SOUL SURMISE

NO SOUL WIPE

We had the privilege of  my dear friend Rev Doug Gay preaching for us in Fitzroy this morning. The lectionary readings of Malachi 3 and Luke 3 had Doug sharing God's desire to purify us, from our self indulgence and lack of motivation towards justice, with fire and soap. 

My heart was warmed with the inspirational challenge. When I had my Damascus Road conversion as a 17 year old I didn't commit my life to Jesus to get a 1/10 or 5/10 life. I wanted 10/10 - life in all its fulness. That is what I sensed Malachi's message of refining was all about.

So, as we went into communion I used this poem. I don't want what Malachi preached against - second best!

 

Don’t give me an analgesic soul wipe

Or a sanctimonious side swipe

But a sacramental hit when I’m just ripe

Burst the bubble of the selfish me

Not a dull dumbed down drab drone

Or a monotonous mumble and mad moan

But the glorious song that I’m not alone

Love to fire what we all could be.

 

Don’t give me easy empty cheap cliches

Or weightless words to get blown away

But some substance of soul to fight the decay

Poetic imagination that redeems

Not a rut that we cut way back when

Not the hurt of history again and again

But a done deal hope that grace can send

Seeing visions and dreaming dreams.

 

Oh this can be useless hobby

And I can be a sad time waster

The the bread and wine and follow

As a radical audacious dreamer.

HOPE

Advent is a waiting in hope. Jesus followers are hope representatives, hope breathers, hope builders... in little gestures... in social transformation. We are called to intentionally live lives of hope in the waiting reality of hope in our hearts, our families, our neighbourhoods, our nations and our world... 

 

Hope is a known starling falling

Hope is the shade of an apricot tree

Hope is a dove with a leaf in its mouth

Hope is a star in the sky named for me

 

Hope is a greeting in the silence

Hope is a hand held tight in grief

Hope is a song sung darkness

Hope is a fragile and robust belief

 

Hope is the promise you remember

Hope is the substance of a mystery

Hope is a veil that’s torn asunder

Hope is a stone that’s rolled away.

 

Hope is a decision for love and joy

And that we're going to get out of this minute

Hope is belief in tomorrow ahead

And that today we’re going to live in it.

 

SINDY (Damnation Is All That You've Heard)

It was back in 2006 when I met Sindy BUT I remember her every World AIDS Day, and many other days of the year. She represents all those who have died of AIDS, all those who still live with the virus and the stigma. She also still speaks lessons I learned from God in my few moments with her. 

Sindy let me close the curtains
I know how the bright can hurt
You’re yearning to hear love whispered
And damnation is all that you’ve heard
As I feebly reach to touch your pain
Your faint grasp it heals my heart
God is served and God is serving
And he dwells in that connecting part.

You’re tired and bored of living
But oh so frightened of dying
You haven’t the energy left to laugh
And you’re all out of tears for crying
And I‘m tired that all I say
Is ignored by all that I do
And God knows that I see Jesus, Sindy
Every time that I look at you.

You said that God came to visit
Well Sindy it was only me
Haunted by your pop star posters
That screamed my complicity
Light can shine from a distance
But salt needs to cling to what’s raw
Christmas Day is for all year round
A baby nestling in our filthy straw.

DRIFTING BUT NOT ADRIFT (COMING TO TERMS WITH LOSS)

I wrote this the summer after my mother died... a coming to terms with.

 

I can’t believe the summer is over

Seems like it was yesterday

We took the bus to plane to bus

To take ourselves the long way

Climbing the hills so leisurely

The descent is oh so fast

The proverbial blink of an excited eye 

And all that joy is past.

 

On the last drive home from summer

Saw a plane coming into land

Too quickly we start unpacking

All the carefully made plans

Where does all the love go

All the tears and all the laughs

Do they live on in our memory

Or come alive out of photographs

 

This year the rope was slashed

I was out without a tether

I was drifting but not adrift

No one asking about the weather

No last night phone call

No final kiss goodbye

Where does all the love go

When an anchor of love dies.

