The Teapot Blog

A strange fight to choose

2012-02-10T14:42:00.000Z

"The tide has been flowing pretty firmly against Christianity in public life and it's caused huge concerns for the churches." according to the BBC correspondent. I'm glad someone has recognised it and said so; churches have been saying so for quite some time, and have been somewhat shouted down by those in authority. This article, however, I found a surprising one for a couple of reasons. Read it through and ponder with me for a moment

1. Wake up NSS. This is not a faith vs non-faith issue. Christianity asserts (among many things) there is a God, the NSS assert that there is not. The NSS asserts prayer is useless; the Christian asserts prayer is helpful in making big decisions. But who can - materialistically - say which is right? Both are beliefs. NSS are deluded if they think they want an "absence of the expression of religious belief". What they want is a removal of expressions of Christian belief, replacing it with an expression of their own assertions. If they really wanted freedom, they would be arguing for "you don't have to join in", which I'm sure is already an option.

2. Worryingly, this NSS appeal apparently flies in the face of what members of the council voted for. Twice. This should be ringing some alarm bells, and yet NSS have won their case - something the objector was "delighted, and not surprised" about. Disturbing. Lots of comments on the BBC site about "Christians forcing everyone to pray" - nonsense, I suggest. Read the article again: the majority want it, but the judge has said they don't have permission to do it, interpreting a 1972 bill.

3. Really now. Is someone's freedom of religion impinged by someone saying a prayer in their presence? I don't know exactly how long/how much goes into the prayer time; I would imagine it is not a great portion of the meeting. Is it possible for the non-believer to endure that ordeal without getting offended and upset? Just don't join in, or come a bit late. Evidently, the objector thinks not; let's leave the council and have a court case about it instead.

In summation. I think this is a load of highly unnecessary trouble-making, with disturbing undertones on grounds of both faith and political freedom.

The cost of free speech.

2011-06-18T18:14:00.000+01:00

Further to my previous rant about not being able to get writing paper... the cheapest pen you can currently get in WH Smiths in Charing Cross station is £2.03. That's in the "stationery specialist" store of course - not the other two Smiths outlets, which don't sell pens at all.

Helpful Humanism?

2011-04-19T12:49:00.005+01:00

I have a backlog of things I wanted to write about, and just haven't had the time. Better late than never.

A month or so back, it was census time, and the British Humanist Association (BHA) ran a campaign that advertised "Not Religious? Then say so" on the side of London buses, in reponse to the survey question which says "What is your religion", with options in order, No religion, Broadly Christian (my abbreviation), Buddhist, Hindu, Jewish, Muslim, Sikh.

BHA also did their own survey, finding two-thirds of people class themselves as non-religious. Their complaint is that people too readily describe themselves as Christians when they're not actually religious - thus describing that the question is not well phrased, because people don't really understand what religious means any more.

And I agree.

My problem is a little different to BHA's. By ticking the box that says Christian, I feel like I am grouped together with people who might go to church twice a year by some sort of internal obligation, then say and do for the rest of the year things highly opposed to the meaning of those two "special festivals". That is a little uncomfortable actually. If you really want to know, I would prefer a box that gives me the option to say that my life rests entirely upon the amazing and miraculous things Jesus has done, and my future I voluntary base wholeheartedly on what He wants to do with me, plus I can affirm various theological aspects of what I believe with a thorough and rigorous account (yes, with uncertainties and caveats named specifically) if requested. But there isn't a box for that...

At the very least, the term "evangelical" is a reasonable candidate, and has been well defined at least since 1846 (foundation of the Evangelical Alliance). Those who are evangelical probably know they are, and are unlikely to tick it by accident or default. Yet, that's just a minor irritation. Two ironies caught my attention more strongly, one grammatical, and one for anyone who has a passing knowledge/interest in church and non-church history.

First. If "religious" is really the problem word, then I wonder why the BHA think that inserting the word "not" before it makes the meaning any more clear. I do think the word needs clarification, as I wouldn't describe myself as "religious" in my terminology - although if I described my lifestyle and values to BHA or the Census writers, they would probably say that I am religious in theirs. I wonder how many Christians might stubbornly tick "No religion" because they don't feel that word describes them? (Which would be very high-principled, and possibly a bit daft and unhelpful, yes...). Anyway. If, as the BHA think, people don't know what "no religion" means, then saying "if you're not religious, then say so" (in upper case) I suspect won't assist the people very much.

Second. Just to cloud the terminology even further, humanism was founded (or perhaps formally specified) as a "new religion" in the literature around 1930. Early humanists described themselves as "religious humanists". Not just the keen ones, or the conservative ones. It was described as that in the first humanist manifesto of 1933. Things have changed, and many modern-day humanists have split off into the self-titled secular humanists, and have distanced themselves as far as possible from the religious terminology, even though their beliefs are broadly unchanged. It seems clear, humanism has a creed system, values and philosophies about religious issues. If that does not make it a religion, I'm not sure what does. If someone is to define for me what "religious" means then, BHA would not be my first choice with this somewhat tangled historical stance.

And one third point. I can't find any documentation of the BHA survey itself to find what question they asked, or who they asked, or how. I know they asked 1900 people, so it's a relatively small sample. It would be presumptuous to rule out too easily the results of a survey that represents most of 62 million, because the BHA think they don't understand what "not religious" really means, and tick "Christian" just for the thrill of it.

More probably, I suspect many people do feel that even if their lives don't go along with what they think Jesus is about, they have more attachment to Christianity than to other options because of the country's background, underlying legal system (many believe it is based historically on 10-commandments. Not so convinced myself), traditions (and what those traditions were based on), church buildings centuries old, Wycliffe, the Wesleys, some "major" educational institutions, many charities, etc, etc. And if they feel they achieve most satisfaction by ticking the box "Christian", then for the purpose of they survey, that self-assignment should not be unequivocally discounted either, even if it may not amount to being a zealot.

Self-obsession in WH Smiths

2010-10-18T14:09:00.000+01:00

I went out this lunchtime to get, not only my lunch (a medium traditional cornish pasty), but also... a pad of writing paper, to write to my Great Aunt about my nearly 5-week old boy.

I failed.

In the whole of Paddington, it seems to me there cannot be found a shop that will sell you a pad of paper suitable for writing a nice letter - including all the main places that you would imagine would sell that sort of thing. By nice I mean... I don't have to rip it out of the ring-bound book,

My first thought was that perhaps a few years of Facebook and even Twitter laying into our communicational skillset have taken their course, and nobody actually knows how to write a proper letter any more, or perhaps they don't have the time to spend on that "personal touch" when something typed, emailed, or even texted would do the trick. (And don't waste the irony here that I'm typing this, and you're reading it on blogger or facebook...!)

However, as I searched through the shelves for something suitable, the second thought arrived. It's not that there's a lack of actual "writing" going on. 4 shelves of journals, diaries, special-purpose planners, self-assessment guides, personal notebooks for weight loss, muscle gain, countries visited, recipes cooked... all stuff that if I actually felt I needed, it would be almost entirely for my own personal use, not for communicating with anyone else.

So, my lunchtime has pushed me towards an opinion that people don't communicate with each other on paper so much any more either because they don't know how to, they don't think it's worth the time, or they're too self-obsessed to pull themselves out of their personal world for long enough to actually communicate with anyone else at a deep and personal level.

Or am I making a meal of this? (The pasty was yummy at least...)

Just not cricket

2010-09-20T21:26:00.000+01:00

I don't often get moved to write about sport.

So late last night, Mr. Butt, the chairman of the Pakistan Cricket Board apparantly said that "There is loud and clear talk in bookie circles that some English players were paid enormous amounts of money to lose. No wonder there was total collapse of the English side." regarding the 3rd One Day International.

1. The total collapse of the England team was perhaps more due to the most excellent bowling of Umar Gul, who bowled phenomenal reverse swing to wipe through the tail - probably good enough bowling to knock out the best tail-end batsmen in the world, and some top order too. Mr. Butt not only has made a phenomenal accusation of the England team, without any apparent evidence, but also seems to be oblivious to the world-class talent in his own country's team. I wonder which is the more disturbing of those two things?

2. I feel for the England team who lost today's 4th ODI - a match they understandably were not too keen to play, and needed to be essentially persuaded (or would we say pressured?) to do so by the ECB, in response to things like tickets, public anticipation, and probably to salvage some future for Pakistani cricket, which would surely take yet another plunge if today's ODI had been cancelled. It must have been quite gutting for them to observe such an uninhibited flamboyant Pakistani celebration all things considered, since there wasn't a smile among the England players all day - again, understandably I think.

So, a decider at the Rose Bowl - provided nothing else happens before then...

Modelling Eyjafjallajokull

2010-04-22T15:07:00.002+01:00

A couple of mornings ago, the Daily Telegraph front page expressed quite a special ignorance of modelling, when it complained that the climate models used to predict how the ash from the eruption were based on probability, rather than on fact.

Plenty of people among my research community have commented on this already. Models are built when you want to make a best guess at something that isn't obvious, using some things that you do know, and some theories about how you expect things to behave. Unless you can perform time travel, models about the future will always rely on theories that may or may not be completely accurate. Facts about the future are hard to come by.

Facts about the past are somewhat easier. In *fact*, in 1982, BA flight 9 lost all 4 engines and descended some 26,000 feet in an ash cloud over Indonesia, before restarting an engine and enduring a pretty difficult landing. I would hope this might be more significant in today's discussion about how cautious we should be with rare events that we don't understand.

I know this has been very inconvenient for everyone... I was extremely lucky to get back from Pittsburgh the day before this all started. But considering the number of people who fly, and considering that today the RAF has stopped flying in Lincolnshire because they've found deposits of volcanic ash in the engines, I personally would cut the civil aviation decision-makers a little slack.

A Dad Moment. Or two.

2009-06-07T20:31:00.004+01:00

The other night I was bathing my 1 year old boy, Luke. Now, every parent thinks their child is the cutest kid in the universe. But seriously, even some people who aren't Luke's mum and dad think he must be a serious contender. In his earlier days, Faye and I used to joke about how he could be a model for various kids' clothing catalogues.

Anyway. I was bathing Luke. He's been learning to walk recently, which he finds utterly hysterical. Walking in the bath is quite fun for him. Also rising out of the bath with a manic grin, wet sponge held aloft, and unleashing it into Dad's face is quite a joy for him. I love this boy! Haven't quite thought what to do about the sponge thing yet...

And that's when it happened. Well, a few things really. As I was swirling the water around Luke, who was playing with his various bath toys... I was imagining his future, remembering highlights of his first year... and mine... thinking about all the things I pray and hope for him every day... all the ways he might surpass me when he's my age... my mistakes that I pray he won't make, and my short-comings that I pray he'll fully achieve... that he'll know his Father all the days of his life... and so on.

The first thought was this: I love this little guy immensely, and there's nothing he can do about it right now except be his cute splashy self. (I also love him when he's been yelling his head off for no reason I can fathom... like tonight, by the way.) Not even a wet sponge in the face, or where he tries to remove my face... nothing could put me off him!

The second thing I felt was a sort of frustrated hope that as a one year old... can he understand how much I love him? I can give him all the hugs, all the time I've got, try my best to raise him well... and at the moment, I wonder how much of that he understands? How can I convince him more? Maybe right now he doesn't even have the capacity to understand the depth of love I've got for him - what I would do for him - and how desperately important and valuable he is to me.

The third thing, maybe a minute or two later, was God. In a gentle, hinting, and perfectly accurate whisper, finely cutting into my thoughts. "Are we learning anything yet?"

Those nasty rules!

2009-05-14T15:38:00.002+01:00

Now, forgive me if I'm a bit simple about political things. But the events of the last week I find make me want to unplug my brain, squirt contact cleaner in the prongs and plug it back in again to check that my senses really are working.

