Josh John's blog

Create A Spark #3

2012-01-24T11:25:00.001Z

On the 9th October 2011, Reading Family Church (the church i'm part of) celebrated 10 years of meeting on Sundays. We met together at Reading Town Hall and enjoyed looking back on what God has done amongst us.

What was a highlight for many people was when people came out and shared how their lives had been transformed by Jesus using a piece of cardboard and a few words.

He makes beautiful things out of dust... An amazingly glorious thought

Therefore, if anyone is in Christ, he is a new creation; the old has gone, the new has come!

(2 Cor 5:17)

Create A Spark #2

2012-01-12T16:53:00.000Z

It could be said that being creative requires you to think outside the box, whoever designed this not only thought outside the box, they turned the box into something else entirely.

Create A Spark #1

2012-01-10T15:25:00.000Z

As i try to keep stirring myself in creativity, i thought blogging on things that begin to create "sparks" in me could prove to be helpful. So here's Create A Spark #1

Genesis 1:1 - In the beginning God CREATEd the heavens and the earth.

The word "creativity" never appears in the bible (not even in The Message translation) and yet we see creativity bursting throughout the bible. The description in Genesis of how God formed the universe is quite breath taking when you sit and think about it.

In perhaps the biggest understatement ever written, Genesis 1:16 - "God made two great lights--the greater light to govern the day and the lesser light to govern the night. He also made the stars.", we see He created these out of nothing...

There was no one else's work who he pinched, no magazine who's ideas He incorporated into His own, no one else's who inspired Him to be creative, as God is creative, it is what makes Him who He is...

So many times i catch myself trying to find someone or something that will help spark off something in me, when actually what i should be doing is coming back to God, letting Him captivate me and marvelling at Him.

When you see who He is, what He has done and is doing, creativity will flow...

Reaching Alice, Christmas Film

2012-01-04T13:38:00.000Z

Reaching Alice Official Trailer from The Tungsten Collective on Vimeo.

Christmas may be over, but this little video caught my attention. Willow Creek are a church that does things really well and it would seem they created an entire film for their Christmas meetings. Would love to see the full feature at some point...

Maybe in the future there will be an RFC Christmas film...

A Baby Changes Everything

2011-12-20T13:37:00.000Z

Christian palindrome used at the Reading Family Church christmas carol concert 2011. On the night we had 2 people narrating the words over the top. Made the video from scratch and hopefully created a nice reflective moment on the night.

All copyright for text is not our own, it is all the work of The Bible Chapel - http://www.youtube.com/user/TheBibleChapel. Video background is the fantastic work of Zach Fonville - http://zachfonville.com/. Music is Chad Lawson - Sing We Now Of Christmas (http://feelslikechristmas.com/free-christmas-music/traditional-instrumental/)

Carol Concert 2011

2011-12-14T09:59:00.000Z

This Sunday we will be holding our second carol concert at Reading Girls' School from 5-6.30pm. With plenty of carols to sing-a-long to, a choir doing some fantastic performances, minces pies afterwards and plenty more, it's going to be a brilliant night. If you're in the Reading area do pop and join in the festive fun with us...

Look forward to seeing you there

My fave new version of a Christmas carol 2011

2011-12-06T14:32:00.001Z

Last year it was Phil Wickham's "Evermore" which is quite frankly still fantastic... this year i've gone for David Crowder's redo of "Joy To The World"... fantastic drum beat and a new shout along chorus...

Give it a listen here

I am second

2011-11-22T14:03:00.001Z

I came across this website called "I Am Second" where some relatively famous (well in America they are) Christians give their testimony. The Brian Welch video (ex-guitarist from Korn) is the most popular and in some ways it was a very high profile conversion.

Give it a watch and see just what a difference Jesus can have on a person's life. To me hearing his story and seeing the beautifully extreme transformation is just astounding.

Watch the video here: Brian Welch - I Am Second

(Warning - He talk a bit explicitly about his previous drug use, in some ways that helps show just how radical the turnaround is)

Here For You + One Thing Remains

2011-11-18T15:48:00.001Z

It's always interesting to see which songs are beginning to extend beyond a certain movement. It would seem currently that Matt Redman's "Here For You" and Jesus Culture's "One Thing Remains" are 2 such songs (judging by the amount of CDs the songs are on). Have a listen and see what you think of them

Matt Redman - Here For You

Jesus Culture - One Thing Remains

Duelity

2011-11-16T15:53:00.001Z

"Duelity is a split-screen animation that tells both sides of the story of Earth’ s origins in a dizzying and provocative journey through the history and language that marks human thought."

apologies for the rather crude animation of "animals filling the land" in advance... but i thought it was a rather interesting comparison of Creation & Evolution...

Acoustic Night Sat 12 Nov

2011-11-10T15:35:00.001Z

This Saturday will see us holding our second acoustic night. We've got 3 fantastic acts - Lozi Bolton, Mimi & Friends and Forerunner and we're very excited to hear what they have in store for us.

You can book tickets here, to avoid missing out on what will be a brilliant night, or grab a ticket on the doors.

So bring some friends, nab a ticket and look forward to seeing you there!

Today...

2011-10-29T00:00:00.001+01:00

Today is no ordinary day
Today is one that I'll always remember
Today it's no longer I but we
Today I get to build a home
Today things change for the better
Today I get a join a family
Today my family gets one person bigger
Today we throw a party
Today we celebrate what God has joined together
Today my best friend becomes my wife
Today I get a partner for life
Today is a very special day
I like today

Beats, loops and Sunday Meetings...

2011-10-21T12:06:00.003+01:00

On Sunday i will be attempting something a tad different. We're constantly trying to think of creative things we can use to help stop us being stale musically and that people don't turn up already knowing exactly what's going to happen. We also want to use our creativity to help draw people closer to Jesus rather than taking attention away from Him.

What will be different this week is that we won't have a drum kit (though we will have a djembe), instead for the first 3 songs we'll be using beats & loops to create most of the rhythm for the songs.

We'll see how it goes, just gotta hope Mr. Mac doesn't decide to switch off randomly!

Humble Pie strikes back

2011-10-18T17:00:00.000+01:00

The humble pie has returned in full force. While covering Karen's duties of writing out the life group notes i managed to write this:

"Community Lunch: On the 30th October after the morning meeting (12.45-3pm) we will be holding a community lunch at the church offices. There will be an African theme to the event with bring & share food, fellowship and the opportunity to learn some traditional “Gumboot” dancing, so bring your willies."

My bad... hopefully my embarrassing mistake brought a laugh or two out of you!

Keep Singing Of The Cross - released

2011-10-11T15:45:00.000+01:00

So on Sunday we released the CD and gave them away for free. You can still grab a copy from the church office.

You can also download the album from this website:
http://readingfamilychurch1.bandcamp.com/

Below is a player if you want to have a listen to some of the songs.

<p>&amp;amp;lt;a href="http://readingfamilychurch1.bandcamp.com/album/keep-singing-of-the-cross"&amp;amp;gt;Keep Singing Of The Cross by Reading Family Church&amp;amp;lt;/a&amp;amp;gt;</p>

There is also a songbook which we've made up which you can download from here:
http://issuu.com/rfcmedia/docs/songbook

So after many months the CD is out, hope you enjoy listening to the songs!

They've arrived!

2011-10-07T11:49:00.001+01:00

So we started the CD project back around February time and since then we've had a lot of recording sessions, many discussions about the CD & plenty of phone calls to production companies. The result is our first CD which arrived in its physical form today. You'll be able to grab a copy at the 10th Anniversary Meeting this Sunday. If you miss the event you'll be able to get your mittens on one by heading down into the church office.

If you're more of a digital kind of person you'll be able to download one off our newly formed bandcamp website. It'll be live this weekend and you'll find it here

Phew, i think i'll have a large cup of tea to celebrate...

Download website

2011-10-06T13:47:00.002+01:00

We're days away from the 10th Anniversary and I'm currently trying to finish building a bandcamp website so people can download the RFC album "Keep Singing Of The Cross". Hopefully we'll be able to keep updating it with new content in the following months & years. We aim to include some dance remixes of our songs as well as acoustic tracks and any future songs we write. Exciting times! Will let you know when it's live...

Keep Singing Of The Cross Song book (coming soon)

2011-09-29T11:15:00.000+01:00

Just finishing off a songbook we're hoping to release along with the CD. It'll include the chord for the songs on the RFC CD. Hopefully you'll enjoy the chance to play along to the songs you hear. We'll have it available off the website to view & download and probably off this blog & the RFC music blog website.

Forumla For Happiness

2011-09-28T11:34:00.003+01:00

The Formula For Happiness from Central Films on Vimeo.

perhaps a little on the cheesy/american side of things, but i love the simplicity of the graphics and how they've used them effectively

Keep Singing Of The Cross released 9th Oct

2011-09-22T16:51:00.002+01:00

So the CD is now currently being physically made... The picture is the artwork for those interested. The fantastic Pete Coggan designed it and we're ever so pleased with it.

We shall be giving the CD away at our 10th Anniversary Celebration so don't miss it!

"Mixy mix mix time"

2011-09-09T11:10:00.002+01:00

Yesterday Grae, Jess Del Rio and myself sat down and listened to mixes for what seemed like a very long time, making subtle tweaks, played around with intro/exits and amused my strong desire to "reverse delay" everything.

So where we're at is, listening to the mixes on repeat... constantly... and hopefully catch things that don't sound right as well as thinking of any other changes we might need to make. The artwork will shortly be commissioned and be ready, fingers crossed, by next week. Mastering will take place next week as well, if we stay on plan, and then production the following week. We also have a potential bonus addition if we can figure it out...

It's been amazing hearing these songs that we sing on a Sunday translated into recordings and we hope that these songs may benefit other churches. We do feel we have something different to bring compared to songs being written by other church, so 7 Reading Family Church home written songs coming your way, very soon...

Grace (Jesus Author Perfecter of Faith)

2011-08-23T13:45:00.000+01:00

So i have a few songs on the go which are in the unfortunate limbo position (i.e. frustratingly close to being finished but can't figure out as few lines)...

