So you’ve been following the Friday Fix and have loved reading them. Some might have really provoked some action you’ve taken. Some might have made you nod in agreement. Some may have reduced you to tears. Some may have made you chuckle or reassure you.
You have an idea in your mind about a song that you love, or made a difference, or reassured you, or challenged you but you don’t think anyone would want to read all about this.
How wrong you would be. We’ve received Friday Fixes from lots of people who have said ‘you don’t have to use it’ or ‘it’s probably not good enough’ – only to find that they have been some of our most popular posts.
So go on – take a deep breath and pop your thoughts down in an email to Gill at thomasg@methodistchurch.org.uk. You don’t have to find the video clip, it doesn’t have to be word perfect and it can be about any song as long as it’s ‘secular’.
Looking forward to a deluge of contributions over the coming days and weeks!
At the end of last year both Paloma Faith and Little Mix released new albums which fast became my ‘go to’ playlists that I listened to on my daily dog walks. I love Little Mix (is that a confession?) primarily because their standout feature is that all four of them can actually sing (and rather well) – a rare quality, I think, in most all girl (or boy!) bands.
Like many fans, I was gutted when Jesy Nelson announced in December that she was leaving Little Mix after 10 years in the group. How would the group sound without her low tones I wondered?
She announced her departure on Instagram saying that being part of the group had “taken a toll on my mental health.” You may of course remember that Jesy produced a documentary on her mental health struggles ‘Odd One Out’ and received enormous praise for opening up about the cyberbullying she received and the effect that had on her. If you haven’t watched it – please do. It’s the kind of documentary I feel that everyone who journeys with young people and young adults should watch. I was deeply moved by it.
Jesy’s announcement that, “I need to spend some time with the people I love, doing things that make me happy,” made me think of a track ‘Me Time’ on Paloma Faith’s new album (Infinite Things). She sings:
I need some me time
Figuring out who I wanna be time
Saying what I want because I’m free time
No one’s ever gonna mess with me time
I need some dream time
Going places that I’ve never been time
Shut the door and I just wanna scream time
Trust me, I’ll be fine, I just need a little me time
As I listened to the track, I was reflecting that ‘I just need a little me time,’ was probably what Jesy needed.
Wish I could hide somewhere and just be alone
They say they want the best for me but they don’t, no
All of these people think they know better
Done this and done that, tell me whatever
Too many thoughts and noises up in my head…
Perhaps Jesy needed some time out to rediscover herself again and as she said, “it’s time to embark on a new chapter”. I wish her well.
I wonder though, how many of us have needed some ‘me time’ during lockdown? Statistics tell us that Covid-19 has had a huge impact on our children, young people and young adults. Teenagers, in particular, feel more anxious now (10% higher for black and mixed-race teenagers), social support mechanisms (friends, classmates) disappeared and the stigma of being in quarantine heightened mental health issues and lack of wellbeing. Young carers in particular, have felt overwhelmed and stressed(1). We know that there has been a spike in domestic abuse during lockdown(2) and we know that an estimated 6 million folk have fallen into debt, with the biggest increases amongst the poorest households(3).
All in all, our mental health has suffered and we need to pay attention to how we look after ourselves and each other – ‘we need some time, figuring out who we want to be…. and some dream time….’
Perhaps we can use this time of Lent to do just this.. spend some time doing the things that are good for your wellbeing: be in contact with your friends and family (I’ve started writing letters for the first time in about 20 years!), a phone call can make all the difference to a lonely and isolated person, take a walk and look around you, take up a new hobby or learn a new skill or course… the list is probably endless – but above all, look after yourself and gift yourself a little bit of Me Time.
Once upon a time in the mid-80’s, I was a bit grumpy with a number of friends. I was grumpy because they were a bit older than me (as in 18 or 19) and had more economic means that enabled them to get to gigs that I so desparately wanted to go to as well. In other words, they were working or had part-time jobs that raked in reasonable amounts – and 16 year old me had a Saturday job scrubbing and cleaning a bakery for 5 hours for the grand total of £7.
