Author: Jonnyfun.E

Now retired, and enjoying making music and writing. Living in Gloucester, historically an important port on the river Severn, and situated with The Forest of Dean and the Brecon Beacons to the west, and the beautiful Cotswolds to the east.
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Is This What God Wanted ?

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I’m reading through the First book of Kings in the Old Testament.

Today, reading about the completion of Solomon’s temple.

The temple wasn’t Yahweh’s idea actually.  King David felt bad about lavishing so much on his own house while Yahweh didn’t have a house – just a box with some stone tablets.  So he proposed to Yahweh that he (David) build Yahweh a house.

Yahweh’s response was a cool one. He said “Thanks, but no thanks. But I’ll tell you what – I promise that your house (as in your family) will continue ruling Israel for as long as you walk in my ways.”

For God, it’s not about buildings, but people.  God doesn’t promise to be in a building, he promises to be with his people. (Exodus 3 verse 12 for starters).

Yahweh relented and allowed that David’s son, Solomon would build a house for Yahweh.

So God didn’t choose to build a temple, David did.
And God didn’t choose the location, David did.

And now it’s finished. And Solomon is praying a kind of prayer of dedication.  He makes sure to note that Yahweh is the God of heaven and earth, and not contained in a building, and yet the building’s magnificence seems to speak a different message.

When we think now about our churches, it’s actually not God’s house that we’re talking about, let’s be clear about that. The most we can say about a church building is that it is the ‘House of the People of God.’ (a vicar and writer called Richard Giles said that)

a Church building is not something we should be especially attached to, after all God isn’t – he’s attached to us, and wants us to be attached to him and to others.

Maybe we in the Northern hemisphere have a particular problem.  It’s cold a lot of the time, and we like being warm and cosy in our homes, shut off from the rest of the world.  So maybe that leaches into our church life and we prefer the comfort of a church building to being out in the world.

This is especially relevant at the moment as we are SO keen apparently to get back into our buildings.  It almost seems like that’s more important than getting to see each other in the same physical space ?

Maybe we could keep all our buildings closed until we no longer hanker after being back inside, and until we find ways of being with each other that transcend the holy hour on a Sunday.

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Song for Today #16

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The Lord’s Prayer

Years ago, my good friend Adrian gave me the sheet music for a sung setting of the Lord’s Prayer that was used in the worship at Cranmer Hall (Durham, England) when he was training for ordination.

It’s a beautiful arrangement, and there are many versions in Russian.

Here’s one, probably the source for the English version I have.


Sheet Music for the English version, pretty close to the above.




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Planning for Failure

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This post is really about planning for growth, but in reality we don’t know much about that – we’re much better at planning for failure.

“Our current system is perfectly designed to see the results we are currently achieving” (Alan Hirsch)

So if we want to see the church continue its steady decline into oblivion, we’re on the right track.

This blog post is interesting, saying similar things to what I’ve been posting about in the last couple of months:

What might church growth look like post-Christendom?


Three things at least are clear to me –

1.   For the church to groow, as I have already written several times, we must change our order of priorities from:

    Worship – Fellowship – Mission
    to
    Mission – Community – Worship

2.   For the church to grow, the primary role of clergy (in my Anglican context) must be to empower lay leadership.

3.   For the church to grow, we must put discipleship at the heart of church life.

The discipleship model that I have been most influenced by is here


and here



And most recently, seeing this as a great resource for exploring Jesus’ teaching in a very non-religious way


Grace and Peace


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When the Bridegroom Comes

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One of my favourite albums is Heart Food by Judee Sill.

This song is based on the parable that Jesus told in Matthew 22.

The album version on Youtube, but sadly no live version of Judee Sill herself.


See the bride and the spirit are one

Then won’t you who are thirsty invite Him to come?
With your door opened wide
Won’t you listen in the dark for the midnight cry?
And see when your light is on that the bridegroom comes

Into cold outer darkness are gone
Guests who would not their own wedding garment put on
Though the chosen are few, won’t you tarry by your lamp till He calls for you?
And pray that your love endure ’til the bridegroom comes

When the halt and the lame meet the son
And He sees for the blind, and He speaks for the dumb
Let their poor heart’s complaint
Like the leper turned around who has kissed the saint
Lift like a trumpet shout, and the bridegroom come

See the builders despising the stone
See the pearl of great price and the dry desert bones
By the Pharisees cursed
Be exultant with the rose when the last are first
And see how his mercy shines, as the bridegroom comes

Hear the bride and the spirit say come
Then won’t you who are weary invite in the Son?
When your heart’s love is high
Won’t you hasten to the place where the hour is nigh?
And see that your light is on, for the bridegroom comes

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What Do You want Most ?

