Yours Truly Read online

  There will be no judgement, no mercy; no moral law, no forgiveness. No love.

  There will only be me.

  Because while God’s people were sleeping, I crept into the world and stole all the children. I carried them through silver screens, through laptops and tablets and smartphones and computer games, through apps and social media, through box sets and soaps and sitcoms, through magazines and adverts and films.

  I took them all into my garden.

  I led them there laughing.

  I entertained, I thrilled them.

  I blinded them with my beauty.

  The Addict

  A woman was walking through her local park when she saw a man lying under a newspaper on a park bench. He was in a desperate state but, surprisingly, he offered her his newspaper and asked if she would like to read it.

  ‘No, thank you,’ she said. ‘You need everything you’ve got.’

  ‘No, really,’ he insisted. ‘Please have it! I’ve got the colour supplement here as well. Take it all!’

  She was flustered when she realized that he had no clothes on at all under the newspaper. ‘Oh no, honestly,’ she smiled as politely as she could. ‘Your need is greater than mine.’

  ‘How do you know?’ he said. ‘There might be an advert in this paper for the perfect job, an article that could change your life.’

  ‘Really,’ she said, nervously pushing the newspaper back towards him. ‘I’m fine as I am.’ He covered himself with the newspaper again and she relaxed enough to sit down beside him. ‘But what about you? Do you have anywhere to sleep tonight?’ She was determined to help him if she could.

  ‘No, just this park bench,’ he said. ‘Luckily, it’s bolted to the ground and it belongs to the council, otherwise I wouldn’t even have this.’

  He was clearly an unusual character, but she could see his situation was desperate. He had literally nothing in the world. ‘Tell me,’ said the woman, overflowing with sympathy, ‘how did your life come to this?’

  The man was silent for a moment, but her kind and patient presence was reassuring. Finally, the sad tale of his terrible addiction came pouring out.

  ‘It started small,’ he said. ‘I knew it was wrong. I used to give small gifts to people, the odd sweet here and there. A bunch of flowers, a bar of chocolate. But then it escalated. I gave five pounds to a homeless man and I couldn’t stop. Soon I was a Registered Giver. I set up standing orders to many charities. I started reading the Gospels. Somebody said they liked my coat, so I gave it to them – and my suit jacket as well.

  ‘I had cognitive behavioural therapy sessions and I was advised to put a ten pound note in the collection bowl and treat that as my entire giving for the week, but it didn’t work. I kept emptying my pockets and then making payments for large amounts. I knew I had let the therapist down and I stopped going because I felt guilty.

  ‘I was so desperate I sought help at many churches and, for a while, I was greatly comforted by a large city church where people were obviously very rich, but gave almost nothing away. There was hope at last, but then I had a terrible relapse.

  ‘I met someone, a preacher from an American church, who told me that “the Lord is no man’s debtor” and, if I gave money away generously and sacrificially, the Lord would pay back double. That is exactly what happened. The more I gave away, the more money kept rolling in and I found that I had to give away more and more. It was a nightmare. I got into a terrible downward spiral.

  ‘Eventually, I found two credit counsellors who were full of good sense. They knew what was good for me: complete and utter selfishness. They showed me how to keep all my money. They persuaded me to become a total miser, but it was no use. One day, I just ran off and gave away the books and DVDs they had shared with me. I went on a complete binge. I bought a thousand copies of the Big Issue in one afternoon. I felt compelled to give away something every hour of the day and if I didn’t, I would suffer from agonizing withdrawal symptoms.

  ‘Finally, I knew I had to go into rehab and I went to a remarkable place called the Friary, which is run by ex-Franciscans who have bravely faced their extreme addiction. Now, many of these former monks drive expensive cars and live in luxury. I felt there was a bright light at the end of the tunnel. I hung on every word of wisdom, I attended all the sessions that took place over seven-course meals. For a while I felt an incredible sense of hope, but then it happened. A craving, a longing.

