SOUL SURMISE

LEAVING DAUGHTER TO UNIVERSITY - EMOTIONAL SONGS

So, we have had an exciting Road Trip to leave Jasmine off to University. The Stockies have always had music on such trips. It used to be the old CD for holidays. This time it was an 8 hour playlist made up of favourites by all 4 of us and Daddy adding all the old favourites like The Sawdoctors - “get the wasp off my sandwich”! 

This mix was a whole lot more poignant and deeply emotional. 

Jasmine herself chose a Maisie Peters (she’s always teaching her dad about new artists) song called The Place We Were Made and as I listened in the tedium of an English motorway I heard loud and clear what was in her ‘leaving home’ mind:

 

I know every streetlight

And maybe the colours will fade

This is the place we were made

By the late nights and the fires on the beach

Made by the small town secrets we'd keep

All that I know is

No matter how far away

This is the place we were made

 

Indeed!

Caitlin was intentional in her choices too. She carefully picked Belfast boy Ryan McMullan’s Letting Go For A Little While. His leaving song is from the child, not the parents, point of view as no doubt he goes off on tour: 

 

I know you love me, but now it's time to let me go

And I know you're sad but please don't cry

After all it's not goodbye

We're just letting go for a little while

 

Since the release of Deacon Blue’s great new record City Of Love Janice has been loving the song Intervals, surely about such moments in the Ross/McIntosh family life, and singing loudly the lines: 

 

When you grow up to be a star

Don't leave home for anything less than you are

 

For me another of this year’s top records has been tugging my heart strings, preparing for this seismic moment in our family life in general and Jasmine’s in particular. Jason Isbell is at the very early stages of watching his child grow. Letting You Go begins with him strapping his daughter into her baby car seat. At the end of this road trip I will be unclipping Jasmine’s for a last time, in some symbolic sense. Tears were creeping when this one came up on shuffle:

 

Being your daddy comes natural

The roses just know how to grow

It's easy to see that you'll get where you're going

But the hard part is letting you go

The hard part is letting you go

 

I am a very proud father this weekend. I am so inspired by how my daughters have turned out. Nothing like the plan I had for them, they are living a far better vocational plan of their own and prayerfully God's. As Jazzi starts International Development at Reading University I am excited for her and believe she is going to make her contribution. What an adventure! What a girl! BUT still… “the hard part is letting you go”… love you baby girl!

COLDPLAY - BROKEN

Lord, when I'm broken (When I'm broken)

And I'm in need (I'm in need)

Feel that ocean (Feel that ocean)

Swallowing me (Swallowing me)

Head is hanging (Head is hanging)

So sorrowfully (So sorrowfully)

Oh Lord (Ooh-ooh)

Come shine your light on me (Shine your light on me)

 

Coldplay’s singer and lyricist Chris Martin grew up in a Christian home and has constantly returned to that well for lyrical inspiration. He has distanced himself from that evangelical branch of Christianity and now calls himself an all-theist.

If Martin is drawing on all faiths and none in his songwriting then for sure he has gone back to his parents faith here. This lyric reminds me of a psalm or those hopeful poetic sections of the Old Testament prophets. BrokEn is like a Psalm. It is a first person prayer and praise to God. It approaches with needing asks for some light.

As I listened to the song I was drawn to some verses from Isaiah.

 

ISAIAH 60: 1-3

“Arise, shine, for your light has come,

    and the glory of the Lord rises upon you.

2 

See, darkness covers the earth

    and thick darkness is over the peoples,

but the Lord rises upon you

    and his glory appears over you.

3 

Nations will come to your light,

    and kings to the brightness of your dawn.

 

There is a hopefulness in the faith of the people of God. It marks us out. Always has done. Slaves, exiles, oppressed by Empire. There is always hope of morning… of light.

The same goes for the individual pilgrim. Lost, broken, grieving. God’s light gets in.

On Coldplay’s Everyday album this Gospel sound arrives in the middle of heavy songs about serious topics. It shows that human desire to see comfort in times of need.

Listen again to BrokEn (a Reimagined version is available too). In your Lenten journey, use it as a prayer for hope… for you… for a loved one… for the world!

GRACE - BLACKIE & THE RODEO KINGS

(my song of 2020... Stephanie Hall performed it in Fitzroy's Sunday Service on September 6th, 2020...)