So grumpy Gill didn’t raise funds quick enough to bag tickets for concerts like her friends – awww. One particular gig that I was devastated about was U2’s Unforgettable Fire Tour date at Manchester Apollo in 1984. They all came back fired up as much about the support band as they were about U2 – and that was when The Waterboys nudged into my musical universe.
I rediscovered this song a couple of years ago just before Ellie Goulding’s remake of it – and it regularly makes it on to my Spotify Daily Mixes these days. It never fails to raise my spirits, even on the gloomiest or grumpiest of days (yes – I still do grumpy!).
I love the melody because it makes me want to move – and I love the lyrics because they lift me up and reassure me. Sometimes I imagine it’s a rhetorical conversation between me and Jesus – my questions are being answered, even before I ask them. I use the word ‘rhetoric’ in it’s original sense here – from the ancient Greeks for whom the word captured an appreciation of things being true, good and beautiful; the ability to speak eloquently and persuasively and that the art of rhetoric required virtuous character.
How long will I love you? As long as stars are above you And longer if I can
This song, to me, sums up love that is unconditional – or as much as we humans can envisage unconditional love. That love is there in copious amounts, with leftovers. I know that some people struggle with understanding love, particularly when all that has been experienced has been conditional love but it’s worth bearing in mind that there are no ‘ifs’ with God. God doesn’t love us ‘if’ we do something for God, God loves us because of who we are – regardless.
How long will I want you? As long as you want me to And longer by far
God’s love for us existed even before we were born and unlike human love, it’s not hemmed in by time or circumstances. Our love may be limited but God’s love is not. It’s quite mind-blowing really and I think that’s why this song says so much to me. It’s trying to nail down what loving unconditionally looks like.
What, to me, is even more incredible is that God’s love is not just around me but within me also. Every now and again, my actions or my words are the way that God shows the amazing love and grace to others – and that really is top-level delegation.
How long will I give to you? As long as I live through you However long you say
Fancy trusting me to show others your Love God – that’s quite a responsiblity!
Van Morrison was born in 1945 into a Belfast protestant family. He left school with no qualifications and ‘showed little empathy for others’ and an ‘aggressiveness’. His father had a huge blues collection and it was this sense of dislocation among black musicians that Van tapped into from an early age. He grew from show bands and hit pop groups like ‘Them’ to a major (some would say giant) figure in music. His words, arrangements and voice are a unique interwoven combination. He creates poetry and music, both of which can stand alone, but move seamlessly together.
Van has sought particularly from 1968 onwards to express a journey of the soul. He takes from many faiths to do this. He believes his songs come to him from an outside source. He has often said he considers himself to be a Christian mystic. He might well draw back (depending on what day of the week it was I suspect) from terming himself a practicing Christian. However, there is a lot in his ‘Caledonian Soul’ music for a Christian to use and grow within.
This song poem, ‘In The Garden’ is perhaps one of his greatest and most successful contemplations of the soul. He says that he intended it to be a meditation; he intends to lead the listener and reader through to a sense of tranquillity.
There is a strong tradition of meditation in the church that gradually lost its way from the 18th Century, but had a resurgence in the 20th Century. The 1965 Vatican Council and the Pope Benedict XXVI re-emphasized its role in Lectio Divina, sacred writing. Methodism has had a resurgence of interest in meditation. It has become a valued part of services and in 2005/6 the Methodist church encouraged people to ‘pray without ceasing’ which lasted over 14 months.
The poem/song grounds itself in a person and a place. It gives a starting point for the spiritual musings and journey. It sets up the senses with the use of rain in the streets and then the garden, transposing that to the tears of the girl. This is to move the observer into empathy, a physical as well as spiritual empathy. And this in turn sets up a contrast as we see the new radiance in the girl. The garden is a renewing and renewed place of grace, of joy, of rapture where God and human meet. Again physicality is linked to God at work. The breeze blows, the colours change on her skin. And then the writer is caught up in the ecstasy of the scene:
“And as the shiver from my neck down to my spine ignited me in daylight and nature in the garden.”
One almost feels and sees a trail of gunpowder with a flame traveling along it to ignite a bonfire of feeling.
