"We are travellers…not yet in our native land" – St. Augustine
“[Y]ou can learn a great deal about an artist from the works he creates. Surely you see that God is more creative than we can possibly imagine, and romatic to the core. Lovers and honeymooners choose places like Hawaii, the Bahamas, or Tuscany as a backdrop for their love. But whose idea was Hawaii, the Bahamas or Tuscany?” – John Eldridge, Epic, Page 46
Wow…just…wow…
Honestly, who’s this meant to convince?
I was recently speaking with a friend from a non-liturgical congregation about the beauty of liturgy. I was going to write a post explaining why we do liturgy, but then I realized that I wouldn’t be able to do any better than Michael Spender’s (aka “The Internet Monk”) piece Dr. StrangeLiturgy:
At University I became a huge fan of the Italian opera singer Andrea Bocelli after first hearing his album Songo. This blind musician has thrilled audiences around the world for years now. In the video below Andrea tells us a little story…
(Thanks to Erika for this one)
Today I’d like to talk about one of the songs from a recent album of my favourite contemporary Christian band, Casting Crowns. The song is entitled “Wedding Day” and describes the wedding feast of Heaven when Christ’s Bride, the Church, is finally presented to the Him:
Towards the end of the song there’s a lyric which speaks of the scarred hands of Christ wiping away every tear:
When the hand that bears the only scars and heaven touch her face
And the last tears she’ll ever cried are finally wiped away
And the clouds roll back as He takes her hand and walks her through the gates
Forever we will reign
At the beginning of Advent I did a short post with a video of my favourite Advent hymn, “O Come, O Come, Emmanuel” (The Piano Guys were even good enough to release their rendition of that hymn today on YouTube).
Today I wanted to share one of my favourite non-religious Advent-ish songs. The song is by Karmin, the group which rose to fame on YouTube after releasing their own version of Chris Brown’s Look At Me Now. Here’s their newly-released song, “Sleigh Ride”:
I’ll admit I still find it very strange listening to songs which talk about snow while living in Southern California…
So what’s your favourite non-religious Advent/Christmas song?
It’s now December and time to start thinking about New Year Resolutions for 2013. Here’s a little bit of inspiration for you to try something new next year:
What new thing are you going to try in 2013? What new things do you think I should do?