There have been some wonderful songs written and released this year. My very favourite one has to be Grace. Soul Surmise readers know that that title was always going to catch my eye but this Grace is not from some Trump supporting church in California. It is theology from a slightly less likely place, though through the years I have come to the realisation that the best theology in the arts comes from places we least expect. (Check the name of one of my books)

Grace is written by Canadian (with a whole lot of Irish in him) Stephen Fearing. Stephen is a wonderful songwriter and amazing guitar player. Grace does not appear on Fearing’s stunning recent record, The Unconquerable Past, but on the latest Blackie & The Rodeo Kings album King Of This Town. 

In the album’s liner notes Fearing explains the writing of the song:

 

“’Grace’ is ‘The Water is Wide. That melody has been haunting me for years. I went back to the Sheraton where I was staying. I was sitting on the 10th floor and there was a snow storm coming in. It was just beautiful. I’m just thinking what will I bring to the table tomorrow [while] playing that progression of ‘The Water is Wide.’ I’m going ‘Okay, how can I use this?’ The how and the feeling of the song is two o’clock in the morning, sitting in the hotel room, it’s dark and the snow’s falling and that song ‘The Water is Wide.’ That’s where it comes from.”

 

Out of that simple snowy night scene, with that simple traditional tune running round his head, Fearing conjures not only the physical moment he is in but in keeping with the song dives for a spiritual pearl.

I heard the song just about two weeks into lockdown and it made the hairs on my soul stand on end. It is beautiful and in these very short verses there is so much soul food and hope.

Old Testament theologian Walter Brueggemann writes about hope:

 

“Genuine hope is not blind optimism. It is hope with open eyes, which sees the suffering and yet believes in the future.” 

 

Grace is a song that carries that entire quotation. There is no blind optimism as Fearing sings. There is a melancholic yearning, near catharsis, going on. Out of almost lament, Fearing brings in the hope. It is not big and bright but it is light and the morning will come…

 

I look for grace

When I am broken

A deep sea diver

Reaching for a pearl

One tiny light 

In all this darkness

Til the morning, til the morning

Until the morning shines upon the world.

 

I cannot tell you how much I love it!

STOCKI'S TEN TOP HOLIDAY SONGS OF THE WEEK #1

10 tunes that particularly caught my attention in my first week of stay-cation...

 

LUKA BLOOM - THE BEAUTY OF EVERYDAY THINGS

Bloom’s new record Bittersweet Crimson deserves a review. Maybe next week. It is all perfect Irish coastal scenery reflectiveness and as this one states, The Beauty Of Everyday Things!

 

RORY BUTLER - WINDOW SHOPPING

Butler has that Scottish John Martyn sound but adds a contemporary energy in sound and content.

 

FONTAINES DC - HERO’S DEATH

These boys are conquering the world Kinda The Velvet Underground meet The Pogues. They don’t write unless the song has a reason to write.

 

JASON ISBELL - LETTING YOU GO

About his daughter. I relate so well.

 

RANDY NEWMAN - IT’S MONEY THAT MATTERS

A Mark Knopfler guitar riff fuels yet another Newman cultural critique. 

 

SAMMY BRUE - TRUE BELIEVER

One of the more reflective songs from Teenage Mayhem. 

 

TAYLOR SWIFT - MIRRORBALL

Yes! That Taylor Swift. A lo-fi album to sit beside Bon Iver who actually features on the album. Lovely haunting melodies. A very different beast from the beauty of pop.

 

SNOW PATROL - REACHING OUT TO YOU

This EP will get its full review in late August. Songs written in lockdown along with fans on Facebook. Only Gary Lightbody! Then produced by Iain Archer.

 

SARA BAREILLES - SAINT HONESTY

Dipped in Bareilles for the first time. Saint Honesty seems a relevant song in such times.

 

DEACON BLUE - WHAT SO FUNNY ‘BOUT PEACE, LOVE AND UNDERSTANDING

Why indeed? From their Lock Inn Session, I love how they almost make this Nick Lowe song a Gospel hymn. 

PAUL WELLER'S SERMON ON THE MOUNT MOMENT ON HIS NEW ALBUM ON SUNSET

Paul Weller’s new album On Sunset might not be as sonic shifting as some recent albums. Don’t however be as lazy as some reviewers and think for a minute it is not experimental. It is Weller doing his best Curtis Mayfield, an influence surely hinted in his work since at The Gift in 1982, and there are sprinklings of Beatles’ stardust all across it. 

