When the tears fall [worship song by tim hughes]

i have not met Tim Hughes personally, but i was once in a room with him [and quite a large room at that]

it was on a trip to visit my sister Sue and her family in a town called Rancho Cucamonga near LA which must have been 2006 or 2008 and i organised my ticket so i could stop over in London long enough to take the bus to visit some friends in Holland before continuing on to Americaland.

when i lived in London for about 6 months in 2000 i had attended and really enjoyed a church called Holy Trinity Brompton or HTB [where i had inadvertently ended up with some screen time on the filmed for ITV Alpha Course that church and its pastor Nicky Gumbel is known for – i also helped inspire at least one third of a relationships preach with my ‘is sex better than chocolate?’ question i popped into one of their panel discussions which they decided to answer as if it was a serious question, but that’s another blog post] and so on the way back from Holland i had made a plan to go and visit a service before my flight to Americaland.

something happened with the bus or my directions and i ended up being quite late for the service and i walked in as this youngish, decent looking dude started to preach and it was a really great preach, littered with references to “my friend Matt” which i didn’t quite get until afterwards when i discovered he was Tim Hughes [a worship leader whose songs i really enjoy] and ‘my friend Matt’ was of course Matt Redman [who i have met and interviewed on radio and asked stupid questions like ‘if you were a vegetable, what vegetable would you be?’ true story, i was young]. it was really cool for me that i got to hear the preach and evaluate it on its merits [as i had no idea who he was the whole time he was preaching] as opposed to listening to it through the filter of  ‘ooh, that’s Tim Hughes’ and i learnt that he is a really good preacher as well.

so yes, Tim Hughes, really enjoy his song writing and songs and this is one of my favourites [i really enjoy how real and rough and raw it is, just so honest] , but first the story of how he came to write it:

‘The song, ‘When The Tears Fall,’ was birthed out of a hard time I was going through. One evening I sat with my guitar and poured out my heart to God. I found great hope and strength being able to express my pain, and in the midst of the doubt singing, ‘I will praise You, I will praise You. When the tears fall still I will sing to You.’ Initially, I thought it wasn’t a song that could be sung in a Church context. We don’t seem to sing many songs of lament. However, as I read through the Psalms, I discovered many cries of worship that came from a place of brokenness. Life is full of pain and sorrow. Loved ones die, dreams fail, people get hurt – we are left with unanswered questions. That’s the reality of the world we line in. Yet in the midst of the pain, through the tears God is good. He is and always will be worthy of our praise.’ – Tim Hughes

WHEN THE TEARS FALL by Tim hughes

I’ve had questions, without answers
I’ve known sorrow, I have known pain
But there’s one thing, that I’ll cling to
You are faithful, Jesus You’re true

When hope is lost, I’ll call You Savior
When paid surrounds, I’ll call You healer
When silence falls, You’ll be the song within my heart

In the lone hour of my sorrow
Through the darkest night of my soul
You surround me and sustain me
My defender, forevermore

I will praise You, I will praise You
When the tears fall, still I will sing to You
I will praise You, Jesus praise You
Through the suffering still I will sing

Written by Tim Hughes. © 2003 Thankyou Music/ PRS/ Admin by worshiptogether.com Songs for the world excluding the UK and Europe which is admin by Kingsway Music

[You can listen to it here]

Rejected Olympic Events

this started out as a hashtag on Twitter i believe, but why should everyone else miss out on the fun…

so far we have such winners as:

Anne Hirsch for North Pole Volting, Synchronised Swinging and Underwater singing

Bruce Collins for Field Hickey and Archrivalry

and of course i have been going crazy but amongst my suggestions are such diverse elements as:

Cross Country Music, Intimate Frisbee, Underwater Signing, Corgi Putt, Table Tenants, Stolen Television Fencing, The Hundred mm Print, dress-[your]-age, the M.C. Hammer, individual discuss, the lesser known Venezuelan Wave

all of these are Rejected Olympic Events… remembering that this is by and large a family show, what other events can you think of to add to the list? let’s have one event per comment… [or high five one someone else mentioned that you thought was particularly clever or witty]

oh shucks it’s trigger happy

was it just me or did anyone else watching the latest Leon Shuster movie notice the two BLATANT thieveries he committed from that brilliant show ‘Trigger Happy’ from the UK [think man in snail suit crawling across pedestrian crossing in front of a growing irate stream of traffic or else people in giant animal suits beating each other up and of course the giant cellphone and nokia ringtone – “HELLO, WHAT? NO I’M IN A LIBRARY. IT’S RUBBISH”]

pulling the traffic over into a no stopping zone as a traffic officer and then giving them a fine cos “you can’t park here sir, it’s a double yellow” – only difference was Dom Joly picked on okes at traffic lights or stuck in traffic and didn’t actually pull them over but same gag

and then interviewing famous people (Tony ‘Baldrick’ Robinson, Ken Livingstone (mayor of London), Terry ‘Monty Python’ Gilliam and so on) vs (Helen Zille, Allan Boesak, Rob van Vuuren) with someone walking into the shot and being repeatedly asked to move out and then having the interviewer (Joly/Shuster) beat the crap out of them with the interviewee not quite knowing what to do (except maybe for Helen Zille who launched herself between them)

oh and does anyone have Dom Joly’s email address, because…