Spotlighting some of the songs on The Experience 8
DEBBY BARNES
"Hurry To This Heart"
Essentially this song is
about the human condition. Christians are not immune from the things
the world throws at us. And from time to time each one of us is likely
to throw ourselves before God and moan about it! This crying out to
God is something I believe every Christian needs to be real about.
MIKE ROBERTS
"Still Time"
"So High"
This is the title
track of the album and reflects on a simple truth for both Christians
and non-Christians: that there's still time to accept him as Lord and,
for believers, still time to go deeper into his purposes and plans.
The whole thrust of the album is relaxing jazz music, jazz that is
accessible, whether you're hearing it on an Alpha meal, a concert or a
club.
The song "So High" is not really representative of the
album as a whole. I have a strong conviction that this is a song God
gave me in a very direct way. In fact, we sing it at the church where
I'm worship leader, as a congregational song. I
COASTAL DUNE
"Beautiful"
(Nick Drake)
It was one of
those songs that came easily. I was standing in a room looking out of
the window. It was a beautiful day. Suddenly I was thinking, "This is
beautiful." But of course a sense of that beauty comes through the
perspective of a relationship with God. The verses reflect on the fact
that there's also going to be pain and struggle. But even there, with
God in our lives life does have times of real beauty.
SONS OF THUNDER
"Hung Up On A Cross"
(Lewis Turner)
The recording is actually an amalgamation of two songs. The verse is
pretty straightforward though it contains the lines, "When I wander
from your path/As you know I often will." It's easy to write songs
full of shallow triumphalism but we need to be real in our
songwriting. The chorus is equally personal, expressing how we all
contributed to Jesus' pain as he hung on that cross.
LIZ SHEA
"Trust"
It was inspired by two things. One was
valuing the trust I have with my husband. Trust is such a precious
thing and if it breaks down it is incredibly hard to restore. Another
thing which influenced the writing of the song was a friend of mine
who was going through real problems with her teenage son. She had come
to a place where she told him, "I can't trust a word you say." It's a
real tragedy when that happens. As I said, when trust goes it's very,
very hard to rebuild.
RICHARD REID BAND
"Keep On"
This deals with disappointment,
a subject that many people working in Christian music know a lot
about! The lyrics go, "Why should I be disappointed/When I know I've
been anointed?" The fact is though that being involved in ministry
often puts us into a place where we come under attack and we need to
come back again to a place of 1 God's comfort and protection.
DREAMCOAT
"No Glitter"
(Ivan Malin)
This song
deals with star signs, cosmic charts and all that rubbish that is
promoted these days. I heard a radio show recently and it had all this
nonsense about when the moon's in alignment with the planets, etc. It
was terrible. The chorus of the song goes, "All I need is the God I
trust/None of your glittery stuff."