1. Lose weight, minimum 2 stone, preferably 3.
2. Read the Bible from beginning to end, not skipping the tricky bits.
3. Recover mind and body.
4. Write some songs, good ones n’ all.
5. Write.
6. Find an author I didn’t know anything about before, but will really enjoy.
7. Rediscover some dreams.
Don’t you just hate it when someone does something with your idea?
My friend David and I have spent many long hours – usually accompanied with beer, whisky and cigars – pondering on how we could make our fortune. This pastime was a little more common when we were students (poor and idle) than we are now (less poor and very busy), but we did occasionally strike on the odd good idea. I seem to recall coming up with the idea of a mobile internet device for downloading music at one point. David was the engineer, could actually build stuff; whereas I would be in charge of marketing, sales, finance, that kind of stuff. Millions would surely start rolling in.
The abiding feeling I always had after these conversations was that (a) we would never get around it; and (b) someone else is likely to have had the same idea and will take all our money. I would suspect both of these things are true, but I’m in the middle of experiencing a similar feeling about a few of the things God has given me vision for over the year.
Example: I remember sitting with the man who can only be known as “Crazy Pete” at a party once and talking about the idea of having some big Christian music event in Scotland. Get all the churches behind it; have loads of people worshipping; change the city/nation/world. That kind of thing. We even came up with a rough budget (£750,000 if you must know) and promptly didn’t do a single thing about it.
Then the boys in Dunfermline came up with the whole Frenzy idea. A brilliant event that brings so many people together. It introduced to the awesomeness that is David Crowder and I’ve had some cracking worship and Jesus experiences there. The guys had the vision and acted on it. My emotions went something like:
Brilliant
I want to go
Didn’t I have that idea?
How dare they steal it!
I’m still going.
Why can’t I act on vision?
Or does God have a better one?
Tonight, I’ve been reading some of the blogs about the Passion event in Kampala and getting a similar run of emotions. Even any casual reader probably knows I’ve got a bit of a thing about Uganda, something I strongly believe that God gave me back in 1997 and shows no sign of going away. I was already feeling a bit sensitive about this, as some folks from church are just back from a shortish trip to the awesome Soroti and my mind had started turning to planning a trip next year.
One of my strong passions for the church in Uganda is to trip and help unlock the awesome worship that is stored in these people. Through adversity, they still have the most glorious faith and it continues to be a real challenge to me, who will find struggle in the most insignificant travail. From time to time, I’ve wondered about the idea of getting some of the great songwriters of our time to maybe pop out with me. There was an unwritten email to Martin Smith of Delirious after a piece he wrote about a trip to Rwanda. Several thought about comments on David Crowder’s blog. Those kind of things. I wasn’t thinking of like a huge event or anything, just a way to further encourage that spirit of worship.
Then the Passion folks just went and did it. OK, so they might have had a hand – I understand that Kampala Pentecostal Church, the largest church in Uganda, was involved in the organisation – but the fact remains that they answered God’s call. I kind of pottered along, waiting for things to fall into place for my vision, rather than actually doing something about it.
The moral of this story, or at least one version of it? When God gives you a vision for something, get on with it, or He’ll find someone else to do it instead. The alternate ending to the tale involves Him providing a bigger/tougher vision, after being inspired by what others have done in faith, but I’m not sure anyone should be relying on that. Do you?
Everyone knows I’ve been investing a little in my guitar rig recently. This is only really part of my determination to get back into being musically creative, recognising that I’ve written very little in the last couple of years. So, I’ve finally got around to getting a little piece of musical software (only the lite version) and a small midi keyboard.
Now, I can’t pretend that I’m much good at it yet. What I’m trying to produce is little scene-setting loops. Just a brief idea or so, a few bars. Something I can come back to later. There’s so much more to the software, and I’ll never understand it all.
Here they are. Let me know what you think.
Obviously, all (c) matthewrestored 2008, just in case they are good and somebody wants to steal them.
Has gone by. How did that happen. Oh yes, here’s why…..
It’s now the bank holiday weekend and I am DETERMINED to give my brain a rest, it’s been absolutely buzzing with some work stuff. Even now, I’ve woken up early on a Saturday morning and am thinking about a particular situation. To be fair, and to give God a bit of glory, I’m not feeling as totally wired and stressed about it as I was last weekend. A friend prayed with me at church on Sunday, following some serious prayer at cell group the previous Thursday. Amazingly, He cares, who’d have thought it.
So many things to say, so little time. I’ve been working quite hard lately, hence lack of anything approaching blog activity, nor socialising or anything like that. The deal is now done and I have vowed to return to normality for a while. In the meantime, here are some random, some not so random, things that have been occupying me.