Actually it is more than a little bit Michael Kiwanuka. The careful and clever use of instruments. Hannah Peel’s strings so evident in True Meanings, horns, old mate Mick Talbot’s hammond organ and even Slade’s Jim Lea’s violin. The grooves, the psychedelia, near music hall. All full of soul - Baptiste gets almost spiritual about it! 

Best of all for me is the song More. Weller might not be fully aware of how Jesus-like this song’s sermon is. I preached in Fitzroy recently about Jesus idea that where your treasure is your heart will be also. It is in Jesus’ Sermon on the Mount and he is talking about treasure in general, how God and money is a constant battle and how we shouldn’t be obsessed with treasure on earth.

Jesus could have put it another way. The Paul Weller way:

 

The more we get, the more we lose

When all is more, it's more we choose

There's always something else in store

That keeps me running down that road, keeps me running

To an unknown place I think is more

 

The addiction for more seems a modern ailment. Jesus obviously felt that it was a problem in his day too though he might have been talking about the religious leaders of his day who had done financial deals with Herod and the Roman occupiers. 

I actually think that this teaching of Jesus makes this past of the Bible even more relevant than it was when it was written. Jesus followers didn’t have much treasure to store! 

Paul Weller puts it beautifully though and I was sorry I forgot to quote it in that ‘treasure’ sermon. Lyrically brilliant. Spiritually, right on it!

THE KILLERS - MY SOUL'S OWN WARNING - Soul Surmise Song

I love it when songs kick some spiritual surmising into my day. I love to share them. Here's a new one by The Killers...

 

"If you could see through the banner of the sun

Into eternity's eyes

Like a vision reaching down to you

Would you turn away?

What if it knew you by your name?

What kind of words would cut

Through the clutter of the whirlwind of these days?"

 

The Killers have been teasing us for a while, streaming singles off a new record, Imploding The Mirage, that still doesn’t seem to have a release date.

A song called My Soul’s Own Warning was bound to catch my attention. They lyricist and frontman Brandon Flowers has never been short of some spiritual surmising. and then this verse had me really meditating on spiritual things. This one has us looking into eternity, finding a vision from what can only be understood as heaven. 

The thrill for any human being of being known by name. To be seen, recognised, taken seriously is something that is becoming more and more realised as being vital for a human being’s mental, emotional and spiritual health. That lyric had me off to Isaiah 43 where God tells us that we are “precious and in honoured in my sight” and “I have summoned you by name.” Flowers’ lyrics ask if we would turn such attention down.

He then goes on to ask if such a vision and such knowledge might cut through “the clutter of the whirlwind of these days”. Maybe Coronavirus has exposed the clutter but it certainly tossed up the whirlwind.

My Own Soul’s Warning is the stuff of spiritual surmising. Now what about the rest of the record? 

HERE COMES THE SUN - THE BEATLES

On our one permissible escape from the house today, we went as usual to walk Jed around Barnett's Demense. It wasn't us usual though. The sky was blue and even more intriguing was that the sun felt warm! There is one particular 30 metre hill that is worth a 3 mile walk in fitness and at the top I was feeling my body sweat... and I wasn't wearing a coat for the first time since about October.

The strong hint of spring brought a smile to my face and immediately George Harrison’s voice was in my ear... “Here Comes The Sun... little darling...” It is for me the ultimate celebration of sunshine. Harrison's guitar seems vibrant with goodness.

Harrison wrote it at a time in rock history when things were far from sunny. Just two years after they sang ‘All You Need Is Love’, the Beatles were breaking up. It was while Harrison was escaping the managerial backbiting that he found himself in Eric Clapton’s garden, and with the sun shining he found some hopefulness. “It’s been a long cold lonely winter but here comes the sun”.

Winter is about discontent and we living through a metaphorical winter right now. Summer is where we would rather be. We all need songs of hope. We all need hope. It is easy to be gloomy in these Coronavirus days. Listening to the news and rising death tolls across the world it can be difficult to look ahead with any sense of sunny-ness.

My faith gives me an alternative. I look back to a long heritage and find myself part of God's story full of liberation, redemption and purpose. And the Jesus of the story speaks into the here and now with another way to navigate this rocky terrain, looking ahead with the hope of a better future.

Faith in Jesus is not just some ‘pie in the sky when we die’ hope, but a belief in a divine presence that brings strength, grace and wisdom to change what is into what could be. As American activist Jim Wallis describes it, hope is believing in spite of the evidence, and watching the evidence change. That might be exactly how George Harrison felt when he wrote Here Comes The Sun!

