Returning from Harrop

Submitted by Alan Marsden on Wed, 14/08/2024 - 00:00

I cycled fourteen miles up to Harrop Chapel again on Monday evening for their annual convention. Dr McMurdo of Glasgow gave a thoughtful exposition of the scriptures, explaining why we should pray for the King and government regardless of our feelings towards them. Pastor Paisley of Lowestoft also spoke well on the excellence of praising God; contrary to my earlier assessments, he possesses something of his father’s capacity for volume. I was sitting in the balcony with members of the Ayrton family of Abbeystead, so the singing was wonderfully sonorous. Mervyn France updated us on the affairs of Wyresdale Children’s Homes (a cause to which we have previously given), while his wife Lucy provided the music. A Pastor and Mrs Philips of Wales sang duets, transporting us, briefly, from the hills of Lancashire to the plains of America's Midwest on account of their singing accents. I enjoyed the evening; it was a curious mixture of patriotism, old-time Pentecostalism and nineteenth-century revivalism.

It was a tad nippy as I raced down from Harrop towards Grindleton and from thence to Chatburn and Martin Top. Summer is winding down, such as it is, and by 8.30 there was already a darkness creeping over the valleys. The sun illuminated Pendle beautifully:

The skyscape at Martin Top was deeply evocative. Whatever talk of revival we heard, whatever the need to stand firm in these days of compromised truth and lethargic churches, the return of the Lord Jesus is closer than ever. The Saviour Himself used the redness of the evening sky to illustrate the propensity of the people in his own day to see what is going on around them:

But he answered, and said unto them, When it is evening, ye say, Fair weather, for the sky is red. And in the morning, ye say, Today shall be a tempest: for the sky is red and lowering. O hypocrites, ye can discern the face of the sky, and can ye not discern the signs of the times? Matthew 16:2-3, Geneva

This world is drawing closer to its last season.