Jesus and Doctor Who

Sue and I were married on 18 February 1978.  Snow lay on the ground; it was a very cold day.  After the service in church and the obligatory photographs we all hurried to the nearby village hall for the reception.  Hot soup was a welcome starter!  After the food and speeches, Sue and I chatted with our guests before heading off to our hotel in Hull for the first night of our honeymoon (we travelled round the country during the next several days).

Much to my delight (but not so much Sue’s) we somehow managed to arrive at our hotel, check in and get to our room in time to watch that evening’s episode of Doctor Who!  The episode concerned was the third in a story-line titled Invasion of Time starring Tom Baker (who is still my favourite Doctor).  Unlike today’s Doctor Who, where each episode tends to be complete in itself, in the early days of Doctor Who a particular storyline would be a mini-series over a number of episodes. 

To be honest, I think Sue still thinks that I rushed us away from the reception a little too soon, and that getting to the hotel in time to watch Doctor Who was not a good reason for doing so!  I was reminded of this when I recently read Tom Baker’s autobiography, “Who on Earth is Tom Baker?”  He is certainly an interesting and rather unique character.  One incident he relates in the book was from 1976 (the days when I was still trying my best to persuade Sue that we ought to get married!)  He had been filming a storyline called ‘The Deadly Assassin’, in which there was a scene where Baker was being held under water and had to appear genuinely afraid.  He writes:

 … I didn’t see the editing, and the broadcast came as I was passing through Preston on the way back from the Doctor Who exhibition in Blackpool.  I was with Terry Samson and talking to him about this episode and my anxiety about the water sequence.  Terry suggested that we watch it in the window of a TV shop.  We tried to, but all that time ago in Preston the shop was either closing or the sets were tuned to the other channel.  So the driver took us disappointedly off through some suburb or other and, as he slowed down on a corner, I saw a couple of kids’ bikes in a garden and wondered if I dare invite myself into the house to see Doctor Who … I went to the back door and knocked.

The programme was due at any moment and I felt a bit self-conscious about barging in on some innocent family at sacred tea time.  I need not have feared.  A young man of about thirty opened the door to me and I asked, ‘Do you watch Doctor Who in this house by any chance?  For a split second the man looked puzzled and then he smiled, opened the door wide, and simply said, ‘Come in, Doctor.’  And in I went.

As he ushered me into the sitting room, I heard the title music and I quietly sat in the chair the man pointed me to.  As I took my seat, he pointed to two little boys sitting on the sofa, eyes glued to the screen as I appeared.  They watched with terrific intensity as a bit of the drama unrolled and then, as someone else took up the plot, they lost interest slightly and glanced up at their dad and then at me.  Just as they did so, I reappeared on the screen and they looked at me there.  Their amazement was simply amazing!  They were utterly gobsmacked as the two images jostled in their heads.  They could not grasp how I could be in two places at once and then, to the delight of their dad, they couldn’t believe that Doctor Who was in their house.  What a wonderful hour or so that was (p215/6).

What a great story!  I’m sure those two boys never forgot the time Doctor Who came to their house.  At Christmas we celebrate a far greater and more wonderful event.  As the gospel writer John puts it, ‘The Word became flesh and blood, and moved into the neighbourhood’ (John 1.14).  Jesus Christ, Son of God, stepped into our world; he walked our streets, he brought the message of God’s love for all people.  He willingly offered his life on a cross, and by doing so opened the gates of heaven to all who believe in him.

Tom Baker stayed in that home in Preston for around an hour, but then he went away again.  Jesus is still with us now, by his Holy Spirit.  How amazing is that?