The Rev Kevin Logan, Vicar of Christ Church, Accrington

THE answering machine growled: "Hi. If you're a burglar, then we're probably at home cleaning our weapons right now and can't come to the phone... "

Another trilled, "Hi, Susan's answering machine's broken. This is her fridge. Speak very slowly, and I'll magnet your message to my door."

What's not funny is tuning into heaven and not even getting the engaged tone? Nothing! Zilch! It happens. One day God pours down like Niagara. The next, he's lost in a fog.

I challenged a theologian mate about this. "If God seems a million miles away," he intoned, "it's not him that's moved, is it?"

Glib, yet not without a tinkle of truth, especially in times of crisis when we desperately need God to be there, to do something.

"How long, O Lord?" cried one poet in the Old Testament book of Psalms, "will you hide yourself forever?" (Psalm 89).

The poets who penned the psalms found a big solution when life's problems mount up and imprison us. The best escape from the prison of self is to wilfully break out in praise of another Self.

God, those trees of yours this week are incredible! Lord, how on Earth do you create such golds and reds? Wow! Imagine the Designer of autumn loving little old me!

In doing this, we obey the first law of creation: we're made to enjoy God. As we persist in doing this, the most natural thing in the world happens.

Praise melts the prison walls into the enfolding presence of a great and loving God. Try it.