The Church.

The Church was empty as it usually is at this time of day. Midday’s I walk in, go to the place where I always sit and bow my head in prayer. Nothing unusual you might say many people do the same in all kinds of different churches. I at this time of the day am always alone there is no preacher to be seen, none of the ladies that clean the Church and arrange the flowers, no one. Today for some unknown reason I had this strange feeling of expectancy. Something was different. I could not place it but the atmosphere was not as it usually is. The smell of candles and incense lingered in the air as they always do. The pews are tidy with bibles and prayer books waiting for the visitor to take in his or her hand. For the first time I really looked around the church. The stained windows with their religious pictures looked as they always do. The altar with its candles waiting to be set alight, everything seemed as always. I sat in my pew and listened to the silence. There is no silence like in an empty Church; it is a silence that one can feel. The Cross-with Jesus looked as awful to my eyes as it always did. I prefer the small room at the side of the church where the children go to Sunday school, in this room there are happy pictures all is colourful nothing to frighten a child. In the Church the Stations of the Cross give me a feeling of despair. I do not like the Church but as I have the feeling that I should go to Church to pray and thank the Lord for all his blessings. I was taken by surprise in the middle of my prayers it happened.



A peal of trumpets sounded. Looking up from my prayers I expected to hear the Church Organ playing some music, but no, another peal of trumpets and then in front of the alter I saw a picture that I will never forget. A gentle looking man with the most compassionate of eyes sitting on the ground and children, hundreds of children were gathered around him. The man was smiling and one could see that all of the children were happy. Sitting in the pew I looked with amazement at the picture that I was being shown. Above the Alter winged beings sang and the song they were singing was, “Let the little children come unto me.” I have never seen such a picture with so much clearness. I was actually there in the picture although I was sitting in a pew half way down the Aisle. The man with the gently smiling eyes raised his hand and said to me, “Come! You too are one of my children.” Rising from my seat in the pew I floated towards the children and took my place amongst them. My head was full of wonderful thoughts. I was seeing and feeling for the first time an utter peace. The peace enveloped me like a shielding cloak. The picture faded and the priest who had come into the Church awakened me. “What are you doing sitting with your head on the side of the Alter? I mumbled something and walked back to my pew. I have never had such a vision before but whenever I am in Church this most wonderful picture of Jesus with all of the children comes to me in full force.



I spoke to a priest later and told him what I had seen. “You must have been hallucinating” was his reply. I thought to myself that what I have seen while fully conscious couldn’t be a hallucination. I still go to the Church and say my prayers but sadly I have never seen such a picture again. The faces of the little children were smiling, each was happy and strange to say when I joined the children, I too was extremely happy. My wish is for all to have some similar event happen to them and that they will talk about it and show that there are many things in this world that cannot be explained.

This short story, I hope will show that I am a christian. The story is not copyrighted