You may or not be like me, but I find the world confounding at the moment. I can’t fathom out why 80 year olds are arrested for holding up bits of cardboard with some words that are deemed to be illegal, even when not in the order that they are apparently not allowed to be used. I admire these people. I get angry and upset, not always with situations like these but because I’m not angry enough to do something about it. Being arrested would cause anxiety for family and mess up our rotas!
It’s not always easy to put these thoughts on to paper especially in a cosy Church Blog in a beautiful peaceful rural setting. We don’t always stray into politics as if Jesus never turned tables or got angry at the hypocrisy all around him. I can’t fathom out why our politicians don’t have values and principles that they stick with like signposts, rather than being like wind vanes that change all the time.
One of the ways I process this stuff is through music. So I’m working on a song at the moment.
I don’t just wanna be a church goer/I’d rather be a love sower/I don’t just wanna sing some happy songs/I’d rather right some unjust wrongs/I don’t just wanna be a pew filler/I’d rather be a joy thriller/I don’t just wanna have my private space/I’d rather share a living faith.
Because it matters what we do, It matters to me and should matter to you. That we live by what we say, Everyday.
I don’t just wanna be a Bible nerd/I’d rather be a living word/I don’t just wanna be a Jesus freak/I’d rather serve throughout the week/I don’t just wanna be a passer by/I’d rather ask and question why/I don’t just wanna come to drum and jam/I’d rather come just as I am.
Because it matters what we do, It matters to me and should matter to you. That we live by what we say, Everyday.
I don’t just wanna be a mickey taker/I’d rather be a peace maker/I don’t just wanna be a hanger on/I’d rather play on my cajon/I don’t just wanna strive for my own needs/I’d rather be a friend indeed/I don’t just wanna be a Sunday bod/I’d rather be a friend of God.
Because it matters what we do, It matters to me and should matter to you. That we live by what we say, Everyday.
And I go to songs that have inspired me. This song called ‘Make a Difference, is written by Martin John Nicholls, from a Album ‘Beyond Belief’ written in 2004 which I first heard when I saw him at the Greenbelt Festival. I can’t believe it’s 21 years ago. The words still resonate today.
‘I don’t wanna buy Jesus on a corporate CD/I’m not looking for a lifestyle based on some kinda holy MTV/ I don’t want a new experience to take me deeper into myself/I want faith that’s gonna make me some good to someone else.
It’s gotta make a difference from the cradle to the grave/to the diamonds in the dirt that we dig up along the way/It’s gotta make a difference to our short attention span/If a cross can be a crown and if God can be a man.
I don’t wanna to come to worship for a Sunday morning shine/Just like a pill you take for holiness, washed down with bread and wine/I can’t kneel before an altar built on riches and success/I want love to touch my heart, nothing more and nothing less.
It’s gotta make a difference in a world of our mistakes/to the lies that we can’t swallow/ the garbage we won’t take/It’s gotta make a difference if we start to understand/It completely changes everything if God can be a man.
Every man and woman equal/ let compassion draw the line/From Baghdad into the White House/ Israel to Palestine/It’s gotta make a difference from the bottom to the top/let the hope begun in Jesus be the passion we can’t stop.
For the outcast and the broken/ to the hungry and the poor/For the zealot and the terrorist who are beating on our door/Beyond the streets of Babylon we need a prayer to pray/To go beyond religion and let love have her way.
To go beyond religion and let love have her way.’
Keep the faith, but never ever to ourselves.
Love Philip x