  ‘I sneaked out one afternoon to the local town and I just gave away a few pounds here and there: one pound fifty to a busker, two pounds to an Albanian woman begging, five pounds to the Salvation Army. I really couldn’t stop myself. I ran into the local library, to see if I could calm down and find a book that would teach me how to be completely mean and selfish. I was just thumbing through the autobiography of a famous businessman, when I saw a book on the life of St Francis. That is what destroyed everything.

  ‘I took the book back to the Friary which, of course, had totally banned this dangerous work. I kept it under my pillow and I read it many times over. I went home, put my house on the market, sold it for a great deal of money, gave everything away, sold all my clothes and possessions on the internet and then walked naked into this park. Somebody gave me this newspaper, but I feel awkward having it.’

  The kindly woman stood up, profoundly shocked at everything she had heard. She knew this man was completely beyond help. His condition was extremely serious and certainly very contagious. If she stayed there a moment longer, she would be in danger of giving away her handbag on the way home and goodness knows what else. She might be arrested for indecent exposure. She began to walk away hastily.

  The addict called after her, ‘I don’t suppose you’ve got the price of a cup of tea, madam?’

  ‘No!’ she said sternly. ‘Because you’ll just give it away to someone else.’

  ‘You’re right,’ he smiled. ‘I can’t help myself.’

  The Divine Call Centre

  There was a very successful businessman who made a fortune in the telecommunications industry. Like many brilliant entrepreneurs, he started out humbly, offering a telephone advisory service and handling all the calls himself. Gradually, he increased staff and multiplied offices and soon his company was helping thousands of people daily. As mobile phones, the internet and all varieties of social media began to proliferate, he then had to outsource much of his work to call centres around the world. Finally – and he was very proud of this – he was one of the very first global companies to develop algorithms that could deal with millions of customers simultaneously using the most advanced computer technology.

  It was amazing. He hardly needed people any more – computers did everything, including offering highly technical advice. He floated the company on the stock market and made $1.5 billion in a single day.

  Soon after this happened, however, now retired and living in a huge villa in the south of France, things began to go wrong. His wife left him and sued him for a huge sum as a divorce settlement, his youngest daughter became very ill and the tax authorities launched an investigation into his finances, all at the same time.

  It was a sweltering hot day and he wandered down the street in utter loneliness and desperation. For the first time in his life, he found himself going into an old church, where he sat down beneath a stained-glass window and gazed curiously at the depiction of angels ascending and descending above a man who was sleeping on a stone pillow. He had no idea what this story was about, but he felt some sympathy for the strange figure, lying there in a barren desert, and he wondered how so many angels came to be there, all visiting him in person, one by one. It was a beautiful and touching sight and it brought tears to his eyes – tears of sympathy and desperation.

  He found himself trying to pray. He called out to the Almighty, ‘Oh God, if you exist, please hear my prayer. I’m in a whole lot of trouble and I need you now.’

  He was astonished to hear a voice high above, in the stillness of that beautiful churc
h. The voice rang out, loud and clear, ‘Hello. Your call is in a queue and your query will be answered within two minutes.’

  He was stunned. He looked around everywhere, but could see no one. He began to think his mind was going, in the midst of all his desperate troubles, but then the voice came again, in a soft and pleasing American accent, saying, ‘Your call is important to God. Please don’t hang up.’

  He looked up wildly and the angels were still quietly ascending and descending to the lonely figure. If only he could see an angel for himself! If only a divine figure would come down now, solve his financial problems, heal his poor suffering daughter! Just then, he glanced in front of him and, instead of a Bible or a hymnal on the pew, he noticed there was a keypad.

  The voice spoke again: ‘Press 1 if you have problems with your family, press 2 if you have financial problems, press 3 if you are suffering from an illness, press 4 if you are depressed.’

  He didn’t know why, but he pressed 4. He was certainly feeling very desperate inside. The voice came again: ‘Press 1 if you feel a vague sense of unease, press 2 if you feel desperate, press 3 if you feel utter despair, press 4 if you feel suicidal.’

  He stormed out of the pew, shouting and swearing. ‘What kind of answer is this?’

