“Oh, kiss me beneath the milky twilight Lead me, out on the moonlit floor Lift your open hand, Strike up the band and make the fireflies dance Silver moon’s sparkling, So kiss me.”

I’ve never been kissed beneath the milky twilight, that is not why I bring this song up. It’s not because I spent many a Saturday morning watching Dawson’s Creek and therefore heard the vocal stylings of Leigh Nash play in the background as Joey and Pacey embraced on screen; the reason I bring this song up is because of the singer/songwriter and the chosen name of her band.

For all of you still in the dark the lyrics are from the song ‘Kiss me’ by sixpence-none-the-richer. Strange name for a band that? It’s a name that hails from the following passage in Mere Christianity:

“Then comes another discovery. Every faculty you have, your power of thinking or of moving your limbs from moment to moment, is given you by God. If you devoted every moment of your whole life exclusively to His service you could not give Him anything that was not in a sense His own already. So that when we talk of a man doing anything for God or giving anything to God, I will tell you what it is really like. It is like a small child going to its father and saying, ‘Daddy, give me sixpence to buy you a birthday present.’ Of course, the father does, and he is pleased with the child’s present. It is all very nice and proper, but only an idiot would think that the father is sixpence to the good on the transaction. When a man has made these two discoveries God can really get to work. It is after this that real life begins.”

In using or talents to glorify God we are not really giving Him anything which isn’t already His, the miracle of Gods’ love is that even though He gains nothing, He is pleased with our efforts. This is the foundation on which all Christian servitude should be built – if we start off thinking that our gifts and talent are our possession, then we’ve lost out before we have even started. The truth is we can only give to God the life that He has given us.

All of this is by way of introduction; Gareth has asked me to share my experiences of training to be a local preacher and I couldn’t begin without laying this foundation. From this first step I will try to take you with me on the journey of my training and preaching, hopefully in the retelling you will be inspired and maybe even consider becoming a lay preacher also.