One such song is this one called "Grace" or "Jesus author perfecter of faith. I started writing it possibly last year after looking at the passage Hebs 12:2. I then started to incorporate the idea of adoption and how because of what Jesus has done we can now enter into God's family. Pete Coggan helped me shape a great tune for the chorus though unfortunately i still can't figure out a second half to the chorus... there are some other frustrating lines and i've pondered trying to write a simply Trinitarian tag... but so far my efforts haven't resulted in a finished song... anyways here are the lyrics i have so far...

---
Jesus Author Perfecter of Faith/Grace

Verse 1:
Jesus author perfecter of faith
You have lifted me from the grave
By Your spirit I’m found in You
Now my soul will sing Your praise

By no merit or work could I boast
Simply Jesus and your great worth
My salvation secure in you
Now my soul will sing Your praise

Chorus:
Grace has freed me
Grace now leads me To the open arms of my Father
---
???
???
???
---

Verse 2:
Was a sinner and far from you Yet you chose me, (maybe: said I am yours or “You are mine”)

Irresistible grace you showed
Caused my soul to sing Your praise

Now this orphan’s a child of God
And my sonship forever stands
For my Saviour has called me home
Caused my soul to sing Your praise

Bridge ???

So hopefully with a bit of prayer, inspiration, some elbow grease and a lot of thinking i may get this song finished and hopefully it'll get a play at RFC at some point in the future! I'll share some of the "other songs in waiting" soon

Newday 2011

2011-08-11T15:05:00.001+01:00

The youth from RFC attended Newday this year... Check out the rather fantastically well done video review of what went on. Our training base leader Brett has headed up Newday for the past few years and this was his final one. Looks like the event went down pretty well (despite rain!)

We Are Yours - Forerunner

2011-08-05T13:33:00.000+01:00

My good mate Pete has done it again... He's written this cracking tune called "We Are Yours". It's a song that talks about freedom, how we've been adopted into God's family and the chorus swells at the end to the very shout able "WE ARE YOURS..." I remember when he first played it to me and it sounded brilliant then, but the recording of it is top notch... The boys definitely have some talent up their sleeves. I believe it may have been played at Newday this year and will be interesting to see how it was done there. Do give it a listen, i can't wait to download it soon...

Continued progress

2011-07-29T11:52:00.001+01:00

Weds was my first day doing some vocal recording with Claire. While singing on a sunday meeting feels quite natural now, standing in in front of a mic and with headphones on in an empty room is quite a different experience. You feel quite exposed and every little mistake made is quite evident (and there were quite a few mistakes on my side!). It was though great fun trying out new things with harmonies etc... and just trying to give character to tracks through melodies. The songs are now starting to take real shape and i can't wait to hear them all filled out with vocals.

All is progressing well with the CD, we're finishing off the lead vocals and harmonies in the coming days and then adding in the vocal group to beef up a few parts of the songs. Below are 2 video clips if you're interested that may whet your appetite of what it's beginning to sound like... don't judge the songs by my phone's poor recording quality though!

More updates coming soon!

When Maccy boy became extremely useful

2011-07-27T11:40:00.001+01:00

Recording for RFC CD (still to finalise the name) is back on and i'm sat at my desk editing recordings for what will hopefully be a few parts for a nice vocal group/choir to sing on a few tracks...

Claire and I spent a few hours tracking some parts and hopefully all the parts will sound really nice together. Here's a little clip of how the harmonies will hopefully help strengthen verse 4 of "And Can It Be"

What a few weeks

2011-07-18T15:06:00.001+01:00

Haven't blogged in ages, been a very busy period...

Moved house twice, been to 2 weddings (played at both), marriage prep of both kinds, lead worship, been to brighton, said farewell to my fellow london fpers, had new projects assigned to me, seen the cd project start up again, practiced for another wedding and many other things...

How much of it i've tried to do in my own strength and how much I relied on God is something, i've been thinking about and probably it's been weighted the wrong way...

Claire gave me a good scripture when I was beginning to feel the weight of stress...

"because of the LORD's great love we are not consumed, for his compassions never fail. They are new every morning; great is your faithfulness". (Lam 3:22-23)

I'm glad my God is always trustworthy to get me through whatever I face in life and showers compassion on me!

I'm now relaxing in Cheltenham and looking forward to a nice week off I have ahead of myself

Worship Leader Meeting

2011-07-07T09:56:00.000+01:00

Last night we had our first worship leaders meeting of the year. It was great fun as we sat, ate some chinese takeaway first, had a few laughs and then talked about how we felt about worship leading currently and some other practical stuff.

It was a brilliant time of encouragement and re-envisioning for us. It's fantastic to be on team with these people and a real privilege to serve with them.

Lots and lots of drums

2011-07-01T16:23:00.000+01:00

so as we try and push on with doing creative things, this week i'm attempting to have 2 djembes and 1 cajon and seeing how it works musically at the evening meeting...

If all goes well may try and do it bigger scale the following week... not sure we'll be able to pull of what the people in the above video do but it's definitely got me in the mood for more drums!

Worship Song "Audit"

2011-06-29T16:09:00.000+01:00

I'm a big fan of looking at stats... it's a great way of being able to see things that at a glance you may not be able to see.

I've done this before, but today i complied a list of all the songs we've played so far this year and tallied up how many times we've played each song, and also what individually each worship leader has played... on top of this i also put the year each song was written on the totals (just because it interested me really!)

Our top 14 songs were (because there were 5 joint number 10s)

And can it be (2010) - homewritten remake of the hymn
To God be the glory (2010) - Lou Fellingham
Keep Singing (2011) - homewritten
Stronger (2008) - Hillsong
Amazing Grace (trad)
Because of your love (2008) - Al Gordon
How great thou art (trad)
See his love (2005) - Tom Lockley
There's no condemnation (2005) - Simon Brading
I delight (2010) - homewritten
Our god he reigns (2007) - Simon Brading & Matt Redman
The righteousness of god (2010) - Jordan Dillon
When I survey (trad)
Yahweh (2009) - Hillsong

It's an interesting mix of songs, and in our top 3 we've written as a church 2 of them!

As a team we don't want to get stale and simple play the same songs again and again... As one would hope, it's encouraging seeing the top songs we played last year not getting played as often this year as we hopefully keep trying to stay fresh in the songs we sing and not kill songs by playing them every week...

While it's good to not making 'singing the latest song' the be all and end all, we similarly want to keep pressing on and singing the timeless truths in a fresh way... i'll be interested to see what songs RFC are singing when i do this next year!

So long farewell, auf wiedersehen goodbye (london training base)

2011-06-23T10:01:00.000+01:00

So yesterday was the final training block/day for the London training base. It's crazy how quickly this year has gone by and how the end is now very much in sight.

I still remember as we all shuffled in at the first training block, so many strange faces, awkward first conversations, sizing up each other and all that first time stuff that happens when you meet a whole new group of people. Over this year we've seen strong friendships form, seen highs and lows, done fun things together and generally just been one big happy FP family.

Brett got us doing various things throughout the day such as writing a letter to ourselves (quite a surreal experience), brainstorming what can be improved about the year, thinking about what advice we would give the future FPers. Stef Liston gave us a stirring talk on how to guard our tender regenerate hearts, and Pete Wood gave us a few hard hitting words... We ended the day worshipping God, thanking Him for what's He's done and fixing our eyes on Him as we walk towards what He has planned next for us...

It's been such a fantastic year, I've met some brilliant people who are going to do some amazing stuff for God, I'm sure of it, Brett has been a fantastic base leader who's honesty and openness has helped set the pace for us to do the same and generally he's just been amazing...

The next London Base Fpers are going to have a fantastic time and if anyone reading this is um-ing or er-ing about FP... just do it... you won't regret it!

p.s. we did a "most likely to" poll and apparently i'm the most likely to get a card from "Big Tezza" (aka Terry Virgo)... He forgot this year and i'll forgive him but i'm expecting one next year!

Craig and Ellie

2011-06-18T23:42:00.001+01:00

Today saw my FP mentor Craig get married to the lovely Elli, was a fantastic day and a joyous occasion... It's great being part their family's day... I had "the view from the music seats"...

In His Shoes

2011-06-15T12:33:00.001+01:00

As father's day approaches there's loads of videos popping up over the net/church resource websites... It's a challenging topic in many ways, and as I prepare to get marriage the reality that I could one day be a Dad does hit me every now and then... it's videos like this one that remind me I've got a lot of growing up to do still and how much responsibility there is as a parent!...

*UPDATE*
Dave Rogers has shown me a brilliant little video along the same lines!

Lion of Judah... the film...

2011-06-14T16:11:00.000+01:00

So i came across this little film trailer, it can be perhaps described as a Christian attempt at a Pixar-esque film. I'm not going to say if i like it or not you can make your own mind up about the film, but it's interesting to see Christian's trying to step out into film culture.

Shame they seem to have given the whole plot away in this one trailer...

A little bit older, maybe a little bit wiser

2011-06-12T00:08:00.002+01:00

So i've now collected another year to the 22 I've already collected so far. I managed to head back early from southampton and was treated to a meal at tampopo by Claire.
It's been quite a year with ups and downs. Highlights including getting engaged to my beautiful fiancee Claire, fp as a whole, the packed out carol concert and many other things means there's lots to remember. This time last year I was working at a recruitment agency wondering what my fp year would look like... Now i'm sat wondering what marriage and full time employment at rfc will look like... I know that this coming year is one of a big transition...
The best thing of all is that I can testify about God's faithfulness and goodness throughout and how I know this will follow me through all my years. Thank you to the many many people who have blessed me this year, i'm so grateful to God for you. Looking forward to being able to talk about all the great things that have happened this time next year.

Park life - day 4

2011-06-10T23:04:00.001+01:00

So friday at park life has come and gone, and we've witnessed God move once again. I left a bit early today but there was loads of people still receiving prayer for all sorts of things. Rfc's very own Scott Taylor was giving the talks and he communicated the gospel brilliantly. We saw more people once again responding to the good news that Jesus saves and numerous people asking for prayer for healing. We had a great time celebrating as well with some very unbritish dancing going on. It's my last day tomo so looking forward to whar God is goin to do amongst us... Plus it's my birthday!

