03/19/10

Day 31: Christian Agony Aunts

I’m personally not remotely a fan of the Christian sub-culture whereby we have a ‘Christian’ alternative for everything for example want some shoes? We have Jesus sandals…Like rock music? There’s a Christian band who sound just like your favourite band (just not as well produced and only very vaguely sound like them!) and want a magazine? Try Christianity magazine for all the juicy Christian gossip…erm…news

Every so often I get handed magazine cuttings from Christian magazines and I have to say whilst they are given with the best intentions they do make me laugh! Recently I was given a page from Christianity Magazine titled ‘Sex and singles’ from their ‘Dear Maggie’ agony aunt section.

Now it’s not that I disagree with the answers given but the problem with a Christian Agony Aunt in a widely read Christian magazine is you can’t be realistic…your answers have to match up to the most conservative Christian doctrine imaginable and so here are the three questions given in this article and a summarised version of the answers.

Question 1: I am now in my 30s and a virgin. Even though I believe that being a virgin has been the right thing. I dread the day one of my secular friends of acquaintances brings up the sex topic in relation to me. How can I deal with this?

Answer 1: (Summary) – don’t worry about it!

Question 2: Is it ok to kiss random guys in clubs to let some sexual tension out? Is this ok for a Christian?

Answer 2: (Summary) – No

Question 3: In your experience, how much does the physical influence the relationship side of a relationship?

Answer 3: The answer didn’t draw in any of Aunt Maggie’s ‘experience’

Whilst these questions in a secular context such as The Sun’s Dear Deirdre would have been answered in a secular way and very unhelpful to the writers I can’t help but feel that those who wrote in knew the answer before they asked it…there’s not really any advice…just the answer you’d expect.

A bit of reality might be helpful!

03/18/10

Day 30: Post Secret

Yesterday at Christian Union I used my Post Secret session (you can find it on my youth work website www.youthworkresource.com) which I wrote a couple of years ago. This session always seems to work well and be a fairly powerful session for encouraging young people to reflect on God’s love and His knowledge of them…as part of it they have to design a post secret and we share some of them…I thought I’d post a couple of Post Secrets from the website!

03/17/10

Day 29: Contemporary Music in Worship P.2

Yesterday I began exploring the idea of contemporary music as worship. I complimented the song writing skills of Paramore, Five Iron Frenzy and Family Force 5, had a bit of a rant and posted some thoughts on where we’re at with worship in our churches and a lack of passion (does this lack of passion extend beyond our worship?).

So today I’m going to continue those thoughts but hopefully in a way that ponders how we can actually use contemporary music in worship.

Firstly I think we need to remember that worship isn’t always singing and so I see no reason why contemporary songs couldn’t be used as reflections (even screamy reflections…although we may need to display lyrics in such cases).

Secondly I don’t think worship music needs to be written by a Christian! – Surely it’s the lyrics and the place our heart is in as we express, pray, sing or ponder those lyrics to God. Our worship shouldn’t be about the song writer but about the sentiment we’re trying to express to God in doing so.

Thirdly I believe contemporary music may see church growth - Let’s face it, anyone coming into a church for the first time may find church a strange place and more to the point the singing of a lambs blood probably doesn’t help matters. So how would their experience differ if they came in and found songs they knew being used in a different way? Would they feel more at home hearing something familiar?

Finally I think contemporary music could be icing on the emerging church cake! It’s great doing Cafe church, pub church or whatever form of church a place is trying out but if music is going to be used then contemporary music would be more appropriate and fitting. I remember a youth worker telling me he did a series of acoustic songs in a youth cafe all of which were contemporary songs but used in a Christian setting…I even heard one of my lecturers at uni talk about using Last Resort by Papa Roach as a song in church!

I whole-heartily believe there is a place for contemporary music in church and I think if we use it well it could deeply enrich our worship…yes it may isolate different generations…for example a Green Day song may not be as helpful in worship to some as a Beatles song but surely this is no different to our organ/worship band or Redman/Townsend divides we already have?

03/16/10

Day 28: Contempory Music in Worship

As a musician and Christian I am lucky to be part of the few of are able to be involved in the church worship band which is probably a good thing because otherwise I suspect the music would have driven me away!

More and more often I’m finding that the Matt Redman that crops up on my iTunes or iPod when shuffling is quickly moved on before the first cliche lyric is sung…now don’t get me wrong Matt Redman (Tim Hughes and other Redman clones) are fantastic for drawing people into worship, their lyrics do help people (and on occasions myself) connect with God however on more and more occasions I’m finding myself drawn close to God by bands who either aren’t Christian or those who aren’t Christian bands but bands of Christians.

