long as society persists in fragmenting and we carry on being encouraged to live too much of our lives online. Because a life lived virtually is a life that isn’t quite complete – and a life that isn’t quite complete will feel, to many, like a life that is no longer worth holding on to.

Something is missing from our all too virtual lives, something has been lost. And that something is ourselves We all so long to be found.

‘Will you search through the loamy earth for me
Climb through the briar and bramble
I will be your treasure’

So run the opening lines of Johnny Flynn’s theme song to the TV comedy series ‘Detectorists’. If you haven’t seen it then do yourself a favour and give it a go. It’s about two friends, Andy and Lance, who spend all their spare time metal detecting. To be honest, not a lot happens. But as what doesn’t happen unfolds, a wonderful friendship between two people is portrayed, one which one can’t help feeling is something that is precious beyond words. Something to be envied.

In one scene Lance is talking to another character about his years of metal detecting. He says,

‘This was our escape from the rude world, the madding crowd…Do you know how often we find gold? Never. We never find it. And that’s what we’re looking for. We don’t say that. We don’t say that we’re looking for gold. We pretend we’re happy finding buckles and buttons and crap, but what we’re hoping for is gold.’

But what Lance is forgetting is the gold he has already found in the friendship he shares with Andy. The truth is that, because of that friendship, he really can be happy ‘finding buckles and buttons and crap’.

Likewise, we too all need to sometimes stop our searching for things that don’t really matter and see what of value lies right in front of us, but which we so easily overlook. Good relationships are the basis for happiness – if we have them, we are fortunate indeed. We should not underestimate their worth.

Despite having no interest in angling, another program that I have enjoyed immensely is ‘Gone Fishing’. Like ‘Detectorists’, whilst precious little takes place, we see a genuine friendship in action, this time a real one, between Paul Whitehouse and Bob Mortimer. They are long standing friends who have known what it is to support one another through the difficulties they have each known in their lives. And again, it’s genuinely heart warming to watch.

Good relationships enable us to carry on when life seems to be falling apart around us – if we have them, we need to be careful that we nurture them well. I have often thought that it is less important what we do in life than who we do it with. Friendships can and do make all the difference but they need time to develop, time that is spent together, time that our frenetic lifestyles too often don’t afford.

Given that humans are meant to live in community, it is no surprise to learn that loneliness is bad for us. It is of no surprise to anybody that individuals who experience prolonged loneliness are liable to suffer low mood and anxious thoughts. But it is not solely in terms of our emotional wellbeing that loneliness has adverse effects. Less appreciated is the fact that loneliness is also bad for our physical health with those experiencing it having higher rates of cardiovascular and cerebrovascular disease as well as poorer cancer outcomes. It has even been suggested that loneliness is as bad for us as smoking 15 cigarettes a day.

The truth is that loneliness is deadly. Furthermore there a lot of it about. Loneliness in the UK is at epidemic levels with, according to the Office of National Statistics, 2.4 million adult British citizens knowing what it is to be lonely. So if there are so many lonely people, and if loneliness is so bad for our health, why don’t we give it the same attention that we give to such things as blood pressure, smoking and cholesterol levels?

Part of the answer, perhaps, lies in the fact that, with no pill available that can take away the isolation, there is no money to be made from these individuals who live on the edge of society. And where there is no money to be made, there is no incentive for those who decide what our priorities should be to make loneliness one of things that is considered important enough to tackle.

But there is another reason. And that is that lonely go unnoticed – unless we are forced to see, they are so easily overlooked. ‘

‘Eleanor Rigby
Died in the church and was buried along with her name
Nobody came’

For me at least, far more than the physical consequences of isolation, it is this, the enduring sadness that inevitably accompanies loneliness, that concerns me most. The problem of loneliness is not, of course, one that can be solved by any single individual, it is all of society’s responsibility, but even though most of those affected will never dare to ask us for our help, we should, I think, be conscious of both the problem and it’s invasive and malignant consequences.

And so we must always keep asking the question, ‘

All the lonely people – where do they all belong?’

Because, somehow a place for them has to be found. But how?

Personally, faced with someone who is desperately lonely, I admit to sometimes hearing again the words. ‘I don’t know what to do’. Only this time it is me who is whispering them quietly to myself. It isn’t easy to find ourselves not knowing what to do, it is part of what makes it difficult for those of us who are – or were – doctors to break bad news to our patients, it’s part of what makes it hard for us to tell them that there is nothing more that medicine can offer.