The financial system
Not in meltdown, just a little jumpy. The [insert expletives here] who messed with my employers’ share price last week – and put the jobs, dreams and pension plans of 1000s at risk – are, in a spirit of Christian forgiveness, erm, forgiven. But don’t do it again, you naughty boys/girls.
Things are curious in my line of business at the moment. I didn’t have to go through the early-90s recession that my Dad did, but this is all a bit different. There is nothing fundamentally wrong with the UK economy, its just slowing down a little bit.
I went to Spain
Played golf. Went to Gibraltar. Saw Africa. Drank wine. Drank beer. Ate the most amazing lamb dish. Took lots of photos.
Realised I will never be good at golf.
The Mixu revolution
So, Hibs are suddenly good again. This is a very pleasant turnout of events.
To be fair, we haven’t played particularly sensationally in the last 2 and bit months. We are just looking a lot more solid than we were under the now-much-maligned John Collins. Some key players – Hogg, Jones, Maka, Fletcher – have found a bit of form and confidence, and we don’t look like we’re going to lose unluckily time and again. Top 6 is a certainty and 3rd place is more than a pipedream, but a real possibility.
Keeping this team together, of course, is easier said than done. However, one is allowed a little bit of optimism in the words of imminent Scotland debutant Steven Fletcher so you never know.
Toys
I bought a new guitar. It’s very pretty.
And worthy of a post all of its own in the coming days.
Stupidity
Further to my previous posting, I have made up for not doing the charity run thing in May by volunteering for the Cairngorm Mountain Bike Challenge. This is a corporate-led thing, with the need to cycle up to 100km in one day. Its in September, so theoretically I have the time to train and get fit/lose weight.
The really stupid thing is that I managed to talk myself into this while in the pub last week. In front of my Head of Dept. Who’d just bought me three G&Ts, which I’d drunk on an empty stomach.
Yes, I am stupid.
Hodilays
I’m going to fly on one of these:
I’ve finally booked my flights to Australia for November. Leaving London on the morning of the 1st, arriving in Melbourne on the evening of the 2nd. Back from Brisbane late on the 27th, landing in London in the afternoon of the 28th. Inbetween, a lot of Australia to see.
Having booked on Singapore Airlines, the thought suddenly occurred to me earlier that I might end up on the new A380 double-decker super jumbo plane thing. A quick potter around their website confirmed that yes, I’ll be on this. That’s quite exciting.
Generally, I’m quite excited anyway, but that’s the creme-de-la-creme.
In a restored world
Things I’ve been pondering God-Jesus-Church-wise:
Am I engaged with Church/community?
What is this emerging church stuff about?
When I worship, am I just playing music I enjoy?
How do I get a deeper relationship with God when almost everything I’ve tried – bible notes, prayer guides, all the “cool” books – has left me feeling unsatisfied?
So, it’s now 2008. An appropriate moment, I’m sure you’ll agree, to reflect on 2007.
From the first few hours boogying at Ardeonaig to the last minutes at, erm, Ardeonaig again, it flew past. Did someone speed up time when I wasn’t watching?
A year of great success (and not a little stress) at work but also when I realised I am now on the downhill slope towards oldfartdom. For example, I no longer have any idea what is in the “popular” music charts. OK, maybe I’ve heard that Umbrella song, but that’s about it. I know what I like and I like what I know, or some such other boring cliche.
In no particular order, highlights of the year included:
However, there were some things I really wished hadn’t happened:
Given that last of these is still rampant, I don’t have time to think about what 2008 may hold. That will follow.
Anyone paying enough attention will probably think I’m just a Rush-loving Hibs fan. Well, as it happens, Rush aren’t even my favourite band. Or my second favourite. Actually, to be honest, they only really sneak into the Top 5 – U2, David Crowder Band, The Killers and Delirious are all arguably ahead of them. Its just that they’ve been a large part of my life in the last few weeks. It was great fun, but I guess its not really what I meant to start a blog for.
The obvious question is what DID I start a blog for? Well, it seemed like a good idea at the time and a few of my friends have got cool blogs, so I thought I’d join them. But that’s not the beginning and end of it. I’ve had a rather vague notion for a years of a website dedicated to life in faith, music, culture, politics and the odd bit of sporting banter. The blog thing was meant to be a starter for this, but I haven’t really captured that yet.
This fits quite well alongside something I’ve been thinking about in the last month or so, and struggling with it to be honest. It’s that I have difficulty properly expressing my faith. One of my admitted weaknesses (yes, I do have 1 or 2) is my regular inability to succinctly put across my point, both verbally and in written form. In other words, I tend to waffle.
As far as I am concerned, faith is a journey and I’ve been trying to come to terms with where I am exactly on those travels. I’m not at the beginning, I’m not at the end, which really only leaves somewhere in the middle. But is it in the middle part that’s full of youthful exuberance? Or the bit that’s in a phase of healthy scepticism? Or world-weary acceptance of a low level spirituality?
