St Michael’s Church, Shap

I preached up in Cumbria on Saturday night and found myself with a few hours to kill ahead of the meeting. I called at Shap’s St Michael’s parish church. Thankfully, it had been left open for visitors, the man only coming to lock up once my visit was concluding. The interior is rather pleasant, and nicely apportioned. The building pre-dates the nearby abbey ruins, being from the 12th century, with some interesting monuments built into the outside wall and some intriguing blocked-up windows. An information board detailing the parish’s history records the water stoup broken ‘probably by puritans, circa 1650’. Good on them.

 

In the porch, by a defunct Norman font and a rather tasteless statue of Jesus, are the broken remains of what I judge to be a seventeenth-century gravestone or funerary monument. Next to a skull & crossbones motif is an hour glass. For whom it was originally commissioned, I know not, but its message remains the same: death comes to us all, your time will not last forever. I always like it when historical parish churches leave visitors with an explanation of the gospel, such as via a tract stand or explanation cards. Although Shap’s church offers little of these, this little stone relic is perhaps just as eloquent a reminder to seek God while we may still find Him.

 

Ecclesiastes 12:

Remember now thy Creator in the days of thy youth, while the evil days come not…or ever the silver cord be loosed, or the golden bowl be broken, or the pitcher be broken at the fountain, or the wheel broken at the cistern.