But telling someone that we can’t do anything more for them as doctors doesn’t mean that we can’t do more for them as individuals – we don’t have to leave them alone just because we can’t solve their problem.

In ‘Out of Solitude’, Henri Nouwen wrote,

‘When we honestly ask ourselves which persons in our lives mean the most to us, we often find that it is those who, instead of giving advice, solutions, or cures, have chosen rather to share our pain and touch our wounds with a warm and tender hand. The friend who can be silent with us in a moment of despair or confusion, who can stay with us in an hour of grief and bereavement, who can tolerate not knowing, not curing, not healing and face with us the reality of our powerlessness, that is a friend who cares.’ ‘

‘All the lonely people, where do they all belong?’ The answer, surely, is with friends. Though it may be the case that sometimes we can do no more than be a friend who cares, a friend who cares may be all that we are needed to be.

Because, when we do what may seem to be nothing very much, that is when we may actually be doing a very great deal indeed. Sometimes we need to stop being those who disappear when they cannot help and become instead the individuals who, when they don’t know what to do, know how much it can help to simply stick around. For as long as it takes for the one who is lonely to become, perhaps, somebody’s ’very special one’, to become, perhaps, somebody’s treasure.

Listen here to Johnny Flynn singing the title song of ‘Detectorists’

Related blogs:

To read ‘An Audience for Grief’, click here

To read ‘Life after Life’, click here

To read ‘On not remotely caring’, click here

To read ‘Contactless’ click here

To read ‘The Medical Condition – or Hannah Arendt is completely fine’, click here

To read ‘The Life I Lead’, click here

To read ‘General Practice – still a sweet sorrow’, click here

THE LIFE I LEAD

Some while ago I was fortunate enough to be sat in Exeter’s Northcott Theatre to see the opening night of ‘The Life I Lead’. It was a brilliantly written play by James Kettle performed single handedly with equal brilliance by Miles Jupp.

Through a conversation with the audience, it told the story of the life of the British character actor David Tomlinson best known for his portrayal of Mr Banks, the father in the Walt Disney film version of ‘Mary Poppins’. It was a warm and gentle two hours which managed to be seriously funny as well as poignant and moving. It left those watching with a genuine affection for a man who few will have previously known much about.

I’ll not spoil it for those who may yet go and see it but, suffice to say, the play revealed that behind the genial public image, Tomlinson’s personal life, though generally happy was not without tragedy – he was a man who had to live with sadness.

Tomlinson is not alone in having to bear the inevitable sorrows that come as the years pass. Whilst continuing to live and work, attending to the everyday and endeavouring to find happiness, meaning and satisfaction, we all, to a greater or lesser extent, have to endure grief.

In that respect, the performance was made more poignant still from knowing that, as he portrayed Tomlinson so perfectly, Miles Jupp was himself carrying a grief of his own, having lost to cancer, less than a week previously, his friend and colleague, comedian Jeremy Hardy. I hope Jupp was able to enjoy performing despite the sadness he was no doubt still feeling – and appreciated the very warm applause that he received when the show was over.

If he did, then he was not so different from me who was also able to thoroughly enjoy the show, laughing frequently, despite my own ongoing sadness regarding the sudden death of a friend of mine just four weeks previously.

The evening left me reflecting once more how few lives are devoid of tragedy, that life for most is a mixture of the good and the bad and that even when sadnesses come thick and fast, happiness can still be present, intermingling alongside the sorrow.

Life then can, and does, go on, a complex mix of fortune and disaster. Such was the life that Tomlinson led, such is the life I lead and such, perhaps, is the life that you lead too.

T. S. Eliot was right when he wrote: ‘People change and smile: but the agony abides’. I saw it all the time when I worked as a GP, when a little scratching beneath the cheery facade would all too readily uncover a back story to my patients’ lives that I would otherwise never have known about and without which I could not possibly begin to fully understand their presentation.

Why did that woman burst into tears quite so readily over a relatively modest degree of back pain when she consulted that morning? What hidden pain was behind her presentation? What sorrow was she bearing, possibly alone?

It’s sure to have been there because ‘everybody hurts’.

