Guest Service | Charlie Mackesy | 29 September 2013

Charlie is an artist some of his paintings are coming up on the screen right now and he has exhibited all over the world with Nelson Mandela and Charlie Maxie Rembrandt etchings and Charlie Maxie this sculpture behind me of the prodigal son is by Charlie Maxie he's an amazing artist and he's also a great friend would you give him a warm welcome as he comes to speak to us I hope you're right if you've never been here before and if you're a visitor then I just felt empathy with you I hope you're alright I won't ask you who you are but I really hope you're okay and the whole thing is quite weird I the whole arm in the air thing I don't if you had seen that but I I still can't do it I managed to get sweat but managed to get to back here and then I just tend to pretend that I'm stretching and do that really genuine concert and Nicki gamble is like this ball of enthusiasm he is a clerical enthusiastic sort of I don't what is these and when he introduces people like what he just did me in Charles he always tells the best of you that's him he always looks the best in you but if he was you know if there were if you would let's say we're gonna have a and not a highlight reel but just a more honest introduction about me this could have been an introduction speaker tonight is Charlie maxi he see here it's probably outside he has attention problems and doesn't last services he went to university twice and left both after week he failed his driving test five times he has five versions of the same blue t-shirt with a rhino on it and nearly all nearly always worth one when he prays in church with his eyes shut he's often just thinking about other things he worries about speaking in church in case he swears or a pierce a heretic he often wears wax earplugs in services to avoid getting a headache he used to crave success but it hasn't given him what he hoped for at all and has a talent for chasing things up dead ends he probably thinks he screwed up more than most of you put together which makes him wonder why he's speaking here at all he sure the cord is coming one day saying we know and it's widely noted you're a terrible artist he's addicted to crisps watch his family guy every night BBC three and and double bill and strug struggles struggles with institutionalized religion yet loves the lifelong patient kind friends that he has made in church that could have been intercession Henry Chadwick said a saint is a person whose life has been under-researched if you research mine you would have to look too hard to discover that I'm far from being same my journey to faith has been messy ariseth strange going from theism to atheism to theism to belief to non-belief to argument to argument - you know I'm tricky and I spent a lot of time chasing all kinds of things in the process some worthy some less so I was painting in a foreign country a while and when I was there I really fell for a woman who really didn't fall for me and when I go back to England but I thought I would do is go back and see her and against all the advice of my friends all the advice of everyone I knew all the advice of my enemies all the advice of every small cell of wisdom that was within me which a few I went against all advice and I flew there took 9 hours when I got there eventually arrived at the house it was minus 30 she opened the door have you ever seen anyone whose credit card has been declined in a restaurant on their first day tough crowd she you know she let me in because she had to kiss -30 I went and we then sat down and she made tea it was probably the most Awkward cup of tea I've ever heard when I got to the sugary bit the bottom this is what happened no sipping and she stood both upright and went to the window and this is what she said that's my ex that's his car he's driven a long way he's heard about you he has guns I think you should hide ready and I think it's everything I'm not even with you and he's your ex and she turned said I screamed at me so I ran out the door backed into the snow thought this is minus 30 came back in again I really die she's meeting me again so I thought okay upstairs run upstairs there was a landing two doors ran into this door dived under a duvet starfish and as our star fishing trying to get it all flat with my hands hoping that didn't look like a person thinking it was a really clever place to hide I heard the banging I heard the screaming I heard her letting him in I heard her shouting this is a night man it was a very small house made of wood and they were just below me and I heard the word gun I heard the word he isn't here he's in England not word words and I remember lying in there thinking I'm gonna die soon I'm getting hotter and hotter what talk is this TV what is the tog what you think of when you're about to die seriously and then I tried to listen really hard what they was talking about and they've always got quiet and quiet and then I heard him laugh and then I this happened I thought oh maybe they're gonna get on really well and maybe he's gonna come upstairs so I did what you see in movies when you're begging the character not to do which is I decided that I was going to move and I had looked in the duvet and across the corner with a large painted wardrobe and I thought that nice better place to hide