So. It seems a fair summary that various politicians across the parties have been charging various things to their expense claims. Sometimes the things have been not strictly necessary, either by general common sense, or that what they bought did not relate specifically enough to their job. And in some cases, making an expense claim for precisely the maximum amount of money available to do one job or another just looks a bit iffy.

I have no problem really understanding this, or why MPs did it, in the same way that at the end of each financial year, all sorts of unnecessary road projects are built because the budget won't roll onto the next year. It's not nice, but I understand why it happens.

What I find so ludicrous is the same people who made these expense claims saying, "Yes, it was wrong, it was a very bad system, and it's time to change it". Of course it is, you've had your moat cleaned now haven't you! Am I the only person to find this the most potty thing on the planet? Those wretched rules, yes, they were so inflexible I had no choice within that terrible system but to spend all the money in those ways...

The truth as I see it is... MPs probably are underpaid in terms of salary as their job, if they do it well, is one of these all-consuming ones, where they are to a degree required to serve by their constituency at all hours of day. I think probably (from a truly layman perspective) higher salary, lower expenses, and a more sane justification of expenses would be a step forward.

But what narks me is... that's not what I've heard any MPs saying. All they've done is blamed their own choices on the system that was in place, which I find... remarkable!

In the end, these things have nothing to do with systems or structures, but on the state of the human heart, and the choices people make. We will answer to the people we serve (regardless of our job), and ultimately to God for those choices, and there'll be no "OH, but the system of the earth was like this" - we will be judged by the contents of our hearts.

I was impressed among such a state of affairs to see a few examples of MPs who had claimed very modestly - having a second home that cost about what my student rent used to cost - who evidently from this week could have quite easily got 5 or 6 times what they asked for.

One more thought. There was a bit of resistence at the beginning of this affair to the details being made public - and you can see why. Now, I know this isn't the full story - there's grace, forgiveness, confession, and restoration, YES. But regarding just this week... I heartily urge all of us, myself included, to live our lives such that if they were to be made public (as indeed they are to God), then as much as is possible and reasonable, we would not need to feel ashamed.

Big Mac

2009-04-22T11:28:00.004+01:00

Apologies in advance, this is going to be a boring blog for many. But I just need to get it out of my system... Don't actually read this.

Certain people are often telling me I should get a Mac. I have now, by a strange process, got 2 of them, and thought I'd document my experiences... now, these are quite old relatively speaking, but never-the-less, a pair of Power Macs: G4 dual 1.4G processor with 4G of RAM, and a G5 dual 2G processor with 8Gigs of ram should hold their own.

So, I slide the case of the G5, "Big Mac" open. It glides out gracefully. Within 20 seconds I replace the hard drive which I know has physically died (the second one to make grinding noises in this 5-year-old computer). All very nice so far.

I google and find you have to hold C to boot of a CD/DVD, and start installing Mac Os 10.5. I am offered whether I want a case-sensitive file system or a standard Mac one. I go case sensitive, as I'm used to that. The installation gives me nearly no choices (which is fine with me), takes 2 hours, then goes into a cycle of rebooting that doesn't seem to end. I eventually end it myself, boot it up, and it seems ok... except none of the Mac software works, crashing with "error -10061" and the like. I think. I google. I find that the "case-sensitive" option is a bad thing to choose. I reformat and start again with the other option. It takes 2 hours, reboots 4 times, and then lo and behold the software seems to work ok. Once I find where everything is...!

I update to 10.5.6. It takes 4 hours to download. 3 more reboots. Still seems ok.

Then I try to connect to my (completely trivial PPTP) college VPN. Comptuer says no. I try all the available options. I mail tech support, who ignore me. I add my mails to various support forums full of people with the same problem, that no-one can solve. To cut a very long story short, the people who make my router eventually release a firmware update for it, and the Mac VPN starts working. Fair enough, not Apple's fault, although it remains curious that Windows laptops have been using my router for VPN for a couple of years now with no problems.

Next I install skype. Plug the mic in... oh, there doesn't seem to be a socket for it. Only a line-in. Bit annoying. I go to Apple Retail. They'll sell me one for 74 pounds. I go home, rearrange the furniture and all my wiring and take a line-out from another amp. It works.

I plug a web cam in for skype. Doesn't work. Strange. To cut another long story short, while my mac has 8 USB ports, only two of them - the front one, and the top one on the back of the box seem to supply enough power to run a small webcam. The others seem to have driver problems that prevent them running much.

Anyway, those were the G5 quirks. There's a learning curve, but with this one, I'm ok (with the exception of one idiotic and infuriating choice Apple have made about Java - see later). Other than these, and me getting a bruised forehead (they should pad the cases), things aren't too bad, and I'm getting used to the ridiculous one-button-mouse just about ok.

Now onto the G4. This one used to work, but on arrival to my house, it asks if I would please restart it after about a minute. (Which is a bit like an Apple blue screen of death). I can hear a fan making grinding noises. I guess that it might be cooking. I book myself into an Apple genius bar. I drive half an hour there. The weight of the G4 nearly disjoints my shoulder as I trudge through Midsummer place in Milton Keynes. I dump it on the counter upstairs. I realise I've cut my hand on it and bleed all over their counter. They give me a plaster and a dry paper towel.

They switch it on. It grinds. They suggest it sounds like a fan. I concur. They open it. Hmm. Looks like the graphics card fan - it's stuttering round and dying. Sounds good. They scan the barcode. Ah. Apple calls this computer "vintage" now, and won't support it. Oh. Can you get me a new graphics card for it? No. Oh. They suggest I should try ebay. Thanks Apple genius. I know it's not your fault, but really... I could have told you everything I learned myself here, over an email or something, but you won't do this kind of thing by email...

I go home. I go to ebay. I find the fan, order it from Hong Kong. It arrives. I replace it. It spins like a dream.

But then, after a minute or so, of booting into some old Mac Os (10.3 I think) the G4 starts to makes a noise like a jet engine, and asks to be shut down. Next time it freezes completely. I google.

I let everything cool down. I insert the Apple Hardware Test disk. The basic test goes through fine. The extended test says there's a memory error. I take out all the memory. (4 sticks). I put them each in one by one, testing different chips different slots. Apple Hardware Test crashes even earlier with memory access errors each time. Strange. All my memory chips blown?

I google some more. The version of my disk is 1.2.6. Ah. It's a buggy disk. The one they supplied has problems detecting some memory. Right. I try to download the most recent. Oh. Although 1.2.7 exists, they've only got the buggy 1.2.6 online for download. I have to BUY 1.2.7 from Apple. Except as the G4 is vintage, they no longer will sell it to me. Apple recommends ebay. Ebay doesn't seem to have 1.2.7.

So I'm stuck. I can't solve it myself because I can't get the diagnostic disk, because Apple won't give it to me even though they have it. And Apple won't do it themselves because they've discontinued the G4 as it's vintage. So....? I have a new shiny oversized doorstop.

One more thing... some of the work I do is in Java. The good thing about Java is that it runs anywhere there is a Java platform - windows, linux... er, except that Apple want to do it their own way. They produce their own Java that is about 2 years behind the version that everyone else gets. Well, ok, as long as they get there in the end.

However... Java 6, which is nice and quick and shiny... Apple have decided that my G4 and G5 with their PowerPC processors are just too old for the job, and so I can't install Java 6 on these. Only on their most recent Intel-based processors. A stab in the back for cross-platform development then. And while we're at it, because Mac Java is a different beast from the others, you occasionally get some lovely issues where things work on the "standard" Java from Sun, but won't work on a Mac.

[NB. I've discovered SoyLatte. Might be able to get Java 6 on them anyway, but no thanks to Aplpe]

Conclusions...

Those who know me will know I'm not a Microsoft fan either by any stretch of the imagination. But generally, being able to choose my own generic hardware, choose my own software and maintain it myself is more appealing now than it's ever been.

While Apple can make nice pretty cases, iPods with weak batteries, and iPhones that run only Apple software... to my mind, I question whether they have the common sense to make good computers that will last, and consequently whether they can keep their customers from going insane.

One Word Answers...

2009-02-17T20:48:00.002Z

Again, I never usually do this, but it's Paul Brownnutt's fault. Blame him.

Where is your cell phone......pocket
Your spouse.......sparkly
Your hair ..........blond
Your father ........missed
Your favorite thing ..........Luke!
Your dream last night....forgotten
Your favorite drink ...........tea
The room you are in ......LOUNGE
Your fear .........failure
Where do you want to be in 6 years....home
Muffins ............yeah
One of your wish list items.......wisdom
Where you grew up ..........Kent
The last thing you did ......pie
What are you wearing.......hoodie
Your TV...........off
Your pets ..........homicidal
Your computer.....slow
Your life ........complicated
Your mood ........overcooked
Missing someone .....yep
Your car ....recovering
Favorite store.....fridge
Your summer .....friends

Would I shoot Mugabe?

2008-06-25T11:26:00.002+01:00

Now there's a provocative question.

When I first wrote about this topic two years ago, it was in the context of Al Qaeda, and a phrase in the press that caught my attention: The UN have "welcomed the killing" of a certain known terrorist. Read the blog for a catch up. Interestingly at some anonymous point, the BBC article has been rephrased a little, and the title has been changed to "Iraq allies hail Zarqawi killing", and the article talks about "hailing the news" rather than "they welcome the killing" - which was what got my hackles up in the first place. But the photo still tells a thousand words.

I am not Zimbabwean, but I have friends who are, and I get troubling news reports from good places - orphanages and the like that are still running there - which I trust to be true. A few weeks ago, a man I respect greatly said, "I would rejoice if someone were to assassinate Mugabe". Among many South African and Zimbabweans, who have suffered great personal pain at the indirect hands of Mugabe, I can understand that feeling.

Yet, part of my thought processes remain in turmoil. Mugabe has a history, of which I know little, but the snippets of which lead me to think that people don't become like he is now overnight. At this stage in time, he has the appearance of insanity about his decisions, and personally, I'm thinking along the lines of something demonic to be honest. Again, I find myself deeply troubled by the unending, brutal damage he is causing on so many levels, and the feeling of futility is sickening. Yet, I feel heavy hearted when someone pronounces at least the intent of a death penalty towards him.

But I've reached an answer that enables me to stay sane. It comes in two steps, and it is subjective - it works for me, and if you'll give me some time, you can fit it to yourself.

It's probably not quite allegorically ideal to talk about "whoever has no sin throw the first stone". (John 8:7). The women had been caught in adultery, she wasn't committing daily brutalities and running a broken country even further into the ground. The situation is more complex than that, and I don't intend this to be a complete answer. Yet, I would challenge anyone who finds themselves longing for a dictator's death to consider the question: would you like to be the one to pull the trigger? Would you like to be playing the judge, looking down the gunsight, being the one to end it?

I'm not going as far to say it would be wrong to do so. War is always messy, disturbing, scarring, and there are stories out there of soldiers "switching off" to the reality, maybe pretending it's a computer game, to try and escape the weight of it. It's easier to hypothesis about it from our safe places, both in terms of the violence in Zimbabwe, and on the other side that we won't get the opportunity to "follow through" our vocal intentions.

For that reason, my first step is to humbly say, slow down. Think. Even for people who have had more bitter experiences than I can imagine, let's not charge into a euphoric death-march before we contemplate the weight of our intentions. What you harbour in your heart is important. I am not making a judgment about what you should think, but I'm suggestion you should reach that decision carefully. It should take a while, some soul searching, and a recognition that perhaps a little of the "throw the first stone" thing might actually apply to us too.

Secondly, people are different, and that's ok. I recently read that David, the great worshiper, the man after God's heart, was not suitable to build the temple, because of the amount of bloodshed on the earth he had caused. 1 Chronicles 22:8. And 28:3 for an encore. David was a warrior. And a worshipper. It seems you can be both. David was a guy who was able to say, "I will worship God, and I'll wipe out His enemies". Solomon, his son, wasn't quite so much like that, he went about things a different, peaceful way, and his character was more apt for building a temple for God.