The writer draws us beyond observing into the feelings of those ecstatic spiritual moments and commune with the world and God. This is a key part of many Christian meditations; the moment when intellectual thought, mental awareness, heightened senses, heightened awareness and spiritual openness co-join with the presence of the Holy Spirit – or, as Van puts it, the Holy Ghost. Often Methodist meditation will use a physical object, like a candle to draw in and focus the mind and spirit. It is about being in a place where the presence of God, the Holy Spirit, can be recognised and felt.
Sarah Middleton writes in ‘Sensing God’ that all five senses are to be employed. She cites so many places in the Bible that enjoin the senses in the moment of realisation of God at work. Among these: Psalm 34:8, ‘taste and see that the Lord is good’; Psalm 141:2, ‘Let my prayer to you be as incense.’ St Paul says that we are God’s incense, the aroma of Christ to the world.
Not many know that the painter Vincent Van Gogh was, at one time a Methodist auxiliary preacher. He wrote about seeing Christ in the eyes of others and referred to Jesus as the ‘ultimate artist’, creating not pictures but people. This is the link between meditation and the senses. Someone like Van Morrison or Van Gogh draws in our physical antennae unites them with our intellect and uses that intermingling to open up our souls to spiritual awareness.
Here is Van painting with words and music and the very physical strains of his own voice, wrestling with the words, his emotions, his limitations to achieve a meditative state for himself and his listeners. He dives into the streams of his engagement with God by portraying it in a sensual and physical action:
“And as it touched your cheeks so lightly. Born again you were and blushed and we touched each other lightly. And we felt the presence of the Christ.”
He then places the experience into a context, saying:
“No Guru, no method, no teacher Just you and I and nature And the Father and the Son and the Holy Ghost In the garden wet with rain No Guru, no method, no teacher Just you and I and nature and the Holy Ghost.”
This is not about religious rules and advice. It is about face-to-face, sense-to-sense encounter with the infinite, with God. It is a personal responsibility. Some might decry that as quite New Age. But it goes much deeper than some of that trend’s superficiality.
The music allied to the words: The chord structure has a lilt and flow like water changing its force at different parts of a stream, gathering itself in places, then falling faster down a hillside. Van sings it straight for a few lines and very vulnerably with the guitar strumming harder and softer to show the ebb and flow of emotion. Then gradually he starts to play with the range of notes adding a roughness at times. What follows that is speaking with a singing voice. There is tender whispering over extended lines which gradually, in the repeated last verse, gains steam.
One can feel the awe in Van’s voice, the trembling in his senses, the spiritual impact of the experience of encountering God. The musicians get louder, the guitar is more visible and Van’s voice more strident and full. Then everything drops away to a hush and time slows; a time for the listener’s mind to wander into its own feelings and thoughts.
And at the very end Van begins to bring us out of the meditation; but he leaves an anchor for the experience so we can go back to it. The Father in the Garden. The Infinite standing in this world.
This song is on an album bought in 1988 when vinyl was king and the joy of buying a new turntable and speakers was a day-long outing in a padded room (intentionally for sound quality) – with cups of tea and endless listening to the same thing.
I know this album really well as a result but time passes and new music fills your ears. It was, in fact, the track title then that sprang into my consciousness as I was reading a reflection on what it is to think that something is done and finalised and, at the same time, be well aware that within a nano-second, circumstances will change and the now will be new again.
There’s a lot of stuff swimming around in this little head of mine at the minute.
I am generally a girl who likes closure and clarity – it’s in my personality – and yet, even I have had to learn that the only certainty at the minute is uncertainty, and what seems to be done or important slips away to something else. Its like grappling with jelly. I am also a sensitive soul who occasionally just has to batten down the hatches and “run away” – yet that too is for the large part unsatisfactory against the reality of what we face as a society. God’s Beloved People.
Oh, and alongside that, there’s a lot of procrastinating around at the moment. I’m seeing it everywhere and it’s beginning to wear thin.
“Well we won’t meet again as Local Preachers until we can do so in person.”
“Let’s leave the covenant service until next year when we can be in the building.”
“Let’s not have Holy Communion because meeting on Zoom (substitute another medium here) isn’t real community.”
“Let’s leave that until we can be together and sort it then.”
