The Sacrament and the Kindly Light

“I do not ask to see the end—only to know that this step, this breath, this table, is enough.”

The bread was broken with quiet reverence.

Every movement behind the sacrament table seemed to resonate with an amplified significance—Jerome’s head bowed in solemn devotion, the unfolding of white linen performed with the slow care of ritual, the faint creak as a metal tray was placed down with reverence, not merely as a logistical act but as a sacred offering. These were gestures so precise and practised they bordered on choreography, yet never felt rote. There was meaning in every tilt of a hand, every pause before the next motion—like breath drawn in before the next line of prayer, or the stillness between verses of a hymn. Even the hush that accompanied them seemed to deepen, as though the very air in the chapel had agreed to honour the ordinance with its own restraint.

I watched as Jerome reached for the microphone and began the prayer, his voice low and even, shaped by years of quiet participation and the gradual, steady anchoring of conviction. He didn’t rush. He didn’t falter. There was no theatricality, just the plain truth of a young man who understood the weight of his words and bore them with grace.

I bowed my head, letting my hands come to rest in my lap, fingers loosely interlaced. My eyes closed almost of their own accord.

The words—O God, the Eternal Father…—settled over the congregation like a warm balm applied to weathered skin, familiar as breath and yet never diminished by repetition. They did not simply pass through the room; they lingered, pressing gently into the quiet spaces between us, an invisible thread drawing every heart a little closer to centre.

In the hush that followed, the sound of trays moving along the rows became its own kind of liturgy. Fabric shifted—soft wool against wood, polyester brushing cotton. A child whispered something urgent and was swiftly hushed with a mother’s gentle hand. Somewhere to my left, the click of a belt buckle, hastily adjusted, was followed by a murmured apology. These ordinary sounds, instead of intruding, wove themselves seamlessly into the reverence of the moment.

The air seemed to still itself in solidarity—as though it, too, had chosen to observe, to bow, to listen.

When Charles reached our row, he held the tray with both hands, his grip careful, his expression composed. His dark eyes met mine for the briefest moment—steady, watchful. There was a kind of self-possession in him that caught me off guard, though I knew it well. The same boy who, not so long ago, had twisted restlessly on chapel benches and asked, “How much longer?” now moved with a sense of calling. His steps were measured, his bearing quiet but intentional. He didn’t smile, but something flickered across his face—pride, perhaps, or the delicate awareness that he was doing something that mattered.

There was no show in his service, no glance around for approval—just that brief eye contact, a thread of connection between mother and son in the middle of sacred ritual, and then he returned to his purpose.

I took the bread with deliberate gentleness, conscious of the symbolism held within that small, silent act. My fingers brushed the edge of the tray lightly, almost reverently, as I lifted the portion and brought it to my lips. The bread itself was unassuming, but in that moment, it became both memory and promise. I passed the tray along without haste, unwilling to let the moment slip too quickly through my hands.

Charles gave the slightest nod and waited patiently with the focus of someone whose hands carried more than just bread. The priesthood might be borne in title, but it was moments like these that gave it shape, weight, texture.

Noah received his portion next. He caught Charles’s eye and offered a small, affirming nod—nothing grand, nothing exaggerated, just a quiet gesture that conveyed more than praise ever could. Well done, it said.

And I felt that, too—the unspoken dialogue between father and son, man to young man, written not in words but in acknowledgement, in presence.

As the water was blessed and distributed, the stillness seemed to deepen further, the chapel folding in on itself in reverent silence. Breath slowed. Even the smallest sounds—the shift of a shoe against the carpet, the quiet clink of glass—seemed to move through the air with a kind of sacred discretion. The world outside—the to-do lists, the dishes in the sink, the emails awaiting responses, the unresolved conversations and the minor frettings of daily life—receded like a tide gone suddenly still.

There was only the sacrament now. Only the soft ticking of time suspended within a sacred moment, held not in grandeur but in simplicity, in shared belief and humble ritual.

No one needed to speak. Reverence had become its own kind of language, understood instinctively. I watched as each tray was passed from hand to hand, as fingers moved with care and intention. My own hands felt quieter somehow—more settled, more present—as I accepted the water and lifted it to my lips. Cool against my tongue, it seemed to wash through not just my body, but my thoughts. A cleansing, of sorts. An exhale.

By the time the trays had been returned and the young men resumed their seats, the meeting moved on in its familiar rhythm. A brief pause. A smile from Bishop Hahn. Then:

“Our intermediate hymn this morning will be number 97, ‘Lead, Kindly Light.’”

I reached instinctively for my hymnbook, though my fingers had already begun turning the pages to the right place before my eyes had registered the number. They had travelled this path too many times to need conscious direction. The muscle memory of a thousand Sundays guided me now.