 

On our one permissible escape from the house today, we went as usual to walk Jed around Barnett's Demense. It wasn't us usual though. The sky was blue and even more intriguing was that the sun felt warm! There is one particular 30 metre hill that is worth a 3 mile walk in fitness and at the top I was feeling my body sweat... and I wasn't wearing a coat for the first time since about October.

The strong hint of spring brought a smile to my face and immediately George Harrison’s voice was in my ear... “Here Comes The Sun... little darling...” It is for me the ultimate celebration of sunshine. Harrison's guitar seems vibrant with goodness.

Harrison wrote it at a time in rock history when things were far from sunny. Just two years after they sang ‘All You Need Is Love’, the Beatles were breaking up. It was while Harrison was escaping the managerial backbiting that he found himself in Eric Clapton’s garden, and with the sun shining he found some hopefulness. “It’s been a long cold lonely winter but here comes the sun”.

Winter is about discontent and we living through a metaphorical winter right now. Summer is where we would rather be. We all need songs of hope. We all need hope. It is easy to be gloomy in these Coronavirus days. Listening to the news and rising death tolls across the world it can be difficult to look ahead with any sense of sunny-ness.

My faith gives me an alternative. I look back to a long heritage and find myself part of God's story full of liberation, redemption and purpose. And the Jesus of the story speaks into the here and now with another way to navigate this rocky terrain, looking ahead with the hope of a better future.

Faith in Jesus is not just some ‘pie in the sky when we die’ hope, but a belief in a divine presence that brings strength, grace and wisdom to change what is into what could be. As American activist Jim Wallis describes it, hope is believing in spite of the evidence, and watching the evidence change. That might be exactly how George Harrison felt when he wrote Here Comes The Sun!

STOCKI'S ST. PATRICK'S DAY PLAYLIST 2020

(St. Patrick's Day 2020... never been anything like it... Coronavirus has quietened the world... so here's what I have been listening to as I celebrate my Irishness... be it that you will notice that it leans towards ny Northern Irishness)

 

I THINK OF HOME - SNOW PATROL

(from Reworked)

 

NORTHLAND - BOBBY SPEERS

(from Northland)

 

LAST TRAIN TO LIMERICK - JULES MAXWELL

(from Songs From The Cultural Backwater)

 

SHIPYARDS FROM BELFAST - ULAID & DUKE SPECIAL

(from A Note Let Go)

 

YOU I KNOW - RUNABAY

(from Between the Lines)

 

IN A HEARTBEAT - RYAN MCMULLAN

(single)

 

I’M STILL ALIVE (live) - DAVID C CLEMENTS

(from The Sound Of The Forest Choir (live))

 

TALK (single edit) - TWO DOOR CINEMA CLUB

(single)

 

KNOCK ME OFF MY FEET - SOAK

(from Grim Town)

 

DOWN DAYS - ROE

(single)

 

SUGAR ISLAND - THE 4 Of US

(from Sugar Island)

 

I’LL BE ALRIGHT - MALOJIAN

(from this Is Nowhere)

 

TELL THEM ALL - CIARAN LAVERY

(from Let Bad In)

 

MY ISLAND (feat. Stephen James Smith) - RYAN VEIL & ELMA ORKESTRA

(from Borders)

 

ST. PATRICK ON SLEMISH MOUNTAIN - THE ORPHAN BRIGADE

(from To The Edge Of The World)

 

MY LAGAN LOVE - THE CHIEFTAINS & LISA HANNIGAN)

(from Voice Of Ages)

 

CARRICKFERGUS - BRIAN HOUSTON

(from Songs Of My Father0

 

GREEN GLENS OF ANTRIM - BEN GLOVER

(from The Emigrant)

 

FROZEN NORTHERN SHORES - IAIN ARCHER

(from Frozen Northern Shores)

 

GOING DOWN TO BANGOR - VAN MORRISON

(from Keep Me Singing)

 

BANGOR TOWN - FOY VANCE

(from Wild Swans)

 

BELFAST - JOBY FOX

(single0

 

BELFAST (PLACE OF MY SOUL) - BURNING CODES

(single)

 

BELFAST TOWN - KAZ HAWKINS

(from Feelin’ Good)

 

SHAKE THE DUST - KATHLEEN TURNER

(from Like A Lion)

 

HUMAN - KITT PHILIPPA

(from Human)

 

SHANDY BASS - ROMANTICA

(from Shadowlands)

 

ONE FOR THE BLACK BOX - ANTHONY TONER

(from Our Lady of The Wind And Rain)

 

HOMEWARD BOUND - STREET LIGHTS

(single)

 

COME, COME AWAY - STEVENSON AND SAMUEL

(from Gracenotes)

MASQUERADE (SAM HILL JR) - FOR JANICE'S BIRTHDAY

A song for Janice's birthday. It is written and performed by Sam Hill Jr but from a lyric of mine. Sam and I went on to make an entire album - Grace Notes under the name Stevenson and Samuel.