I met Jeremy Hardy once. He was performing his stand up show in Taunton many years ago and I went to see him one evening with a friend who was simultaneously on call for a local GP practice. Those were the days when one could, if covering a small practice population as was he, risk combining an evening on call with a trip to the theatre – provided, that one was careful to position oneself in close proximity to an exit.

Predictably enough, my friends mobile went off and as he sloped out to attend to the sick, Jeremy Hardy took the opportunity to extend his routine by ten minutes with a good humoured berating of anyone who would allow their phone to ring in such a setting. My friend made it back in good time and, having enjoyed the rest of the performance, we were able to indulge in a post show drink in the bar together.

Jeremy Hardy was there too, amiably chatting with anyone who cared to spend time with him. My friend’s phone went off once more and, realising he was a doctor, Jeremy Hardy had a brief chat with us, apologising for his on stage criticism and wishing us well. He seemed to be a genuinely warm and friendly person and I am sorry that no longer entertains us with his fine sense of humour coupled with the earnestness of his politics.

Dying at the age of just 57, Jeremy Hardy no doubt also knew what it was to experience tears amid the laughter.

Sadness then, is universal, even in the happiest of lives. The causes are many, but include both the grief felt for things which are lost – the regret of the broken relationship, the missed opportunity, the faded dream – and the sorrow resulting from the fear that the future will bring no relief – the loss of hope itself. And then of course there is the sadness that results from the unhappiness of others, the misery of those we love.

Many will be familiar with the words of the psalmist who wrote, ‘Weeping may tarry for the night but joy comes in the morning’. I don’t doubt the truth of these words – even so but for some the night has already been long and the day still seems an eternity away.

Elsewhere in those ancient writings are chronicled the trials of Job and the ineffectual efforts of his comforters who needed to learn what we too must appreciate – that sometimes it is best to simply ‘weep with those who weep’ rather than to try to argue them out of their sadness or, worse still, point out to the one who is unhappy the mistakes we think they have made to bring about their misery.

Regardless of whether we believe in God, we can, I think, agree that there is wisdom here.

Regret and sadness have much in common.

In my first year as a GP Principal I recall one Sunday morning visiting a patient who had had a few days of severe diarrhoea and vomiting. He appeared sufficiently dehydrated to require admission and I requested an ambulance to attend, not immediately, as I was soon to regret, but within the hour.

There was, uncharacteristically for those days, some delay in the ambulance attending, and sadly the patient suffered a cardiac arrest and died on route to hospital.

The next day I chatted to my partners about the case. All were supportive and quick to point out that they felt that I had acted appropriately and that the outcome would likely not have been any different even if the ambulance had attended earlier.

But the response that helped me most was that of my senior partner who simply acknowledged that it was tough when things went wrong and related an incident when he had regretted a judgement he’d made some years previously.

That such an experienced and respected GP could ‘regret with those who regret” was very comforting for me.

We are all flawed – even the most experienced make mistakes – mistakes which may be regretted for years but from which, having honestly acknowledged them to both ourselves and those affected by them, we can, none the less, learn much. Perhaps it is even true to say that mistakes are in fact necessary if we are to become the more experienced and better people we desire to be.

Experience comes over time so perhaps it is older folk who recognise this most. Perhaps they are more accepting of their mistakes and are more used to knowing at first hand what it is to experience the associated regret. Just as Abraham Lincoln suggested that the old have come to ever expect sadness, so older people have perhaps come ever to expect regret.

If then mistakes and regret are an inevitable and necessary part of what it is to be human, perhaps sadness is too. Though for the most part I am happy, there is still a sadness that sits alongside my happiness – a sadness which sometimes is easier to feel. That, I suspect, is a feature of the lives we all lead.

But if mistakes and regret have the capacity to make us better people, then maybe sadness has the capacity to make us better people too.

Rather then than trying to constantly avoid sadness and, when it does make it’s inevitably unwelcome appearance, attempting to rationalise it away, perhaps we would all do well to learn to accept life’s sadness as a ‘severe mercy’ – and allow our lives to be paradoxically enriched by it’s presence.

If so, I hope I can become that wise.