Park life - day 3

2011-06-09T23:24:00.001+01:00

The fact day three ended with a large prayer tunnel pretty much sums up today. We saw more responses to thr gospel, healings (including legs regrowing!) and once again trying to bless southampton as much as we can in the time possible. We're definitely enjoying our time here and it's a privilege being part of park life 2011... it's great there's plenty of time left for God to continue to wow us

Park life - day 2

2011-06-08T22:45:00.001+01:00

So it's been a busy day here at park life. After yesterday's training, it was the real deal today, as we told southampton about jesus. We had iffy moments with the weather including incredibly hail... I've been on bass duties for a bit and we had great times of worship over the 3 meetings. We've seen numerous responses to the gospel (unofficial count is 8) and people coming up for healing, so it's great seeing God working from the outset. Looking forward to more of the same tomorrow.

Park life 2011 - day 1

2011-06-07T23:06:00.001+01:00

So we've finished our first day here. We've mostly had training, worship and lots of prayer. It's been great hearing what's happened in previous years and stirring ourselves for the week. It's going to be a good week, i'm sure!

Park life - almost there

2011-06-07T08:43:00.000+01:00

So tomorrow morning, the rfc interns once again hit the road for another chapter in our fp year. We shall journey to Southampton to take part in Park life 2011. Sounds like there's going to be loads going on and we're expecting to see God do some amazing stuff (the stories from last year's event sound fantastic). Do keep the event in your prayers and hopefully we won't have to pull out the umbrellas very much over the week. Will try and blog/twitter during the week...

Prayer Meeting

2011-06-03T14:06:00.000+01:00

Last night we had another one of our new monthly prayer meetings where we gather together as one church instead of meeting as life groups. We started by Richard giving an exposition on Psalm 24 before we launch into some songs.

It's always stirring seeing people passionately worship Jesus at these meetings and last night was no different. We try to choose songs that lift our gaze to our Saviour and remind us of biblical truths to help lead us into action. I think it's always good to be remind just how big a God we have before we start praying!

There was loads to pray about and we saw prophetic words spoken. We prayed about buildings, salvation, people to be set from and for people serving overseas. One of my favourite moments was seeing the church family huddle around Laura (who's going out to South America) and pray blessings over her.

It's such a privilege to be at nights like last night and to be standing side by side with other RFCers as we cry out to our Father. I'm looking forward to what He has in store for us! Do try to get along to the next one... you won't want to miss it...

Father's Day @ RFC, 19th June

2011-06-01T11:26:00.001+01:00

On Sunday 19th June at 12:30pm we're going to be celebrating Father's Day together as a church (that means both meetings). There's going to be a BBQ, a bouncy castle, inflatable joust, a tug of war and the infamous "Young Pups Vs Old Dogs" football match which i'm sure will be just as much fun as last year.

I'm looking forward to chatting to some new people, great food and lots of fun! Hopefully see you there (maybe on the pitch!)

Sitting is Killing You?

2011-05-27T13:28:00.000+01:00

I came across this rather worrying graphic. Is a job sitting at a desk starring at a computer killing me? Maybe I should take up jogging while on the computer...

Via: Medical Billing And Coding

Smart Phones on the mind...

2011-05-26T14:15:00.000+01:00

So at the weekend Claire (my fiancee) signed up to a new contract with 3 and got a shiny new HTC Desire S in return. Now not only is she better looking, of higher "cool" standing and more talented than me, she now is more technologically advanced than me...

The world of phones has changed massively recently, and where we once were gasping at the fact that phones had colour (remember how blown away you were by this), we now expect them to do everything from emails, tell us where we are, entertain us, be a substitute for our debit cards (about to be introduced), take brilliant photos and many other things.

The world wants us to believe that these things will change our lives completely and fulfil our wildest dreams. I'm not sure they will but i do like the idea of getting emails on the go and playing a bit of Angry Birds during long journeys... (as well as a variety of more pious reasons).

Matt Giles (writer of "The Grace Of My God") has written an interesting blog on the topic and given reasons why he's given up his iphone. You can read it here

I like John Piper's idea of the Bible App arresting our focus on our smartphones... hopefully that'll happen with me if I get a smartphone... You can read Piper's thoughts here

All in all i guess with most things, a smartphone is a neutral thing that can be a good thing but without self control can quickly be a God thing too. Hopefully if i get one it won't become one for me!

oh and p.s. if i do get one and I start to do that classic "not listen properly to conversation as i'm starring at my smartphone and flicking randomly" then you have permission to tell me off good and proper!

Erasing Hell...

2011-05-25T11:21:00.000+01:00

So it seems Francis Chan will be wading into the Hell debate with his own book. A nice controversial title and a little promo video to accompany. I really enjoy Francis Chan's stuff and his humility shines constantly through his books/videos/talks. I like a lot of the points he makes about this whole hell conversation and looking forward to purchasing the book when it come out in July.

Check out the video and see what you make of what he says...

Beautiful Things

2011-05-21T10:11:00.000+01:00

Beautiful Things from Studio B on Vimeo.

In St Petersburg I struck up a conversation with a student about God, Jesus, the bible and his thoughts on the whole matter. He seemed to give me the classic answers of Jesus being a good teacher, agreed that there was something different about Him and what He taught, and generally seemed to think Jesus was a pretty brilliant person. Why I've remembered this conversation above the many others I've had was how he asked me "what difference does believing in Jesus make in a christian person life? What radical changes in their lives have taken place?"

The amazing thing about the God, is that He's in the business of actually changing us, of making us new. The 2 Cor 5:7 verse proclaims this boldly...

"Therefore, if anyone is in Christ, the new creation has come: The old has gone, the new is here"

I'm sure we all have stories we can tell about what Christ has done in us & in others and I love how the video above shows this...hopefully the video above will make you smile and reflect on how wonderful it is that God is actively at work in us and it making us more like Christ each day.

Day (i'm not sure anymore) of Recording

2011-05-16T23:37:00.000+01:00

Today we had another day of recording (i've lost count of how many days we've done so far) and the songs are now all starting to take shape. It's been great hearing some of the ideas people have come up with for the 7 songs we're doing. We now tracked all drums, bass, rhythm and the majority of electric. Keys are also in the process of being recording atm. May try and give you all a sneak peek of some of what we've done at some point, in my opinion it sounds brilliant! Hopefully can start taking preorders at some point soon! Big thank you to all who have put in so much effort already and those who are working away at parts at the moment, it's a privilege working with such talented people.

Monday Football Thoughts

2011-05-16T10:58:00.000+01:00

My favourite football blogger pretty much sums up my frustration and disappointment with this season here

While we certainly weren't the best team in the league, we had clear chances to turn us from being from nearly men to actually winning something. Yet once again Arsenal fans are left watching our rivals gloat over us... (2 man utd fans in my house ensure this...)

So what will the summer bring? Well the rumour mill will begin that Captain Cesc will leave, The founder of Compare the Meerkat will leave us to return to the homeland, and i'm sure some young french "next big thing" will be linked to us

What would I like? I'm switching between if Cesc leaving with do us good or not, deadwoods need to be removed quickly and we need a backbone as a team again. The Verminator's return should help this process but it would seem that major investment is needed.

We lost 2-1 to Aston Villa, a team without it's manager and yet seemed to be much more up for a fight than we were. Let's hope that the team regains it's confidence with a successful summer and some fresh faces who are up for the new season...

All I Have Is Christ (Animation)

2011-05-12T13:26:00.000+01:00

This is simply a stunning piece of work... I love the imagery of how Jesus on the cross takes the wrath of God & of the person running towards Christ. Hope you enjoy this and it stirs something in you.

St Petersburg

2011-05-05T11:17:00.001+01:00

So for the past week i've been in the city of St Petersburg with Sean, visting Dave and Hannah Henson. It was great to finally see what's happening @Hope Church after hearing so much about it.

The trip was rammed with things to do, including: Pastor meetings, 3 church services (got to do some bi-lingual worship, a real treat), their first ever Alpha, a discussion group on the doctrine of election, and many other things. Was great fun being part of Hope Church for a week and catching some of what's going on at this vibrant church.

We spent a lot of time with the Henson family who are simply fantastic. They're clearing doing some amazing work as they seek to help build Jesus's (bilingual) church in St Petersburg. I'm so glad we're supporting this wonderful family as a church.

I stayed with Phil & Julia Pike who looked after me over the week. It was always nice to be greeted with a warm welcome and an even warmer cup of tea when arriving back, so a big thank you to them as well.

I learnt loads, met with some brilliant people and got a glimpse of what life in St Petersburg is like... So all in all a fantastic trip!

Keep Singing... Remixed... soon?

2011-04-26T09:00:00.000+01:00

Due to some very generous and lovely people I ended up receiving an Ibook and quickly purchased "Garageband" to hopefully help spark off my creativity in songwriting.

While playing with loops, beats and other such fun things I thought I would attempt doing some interesting arrangements of some of the songs I've written. My first efforts have been on my latest song "Keep Singing Of The Cross". Lots of fun and hopefully when i've finished adding stuff/mixing/etc... you might get a full listen.

I'm actually off to Russia for the week so any work (or blog posts) will have to wait til next week. For those of you who are interested here's a 2min peek into what i've done so far (hopefully you'll like what you hear so far...) Maybe i'll attempt an "RFC remix" album some time soon.

See you next week

Monday Football Thoughts

2011-04-25T19:31:00.000+01:00

There's not much to say really... another poor performance now sees us in third and seemingly free falling. I guess you have to look back to the Carling Cup final for the root of this collapse in confidence. From challenging to all four competitions to now settling for third place...

I've said all that can be said really... Really just looking to next season now and hoping that we see a new rigid backbone that we desperately need. I used to one of those Arsenal fans who argued that the team just needed one or two players and that's what would make the difference. Yet after once again witnessing the demise of any real challenge for honours, I'm beginning to wonder if there needs to be real change...

Anyways I'm tired of evaluating this disappointing season so a short blog post this week

Hopefully next week I can say something positive!

Follow

2011-04-20T09:56:00.004+01:00

Here's the follow up to "The Social Network Christmas"... seems to simply us Twitter as a model rather than all the social networks... powerful stuff still!

Monday Football Thoughts

2011-04-18T23:48:00.000+01:00

And so it would seem Arsenal are out of the title race. While numerically it is still possible for them to snatch the title out of Man Utd's grasp, it just seems inconceivable that a team with such a strong winning mentality as Man Utd can simply collapse...