All of that despite the fact that we have been meeting for work, socialising for life and worshipping the Living God that way for the best part of a year and still we don’t see it as a reality of life as people of faith.
I get it in a way, as I am longing for the days when I can breathe the same air and feel truly connected to others again. Sing together (and I don’t just mean church – our family has a long tradition of it when we gather); natter about something other than death and a virus that’s killing thousands of people, the economy and our resilience; hold hands and hug when words can’t say what you want them to. You get the picture but if we’re not careful, there is something afoot that’s akin to inertia. Our uncertainty leads to inaction. We breed our own malaise. I breed my own malaise.
So for me this song title alone is enough to jolt me from that kind of slumber and complexity. The writer is, I’m pretty sure, not writing about a global pandemic but the words are so provocative around how we act in response to what we actually place value on and how we love one another.
If not now, then when?
If not today,
Then, why make your promises?
A love declared for days to come,
Is as good as none.
We have just been through a period of preparation and waiting. “Noticing” in readiness for remembering the incarnation of God and as a tradition we value this waiting space. It has something to teach us and as we approach Lent, the same messages will be heard. Time to stop – to think – to wait.
The Bible though, is also littered with passages of urgency, agency and grasping opportunity. Stories of fleeing persecution in the midst of chaos, building an Ark, upping sticks and venturing out into the unknown, following a star just because you think you should, changing plans to use other routes, healing the sick, following a call to leave fishing nets there and then, getting out of a tree, offering the Good News to anyone who listens, recognising the kingdom of God is already at hand within each one of us and therefore changing to a new way of living. I could go on. It advocates prayer and listening to God but does it really ever say “well….. it’s a bit tricky so you wait a bit until the dust settles”.
As people of faith we make promises to God that we will live in a way that shows others this God of love that is constant and faithful, yet ever-changing and renewing. That we will step out and step up when required to. That we are sure God is with us. ‘Cause if not now, then when? If not today, then, why make your promises? Don’t mis-hear me. This is tough. It isn’t always doable and it isn’t about being busy with stuff just to be distracted.
We are in difficult and uncertain times but we are here. It is for me about seeing that life now is what it is and God is a God for now – not later, not eventually, not in due course – NOW!
We’re coming to the end of January – the month with at least 60 days in it or at least, that’s what it feels like. It’s also, for many, a month of clean slates and new starts; a month where some of us try to change habits and behaviours to live better lives and to be better people. For Methodists, January often brings Covenant Services – and in particular, the Covenant Prayer which you can find at the bottom of this post.
This yearly act in Methodism enables a revisiting and a renewal of commitment to relationship with God. The ebb and flow of life means that our relationships ebb and flow too – including the one with God. For many, the Covenant Service can feel like a harbour in the tempest – life can be choppy and frightening at times so setting anchor for a while in a safe, calm harbour gives us the chance to return and reconnect with God
I saw the sun begin to dim And felt that winter wind Blow cold A man learns who is there for him When the glitter fades and the walls won’t hold ‘Cause from then, rubble What remains Can only be what’s true If all was lost There’s more I gained ‘Cause it led me back To you
These are the opening words of the final song of ‘The Greatest Showman’ and to me, the whole song is about coming back to what is important and making a commitment to value it more and never take it for granted. It’s the point in the film where Barnum realises that he is nothing without all those people around him – who support him, challenge him & encourage him to be who he is.
Although the Covenant Prayer is a one-one interaction with God, it’s also an act of community too. For our relationship with God to grow and flourish, we need each other to help nurture our gifts and graces – just like Barnum realises in this song. It’s a public declaration to say ‘it’s not just about me, it’s about you too’. Without you, I am not me.
And from now on These eyes will not be blinded by the lights From now on What’s waited ’til tomorrow starts tonight It starts tonight And let this promise in me start Like an anthem in my heart From now on From now on From now on
The video I chose to share is not the slick, final product but one that has it’s own story to tell. It captures an incredibly powerful moment in rehearsals when the song takes on meaning and energy and a life of it’s own. Even watching it causes me to be consumed by the emotion in that space and to hear that Hugh Jackman couldn’t stop himself rehearsing it – even though his doctors told him he couldn’t sing (he was recovering from an operation on the side of his nose) – says something about the power of song and connection.