To read ‘On Gratitude and Regret’, click here

Other blogs related to Films, Plays and TV Series:

To read ‘Life in the Happy Valley’, click here

To read ‘I’ll miss this when I’m Gone’, click here

To read ‘I’ll miss this when I’m gone – extended theological version’, click here

To read ‘Somewhere over the Rainbow’, click here

To read ‘When the Jokes on You’, click here

To read ‘Three Chords and the Truth’, click here

To read ‘With great power…’, click here

To read ‘An Audience with Grief’, click here

To read ‘The Dig – it’s well worth it’, click here

To read ‘Do You Hear The People Sing?’, click here

To read ‘Life after Life’, click here

To read ‘A Dream if an Antiques Riadshow’, click here

To read ‘Brian and Stumpy visit the Repair Shop’, click here

To read ‘The Great Cricket Sell Off’, click here

To read ‘I’m a GP…get me out of here!’, click here

To read ‘Mr Benn – the GP’, click here

To read ‘A GP called Paddington’, click here

To read ‘Scooby Doo and the Deserted Medical Centre’, click here

To read ‘Paddington and the Ailing Elderly Relative’, click here

To read ‘Dr Jonathan Harker and the post evening surgery home visit’, click here

To read ‘Bagpuss and the NHS’, click here

To read ‘Jeeves and the Hormone Deficiency’, click here

To read ‘Scooby Doo and the Deserted Cricket Ground’, click here

To read ‘General Practices are Go!’, click here

To read ‘A Mission Impossible’, click here

To read ‘Vanity Fair’, click here

To read ‘Measure for Measure – Appraisal formAppraisal’, click here

To read ‘Eleanor Rigby is not at all fine’, click here

To read ‘The State of Disrepair Shop’, click here

GP, GP – WE’RE SO IN NEED OF YOU!

Here’s a link to a job advert:

https://www.bmj.com/careers/job/158777/salaried-gp-gp-partner-6-sessions-east-quay-medical-centre/

A successful advert should be a) eye catching, b) memorable and c) capable of generating some excitement for the thing which it is advertising. I’m not sure the above is wholly successful in those three endeavours!

And so, last week, in a desperate attempt to attract a new GP to East Quay Medical Centre in Bridgwater, I drew inspiration from the Wurzels in the hope of relaying something of the rustic charm that is to be enjoyed by any who make their home in this beautiful part of the country. [You can read of that by clicking here] Unaccountably, however, channeling Somerset’s finest musical ensemble doesn’t appear to have cut the mustard and, seven days on, the post remains unfilled! I know, unbelievable isn’t it?!.

In keeping with my Scottish roots, therefore, it’s a case of ‘If at first you don’t succeed, try, try and try again’. And so this week I’m upping my game and, rather than inflicting on you something which might be considered a little parochial, have chosen instead to offer up a more upbeat and ‘out there’ classic!

The song is entitled ‘GP’ and is a take on Blondie’s 1978 hit ‘Denis’. Below is a link to where you can hear it being sung by a special guest songstress. As you will see, though she might not have the same distinctive hair as her more famous sibling, Debbie Harry’s twin sister does possess comparable vocal talents to the aforementioned chanteuse. I am indebted to Purpley-Pinky who kindly made herself available for the recording, one which is already being heralded as superior to the version on which it is based.

Here then is the link to the performance – those who follow it do so at their own risk.

As a job advert, I think it ticks the boxes for being both eye catching and memorable and I apologise if that means you can’t something you’d rather you hadn’t seen out of your head! But I hope too that it will serve to generate a degree of excitement in the GP post that is available at the practice that was once nominated for the award of ‘Best Medical Centre situated next to a Home Improvement Retailer’ and which subsequently came second in the subcategory allocated for those who find themselves adjacent to a branch of Wickes.

And so next week I am anticipating that we will be inundated with applications. And if we’re not?… well you’ll have yourselves to blame if at some point in the future I’m forced to embarrass myself again and expose you to yet another tragic musical misadventure!

Here’s that link to the actual job advert again:

https://www.bmj.com/careers/job/158777/salaried-gp-gp-partner-6-sessions-east-quay-medical-centre/

And you can find out more about East Quay Medical Centre here.

http://www.eastquaymedicalcentre.com/

If you know anyone who might be interested in the post, do please feel free to share!

Links to other medically themed songs can be found at the bottom of this page!

Oh GP, ooh-be-do, we’re in need of you,
GP, ooh-be-do, we’re in need of you,
GP, ooh-be-do, we’re in need of you.