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This was the question that God spoke to Solomon in a dream.  (1 Kings 3).  It was early in Solomon’s reign, and he answered well. Wisdom.  The wisdom to listen, and to know who to listen to. (Unlike Eve in the Garden of Eden, who listened to the serpent, and then Adam who listened to Eve)

When Jesus asks Blind Bartimaeus the same question in the Gospel, Bartimaeus could have asked for some loose change, that would have been a good answer.  But he didn’t. He asked for his sight.  He was healed.

I remember back in 1984, I had a job interview.  I was a secondary school maths teacher, and having taught for 7 years, was looking for promotion.  The job was 200 miles away from where we lived in Kent, in North Yorkshire.  A different world. 

At the interview I was asked what quality I felt that I needed more than anything else for the post – second in the maths department.

My answer was ‘wisdom.’  I hadn’t thought about it, and it wasn’t a question I was expecting.  But that was the answer that came out of my mouth.  When I thought about afterwards, it did seem like an unusual answer.  I could have given so many other ‘good’ answers, but ‘wisdom’ was the answer I gave.  I got the job.

It’s a good question to ask oneself from time to time.  What do I want most ?  The answer will likely vary, depending on what’s going on at the time.

Acknowledgment for this post: 1 & 2 Kings for everyone, by John Goldingay in the ‘Old Testament for everyone’ series.









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Open Churches again ?

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There’a a verse in the psalms that says this … “The stone that the builders rejected has become the cornerstone.”

It’s a verse that is quoted several times in the New Testament – for example by Jesus in Matthew 21. 

Jesus has just told a parable – a story that shows the way that religious leaders often miss what God is doing.  Jesus himself is the cornerstone, yet he is being rejected.  The very people who should be  most attentive to God don’t see it.  In Jesus’ case of course, this led to his death. 

If human nature is the same now as it was then, my guess is that religious leaders are still in danger of not seeing the big picture.

As churches, we are now in danger of being obsessed by the return to our church buildings.  It is starting to consume much of our thinking and energy.

One of the main things that the gospels show us is that God is not limited to buildings.  The Jews thought that the temple was THE place to meet with God.  Jesus showed them that God is out and about in the world, as he went around teaching and healing in homes and on hillsides.

This current situation is one to be treasured for giving us the opportunity to be a people that are not bound by buildings.  Let’s focus on ways to find God in everyday life.  To listen to what the wind of the Holy Spirit is saying to the church.

Grace and peace.
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Tell it Like it is

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I’m reading the first book of Kings in the Old Testament.

John Goldingay, my Old Testament teacher years ago, has written a little book to help us understand the Old Testament.  He prefers to call it the First Testament, because calling it old seems to relegate to the discard pile.

I read some words in the introduction that made me think of the current debate about statues of those who were involved in the salve trade.

John Goldingay writes this: “First and Secong Kings tell the story of Israel’s life from Solomon to the exile in such a fashion as to acknowledge the ways in which both nations (Israel and Judah) failed to follow after Yahweh, their God.  They invite the people who read the story to acknowledge that the story is true – not merely in the sense that the historical facts are correct, but in the sense that they accept responsibility for their wrongdoing over the generations. In effect the story is a kind of confession; it says, ‘Yes, this is the way we have lived as a people.’  The only possibility for a future for them is thus to face facts and to acknowledge these facts to God.  There is no way that they can undo those facts, or compel God to forgive them and give them a new start.  All they can do is to cast themselves on God’s mercy.”

The statues that are under debate were originally there to celebrate the lives of men (mostly men …) who had done great things.

We now see how those men were flawed, and the systems that they served were the cause of great injustices.  So, in a sense we have to rewrite history, or at least to retell those events of the past in the light of what we now hold dear.

And, now, in the present, for myself as a privileged white man, to confess to my shortcomings in not doing more to address racism.  We need to confess the things we have not done and said – our inaction, as well as explicitly racist words and actions.

Somehow, through all the tools that are available to us, we must do what the writers of those Old Testament books did – to say ‘Yes, this is the way we have lived as a people.’  There is no way that we can undo those facts, or compel black people to forgive us and give us a new start. All we can do is to cast ourselves on their mercy.”

Back in 2009, I wrote about an inititiative in the USA – ‘Come to the Table’  a project where the descendants of slave owners and the descendents of slaves come to the table and talk and listen about their past. 

The reaction of some people to history is to say ‘Get over it’.  But it is not as simple as that.  Even if the events are way in the past, there may still be unmet needs that, if not addressed, will prevent us all from moving on.


