overload

I don't think my laptop's recovered at all from the trauma it had on Friday. Close on 10,000 e-mails shoved through it's cyberspace letterbox was a shock to the system.

The laptop's declaring it's full to the brim and cannot take any more. Despite my removing at least some 8 gigabyte of data, it still insists there's no more space available. It's had enough.

And now it won't even let me access my e-mails. (So those who've been e-mailing in and wonder just why I haven't replied ... well, now you know!).

It seems to have reached a sort of saturation point. Which is neither a technical term, nor an accurate diagnosis of the malaise that it's suffering from. But it tells you what it looks like.

And we've probably been there ourselves. The point when we've had enough.

Sometimes it's adversity which brings us to that point. Our coping capacity reaches its limit and we sort of emotionally close right down. Sometimes it's information which has that effect. We close the doors and mentally shut up shop.

I've been seeing some people today where both of these sorts of saturation points came to my mind.

A man who's known bereavement once again. He's been for some years a widower. And now the woman, a friend from his earliest days, with whom he got together once again these last few years - she, too, has died.

They weren't together long before her cancer was being diagnosed. And the last few years have been a sore and painful struggle for them both - though they've been glad to have had each other.

Sorrow heaped on sorrow. Grief on grief. It's hard. And there's only so much our finite hearts can handle.

The man's doing well. Outwardly he's calm and shows a poise and equanimity. Inwardly, though, the poor man must be struggling with the hurt and pain of loss. The overload of grief.

It was good to get by and to see him. He's been here at worship before so I wasn't exactly a stranger. Which probably helped. And I prayed as I left and he found some very real comfort in that.

The sense of the Lord being there, and of the Lord's understanding, when the rest of his world is collapsing around his grieving, broken heart.

I went on from there to see another couple. They've been around our fellowship here for a good many years, in one way and another. So it's all hardly new for them.

And yet, in some ways it is. They come from a different tradition and both the way that things run and the terms that we use are all very different for them. They wanted to know how it worked. How all the bits fitted together.

It was here, with them, that I started to think in terms of information overload. A lot to take in.

I was trying to explain how the whole thing worked. What 'Kirk Session' is. How the 'elders' fit in. What a 'Presbytery' is and does. And how they themselves might be able to get involved in the life of the 'congregation'.

These are intelligent people, who've been around: who've shared in the life of another Church of Scotland congregation in their time. But who are still not all that clear.

I fear we often make the simple, thrilling business of following Jesus very complicated. When it's not like that at all.

Like the laptop, I guess, when the thing works well, it's great. But when some sort of overload kicks in, it can all start to seem just a hassle.

Whatever happens to the laptop, let's keep our following Jesus nice and simple!