  Undeterred, the voice repeated blandly: ‘Your call is important to God. Please don’t hang up.’ Suddenly there was a crackle on the line, then a buzzing sound and then there was another voice, this time a female one with a British accent, who said pleasantly, ‘Your call is in a queue and it will be answered in less than ten minutes.’

  Enraged, he hurled the keypad across the marble floor, smashing it to pieces. ‘What kind of God is this?’ He began to storm out of the church. ‘Is this how little you care for anyone?’

  ‘Jacob,’ said a voice so soothing and beautiful that he was immediately stopped in his tracks. ‘Jacob!’ for that was his name, ‘You’ve been running away for such a long time.’

  ‘How do you know my name?’ the businessman said, deeply troubled.

  ‘I try to remember the names of my children,’ said the voice, sounding like music from far away, so gentle and lilting, more like a whisper in his ear.

  ‘What was all that about? All those numbers and options!’

  ‘You tell me,’ said the voice, but with no hint of criticism. Jacob looked down at his feet, suddenly stirred and ashamed. ‘You see all those angels?’

  ‘Yes.’

  ‘You’re wondering what they mean?’

  ‘Yes. They’re beautiful, but I don’t understand it.’

  ‘Neither did your namesake, thousands of years ago. He had spent his whole life manipulating everyone, trying to get to the top at any price. Then he found himself alone, having lost everything, lying in the desert in sheer anguish and despair. You see that stone?’

  ‘Yes.’

  ‘It was a very uncomfortable pillow and he didn’t sleep well that night.’

  ‘Did he dream the angels?’

  ‘No, as a matter of fact they were real. I sent them to him, but in the form of a dream so it didn’t scare him too much.’

  ‘What was it all about?’

  ‘Well,’ said the voice, ‘relationships really.’

  ‘Ah,’ said Jacob, ‘you mean . . .’

  ‘Well,’ interrupted the voice, ‘I like to consider my angels as the “personal touch”. So they came to remind him that even though he was lost in the wide wilderness, he was not alone. He was surrounded by love.’

  ‘The personal touch?’

  ‘Yes. Ring any bells? It’s a little rare these days and in some countries it has almost vanished completely.’

  There was a long silence as Jacob gazed at his namesake beneath the throng of angels who were floating up and down a ladder of fire. High above, he could see a brilliant light, but he could not really make out the figure in the trefoil at the very top of the window, only rays of gold and silver, of red and blue and yellow piercing through a dark cloud.

  ‘What did Jacob say to all this?’ he asked.

  The voice laughed softly. ‘Well, he said, “This is an awesome place. I have been standing at the gate of heaven and I didn’t know it.”’

  There was another long silence. ‘Is that where I am now?’ said Jacob.

  ‘If you would like to be. It’s your choice, of course. I could give you four options if you like.’

  ‘No, no!’ Jacob cried out loud. ‘No!’

  ‘Then would you like me to speak to you in person about your troubles?’

  ‘Yes, please.’

  ‘Very well,’ said the voice, ‘but this is going to be a long process because we’re only just getting acquainted. At least, you’re just getting acquainted with me. All I can say for now is that your daughter will be fine. The rest, I can’t comment on. That will have to wait.’

  ‘Thank you, thank you,’ said Jacob, overwhelmed with happiness at the thought of his daughter.

  ‘I’m sorry I had to lead you into the wilderness so we could make a start on a personal conversation, but that’s the way it goes sometimes. I can’t promise that you will ever hear my voice again like this, but you will always know my presence.’

  Jacob nodded, his eyes filling with tears. Slowly he left the church and the sun was now slipping into the azure sea, filling the whole world with fire.

  ‘Oh, one more thing,’ whispered the voice kindly. ‘Remember that communion is more important than communication. Togetherness, intimacy, friendship, love. That’s how I made the world. I like to keep it personal.’

  Cruising Along

  Two disciples, now retired, were sitting in deckchairs on a Roman cruise ship. They were sailing in glorious sunlight past an archipelago of islands in the Mediterranean.