Which of these is right? Well, both. David is remembered as a man after God's own heart. Acts 13:22. Yet Solomon was the temple maker, who pleased God by asking for wisdom, who wrote the rather profound Song of Solomon about how intimacy with God is like marriage.

I am more the temple maker type of character. And that's ok. Those who are more like warriors will be frustrated with me and think I'm weak and passive, too merciful, or these days, too "tolerant". But equally the temple-maker sort of character may think the warrior mentality is insensitive, uncompassionate, unforgiving and cruel.

This doesn't make the issue easy - and let's face it, the situation is a mess, and getting sense out of it is a fairly ridiculous notion anyhow. But it may be comforting to suppose that both positions can be held strongly by passionate people, and neither is wrong. I'm pretty sure that even the most extreme cases of warrior or peacemaker may have an uncomfortable little region in their minds that the opposite extreme also has validity. Don't silence it - it's an important tension.

Others may validly rejoice for freedom, an end to the oppression, and welcome that moment of judgment with all their hearts, and that angle may be ok to take. I won't take issue with that, even though it rubs my character up the wrong way. I couldn't ever be the one to pull the trigger, and that angle is just as valid a place to take, though to those suffering right now, and those with a more strongly warrior-like temperament, I would be a great frustration.

Perhaps the ideal position is for all people to submit to one another, holding their own views more secretly at times, learning to pause, listen and understand, and to acknowledge we are in difficult, evil times. Eph 5:15-21.

Advertise my worldview.

2008-03-03T10:33:00.006Z

On my drive into London on the M4, there is a certain place where a huge poster for a clothing company is situated. However, at the moment, the poster that greets you does not in fact contain any clothing as such. The guy in the photo is as naked as the day he was born, and he holds his jeans in a careful location so they just about preserve his modesty - or at least, the final shred of it.

Now... part of me just finds this totally ridiculous. How can you sell clothes by showing pictures of people not wearing them? Duh! But of course, this isn't what they're really advertising is it? It is not primarily the clothes we are being sold here. We are being sold a worldview of some kind that will make us want to buy the clothes - perhaps the idea that it's good to be naked and free out in the fields. Does subscribing to the company by buying their clothes somehow associate you with that kind of freedom and confidence? I dunno. Some have suggested there's a simpler answer concerning the types of people the ads will appeal to.

Meanwhile, David Beckham is appearing on the side of buses in only his underpants - or rather, some other company's designer undies. Not even nice ones in my opinion - they look sort of like nappies. I wonder how many people will get some kind of genuine identity affirmation by knowing that they wear what they think Beckham wears? Hmm...

Anyway, while all of this is slightly distasteful, it did raise one interesting thought for me this morning. People are trying to get you to buy their worldviews everywhere. I hope I advertise my worldview prominently, and it carries something obviously authentic enough to cut through the noise, and look genuinely attractive.

Old habits...

2008-02-01T16:09:00.000Z

About 22 years ago, the left-shift key of my little Atari computer broke. It was a problem at first, but I was quite a flexible lad, and soon learned to compensate my steadily improving typing skill by switching to the right-shift key, which worked fine, and did exactly the same thing as you'd expect. (Don't think the Atari could tell whether it was the left or right shift key actually!)

And behold, 22 years later, although I now have a nice modern-ish laptop with both shift keys working, I was noticing today that my right shift key is discoloured by repeated sweaty impacts , wheres my left shift key is pristine and shiny.

Profound huh?

The day my food tried to get me.

2008-01-29T11:31:00.000Z

So, the first thing that happened was that I woke up feeling pretty rough. That's not usually a good start, especially on a Thursday. What happened next was my wife Faye drove to work, with me as a passenger. She had in her possession two large slices of toast buttered and liberally smeared with sticky blackcurrent jam.

At the roundabout in Dunstable, Faye passed me a half-eaten bit of toast (more specifially, the half that she hadn't eaten yet - that would be just gross, even for a doctor to do), because it hindered her from changing gear. The hindrance removed, she sped around the roundabout and up the hill towards Dunstable downs. Unfortunately during this manoeuvre, the second piece of toast, initially sat face up on the dashboard, overcame the forces of friction, and flew in smooth uniform parabola, to settle itself blackcurrent-face-down on my trousers. I was not amused. Faye however was, and laughed her way through the rest of the journey while I behaved with remarkably restrained Shakespearian displeasure. That was the first time.

The second time was more my own doing. That evening, I walked calmly from my kitchen into the sitting room, ready to sit down with my wife to watch the end of Jamie Oliver cooking rabbits. I had in my joyful possession a bowl of hot lemon meringue pie. However, half way, due to a completely unexplained loss of concentration, the bowl slid out of my hand sideways. I caught most of the meringue against the bathroom door, in a similar way that you'd use a glass to catch a spider. A few bits of lemon sort of escaped and oozed their way slowly down the door, a leaving behind them the sort of trail you usually get from snails on your front door. But most of the meringue was saved, fortunately.

However, after about a ten second delay, I started to feel in pain. I could not at first find the source of the pain. Eventually I traced it to my left little finger, which was covered in bubblingly molten lemon stuff. It started to sting. Like, really. I stuck it under the cold tap until I felt like passing out. It relieved the pain for a few seconds, then it returned. I spent the rest of the evening feeling very sorrow for myself, and plastering my little finger with packets of frozen vegetables, which I think kind of adds insult to injury, that foodstuffs should first try to kill me, then make like everything is ok and innocently offer to help reduce the swelling.

Anyway, the blisters have now gone down, I can type freely again. But I warn you. Watch the food. It has motives of its own.

How to practice.

2007-12-18T18:32:00.000Z

Firstly, I'm just going to write a reminder of how to spell the word in ENGLISH! The practiCe of doing something. I go to a band practiCe. But I practiSe playing guitar. Right, got it.

I've got someone in my team who I think is amazing. Hopefully he'll read this and be very encouraged, and everyone who knows my team will know who it is. He's been playing acoustic guitar for a little while - not that long. He got his first "proper" guitar earlier this year, and at the beginning, it would probably be fair to say he wasn't that confident with the songs we were using, and generally getting to grips with playing. However, a few months later, listening through the (fairly rough) recordings of church meetings, there seems to be a rather good sounding acoustic guitarist coming through. It wasn't me - I was on piano... and Dan had stopped playing a guitar at that point... Someone's been practiSing!

Anyway, that was a shameless plug of encouragement for someone I think has worked hard, and is doing really well - it's showing. Nice job! I'm also thinking at the moment about how to improve at the instruments I'm playing, and I've come up with a nice sort of idea that might help.

If we want to get better at playing, I think there are two directions we need to pursue. The first is learning to play simple things well. The second is learning to make difficult things simple. And as you can see, there's a sort of flow from the second, into the first, so that eventually, you learn to play more and more things that were once difficult for you, but now they seem simple.

Now, let's start by saying... you can get a really long way by just doing the first of these - it's much better to play simple things that are within your grasp - and do them excellently - than to just about stretch to play something that at that moment in time is actually beyond you. I learned that in my music AS-level, taking on Rachmaninov's prelude in C# minor in concert. I did ok, but it was by FAR the hardest piece I'd ever taken on, and when I did perform it, it wasn't "simple" to me - all my energy was going into getting my fingers on the right notes, and not into the detail of how exactly I played them - the expression and mood - even the timing was probably more mechanical. It was like playing in freefall, with no time to consider exactly what I was doing. Just got to keep hitting the right notes...!

So. Being able to play simple things well is a fantastic start. How do we practise that? By repeating things you basically know how to play. On a guitar, it's getting the fingering smooth - any buzzes or places where your fingers slip, miss, or bend the strings out of tune, play those chord changes a few more times until it becomes part of muscle-memory. Maybe record yourself in some way and listen to it back. Try and sing along - a good estimate of whether your tempo was ok! It also highlights to you times where you can overplay - too many strums - without realising. Listen for your dynamics - does the song have any contrast in volumes (if it should?) - sometimes you want to play at a constant regular volume for a whole song, at other times you might want more differences in sections. Whichever it is, think about what you're doing.

But if all you do is practise the simple things, then you'll probably end up plateauing sooner or later. You'll find yourself comfortable at playing everything you need to, which is great, but your ability may not get stretched much further. For some of us, that's a frustration - those inclined in that direction, like me, will get fed up if you feel you're not getting continually better. I hope to be better this week at playing than last week if at all possible. The usual response to this is "I don't have time to practise". It may be true, but it's also very significant how you practise with the time you do have. I suggest it's less about spending an hour a day with an instrument - I think it takes that sort of time to perfect simple things. It can take far less to learn a new skill - if you know how.

Essentially, to do this second part, making difficult things simple, you need a challenge. Perhaps it involves getting some sheet music or some guitar tab that is beyond what you can currently "simply" play, and applying yourself to it. It's got to be something you actually want to play, as you'll spend some time working on it! Learn to read the music or the tabs if you need to - although it can seem daunting if you're not used to it, it's really not as hard as it seems. (I learned where the notes are with an rather old-fashioned first music book for kids when I was 5) In my teens, I slowly stumbled my way through the Rachmaninov, but the second time through, I stumbled a little less and played a little more... and so on. And bit by bit, it became within my reach. Some of it I now find simple!

Take a small section at a time, repeat it a few times, until it starts to get into muscle memory again. You can think of it as representing life - if you learn to do anything that you couldn't do before, you grow in confidence. God uses trials to bring us towards completion. In a sort of similar way, if you never have to learn to do new things with a musical instrument - that is, you never have to do any overcoming - then you won't grow towards "completion" - it works for real life, as well as playing an instrument.

If sheet music/tabs really isn't your thing, you can try listening to something you want to learn to play, and figure out what notes you need to push by hearing it. You'll grow in different ways, probably figuring out what sort of tricks (capoing, alternate tuning, etc) writers employ to get the sound they want.

Another way is for those who write songs - let your imagination run wild when you write, don't settle for chord progressions that you already know from other songs. Think in more detail about which notes you want to emphasise in the chords, and work out the fingerings that you need to reach in order to make them happen.

Anyway, all of this is quite subjective really, but the central question/challenge for today is this: if you're a musician, and if I listen to the best you can play this week, will I be able to notice the difference if I do the same next week? Will you be better at doing simple things? And will there be more things that you can make look simple? Do you have something you're working on that is too difficult for you to currently achieve, but in a few weeks, you'll be able to achieve it? This is the long and exciting road towards being an excellent musician.

One last recommendation. Separate all of this from times of worship. Yes, it's true that developing your gifting is good stewardship, and it will help you to express yourself musically to God. But a good practise is no substitute for a good time singing, playing and talking with God - and I need to keep that separation very clear to preserve my sanity! Either concentrate on your fingers, or concentrate on your best friend.

Anyway, that's my take on how to practise... for now!

Sin in worship!

2007-10-08T12:01:00.001+01:00

For a while, I was very uncomfortable with songs like "Everylasting", which starts, "A thousand times I've failed..." in church praise and worship. Is that the kind of thing we want to be confessing in praise and worship? Isn't it a bit defeatist? I talked to Dan, my leader at that time about it, explaining my discomfort, and as often happens, that kind of conversation leads you to discover that you've only seen half of the picture. In fact, many people find that kind of song very comforting to sing together, because it doesn't encourage this false belief that every Christian is perfect, and if I sin, then I must be a fake. Rather, it collects us together, and then the song takes us somewhere good afterwards. And that's mostly satisfied me for that song. But in a lot of criticism, there is a seed of helpful truth...

A few months ago, I was again quite surprised, but more thoughtfully this time, that a special couple I know chose to have this song during their wedding. And depending on which hat you put on as you sing it, you could either say, "that's a very negative thing to sing at the start of a new beginning..." or you could say, "that's a very realistic thing to sing." - We are likely to be imperfect, especially in things you've never done before. But with God's mercy, every day is new, and no mistake made is beyond God's grace and forgiveness.