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What’s In a Name ?

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I noticed a couple of weeks ago that it was the day the church remembers a saint called Wynfrith.  He was originally from Crediton in Devon, but spent a lot of his adult life in continental Europe as an evanglist and teacher.  By then he had a new name – Boniface, and it is by that name he is more generally known.

This reminds me of a retired vicar we knew when we lived in Beverley.  All his adult life until retirement he had been known as Grenville, but he had another (middle ?) name of James.  He decided that to mark the start of a new phase of his life, he would now be known as James. 

James is a version of the biblical name Jacob.  Jacob also had a name change at a crucial point in his life.  It was the night that he had struggled with an unknown man by the brook Jabbok, and he is given the new name of Israel.

After wrestling all night,  The man said, “Let me go; it’s daybreak.”  Jacob said, “I’m not letting you go ’til you bless me.” The man said, “What’s your name?” He answered, “Jacob.”  The man said, “But no longer. Your name is no longer Jacob. From now on it’s Israel (God-Wrestler); you’ve wrestled with God and you’ve come through.” 

Jacob asked, “And what’s your name?”  The man said, “Why do you want to know my name?” And then, right then and there, he blessed him.  Jacob named the place Peniel (God’s Face) because, he said, “I saw God face-to-face and lived to tell the story!”  (From Genesis chapter 32)

So, back to Wynfrith.  I would have stuck with that name rather than Boniface because it means ‘Friend of Peace.’

In fact, if I ever change my name, it will be to Wynfrith, and I will ask to be known as Wyn.

Wyn Evans, that sounds fine to my ears.

Grace and Peace.


Songwriting

DADGAD Is Just Too Wonderful

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So what is DADGAD … it’s a guitar tuning that I’ve been working with almost to the exclusion of anything else for about a year. I’m trying to get better at the craft of songwriting, and my mantra is something to do with – the more songs you write, the more likely it is that you’ll eventually write a good one.

I found that with this tuning, I can come up with melodies that I would never have thought of with the regular EADGBE tuning.

So what about lyrics ? I have always thought that this my weak point, but a year ago I went to a songwriting workshop led by Boo Hewerdine, and facilitated by a great musician and community activist – George Moorey. With the teaching we had that day, I was inspired, and I’ve written about 8 songs over the last year. That may not sound lie much, but for me it’s amazing.

Most of my songs are story based, drawn from books, movies and people I’ve met. For example, one was about a fishing disaster in the early 20th century in Cornwall. I researched it from newspaper accounts, and used direct quotes to help with the song. I got really stuck a few months ago, actually right at the beginning of lockdown, and had no inspiration, but I had a starting line – ‘It’s been 39 days, since I saw the sun.’ (A reference to Noah’s Ark). Throughout January and February, it seemd like it had been raining every day, so that gave me the first line.

But that was all I had. I happened to have just started a thriller by Stephen Booth (which I never finished, by the way), and I just opened it at random and looked for interesting phrases. Somehow, I managed to put some of the phrases together into the song. I’m not entirely sure what it’s about, but it all seemed to work.

39 days

It’s been 39 days, since I saw the sun
grey clouds, the winds been blowin
the dogs are getting restless, they feel it in the air
You can’t see it yet, but you know it’s coming

Praying that the waters don’t get too high
fearing the worst as we see them rise
Looking outside and the sky is black
wondering if the sun will ever come back

I’m lying in the kitchen, face down on the floor
gravity’s got me, it’s pulling me down
I hear a voice laughing, smell the cigarette smoke
I can’t see it yet, but I know it’s coming

Praying that the waters don’t get too high …

She didn’t look up when he walked in the room
the old ‘duck and roll’ when he tried to kiss her
she said she was tired just couldn’t go on
He can’t see it yet, but he knows it’s coming

Praying that the waters don’t get too high …

It’s crouching at the door, this crown of thorns.
We can’t see it yet, but we know it’s coming

Praying that the waters don’t get too high …

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Regrettable, Shortsighted and Plain Wrong

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This is the decision taken on Tuesday this week (16.6.20) to mege the Department for International Development with the Foreign and Commonwealth Office.
I was so incensed by this decision that I started a petition on the government website.  I’m not convinced that I have worded it in the best possible way to attract signatures, and it looks like it is being raised in the House of Commons anyway.
Even if it is debated, a petition could indicate the strength of feeling for this issue.  It takes a couple of weeks apparently for petitions to go through the system before they appear on the government website.  If the government still haven’t backtracked on the decision, please look for and sign the petition here.
Thanks