…. sums up where I’m coming from and the kind of music I’m into…. heard Elvis back in the ’50s, picked up a guitar and started to play…. along the way I studied Chemistry, worked in the Gas Industry, played Rock n Roll in pubs and clubs across the Northwest of England…. picked up the ‘ways of the world’ including a bad alcohol habit…. then met a man who said ‘there’s something missing in your life……!’
Found peace, forgiveness and a satisfied mind when I became a follower of Jesus in the Summer of ’69…. caught a glimpse in my heart of a cross on a hill where He paid the price for all that I’ve done wrong and I put my trust in Him…. helped form the Country Gospel Band ‘Canaan’ that made a couple of albums along the way…. they started out selling slowly, then faded out of sight so I never got the silver shell suit and the Mercedes Benz!….. heard the call to ‘go into all the world with a voice of singing….’ and finally left the day job in 1976 to spend the rest of my life doing just that, passing on the Good News about Jesus Christ.
Spent the early years singing and speaking in schools, colleges and even universities plus setting up coffee bars as another way to reach out to young people with the Good News.
Made regular visits to mainland Europe for 25 years or so which among other things involved taking an audio/visual drugs awareness programme called CHOOSE LIFE into schools, mainly in Poland and Hungary…. also visited prisons, rehab units and churches.
I’m a long way down the road now, being on the wrong side of 75 (!)…. but still visit prisons and soup kitchens in the UK as well as speaking in churches in the North West and giving gospel concerts where and whenever the opportunities arise.
COVID 19 has rather put a stop to these activities in recent months but God willing I’ll be back on that road before too long! WATCH THIS SPACE!
music & songs
Most songs come along when I’m sat in one of those ‘dusty old rooms of my mind’ with a slightly battered much-travelled Gibson J45 to hand…. a scene I’ve lived, a face I’ve met, an awareness that all you can see isn’t all that there is….and a knowledge of the Holy One that comes from reading the Bible…… ‘Be still and know that I am God’, sang the Psalmist… maybe you’ll hear that quiet whisper…. the Saviour saying, “Follow Me.”
just a thought
Life has always been a bit of a vale of tears…. getting used to the idea that everything nice ends and everyone you love dies was always going to be a bit of a downer no matter how you sliced it – hence the blues.
The modern thinker often has a very complex answer including genetics, evolution, conditioning and a whole bunch of other stuff most of us don’t understand.
I’m convinced that the answer is much simpler and is found in the bible – hence the gospel shoes.
God made us in his image and we blew it…. ’get off my planet I’m gonna sail my ship alone’, is the cry of the human heart and the root of all that’s wrong
ignoring God and his rules for living in this life leads to separation from him now and for ever….
But the gospel always was good news…. ‘God loved the world so much that he gave his one and only Son that whoever believes in him shall not perish but have eternal life’.
A cross on a hill where sin was paid for, an empty tomb in a garden where resurrection became a reality stand as testimony to the truth of it all.
Jesus said, “change your mind and believe the Good News”…. countless millions have done just that finding peace, forgiveness and a satisfied mind, yes and even joy in the vale of tears…. plus a real hope of the eternal life he promised…. AND YOU CAN TOO! simply turn to Him and trust in Him.