The 1-1 draw against Liverpool was simply 2 points thrown away, as once again the flaws of the gunners were exposed for all to see... Cutting edge? didn't see it, a solid defence? MIA, the ability to grind out a result when it counts? i've forgotten what that looks like when watching Arsenal...

I'm not quite sure how you can have a penalty in the 8th minute score, and still end up with a draw. I read one description of there seeming to be sheer terror in the Arsenal team when Liverpool got the ball before their penalty and that feels like an accurate description, the players seem unable to simply make the tackle and finish the game off. Instead the one man wrecking ball of Eboue allowed Liverpool to get back into the game...

What else is left to say that hasn't already been said? Yes Man Utd have the potential to slip up in their remaining fixtures, but it feels like Arsenal have the greater tendency to self-implode than Arsenal. Yes we're most likely going to come second and perhaps that shows an improvement, though I feel it's perhaps the capitulation of Chelsea and Liverpool that has allowed us to leapfrog from 4th place.

Maybe I'll be surprised and Arsenal somehow pull the cat out of the bag, but I can't say i'm too hopeful...

P.s. well done to Jack Wilshere on winning PFA Young Player of the Year, definitely deserved, not too sure about Bale though...

Driscoll on Men (and marriage)

2011-04-18T00:58:00.001+01:00

On saturday night, the men of RFC gathered for a night of curry, fellowship and some hard hitting truths. Sitho brought along a dvd series from his brother's church on the topic of "Real Men" showing us a bit of a talk by the man's man himself Mark Driscoll. It was a stirring talk by Driscoll and well worth checking out. The talk reminded me of another talk i've heard Driscoll do, which covers some of the same material. I thought I would share it with you. If you haven't heard it, it's definitely worth listening to, a sermon that will definitely challenge me to be the best (future) husband i can be

A busy week/month/year...

2011-04-16T23:52:00.001+01:00

A distinct lack of blogging has been down to a rather hectic few weeks

Highlights include:

Training @Bracknell - with some great sessions on the church, church history, Simon Benham's musings and a brilliant time @Oakwood Youth Challenge... I was made to do 5 press ups during a session on team exercises when I tried to be funny while doing a "get across an acid river" task and commented "well as long as I get across that's fine"... lesson learnt...(humble pie moment 4). It was great that I got to hang out my brothers & sisters for 3 days, what a privilege it is to be part of this group

Recording - we've started and there's now a real buzz about the project, next step is bass/guitars...

Playing bass - filling in 2 weeks in a row may mean that I'm now officially a bassist! or not...

Seeing family - my parents, brother & sister-in-law came to visit which was brilliant. In such a hectic year it's amazing having the fantastic support of my family.

Men's curry night - great to gather with the guys from the church to eat some curry, chat and hear some encouraging/challenging stuff

Doing lots and lots means i'm having to learn how to say "no" and also how to simply rest... The threat of tiring myself out seems very real at times and so I'm having to take big steps on the journey of organising myself and why God gave us a Sabbath.

Exo 20:8-11
“Remember the Sabbath day, to keep it holy. Six days you shall labor, and do all your work, but the seventh day is a Sabbath to the Lord your God. On it you shall not do any work, you, or your son, or your daughter, your male servant, or your female servant, or your livestock, or the sojourner who is within your gates. For in six days the Lord made heaven and earth, the sea, and all that is in them, and rested on the seventh day. Therefore the Lord blessed the Sabbath day and made it holy."

It's times like this i need remind myself i can't do everything, and it's pride that would make me think i can... i need to ensure I rest, and on top of that, rest in my Saviour. I know the danger of burnout is a very real one and i want to ensure it doesn't happen to me. This puritan prayer is something that I want to have on my mind when over this final stretch of my FP year...

MY DEAR LORD,
I depend wholly upon Thee,
wean me from all other dependences.
Thou art my all, thou dost overrule all
and delight in me.
Thou art the foundation of goodness,
how can I distrust Thee?
how be anxious about what happens to me?

In the light of Thy preciousness
the world and all its enjoyments are
infinitely poor:
I value the favour of men no more than pebbles.
Amid the blessings I receive from Thee
may I never lose the heart of a stranger.

May I love Thee, my Benefactor, in all my benefits,
not forgetting that my greatest danger
arises from my advantages.

Produce in me self-despair that will
make Jesus precious to me,
delightful in all His offices,
pleasurable in all His ways,
and may I love His commands
as well as His promises.

Help me to discern between true and false love,
the one consisting of supreme love to Thee,
the other not,
the former uniting Thy glory and man’s happiness
that they may become one common interest,
the latter disjointing and separating them both,
seeking the latter with neglect of the former.

Teach me that genuine love is different in kind
from that wrought by rational arguments
or the motive of self-interest,
that such love is a pleasing passion affording
joy to the mind where it is.

Grant me grace to distinguish
between the genuine and the false,
and to rest in Thee who art all love

(Taken from ‘The Valley of Vision: A Collection of Puritan Prayers,’ edited by Arthur Bennett)

Monday Football Thoughts

2011-04-11T23:00:00.000+01:00

And so it would seem Arsenal becomes the next Premier league team to end up in foreign hands. Stan K looked always likely to be a future owner once he started to become best mates with the Arsenal board...

It's hard to grasp just what it will mean for the club. He's not uber rich so it's unlikely to result it Man City style transfers, nor does it seem like he's going to saddle the club in debts to buy the club... Which leaves potentially Arsenal in the same position as before, which is what Peter Hill-Wood/the rest of the directors wanted. I guess maybe he'll exert some extra pressure on Wenger for results so that it will = profits, but my guess is that Arsenal won't change much because of the change of owners... (though I'm sure i can be proved wrong)... I'm sure the Stan K camp will continue to release "we understand the club", "we too love Wenger" statements which will remain interesting to read for another... well few seconds... anyways we'll wait and see what actually happens as a result of this potential change of ownership

On the actual football side of things, we managed to record and victory against the team with the weakest defence in the entire league... How we weren't up by more than 2 goals i don't know, but yet again the Arsenal defence seemed intent on making things harder for themselves than is necessary. Clichy hesitating on the ball, Koscienly attempting to give away yet another penalty (luckily the ref thwarted Koscienly's best efforts) and for Eboue words "defensive duties" still seem to have no meaning. But a win is a win and hopefully confidence will begin to trickle back into the players... Hopefully the defence will start to be a bit more ruthless with "Mad Jens" screaming at the back again. It's funny how you forget what a difference it makes to have a strong leader within the team again... All credit to him to be able to play in the Premiership at the age of 41... I'm sure he'll give us a few moments over the next few games...

That's all for now, training tomorrow @Bracknell which will be fun... see you next week!

RFC CD - Day 2 of Recording

2011-04-08T16:04:00.000+01:00

So yesterday we finished the drums for all the songs, was a brilliant day of working through the songs, trying out new things and a lot of hard work. Loved the end product and looking forward to fleshing it all out now.

Some of the songs required extra work with making distinct drums parts and was really interesting realising how we often do just everything the same usually in a song. Definitely needed to be on our creative best and hopefully we've managed to make the songs sound individually unique... I guess those who buy it can tell us if we managed it!

Well done the two drummers of Jethro & Rob, Grae for bearing with us and the Del Rios for once again being fantastic!

Here's a clip of yesterdays recordings... can you guess the song?

Drum Recording from Josh John on Vimeo.

There's another clip here... but it's a ridiculous size...

Next stop Electric/Bass/Synth/Piano... etc....

RFC CD - Day 1 of Recording

2011-04-05T17:47:00.000+01:00

So a big project for my FP year was to attempt producing a CD of some of our home written songs. There was some ground work done from the year before but it's a big new venture for the church.

We're hoping to release a 7 song EP sometime around Aug/Sept. It will contain some of the songs that we sing regularly at the church which we have written ourselves.

It's going to be a great blast trying out stuff and letting rip in terms of creativity

Over the past few weeks/months I've been deep in budgets, track lists, thinking of titles, arrangements, pondering what's the best way to distribute the product and so on. So it was brilliant that this Monday we started actually getting it recorded.

The first step has been tracking the drums. After a bit of setup we started with the new song "Keep Singing" where Jethro had a few fills he had come up with. It sounded fantastic and I'm looking forward to hearing how the song develops. On thursday we'll be trying to get all the other drums done (with both Jethro and Rob)...

Big thank you to Jess & James Del Rio who have been amazing in helping us attempt this project, Grae who's producing it all, and Matt Sales for helping us out with some equipment... Looking forward to letting you know the continued progress and maybe giving you some video clips of what's going on!....

Yesterday/Monday Football Thoughts

2011-04-05T10:18:00.000+01:00

And so the title race is no longer in our hands, 2 disappointing draws have meant that we've fallen quite far behind Man Utd and now can only hope that they slip up in the coming matches. The 0-0 draw against Blackburn only showed how far our confidence has fallen and why no one really fancies us to win the title anymore. This wasn't Barca, Man Utd, Milan or some other team of significant calibre, it was Blackburn... AT HOME!... Perhaps one win will give them the vital self belief boost they need for this frantic end of season.

The team seems emotionally/physically drained as well a void of any urgency in their play. We got the ball, passed around a bit and then proceeded to let the Blackburn team get organised and simply punt away any chance. We had 11 attempts on goal and only 3 on target... that's pretty shocking from a team that prides itself on attacking football... Why did Wenger wait until the very end to bring on Chamakh and Bendtner who seemed like they could actually get on the end of one of the many crosses... I'm still a bit perplexed why we attempt crosses with VP as lone striker... Well done to Nasri for playing with that gigantic bump!

I've moaned about the failing of Arsenal since pretty much I decided to start making monday, a football blog day... so I'll leave it with this, please start shooting, start to have some urgency and please please get a win... (surely we'll beat Blackpool at the weekend)

In other football news, Crewe beat Cheltenham 8-1 (a crazy score no matter what division), Rooney decided to tell a camera what he thought of it, and this little Japanese kid tries his best Messi impression...

i don't know whether it would be more frustrating playing against the kid, or being on his team (I don't remember seeing him make a single pass)...

Until next time...

April Fools... some highlights

2011-04-01T16:42:00.000+01:00

So April fools descended upon us. There have been some brilliant April fools pranks on the web...