THE ANGEL'S SHARE

(I took this photo recently and it reminded me of this poem.

I wrote it as a kind of Psalm of praise to God for Ballycastle, where we spend so much of our leisure time.  

The first verse is standing where the river meets the sea in Ballycastle. The second verse was written as I showed a few American friends around Dunluce castle. I was looking out the gap of an old window and
one of the stones of the castle ruins was the same shape as the Giant’s Causeway,
sitting round the coast in the direction that I was looking.

The Angel’s Share is the aroma that wafts off the vats at the Bushmills’ whiskey distillery. I
named my last night chat show at Greenbelt that for a few years. Rich Mullins’
song Colour Green was the idea for the last verse…)

 

The moon is walking on the water

From her home above Fair Head

Like a light bulb lit up in heaven

Much more beautiful without a lamp shade

Like a ballerina she shimmers across

Just gently skimming off the dance floor

Gliding on the waves in her yellow dress

Before waltzing up along the seashore

And two gulls shooting the evening breeze

How they spent there day and where

And alone I stand in epiphany

Breathing in the angel’s share.

 

I’m gazing out the eastern window

To these ancient walls rich seam

Born in a clash of volcano and sea

Erupting from the sculptor of heaven’s dreams

And west, I see a painting hangs

Of eternal colour and deepest mystery

Six short days to set up the canvas

Then sketching on by the numbers of history

And friends are taking photographs

Faded imitations of what is there

And alone I stand in epiphany

Breathing in the angel’s share.

 

From where in your imagination came waves caressing

Where in eternity did you think blue sea

From where the depth and breadth of ocean

And where did you come up with me

From where in your imagination came the sun descending

Where in eternity did you think red sky

From where did you conjure the dream of love

And the idea that you’d have to die

The idea that you’d have to die

The idea that God would have to die.

EVERY SINGLE DAY - On The 25th Anniversary of the Shankill Bomb

She would have looked up and smiled

The light of Jesus shining through her

Warm words and those bright eyes

Known by everyone who knew her

Sensitive to something somehow  

She would charmed his nervous frown

Been a welcome calm to uneasiness

Before he set it down.

 

And he blew her away

Blew her away from you

Blew her away from her daughter

And everything she still had to do.

 

That mark across your heart

It wasn’t a scar that I saw

It was still a hurting open wound

Still bloody and raw

The preacher speaks forgiveness

You honestly do not know

But the bitterness will not twist your soul

So you let it go.

 

Today we will remember

You remember every single day

Wake up with her love on your mind

They can’t blow that away.

WHAT IF FORGIVENESS IS THE MOST IMPORTANT THING?

Since a panel discussion at last year’s 4 Corners Festival I have been surmising on what forgiveness is. In the summer I read Jennifer Nansubuga Makumbi’s book Kintu that takes us through a few centuries in a Ugandan family. The line “Ntwire must be punished for being unforgiving…” fuelled that thinking. Could forgiveness be the most important thing? I have been surmising ever since how crucial an act forgiveness is at the heart our human flourishing and fulfilment!

 

What if forgiveness is the most important thing

The Godly thing

That God’s forgiveness 

Is the essence of his holiness

His otherness

Where his love and justice meet

In a tangible

Costly 

Cross carrying

Forgiveness

 

What if forgiveness is where the healing begins

The soul medication

For spiritual wholeness

Where salvation is

Being forgiven

And then forgiving

God’s grace

Giving God’s courage

To forgive.

 

What if not forgiving is the only unforgivable

The damning thing

Insulting the Spirit

Who forgives us our trespasses

As we forgive those who trespass against us

The fruit of grace

By our fruit known

Living grace

Is forgiving

 

What if forgiveness is the most important thing

The Godly thing?

