‘It’s mi nerves, vicar.’ I’d heard it many times, offering sympathetic noises yet devoid of real understanding.

Each time I’d stifle the ‘pull yourself together’ thought until the day I learned how inappropriate such words were.

I sat through the 1995 Wimbledon fortnight unshaven and stewing in my dressing gown, shot to pieces by an over-hectic, over-extended life and screaming ‘it’s mi nerves, doctor!’ It started with overwork but that friendly bank manager in the wardrobe (remember the TV ads) didn’t help.

‘Extend your loan with us, Mr Logan,’ he enticed. A year later when the car blew up he said exactly the same thing, and both times I forgot all the Godly guidance of good stewardship of living within my means.

The mounting debt preyed on me so much, I forgot how to pray and had a nervous breakdown, unable to see beyond jangling nerves of depression.

Three things rescued me: happy pills, a two-month sick note, and getting back to biblical principles of finance.

And it’s this third area we’ve misplaced as Britain goes on strike and toys with throwing itself into financial tragedy of Greek proportions.

Since letting go of God and his values, we’ve tumbled away from our Christian heritage of common-sense biblical stewardship.

And still we kid ourselves it was merely the folly of bankers, forgetting it was we who ran up a trillion in domestic debt long before commerce went crazy.

Back in the 1990s, I had it too good for too long and then had to buckle down and get back to Godly, common-sense basics and the discipline of thrift.

Not a bad recipe, I think, to solve our national financial breakdown.