My original lyric 73a Penwith Road is a love song for Janice when we going out together. She was living in London and the lyrics are based on pictures on the walls of Janice's flat and what I watched her do in love and hospitality.

Sam sang it with the help of Iain Archer, Miriam Kaufmann, Helen Killick and a Derryvolgie Student Choir as Janice came up the aisle at our wedding.

Here's the original poem. Happy birthday wonderful woman!

 

73A PENWITH ROAD

 

Where there's mist upon the lake

And painted African faces

Romantics in a field of poppies

And badgers on a thousand places

Smell the sweetness of her laughter

Of flowers on the window sill

Homemade cooking in the kitchen

Always much more than your fill

In the midst of all these changes

Memories time cannot erode

My heart discovered love right here

73A Penwith Road.

 

Where the arms of love are open

Hearts wider than the sky

Touching those who need a touch

Without ever asking why

Here the dance of her laughter

See the radiant sunshine smile

If you're pounded by the weary world

Sit down and rest a while

Feel the strength of gentleness

Come take your heavy load

I fly with freedom in my soul

73A Penrith Road.

 

 

Check out more Sam Hill Jr work here - https://samhilljr.co.uk

 

 

 

PARTICLES OF LIGHT...

photo: Philip McCrea

 

LISTEN to Bruce Cockburn's Hills Of Morning 

There are phrase that the preacher uses that stick, that are repeated, that can become imbedded in lives and communities. Just a few words that can carry a sermon or a theological idea or a mission statement into people’s minds before hopefully seeping into their hearts and souls and then out into their lives and actions. “Particles of light across the city” has become one of many such phrases in Fitzroy.

I stole it as I often do from a song. My very favourite Bruce Cockburn record is Dancing In The Dragon’s Jaw. It is a spiritually potent album, vivid in literary images, influenced by the Charles Williams books that Cockburn was reading at the time. For years I had the chorus of one of that album’s songs, Hills Of Morning, on a photograph of the Giants Causeway up on my study wall.

“Let me be a little of your breath
Moving over the face of the deep
I want to be a particle of your light
Flowing over the hills of morning”

These words conjure the mystery of how us humans somehow get the privilege of merging with God in God’s tangible presence in the world. It is a prayer to be involved in God’s breath, in God’s light, in God’s mission to make the world better than the world is. 

Of course we know Jesus is the light of the world but Matthew 5 turns the direction back to us:

¹⁴ “You are the light of the world. A town built on a hill cannot be hidden. ¹⁵ Neither do people light a lamp and put it under a bowl. Instead they put it on its stand, and it gives light to everyone in the house. ¹⁶ In the same way, let your light shine before others, that they may see your good deeds and glorify your Father in heaven.

Back in September 2010 I titled a sermon on Matthew 5 “Particles Of Light…” and it has stuck. As well as attempting to be missional where we are located, on University Street in Belfast, we are aware that as a community we are vocationally scattered across the entire city and indeed beyond. Our members work in very influential places, effecting social change and caring for many people who are not finding themselves cared for elsewhere.

A friend of mine who now works for a Christian development organisation told me once that when he was a probation officer no one asked him how he was bringing the Kingdom but that now that he is working for a “Christian” organisation lots of people ask him. 

I don’t believe you have to be working for a Christian organisation to bring the Kingdom. We can, and indeed must, be “particles of light” scattered across the city, bringing the thinking, voice, touch, attitude and ultimately love of God wherever we are and whoever we are with. Those particles of light are somehow partners with God making up the bigger light. I guess that is why Jesus called himself the Light of the world and then at another time told the disciples that they were the Light of the world. 

Cockburn’s lyric is powerful prayer seeking God that we might be part of the force that transforms the world.

“Let me be a little of your breath
Moving over the face of the deep
I want to be a particle of your light
Flowing over the hills of morning”