Spectrum GT

I wrote this song back in 2001 in commemoration of one young man’s bravery after reading about his story. Here’s the background.

It’s about 3000 years ago and the Israelites are at odds with the Philistines (nothing new there!) and engaged in daily fighting and skirmishes. This particular incident takes place near modern day Mukhmas a few kilometers northeast of Jerusalem in the West Bank.

The King of Israel in those days was Saul and as national leader he should have been setting an example of courage and bravery but instead it’s recorded that “he was sitting under a pomegranate tree” no doubt feeling thoroughly miserable and full of self pity.

However his son Jonathan was of an altogether different spirit. He said to his armour bearer ‘Come on lets go up to the outpost and take them on single handed’ and ‘Perhaps the Lord will act on our behalf for nothing can hinder Him from saving whether by few or by many’. As they ascended the Philistines started chanting “Look the Hebrews have come out of the holes in which they are hiding!” Humanly speaking it looked impossible but Jonathan relied on the God for whom nothing is impossible and through his courage and willingness to step out in faith against all odds they got the victory that day. Read all about it in 1st book of Samuel chapter 14

RUNNING THE GAUNTLET

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The lyrics of this song are taken more or less as they are written in the book of Ecclesiastes chap 12. Musically there are two variations of the song and I couldn’t decide which was better so solved the problem by posted both on the music page!

The lyrics encourage us to seek God while we are young and have both the energy and interest. The picture painted is a beautiful metaphor of the state of old age when things don’t work anymore as they once did!

I am indebted to Adam Clark’s commentary on the book for the explanations below:

Remember now your creator
In days of your youth
Before the evil years draw in and surround you
And quench desire for the truth
(Remember Him now, you never know what tomorrow will bring. When old age comes interest and energy wane so don’t say ‘I’ll wait until later’ – seek God now while He may be found! )

Before the sun, the moon and all the stars are darkened
(Speaks of the springtime and summer of your life)

And the clouds return again after the rain

(Speaks of winter and the infirmities of old age)

For in that day the watchmen tremble,
(The body is compared to a house – the keeper’s/watchmen of the house are the hands which become paralytic with old age)

Mighty men grow weak

(The legs become feeble and can’t support the weight of the body any more)

The windows all have been darkened
(The eyesight begins to fail)

And the doors in every street
Have all been shut
(The mouth and jaws no longer work, gone are the days of the juicy steaks, the most we can manage is a bowl of thin soup)

Remember Him before the silver cord is broken

(Silver cord refers to the spine and nervous system which become debilitated)

And the golden bowl lies crushed beneath its weight

(The golden bowl refers to the brain and the waning of mental activity)

The pitcher by the well has cracked
(The effects of old age on the heart and blood circulation)

The wheel no longer turns
(Refers to the aorta, diminished blood circulation and respiratory conditions of old age)

The dust returns into the earth
The spirit unto God
From whence it came

(Self explanatory!)

It was late in the evening of September 4th 2006. I was on my way home from work when I tripped on the pavement and twisted my ankle. It swelled up like a football and I ended up in bed for a few days with my leg supported on a cardboard box to keep the weight off it. Luckily there was no brain damage so I used the time to catch up with some reading and to start to write a song I had been planning for some time - a song based around the last line of Psalm 132 verse 18 (The Message)

“but I'll make his crown sparkle with splendor”

I had just started earlier in the year to work through a song writing book I had bought at the local bookstore “Successful Lyric Writing” by Davis (Writer’s Digest Books). It is an excellent book written obviously by someone who knows what they are talking about and giving detailed practical advice on how to write a lyric from start to finish. Unlike many so called lyric writing books I have seen where most chapters are dedicated to copyright protecting, publishing and promoting your precious future number one hit which, by the way you still haven’t written yet because you are still none the wiser how to do so after reading the book!

Anyway back to the song. This proved to be for me a milestone in lyric writing because in the past I would mostly strum a few chords with the guitar and hope that some ideas would come along, but inevitably the lyrics and melody suffer as a consequence. So I set myself the challenge to write the song without lifting the guitar and without so much as a quaver in my musical quiver just using the knowledge I had gained from reading the book.

There was a great sense of achievement in writing this and since then my approach to lyric writing in particular has changed and for the better I hope. I added the music later. One day I hope to see the crown for myself and more importantly meet the One who wears it!

SEE HOW HIS CROWN SHINES NOW!

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Had a thought the other day. If I look over the garden fence and am envious of my neighbour’s house and garden, his BMW and his wife’s Ferrari, their swimming pool, and their cattle and goats then I am said to covet his possessions of today. Does this also mean that if I desire that new Fender Precision bass in the window of the local music store I am also covetous of his possessions of tomorrow?