Come work with us, illness investigate,
Prescribe a truss, and heart sounds auscultate,
GP, GP, we’re so in need of you,

You soon will find – we are a friendly bunch,
And if we can – we gather for our lunch,
GP, GP, we’re so in need of you.

At East Quay, we are looking for a doctor just like you,
So come on, please do apply,
You’ll be so happy if we give the job to you.

J’aimerais pouvoir parler français,
Mais je n’ai pas oh la capacité,
GP, GP, we’re so in need of you.

GP, GP, the senior partners cool,
GP, GP, he never acts the fool,
GP, GP, we’re so in need of you.

Oh GP, ooh-be-do, we’re in need of you,
GP, ooh-be-do, we’re in need of you,
GP, ooh-be-do, we’re in need of you.

Oh GP, ooh-be-do, we’re in need of you,
GP, ooh-be-do, we’re in need of you,
GP, ooh-be-do, we’re in need of you,
GP, ooh-be-do, we’re in need of you.

We’ve got a brand new GP Vacancy*

East Quay Medical Centre Madness*

Baggy White Coats*

Working in a Healthcare Hinterland*

What A Wonderful Job This Can Be*

The Wild GP*

GP Kicks*

A Hard Year For Us All*

WE HAD THE EXPERIENCE – BUT MISSED THE MEANING

A while back I read ‘Histories’ by Sam Gugliani – It’s a very good read relating the stories of various individuals, clinical and non clinical, who work in a hospital, and gives their differing perspectives of what takes place there. To give you a flavour, here are a couple of quotes that stood out for me and got me thinking.

‘Hospital words spun like stones across the still waters of people’s lives.’

‘We’re all victims, aren’t we, of medicine’s success’

and

‘Their voices change key when they speak to him, lengthening to a sing-song, as if his dying might be rendered in nursery rhymes.’

And then there was, ‘We had the experience but missed the meaning’. Those more literate than I will know without resorting to an internet search that it is a line from the third of T.S. Eliot’s ‘Four Quartets’ entitled ‘The Dry Salvages”. It has been on my mind since discovering this remarkable, if perhaps bleak, poem.

Drawing on a 2010 blog by Ben Myers which helped me understand the poem, Eliot seems to be saying that ‘as one becomes older’ our pasts reveal, if we will see it, a pattern in which moments of ‘sudden illumination’, those times when we are happy, are the temporary exception to the norm. They are like a ‘ragged rock in the restless waters’ which serve only to reveal that the true nature of our existence is one in which permanency is characterised by abiding ‘moments of agony’ – such is ‘the primitive terror’.

‘And the ragged rock in the restless waters,
Waves wash over it, fogs conceal it;
On a halcyon day it is merely a monument,
In navigable weather it is always a seamark
To lay a course by: but in the somber season
Or the sudden fury, is what it always was’

Eliot describes Time as both our ‘destroyer’ and our ‘preserver’. The only thing that keeps us alive is the very thing that brings about our demise. Eliot is urging us to see this deeper truth that our moments of happiness display. We have these experiences, he says, but are want to miss their meaning.

So what do I take from this as a doctor? Like moments of happiness, health too is but temporary. In due course normality will be restored and we will all succumb to the ravages of time. It will ultimately destroy us. I don’t mean that we should resign ourselves to a life of melancholic anticipation of death, but we should, I think, appreciate health for what it is – a state of being that we should value whilst we have it. Furthermore, as doctors, we should be realistic in terms of what we can expect to achieve for our patients. We are, after all, only doctors. We should make every effort to tend the sick and whenever possible endeavour to effect a cure, but just as important perhaps is how we encourage our patients to value their health as the fragile state it truly is and we would do well to consider also how we might prepare them for the inevitability of death. Colluding with patients that with the right combination of pills and sufficient attention to lifestyle death will be avoided is dishonest and, perhaps, detrimental to all our chances of enjoying the life we have.

To end on a more positive note, it should be remembered that ‘The Dry Salvages’ is but the third of Eliot’s ‘The Four Quartets’. The fourth, ‘Little Gidding‘ offers us some hope of redemption. Ironically perhaps, the reader is asked to reflect on their experience of what they have read earlier and understand that they may indeed have missed the meaning. There is redemption but it is a redemption not from, but through death.

