In the aftermath of the historic vote on 23rd June 2016 for this country to leave the European Union, for me personally the time has come to offer some reflections on what has happened and my hopes for the future.

I have relentlessly campaigned for Brexit but six days before the referendum a major incident happened which profoundly changed how I approached the potential outcome.

On the Friday, the day following the murder of Jo Cox MP, our youngest son, Tim, contacted us to tell us about what had happened to him that morning.

He has recently bought a new car and we shared a long weekend with the family in Bognor, so he had driven quite a fair distance by the Friday morning and some of that on high speed roads. In the morning, in his own words, "Something told me to go to Quickfit and get the tyres on the vehicle checked" (these had been replaced by a local tyre company before going away). So, with Caroline and Daniel aboard they drove to Quickfit.

As soon as they drove on to the forecourt of Quickfit one of the front tyres burst! Quickfit examined the tyre and checking the other tyres made the following statement. The tyre which burst and the other front tyre were the wrong type of tyre for the vehicle and the other front tyre was in imminent danger of failing.

As regards the supplier of the defective tyres there are now issues involving Trading Standards, the local council and possibly the police. That's as it should be, but the most important thing was that the family were saved by Tim's acting on the 'something' which was telling him to go to Quickfit. What are the odds against any of this happening the way it did?

Tim had rather a roller coaster of emotions as can be well imagined but the important thing is that they are all safe and well.

What was that 'something' that prompted Tim to get the tyres checked? My answer is the Holy Spirit. It's as though through this God was showing that His hand was very much on their lives at that moment (I appreciate the theological issues around saying this in the wake of the death of Jo Cox and others who have not had tragedies averted).

While this didn't change my views about Brexit it became a major assurance that whatever the way the referendum went, God was ultimately in control. I have campaigned with the conviction that Brexit was right - but almost reluctantly had to admit that I don't know the mind and purposes of God who could bring good out of whatever result.

This left me with a sense of peace about the outcome and enabled me to move on whatever way it went.

Sadly there is now much division, hurt and recrimination at the result. It's perhaps easy to say this as the result was the one I had worked towards, but I resolved to work with whoever and whatever after the result was announced.

Like anybody I could speculate, forecast and criticise how things will develop in the weeks and years ahead but the reality is that I can do little or nothing about how this will all unfold at a political level.

But there is much I can and will do at a personal level to contribute to healing the wounds this has opened up.

1) To appreciate that many in the remain camp were sincere, thoughtful and decent people.

2) Not to reply to provocative posts on social media.

3) Not to make negative, sarcastic and critical posts on social media and to people in conversation.

4) To express my appreciation of the goodness and competence of people who have a different view to mine.

5) Not to express pessimism.

6) To grapple with what personal lessons I need to learn.

7) To affirm the sovereignty of the God who still works in the lives of all peoples and proclaim the good news of the only Kingdom which will never end.