The Fish Window
Leave the porch and re-enter the church. Immediately on the left as you enter you will find a window with the symbol of a fish set in the glass. The fish is an ancient Christian symbol. The letters of the Greek word for fish -I CH TH U S -stand for Iesous Christos Theou (h)Uios Soter - Jesus Christ, God's Son, Saviour. The fish is the gospel in glass.
The Fish Window stands in the old doorway. Visitors occasionally come during services and peer in to see what's going on. This is as it should be. For hundreds of years stained glass windows have acted as entry points into the gospel. Of course, from the outside youcan see little of their colour and design. You need to be on the inside looking out through them to appreciate their beauty This is a parable of the Christian life. What may seem strange or irrelevant to the casual observer will come alive when viewed from inside the experience.
From inside you can see the marketplace through the glass. This is a reminder that all of life, however difficult or complex it may be, can be transformed if we look at it through the perspective of faith.
The War Memorials
The two memorials on either side of the Fish Window commemorate those who died in armed conflict. It is a strange thing to read the names of people whom we shall never know Perhaps we can sense something of the pity of war as we reflect on these young men. Many films and books have captured the high, even naïve, hopes of those who set off for victory only to meet the terrible slaughter of the trenches. How was the news of death received by parents, brothers and sisters, Sunday school teachers, Boys Brigade leaders? Such memorials are to be found in almost every village in Britain. They mark the flower of the nation cut down in full bloom.
The vicar during the First World War was Westley Bothamley. His reaction speaks for many: 'Oh, that terrible war. I think of the names, my dear friends, inscribed on that memorial who, had they lived, would have been pillars of the church. I look round and cudgel myself sometimes to think that we are not doing better in the church and then I know that those who would have been in the full strength of their young manhood are all gone.
If you have time, pause and pray for peace in our world, that wars may cease and old hatreds be forgotten. Pray for those damaged by war and those who still grieve over the loss of those they loved. Wars begin in the heart. It may be that you need to forgive and seek reconciliation with someone. The two lines of poetry on the left hand memorial urge us to do our part in making this world a better place so that the sacrifice of those who fought for freedom may not have been in vain.