How can I express in contemporary terms what exactly I mean by my faith in God and belief that Jesus was His Son, died on the Cross, and rose again on the 3rd day? How can I convey the emotion I feel when I know He’s with me? Or even when He’s not? How can I be a witness, when I can’t even string together a sentence describing my Christianity that doesn’t use churchy cliches or Godspeak? What is the vocabulary of faith in a secular world?
One of my current favourite Scriptures to go to when I need spiritual sustenance is in the first chapter of Paul’s Letter to the Colossians:
Now I rejoice in what was suffered for you, and I fill up in my flesh what is still lacking in regard to Christ’s afflictions, for the sake of his body, which is the church. I have become its servant by the commission God gave me to present to you the word of God in its fullness — the mystery that has been kept hidden for ages and generations, but is now disclosed to the saints. To them God has chosen to make known among the Gentiles the glorious riches of this mystery, which is Christ in you, the hope of glory. We proclaim him, admonishing and teaching everyone with all wisdom, so that we may present everyone perfect in Christ. To this end I labour, struggling with all his energy, which so powerfully works in me.
I’ve underlined the really important bit. This is the crux, Christ is in me, the hope of glory. But how do I get Him out and show Him off to the rest of the world. Step 1 is, I suppose, trying to live a life that honours Him. Step 2 is being able to express why I would want to do that (other than ‘because He said so’).
Step 1 is hard enough, but Step 2 right now feels just about impossible. I can’t find the right vocabulary of faith. Any ideas?
Remedy didn’t arrive today again. It seems a lot of peeps on Bwack’s forum are in the same position, so I’m not feeling too grumpy. However, I gave in this morning and downloaded it from iTunes. Its quite good. And when I say quite good, what I mean is it is definitely the best album I’ll buy this year and, almost certainly, a new entrant into my Top 10 Albums of the 21st Century (alongside DCB’s last effort, A Collision).
I’m still savouring it too much to post a few full review, but I am absolutely 100% certain that “The Glory Of It All” will feature the next time I’m leading worship at CCE. How did I get to such a conviction? I should really explain.
As a lot of my friends are probably tired of hearing, for the later years of the bygone period known as my 20s, I had a very strong feeling from God that 30th birthday would be a turning point for me. Many things happened that year, not the least of which was a great trip to Uganda, an aborted attempt to quit my job and move to Canada to study, and something else which contributed to the downfall of the last part (I definitely don’t have to explain that, if you don’t know, don’t ask).
On 11th June 2005, being during the year in question, Frenzy took place for the first time. Midway through the afternoon, a very odd looking bloke strapped on a guitar (third from the left in the photo), wandered up to the front of the stage and started to sing. The next hour or so changed how I thought about leading worship and songwriting. I have never been so impacted by a live performance as that, and I don’t reckon I ever will be again (yes, that includes U2). That bloke was David Crowder with his imaginitively named “David Crowder Band”.
Then, 364 days later, they repeated the trick at he 2nd Frenzy. This time, I knew all the songs, but familiarity certainly did not breed contempt, nothing like it. The humility of their performance, reflecting the awesomeness of the gift God has given them, still thrills me everytime I think about it. Which brings me to my excitement at the arrival of Remedy.
So far, 2007 has been a strange year, spiritually-speaking. At times, I have felt on fire for God but there have been other times when I have never felt further from Him. I think God is doing a realignment in me, a journey I’m on. He’s taken me from my comfort zone, thrown me around a bit and I’m yet to return to the place where I’m being effective for Him. The phrase that kept coming to me when I as in Uganda recently was – when you are travelling, the only place you can’t go, is where you came from.
In the light of this, Mr Crowder and his bandmates have produced a song that just, you know, gets me there. That part of me that aches when God seems distant, that rejoices when His blessings overflow, that longs for His touch. The song is “The Glory Of It All”.
At the start
he was there, he was there
In the end,
he’ll be there, he’ll be there
And After all our hands have wrought
He forgives Oh the Glory of it all is:
he came here
For the rescue of us all
that we may live
for the glory of it all
for the glory of it all
All is lost
find him there, find him there
After night
Dawn is there, Dawn is there
After all falls apart
he repairs he repairs
Oh the Glory of it all is:
he came here
for the rescue of us all
that we may live
for the glory of it all
oh he is here
for redemption from the fall
that we may live
for the glory of it all
oh the glory of it all
the glory of it all
oh the glory of it all
After night
comes the light
dawn is here
dawn is here
it’s a new day
it’s a new day
everything will change
things will never be the same
we will never be the same
we will never be the same
we will never be the same
we will never be the same
Oh, The glory of it all is
you came here
for the rescue of us all
that we may live
for the glory of it all
Oh you are here
with redemption for us all
that we may live
for the glory of it all
for the glory of it all
oh the glory of it all