your Narnia you know so so I got I heard him I took my shoes off under duvet and started the slow painful agonizing journey above them knowing that was probably a revolver on the table below me and I got about halfway across and the proverbial floorboard did its thing and when I don't know if you've ever been in that situation where you're trying to get to wardrobe I I had Tara going from my toenail this app I felt it physically physiologically terror going from Turner through mouth beats threat into my chest and out through my head and it was all I could do not to scream but within me I screamed out God have mercy on me or something like that maybe less eloquent something like oh god help me it's something anyway I wasn't at the time particularly prayerful I don't think and so I pray seed what he could have said I really meant which is this God I know I don't talk to you really basically on intellectual grounds you don't exist but if we could possibly just it's not that convenient right now is it so we just shelve it and you could ignore that and help and that I thought was going on me begging begging to a God that I didn't think existed and then I heard the conversation resume so I made a slow painful progress of Wardrobe open the Wardrobe it was full of clothes and the smell of mothballs was palpable I crawled under the clothes I got under curl that pull the door shut and started pulling all the clothes on top of my head and luckily they're on bendy wires so they landed on my head and lot of them and then when I thought I've covered enough I just lay still if you've ever been in a cupboard and for six or seven hours which it was your head does weird things particularly when you might be breathing your last particularly not necessary just the gun just for the mothballs I thought they might kill me um my thinking stuck this was my thinking okay and this is this is it what an earth am i doing in the cupboard far from home like yesterday I was really having a nice time and now I'm lost lonely terrified of death in the dark wishing that I wasn't here wishing I was somewhere else wondering how on earth I can get back and then I start thinking as the hours went by about bigger things like why do I chase things what am I really chasing why do we exist why does matter exists I know that makes made of atoms but why why'd they choose to somehow assemble into this intricate unique space that is yours and mine as some further future stage which is unknown to us just decide to come apart and go into other things and atoms are dead just dust why how is this no one's ever said why they just say what it is why and it was really frustrating me actually and then I thought why did I just pray why despite you know and only I pray when I'm I'm in trouble or why and despite our science and knowledge do we still have a spiritual instinct and if we do who's it for and why are we so selfish what's gone wrong why why why why why like that for hours and hours no conclusions and I then thought think about atheism which I've been into and if they're right why are we spiritually wired and yet if prayer is so natural and instinctive why do we make it so unnatural why is religion so desperately dull or odd and why when I'm in the pub drinking my point whenever Bob Marley sings Redemption song do I burst into tears when he starts singing about songs of freedom my hand was made strong by the hand of the Almighty why do I cry at that I don't know and then I started falling asleep and I fell asleep making a speech to the guy who may well shoot me and it was something on the lines of I've come on holiday by mistake I'm in the wrong covered mic my wife's expecting a baby I have a heart condition you know that kind of stuff pretty pathetic so and I've did 40 and then I was woken I was woken by a noise and voices I heard the calf didn't know where I was now I suddenly remembered I felt clothes being moved and I saw a bright light I saw this enormous guy large frame and I remember wincing gang okay here we go here we got hope he doesn't miss that's a I hope I hope I hope he does I didn't know what I just wanted to be over and he bent I saw him bent that time towards me he grabbed me by the scruff of the neck and live extraordinary power just lifted me up this oh it's like a sort of doll and he's lifted me out and I was just kind of going get off get off and he grabbed an arm and push out of the way and put an arm round me and then on the arm ran and after a while struggling I realized he wasn't trying to kill me he was actually embracing me and when I realized this my whole body went into just heaving with relief now sobbing and I could see her going but I was just so relieved and what had happened was the the axe had left with his gun and he'd gone home and a few hours later a mutual friend had come round to neutralize our situation he come to find me in sort of that so there we go and I have always looked on that moment is that what I would call the cupboards agha as in a way like the human race I think it's a bit like us that we we get lost we feel disconnected we are fearful we get back ste we we are wondering what we're doing here we feel like we're in the dark we don't know what worked what spiritually what is what direction we can look very jolly and well painted on outside but on the inside it's