Trinity Western University

So I had the chance to go out with some old friends from TWU last night. It is funny how strong the bond is to your Alma mater, the memories and the people. So much personal growth and formation happens during this time, and the relationships seem to be able to withstand huge gaps of time between visits because, when positive, the original experience carries such weight in your life.

All that to say it was a great time.

On another note, it is great to be back in Burlington. It has been less than three months, but I feel like we are starting to re-integrate into life. When I came home great friends were there hanging with the family and we hung out some more. Feels like home to me. Reminds me of a song.....

Working Through Worship (Music) Part 2

It has been a long time since my first post on this subject, and a lot of songwriting and "art" creation has taken place since then. One big difference for me since that time is I have actually had the chance to visit several churches and experience some very different worship environments. It has, in fact, confirmed in me the theory that we are missing a part of the mark when it comes to creating music that reflects all of the humanity that we might, maybe should, be bringing to God in worship.



For example, there is a general lack of lament, repentance, meditative or self examinational lyric present in worship services. The actually mood of the music generally never leaves "positive" land. It IS worshipful, but it one dimensional. I think the problem here is that as we try to reach for authenticity as churches (it is a buzzword used a lot anyway) that we are not representing all that most everyone experiences with consistency. There is a need to worship the way we do, with positive, upbeat lyric, but there is also a need to mourn over the state of the world, our personal worlds and the bad stuff that is going on. Even if we are just talking about our own shortcomings as it were. I DO NOT know how to implement this. I feel that it needs to be done. Not all the time, but in balance.



More of a musing than a conclusive thought I know, but just some observations.

link to Part 1

Some Movement

The last two weeks have been pretty good as I try and balance this crazy life right now. I finally spent a good part of a weekend mixing and finished the rough mixes of the drums. That is to say I still have some "micro" editing to do, but it is a beat or bar here and there, not whole songs.

So with twelve songs feeling pretty good, it is time to start recording the piano which should begin in the next few weeks and hopefully not take too long...heard that before haven't we.

I am going to be recording on a baby Yamaha grand that my in-laws have which is sweet. I love playing it, and it sounds great. The acoustics of the room should be good as well, and the set-up of their house might actually allow me to do some interesting things if I can get my hands on enough mics.

Great Time at St. Giles

Here is a pic of me a Bryn MacPhail, Senior Minister at St. Giles Pres. in TO. Sunday morning was great. Definitely good to be in a different environment and experience liturgy done well. Had a great time hanging out as families as well after the service with some burgers and dogs.

This Weekend / Email Updates

I will be at St. Giles Presbyterian this Sunday doing solo worship music. Bryn McPhail is the Senior Pastor there and a great preacher. The service will be traditional, the sermon will be great, so come out and say hi if you are into the traditional thing. (info)

I have joined the FanBridge gang for email updates, so if you want to signup, I plan on sending one update a month to keep people informed better.

Looking for a Church (Part 2)

Have I become a consumer of church products? In our effort to find a church we have, of course, gone to several and have started to return visit to some that seemed to offer the most promise. Then..disaster strikes. A Sunday experience resembling poor (meaning distracting) production value, vacuous content, and a lack of passion and focus that was very discouraging.

Hey I was a Pastor for five years. I know it is hard to hit every time, but scale and resources should be a factor as well.

Here is the rub. When did we all become such shiny, happy people holding hands. Life IS hard, for most (ALL) people. The Jesus I know lived that same life, maybe more on the rough edge than most of us. He did not start a shiny happy church, he started a real front line church, that dealt with the pain, social strata issues, hard issues of what truth is. Truth, that word that we seem to almost believe is relative, but is in actuality for all of us anything but. I know no one for whom life is perfectly relative. There is no relative bubble. We are all humbled by an absolute at some time or another.

I guess I am looking for authenticity, a buzz word with preferences attached I suppose. I have seen it, but at this point, I still haven't found what I'm looking for - at least as it pertains to a church.

Jarry Seinfeld, Business Coach?

I am in a time where the to do list looks longer than at any other time in my life. It is astounding. I am trying to stay calm and approach it like cramming for exams in University. A thousand pages a night for eight nights straight, each night a different subject, and then, well hopefully successfully done. Back then I think procrastination had something to do with it, now a days, sheer volume and multiple pressures.

What is a guy to do?

Well, although this is a little simplistic, it reminds me of the focus that can reduce the stress associated with having mammoth tasks to complete and limited brain space to do anything but, well do just do it.

Who knew, Jerry Seinfeld - business coach.

Hey Preacher Man

So I spoke at a college today about FTC (where I work) and how one can engage in community outreach.

My approach was to give 6 perspectives on life, as it were, to help the students contextualize what they should be doing for the poor in our midst.

Perspectives:

1. The current state: over 10 million children die every year from hunger in the world
2. What is my story (baggage) that effects my perspective on this matter (Gen X)
3. What is there story (Gen Y)
4. What about a leader's perspective on addressing issues www.jimcollins.com
5. What does the Bible say?
6. The great philosopher Jerry Seinfeld's thoughts

My boss asked, "So did you preach?"

I responded, "well I think I talked about the issues and introduced them to FTC Canada."

He said, "I think you preached, I know you, you always preach." (paraphrased)

I am going to take that as a compliment:)

The Van Man (the end of the story)

So Honda did not totally disappoint. I called up head office in Canada to discover that the warranty (extended) on my van had expired, one month ago. The transmission had fried and i needed a new one.

Long story short, they agreed because of the cars good service record (I did my trany changes) and because I am a loyal Honda customer (my other car is a civic) to pay for the parts if I covered the labour. Let's just say, that gave me the acceptable good side of the deal.

The bus is back, and with four kids, we need it!

Back Home

A short little one stop tour, my specialty I suppose, to Windsor ON and back to Heritage Park Alliance Church where I visited last year. Great fun to go back to a place where you have been before. Saw most of the folk that I worked with last year and then met some more new friends.

The church itself is pretty slick in a good way, well run and the sound and lighting side of things is very strong, a great venue to play without having to fight any of those side issues. The sermon was on worship and the songs were fun to play. I had actually never played four of them. A good challenge and some nice tunes. It was book ended with some great upbeat tunes and having a pro drummer backing us up was a highlight.

So Thanksgiving and then a return visit to St. Giles in Toronto. I as hoping to be promoting the new CD by now, but I am happy to get out playing again as I ramp back into the production phase.