Now, having accepted both viewpoints as valid, I still wasn't quite comfortable with how to get the tension right between the two, until a few thoughts came to me last week.

The thing that troubles me with this kind of song is the risk that it might create an atmosphere, (and we might create a culture), where sin and failure and resulting repentance is the "normal, expected experience". It's a very fine line clearly - we've all fallen short for a start, and if any man is without sin he deceives himself. I do not claim perfection in any way - (otherwise, pride would be my next sin!) But what good do I really do by dwelling on that truth? Do I improve my chances of avoiding sin? Shouldn't I instead plan my life as if it's possible to never sin again? Or at least, have a heart that says, "Even if it's theoretically achievable, then I'd love to be a man who achieves it!"

Of course, we can't impress God with our good behaviour. However, do we then continue to sin because we can? "Certainly not!" Jesus never tells someone, "If you sin again, there will still be mercy". Instead, he says, "Go and sin no more", and "Be perfect, just as I am perfect". And I don't think he believed for a moment that every person would be as sinless as he was from that day onward, but never-the-less, that is what He chose to say to them - that was the direction of travel he ushered them along: not looking back, and without apparent "safety nets" of mercy and forgiveness mentioned, although of course, they are. He said, "Your sins are forgiven" and from that point on, a new journey had begun, with a completely new destination in mind.

The challenge for songwriters regarding this issue, I think, is to express God's mercy, so that if we have sinned we praise Him for the gift of forgiveness. But on the other side, we must be careful that we don't breed a culture of worshippers who have a feeling of inevitably that "I will certainly sin again". (and I'm not suggesting the song above does that - it is just for us to be aware of). Let's not talk about "if I sin next week, I'll still have mercy". It's true - of course it is - but "Go and sin no more" is also a true way to live, and we must move quickly to there. I can think of many songs about mercy and what God is like "when we fall". I can't think of many that state as explicitly as that "Let's leave our sin for good."

So in all that... I think we must strike the right balance between emphasising God's mercy to those who need it, but be very cautious of propping the door open even a crack that leads back into repeating the same sins, and finding ourselves at the same point some time later. There are enough opportunities in the world to fall into sin again, without us diluting Jesus, who is sympathetic to all our weaknesses, yet chose to send us on our way with "Go and sin no more! Be perfect!" as the ultimate state of our lives.

Christmas is coming...

2007-09-05T08:51:00.001+01:00

John Lewis has its Christmas trees up. Better late than never....

Tube hell?!

2007-09-05T08:11:00.000+01:00

The tube strike this week had made London travel a bit tricky. It's especially tricky if you fall asleep on the train and forget to get off at Watford Junction to change train, and find yourself in Euston with a 1 hour 10 walk ahead of you (me yesterday!). However, a 1 hour 10 walk in pleasant sun, down through the hi-tech busy regions of Tottenham Court Road, down through the more glossy Bond Street, through an expansive and mostly deserted Hyde Park, is not really so bad.

It was with some annoyance I noticed multiple newspapers on the journey home, and a few Radio 4 interviews all agreeing that the consequences of the tube strike were "hell". I think not. Having a much slower journey to work, a long walk, a seriously crowded bus, or not being able to go to work is not hell. Even if you do have a pressured job, it's still not hell. Even if you're late for something important... no.

We used to criticise so-called "hell-fire and damnation" preachers for giving the "brutal truth", instead of a more compassionate balanced account. We probably still would, with some justification. However, it seems blatantly obvious to me that the man on the street hasn't the faintest idea what hell is any more, regardless of whether he believes in it.

It reminds me of a G.K.Chesterton quote at the funeral of an atheist. At that time (and sometimes still today), the body of the dead person would be dressed in a smart suit, for some probably superstitious reason, and an onlooker commented to Chesterton "All dressed up, with nowhere to go!". Chesterton replied grimly, "I bet he wishes that were so."

Come on people, if you're going to describe your life as "hell", at least look it up. I suggest Malachi 4:1 isn't a bad start.

Ironies in the tube

2007-06-05T14:11:00.001+01:00

Two tube posters annoyed me today...

Firstly, something along the lines of "Oyster Card reduces single from £4 to £1.50". Right. How about something more like, "We've jacked non-oyster card fares up from £1.50 to £4" instead? In fact it's even worse, because at the time I was effectively forced to use Oyster, they abolished the Carnet which I used to use - it went from £11 for 10 singles, up to £16 overnight, and has now been completely withdrawn. Do they think we're all silly?

Secondly, a huge advert for Richard Dawkin's book, "The God Delusion", with a few quotes about how magnificent and brave it is. The thing that I found was ironic was the encouragement on the poster to "Join the debate", since until a few months ago, this is precisely what Dawkins has notoriously refused to do - to the point that his refusal to debate with peers was arguably as well known as his contraversial beliefs. It was with some surprise and interest I noted in the last few months that he has at long last had a face to face talk with Alister McGrath, author of "The Dawkins Delusion". Further, if "join the debate" was the encouragement, perhaps it would have been better for the poster to attempt some kind of balance, rather than the entirety of their quotes being so drippingly pro-Dawkins.

A bit of Job

2007-05-15T16:29:00.000+01:00

I've been reading sermons by Spurgeon... love it! Particularly, I'm on number 3 out of 25 on the topic of Job, which from the lamenting themes last year, is a passionate topic. I was reading this morning about "The Lord give[s/th] and the Lord take[s/th] away" - choose[th] your preferred[eth] version[eth].

Think of a couple of things, right now, that you'd like to be given. And then think of a couple of things that you'd like to be taken away from You. If God were to take away, for example, my fear of failure... that would be a precious gift given to me, and in the same breath a curse taken away from me all at once. Those who say, "But the Lord only gives", are only talking about one side of the coin.

But that is an obvious example - a fear of failure is something you'd instantly want to be rid of, like an infestation of warts. No-one would complain at God if He takes that away! But supposing that God, rather than zapping me so I instantly have no fear (or warts) left, decides that He's going to discipline me by taking away different things that might hurt, in order that the life I will consequently grow into, will be greater than it ever has been before. Hmm... will I let Him?

Will I recognise that absolutely everything I have, including my body, my health, my family, my cats, my piano... is God's anyway, and He's hardly robbing me if He takes it away again? Will I trust that when He takes away, it is Him divinely preparing me for something to come? And that God, with perfect foresight, is telling me that I'm better off without the thing He's taken away, than I would be if I still had it?

These are no doubt, difficult questions. But who, in the history of the earth, has lost as much as Job did? Surely not many. And so Job's statement, "The Lord gave, and the Lord has taken away..." and yes, "Blessed be the Name of the Lord", is not only a statement of enormous challenge to Christians struggling when God doesn't give them their own way, but also one, I think, that brings great hope, if we will just remember who God is.

An increase of cats

2007-04-30T13:53:00.000+01:00

Lucy produced 6 kittens last week! It was the day before Faye and I went to Athens for a week of mixed work and exploration... so good timing. With a litter that big, sometimes not all of them survive, and indeed, one of ours died at 4 days old. Such is life.

These are a week old now, so they're noticeably bigger, (and cleaner) than the last time I saw them (day 1). The ginger ones are probably a couple of lads, and are already wrestling each other... must be a ginger thing...

Quite cute I reckon!

And another bad apple!

2007-02-07T16:06:00.000Z

Apple are really going out of their way to annoy me this week!

Steve Jobs has been writing pleafully about how dreadful DRM is, and how Apple is so forced into using it, and that actually it has nothing at all to do with ITunes being locked into IPods etc...

Point 1: There are songs you can get from ITunes that you can get from other legitimate sites in unencrypted MP3 format, because those artists (Barenaked Ladies, Sarah McLachlan and Avril Lavigne - see eMusic) aren't members of the 'big bad record companies'. However, when you order it from iTunes, it's still encoded so you can only play it on an iPod. This isn't legally required by any means, so if Steve Jobs is going to have such a rant about DRM being thrust upon poor innocent Apple, I just don't swallow it, otherwise they'd avoid DRM whenever they could.

Point 2: Jobs clearly goes on the defensive about Ipods and Itunes not being locked together, but his statistics are just confusing and not really the point. He says there are 90 million ipods, 2 billion songs purchased, so that's only 22 songs bought on iTunes per iPod. How many people do you know that have only 22 iTunes-purchased songs on an iPod? Among my friends, those who have iPods bought them specifically so they could use iTunes without the hassle of having to hack the DRM yourself, and have hundreds of iTunes-purchased songs.

Point 3: In any case, the damage is already done, those 90 million iPods and 2 billion songs have already made Apple a fair amount of money at an opportune moment - that's probably enough to create an infuriating set of crafty commercials about PCs and MACs. Opening up iTunes so you can use it even if you don't have an iPod, bearing in mind it has become pretty much the standard already, is just going to be more good for Apple, and bad for the smaller "emusic" sites that have currently been making a living from what iTunes forbids you from doing - namely buying music for a non-iPod. Come on, how obvious can it be?

Apple might well argue that now is the opportune moment to drop DRM, but let's be very clear on this, while DRM may well have been necessary to get things started, (although I'm not so certain of the details there), Apple certainly were fortunate to get the iPod-iTunes link which DRM so conveniently provided, and will now be fortunate once more if they can get rid of it, as iTunes will inevitably launch into the market for non-iPod players too.

Mac vs PC, the non-debate.

2007-02-05T13:44:00.000Z

Sorry guys, had to write a techie one today.

The Mac vs PC posters are all over the tube at the moment, in several different varieties, and you can go and see them by clicking the link above. They're sort of quirky - I like the virus one, where the PC guy says, "I'm just going to crash for a while" as he falls amusingly over...

But aside from that, it's a confusing and deceptive state of affairs in my opinion! Firstly, we're obviously not talking Mac vs PC in the slightest; instead we're clearly talking Mac OS vs Windows aren't we. More to the point, Mac OS seems to me to be linux with a pretty maccy front end. So cutting to the chase, this is really the next chapter in the Linux/Windows debate isn't it, and Apple are clearly going for an image-based persuasion, right?

It's annoyed me a little, because most of the selling points that Apple are using have nothing to do with their system at all, but instead are qualities of the underlying linux. The exception perhaps is the 'designed for music and photos', which may well be true, but my Windows XP box does both of those things totally adequately, and certainly isn't 'designed for piecharts and spreadsheets', otherwise it would be better at doing them well! It is nice, however, for playing games, something which Apple should consider for those poor new recruits who might like to use their home (rather expensive) new mac for more than music and movies.

Possibly as a result of this campaign over the years, my job now includes maintaining 2 MAC laptops, 2 desktops, (one of which has a habit of burning out its hard-drives after a few months. Hardware glitch maybe? Oh, Mac doesn't have them. Right....), and another one in Italy which I've not had the pleasure of meeting. But MAC's are all the same aren't they, so I shouldn't have any trouble. You'd hope. Alas, contrary to all the hype, the scripts I wrote for installing and updating our software fall flat on this new iMac, because of a variety of operating system changes - different script processors, different default paths... what a complete mess. It's as if the system's default configuration has been set up by someone with less linux experience than me, which is scary.

As a software developer, all my computer-specific issues are with the Mac computers, subtle differences between them, and lack of any documentation on the web of the particular idiosyncracies that Mac like to do. (Eg, Safari automatically unzipping compressed streams of data I was downloading and sending into a Java decompressor application).