As Sister Crofton’s hands found the opening chords, their sound rose gently through the chapel like a beckoning—soft and solemn, a call without urgency. A kind of permission.

The congregation stood as one—rows of believers lifting themselves to their feet with the quiet rustle of fabric and shared anticipation. I remained still for a heartbeat longer, just breathing, just being, then rose with them, the hymnbook resting open in my hands, though I barely glanced at the printed lines.

I closed my eyes, and my voice joined the others—softly, reverently:

Lead, kindly Light, amid th’encircling gloom,
Lead thou me on.

The notes settled around us with the unhurried grace of something older than doubt. These were not simply lyrics; they were words I had carried in my bones for decades—etched into memory by repetition, by need, by the quiet yearning that clung to late-night prayers and unanswered questions.

The night is dark, and I am far from home—
Lead thou me on.

Even now, after all these years, they found their way past the outer layers of composure and duty, threading through the cracks I kept carefully hidden behind routines, behind polite smiles and volunteer rosters. The ache of uncertainty, the fatigue that came not from physical strain but from decision-making layered upon emotional endurance, the unspoken questions I carried behind my scripture study and hospitality—all of them found expression in that one, enduring line:

Keep thou my feet; I do not ask to see
The distant scene—one step enough for me.

And it was. At least in that moment.

As the final verse drifted to its close and the music softened into silence, I opened my eyes to find the chapel once again still. The final notes lingered in the air like breath held for just a moment longer than necessary, reluctant to let go.

Then, gradually, the congregation began to settle back into the pews—coats shifting, pages turning, small children adjusting themselves against patient laps.

And in the centre of it all, I felt a quietness settle within me. Not resolution, perhaps, but peace. A kind of soft reassurance that I didn’t need to know how it all would unfold.

Bishop Hahn stood and made his way to the pulpit.

There was something about the way he walked—measured, deliberate—that seemed to signal not only the next phase of the meeting, but a shift in atmosphere itself. The room, already hushed, seemed to draw in around him, the stillness becoming denser, more attentive. It was as though every pair of eyes, every still body, every breath withheld, leaned towards him in expectation.

His presence at the pulpit always commanded attention, not through volume or charisma, but through the quiet conviction that underpinned his every word. The kind of authority that didn’t raise its voice because it didn’t need to. It simply was—anchored, resolute.

I found myself leaning forward without quite realising it, drawn by the familiar cadence of a voice that had comforted, encouraged, and challenged us in equal measure over the years. His tone was steady, resonant, shaped by years of lived discipleship and the burden of gentle authority.

“Brothers and sisters, dear members of the congregation,” he began, his gaze sweeping across the pews with a warmth that included everyone and excluded no one, “I am grateful for the sacred spirit that envelops us on this Sunday morning. As we joined our voices in the hymn ‘Lead, Kindly Light,’ the words and melody echoed the sentiments of our collective journey—a journey marked by faith, guided by a light that shines even in times of uncertainty.”

I felt myself nodding before I even consciously decided to. That image—of stepping forward without full sight, of trusting not in clarity but in conviction—was so familiar it might have been pulled from the folds of my own heart. It was the shape of my life: the unseen path, the whispered assurance, the steps taken without knowing exactly where they would lead.

I nodded again, slower this time, letting the resonance of his words settle.

The journey of faith, a pilgrimage illuminated not by certainty but by grace, had been the quiet backbone of our family’s story. Through grief and joy, through years of repetition and surprise, it was the steady light ahead that had kept us walking.

Bishop Hahn continued, his words unfolding with that particular clarity that comes from deep preparation and deeper conviction.

“We find ourselves at the crossroads of our faith today, contemplating the theme ‘Enduring Faith in Times of Uncertainty,’” he said, the phrase landing with careful weight. “In a world that often feels tumultuous and unpredictable, the foundation of our faith becomes all the more crucial.”

I felt Noah’s hand reach gently for mine, his fingers curling around mine with the familiar ease of a thousand similar gestures. No urgency, no flourish—just presence. His thumb rested against the curve of mine, a steadying presence, as if anchoring me more fully in the moment.

Twenty-five years of quiet partnership rested in that touch. Twenty-five years of shared pews and whispered prayers, of sitting side by side through births and losses and callings and ordinary Tuesdays. Twenty-five years of I’m here. I believe, too. It didn’t need to be said aloud. It never had.

Around us, the congregation leaned in—some physically, some spiritually. Shoulders stilled, eyes lifted, breaths drawn a little deeper. Even the children, usually an undercurrent of fidgeting motion and muffled whispers, seemed caught in the stillness, subdued by the gravity of the bishop’s words and tone. Something sacred had settled into the air.

