David Clavey

“It was a cold misty evening in the sleepy village of Ambleside nestling at the feet of Laughrig and Helvellyn. There seemed to be a slight drizzle in the air as Dimmy, Rocky and I came to the gate house of the Parish Church. The ancient church building loomed out of the mist and as we looked closer we could see it was surrounded by graves. The scene looked perfect for the plot of one of those B horror movies I was always watching on a Friday night at the Ambles Flicks.

All three of us stood rigid with fear as we looked at each other, no one moving. Rocky said “Smiler, go on in then, it was your idea to go on a church crawl”. “No fear” I said “It’s scary in there and besides I can’t see any lights on in the Church”, “Looks dead quiet to me”. We looked at each other, daring each other to make the first move.

How did we come to this, standing outside these ancient gates? Well the three of us were students at Wray Castle college. A Victorian mock castle four miles south of Ambleside, high above the west bank of Lake Windermere in Cumbria. The college only had sixty odd students and was training us boys to become Radio Officers in the Merchant Navy. Teaching us skills such as electronics, radio operating procedure with sending and receiving morse code at over twenty words a minute. In the classes we would listen to or send morse code for hours at a time, until our hands ached with fatigue. We were taught to do this automatically so our pen holding hand would write the morse our ears heard, but our minds would be far far away, thinking all sorts of thoughts. Such as hill walking, canoeing or sailing on the lake, which were all visible from our training room.

Thoughts drifted to Friday nights at the Salli, drinking and looking at the Girls dancing around their handbags. Wishing I could dance, but not daring to ask any of the girls out. Anyway these were all painted girls, and far from my vision of what girl friend looked like, she would not be seen dead in the Salli. In my thoughts she would have long hair and wear long dresses, and have a zest for life, laughing, walking, running, climbing, sailing. As you can gather I was going though a bit of a hippy phase at the time. It started after buying my first pair of Levi’s in the summer and was cemented with my introduction to various heavy rock bands. I was a living the 60’s in the 70’s! However at the college we had to wear full cadet Uniform, it was a relief when outside the castle to wear some comfortable cool hip jeans, although the Uniform came in dead handy when hitching around during the Holidays. I visited Wales, Newcastle and Devon all at no expense to myself.

So why were the three of us on a Church crawl? Well I was very religious and went to the Roman Catholic service every Sunday evening without fail. And at college I would always take God’s side in the frequent God vs Communism discussions that were typical of that era. I would always defend God even though to me he lived in a far far away place. I tried to get close, to feel something, but nothing happened. For instance I carved a cross into a tree on a secret hill in the grounds of the castle. And visited it once a week saying a whole rosary of “Our Fathers” and “Hail Mary’s” expecting to see a Vision of the Virgin. Appearing as she does in all those stories I had heard told by the nuns and Holy Brothers when I was a small kid. But as I said nothing happened. But that did not sway my simple blind faith, which is typical of so many religious people.

Anyway a week before the Church crawl, I was just coming out of the Roman Catholic Church in Ambles when I saw a small poster on the Church notice board. It called for young Christians to come to a Sunday evening coffee bar called “Ark” held at the YMCA. I assumed this must be some kind of Disco for Teen Christians and that sounded fun. During the week I told my friends about it and two of them decided to come with me the next week and check it out. However I could not remember the time of the meeting and when we walked into town that night, the YMCA was shut up and all dark. We decided we had come too early and then Dimmy said “Lets go on a church crawl”. After some laughter, both Rocky and I decided that would be an amusing thing to do.

