The End is Nigh!

The Conspirators.

I remember when I was doing my assistant ministerial year something my sense of humour just could not resist. I was serving as assistant in a great church in a beautiful little coastal town. The church sat on the main road through the town just on the bend as you arrived in the place. Directly opposite there was a small cobbler shop. That was in the days when people still got shoes repaired.

The cobbler had decided to run a special promotion so he had placed a large poster in his window. The poster read, "Special offer heels saved here at reduced prices." I just could not resist designing a poster for the church noticeboard directly opposite his poster. My poster read, "Souls saved here absolutely free."

Later in my ministry now no longer an assistant but a minister with my own parish. Next door to my church stood the Roman Catholic  church. The place I lived in had a long history of dispute between catholics and protestants both with small letters because the conflict was between the non attending of both persuasions. I could never understand this and was determined to foster good relationships between both congregations. 

So various things were tried to bring the two at least into a friendly and working relationship with a great measure of success.

This reminded me of the two ministers working to help the town in which they lived. The two Ian, the Protestant minister and Patrick the Roman Catholic priest were seen erecting a poster at the edge of the road.

The poster read,

"THE END IS NEAR. TURN YOURSELF AROUND NOW, BEFORE IT IS TOO LATE."

As a car sped towards them , the driver leans out his window and yells, "Leave people alone, you religious nutters. We don't need your ##### lectures."

 From around the bend they hear the screeching tyres and the big splash.

 Shaking his head Father Patrick says, "That the third one this morning."

 "Yes," Ian agrees, then adds, 

"Do you  think maybe the  sign should just say:

"BRIDGE CLOSED"?

Simplicity of word and action is usually the best way. 

While on the thought of life and death I am sitting here smiling at what I am remembering. I remember my gran saying to me on many occasions that she had stopped read the death columns in the weekly local paper. "I am getting so old," she would say , "that one day I will read my own name in there.

This is exactly what happened to a man by the name of Gallagher. he was reading the paper and noticed he was listed as dead. There was no doubt about it it was him.

He immediately got on the telephone to his best friend. "Have you read the paper Jim? It says that I have died."

"Yes," says Jim, "I saw it. Where are you calling from?"

Have a great day.