His message felt less like instruction and more like gentle testimony—an acknowledgement of the storms we each carried in silence, and an invitation to remember the light that still guided our way through them. A reminder that it was not the absence of struggle that defined faith, but its persistence.

It wasn’t a call to perfect faith, but to enduring faith. Faith that persisted, even when it wavered. Faith that returned like breath.

As he turned to the scriptures, his voice softened with reverence.

“As the apostle Paul declared, ‘We walk by faith, not by sight’ (2 Corinthians 5:7).”

A quiet shiver passed through me at the simplicity of it. So few words, yet they held the essence of what I had spent a lifetime trying to practise. Not by sight. That was the whole thing, wasn’t it? The trust that survived even in the absence of clarity. When prayers seemed to return unanswered. When children wrestled with doubts you couldn’t untangle for them. When silence echoed louder than divine response.

It wasn’t about certainty. It was about choosing to keep walking, even in shadow.

I breathed deeply, letting the verse settle into the quiet places of my heart like a seed finding good soil. Not loud or immediate—but planted. A truth to grow in its own time.

Then came the mention of Lehi—the ancient prophet whose journey through wilderness was both history and metaphor. Bishop Hahn spoke of Lehi’s family, their uncertainty, their faith in the face of the unknown.

And suddenly, I wasn’t just listening to scripture—I was remembering.

Our own wildernesses. Our migrations—emotional, spiritual, and literal. The choices made with incomplete maps. The times we didn’t know how the story would end, but walked forward anyway. Craigmore to Broken Hill. Broken Hill back to Adelaide. Each move a kind of surrender. Each one a step without full sight. Our family, too, had wandered. And somehow, always, the light had led us through.

As Bishop Hahn’s voice cracked with unexpected emotion, I felt my own eyes begin to brim. Not the theatrical tears summoned by sentimentality, but the quiet, genuine kind born of shared conviction—and something deeper. Recognition.

His testimony wasn’t rehearsed or polished. It emerged raw from somewhere sacred, a place where faith had been tested and had held.

When he spoke again, the cadence of his voice shifted. There was a hush in the chapel, a collective stillness that suggested we were all instinctively leaning in.

“My dearest Brothers and Sisters,” he said, and in that moment, his gaze caught mine. Brief, unplanned—but clear. “We cannot know everything in this life, but I feel compelled by the Spirit to share with you my knowledge that I know our Saviour lives. We are standing on the precipice of a new chapter. A divine calling awaits, and as we embark on this journey together, may our faith have endured, shining as a beacon of hope and light for all.”

The atmosphere changed.

It was almost imperceptible at first—an intake of breath, a subtle straightening of shoulders—but it grew, deepened. Something about those words struck a chord. The sense of a threshold being named, of something unseen and important poised just ahead, waiting. His words didn’t explain the future; they invited us to enter it with trust.

I glanced at Noah, our eyes meeting with the unspoken language of long partnership. In his expression I found mirrored the same stirring within myself—a mixture of curiosity, solemnity, and resolve. Whatever this “new chapter” was, it would find us side by side.

All around us, the congregation remained utterly still. Families who had come from different walks of life—teachers and retirees, young couples and teenagers in borrowed jackets—sat united in a shared breath of anticipation. The chapel had become more than a building. It had become a waiting place. A listening place.

My throat tightened, not with fear, but with that peculiar weight that comes when something stirs just out of reach—some new shape your life is preparing to take, but hasn’t yet revealed. Not all callings are gentle or small. Some come like weather. Some rearrange everything.

We had faced change before. We had stood on unfamiliar ground, together. And if another change was now approaching, we would face it as we always had: hand in hand, led by faith rather than foresight.

As Bishop Hahn’s final words settled over us—words that called not to passive belief but to active trust, to a shining forward through the dark—I felt something anchor itself within me. Not certainty, but readiness. A quiet shift, like a weight realigning in the soul.

Then came the “amen.”

It didn’t arrive timidly, nor with formality. It came like an agreement, voiced by an entire body of believers—layered and full, a declaration of shared commitment. An echo of unity. A promise made aloud. It resonated through the pews like a single note struck with intention, and held.

I squeezed Noah’s hand, feeling his returning pressure in kind. Our hearts were aligned, our lives bound in covenant and shared purpose. There was no need to speak. Whatever lay ahead, we would face it not as spectators, but as participants in something greater than ourselves.

The kindly light beckoned—not as a blaze that revealed everything at once, but as a constant gleam just ahead. A guide. A promise. It did not demand that I know the whole road. Only that I take the next step.

And I, who had feared and faltered more times than I cared to count, now felt eager. Ready.

With Noah by my side, and the strength of our faith gathered like fuel in our bones, we would walk forward.

Into whatever came next. Into the mystery. Into the call.