The "gmail motion" was a fantastic little clip. You can find the full video here. I think the "sending mail" motion of licking a stamp and putting it on was my faveourite.

Following closely behind, the "playmobil apple store2 made me giggle a fair bit... miniature ipads, how amazing...

I enjoyed the spoof of Mark Driscoll's latest release, the chapter on "cowering" would have made for some interesting reading no doubt...

utest (a market place for software testing) setup a pretty hilarious dating website for software testers... (website) if you're a wookie looking for a droid that's the website for you... techcrunch has compiled a list of some other brilliant April fools gags (list)

There's plenty more which i've missed (such as the youtube 1911... BMWs Royal themed car etc...) but there's only so much i can blog on, do let me know if there's a spectacular one i've missed tho!

So all in all a pretty successful day, if you want to hear what we as interns concocted transfer yourself over to Sean's blog where he's listed the pranks we pulled (and the failed attempt).... you can find it here

So happy April fools hope you had fun

Q&A on prayer from DesiringGod.org pastors conference

2011-03-30T16:02:00.001+01:00

I came across this interesting Q&A session from the recent Pastors conference held by Desiring God ministries. Some really thought provoking questions... Christianity today has profiled a bit on unanswered prayer which is worth having a read over. Prayer is a topic with some deep questions tied to it, so it great seeing some good answers. I've got Francis Chan's talk from the conference lined up to listen to as well! Enjoy the panel discussion and the interesting questions..

Forerunner - Hold Your Fire

2011-03-29T10:50:00.000+01:00

My mate Pete Coggan's band (Forerunner) have released their long awaited EP called "Hold Your Fire"... I had anticipated this was going to a fantastic collections of songs and boy did they exceed expectations. Riff laden, hook filled, musically quite distinct and just essentially a brilliant listen. This self produced gem is well worth picking up and it's only £3.95, what a complete bargain...

I can't recommend it highly enough, go and buy it here, you won't regret it!

Monday Football Thoughts

2011-03-28T23:46:00.001+01:00

So club football took the back seat this weekend and we were left to marvel at the international football scene... A clearly superior England team defeated a Welsh team that was hoping to ride on the Gareth Bale hype and create an upset. The injury to Wales's star however ensured that the tie was less than enthralling. Instead 2 early goals in many ways killed of the match before it had even really started. The Welsh team is young and I'm sure that one day they may cause other sides more problems, but if Saturday was anything to go by, they are quite a way off being a top international side and Gary Speed has quite a job on his hands.

The apparently new system for England seemed to work well and it was brilliant to see young Jacky Wilshere put in another fantastic performance. With each game he seems to gain confidence and I'm glad he's getting the recognition his performances deserve. Just need to hope that Wenger can talk him out of playing at the U-21s tournament in the summer. I understand that it would be brilliant to win the tournament etc... but from a strong Arsenal point of view, I would much rather he rests, doesn't get injured or burnout and remains the crucial cog in helping us achieve another title challenge next season rather than take the first few months recovering... Alan Hansen seems to agree that perhaps the U-21s tournament has no real benefit for him (here)

It was a quite weekend apart from the international fixtures, England have the Ghana friendly on Weds and then back to club football at the weekend. Hopefully Gyan won't score and make us watch him do "that" celebration once again... then again he's in my fantasy football team so maybe it could give him a confidence boost for the weekend... Oh how fantasy football messes with allegiances!

UPDATE

When I saw this had to add this on...

100 goals as a goalkeeper!... hats off the the fella

The pitfalls of ebay... perhaps a humble pie moment

2011-03-25T11:24:00.001Z

So for as long as I've started writing songs and discovered how useful garageband is for making good demos, I've wanted a mac... I love how easy it seems on the program to create good sounding tracks and help try creative things out with songs idea, plus the internal mac mic produces a pretty excellent sound. While I cannot afford a new mac (I can't even dream about buying one!), a second hand one seemed reasonable and my wonderful financee donated some finances to seemingly help realise the desire.

While an actual macbook seemed out of the price range, i managed to secure a ibook G4 for fairly cheap on the wonder that is ebay... Yesterday it arrived and I excitedly opened up my package... bit by bit the dream crumbled...

Firstly the DVD drive seemed to scratch the top of CDs that were put into... okay no biggie i can live with that, then i realised garageband was not on it... okay i was sure it must be around somewhere... found it on the required disc and then watched the screen go black... doh.... a few attempts to restart it and it seemed to work again but my confidence was shaken... then this morning it really struggled to turn on at all and therefore left to ask to return the laptop. A brilliant seller means he will refund me and allow me to return the laptop but I'm left where i started... sadly without a mac...

I've been left with the lesson that maybe secondhand isn't always a good option or at least not to get my hopes up too high... maybe one day my dream will be realised fully (or instead at least hopefully my materialistic tendencies diminished!)

Bye bye ibook, you served me... well rubbishly...

p.s. if you own a macbook (that you no longer need) and would like to give it to a new home where it will be love and cherished do let me know!! it's worth a try...

Smithy Red Nose Day Sketch

2011-03-22T22:18:00.002Z

I'm sure you've already seen it, but this definitely has to be the best sketch from Red Nose Day... Gordon Brown went up in many people's standing I'm sure for simply taking part!

Enjoy (once again for most of you...)

Monday Football Thoughts

2011-03-21T23:29:00.000Z

So the perceived obvious win against West Brom didn't happen thanks to the commitment of Almunia, so instead we have to settle for a 2-2 draw... The sheer comic nature of West Brom's second goal where Almunia for some reason decided to rush out of his goal, push Squillaci out of the way, leaving the West Brom striker an open goal and make it extremely difficult for Arsenal to make a come back...

Luckily Arshavin/Alexandr Orlov and Van P managed to pull us two goals back. It's becoming increasingly frustrating to watch this team play and consistently self-implode. We may have a game in hand and some might argue an easier run in, yet with a defence that is as likely to kick itself in the head rather than kick the ball away, a title challenge feels a bit beyond us at the moment...

The Champions league draw poses a few interesting ties... Spurs vs Real M will give the overly confident Spurs a real test in a way that the steadily ageing Milan team could not... Man Utd vs Chelsea of course will be a cracker, will Torres score? will Terry be once again brought to tears? will Berbatov actually run for the ball? i'm sure whatever the result it will be worth a watch...

There's plenty more football news floating around but I'm sure a more comprehensive blog/website will have covered it better. Instead I'll leave you with the genius that is Mario Balotelli vs Bib (you've probably seen it but it's worth watching again and again...)

"Hymns that Last..."

2011-03-18T15:03:00.000Z

I came across this interesting article in Christianity Today about "Hymns that last" and compiled the Hymns that can be found in all major published hymnals across the denominations. Interestingly there's quite a few classics which seem to have not made the cut... Amazing grace, And Can It Be, Praise My soul, etc... I guess it was a slightly different way of compiling the data rather than simply a poll.

As a church we sing I think we sing 2 off this list (Holy Holy Holy Lord God Almighty & When I survey), though do correct me if i'm wrong, but I sure many within the church would love some of these to be played on the sunday. As a songwriter, I can't even imagine writing a song and then have that song played hundred of years later, with people still connecting with the words, and yet these giants of songwriting have managed it (some more than once)! Timeless truths with brilliant music, what a combination! There are fair few on there that I don't know but I'm looking forward to spending a bit of time to learn them!

Check out the full article here & the pdf of the list here

Do you have a favourite hymn? Is there a hymn you've been aching to sing on sunday? Do comment and let me know! It's always great hearing what hymns stir people in worship and why...

P.S the BBC Radio Solent did a more common way of finding out what was the top hymn and complied their list here hopefully you'll see your favourite hymn there!

Christian Palindromes

2011-03-17T15:28:00.000Z

They seem a bit of a craze atm but here are 2 inspirational palindromes, hope you enjoy them

"COLLIDE" Palindrome from PC3 on Vimeo.

"Our sin and shame, by grace erased (?)"

2011-03-16T11:02:00.001Z

So over the past few months I've been working on the song "Keep Singing of the Cross" which I believe is now finished (thanks to the help of Pete Coggan).

Upon submitting the song for theological checking, I was asked about the line I wrote "Our sin and shame by grace erased". Was that what it says biblically? or does the bible paint a different picture?

In my head it had seemed quite straight forward but i'm glad i was asked the question, as i never want to simply write lyrics as I think they sound good.

Initially I came up with nothing, the word erased didn't seem to appear in my bible (NIV) and the passages i looked up seemed to refer instead to our sins being covered up or forgotten rather than being erased...

However after some further delving i found this Acts 3 passage where Peter says to the Jews he's preaching to:

"Repent, then, and turn to God, so that your sins may be wiped out, that times of refreshing may come from the Lord" Acts 3:19

Looking at a lexicon i saw that "wiped out" or "blotted" in the greek is exaleiphō which means "to wipe off, wipe away, to obliterate, erase, wipe out, blot out"

Therefore we can say that Jesus's blood is the eraser that blots out or erases our sins... and they are remember no more... It is not that God simply erases them without a cost though but it is paid through the precious blood of Jesus upon a cross...

I loved having to search to see if the lyric was theologically correct as it has revealed afresh to me the wonders of His grace that He would remove my sins because of His great love! (plus it's always great to have a good rummage through a lexicon)

Looking forward to getting a chance to play the song soon, hope you like it for those who hear it!

Monday Football Thoughts

2011-03-15T00:19:00.000Z

And so what every Arsenal fan feared would happen, has indeed taken place. In perhaps one of the worst fortnights ever for an Arsenal fan, the Gunners were dumped out of 3 competitions in quick succession. While it can be argued that Barca were by far the better team, Birmingham & Man Utd were clearly not teams of vastly superior class. Questions need to be asked of this team that promised so much but yet once again seem to be falling over before the last hurdle has even been reached!

The FA cup match seemed to show the weakness of this current team. We can play fantastic football, keep possession but lack the killer instinct or the mental strength to actually win a game when we need to... to convert those many chances when it's required. I know we were missing a host of players, and some were clearly not fit, but yet Man Utd were missing plenty of players and yet they still could produce a result when it counted. I was throwing my hands up in frustration as I once again witnessed us make pass after pass, attempt backheels despite being 2 nil down, and instead of trying to counter attack at pace in the dying embers of the game, we walked with the ball hoping that maybe the Man Utd players might let us pass it into the net... I felt sorry for Jack W who seemed to be the only player willing to run at Man Utd and try to take the game by the scruff of the neck. What happened to the counter attacking Arsenal that would put fear into defenders? or the Arsenal that went invincible for a season? why are we suddenly the almost team... the team who can't win when it counts...