‘What we call the beginning is often the end
And to make an end is to make a beginning.
The end is where we start from…
We shall not cease from exploration
And the end of all our exploring
Will be to arrive where we started
And know the place for the first time.’

Similarly then, might we, and our patients, know happiness, not by the avoidance of all sadness, all difficulty, but rather through experiencing hardship and sorrow in all its dreadful intensity?

Too often I make the mistake of thinking that I can only be happy when I’m not sad, and so, when unhappiness steals its inevitable way into my life, I am left feeling that I can no longer know what it is to be happy. Foolishly, before allowing myself to smile again, I insist on striving to put an end to everything that reduces me to tears, on endeavouring to put everything right.

But I simply cannot do it.

Whilst I hope for that time when all will be well, waiting until then before being happy only succeeds in leaving me a long time sad. But, though seemingly contradictory, happiness and sadness are not mutually exclusive. In some sense we cannot know what happiness really is without knowing the pain of sorrow – and sorrow requires the memory of the temporary nature of happiness.

To be truly happy then we cannot deny sadness – on the contrary we must embrace it. And we must learn that it is possible to be ‘sorrowful yet always rejoicing’. It is not that we can not be happy because we know sadness, nor that we can not be sad because there are things to be happy about. Paradoxically, we can be happy and sad at the same time.

As Leonard Cohen sang, shortly before his death, ‘There is a lullaby for suffering and a paradox to blame’.

We may have to be patient but even on the darkest nights there is the hope that there will be other better, brighter days. Days made all the more enjoyable perhaps for having known the sadness that preceded them.

Understand this and we, and our patients, may experience life – without missing its meaning.

To read an extended, more theologically minded, version of this blog, one which considers whether Eliot’s view of life is consistent with the Christian faith he professed, click here

Other related blogs:

To read ‘The Life I Lead’, click here

To read ‘General Practice – a sweet sorrow’, click here

To read ‘Eleanor Rigby is not at all fine’, click here

To read ‘The Medical Condition or Hannah Arendt is Completely Fine’, click here.

To read ‘I’ll miss this when I’m gone’, click here

To read ‘Dark Reflections’, click here

And finally, to read some thoughts on a couple of other other poems, click either on ‘The Windhover’ by Gerald Manley Hopkins, or ‘Be Drunk’ by Charles Baudelaire.

WE’VE GOT A BRAND NEW GP VACANCY

I heard this week of a community in Cornwall who have made a video of them all singing a song in the hope that it might attract a new GP to their village. Well, I thought, that seems like a good idea – one worth copying! So, since I work in a GP practice in Somerset, let me, with the help of the Wurzels, tell you that ‘We’ve got a brand new GP vacancy!’ at East Quay Medical Centre in Bridgwater.

We’re looking for a GP one who can tell
(Ooh ar, ooh ar)
When someone’s symptoms means that they aren’t so well
(Ooh ar, ooh ar)
This is guaranteed, with us you will succeed
(Ooh ar, ooh ar)
So won’t you please come doctor you got something we need

Cos we’ve got a brand new GP vacancy and if you really care
You can have your own consulting room – with a ‘wheely’ chair
We’ve got lots of patients, but one too few GPs
Cos we’ve got a brand new GP vacancy – and those who have disease

You’ll make us laugh, ha ha!

We’ll stick by you, and give you lots of support
(Ooh ah, ooh ar)
We’ll give you homemade cake – not stuff that’s shop bought
(Ooh ar, ooh ar)
With coffee every morning and tea each afternoon
(Ooh ar, ooh ar)
Better get your application in to us soon

Phwoor, we’ve got lovely practice premises an’all

The senior partner he has seen better days
(Ooh ah, ooh ar)
It won’t be long before he’s put out to graze
(Ooh ah, ooh ar)
And so you needn’t worry, grumpy though he is
(Ooh ah, ooh ar)
He’s old and grey now and you’ll have all that’s his!

We love them baby checks ha ha

We’ve got lovely practice nurses, HCAs too
(Ooh ah, ooh ar)
Our manager she is too good to be true
(Ooh ah, ooh ar)
Receptionists and admins, we all work as a team
(Ooh ah, ooh ar)
The only downside is a lass called Doreen*

Cos we’ve got a brand new GP vacancy and if you really care
You can have your own consulting room – with a ‘wheely’ chair
So stop your galavanting, there’s no need for a fuss
Cos we’ve got a brand new GP vacancy – just come and work with us

Ah you’re a fine looking doctor and we can’t wait to see you use your stethoscope!