We all fall short in our relationships – with each other and most definitely with God. We collude; we don’t intervene; we massage our egos; we only see the world from our perspective; we look after ‘number one’. So how affirming; how reassuring; how amazing to know that we can ‘come back home’, repent, renew our commitment and give ourselves to the relationship that we have with God.
“I am no longer my own but yours.
Your will, not mine, be done in all things,
wherever you may place me,
in all that I do
and in all that I may endure;
when there is work for me
and when there is none;
when I am troubled
and when I am at peace.
Your will be done
when I am valued
and when I am disregarded;
when I find fulfilment
and when it is lacking;
when I have all things,
and when I have nothing.
I willingly offer
all I have and am
to serve you,
as and where you choose.
Glorious and blessed God,
Father, Son and Holy Spirit,
You are mine and I am yours.
May it be so for ever.
Let this covenant now made on earth
Be fulfilled in heaven.
Amen.
(Methodist Worship Book: page 288-289)
If you’d prefer the film version of ‘From Now On’ – here you go:
Just to brighten up your January days, we’ve created the Friday Fix 2020 Playlist on Spotify.
It’s nearly all the songs that we covered last year – a couple of them are so ‘leftfield’, Spotify doesn’t know them (or the artist doesn’t want Spotify to know them).
In 2007-8, when we had a difficult time as a family I would sometimes find my husband sitting listening to this song, with tears running down his own face… just listening and crying.
His cousin (aged 28) was killed in the 7/7 bombings. She was sitting in the carriage where the bomb went off and there was no chance of survival. There was nothing anybody could do.
Her parents asked for none of us to talk about her and I’m not going to here except to say that she was an extraordinary person (you could read more in her memory https://www.bbc.co.uk/news/uk-12011102) and that she is still missed.
This piece of music, for me, is one which has helped, since then, to deal with any difficult situations. Until I decided to write this I didn’t even know what the lyrics were. ‘I will try to fix you’ was the only phrase I remembered. There was absolutely nothing that could be done. The fire had literally ignited her bones. And yet… we wanted to fix it. We really wanted to fix it. This song tuned in with that longing and that helplessness.
We all want to fix it… for those we love, for the world. This Covid-19 pandemic has reminded us of our vulnerabilities as a human race. We do feel ‘stuck in reverse’. We also want to fix other people… and really we can’t.
In films those who are called ‘fixers’ are those who are known to be people who claim to do this and always come undone. They are not the ones with real power but the ones who try to convince others that they are! For me it is turning out to be a life-time’s work to learn that only God can help people truly fix things in their own lives.
‘Fix You’ will always remind me of those traumatic experiences (of hearing The News, of realizing it was our family’s news, of the funeral, of trying to support others through bereavement) but since then, the song has become one which helps me with other sadnesses. Until I started to write this I didn’t know that the song was performed at the benefit concert ‘One Love Manchester’ – dedicated to the victims of the Manchester Arena bombing in 2017… but it does not surprise me. The music itself is healing as it brings the tears which register the realities of sadness and make the beginnings of real change possible. We can then begin to look for the ‘lights which will guide us home’
At Helen’s funeral the vicar, who was a friend, mentioned that Helen had supported him after a difficult funeral he had to take for a child, “She said to me: ‘In tragedy, it is never God’s will. God’s is the first heart to break and God is the first to shed a tear.’”
The Holy Spirit (and its work) is infused throughout Creation; it does not just exist in the bubble of the Christian Church. At its most dramatic and obvious it is released and shown in the work of artists – musicians, painters, movie directors, writers, poets and all creative people.
So we come to the song ‘Solsbury Hill’ by Peter Gabriel. A little background. The rock band Genesis formed in 1967. They gradually became very successful and were poised for massive success in 1975. It was at this point that Peter Gabriel, lead singer, decided to leave the band. In his first record he expressed the intellectual and spiritual feelings he had in the lead up to, and moment of, leaving the band and taking a huge risk with his career.