I'm not calling for Wenger's head, or suggesting that it's all over. We're still in the race for the title but the tide really has to turn. Some how the players need to remove this self imposed mental block and get back to winning games. While I know it's possible that we can do it, there are serious doubts and I wonder if we're suffered too much this season... please Wenger bring in the experienced heads, the big centre half who oozes confidence, the dominating midfielder who won't simply watch another player waltz into our half, a striker who doesn't get injured by simply the wind blowing on them... a wish-list many Arsenal fans have had for a long time but I think it's more likely that Santa will bring us such gifts then Wenger...

"In Wenger we trust"... but we're holding our heads in our hands wondering when will this trust give us a cup in return... (P.S. get well Djourou, hope the shoulder gets better, we need you back soon!)

My favourite footy video of the week has to be this delightful disallowed goal that couldn't be more in...

wait for the second replay and smile...

And Can It Be (redone)

2011-03-11T15:13:00.000Z

So last year was a fairly fruitful year for me for song writing, not that it's about numbers, but i've enjoyed seeing songs develop and being used at church and hopefully helping people fix their gaze on Jesus better.

The song that people seemed to connect to best is one that I can't even take all the credit for. The hymn "And Can It Be" has always been a bit of a favourite song of mine. There is great depth to the song and I love how the gospel seems to flow through every verse.

One night I felt a melody pop into my head and I quickly grabbed the nearest guitar to see how it fitted. It seemed to work well with the lines of "And Can It Be" so I mulled it over for a few days and then played it to a few people. I thought there were are few lines that people might not understand as well - e.g. "Thine eye diffused a quickening ray" (or maybe I just don't get a very obvious meaning) and so I rewrote a few lines to make things more clear (this involved combining verse 2 & 3). Another addition was a progression of "And now..." where I tried to create a journey of what has now happened culminating in "And now my soul complete". Lastly I added a little riff to begin to the song as well which hopefully is catchy-tastic!

The first morning I played it, I expected an outcry at the sheer audacity of changing a beloved hymn yet people seemed to receive it well... So here are lyrics (i've highlighted in red the changed lyrics) and I've put a very rough acoustic recording at the bottom (excuse poor sound quality/singing) and hopefully I'll be able to post the full studio recording of it soon!

And Can It Be - Words - Charles Wesley, Additional lyrics & Music Josh John

Verse 1:
And can it be that I should gain
An interest in the Saviour’s blood?
Died He for me, who caused His pain—
For me, who Him to death pursued?
Amazing love! How can it be,
That Thou, my God, should die for me?
And now my soul is well
All because of his amazing love

Verse 2 (original verse 2 & 3 combined):
‘Tis Mystery all: th’Immortal dies
Who can explain this grace divine
He left His Father’s throne above
And bled for Adam’s helpless race
Tis mercy all, immense and free
For O my God, it found out me
And now my heart must bow
All because of his amazing love

Verse 3:
Long my imprisoned spirit lay,
Fast bound in sin, in death and shame
But God himself, He heard my cry
My Saviour came, gave me new life
My chains fell off, my heart was free,
I rose, went forth, and followed Thee.
And now my spirit sings
All because of his amazing love

Verse 4:
No condemnation now I dread;
Jesus, and all in Him, is mine;
Alive in Him, my living Head,
And clothed in righteousness divine,
Bold I approach th’eternal throne,
And claim the crown, through Christ my own.
And now my soul complete
All because of his amazing love

Listen here

Hopefully those at RFC are still enjoying singing the song and hopefully if you haven't heard it before you'll enjoy this acoustic version (or at least it doesn't put you off til we get the CD done and you can hear how it should sound!)

Monday Football Thoughts

2011-03-07T17:04:00.001Z

So another new blog series is "Monday Fooball thoughts" which are on my thoughts from the weekend and of the coming weeks fixtures. Being an Arsenal fan they shall be almost entirely Arsenal focused...

So Arsenal drew 0-0 with Sunderland... It seemed a fairly average game where Arsenal seemed unable to once again turn possession into goals, though the shocking refereeing/linesman decisions at the end clearly cost us 2 points (how did they manage to miss Arshavin being pushed by Bramble!! *sigh*)
The only 2 redeeming factors being that Gyan didn't score (and therefore I didn't have to watch him do "that dance") and Man Utd managed to completely fold against a still pretty average Liverpool side (though King Kenny is definitely doing something right). One game in hand and only a 3 point gap between us and Man U means it would seem that there's all to play for.

Unfortunately after the Cup final , the tame draw this weekend and the Barca game, there's a sinking feeling that perhaps we might be destined for our usual end of season fizzle out and potentially be knocked out of contention for the 3 trophies in quick succession. The first hurdle is the Barca game tomorrow... Now don't get me wrong, I was quietly confident in the first leg against Barca that we could defeat them and I was pleasantly surprised at the result. However having Van Persie and Fabs only just back from injury means they might be off the pace, Nasri not quite the same since his injury, Song and Walcott out etc... means that this won't be the same confident, injury free team of the first leg and that's why I'm worried. Guess us Arsenal fans will just have to hope that we manage to get Barca on the break and finish clinically... you never know Bendtner might actually put his money where his mouth is and become this world class striker he's claiming to be... i'm yet to be convinced though

Spurgeon on prayer

2011-03-04T16:00:00.000Z

I've just finished reading a little book by PJ Smyth called "The World Needs More Elders..." It was a brilliant read and I came across this quote from Spurgeon on prayer

"If we were not constrained to pray, I question whether we could even live as Christians. If God's mercies came to us unasked, they would not be half as useful as they are now when they have to be sought for. Now we get a double blessing - the blessing in the obtaining and the blessing in the seeking. To pray is to bathe in a cool swirling steam to escape the summer sun. To pray is to mount on the eagle's wings above the cloud and get into clear heaven where God dwells. To pray is to enter the treasure house of God. To pray is grasp heaven in one's arms, to embrace deity with one's soul, and to feel one's body made a temple of the Holy Spirit. To pray is cast our burdens, to tear away our rags, to be filled with spiritual vigour, to reach the highest point of Christian health."

It's funny how I often I fall into the trap of making prayer in my head such a small thing and forget what an amazing blessing it is that I can talk to my Father in an intimate way and best of all He listens! I love the language Spurgeon uses to paint a big picture of prayer. Hopefully that quote inspires you in the same way it did for me!

Humble pie/soup experiences 3

2011-03-02T13:27:00.002Z

So I wasn't expecting to have to blog again on my newly started series but I guess I said I would update as soon as they happened...

So it was a normal weds lunchtime, I was looking forward to my delicious Goa Carnival Covenant garden soup. I like my soup to be extremely hot rather than timidly warm. Being the last to get my food ready I wandered over to our lunchtime seated area and placed the bowl in my lap... it was hot... extremely hot... i reacted by moving it backwards leading to the bowl tipping over into my lap in front of everyone... as i slowly walked towards the nearest toilet with soup essentially everywhere and muffled/loud laughter following me, I realised that it's just another experience to learn to laugh at myself, be thankful that God likes to keep me humble because he loves me, and that next time to carry hot soup on a tray...

I later scored 2 own goals in quick succession at table football... i think it's going to be a long day...

Humble pie experiences 1 + 2 (and will be a continuous series...)

2011-03-01T12:02:00.000Z

At the beginning of my FP year I felt really challenged to seek after humility in a greater way than I had before. I tasked myself with reading CJ Mahaney's book "Humility: True Greatness" and then try to take small steps in this journey. It's been amazing seeing how when you decide to take a new path, how quickly you're challenged on that issue and you suddenly see if you can put your money where your mouth is...

So I thought I would share 2 "Humble pie" experiences and will endeavour to blogging about them when they come, as I think it's good to share stories and secondly cause laughing at yourself is a brilliant way to keep yourself humble... Anyway you may not find them funny or particularly insightful but here's the start of the series...

#1
So it was my first slot at leading worship since I had begun my FP year. I was excited, raring to go and had planned to perfection (in my mind). I was confident that I had done all that I had needed to do and therefore the meeting was going to be a success (music wise). I had however picked up a cold/man flu but that wasn't going to take me down, and for some reason i believed the solution was some night nurse tablets. For those of you that don't know what night nurse is, it primarily used to help those who are struggling to sleep due to sickness, but i believed my body would be able to handle any side effects... the next morning showed i could not... my thought process were one step behind what they should be and this affected everything... I ended up breaking a string, struggled to remember what I had planned to say, slurred words, and played through 1/2 a song in the wrong key to everyone else in the band... one of the elders would later suggest that I not lead in the evening as i was clearly that much "not with it". It was a massively humbling experience, though I can now look back on it and laugh (while also being able to suggest any worship leader to not take night nurse the day before leading).

#2
At a recent training block, during a meaty bit of theology, I saw at the edge of my vision one of my fellow FPers doodling as the talk went on, I thought to myself "clearly not able to concentrate on this brilliant topic like myself"... in a few mins time as a browsed twitter on my phone i realised how quickly i'd fallen into the trap of hypocrisy and pride. Big "Doh!" moment...

I'm glad I have a God abounding in grace for all situations, who uses me despite my many shorting comings! It's a good journey I'm on and I'm happy I have my Saviour with me every step of the way.

Rob Bell... controversy...etc...

2011-02-27T23:35:00.000Z

So I could write about the failings of my beloved team... but sometimes it's just too soon... and the loss in the carling cup final is one of them

Instead I'll share the video/book release that is causing quite the stir in the christian blogging bubble...

Rob Bell (author of Velvet Elvis, Sex God, etc...) has released this video to promote his new book "Love Wins"

LOVE WINS. from Rob Bell on Vimeo.