You’ll remember my post from a few months back where I referenced Paramore‘s ‘We Are Broken’ as a fantastic worship song…what better lyrics to sing to God than ‘We are broken, what must we do to restore our innocence and the promise we adored? Give us life again, we just wanna be whole‘…just before lent I looked at the concept of screaming in worship with the words of Family Force 5 who cry out ‘Desperation, needing you, every last breath I scream for you…shatter me into a million pieces make me new‘.

There is such raw, powerful, deep emotion in both the above mentioned songs…to continue this into my listening habits of the last few days Five Iron Frenzy (Every new day) write ‘dear Father, I need you, your strength my heart to mend‘, Brave Saint Saturn (Estrella) write ‘The angels wings will cover you tonight, hallelujah, press your head against the breast of Christ‘ and finally John Mark McMillan (How He loves) ‘He is jealous for me, loves like a hurricane, I am a tree, bending beneath the weight of His grace and mercy‘.

Contrast those lyrics with the weak ‘I am a friend of God woah’ and there’s a massive difference.

Often our church worship songs lack passion…often our congregations and churches lack passion and that is what’s missing!

The reason those lyrics I’ve quoted above connect me with God is because they’re raw and passionate…God doesn’t want us to be fluffy and apathetic in communicating to Him God wants passion…He wants people to be singing their hearts out. Perhaps the problem is that passion is personal but a crowd can unite in apathy? The things that we mean, the things that make our hearts beat are often personal things…is that why our worship music lacks passion?

I don’t have the answer but I do think there’s a place for contemporary music in worship…to be continued tomorrow!

03/15/10

Day 27: They Stole Our Idea

There’s a new product heading to the supermarkets and that product is a Marmite Cereal Bar…Jo told me about it after seeing a billboard advertising poster.

Whilst I love marmite and love this idea I am a little cross about the prospect of a marmite cereal bar and the reason behind my anger and upset is quite simple…ME AND HEIDI CREATED THE CONCEPT FIRST!

Back in September (link) I blogged about our attempt to make Marmite flapjacks which I believe this cereal bar is obviously trying to be…so if you buy a Marmite cereal bar in the shops remember the concept was here first!

From Baking With Heidi & Marmite

03/14/10

Day 26: The Original Sin

As I mentioned at the beginning of lent I have been aiming to read a short reflection from a book titled ‘Daily Reflections for Lent and Easter’ and they’ve been varied so far, some interesting some just dull and uninspiring however one back on Tuesday caused me to raise my eye-brows a little bit and ponder.

The writer (Ron Rolheiser) suggested that the story of Adam and Eve taking the apple was a transgression of rape…as I read that sentence originally I re-read it thinking ‘did he just say that?’…and ‘surely that’s just gotta be an attention grabbing line’.

He then goes on to explain that by rape he meant that Adam and Eve took by force what can only be received in love.

I find his analogy very interesting because much as I don’t like the his analogy of rape I can’t help but feel there’s some truth in it and that this truth is probably the reason I don’t like it.

If we work with the definition Rolheiser suggests for rape which is ‘to take by force something that can only be received in love’ then perhaps there is some truth in it. If we take the things God offers us freely in love by force then to widen the analogy beyond original sin perhaps that can also count as rape by Rolheiser’s definition.

It’s an interesting idea…what are the things we take by force that should be received in love when it comes to God? What does the world take?

Thoughts please!

03/13/10

Day 25: Farmers Market

I have just returned home from a brief walk and visit to the South Cave Farmers Market which happens once a month in South Cave and although I’ve had the best intentions of visiting since I moved here mid-August it’s only just happened…and majorly because of my lent pledge to avoid supermarkets.

The farmers market is held in the playground of the school and attracts a range of local stall holders selling everything from how-made jewelery and bird boxes to meat and vegetables with the odd cake-selling Scout group thrown in for good measure.

It is very much a community thing and within 30 seconds of arriving I’d already seen and chatted to some folk from church…I bumped into a few more as time went on and some young people and in between all this managed to pick up a stupidly large cabbage, some meat and some fish cakes (I’m not going to give a full shopping list!), all at very reasonable prices.

It gave me a chance to reflect on the way home at how this no supermarkets pledge was going on an expenses side and I think that so far I’m probably spending less than I would if I did a regular trip to Morrissons or ASDA…fruit and veg at the farm shops I’ve visited have been considerably cheaper and meat although a tiny bit more expensive is much better quality.

I may never use supermarkets the same way again!

03/12/10

Day 24: Skins

About a year ago as series 3 of Skins was aired Jo spent so much time watching it I decided to start watching it and whilst I don’t like the impression of youth culture they put across (whilst it may be an accurate picture of some young people it works on a generalisation) I find it a fantastic drama to watch.