  ‘Marvellous,’ said Bartholomew. ‘What could be better?’

  ‘Yes,’ said Thaddaeus, sipping his pina colada. ‘This is the life.’

  There was a long silence as they gazed at the horizon, where the sun was sinking in the haze.

  ‘I did a few mission trips over there,’ mused Bartholomew, waving vaguely in the direction of Cyprus. ‘Quite a few people were converted, actually.’

  ‘Really?’ said Thaddaeus, helping himself to some delicious canapés being offered by an obliging waiter.

  ‘Oh yes, I was quite an evangelist in my time.’

  ‘I managed to bag a few souls myself,’ said Thaddaeus. ‘Perhaps not as many as I would have liked, but the persecution was making things rather awkward.’

  ‘Well, that’s fair enough,’ smiled Bartholomew. ‘I think we got out of the race at about the right time.’

  ‘So you got a good deal, then?’ said Thaddaeus.

  ‘Oh yes, final salary pension, good pay-off, golden handshake, all that stuff. Actually, I took early retirement at fifty-five.’

  ‘Good Lord!’

  ‘Well, he was very good to me!’

  They both laughed a lot at this banal religious joke. Bartholomew had a habit of making them.

  ‘Praising the Lord all the way to the bank, then?’ Thaddaeus enquired, playing along with the jovial mood.

  ‘I wouldn’t take it quite that far,’ said Bartholomew, chuckling as he wiped a speck of dust off his sunglasses, ‘but I was rather lucky to be one of the last people to be offered early retirement with such excellent benefits.’

  ‘Who offered it to you?’

  ‘I don’t know his name – a man in a dark suit. Working for HR, he said. Had unusual feet: cloven, I think.’

  ‘Oh? Well, lucky you.’

  ‘Oh yes, he was all smiles when he came to me and said, “Bartholomew, you’ve done a tremendous amount for the kingdom, but there is no sense in wearing yourself out, even for such a noble cause.”’

  ‘Fair enough.’

  ‘Yes, thoroughly good chap. Of course, I agreed. I was feeling quite tired. That last mission with Paul was ridiculous. Morning, noon and night. We never stopped. Always preaching in the marketplace, in the local
forum, debating with philosophers, one town after another – and tent-making to earn our living! I thought that was taking it too far.’

  ‘Oh, it was, it was.’

  ‘He was always trying to make a point. “Mustn’t exploit the new converts.” He went on about that. “I don’t want anyone to think I’m after their money.”’

  ‘Well, it was a perfectly reasonable point, but taken to extremes.’

  ‘Yes, he did rather go to extremes.’

  ‘What happened to him?’

  ‘I heard he spent a lot of time in prison in Philippi and in Ephesus and then in Rome. He had a few chances to escape, but didn’t take them, which was fairly bizarre.’

  ‘If ever there was anyone who needed to slow down a little, it was Paul.’

  ‘He got this crazy thing about explaining the gospel to the emperor Nero. Wouldn’t let go of the idea.’

  ‘Damn fool needed a good holiday.’

  ‘That’s what I said to him once, but he just looked at me and laughed for a very long time. Then he said, “Bartholomew, what do you think this gospel is really about? Is the whole idea to make you feel comfortable?”’

  ‘That was a bit rich, a bit “in your face”.’

  ‘It was, and I really felt I couldn’t work with him after that. I had no intention of driving myself towards a nervous breakdown.’

  ‘Quite right. I can’t see how working incredibly hard for the gospel helps anyone.’

  There was a long silence after this comment, which hung in the air for a while.

  Thaddaeus got out of his deckchair with some difficulty. He had put on a lot of weight since his retirement. He stumbled over to the railing and gazed at the dolphins leaping through the waves. ‘This is the life,’ he said again.

  Bartholomew joined him. He was lean and suntanned and had kept himself in good shape. ‘Beautiful, isn’t it? Inspiring, the whole creation. I find myself full of praise.’

  ‘Full of food and wine, too,’ said Thaddaeus, belching loudly as he returned to his deckchair.