The brave can hear a rendition of the song here – but be warned, the effect on you will be not dissimilar to that of drinking a sizeable demijohn of West Country scrumpy!

Here is a link to the actual job advert

https://www.bmj.com/careers/job/158777/salaried-gp-gp-partner-6-sessions-east-quay-medical-centre/

*Doreen is one of our excellent HCA’s and, having helped me perform many a minor op, is in fact totally underserving of any tongue in cheek jibes. In fact she alone is reason enough to join us!

And if you know anyone who might be interested, do feel free to share! You can find out more about the practice at http://www.eastquaymedicalcentre.com/

GP, GP, We’re So In Need Of You*

East Quay Medical Centre Madness*

A Hard Year For Us All*

Working in a Healthcare Hinterland*

What A Wonderful Job This Can Be*

Baggy White Coats*

The Wild GP*

GP Kicks*

The green green leaves of home

Is it just me or does anyone else feel guilty about eating baby spinach, given how undoubtedly brief their apparently mild and tender lives must have been?

Be that as it may, today I went shopping in order to buy a bag of the aforementioned green leafed comestible. No sooner had I left the shop however, the thought struck me that a second packet was in order, this being on account of how important it is on Valentine’s Day to make an effort in terms of the quality of the gift one bestows upon one’s own true love.

And so I returned to the store and soon found myself stood once more in front of the lady who had previously taken my money. She was surprised to see me back so soon but, cognisant that I had repeated my earlier salad-y selection, excitedly expressed her belief that I was Popeye.

Somewhat embarrassed by her mistake, I endeavoured to let her down gently but in so doing it was nonetheless inevitable that I would shatter her dreams and leave her both heartbroken and bereft.

Before I went on my way, however, I was at least able to console her with the fact that, due to my undeniably muscular physique, hers was an understandable error, one that has been made by a good many others before her.

Related autobiographical blogs, some more tongue in cheek than others:

To read ‘Two of a Kind’, click here

To read ‘Two photos both alike in dignity’, click here

To read ‘We went to the animal fair, the diary of novice grandparents’, click here

To read ‘A cricket tea kind of day’, click here

To read ‘Poor Imitations’, click here

To read ‘Three times a patient’, click here

To read ‘The Life I Lead’, click here

LIFE IN THE HAPPY VALLEY

WARNING: The following blog contains spoilers – please don’t read if you’ve not yet watched all three series of ‘Happy Valley’ but think that one day you might.

It’s finally over. This week the BBC aired the final ever episode of Sally Wainwright’s excellent TV drama ‘Happy Valley’, a police procedural which stands head and shoulders above all others by virtue of the quality of Wainwright’s writing and the exceptional acting of, in particular, Sarah Lancashire and James Norton. It’s one of those programmes that you are genuinely sorry when it’s over, one that leaves you wishing you hadn’t yet watched it so that you could still look forward to enjoying it for the very first time.

This latest series has been a long time coming. Those who enjoyed the first two series which were first broadcast back in 2014 and 2016 have had to wait seven years for this final instalment. The reason given was that Wainwright wanted to wait for Rhys Connah, the child actor who played Ryan in the earlier series, to grow up so that he could continue to play the same role when older. This show of patience by those with a hit show on their hands is commendable given the inevitable temptation to cash in on the programme’s success. Furthermore, given that it could not be guaranteed that after so many years Connah would still be following an acting career, such a show of patience was not without risk. That patience though was amply rewarded by the commendable performance the young actor gave and demonstrates that it is indeed good to sometimes wait.

It was fitting then that the BBC did not simultaneously release all six episodes of series three at the beginning of January, a decision that deprived us of the opportunity to binge watch it on iPlayer over a couple of days. Instead, after waiting seven years for the series to air, we all had to wait a further week between each hour of hugely enjoying drama, something which, as well as heightening our enjoyment, served to make the programme something of a national event, something that we could enjoy all the more as a shared experience. In these days of instant everything, when all we want we expect to be delivered immediately, it’s good to sometimes have to wait.