And here's the description to go with it...
Fans flock to his Facebook page, his NOOMA videos have been viewed by millions, and his Sunday sermons are attended by 10,000 parishioners—with a downloadable podcast reaching 50,000 more. An electrifying, unconventional pastor whom Time magazine calls “a singular rock star in the church world,” Rob Bell is the most vibrant, central religious leader of the millennial generation. Now, in Love Wins: Heaven, Hell, and the Fate of Every Person Who Ever Lived, Bell addresses one of the most controversial issues of faith—the afterlife—arguing that a loving God would never sentence human souls to eternal suffering. With searing insight, Bell puts hell on trial, and his message is decidedly optimistic—eternal life doesn’t start when we die; it starts right now. And ultimately, Love Wins.

Justin Taylor from the gospelcoalition quickly wrote a response on his blog here

As with many of these things, I'm waiting for the book to see what he's actually talking about and I'm sure it will make interesting reading.

Community & Church... a solution = church social network?

2011-02-25T14:01:00.002Z

So we all know that in the last few years, social networks have radically changed the world (for the better or worse is up for debate...). The rise of facebook/twitter/etc has meant churches have had to jump onto the social network band wagon or perhaps miss out on a easy/obvious way of connecting with its members.

Similarly as churches have grown, we are seeing the problem of how to build community within churches becoming a bigger one. Most people would agree that what gets people to stay is thriving community and feeling part of something quickly...

And so because of the rise of social networks and the need for authentic community, we're seeing the development of the idea of church specific social networks.

Here are 2 examples

The Table Project - Introduction from The Table Project on Vimeo.

It's interesting to see how these companies are linking the idea of community and social networks and saying that this can be the solution that church leaders are looking for. I find it really intriguing that the first video identifies that social networks are about "me" and broadcasting who I am, and trying to ensure this doesn't happen with "the table project."

In 10 years time will we see churches having church specific networks as a norm? Or will this simply fall down as it fails to replicate authentic community... I don't know the answer, but it will be interesting to see what happens

Musician Team Meeting

2011-02-24T11:55:00.000Z

On Tuesday night, the musician team gathered together for the first time this year. It was a brilliant time where we worshipped together, celebrated what has happened over the last year, reminded ourselves of some important things to keep in our minds and prayed for this coming year and over some needs within the team.

The musician team are brilliant... they work diligently & humbly and it's a real privilege to serve with these guys and girls. Whether it's at a Friday night practice after a long week or packing down at the end of the evening service I love the commitment that they all show and their willingness to make things work.

We're served as a team brilliantly by our deacon Kat Starling who's passion and joy is so infectious, as evident by tuesday night. After the meeting I think it's fair to say we're all excited by what this year holds for the church and how we can contribute.

Things to thank God for in 2010:

* Full bands throughout the year!
* Serving youth at Butlins
* Evening meeting
* New songs including some of our own!
* New worship leaders
* Carol concert

Things to pray for this year:
* Drummers
* A team of musicians for the evening service
* Diversity within teams
* Creativity in sounds/styles
* God’s protection over us as a team
* Grace to keep going!

If you'd like to know more about the team or want to get involved do fill out the form on this website or grab Kat or (myself at the PM meeting)

RFC Unplugged - my fave of the night

2011-02-22T15:44:00.001Z

Abi Hope - Keep on Movin' from Gecko Collective on Vimeo.

As promised we now have plenty of photos and videos being uploaded from the fantastic RFC Unplugged. Check the videos out here (being edited very well by the talent Joe Smith). I have to say my favourite song of the night was Abi's very clever looped version of "Keep On Moving" by that group Five... enjoy the immense nostalgia factor when listening...

Co-Songwriting session...

2011-02-21T00:14:00.000Z

Tomorrow I'll be engaging in a songwriting sess with, none other than, the fantastic Pete Coggan who is doing FP at the same training base as me. It's going to be great chatting through stuff, hearing each others ideas and getting a chance to just have a bit of a worship time as well. I love learning from others who are on the same journey of song craftsmanship as me and seeing creativity spark from going through stuff.

He's also in what seems to be a rather cool band called "Forerunner" (website ) who are soon releasing a hotly anticipated EP.

Hopefully those from Reading might see the fruit from our labours tomorrow at some point!

RFC Unplugged

2011-02-20T00:43:00.002Z

And so the first RFC Unplugged is finished, it was a fantastic night and I absolutely loved Abi and Bambury Tree's sets, was a real privilege to share a stage with such talented people! Was amazing to see so many people and hopefully we're making steps towards seeing community being built in the church. Looking forward to the photos and videos that I'm sure will follow. Big thanks to all the people that made it happen especially Scott, the Del Rios and to the many others who put in such hard work to make the magic happen! Now to bed....

Ten Lessons From Great Christians

2011-02-18T14:46:00.002Z

Andrew Wilson has written a great little post on "Ten Lessons From Great Christians". I love little nuggets like these that help us see our awesome God in a clearer way...

Here's one to whet your appetite...

Lesson 4 John Calvin (16th Century)
God is sovereign over all, including our suffering. Calvin was not only a great Church Reformer, but he wrote the only systematic theology to come out of the Protestant Reformation: The Institutes of the Christian Religion. The lesson of God’s sovereignty is far from being uniquely Calvinist, since it was emphasized by Augustine and Luther and many other great Christian theologians. But for various reasons it is most commonly associated with Calvin, perhaps partly because he articulated this point as clearly and eloquently as anyone. In any case, it is a teaching plainly taught in Scripture, most clearly in such passages as Psalm 139, James 1:2-4, and Romans 8:28.

Read the rest of them here

While you're there do check out the Theology Matters Website, it's a fantastic resource.
The website is - http://whatyouthinkmatters.org/

Wilberforce animation...

2011-02-17T11:32:00.000Z

The I Heart Revolution - William Wilberforce from Glenn Stewart on Vimeo.

A cool little animation done by the guys at i-heart.org/hillsong. After doing my dissertation on him it's very refreshing to see this neat little clip...

Super Mario Bros... live?...

2011-01-12T12:07:00.000Z

Upon my usual delving into the world wide web, I came across this little gem. For those of you who played the original mario bros I hope you enjoy this!

Keep Singing Of The Cross

2010-12-29T11:03:00.000Z

A video that still resonates with me is this one by C J Mahaney where he talks about why we sing so many songs about the cross

When it comes to song writing I try to write with a view of looking at whichever topic through the lens of the cross. For this song I've attempted to write a celebration song, where we're declaring the glory of our God and what He's done for us. I've had the line "Keep singing of the cross" in my head for a bit and a riff for the intro has emerged. Now it's just the hard work grafting of trying think of fresh ways of saying the important truths of the gospel, and not settling for cliched lyrics. These lyrics I have are not certain but at least I have a song shape! For those in Reading maybe you might hear it at somepoint... (or perhaps on the RFC Cd!)...

Keep Singing Of The Cross

Verse 1:
The cross of Christ
God's love displayed
Our Father made a way
Our sin and shame,
By/His grace erased
For Jesus came to save
Yes Jesus came to save

Chorus:
Now we'll keep singing of the cross
For God so loved us
He sent His Son that we might live
Yes we'll keep singing of the cross
Where grace restored us
It's all we'll boast of evermore

Verse 2
...
...
...
The law fulfilled, sin's cursed removed
...
We're one man now in Christ

Bridge
...

Exciting times :)

2010-12-23T16:09:00.000Z

Formatting seems to have gone a bit strange but woop woop

This is the original link - http://www.thisisannouncements.co.uk/7677632?s_source=clsw_tiwg_glec

Evermore

2010-12-21T11:23:00.001Z

Phil Wickham's "Songs for Christmas", which is fast becoming my favourite Christmas album, contains what in my mind is a stunning song called "Evermore" It's based on an old hymn called "Of the Father's love begotten" and Phil Wickham added a chorus onto it (and probably tweaked some words but I haven't gone through the 2 and compared!). Most people would agree that carols at times fall on the weak side in terms of words and theology... "The little lord Jesus no crying He makes" one of the more famous strange lyrics...

Evermore though I think falls more on the "Hark the Herald" line with some brilliant lines to do with incarnation and condescension. The chorus to me is just one of those you want to sing out loudly at the top of your voice. Verse 3 really stands out for me

He is found in human fashion
Death and sorrow here to know
That the race of Adam's children
Doomed by law to endless woe
May not henceforth die and perish
In the dreadful gulf below
But forever rest in beauty
In the lights of Heaven's glow

I love the depth of lyrics and how the gospel rings out from it! The old hymn it was based on has some interesting words too - check it out here

Do check it out and I hope you enjoy it as much as I do.

Here are the full lyrics

Verse 1:
Of the Father's love begotten
'Ere the world began to be
He the source of all that has been
And all the future years will see

Chorus:
Evermore, evermore
He shall reign forevermore
Humble King, Sovereign Lord
He shall reign forevermore

Verse 2:
Oh that birth forever blessed
When the chosen virgin go
By the Holy Ghost conceiving
Bore the Savior of our world

Verse 3:
He is found in human fashion
Death and sorrow here to know
That the race of Adam's children
Doomed by law to endless wo
May not henceforth die and perish
In the dreadful gulf below
But forever rest in beauty
In the lights of Heaven's glow

A Merry ipad/iphone christmas

2010-12-15T15:22:00.001Z

sometimes you just have to sit back and smile at some fantastic creativity! Enjoy!

Forever Reign

2010-11-01T15:56:00.000Z

We've played this song a couple of times now at church. I love how it has so much truth in it and helps fix our gaze on our Saviour (by saying "You are... You are...) rather than looking to ourselves. An immensely memorable tune and you'll be singing to yourself "Oh I'm running to your arms..." without realising it because it's so catchy! I hope you find it as stirring as I have

Lyrics are:

V1:
You are good, You are good
When there's nothing good in me
You are love, You are love
On display for all to see
You are light, You are light
When the darkness closes in
You are hope, You are hope
You have covered all my sin

V2:
You are peace, You are peace
When my fear is crippling
You are true, You are true
Even in my wandering
You are joy, You are joy
You're the reason that I sing
You are life, You are life,
In You death has lost it's sting

Chorus:
Oh, I’m running to Your arms,
I’m running to Your arms
The riches of Your love
Will always be enough
Nothing compares to Your embrace
Light of the world forever reign

V3:
You are more, You are more
Than my words will ever say
You are Lord, You are Lord
All creation will proclaim
You are here, You are here
In Your presence I'm made whole
You are God, You are God
Of all else I'm letting go

Bridge:
My heart will sing
no other Name
Jesus, Jesus

RFC Music resource website... (needs a better name)...

