We’d crash. The car would burn. I’d be sandwiched between pieces of twisted metal, unable to escape because the lifeless bulk of my fellow-passenger was blocking the way. I started to sweat and breathe heavily. It was terrifying.

I’m not getting in the back of a two-door car again. 

It’s the same with lifts. I was in a small a few months ago in Holland. It was about the size of a large coffin. The thing stopped between two floors and the light went out. For one awful moment I thought I was going to start screaming and kicking against the walls and the door, but, thank God, it started again and the light came back on. I used the stairs for the rest of my stay. 

I’m telling you all this to help explain why the resurrection of Jesus is so important to me. Approaching my mid-fifties, I love life, but spectres of old-age, disablement, death keep poking their heads up and grinning at me from unexpected corners like targets in a shooting gallery, I really do rejoice that I’m not trapped in some pathetic little cycle beginning with birth and ending with death and oblivion or separation from God. If I thought the whole complex, beautiful, tragic thing was going to end in dumbness or darkness it would be like – well, a bit like being in the car or the lift. 

My belief is that the Son of God has done the thing that sets me - us - free from a doom laden destiny and allows us to go home. Life will go on. There’ll be love, laughter, a meeting of the eyes and the sweet, sweet taste of sparkling spring mornings. Not a hint of religion, nor a trace of narrowness, and as C.S. Lewis so famously said, there’ll be a lot of surprises.