Believing
Current Top Bible Verse: He won't brush aside the bruised and the hurt and he won't disregard the small and insignificant, but he'll steadily and firmly set things right. (Isaiah 42:3, The Message)
Welcome | Worship | Word | Works
Welcome
This section of the site was formerly called "Jesus Freak". While I've changed the naming scheme, it's still a description I don't mind. What is a 'Jesus Freak'? Someone who is 'souled out' on the idea that Jesus of Nazareth is God's chosen Messiah; someone who, in the words of Keith Green, is 'Bananas for Jesus'. I came across the 'Jesus Freak' tag on the album of the same name by DC Talk. Although I sometimes don't feel radical enough in my faith to deserve it, I'm going to hang onto it because it reminds just what I have committed myself to.
By the way, if you're interested in this section, you might also like to take a look at the Christian section of my blog.
Worship
While living in London, I attended Hither Green Baptist Church (HGBC), Lewisham, London). I played bass in the group and led worship about once month. If you thought church music was just old hymns with organ accompaniment you'd better take a look at my bassist page!
I created various pages giving information about the songs we used:
- Songs sung in 2008-09 (interactive)
- Songs sung in 2007 (interactive)
- Songs sung in 2006 (interactive)
- Songs sung in 2005 (interactive)
- Songs sung in 2004 (interactive)
- Songs sung in 2003 (interactive)
- Songs sung in 2002 (interactive)
- Songs sung in 2001 (interactive)
- Songs sung in 2000 (static)
- Song keys in 2000 (static)
You could also visit Worship Released, which is an excellent online resource for discussion about worship.
You can also read a short poem I crafted at a cell group meeting.
Word
During my time at HGBC, I had some opportunities to preach. The most recent sermon I delivered, in August 2000, was on the subject of transformation - "Can we really be changed?". I've also published a message that I posted to the Churchbass mailing list, that turned into a somewhat longer essay than I'd originally planned, entitled "Is The Sermon What It's All About?".
I also have the text of my first sermon at HGBC, in January 1997, available online: "The God Who is My Strength".
Works
The key feature in the life of HGBC has been various forms of small groups. From 1999 to 2006 the church ran cell groups. I was very involved in this and wrote several pages about cells as well as borrowing the "Four W's" structure used for the subheadings on this page!
I will just mention one link before closing this page - the World Wide Bible Gateway. Now you've no longer got the excuse that you never had access to a Bible (unless the gospelcom server is down!) because the gateway has several complete translations online... and if you are a Christian, you will probably find the search facilities invaluable for tracking down that passage which is stuck on the tip of your tongue.