2010-10-21T09:54:00.000+01:00

As part of my FP year I started up this little piece of web space, aimed to help better resource the music team at church. Have a look if it sounds like your cup of tea

the link is: http://rfcmusic.wordpress.com/

What if Worship was like an NBA game?

2010-10-08T10:44:00.000+01:00

A video that might hopefully make you smile

Animations

2010-09-15T11:37:00.000+01:00

We're big fans of Sovereign Grace music at RFC. While looking through Bob Kauflin's blog I came across these gems. I love how the animation can help lyrics spring to life and as Bob K puts it "Good art has a way of pointing our eyes to what matters most." I hope these clips stir you as they did me

The Gospel Song - Sovereign Grace

Lyrics:
Holy God in love became
Perfect man to bear my blame
On the cross he took my sin
By his death I live again.

The Prodigal - Sovereign Grace

Lyrics:
You held out Your arms, I walked away
Insolent I spurned Your face
Squandering the gifts You gave to me
Holding close forbidden things
Destitute a rebel still, a fool in all my pride
The world I once enjoyed is death to me
No joy, no hope, no life

Where now are the friends, that I had bought
Gone with every penny lost
What hope could there be for such as I
Sold out to a world of lies
Oh, to see Your face again, it seems so distant now
Could it be that You would take me back
A servant in Your house

You held out Your arms, I see them still
You never left, You never will
Running to embrace me, now I know
Your cords of love will always hold
Mercy’s robe, a ring of grace
Such favor undeserved
You sing over me and celebrate
The rebel now Your child

These last two are by Casting Crowns and Starfield respectively with a more theme of encouragement to those struggling.

Tracking Theological Trajectories

2010-08-12T12:36:00.000+01:00

In July I attended my first ever large scale Newfrontiers conference - Together on a Mission. Since I'm doing FP next year I know that it won't be my last. The various seminars and meetings I attended were brilliant but I missed out on the excellent series called "Tracking Theological Trajectories" that the Leadership part of TOAM (I was on mobilise). I love theology and believe that it's essential for worship leaders to be seeking to be theologically sound especially when writing songs and choosing song lists.

The "Tracking Theological Trajectories" covered 3 books - Tim Keller's Reason for God (need to read), Rob Bell's Velvet Elvis (need to re-read) and N T Wright's Surprised by Hope (need to finish reading!). The 3 books are extremely popular, especially in my age category and so it was very interesting seeing what the Newfrontiers theology big wigs had to say about them. On my gap year I was positively recommended Velvet Elvis and Surprised by Hope by the church I was attending, and my housemate is a big fan of Keller. I've worked my way through the talks on Bell and Wright, and listening about the one on Keller.

It's been challenging listening to the talks as it's made me rethink what I thought about some of what I've read (esp Bell's Velvet Elvis). Perhaps it's due to me maturing in my faith but I would have to agree with a fair bit of the criticism aimed at Bell. It has been a bit of a journey for me as when I was about 18, the people I was with only talked about how amazing they thought Bell and Velvet Elvis/Nooma/anything he touched was, and so the new shift as I've spent time with a more conservative/less liberal (?) crowd which seems to have an almost entirely negative view of him. As always I'm quite against people simply criticising someone's work if they haven't even had the time to read the book (which is why I can't comment on what they said about Tim Keller), but being given a very different perspective on the books by people who have got to grips with the books has certainly been stimulating.

The talks have also been great at being balanced and not attempting to simply point out what is wrong, which I think is brilliant. I'm hoping that next year they run something similar on some other books. If you're a big fan of the 3 authors/books or enjoy theology/debates definitely check them out. I've managed to get through them on my way to work so I'm sure others can do the same.

You can find the talks on the link below -
http://www.newfrontierstogether.org/Groups/131508/Newfrontiers/Resources/Talks_and_Preaches/Select_Event/Leadership_International_10/Training_Tracks.aspx

The wait is almost over (for the new EPL season to start...)

2010-08-04T15:57:00.000+01:00

In a week and a bit the football season shall return and there shall be a big smile on my face. The World cup in my mind was a disappointment on many levels, and so the beginning of the new season can't come quick enough. Once again I'm brimming with optimism for my beloved Arsenal despite a lack of stand out signings or that fact that as always we're being written off as challengers before the first ball has been kicked.

I agree that we lack some squad depth but I don't see us as miles off the rapidly ageing Chelsea team, an Man Utd team that in my mind may struggle (over reliance on Rooney? Ferdinand permanently injured? etc..) and Liverpool... well enough said. Though I agree Man City have improved vastly, their new signings aren't much of an improvement over their current squad (David Silva aside, he is world class), I don't see them overtaking us. Spurs well we'll see... I'm not sure they have the experience (or a manager experienced enough) to be able to sustain a title challenge/europe/various less important cups to be quite there yet (see Everton's ill fated attempted at Champions league in 2005/6 as a potential outcome for Spurs).

So then what of Arsenal? We lack a solid keeper, yes... We've lost a number of centre backs, yes... and our captain is being courted by everyone from Barcelona + their dog. Perhaps it's not the ideal situation for preparation for a new season, but then again we don't have the power to stop this ridiculous Spanish media farce unfortunately so we'll just have to live with it. I once held Barcelona in high regard, seeing them as like a second team, but this summer has meant any respect I had for the club has been left in the gutter along with their dignity as they show how to be the prime example of a class-less club.

Anyways rant over... we've added a solid big centre forward who should hopefully fill the void that Emmanuel "delusions of grandeur" Adebayor left. We still need to add some more centre backs still due to the various departures of Sol Campbell, Senderos, Gallas and the bald headed one. New boy Laurent Koscielny could turn out to be another Vermaelen but we'll wait and see. The only other new transfer rumour is that perhaps we're going to sign some 29yr old centre back from Montpellier... sounds and smells like Wenger so probably will happen.

I hope to see a new keeper added as well as a quality centre back/s. If possible another defensive midfielder could help ensure that if Song get's injured that we're covered though Frimpong has looked like he has potential in preseason. Whether this will happen is unlikely but i'll wait on the edge of my seat hoping on the last day of the transfer window.

On our day we can dismantle almost any team and we're consistently unlucky with injuries in my mind. If Van Persie can stay fit he's can reach the calibre of Torres/Rooney/Drogba, if Cesc stays and has the same desire as last season then he'll challenge for the title of best midfielder in the Premiership. The rising star of Wilshere could potentially breakout this season in the same way Ramsey was last season and could be a new weapon. There's definitely potential in the team. My heart tells me we can take the title but my head might point towards the many bitter disappointments of recent years.

Below are 2 previews about Arsenal and I'm sure many more will come out soon

http://www.guardian.co.uk/football/blog/2010/aug/02/premier-league-preview-arsenal

http://bleacherreport.com/articles/424927-a-realistic-preview-of-arsenals-season-transfers

Welcome back (proper) football, I've missed you and wait expectantly for the classic highs and lows, sublime goals, ridiculous fouls, as well as everything in between!

(some highlights of last season... I have no idea what the music sounds like as I don't have the sound on so apologies if it's poor...)

Reasons not to write songs for your church

2010-07-27T12:47:00.000+01:00

An amusing post about reasons why perhaps I should hang up my guitar... my neighbour would be happy...

http://youngglory.blogspot.com/2010/06/top-10-reasons-not-to-write-songs-for.html

To The Cross we gaze/Yes Jesus Loves Us (working title)

2010-07-19T14:13:00.001+01:00

So I've been working on this song for about 3+months. I've tried to really step up my game in terms of content and hopefully am making progress with it. As you may notice the chorus is inspired by the classic song "Yes Jesus loves me" and hopefully it fits the rest of the song. The last line of the chorus has been a struggle and I'm still trying to think of something that has a real hook to it. For all the times of frustration and feeling like I'm hitting a brick wall, I absolutely love writing songs and I like how the song is taking form. This blog has no real reason to it, I'm just sharing my journey! Maybe this song may be heard soon by those who are RFCers... For my limited readership, if you have any ideas or thoughts I'm always happy for comments

TO THE CROSS WE GAZE

Verse 1:

To the cross we gaze in wonder

All our stains washed by His blood

Crushed and broken, bruised and beaten

By His stripes we have been healed

The cross before us, sin behind us

Mercy poured incessantly

Love we don’t deserve has found us

Grace now overwhelms our souls

Chorus:

Yes Jesus loves us

*possible line* - By grace we have been saved/Hallelujah for the cross/Hallelujah we are saved…

Verse 2:

Father’s love shines through the Saviour/ Father turns His face in sorrow

Son of God died once for all

In the grave His body lay there

But the grave would not prevail

Up He rose, in glorious splendour

Spirit raised Him from the dead

It is finished, He has conquered

Death O where now is Your sting

Verse 3:

Rugged cross we boldly cling to

Boast of only Jesus Christ

Heaven beckons for we’re ransomed

We are His and He is ours

One day we will see our Saviour

Face to face, He’ll call our names

But for now His work, our mission

Tell the lost of saving grace

Graduation Fail

2010-06-30T11:47:00.000+01:00

So my blog is descending into simply a blog of videos I come across and less to do with deep thoughts but oh well! In the spirit of my graduation at 5pm today, I thought I would share this... hopefully this won't happen today! Can't believe I'm graduating but still at least I've got here in the end

Worship Leading Horror Moment

2010-06-17T10:36:00.000+01:00

Perhaps my favourite video worship horror moment...

and my previous fave

A brief sidestep...

2010-05-10T14:50:00.001+01:00

A brief detour away from the topic of healing

One of my fave bands at the moment - Rend Collective Experiment, (whose album is great and worth checking out on the old spotify) have done the quite impressive feat of performing Chris Tomlin's track "How Great is Our God" by simply using iphone instrument applications.. for those who are thinking it's going to be a bit rubbish I hope you are suitably impressed by just how good a sound the band manage to get...

Kingsway released this quote about the video

"Gimmicky? Well, here’s the weird thing: it isn’t. Once you get over the initial smiles that arise from the first shots, you see more clearly what’s going on: this is not about the phones, but it’s all about the worship. Unlocked, unchained and using whatever tools there are at hand to reflect back to God a little of his greatness."