On Windows getting our software packages installed and running is a one-click, (and a few more "Yes" and "OK" buttons) deal, and it's all there with a button to click to run it. Alas for Mac, the only way I could do it is by dropping down to a terminal window and having a nasty looking set of scripts to try and copy things into the right places, sort out protections, create more scripts to run the installed stuff... And pleasantly, on the different Mac builds I've had to work with, they seem to employ a random policy over which script processor they've set up by default. It would have been nice if they'd chosen to add '/usr/local/bin' into the path by default, rather than having to create .bash_profile AND .tschrc to get the path right. It would also be nice if 'javac' automatically pointed to the latest version of Java the MAC had installed, rather than it merrily telling me it had upgraded itself to Java 5, but when you try to run it you get 1.4.0.

My discovery has been this:- if you're going to use the MAC in the office for development, you should learn linux, as that's where you'll spend most of your time. But perhaps this is the message Apple are happy to put across.

Whatever computer you get, Mac or PC, if you set it up nicely and look after it well, it will probably end up doing what you want it to; all the bad things that Apple say PCs do can be avoided without great effort - certainly compared to say, installing a java app on a mac. Apple also omit to mention a wealth of things that an 'out-of-the-box' Mac is cripplingly unsuited for, unless you are a better hacker than me, or have time to learn.

So if all you want is music and pictures and other MAC-tweaked out-of-the-box software, feel free to get yourself a very pretty MAC, but if you want anything more complex than that, don't ask me to maintain it!

Dramaqueenism

2006-12-22T14:04:00.000Z

So... it's a bit foggy right? Well, actually, it's a bit more than a bit foggy. The drive in through the hills of Bedfordshire has been rather foggy, (and icy too the last few days), visibility down to a few metres, which I can imagine makes it a bit more difficult to land or take off a plane.

But it raised a couple of interesting points of discussion for me. The first, is yet another reminder of how the media view things like this. The Evening Standard devoted the entire of their front page to the words, "KILLER FOG". Others: "FLIGHT MISERY FOR MILLIONS", "KILLER FOG CAUSES TRAVEL CHAOS"... all very dramatic! Newspapers like dramatic headlines because they sell well, and I've been wondering what it is about us that we like a bit of 'drama' in our lives so much? Well, I say "us", but to me, it seems as I get older I just can't be bothered with it all any more, and find deep cynicism a much more enjoyable retreat!

But if I'm true to myself... I go for an exciting life. The sort of reaction to thick fog happening at Christmas was so intense and glorious in the press that I just wonder whether something of the 'wild at heart' thing is living itself out here. Perhaps we do long for our lives to be dramatic, for us to be heros, to battle through against the odds and survive. Perhaps we've been made for more exciting, challenging lives than many of us live, and that is something of an internal discomfort for many people who haven't found it. I don't claim to have found it yet, but on some (very musical) days I think I might be on the way.

I was also a bit bemused by the sudden massive outcry of "This is PRECISELY why Heathrow needs another runway - in fact, two!" - would I be unfair to think there was a bit of bandwagoning going on? I happened to be sitting in a cafe in Oxford St, watching Sky News as it broke, where they talked about all these issues - the extra runways, then a sudden dramatic shot to breaking scenes at the Stock Exchange where the reporter with much excitement reported to us that.... today's events at Heathrow... have made... very... little difference.... at all. But best load the sentence with dramatic tension in any case!

Anyway, the compassionate part of me is thinking, it must be fairly tough if you were hoping to go home and your flight was cancelled, so don't get me wrong on that bit. However, to all the press people, and those who long for this kind of drama in their lives, the cynical part of me is saying, enjoy it while it lasts, it'll be gone in a day or two. "There must be more to life than this?"

Listen to Smile!

2006-11-20T19:49:00.000Z

If you click on the title, you'll be able to hear two songs so far, by popular demand, on my myspace thingy... not that I'm a big fan of spreading myself all over different bits of the net - much rather all things in one place, but there we are. One day, blogger might add mp3s to the site, and then I'll be very happy.

So, go on, have a listen to Rich's blistering vocal on "Smile", and the euphoric, and actually quite clever 6-part a capella bonus track, "Happy". You know it makes sense...

Thinking and Feeling

2006-11-02T13:20:00.000Z

Faye's been reading a book on prayer, which identifies various different kinds of pray-ers - if I remember rightly, it's thinking, feeling, intuitive, and spontaneous people. I was unsurprisingly "feeling" motivated... although depending on how well you know me, you may well have thought I am a thinker of thinkers, and little more! And that turns out to be interesting enough for me to write about.

These sort of stereotype surveys never seem to work with me! I go through some random survey about whether certain things make me very happy, quite happy, apathetic, sad, or ragingly miserable, and after 50 such questions, it says that jobs I'd be good at would be... fashion designer, astrophysicist, fighter pilot, or prime minister. Or something like that. Obviously this is a slight exaggeration, but in growing up years, I predominantly got the 'do what you want' sort of answer from those kind of surveys. (Which as I'm now older and more cynical, I'd probably say the survey says... 'What-ever...!').

We shouldn't listen to them too much, and certainly shouldn't let the final analysis of some survey limit what we feel about yourself. A helpful pointer perhaps, but not a definition by any means.

Anyway, I digress. About this thinking and feeling paradigm. I suspect a good few people from my sort of background think... no, let's say... imagine, that because they are thinkers, they must therefore be emotionally weak or defunct. Or on the other hand that if they are emotional, then they must by consequence be irrational or illogical in their approach to life in some way.

I think I viewed myself in the mistaken thinker category for some years, because some of the things I wanted to have a strong emotion about, I actually felt a bit apathetic about. Surely there must be something wrong with me! And as I was far better at solving problems than I was at fixing people, I thought I must be an analytical logistician. No question!

However... then one day I asked myself, why do I even bother thinking about things? Why is it that some things seem to feel... worth my time sitting down and composing a blog - trying to get them straight in my mind - trying to understand the picture properly? Sudden revelation... it's because I want to. It's driven by desire.

Thinking and feeling to my mind are inseparable in a way. I think about things because I desire to. I think about what feels important to me. I don't think about things I'm apathetic about - that I have no desire or feeling for. I could say that sentence a million ways and something emotional and something decision-based would both be in there, one as the reason for the other.

So my point of this blog is... let's not go too far with separating out the stereotypes, or in boxing people into 'this type' of person. Sometimes, like in this example, you need some of both for anything to make any sense. No-one is emotionless, and no-one is thoughtless. Yes, there are trends to one side or the other. My thought-process is driven by my feelings about something or someone, others may be different.

But we carry a balance, with own values, desires, and capabilities in there. Everybody has a heart and a brain, feelings and decision-making faculties, and surely, inevitably, unavoidably, they have to interact together for you to do anything that you want to do, and you're truly neither one thing nor the other, but a unity of the two, inter-relating in some excitingly unique way.

Don't let anyone put you into a "definition box", and certainly don't jump into one yourself.

Smile, OUT NOW

2006-10-26T10:39:00.000+01:00

Smile is FINALLY released today, 26th October 2006, having been started in early 2003. I'll get something up on the Teapot site today, so you can hear some snippets and things, and get yourself a copy if you want one!

About the English!

2006-09-14T17:20:00.000+01:00

I recently heard a preacher amusingly define eternity as two Englishmen standing at a lift door saying, "After you", "No, after you", "No, after you", "No after you"....

However, I have today reached a firm conclusion that anyone who classes the English race as polite to the point of nausea has most certainly not tried to catch a Victoria Line train South from Euston at 9:00 on a Thursday morning. I am actually bruised!

On a related note, I've recently been recommended the book by Kate Fox, "Watching the English", (and also I remember seeing Jeremy Paxman's "The English", which will surely induce a wry smile here and there!) for some good critique of our beloved national traits... but not read them yet! But I hypothesise that all observed cultural habits of social etiquette (not to mention bodily hygiene) unequivocally evaporate during rush hour on the underground!

A quick smile...

2006-08-08T15:24:00.000+01:00

A quick note to say... "the album" is going to the duplicators this week... so the wait is really almost over. I've been listening to it in the car, and can still cope with hearing it all - some of it I still get a bit of adrenalin listening to, which is pleasantly surprising! I was worried I'd be so fed up with it all at this stage that I wouldn't be able to tolerate it any more...

ANYWAY, we're almost there... which is good so we can start thinking about our next project... oh, and the multimedia's quite fun!

Welcoming death?

2006-06-09T00:49:00.000+01:00

I read something on the BBC news website that disturbed me tonight. "Political leaders welcome the death of al-Qaeda's leader in Iraq, Abu Musab al-Zarqawi, killed in a US air raid."

The issue is: you have a man who has done some horrendous evil things - unquestionably. Bombings of cars, hotels, offices... quite a CV. Everything you could read in the obituary testifies to the gross assaults on mankind that he stood for. As I read that, I feel angry, and indeed, getting close to justifying his death as making the world more peaceful.

However, the idea that you can welcome someone's death carries some kind of sting in the tail. I pray for justice, yes. If you push me on the topic of capital punishment then you might even get a... "let's talk about it over tea" at least. My point here is not about the topic of whether we should retaliate, invade, etc etc - too complex for me right now! I'm talking about the response to that killing:- even though I can recognise so readily the man's evil, I can't bring myself to rejoice that he is now dead. Why is this? Am I going soft? I bet some would like to give me a good ranting for feeling any sort of compassion in this situation, and I'm tempted to rant at myself about it. But I think I won't.

Reading the report, I feel a numbing grief about all the hatred expressed over the years, and how any man could revel in such a life and feel it is right. But to sing an Hallelujah song that some 'righteous' violence on 'our side' has killed him... no, that doesn't make me feel happier - in fact it makes me feel like there may not be quite such a chasm between my heart and his, if I can rejoice at his death the same way he rejoiced over the death of his victims.

Does this mean that the aforementioned political leaders value the life of a 'good' human, (whatever that is) more than they value an 'evil' human? Quite a judgement to make I think.

Oh, what am I saying in this blog... "It's all wrong! ALL OF IT!" The world sometimes makes no sense, especially when what seems to be happening is a race of who kills who first - now who exactly is on the 'right side' here, and what is really going on in people's hearts? Perhaps it's just too late, I'm on my own (Faye is on a night-shift) and I should just go to sleep! But let the record show that at this precise time, I am disturbed!

Leadership Analogies - Driving in Convoy

2006-03-21T21:16:00.000Z

This is an article I wrote last Summer, which I've finally got off my old decrepid laptop, into blogular format... quite fun for some random thoughts.

Driving in Convoy.

Shortly after getting married, Faye and I moved (with some substantial help!) into a cottage near Ashford in Kent. A couple of days later, we asked my mum round for dinner. I spent an afternoon subconsciously considering the logistics of the travel - my car was at my Mum's house. So I decided I'd catch a train to my mum’s, drive my car back, and my mum would follow me. This plan saves me a good twenty seconds , as I no longer need to write directions down. Genius. Shortly before departure from my Mum's, I decide it's wiser to spend a couple of minutes drawing an elaborate map of the journey, just in case... hmm!

Then we set off. I lead the way, and all is well. On the way, some interesting thoughts come to me about driving on convoy, and I start to wonder whether God is giving me something to write about. It seems quite a bizarre thought, and I wonder if all the analogies will be a bit stretched.

0. God speaking. It's not so hard to hear...

I used to think that God talks in unusual ways, this being be a good example. And there’s some truth in that, what with God’s thoughts and ways being somewhat higher than ours. However, I’ve also been finding God can talk to people like me in entirely natural ways to them... it's just that people are all as unusual as each other! Uniquely unusual in fact. Today, God is talking to me through driving a car with my mum following, which feels a bit unusual. And yet, it feels totally natural! It's the way I think and work, looking for 'meaning' in often fairly trivial things. And it struck me that... that's the point! God is speaking to me in a way that I can actually 'get'.

How easily we can write this sort of thing off as being ‘just me’, assuming God’s voice to be a complex and virtually inaccessibly mystifying phenomena requiring exclusive days of fasting on a mountain-top, intervention by a talking donkey and preferably a burning bush too just to nail it. When we have that question, "Was that God or me?" maybe we can hold the door open a bit more and suggest it might be both - God helping me hear him in a way that is so naturally 'me' that I can barely believe it. Anyway, on with the story. I’m going to talk about leaders, and followers.

