SOUL SURMISE

NO ONE OUT OF REACH (as read in Hydebank College and Women's Prison)

I came across Jesus

Hanging on a cross

Carved in sand on a Spanish beach

His sparkling eyes

Cut through the dross

Like there was no one out of his reach.

TOMORROW IN FITZROY - 19.1.2020

Tomorrow morning (11am) in Fitzroy we will be looking to see. John's Gospel account of Jesus life is all about seeing. John the Baptist tells his disciples to "Look the lamb of God who takes away the sin of there world". Jesus invites a couple of those disciples including Andrew "to come and see" and when Jesus is talking to Nicodemus he says to him, “Very truly I tell you, no one can see the kingdom of God unless they are born again." Being born again is about seeing. Seeing in new ways. Seeing the kingdom already in this life as we wait for the next.

So, we will look about seeing and how the born again see differently. See everything differently. I will be using examples from Friday evening's 4 Corners Festival event inside a prison. Seeing the criminal and the reasons for their crime as well as their precious humanity and potential for redemption is as difficult combination of things to see differently as any.

With a little help from U2's Walk On, Elvis Presley's powerfully prophetic In The Ghetto and Bryan Stevenson hero of the movie Just Mercy, all wrapped in contemporary worship.

In the evening we touch perhaps the headline world issue of the day - the environment. With Australia seemingly on fire and experts giving some frightening warnings what should the Christian response the environment be. David Livingstone will close our short series on Global Challenges by provoking thought and being provocative. One of the things we are proud of in Fitzroy is opening discussion and debating the issues of the day. You are welcome to join us. 

STOCKMAN'S CHAPEL TALK IN TAYLOR UNIVERSITY, 11.11.19

In November 2019 I had the privilege of speaking at Chapel in Taylor University, Uplands, Indiana.

It is a University I had been to many times and love very much. 

This year I brought a few things together in my talk - BEING WITH OUR ENEMIES. Basing it in Luke 6 where Jesus asks us to love our enemies, I unpacked a 10 week series I had preached in Fitzroy on Sam Wells' idea of BEING WITH. What is it like to be with our enemies? I then used 4 Corners Festival as an example of how we are trying to be with.

In the end this is a very good way to hear a lot of what I preached at the end of 2019 crammed into 25 minutes... follow the link below...

WATCH MY CHAPEL TALK AT TAYLOR UNIVERSITY HERE

(with thanks to Sam Wells and Jim Wallis, from whose work I got my American illustration)

 

STOCKMAN CONVERSING WITH ANDREW CUNNING ON THE LEFT SIDE UP PODCAST

Local Belfast theologian and author Andrew Cunning has started up a podcast called Left Side Up that looks at issues of faith on the edgier side of that kind of town. 

I was privileged a while back to sit down with Andrew in my office and just converse about the issues that are dearest to my heart. We talked about the incarnation, about imagination, about where the arts blend and blur with faith, about the discipleship of peace and reconciliation. Andrew then went off and edited that conversation into a coherent podcast that I am surprisingly pleased with.

Andrew is doing something very interesting. He is conversing with interesting people about big theological ideas but he is rooting them in personal lives and the sense of place that we think the ideas in. That is mainly Belfast and wider Northern Ireland.

Andrew is a provocative thinker and all the more necessary for that. He has an audacious desire to interrupt our ordinariness so that we might see God face to face in that ordinariness.

LISTEN TO MY INTERVIEW ON LEFT SIDE UP HERE

LET ME BE A VESSEL FOR YOUR GRACE - A PIERCE PETTIS PRAYER

I wonder if Pierce Pettis is the songwriter that I have used most in devotional worship. Particularly in Fitzroy communion services. I have been using God Believes In You and You Did That For Me for some years. On Sunday I added another.

Instrument is the closing song on Pierce’s first record in ten years - Father’s Son. It is that kind of work that we are well used to from the Alabama songwriter, guitarist and humble man of faith. These are literary songs on fascinating subjects with exquisite performances from Doug Lancio on guitar and Stuart Duncan on fiddle. 

The last three songs are perhaps the most potently spiritual. More is about mortality, co-written with one of the most respected writers in Christian music today, Andrew Peterson.

Look Over Your Shoulder is the obligatory Mark Heard cover on the new record. Heard produced Pettis’s debut and then passed away far too young. Pettis was so influenced by Heard that he committed to putting a Heard song on every album he would make. Look Over Your Shoulder is one of those subtle, deep and mysterious songs of dense theology that Mark Heard seems prolific in.

Instrument though is a special kind of song. At least for me. Music is my spiritual medium. Songs speak to me and I use them to reflect, to listen, to pray and to commit. 

Pierce has never worked in the Christian music industry but the spiritual depth of his work is second to none. 

Instrument is a grab you by the throat of your spiritual pilgrimage in the gentlest of ways. 

 

Let me be an instrument of your peace

Let me be a tool in your hand

Crooked and warped though I might be

Let me do some good here while I can

 

If I still had my radio show this song would blend beautifully into the Prayer of St. Francis, Make A Channel of Your Peace perhaps the Sinead O’Connor version or Sarah McLachlan’s. They very obviously link and Pierce dedicates the song to Denis Grady a secular member of the Order Of St Francis who has a penchant for music.

Denis Grady says of the prayer, “We say the Prayer of St. Francis daily—it’s really challenging when difficulties come up on our path. ‘Where there is hatred, let me sow love.’ I believe this is impossible for one to do alone, but with God it is possible.”

You can see where Pierce would get inspired. His song goes on:

 

Let me be a vessel for your grace

Let me the first one to forgive

Though the world may curse me to my face

Let me learn to bear it like you did

 

This is a deep study in following Jesus in five short verses. It has a wonderful altar call ending:

 

Make me faithful, make me grateful

Make me useful in this life

All this living without giving

Give me one more chance to try

 

It is potent stuff! What I love about Pierce’s songs is that the depth of his spirituality is never ethereal but always plugged into every day practice of ordinary living. 

Instrument will be a song that I will use regularly in personal devotionals and also in Fitzroy in communal worship. It is a spiritual classic both as song and as Christian teaching. A rarity in its creation. Let us pray that it doesn’t not end up rare in its use.