THE GOSPEL IS A STRANGE THING (AN UTTERLY MAD IDEA)

The Gospel is a strange thing 

It flies in the face of the world

That seeks honour, prestige, power and fame

The Gospel is a paradigm shift

Built on an utterly mad idea

That the first should became last

So that those who are last could become first

Holiness is found in association

In association with 

The poor

The meek

The marginalised

The key to spiritual fulfilment

Is looking outside of yourself

To those who are beneath you

The crux of spiritual greatness

Is not ascending the social ladder 

But in descending it, 

Taking the lowest place

Among those of a lowly position

That is the greatness of love

That is the cross carrying love 

That makes the soul great.

AFRICA RISING (KEEPING MY EYES ON YOU)

In my connections with Fields Of Life and travelling to Uganda I have met so many incredible people, doing amazing things, against the odds. Even when they find themselves rising above the odds they seem to give back more than they have ever been given.

This poem is about all of them but the verses focus on two Fields Of Life alumni. Levixone and Josephine have come through Fields of Life schools. Levixone is a pop star. He has been East Africa Gospel Singer of the Year for five years running. Yet, he still lives and ministers in the Kosovo slum that he grew up in. He showed me the pool table that he used to sleep under at night. 

Josephine came to Fitzroy last year and when she said she had nine children I couldn't believe it. Yet, in January and then again in July I got to go to her little home and meet those children. What an amazing joy that was. Josephine is not rich. She works to get by but feels God's call to love and becomes a guardian to nine orphans. She met one under a Kampala bridge.

So many more do so many heroic things. Forgive me for choosing these two...

 

Make the crowd all turn the replay

This stage my bro is a long long way

From that pool table you used to stay

But still your living there in Kosovo 

It's your place and you’re not leaving

The homeless boy now building homes

Until you gift all your people believing

 

You said you had nine children

I knew that couldn’t possibly be

The saw the line of tiny coloured shoes

And the bunk beds all stacked in three

You found them below the bridge at night

You could not leave them out there

You give more than you’ve been given

To make Kampala more kingdom fair

 

Africa rising

It’s not surprising

I’m keeping me eyes on you

Africa rising

I am surmising

I’m keeping my eyes on you

 

Your acts of kindness

A stronger currency

Love your neighbour

With a weightier urgency

Our souls impoverished

Oh how you inspire us

The simplicity of holiness

In almost innocent trust

 

Africa rising

It’s not surprising

I’m keeping me eyes on you

Africa rising

I am surmising

I’m keeping my eyes on you

DON'T BRUISE MY SOUL

I blogged about the Theologist recently and got a response from many who know the dehumanising. I remembered this poem. It was written back around 1996, when my soul was getting battered black and blue by the Theologists. 

As well as the exclusion that I experienced, the rumours and misrepresentation that hurt, I see it as a time when freedom came. It was the best thing that ever happened my faith.  When my bridges had been burned I was able to forget about having to be conformed to the pattern of the Theologist and seek to follow Jesus.

The photo is me and my good friend Jim Deeds, who I would never have got to know or work with had I remained conformed.

 

I’d rather take risk and make mistakes

Than play safe and stay right here

Failure and doubt have lost their sting

Not living life is what I fear

and I’ve had enough of personal choices

Of worn out clichés and lonely verses

I watched the beloved hate themselves

Good news proclaiming captive curses

Don’t tell God what he should believe

Leave the Holy Spirit on the dole

Don’t lie about me for the sake of truth

Don’t bruise me soul

Please don’t bruise my soul.

 

I’d rather read above and below

And in between the lines that appear

I’m not afraid not knowing all

It confines infinitive expression I fear

And I’ve had enough of labels

I’d rather call people by their name

to differentiate you from me

It casts the very first stone of blame

Don’t tell God what he should believe

Leave the Holy Spirit on the dole

Don’t lie about me for the sake of truth

Don’t bruise me soul

Please don’t bruise my soul.