“Lets give up” said Dimmy outside the ancient gates, “Lets try the Methodist in town instead”. So we abandoned all attempts of going to the scary C of E Church and walked into town. What is a Methodist Church I wondered? Its doors were open and we wandered in and were ushered into a uncomfortable wooden pew by an ancient slightly bowed man. We sat and looked around, there were twenty other ancient people sitting around us but none of them sitting next to each other. We wondered if this was a religious service or some old peoples outing we had wandered into. Anyway the preacher (is that what he was?) continued talking, and he talked about how Walter Scott walked to the South pole. Not only did he talk in a very boring way, but I wondered was he really talking about God. I was getting bored, even more bored than when I went to a Catholic service. And anyway where was the cross and candles and coloured windows. When would this boring man stop talking and the Priest get up? After what seemed an eternity but was probably only fifteen minutes and with much smirking and nudging between my friends we got up and left. Outside we Ran. Then we stopped and laughed and laughed until our sides felt like splitting. Rocky then said “Must be time for the YMCA diso thing, lets give up on this church crawl and go and have a look”

As we approached the dark walls of the YMCA the stead drizzle was turning more into rain. We could hear guitars twanging and people singing folksy type music. “Sounds like a live Gig” said Dimmy. I smiled, “Yeah sounds good, hope it doesn’t cost too much” As a student I was always skint. Again at the door, we dared each other with our eyes to go in. In the end, as it was my idea originally, I went in. I pushed open the dirty, paint pealed, green door and saw a small hall with a second door further on. I walked quietly up to the second door and stood listening to the fabulous music which was clearly being played on the other side of the door. My two friends waited by the first door watching to see what happened next.

Meanwhile in the upper rooms of the YMCA, four lasses were on their knees praying, they had been doing this every week for a two months now. They were all student junior school teachers training at the local teacher training college called Lotties (Charlotte Mason College). Why were they praying? They were praying that more young people, would see the light and follow Jesus. In particular they were praying for more lads, because the regulars at the Christian coffee bar were at that time mainly lasses.

My courage was just about to give up at the second door, when I was surprised by four pretty girls suddenly appearing in the hall behind me blocking my exit. I had not observed a staircase going up to the second floor half way down the hall. They smiled, I stammered “hello” and my mates at the first door bolted, I could hear their laughter gradually fading away. The first girl, Alison, invited me with a smile in to a large room filled with young people. The chairs and armchairs in the room were arranged in a circle of two rows. They sat me down in a comfortable chair, next to one of the guitarist, with a bicky and coffee. Everyone sang, the guitars twanged and everyone smiled at me wherever I looked. I was scared, but also happy, this was good crack. After a few songs, none of which I had heard before, were sung. One of the lads on the other side of the room told a story of how he had come to know Jesus. He was a cook, a rough tattoo painted guy, from one of the local Hotels. But his story was interesting; he was talking about Jesus in a way I had not heard before. As a friend, as personal, as involved, as real. Not like my God who was a million miles away.

After the meeting has finished I got chatting to the guy who had been playing one of the Guitar next to me and told him all about my church crawl. We laughed together. He told me his the surprising story of his guitar. Basically he was a good guitar player, but was continually borrowing other people’s instruments because he did not own one himself and they were too expensive for a student to buy. So he prayed and asked the Lord for a guitar. And a couple of weeks later, a good Christian friend of his, who did not know that he had been praying, suddenly came up to him and said. “I am going away to university next week and wondered if you would like my guitar to keep, you’re a much better player than me and I know you would make good use of it”.

I was stunned. Not only was this a group of friends who gave expensive things to each other freely. But they knew a God who gave guitars. I did not know a God who gave anything.

My new guitar playing friend then went on to explain how God had given something else far more precious than a guitar - his Son Jesus.

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It was a one hour walk back to the college in pitch black along narrow twisty lanes that night. But it was long enough. I had thought I knew God, but my previous behavior with alcohol and swearing clearly showed my heart was rotten at the core. I was still living a life of rebellion from God regardless of my religious behavior and faultless church going. But now everything was new, Jesus had met me, showed me my rebellion and clearly pointed to what I needed to do, turn around and go the other way.

