writers block

At one time I wrote songs reasonably regularly. If ever I sit down to do it these days I tend to draw a blank. The problem isn't the music but the words. When I look at my attempt they seemtrite or contrived. Could it be that in our increasingly sophisticated world, everything is more difficult to do. Look at the 60's the age of the Beatles and veiw some of their hit lyrics:

She loves you yeah yeah yeah, she loves you yeak yeah yeah, she loves you yeah yeah yeah yeah.

Deep.

Christian songwriters try and avoid the - Jesus died on the cross, to take away our loss thing and do something a bit more creative and come up with stuff like - "Healing rain in falling down, it's coming closer to this old town" hmmm.

It seems to me that the safest way is to find a song that's already been written from the bible, say a psalm and put it to music or else work from a passage, at least the source material would be goo.

I think that's what I'll do, let you know how I get on.

Brotherly Love

I have been thinking lately about the importance of friendship. These are days when commodities increase, those things with a shelf life that we use and discard. Heaven forbid that people should become commoditised; in other words assimilated when of use and thrown away when we judge they have served their purpose. Love becoming a shop window experience rather than commitment of the heart. Callous or not we sometimes see another person as a stepping stone to achieving our goal, someone who we can tread on, albeit ever so gently, in order to attain our purpose.

The remedy for this is true friendship, relationships based not on what a person can do for us but upon who they are. Friendships like this are costly, for no two of us are alike and we have to work at synergy; sacrificing parts of ourselves in order that we may fit better with the other person. This is not about romance, although romance and friendship together can lead to love, it is about brotherhood (call that sisterhood if you like).

In the same way that we can be religious and keep God out of our lives so too we can be social without friends because life does not exist in the outward things but in the heart. Salvation will always be free but walking with God is costly, as is walking with brothers. We would never say that half an hour with God is wasted especially when we have fought our distractions to bring it about in the same way half an hour of "wasted" time with our friend is in fact time very well spent.