1. Patient Leadership

The first thing I notice is that the responsibility for keeping the convoy together is the leader’s. If I speed off into the sunset, (which I’d never do of course), leaving a trail of dust (and with my old car, smog and moss) behind me, then I could never blame my follower for not keeping up. I know where we’re going (roughly), but my follower does not. My role is to get us there together, which may entail me going slower than I need to, being patient with those I’m leading, and not expecting them to see and know everything that I am going to do from the outset. I have to take into account who I'm leading, a vary the 'style' in which I lead, according to the needs, abilities and knowledge of my followers.

2. Keeping in touch

As the journey goes on, I realise I’m often checking in the mirror to see if my follower is still there! I make adjustments to my speed and style depending on the distance between us. For instance, I decide to only change lane if I can see there’s enough room for both of us to do so without any other vehicles getting in between us. I make sure that all my signals are well in advance of what I’m about to do. If other vehicles do sneak between me and my follower, (whether it's them being cheeky, or me letting them do so), I'm onto it quickly and do whatever I can to rectify the situation, so that I quickly get us back close together again. But generally, I try to prevent that from happening, giving ample space and time before making any changes.

3. Keep concentrating too!

I realise at times I'm a bit paranoid about looking at the follower and checking all is well. If all my time is spent looking in the mirror, I could get lost, or mess up my own driving in some embarrassing way. So I also need to trust my follower to not do anything silly, and I need to pay attention to my own direction and well-being as well. It wouldn't help either of us if I didn't.

4. Leaders must know where we’re going – almost.

I have given my follower an approximate idea of where we’re going, but the details – recognising the church where I turn right, and the café where I turn left, are known only to me at present. Even so, I’ve only driven there a couple of times and might well have some problems in describing from memory every turning we will make before I reach those decisions.

I have friends who seem to be able to navigate their way by the sun, stars, or... let's say general intuition. Alas, I am not copiously gifted in this way, and while I’m being gently trained to pick up pointers, at my current state of learning, reliance upon my sense of direction can get me into trouble! But I'm good with maps, so I can get a clear enough picture of how to get places.

Thankfully for me, a ‘clear enough’ picture means just what it says – clear enough. Precise foreknowledge of every choice I might have to make on a journey is not a prerequisite for setting off and taking some people with me. And it's absolutely not a reason to sit back and not try to get there, otherwise we'd never go anywhere at all. Something of the fun is in the journey to places, as well as the actual getting there.

5. Behave yourself on the way!

Interestingly, when I have a follower with their eyes trained on my every move, I find myself paying particular attention to the way I drive. Not that I don’t do that when I’m not being followed, but let’s just say the extra pair of eyes on my driving causes me to keep things polished a bit more? It’s a sort of accountability check-up on my driving. Maybe to set an example.

6. And about the follower?

Well, my follower has to trust that I know enough to get us there. And that trust is greatly assisted by me providing some evidence, and giving a bit of security - things to look out for that will tell us we're on the right lines. That trust has to be earned, and if it is, it will prevent my follower thinking it would be altogether better to choose a route of their own.

And my follower has to keep with me, and I have to set a pace that makes that possible, and keep my direction clear.

7. So....

I think I can apply all of this to the way I lead worship; others of you, whether leaders or followers, (in fact, most leaders are followers first), may find good points for what you do. (1) Am I patient with those I lead? In my band? And in the congregation? Do I expect them to be immediately ready to do everything I can do? Or do I have some slack for them? (2) Do I allow distractions to get in between us? Do I check that indeed my congregation is 'still with me', or do I need to slow down and find them again? (3) Or do I get so distracted by thinking of them that I forget to actually focus on God and lead by worshipping Him passionately myself? (4) Do I have a rough idea of where we're going in a time that I'm leading? (Rough being a suitable word!) - and have I told my band/congregation so they know I have half an idea of our journey? (5) Do I treat my band and congregation right? (Or do I frown at them when tempos go wrong, or do I look tense and frustrated when I can't get 'the sound' right?)

(6) Yes, we all have a responsibility as followers of God, and of our leaders, to 'do our bit' as it were - prepare ourselves, be willing, positive, commiting ourselves to giving God our best. But do I help that as a leader? Do I help the people I'm leading to trust that I've been with God, and that I'm letting Him use me to lead them somewhere worthwhile? Or will they feel like they could approach God easier without my attempts to lead them? Will I set my pace right? Will they be breathlessly trying to catch up with my super-spirituality, or will they find a gentle and easy journey into praising God with all they have?

Do we ever find ourselves blaming our followers for their 'slow response', or their 'unwillingness to participate', or their 'inability to grow/step out' etc etc, when actually we haven't given them the support and confidence they've needed, and deserved from us as leaders?

A valid and necessary question I think.

Three amusing things!

2006-02-17T10:28:00.000Z

Some of the blogs have got a bit deep and heavy recently, and this morning has inspired me to write something lighter for today!

1. Listening to Radio 4 (am I getting old) this morning, I sniggered substantially during the report of our first Silver medal in the winter olympics. Well done Shelley Rudman for the 'skeleton'. What amused me was the deadpan very English newsreader saying something along these lines... "The Daily Times has described the event as hurtling down a track at 85 miles an hour on a metal tray. The Daily Mail reports that Miss Rudman does not take kindly to people referring to her equipment, which takes precision aerodynamic engineering to create and costs 3000 pounds, as a tea-tray."

2. Then on the train, I was reading some of Prayer by Richard Foster, and came across a delicious passage about distraction: "Once I was leading a worship service in a home on a hot summer evening. The doors were left open in hope of a breeze. At one point in the meeting I encouraged everyone to "wait on the Lord" in listening silence. The stillness, however, was quickly interrupted by the homeowner's cat scratching at the door, seeking entrance. The more I tried to ignore the cat, the worse it got. I prayed that God would do something - send the cat away, magically open the door, and other more drastic prayers that I shall not mention, since you may have a fondness for cats." Oh, the imagination!

3. Finally on my journey in, I had a conversation with a cashpoint machine, which went along these lines...

Self. I'd like twenty pounds please.
Cashpoint Machine. Enter your pin.
Self. Ok.
Machine. That's not the right pin. Try again.
Self. Of course it is. Perhaps I typed it wrong. Try again.
Machine. Nope, not even close.
Self. Hmmm. Perhaps it's got a problem with its network connection, I bet it's using some non-serviced version of Microsoft Windows NT 4, and it's fallen over. Or maybe that chip+pin thing that's happening at the moment... no-one seems to be queuing at this Nationwide one, they're all using the HSBC one. Oh well, I'll cancel before I have 3 attempts, and use the other one.
Machine. Bye then... (Waits til I'm round the corner...) SUCKER!!!!!

Self. Greetings, oh shiny and colourful HSBC Machine.
Machine. Come on then, as if you think it will help.
Self. Ok. There's my pin.
Machine. Er, no. Here's your card back, idiot.
Self. Huh?
Machine. Too many attempts now, you're blocked out FOREVER! Mu wha ha ha.
Self. But that's definitely my pin.
Self. Oh, wait a minute.
Self. Oops.
Self. Poo.

Self. Hello?
LloydsTSB helpline. Hi! My name's Emma, how can I help you?
Self. I need a new brain please. This one is broken.

Anyway, the lovely Emma sorted me out, all is well again, especially since I then had sufficient renumeration to get a nice cup of tea when I got in... Ahhhhhh!

Life is life-changing!

2006-02-13T09:55:00.000Z

A few of you are aware that I can get a bit pedantic about 'mis-use' or 'over-use' of words or phrases, to the point that they are in severe danger of losing their meaning, mis-leading people in some way, or making life less fun in general. So here's probably a new train of thoughts on that topic, so I do my bit towards redeeming some phrases in life, (or redeeming life from some phrases).

This does I think relate vaguely to previous streams about 'lamenting' etc - put it in the category of keeping life real and authentic: being realistic about where we are, what life is like, not trying to hype things into something they're not, etc.

So my first candidate is the phrase 'life-changing'. For at least 10 years, I've heard this used frequently to describe many, many experiences, both inside church and outside: books that you might read, missions you might go on, countries you might visit, people you might meet, training courses you might go on, etc, etc. You know the kind of stuff.

Now, I DO NOT want to detract from the fact that these are amazing things to read, do, visit, go on, etc. And, also I'm not denying they CAN make a serious difference to the way you live - if treated correctly. But I'm suggesting we should be careful about how we treat such experiences, and how we promote them.

1. Over-use of a phrase inevitably devalues it. If everything is awesome, then nothing is really awesome compared to anything else, and what was once an 'elite' word to describe a select collection of things, (even one thing), becomes trivial, and describes God, your church meetings, your car, your haircut, and anything else you happen to like. True, there is a finger-print of awesomeness in everything that originated (or was made by people who originated) with God, but you know what I mean! If everything is life-changing, then it's hardly worth calling anything life-changing.

2. That was a very general point about word-use. However, with the phrase 'life-changing', I think there's a particularly large avenue for error. The reason is that I really wonder whether it is the so-called 'life-changing-experiences' that actually make the difference in your life. Isn't it how you choose to respond to the 'new stuff' that the experience gave you? Whether you choose to ask yourself, "How can I learn from what I've just done", or whether you just forget about it all, and get on with 9-5 work again.

The whole hyping of experiences being life-changing might even lull you into the idea that the change has 'already happened to you' just by doing it, and it's a matter of time before it somehow outworks. Now, sometimes these experiences do plant things deep within us that we get reminded of later, but for me I wouldn't like to rely on that, as my life seems to move pretty quickly, without much time to reminisce about age-old experiences for the things that have been planted deep.

3. Use of the phrase can make the 'rest of life' seem by comparison boring, dull, non-life-changing, second class living. You return from a mountain-top experience into the dull flat monotous drone which is 'normal' mundane life, thinking "I hope I got everything I could out of that experience, as I won't have another one of those in a while, perhaps ever". It can even put pressure on the experience with the thought, "I must get as much out of this as possible!!!" - a bit like if you have a small amount of holiday, and concentrate so hard on making it so enjoyable and so packed with good stuff that you come out of it exhausted and in need of another holiday to recover! (But alas, you might not have one).

4. It might, if taken to an extreme, even introduce two 'tiers' of people. Those who have been on a certain experience vs those who haven't. The mountain-dwellers vs the mundane-livers. The warriors vs the wimps. The victorious vs the strugglers. The life-changed, from the not so. It may be that there are reasons why people could not, or did not go; finance, other important commitments, or maybe not recognising who those people truly are - not everyone has a heart for specific experiences, and that's not a right/wrong issue. We can even criticise such decisions as having a 'lack of faith' - whatever we mean by that.

I have painted us in our potentially worst light here, to illustrate the point. If that seemed a bit over-the-top for what is essentially an axe-grind about a couple of words, then sorry, but you'll have to get used to the way I write! I'm just carrying things forward to their 'natural conclusion', as I suspect many people do, given time and some habit-building around these things. Think of it as getting foundations right.

I'll switch now to the truth (or rather, what I believe to be true) about life-changing-ness. I think our lives are changed gradually, with....

1. each experience we have, where experience could be as major as a world-mission, or as minor as a cuppa and a chat with a good friend, a quick prayer, a tube journey... Life is FULL to the brim of experiences, all of them potentially 'changing' to us. WOW!

2. the decisions we make in response to the things that happen in our lives.

3. the habits we form as a result of these decisions I guess are the outworkings of these.

It's really very basic. YES, our lives are changed by big events, but that doesn't mean you have to have a big event in order to change. In that light, labelling particular things 'life changing' doesn't especially help us grow.

