Waiting in the Wings




 There were whispers from God long before I became a Christian, even when I was little.

 




















Most of the time I was unaware of God, but I believed He was there somewhere. Occasionally it seemed He swept aside the veil between us and I was aware of Something More. It was not until I studied philosophy at university that I was persuaded to use my ‘common sense’ and become an atheist. (“Can you see him, Jeanette?” my philosophy tutor asked me in front of the tutorial group. “Can you hear Him?” I cringed with embarrassment. No, I couldn’t see or hear Him.) *


One night in Sydney, where I was involved in film-making and acting, I huddled, quivering with adrenalin, in a doorway in the Ensemble Theatre. I was waiting to rush on stage in the darkness between scenes, to collect a chair and some bits and pieces. It was theatre in the round, so there was no curtain. Just black-clad figures running in the dark, transforming the scene on stage.

The play was Rimers of Eldridge and in this scene the actors stood in rows, as if in church, singing a hymn about coming to a garden with dew on the roses, and talking to Jesus.

 
.
Photos by Margaret J Smith


I’d heard this hymn every night for weeks as I worked regularly on the play as a drama student and one of the props workers.  Suddenly, this particular night, the words became real. Something stirred and whispered around me – or was it inside me?

I found myself thinking, what if there really were a God after all? And if you could actually talk to Him like a friend? He would understand the messes we made in life and the way we felt beneath our bravado. A wistful excitement filled me.

The thought lingered a few seconds, then fled, leaving a painful vacuum. I had never before noticed how empty I felt.

The music drew to a close and the lights faded. I ran on stage and the whole God-idea was gone. I went home that night looking, even feeling, much the same as before. Just a little more vulnerable.

But Divine fingerprints had been left on my heart.


·         See Jeanette’s Journallings  on jeanettegt.blogspot.com – My Journey into and out of Atheism

Comments

Post a Comment

Popular posts from this blog

We'll call him Jonah

Image
Last week I left us on holidays in New Zealand. This week we take a detour into my future, years later when I lived in Nambour, a delightful country town just north of Brisbane. Something felt different about that day. I hurried onto the Nambour railway platform, wondering what was important about this particular journey to Brisbane. I travelled down regularly to visit my mother with Alzheimer’s disease but this day I’d felt a clear whisper from God to pray for my train trip. There were quite a few people waiting on the platform but there was space at the end of a seat with a youngish man seated at the other end, so I sat there. “Do you have a pen I can borrow?” the man asked. Do I ever go anywhere without a pen? I handed him my biro and he proceeded to write some notes. A whirring whine announced the arrival of the train. The man, who introduced himself – we’ll call him Joe, as I tend to think of him as Jonah – said, “Oh, I’m not finished with your
Read more

The Silver Lining: Is there any way we can keep it?

Image
The pandemic and the shutdown A strange silence broods over the land. It is early April 2020 and Australia is in the middle of the coronavirus pandemic. Attempting to halt the movement of the virus, the government has placed severe restrictions on everyone. Night after night, television brings news of more severe restrictions. Even families can no longer get together. Anything to protect us ‘oldies’. Shopping must be done alone, for necessities only, and we must keep one point five metres between us and the next shopper. And this is after the initial panic buying, when frightened shoppers grabbed armfuls of all necessities. Toilet paper ran out in most stores! Fear is etched on people’s faces. The news each night tells of multitudes of deaths in various countries, statistics growing nightly. Health workers are catching the virus as they help the sick. Some die. Businesses fold as restrictions have forbidden shoppers, tourists and others, so alarming numbers are out of work, with
Read more

June - Time to Celebrate

Image
  WooHoo! Celebration time. June marks fifty years since, after a series of undeniable ‘God incidents’, I said ‘Yes’ and became a Christian. I was twenty-five.   I’m amazed to find myself so old and so Christian. It’s all happened very fast – well, so it feels.   If you’d seen me fifty- one years ago, before I became a Christian, you would never have dreamt it. I was the girl least likely to become a Christian. In fact, one friend said, ‘If Jeanette becomes a Christian, I’ll believe it all.’ She figured she was safe as an unbeliever. Hah!     Early Hints There were hints during my childhood and teenage years. Chinks in the solid wall that kept me focussed on the material world, rarely dreaming there was anything more. One such chink occurred when I was fourteen.        A Chink It was a hot Brisbane summer day. A skinny fourteen year old, I sat on the verandah of our lovely old Queenslander, my legs stretched out over the weather-beaten floor boards. I gazed at
Read more