just different and that's our condition and Christianity you know whenever I thought about the human condition it was never ever ever an answer to this lostness it was just another condition just another condition and I would say if asked that it was more of a bullet really Christianity that's what I always thought it was just a judgment and actually it's an embrace I'm always wrong about stuff it's an embrace it's the antithesis to the bullet I don't think bullets are what our hearts are crying out for Christianity may not look it but actually it's a love letter not a bill but it looks like a bill it looks brown and dull and you don't open it that's my story what I expected was a bullet what I got and what I know now it's an embrace of the most beautiful kind and it's really actually ultimately about a person who just makes me feel excited about life is this Christ and it's a cliche but I do think he's genuinely the most fantastic person that ever lived Raven and and as a cynic I would still come to him and I what I love about him is he doesn't come to judge the world but to save it not a bullet but an embrace and the word save really means restore make well and one my favorite lines in New Testament is this a lot of people of doubtful reputation while hanging around Jesus not a lot of people who went to church all the time and never swore were hanging around Jesus a lot of people have doubtful and he loved them and he described the story for the prodigal son which is my favorite story ever which is about a boy who does that and ends up in a faraway country in a cupboard alone wondering how to get home feeling lost I don't know why it's called the prodigal son it should really be called I think do you want to know how lost really feels and then and you know what my father thinks about that and how he feels because what happens is the son prepares a speech terrified of death like me in the cupboard wondering what's going to happen not expecting doesn't know what to expect and the father runs to him says while he was still a long way off the father runs to him and embraces him this is a shocker this is Jesus describing the nature of God well you may not believe in God but never for a second think that the core the heart of this faith is anything other than love if it's been communicated with you in another way then I'm really sorry it ain't the truth if you want to sum up that some of the Bible in one word it is love genuinely I really believe that some people would argue with me but if God is love he's at the center one word and Jesus describes this nature of God and that the younger brother he says has an older brother who is at home who you might call dutiful and moralizing and maybe just maybe I think the boy perhaps didn't want to come home because he didn't want to be judged maybe you are here maybe you're here for the first time and you're frightened of church you're frightened of Christians maybe your lifestyle isn't up to the Christian lifestyle people have doubtful reputation hung around Jesus you're in the right place your bang in the middle and I'm really sorry if you've ever been judged ever because this is the most graceful he was full of grace full of love and tell stories of far as embracing people not getting a bullet you are loved you are welcome that's what alpha is all about coming to terms with the most beautiful thing that I think exists and the reason I sculpted this bronze it's a sort of you know rough ruffled thing but it's because of that embrace that I'm obsessed with then if you III see Christianity was a very surface thing so you're looking at a surface that you're looking at my surface and I'm trying to give you a sort of a he's an impressive surface underneath it with something else so and this one I made this bronze that underneath that is this we have the second dictionaries that's the plaster that's more like me under my skin and deepest still the next picture is this that's our condition I think I might be wrong but for me I know it's true and if you go deeper still you get this bits hanging off history complexity brokenness pain that's what it is to be human and underneath that we get this newspaper's loo paper wiring you're unique it's all unique it's your own history and then if you go underneath gets the last that are wearing and then this is an accident but it wasn't intentional the last the initial structure below everything is this and I used to see that shape a lot but what it really means is this that God loves you this much that he dies to embrace you and it's on the inside of the embrace it's not a performance it's on the inside of you and that's what we're lacking in the cupboard that's what I didn't know it's a lostness that's what Jesus comes to do is to bring us home that's what the story is all about and the cross is just central to it and it's buffered in his book unapologetic he wrote this it's like finding there is something in the thin air to lean on something in the void which will hold you up but only if you tip yourself forward onto it and ask it to take your weight that's the only requisite really and I always thought is based on my behavior it's not it's based on his nature which is luck and I looked at Christianity looked at religion and would say oh well I'll tell you what that is that's a hamster wheel