We live in such a quick-fix, impress-me culture; we want the easy options, the ten-steps-that-will-fix-me sort of seminars (although three-steps would be better), we want to just 'do the thing' that will make everything right. We want to 'do something' that will radically change our lives, just like that. In practise, I've found all such quick-fixes to be superficial, if they're not properly installed. I've found that THINKING, making choices in response to everything I know about life, and practising them over weeks, months, years, that really changes me. (I know others do have sudden radical life-changing experiences, eg, Paul's salvation! But I don't think I know anyone who obtained such an experience by choosing it).

By all means, go for the big mountain-top experiences, they do give something excellent to you. I repeat, I AM NOT exluding them, or devaluing them. But let's rephrase our encouragements about some of these events, and cut back on emphasising them as L-C in themselves - if we do that, we only put pressure on ourselves regarding those events, dilute the richness of the rest of life, and for a bonus, we open a nasty can of worms with potentially deep implications. We need to be real, not create a false spiritual ceiling for those who don't go on such events, and highlight that change is a gradual, thorough process.

The reason I feel so strongly about this, is that I think ALL of life is REALLY exciting - EVERY experience you have in life, and how you respond to it, can change you. I can't tell you how cool that is. God is in your life where you are RIGHT NOW, not just in place 'x', doing major-significant-work 'y'. Ponder about that, and ask yourself what we're REALLY saying if we only call part of life life-changing.

Lamenting 2

2006-02-09T11:41:00.000Z

Very encouragingly it seems people do actually read my blog! (Although I bet it's because they read Richie's wonderful world-famous blog first!!) I'm very happy about that, and have one less reason to lament now! It seemed about ripe to sort of summarise current thoughts of lamenting, and focus on the actual HOW... Thanks for taking the time to comment; you'll see that this blog draws on many the ideas that have come up, and I hope makes sense of them all.

So a quick summary of issues so far...

1. Biblical writers and congregations have no qualms about being very honest with God in difficult times, but it is done so carefully, poetically, respectfully. (Oh God, my rock, WHY is this happening.). This is encouraging for us, and certainly gives us permission to ask God very frankly what is going on. He's big enough to handle our complaints...

2. And we have to have the mentality that it is 'ok' for us, or others to go through tough seasons where you're not in a happy happy happy mood. We need to be honest about that, not feel pressured into 'faking it', in order to make progress in it. There is a time to mourn and receive comfort.

3. There are differences between the cultural arrangement of the Israelites in the Old Testament, (they were on the same journey; they all had the same concerns at the same time), so perhaps congregational laments are less easily applicable in our lifestyle today. (NB, I've got a further point on this later).

4. Personal and congregational laments are different things: the need to be able to mourn and be honest about tough times on a personal level is a different issue to whether/how congregations can mourn together today. Relationship, however, is highly important in both personal and congregational setting... (see later again).

Now, thoughts on how to make this actually work....

My heart in starting this topic was to write a cd for the personal lament, because I felt a number of people I knew could be very surprised and blessed by listening to some of the things that I felt God was giving me in the way of songs. So I think there's a strong application in terms of being good encouraging supporting friends to each other, looking to develop relationships in which we can be fully honest, no matter what's going on. I think this is the easier one to think about. For me, writing music to comfort and encourage comes as a sort of extra expression along that line.

It seems the congregational aspect of this has raised most thought... so a few rough points...

1. Prayer. (Thanks James for the inspiration here). In the same way as the Israelites face major things together and feel the same way, we also feel that now and then. I'd say around the bombings last July, there was a sense of coroporate sadness, in our shock, in our prayers... the same way that whenever we've heard disturbing news and prayer requests in church, we pray together, and share in the sadness of those immediately affected. We know beloved friends in church who have faced difficult situations, lost family members, faced sickness... and sometimes have physically cried with them as they've tearfully explained their situation. And we've prayed together to Almighty God our Rock, in the midst of the tears and the confusion. So perhaps we're not so far (at times) from the Old Testament laments as I once thought.

2. Praise/Worship (in the singing-together sense). As I mentioned in one of the comments I think, there are songs that can helpfully allow some people to lament, others to praise, in the same breath. Matt Redman's 'Blessed be Your name' was the first I thought of. 'When the music fades' might be another. There are songs like 'Draw me close to You', which are thoroughly appropriate to those who are feeling great with God, and those who feel more in a state.

3. Serving: (Thanks Mike for the ideas here). Worship leaders (my most 'immediate' servant activity I guess) can be sensitive to the balance of songs being used in a season. There may be whole seasons of rejoicing, and whole season of mourning, and it can be excellent to ask a senior pastor what season he feels the church is in at present; what issues are being faced, what do the leaders feel God has been saying, that could affect what expressions of praise and worship we should be using. I think it's just an awareness and sensitivity, and in the absence of strong feeling to go one way or the other, I suppose I'd try to achieve a balance in the songs we sing, so as many different people feeling in all sorts of different ways, can all come close.

I write this as someone who serves primarily in music. In whatever way you serve in church, there are ways you can be sensitive and inclusive of people's individual journeys. It's funny, a minute ago I tried to write a sentence to cover all the 'range' of ways in which you might serve, which was something like, 'from welcoming to flower arranging', and then realised that these two are probably among the very top universally known ways of comforting mourning people; personal encouragement/welcome/friendship, and sending flowers.

4. Preaching: In our church, we've been talking about Jesus changing water into wine recently, which has been very relevant to much of my thinking. Biblical teaching about living as a Christian will surely deal with both victorious, and highly challenging times of life. More significantly, teaching about God Himself, is relevant and helpful to absolutely everyone! I remember a story once about a church that taught nothing but spiritual warfare for a number of months, and then wondered why everyone in the church seemed to be fighting each other about everything!

5. Relationships among the congregation: (Jenni's points I think). While I could argue (and have argued a bit!) that there is a different sort of lamenting that goes on individually to congregationally, there is common ground. A congregation is made of individuals in varying sorts of relationships with each other. Preaching, or praising, or praying (or persisting in picking properties beginning with p) within a church service (hopefully) becomes twos and threes praying after the meeting, in small groups, over a random tea or a game of croquet somewhere. It turns into questions between couples or good mates: 'what did you think when Wolfi said....'. If we can be humble or patient, it might turn into, 'can you help me live like this', and go into something a bit deeper.

What am I really saying here? Aren't these things mostly what we do in our church services anyway? We can express comfort, and allow lamenting/mourning in everything we do in church. Astonishingly, I think I may be drawing to a conclusion of sorts!

We don't need to do anything especially 'new' or 'radical' in order to allow people to lament in church. We just need to be loving and sensitive in all the things we do anyway; to be aware if there are any church-wide issues that require our particular sensitivity is good. In roles that require leading a load of people together, hearing God is best, following leaders' advice is excellent, and in the absence of anything very particular in either of those, balance is sensible. We need to avoid biasing ourselves too heavily (or maybe too long) towards any end of the spectrum; delirious constant happiness, or sombre and desperate longing. Both have their place, and perhaps learning what the 'common ground', accessible and helpful to all people, is a way of achieving balance.

And in the case of more individual lamenting, it encourages us to be patient listeners, faithful pray-ers, giving our friends time when they need it, and for us to be humble, honest and bold in letting our leaders and friends know how we really are too, asking for prayer, asking for help carring what we're feeling.

If I get to the album-making stage again, I hope that might be meditation material to bring issues up - music and media generally provide good inspirations in that area. Which brings me to what I really hope is my last point: relationship with God on a personal level is very important, whether you're lamenting or rejoicing! It goes without saying, but also really needs to be said! Is that a paradox? Or an irony?

Enough already. Let the next stage of commenting begin!

Lamenting...

2006-01-12T15:21:00.000Z

So, this is a summary of many thoughts that I've been having in the last few months, which is coming together into a new album which I'm writing songs for at the moment.

It's about this question. How does a Christian guy or girl cope with life, when they feel they're really meant to be living a joyful happy life of fulfilment, but the inescapable truth is that they're not feeling life is like that. The reasons for life not being what it 'should be' can vary quite a bit.

What got me thinking about this first was not so much my own experience, but a load of people close to me that I cared about, at different times. The fact that they were hurt affected me, and challenged me to try and relate to their situations as best and as sensitively as I possibly could. In a few cases it concerned friends with sudden and serious illness, in others it was unexplained heaviness and depression for some weeks or months, for others it was like people had gone through a 'passion-drain', and just lost the joy of life they once had. It seemed like most people I knew had been under the hammer in fairly brutal ways.

The kind of shallow solutions you might get if you asked a random shallow person for help in this, are really easy to say: 'you shouldn't be led by your emotions' or, 'it's a season you've got to grow through', or 'God will work it all out for the better'. Perhaps even, 'you've got to sort your attitude out'. And at certain times and situations, there's truth in these statements, but when you're in the thick of it, it can just build the hopelessness, and the feeling of 'there is something really messed up with me'.

You keep on going to church (if you're well enough), maybe try to increase your daily prayer-time, through dogged determination that eventually things have got to get better if you do all the right things. But sometimes even being at church at all is too much, surrounded by people bouncing around you singing terrifically happy songs about how great everything is, and you feel like an imposter, maybe wondering if you are a Christian at all.

Now... the thing is, while some may look on you as unspiritual for having these thoughts or questions, it's with some surprise and comfort that I realised the Bible is no stranger to this kind of thing at all. You know the psalms, those radical expressions of praise and adoration? Well, a third of them are lamenting, asking God what on earth is happening with... me, the world... oh, and by the way, where are you? But notice how it's still in poetry, carefully crafted, not written in haste or hatred.

Lamentations! The Hebrew title of this book literally is 'How...?' What a title... Five chapters, the verse counts are 22, 22, 66, 22, 22 - the 22s are acrostics through the Hebrew alphabet, and the 66 does it three times per letter! Incredible! It's a passionate, desperate lament for Jerusalem, but it's crafted with enormous skill, care taken over ever word. All the pain and anguish is written down, an appeal to God when there is no other hope. But we take our depressed and broken friends to church to sing 'Yes Lord, Yes Lord, Yes Yes Lord'. (I'm speaking through the eyes of heavy-hearted people here, forgive my flippancy).

I don't think in our Western culture we know how to lament. We know how to think positively, to stubbornly deny that anything is wrong, to pretend to be independent, and to compare ourselves to each other thinking, if I'm a real Christian I've got to be as happy as them. We don't know how to wear sackcloth and ashes, how to voice our pain and complaint; we think that perhaps it's a sin to question what on earth God is doing, but fail to notice that if we can't be honest with God in how we're feeling... then what?

So I'm writing a set of songs, probably an album, in three parts. The first part is lament, bringing the unanswered questions, the desperate need, the feeling of being lost, all of that, to God in a respectful, thoughful, but honest way. I'm not disrespecting God in what I say or write, but I'm not shying away from the honest truth before him.

In the second part, I write God's reply. What do you think He says to His kids when they're lost and upset, broken, hurt, confused, wondering what is going on? And they come to him in some kind of tantrum maybe, asking what's going on, and if He's really in control of everything? Do you think He tells them to get over it, sort their lives out? Or do you think He picks them up, (if they'll stay still enough!) and whispers something?

My second part is largely about God's love. In many of the conversations I've had in the last few months, I'd say that there is an enormous amount of understanding about what it means to live for God, keeping sin in check, keeping purposeful in what we're doing, but much less understanding of what God's love is like - revelation that is. Every Christian knows God loves them and the world, but I wonder if far fewer really get soaked in how true and how real that love is.

Third part, is reflection on what God has said. Repentence, yes. The book of Lamentations and many of those type of psalms join the 'lament' itself with repentence to God, which is a good pattern to think about. And it's not a reluctant repentence - it's the kind of prodigal son returning home, with his prepared apology speech, and the Father barely lets him start to get the words out before he's been embraced, clothed, and celebrated. A certain new understanding of what God is like, what I am like, what life is like.

