Thought for the Day

As delivered at BBC Radio Bristol an hour ago:

It was the worst phone call I have ever had. The police called to tell me one of my sons had been arrested for burglary. That was the limit of what I could be told that evening. He spent the night in the cells. My wife and I spent the rest of it awake.

So. Cameras on buses to catch you driving in the bus lanes. An all-seeing eye to shop you for moving over thirty yards too soon. What do you think?

We get a bit heated about being watched by Big Brother. I have some sympathy for those who want to live their lives unobserved. But as a Christian I believe in an all-seeing eye who you simply can't see. I am being watched. By a God who sees.

But Elton John, before he was a sir, wrote:

If there's a God in heaven
What's he waiting for
If he can't see the children
Then he must hear the war
But it seems to me
That he leads his lambs
To the slaughter house
Not the promised land

No Sir Elton. I don't believe bad things on earth disprove God's existence any more than good things prove him. It's just the way I see it.

But if I am right, then all our behaviour, all the time, is open to scrutiny. Being watched.

My own story has a happy ending. My son had been caught up with a gang of guys leaving a pub who had smashed a shop window and stolen beer and wine. Everyone in the crowd was arrested. My son's story, that he was innocent, was backed up by (beat) you guessed it. CCTV. Released with no charge.

The all-seeing eye had vindicated him. Thank God.