He himself says that it all came to him in an epiphany whilst standing on Solsbury Hill. Little Solsbury Hill is a small flat-topped hill; the site of an Iron Age hill fort located above the village of Batheaston in Somerset, England. The hill rises to 191m and is a place of outstanding natural beauty.
Peter Gabriel is not a Christian; a man of indeterminant beliefs. But everything about his ‘epiphany’ shouts of the Holy Spirit at work. The language in the song walks hand in hand with much of a Christian’s awakening. In the closing stages of the recording Peter gives himself over to shrieks and noises which pour out; he moves beyond words to express the intensity of his joy and depth of feeling. Much like St Paul in 1 Corinthians: 14 (read it here) the song achieves a balance to words and speaking in tongues.
Like the song, the Bible has itself also uses the metaphor of the eagle for God at work giving strength:
Isaiah 40:31: “but they who wait for the Lord shall renew their strength; they shall mount up with wings like eagles; they shall run and not be weary; they shall walk and not faint”.
So, taking the song from the start and leading through its revelation, call to action and decisions made.
“Climbing up on Solsbury Hill I could see the city light
Wind was blowing, time stood still
Eagle flew out of the night
He was something to observe
Came in close, I heard a voice
Standing, stretching every nerve
I had to listen had no choice
I did not believe the information
I just had to trust imagination
My heart going boom, boom, boom
Son, he said, grab your things I’ve come to take you home.”
Peter experiences what many Christians also feel; a voice, that of God, the doubt of what one is hearing, the physical response of the body (the heart). The message; “You are being offered a new way, a new life, a new home that you were always meant to have.” The feeling of an experience out of time and this reality while one is still standing in this reality.
“To keep in silence I resigned
My friends would think I was a nut
Turning water into wine
Open doors would soon be shut
So I went from day to day
Though my life was in a rut
Till I thought of what I’d say
And which connection I should cut
I was feeling part of the scenery
I walked right out of the machinery
My heart going boom, boom, boom
Son, he said, grab your things I’ve come to take you home.”
Like many of us, there is not an immediate acceptance; the invitation is just too overwhelming and counter-intuitive. Like many a Christian, Peter keeps the revelation to himself. He knows that to tell others would be to provoke a pushback and incomprehension. Many, many Christians find telling their family and community about a new-found faith and revelation extremely hard. Not the least because most people will view them very differently from that point and even consider them ‘a nut’. Anyone who accepts the Spirit is “turning water into wine”. There is a leap of faith into a Creation where miracles happen, where intuitive responses to the Holy Spirit stretch every nerve, spark imagination and demand we act in opposition to what the secular world says it correct and in our best interests. So much has to be given up to actually let the Spirit guide us. But the Holy Spirit keeps repeating the invitation: “grab your things I’ve come to take you home.”
“When illusion spin her net
I’m never where I want to be
And liberty she pirouette
When I think that I am free
Watched by empty silhouettes
Close their eyes but still can see
No one taught them etiquette
So I will show another me
Today I don’t need a replacement
I’ll tell them what the smile on my face meant
My heart going boom, boom, boom
Hey, I said, you can keep my things they’ve come to take me home.”
Christians recognise that Jesus has an often different way to this world. There is an illusion in this life of who has power. The dance of true freedom is beyond the rules, mores and etiquette of the dust of the Earth. At the end of the song Peter finds the courage from his spiritual experience to say who he really is and act that way. It is a tremendous physical, spiritual and intellectual release, “My heart going boom, boom, boom.”
But you also notice, the last line has changed: “Hey, I said, you can keep my things they’ve come to take me home.”
Peter at the end does not even grab his things to be taken home. He gives them away and heads off to his new life. And then, as I said earlier, the whole experience overwhelms him and he is wracked in an explosion of joyous noises and shouts. But it is speaking in tongues we understand because of what has been said earlier.
To my mind the music and arrangement of this song linked with its words are a wonderful exposition of the Holy Spirit at work in our contemporary world. The song is a great way of showing non-Christians and Christians the epiphany like engagement, challenges and changes that the Holy Spirit works in our lives. The Nature of the Holy Spirit is to light us up, to give us the tool by which we access all the gifts God has created in us.
The Friday Fix 