I still don't want to deny that tough stuff happens - it's not a happily ever after sort of thing. But it's understanding where we are now, what things are solid, what things are not. An idea that whatever God seems to do or not do in our lives, at certain times, there are things about Him that don't change, and that we can trust. Not an exuberant celebration exactly, but more a firm realisation that we're alive, still standing, and able to move on: to mourn, and then to progress.

So... that's what I'm interested in at the moment. If you've managed to read all this, then write me some comments! Do you think this is contraversial? Surprising? Good idea? Or is the writer going off the rails?! (Again....)

MP3s and DRM

2005-12-19T17:27:00.000Z

So I've reached my annoyance level with the state of Apple, DRM, WMA, and technical things like that, to the point that it requires a blog.

Now, ITunes is pretty good as a player in my opinion. It's got my music nicely organised, and I find the player interface fine. However, the thing that was always annoying was that when you bought files through the interface, you could only play them on ITunes, or on an IPod, unless you (a) burn them to a CD, and re-rip them, or (b) use a tool like JHymn, which some people view as controversial, but I'm in the camp that says if you buy it, you have the right to play it as much on an iPod as you do on an iRiver player. I for one don't want to have to buy an expensive, and technically inferior iPod with a questionable fixed-in battery in order to play the songs I buy.

Now, ITunes 6 has got onto this, and basically put an end to JHymn's usefulness - you have to upgrade to ITunes 6 to buy music, and once you do, your keys are all encrypted and there's nothing you can do about it. So the only option is the rip and re-burn method above, which is fine except you lose a bit of quality (if you care), the cost of a CDR, and the time to burn and re-rip to MP3 again.

What's sort of annoyed me today, is that Microsoft are doing the same thing with Media Player. I bought a coldplay track from their site, and the only format was protected wma. No way of removing the protection from that either! So I now have protected files in Itunes that I can't play in media player, Protected WMA files that I can't play in Itunes, and NEITHER of them can I get onto my MP3 player to listen to when I want!

Isn't this getting a bit daft?

So it seems to me that Microsoft and Apple competing over which player (both software and hardware) I should own, and it seems fairly obvious to me that an 'impartial' hardware producer like iRiver are only going to suffer unless they pledge allegiance one way or the other, which is a shame, as I particularly like my player, and find it infinitely superior to all iPods I've tried.

Seeing as both software packages allow you to burn to CD and re-rip, if you can be bothered, then there is no major problem, and nothing to stop me whirling a batch onto a CD at some time, and converting them into a format I can actually play. But in that case, what exactly is the point of all this protection? It just makes me have to use two different bits of software to play my songs, and wastes a bit of time. If the security thing is THAT important, then why not really prevent me from using my mp3 player by removing the 'burn to cd' option?

In any case, wouldn't it be nicer if I was trusted to look after my data files, (in terms of piracy etc) the same way I look after conventional CDs that I own? I'm not out (obv) to commit all sorts of copyright crimes with downloaded music, the same way I don't choose to do that with CDs that I buy, that you can't get on iTunes (like most of my Christian music collection). But being able to play them without having to get a few different format-compliant players would be nice.

The return!

2005-12-15T21:52:00.000Z

Well, it got off to a good start with three blogs in a week in July, but somewhat fizzled out! I guess I'm mostly too busy, and I didn't have enough reason to think that anyone actually read this! But seeing as Rich has linked to me, calling this 'Wessy's poor little orphaned blog', and Will and Tweedie have both seen it, I'll make another entry just to please everyone! Here come my answers to Rich's SEVENS...

SEVEN.... (all these lists are in no particular order, often not even in the order I thought of them in!)

THINGS TO DO BEFORE I DIE

1. Yup Richie, become Dad and Grand-dad is a good thing. Done the husband bit! Yay! And have a dog too.
2. Make some disciples I also agree greatly with.
3. Teach all the the things on my heart about music and its effect.
4. Play some big gigs? Yeah, I think so!
5. Persuade Rich to let me produce one of his albums! (And do a load of mine too!)
6. Go on lots more missions to really different places that need serious help.
7. Learn to have a good quiet time every day.

THINGS I CANNOT DO (consistantly - occasionally I'll 'fluke' it!)
1. Relax and do nothing! (Not sure if I want to learn that much?)
2. Play the oboe. (Just could never bring myself to!)
3. Become a salad lover.
4. Beat James at computer games. (Though I'm giving him a solid fight with Tekken!)
5. Finish a Telegraph Cryptic Crossword.
6. Be nasty to anyone!
7. Draw still life (like fruit+veggies we had to do in secondary school... I sucked).

THINGS I SAY MOST OFTEN (do I actually have any catchphrases?! you guys would tell me, wouldn't you?!)
1. Erm....
2. 'Or something like that' after playing you a song I've just written.
3. 'It's a bit like...'
4. 'You probably know this already but...'
5. 'Take care' when saying good-bye to people. About 3/4 of the time its on autopilot!
6. 'So....'
7. 'Indeed...'

SEVEN BOOKS I LOVE (excluding The Bible - hmm... I don't read many books at all!!)

I should really copy Rich's list, since books 1, 2 and 3 are books I gave to RIch, whereas book 5 I never gave to him, but never-the-less, it's still mine, and Rich still has it! But I don't mind ;-)

1. John Eldredge - Waking The Dead. Indeed, excellent stuff, along with the rest of his.
2. John Stott - more-or-less anything. Ephesians commentary at present.
3. Oh, THE BIBLE!
4. P.G.Wodehouse - any of the Jeeves and Wooster books!
5. Tolkein - Lord of the Rings
6. Gordon Dalbey - Sons of the Father (if I ever get it back!)
7. Terry Pratchett (Discworld series) - sometimes bit surreal for me, but still some genius moments.

SEVEN MOVIES I COULD WATCH OVER AND OVER
-RENAMED TO! Seven moves I HAVE watched over and over and over!
1. Terminator 2
2. Top gun
3. Lord of the Rings
4. Star Trek First Contact
5. The Incredibles
6. Saving Grace (maybe... that cornflake scene!)
7. Can't think of no.7

SEVEN PEOPLE TO DO THIS NEXT
(and if you don't have a Blog yet, add your comments below!)

ER - I don't know who to inflict this on next, so apologies everyone, you're just the people I like!
1. Tweedie! (on request!)
2. Faye
3. James
4. Will
5. Nackles
6. Bob (my imaginary friend)
7. Janice (another imaginary friend).

THE END!

(well, maybe I'll write some more soon if I feel inspired...)

About July 7th

2005-07-08T14:11:00.000+01:00

Yesterday morning, I got into work on my usual train, and everything was completely normal. I arrived on time, walked down to Embankment tube, to find the whole tube was shut down due, (as it was thought at that time) to a major power surge. The buses all looked full, and I felt I could navigate my way better to South Kensington along the river, into Westminster, through Victoria to Knightsbridge.

I arrived about an hour later, curiously had to use my swipe card to get into college, which is unusual for that time of day. And that, along with a phonecall from my wife a few minutes earlier, was the way I started to find out what was going on.

I think most of the world now know what happened. The day for me felt mostly surreal - being so close to the incident, yet largely oblivious, and hardly believing it was reality. I'm relieved that myself and my friends are all safe. And I'm saddened, and a bit shocked by it all for a number of reasons.

I'm sad because, as Tony Blair said, apparently using G8, where the leaders of the world talk about relieving poverty, to exploit a security risk is heartless in an unsettlingly precise way. I'm confused because I don't understand how any human heart can become so disfigured to believe this can be right in any sense. I'm sad because small-minded people will write into various news forums using this as ammunition to preach that God doesn't exist - how could he let this happen, etc., not realising the pain God also sees when his kids go so far from their design, and experience the consequences. A one sentence answer to a very complex issue, I know.

I fear that the spirit of revenge will rise up in people and they will cause further death and pain, and to that end, I do pray for justice, but only on God's terms, in His way, along with praying for the comfort, peace, and protection over the families that have lost more than I have.

We live in troubled times. But I have hopes too. I hope that the value of human life in times like this rises up in our society. I prayed that broken families, realising how fragile life is, would reunite. I prayed that people would learn through yesterday to appreciate each other more, and express it more. For people who had 'close escapes' I prayed that they would recognise God's helping them, and that people who had worse times would reach for God's comfort and find Him there.

I prayed for the killers, and refuse to lose hope, that they might get a reality-check on what it is they have done, and the state of their hearts in doing it. Although I am tempted to feel hopeless for people who spread this kind of evil, I'm refusing even now, to give up that hope, which I think is what God feels too.

Car park rant

2005-07-03T19:33:00.000+01:00

A random rant about car-parking.

Yesterday, I visited my lovely wife, Dr. Faye, who works in a hospital. She was working a long day, and I went on a mercy mission with lunch. Alas, I had to pay £1.70 in exact change to a parking meter which would then allow me to park for three hours. Oh dear. After checking all the random places down the back of the seats of my E-reg Sierra, I was 25p short. £1.45 gets you absolutely nothing alas! Much thought.

After a bit of futile frustration, I drive to a nearby industrial estate, which has a load of good shops, none of which do cashback, and there's no cashpoint. Grr. Another drive to Tescos. Hurrah, three cash points. Buy something futile so I have change, and drive back. An hour has elapsed, and finally I have enough change to coax the machine to give me a ticket (after entering my registration number in a rather unusual way that requires a background in computing! I then do the same for a senior lady next to me who is evidently becoming quite flustered with it all).

This morning, which is a Sunday, much of the same happened at the rail station. This time, £2.70, for the privilege of then being able to spend another £20 on rail transport. Similar change problems - not even my visit to Tescos endowed me with enough change to feed two sets of meters. A mad sprint into the station, get money, buy something meaningless, rush back to meter, put sticker in car, rush to train and miraculously slither in as the doors close... otherwise about a half hour wait today.

I guess I just need to train myself (no pun intended) to think in advance, and carry a lot of change around whenever I imagine I might need to park. But I can't help thinking it's all quite unnecessarily awkward, and in my weekend's experience, pretty greedy too.

Rant over. I'm better now.

First blog...

2005-07-03T04:40:00.001+01:00

Well... I'm still wondering whether starting a blog is a good idea or not. One half of my brain is thinking "What's the point?!" The other is arguing that I enjoy it, and could spend a lot of time writing, to which the first half answers, "do you think anyone will read it?!". I hope so. I'm basically an encourager, and get a lot of encouragement myself out of gently sharing any experience I've got to comfort, stabilise, or generally spur on other people... so that's what I'm hoping might happen, and am keeping the cynical half of my brain locked up for a bit...

I am also spurred on by reading my friend Richie's "AnyoneForTea" blog... and I'm also of course not wanting to fall behind the state of technology so am catching up once again with my friend on this one!

Anyway... I'm hoping through this we'll get to talk about writing songs, particularly of the Christian kind - not that I aim especially to write Christian songs, but more that I find writing songs is a good way of working out where I am in life, and so with being a Christian being of major importance to me, many of my 'workings out' in life come out of that area. I like talking about it all! For about the past 3 years I've been working on an album, and I can't wait to do another one... so I may write thoughts about that. I like a bit of theology too now and then...

I sometimes think about collecting my more interesting thoughts into some kind of book, and immediately face similar reservations about writing even this first blog. The questions 'does anyone really care about what I have to say' is probably familiar to most of us to some degree in our lives. But like a lot of things, I reckon I'd encourage anyone with that question to have a go and write something, say something, play something - be bold and give it a shot. And I'd better try and follow my own counsel with that I think.

Other info about me... I'm a researcher, a computer scientist now using his skill on modelling marine systems (plankton in fact). I've got a Ph.D in that, and on May 29th 2005 I married Dr. Faye, who is a proper doctor, and is very good at keeping me alive!

Enough for now.