I have since watched series 1 and 2 as well and I find that with Skins I become more attached to the characters than with other series. Skins has this trend of focusing an episode on a character and whilst the other characters appear in that episode it gives you a chance to get to know that character and it’s always struck me as clever that whilst you focus on a character a wider storyline is going on.

Having said that I’ve felt disappointed with series 4 as it’s aired over the last 6 weeks, the characters haven’t developed much and whilst the writers have aimed for a darker side they seem to have lost the merging of characters within the episodes. However my urge to blog on Skins comes from watching episode 7 where the series have suddenly got good and back to how Skins should be.

So who’s watching this series of Skins? What are your thoughts so far?

03/11/10

Day 23: Cheesecake

Whilst I have 3 more serious topics I want to blog on over the next few days I don’t have time to do a massively serious blog today however back to the baking theme of a couple of days ago and onto desert!

Today in preparation for tomorrow night’s youth group murder mystery/pudding party Heidi and myself attempted to make a cheesecake and actually it was pretty easy to make!

It was simple a case of mixing a load of crumbled digestives and butter, pressing them down into a base (in a tin!) and then mixing up some icing sugar, some soft cheese and some lemon juice before adding whipped cream (we made a lemon one!)…if you’re interested the recipe was something like: 300ml cream, 125g digestive biscuits, 75g butter, 300g soft cheese and 60g icing sugar (plus 1 lemon)…try it, it’s easy…I’ll let you know if it tastes good tomorrow!

03/10/10

Day 22: Crazy Life of a Youth Worker

Youth work’s a funny old job because there isn’t masses of pattern to it…add into the mix schools work and you end up with some very bizarre days and weeks…you find that some days you don’t have that much on and others (like today) you work 9 till 5 then do an evening thing…you get the same with weeks…some mental weeks where you’re desperately trying to find time to plan everything and other weeks when you’re twiddling your thumbs!

Anyway today has been good and I have thoughts to blog on it but a brain of mush so crazy day post it is and tomorrow there’s some serious stuff coming! Stay tuned!

03/9/10

Day 21: Gym

Attached to the school I do some youth work at is a gym and since starting I’ve had the best intentions of joining and last week the application form finally moved from my desk into the gym and Saturday (as my twitter followers will know) was my induction session where I was shown around the various instruments of torture (I mean pieces of equipment!) and shown how to use them properly and after an hour and a half I left feeling knackered but enthusiastic!

I went back today to have a fitness programme put together…the gym there is very clever and you get given little USB style devices which go into each machine which tells you your programme, what to do, automatically adjusts the machines as you work through and tracks your progress.

The programme set for me includes a variety of activities aimed at variety and tackling everything from cardio to strengthening muscles and so I’m looking forward (and also dreading) giving it a test run either this evening or in a day or two.

I’m hoping that overall my levels of fitness will increase from unfit to fit and it’ll give me something active to do…we shall see!

The gym also has a decent sized swimming pool which I shall also test swim at some point!

03/8/10

Day 20: Newton Faulkner

For Christmas both myself and Jo managed to independently go for gifts ‘you do’ for each other and Jo’s gift to me was tickets to see the genius that is Newton Faulkner and so last night I headed down to Sheffield for the Newton Faulkner gig.

I’ve been going to gigs since I was 17 and it’s the first gig I’ve been to with seats and so even upon entering the venue there was a very different vibe about this gig, City Hall in Sheffield is a lovely venue quite a contrast from the sticky floored O2 Academy in Sheffield I last went to in November to see Bowling for Soup.

The crowd were warmed up by musician Charlie Winston who, whilst being a very talented musician didn’t quite do it for me…not sure why….however this didn’t take any anticipation away from the arrival of Newton.

With some light background music Newton Faulkner casually strolled onto the stage, picked up his guitar and burst into ‘Intro’ and ‘Badman’ from his album ‘Rebuilt by Humans’ before continuing to go through the majority of songs from both his albums with a few quirky sections such as a short cover of ‘you spin me right round’ and concluded the gig with his famous 1 man cover of ‘Bohemian Rhapsody’ and ‘I’m not giving up just yet’.

Throughout the gig there was something very refreshing about the gig, Newton joked, made some comments, explained what he was doing and even tuned his own guitars giving the impression that even though he is really well known he is still a pretty humble man.

For me as a music geek my favourite thing about the gig was the transparency. All but 1 song was played by Newton all on his own combining guitaring, tapping his guitar in a variety of places and using a series of pedals to play strings, synths and a variety of other noises (oh and he used a cassette at one point!). To accompany this one man band was a couple of cameras positioned so you could see him doing everything showing that Newton Faulkner is truly a musical genius!

All in all one of the best gig’s I’ve been to and Newton Faulkner is well worth going to see!