But it’s not just the joys of delayed gratification that can be commended about the show – even it’s title is perfect. ‘Happy Valley’ is the name given by those who police the Calder Valley in West Yorkshire. This is on account of the area’s drug problem. But more than that the title gives a nod to something that is present in this series that is all too often lacking in others, namely ‘nuance’. Things in Happy Valley are never straightforward and just as they are in real life, sorrows are experienced alongside moments of happiness. Furthermore, those who live in ‘Trouble Town’* have a complexity to them that doesn’t allow us to categorise them into stereotypical personifications of good and evil.

So Ryan, the child born as a result of the rape of Sergeant Catherine Cawood’s daughter, is, as a result of his mother subsequently taking her own life, brought up in the care of his grandmother who, understandably enough, is torn between affection for her grandson and hatred for all that his existence represents. Her actions clearly reflect the love she has for him yet, when in a particularly poignant scene Ryan, now in his teens, tells her he loves her, she is unable to respond in the way we, as viewers, long for. Instead of expressing any love in return, Catherine manages only to question Ryan as to what brought on such a show of emotion. Likewise, despite her very apparent hatred for Tommy Lee Royce, the man who had violated her daughter all those years previously, and whose actions since have proven that such violence was an integral part of his psychopathic nature, in the powerful climactic scene, one senses that, as a result perhaps of her recognising that in some measure Royce is a product of his upbringing, her attitude to him softens a little and she finds himself calling him by his first name. And we who watch on, and who have been consistently appalled by all that Royce is capable of, also find ourselves accepting that the man we’ve long wished dead, isn’t all bad.

Likewise Catherine Cawood is far from being a one dimensional character. Despite her brilliance as a police officer, she is not perfect. Though we love her she is herself capable of unkindness when in one episode she is involved in a prank that results in a colleague being made to look something of a fool as a result of his perhaps over zealous belief in alien life forms. But when the individual who is a person of colour accuses her of racism, and her senior officer likens her actions to the worst forms of sexual harassment in the workplace, she is rightly indignant, recognising that, whilst all wrong doing is wrong, there are, none the less, varying degrees of wrongdoing. She recognises that lazily tarring the worst offences with the same brush as more minor infringements ultimately serves only to diminishes the seriousness of those actions that deserve our greatest condemnation.

This recognition of complexity is something that we would do well to take into our day to day lives, lives lived in a world where nuance is all too rarely appreciated. Real life issues are frequently complex and given our inability to fully comprehend all that there is to understand, we need to recognise that, rather than everything being black and white, reality exists in a kaleidoscopic world of grey. This is not to suggest that we shouldn’t ever hold strong opinions, but simply to acknowledge that even those with whom we most vehemently disagree may none the less have a point of view that is worth hearing.

Furthermore, we need to recognise that if we knew what others had experienced in their past, their behaviour that we find so hard to accept might be, not only understandable, but also similar to how we would behave ourselves if faced with similar circumstances. Again this is not to excuse wrongdoing. One’s past does not absolve anyone of the responsibility for their actions, but we nonetheless need to accept that adverse circumstances, whilst not an excuse, are frequently a factor when an individual acts badly. We should allow ourselves to be gracious to others, even as we would wish others to be gracious to us when we err in ways that we would find all too easy to justify.

All this is to say that we really do need to try to understand each other better, to communicate more effectively and listen to one other more carefully. And even though we will, on occasions, still inevitably disagree, we need to do so well. It really isn’t necessary to hate everything about an individual simply because we have differing views to them on a single issue. Left unchecked such foolishness will result in our living lives of increasing isolation and hatred as, overtime, we find that, on at least one small matter or another, we disagree with everybody we ever come into contact with and, as a result of a misplaced sense of moral outrage, our anger increases along with our loneliness.

The truth is out there, and it is of course important, but we are more likely to find it if we search for it together than if we imagine we can find it by ourselves.

It is, after all, good to talk.

* ‘Trouble Town’ is the name of the song by Jake Bugg that provides the title music to ‘Happy Valley’. It can be heard here.

Related blogs:

To read ‘When the Jokes on You’, click here

To read ‘I’ll miss this when we’re gone’, click here

To read ‘In loving memory of truth’, click here

And to read ‘Grace in a political world’, which concerns one who is infinitely gracious, which is exactly how gracious I need him to be, click here