Later that evening back at the college I told anyone who would listen about the coffee bar, and how to get to know Jesus. I sat on my bunk, sewing “Jesus is Lord” on the back of my jeans and nattered and nattered even after the lights had gone out. The rest of the Lads were stunned, some thought I was crazy, some just got annoyed, but they all knew I had changed.

That first week was a completely crazy week, I would not shut up! The guys at Ark had given me a Good News New Testament Bible and I read it like a novel that you can’t put down. And as I discovered things in it I would share them with everyone around me who would listen. Everything was new, previously as a Roman Catholic I had not been encouraged to read the Bible, But here it all was … the Good News.

One of the students called nick had crashed his motor bike the previous weekend and was lying in bed with a broken leg in plaster. He said to me “Smiler I am so bored”. So I lent him my Good News Bible and he read it from cover to cover in a few days. Calling me back midweek he said “Smiler I have become a Christian” and now I was not alone.

The next weekend, which was the last one before Christmas holidays, I took lots of students with me in the evening to the Ark Christian Coffee bar. They all had a good time, but no one else became a Christian that night. Nick unfortunately was unable to come as he was still confined to bed. However several lads and lasses from Ark came back to the college after the coffee bar meeting that evening to see him so he was very happy. The college rocked with Christians singing and was buzzing with discussions on Jesus.

Later in the week I hitched home to Dunstable from Ambleside, slightly fearful of what my Mum and Dad would say. They were predictable presuming I had fallen into the hands
of some cult. So to placate them I went to the Roman Catholic mass on Sunday morning to play the organ as usual. It was so so dull, strange and life less compared with what had been happening in Ambleside.

So I prayed “Lord where do you want me, surely not here?” and to my surprise I felt him say “step out of the building and go to the end of the road and turn left.” I obeyed and as I walked down west street towards the centre I felt him say “stop”. I looked around and saw an old building on my left called “West Street Baptist church” – What is a Baptist church I wondered, do they follow John the Baptist or something? “Are you sure lord” I prayed as I read the notice board, I felt peace. Apparently the evening meeting was to be in the boys club, because the building was being repaired after a basement fire.

So in the evening I went to the boys club meeting rooms and with fear in my voice I shook the person at the doors hand said “Is this a Christian church?”. The friendly chap laughed and chatted to me, I told him my story as he showed me to a chair. The boy club was full of people, then to my surprise the guy who had shook my hand stood up and started preaching. Turned out he was Dr Stanley Jebb the pastor. The teaching was fantastic, I had never heard the Bible explained so clearly. Afterwards he invited me back to his house for a sing song and I told my story to a small group of young people.

Over Christmas I grew stronger and stronger as a Christian and lapped up all the teaching preached. Come January it was time to go back to college and on arriving I discovered that we had another new Christian - Tim.

His story is that over Christmas he had driven out into the country side and parked in a lay by looking out over the surrey fields. His thoughts turned to his life, he had everything, he was a good cricketer, had a beautiful girl friend that he imagined he would marry soon and live in a grand house where he would live contented smoking his pipe and walking his dog. But he was discontented. He realized the foolishness of processions compared to the message of Jesus. So he stopped his rebellion and turned to God. Now there were three of us talking about Jesus.

The next Ark meeting three more students became Christians and the next week three more and the next week three more. Then the persecution started. Some of it was quite vicious, being kicked and punched to see if we would retaliate. During that time three who had become Christians in the previous weeks, including Dimmy and Rocky, fell away. But the remaining twelve were strong. We started our own CU (Christian Union) meeting and I taught them everything I had learned over the Christmas holidays from West Street.

The Ark coffee bar group soon realized their prayers had been answered and needed quickly to setup additional mid week teaching meetings. And even weekends away at Kestrel lodge, a new Christian retreat, near Bassenthwaite lake.

My lasting memory is of the twelve of use, walking on the narrow twisty road to ambles, early on a Sunday morning, singing "Amazing Grace, how sweet the sound".