When I go into the local music store I drool like Homer Simpson in a donut emporium. I had for a long time this idea that if I owned that new bass somehow I would be a better player and my music would dramatically change for the better. I also aspire from time to time to be a songwriter. How many times have I thought if only I had gone to music school and had some training perhaps I could today be able to tell a quaver from a crotchet. Or if I had learned to play the piano or learned to sing or if I just had some music skill or a creative left brain instead of an analytical right brain to write better lyrics then things would somehow be better.

We all think like that from time to time. If only I was here or there or had extra training or knowledge or experience or this or that….but the reality is they are just excuses!

 “Nothing will ever be attempted if all possible objections must first be overcome” (Samuel Johnson)

I came to a conclusion a number of years ago and it is the principle by which I live today. It’s not rocket science by any stretch of the imagination and can be summed up as follows:

Do your best where you are now, with what limited resources you have in your possession and do it in the best way you know how. But just do it. Don’t wait, do it now. At the same time look for ways of increasing knowledge and skill and as you acquire these, plough them back into your current efforts.

“Use your gifts faithfully and they shall be enlarged; practice what you know and you shall attain to higher knowledge” (Matthew Arnold)

Maybe one day I will own that bass guitar and maybe one day I will be a songwriter and write inspirational lyrics and beautiful melodies but in the meantime I will continue to churn out ideas and song efforts in the hope that over time the lyrics, music, singing and production will improve.

Here’s a thought. Is it possible to take God by surprise? When we read that he knows what we think of or say even before we do then you might expect the answer is no, but I sometimes wonder…

I was inspired to write this song early in the morning as I was walking down to the station to commute to work. It was the early part of the year, 6 am in the morning and still dark. It had rained heavily during the night and the air was  damp and heavy  and as I walked through the park suddenly the fragrant scent of a shrub growing in the hedgerow rose up to greet me. It was a pleasant and unexpected experience at the start of what would otherwise turn out to be a dreary, routine day. Later I got to thinking wouldn’t it be nice rather than grumbling and complaining about things around us we could instead for once take God by surprise with our  fragrant offering of praise and thanks to Him for the all good things he has done for us in our lives.

TAKEN BY SURPRISE

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The Bible constantly urges us to seek God and His Son Jesus Christ. But where should we look and where will we find God? Job found Him in the whirlwind but Elijah also found Him in the still small voice. God it appears to me at any rate will not restrict Himself in how and where He can be found for He ought to be able to be found anywhere we look. In my simple understanding a God who cannot be found in the mundane drudgery of the routines of everyday life is no better than the gods of the heathen, distant and no longer relevant to the world we live in.

And this leads me naturally to shopping! I have this thing about shopping, basically an intense dislike of it. Each week you will see me in the local supermarket pushing the trolley around like a zombie whilst my wife scurries around looking for the bargains. There are no  traffic rules, it is basically a free for all and as the store is always busy it becomes a nightmare negotiating my way around the aisles. You can usually find me and my trolley parked alongside the exotic food section in the hope people like me will not even know what asafetida, fenugreek and lychees are, let alone what to do with them in the kitchen!

So it was in this context I put a challenge once to God to see if I could find Him in the local supermarket for if I could find Him there then indeed He could be found anywhere. I wasn’t however expecting His quick response for the next time I was in the supermarket the answer came to me so clearly! There I was standing in front of rows of wine with the bakery in the background and the fresh aroma of baked bread wafting down the aisle and the revelation suddenly came to me. God is in the bread and the wine!

For us today meat and vegetables, pasta and rice form our diet but for the people in Jesus day the staple diet would have been bread and cheap wine because the water was undrinkable.  Just as Christ is as much the meat and drink of our modern day lives today as He was then. We simply cannot survive from day to day without Him and His strength. From that point on the breaking of bread and pouring out of the wine in the Eucharist took on a new meaning for me.

COMMUNION SONG

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The lyrics of this song are taken directly from Psalm 55 verse 22. David the Psalmist was by the sounds of it having a rough day.

Yet instead of crumbing under the weight of all his anxiety he turns to God who hears his cry and saves him from all his troubles. He then at the end of the Psalm encourages us to cast our burden and care upon the Lord and He will deliver us in like manner.

Note however the use of the language, it’s in the imperative, in other words it’s a command. We are to cast or toss our weight of anxiety, care or sin upon Him. It takes a step of faith, or act of will on our part but once we take the initiative Christ will take our burden from us and we will know His freedom and an immediate lifting of the weight off our shoulders. But note also that the burden is not left lying at the roadside of life, it doesn’t come that easy. Christ Himself picks up that burden and carries it. Where? To the cross at Calvary of course where it is placed along with the sins of the rest of the world.

It’s a mind boggling solution that God has found to the age old problem of sin and its consequences and though we will never fully understand the depth of love He has shown in His sacrifice yet we can along with many other generations of the redeemed be thankful and know his deliverance from the oppressive weight of sin, guilt anxiety and worry. So cast your cares today upon the Lord and be amazed at how quickly He will respond!