isn't it that's people a hamster be like on the religious wheel with a piece of cheese just out of reach if I just run another ministry if I just don't swear if I just keep going if I just do this then maybe I will get the cheese but I never quite and if the mouse had the temerity if the mouse had thee that hamster other just a second to look left he'd see a cheese Emporium of grace of every cheese he can imagine and he can get off this stupid will but we don't we think religion we got to do that that's not that that this is life he office that's what the cross is holds you that's why I get sweaty on alpha it's the most you know beautiful thing and if you thinking you're doing alpha you know it's hilarious you're not joining a church and not doing a movement you're just thinking for yourself maybe for the first time and really talking it through and being rude if you want to it's quite funny um my um when I favorite from the world is called Daisy who's an atheist and she and I walk our dogs every morning and she was getting married she got married a months ago and she asked me about getting married the church I said yeah you should get married a church and she said no it's not scrap isn't it anyway we wouldn't be allowed because we hadn't earned it you know we don't really go to church and I said Daisy can't earn this you know exists for you please and she said no no she ended up having her wedding in the garden in Brixton and it was actually one of the loveliest weddings I've ever been to there's no sermon which is great and also we had these pink service sheets and on the left hand side was him number one him number one went like this we all sang it 60 of us don't know much about history don't know much biology yeah don't know much about the French I don't know much bad science book but I do know that I love you and I thought why actually well I don't see it I'm thinking you know this is actually D logically bang on we don't know much about biology really no no we're at ins a boy that's physics we don't we know we've got a big idea there much really about theology frankly but we know one thing that we love we know what love is it's a verb and a noun but we know what it is and then that then as the Sun came down to that line it said this maybe by being an A student maybe I could win your love for me and I thought no that's where it fails you can't win it it's being won there's no if in God's love you are loved and that love if you allow it to get into you let the cross inside of you will change you from the inside out slowly in my case I'm a crusty and arrogant but it will change you and it will answer the question my friends will say why do you bother with this spiritual stuff why why my lovely atheist friends who I adore they all say and I said well and I always think you know the reason why bother is because we have an instinct that needs attention you cannot answer it in all the books I've read and I love them I actually really enjoyed Dawkins particularly Christopher Hitchens but it doesn't answer the question that I'm looking for which is why over here why do we feel lost what's gone wrong what is the answer the answer is love it's a gift of forgiveness and reconnection it's the most beautiful thing it's a love and be loved that's it so we really need and on after you know I just hope quietly that maybe you find that if you have that I guess if you're brave enough you take the risk enough because nothing can substitute experience my talking is not an experience really if you do it you may is he you may find that what you thought was a bullet and actually what you thought was a bill is a letter I really hope you do I've written I'm rambling I've written this tiny little thing to finish because I always think I'll make no sense I'm gonna read it we have found ourselves in a strange predicament these days as a secular culture or as a culture we are secular yet we feel somehow disconnected and frustrated and maybe a little lost clinging to sports results or bonuses or relationships or the next relationship but often deep down really fearful and God can't be proved or disproved but what can be proved is the yearning that we have that lands is often in cupboards metaphorically searching for something we look at religion and often recoil at the oddness and irrelevance of it the arguments the judgments and so shut out the one true thing that could free us the one gentle voice that can quietly open the door but we turn away we don't open the letters because we think they look like bills or a bullet but they're love letters from the one who knows you has always known e and will always know you and the more we know of Jesus the less lost we feel and then a little less lost again the more inspired we feel the more free we become the less Shane we feel the less fear and the more hope and the embrace is the last thing we expect and nothing can separate you from it nothing can earn it no CV good deed can get you home no ministry or charity is enough he is enough his grace is enough his action is enough his love in the end is enough and from this fearful fall in place he whispers this I will bring you home

Channel: HTB Church

Views: 21,110

Rating: 4.8714857 out of 5

Keywords: Charlie Mackesy

Id: vvtG6y6wHAY

Length: 25min 51sec (1551 seconds)

Published: Mon Sep 30 2013