Connor and his Cows

Connor is a dairy farmer and for a couple of decades now has got up in the middle of the night in the blistering cold to milk the cows that kick him. He is rained upon and pooped upon. He has been manipulated by the upper echelons of people in warm cosy comfortable board rooms. Folk he has never met and never will.

And yet time after relentless time I knew where to find Connor and what he would be doing. Somehow he would grin from under his tattered beanie and quip in good humour “These insatiable cows want more milking”.

This morning it was ink dark, the cold was stinging and the rain was horizontal. I also found myself wearing a daggy beanie, more for comfort than insulation. My mantra was

“This insatiable God wants more psalms”. The heady days of theological college and ordination seemed to belong to someone else. A different, much younger man. Back then we used to speak of ‘arriving’ of ‘making it’. As I pushed open the church door I wondered … “Have I in fact ‘arrived’ ”? But then some measured words came to me and I offer them to you.

You have not arrived when you want to go to the altar because you are exuberant with puppy dog enthusiasm and bubbling with uncontainable excitement. You have started the journey when you want to go to the altar when all gloss has worn away and the sparkle has disappeared and disappointed. You know that you are nearly there when you know how much you need to go to the altar and how very much you need Him. You know that you are much closer again, when you understand that He has always wanted you to be there, even more than you wanted to.