Latest / The Speak Life Podcast / Every Moment Holy: Why Liturgy Is Making A Comeback || SLP655

Transcript

Every Moment Holy: Why Liturgy Is Making A Comeback || SLP655 · The Speak Life Podcast

0:00
SPEAKER_08: We're not meaning makers.
0:01
SPEAKER_08: These little things find a sense of meaning because they're in a bigger story.
0:04
SPEAKER_08: A desire for structure to feel held in the midst of this chaotic world that we see in an embracing of the liturgical and in the secular embracing of religion, even if they won't embrace Christ.
0:16
SPEAKER_03: This is the liturgy for those who doff film things.
0:20
SPEAKER_03: For those of us who are called to share Christ online, please give us the strength to do so boldly and creatively.
0:26
SPEAKER_03: All of these little details that feel quite mundane and irrelevant are actually highly relevant because they are part of this universe that God has created and we, as his image bearers, experience.
0:38
SPEAKER_08: I've got a bunch more questions about Every Moment Holy.
0:40
SPEAKER_08: What if phrases from Every Moment Holy are forming my thinking more than the Bible is forming my thinking?
0:48
SPEAKER_08: Is there something that only the local church can and should do when it comes to corporate prayer?
0:54
SPEAKER_03: Hmm.
0:59
SPEAKER_03: Today on the Speak Life Podcast, we're talking about something that's gone viral in certain Christian circles.
1:05
SPEAKER_03: It's not a video, it's not a meme, it's a prayer book.
1:10
SPEAKER_03: Every moment holy is what we're talking about.
1:12
SPEAKER_03: Naomi, for anyone who doesn't know what is every moment holy, and how did you come across?
1:17
SPEAKER_08: Yeah, every moment holy is the name of now a series of books, um, which are prayers for various different everyday life situations.
1:28
SPEAKER_08: Which I flipping love.
1:31
SPEAKER_08: Um I remember, so how did I come across it?
1:34
SPEAKER_08: I remember, I think I first came across it because it was in a friend's kitchen and it was sat open on um for the preparation of a meal.
1:42
SPEAKER_08: That prayer.
1:43
SPEAKER_08: And and I think I just s sort of like stood there and read it and thought, oh, this is not like fluffy.
1:51
SPEAKER_08: You know, these this prayer is profound and joyful and yeah, helps me think about the significance of this preparing a meal, which is something I don't take much joy in.
2:02
SPEAKER_08: Um someone asked me the other day, they're like, Oh, do you like cooking?
2:06
SPEAKER_08: I was like, no, I I like people and people need to be fed.
2:10
SPEAKER_08: So I think I then might have asked for it for Christmas.
2:13
SPEAKER_08: Um, and I think my parents maybe got it for me.
2:17
SPEAKER_08: Apologies if it was someone else that got it for me.
2:19
SPEAKER_08: Someone got it for me.
2:20
SPEAKER_08: It is produced by the Rabbit Room, who I hadn't heard of and didn't know what it was referring to until someone explained to me that the Rabbit Room was the name of the room in the pub where the inklings used to meet in Oxford.
2:35
SPEAKER_08: Is that right?
2:35
SPEAKER_08: Ah, yes.
2:36
SPEAKER_08: And the inklings were CS of this?
2:39
SPEAKER_08: J.R.R.R.
2:40
SPEAKER_08: Tolkien.
2:41
SPEAKER_03: Yes.
2:41
SPEAKER_03: And can you name the others?
2:42
SPEAKER_08: No, I cannot.
2:43
SPEAKER_03: I can't either.
2:45
SPEAKER_08: There were others.
2:46
SPEAKER_08: Zero research was done for this podcast episode.
2:48
SPEAKER_08: Um Rambit Room, I think, are based in the States.
2:52
SPEAKER_03: And this book is written by Doug McKelvey.
2:56
SPEAKER_08: Yeah, Douglas McKelvey.
2:58
SPEAKER_08: And um and I was gonna say illustrated, but the so the illustrations are Lino Prints by Ned Bustard, and they're amazing.
3:06
SPEAKER_03: All right, well, I'd actually be quite interested in hearing some extracts from some of these.
3:12
SPEAKER_03: So let's have a bit of the ritual for morning coffee.
3:19
SPEAKER_02: Meet me, O Christ, in the stillness of morning.
3:22
SPEAKER_02: Move me, O Spirit, to quiet my heart.
3:25
SPEAKER_02: Mend me, O Father, from yesterday's harms.
3:29
SPEAKER_03: What about for one who is employed?
3:33
SPEAKER_01: O Christ who supplies my every need, I praise you for all provisions and for the means by which they are provided.
3:40
SPEAKER_01: For my current employment in this season of life, I give you thanks.
3:44
SPEAKER_01: By it, may I meet my own needs and contribute to the needs of others.
3:50
SPEAKER_03: Oh, this one looks interesting.
3:52
SPEAKER_03: Before consuming media.
3:55
SPEAKER_03: What kind of media?
3:56
SPEAKER_03: Like TV or film or something.
3:58
SPEAKER_08: Well, yeah, I guess anything.
3:59
SPEAKER_08: I want I prayed it with a friend in Canada before we watched.
4:04
SPEAKER_08: Oh my gosh, what's the name of the film that was like the red panda that was actually about periods?
4:08
SPEAKER_03: Oh, turning red.
4:11
SPEAKER_03: It's not Pixar's best, is it?
4:13
SPEAKER_03: But I did watch that.
4:15
SPEAKER_03: Yeah.
4:15
SPEAKER_09: That's actually the only time I've prayed that.
4:17
SPEAKER_03: Okay.
4:19
SPEAKER_03: Did it help?
4:20
SPEAKER_00: Yeah, I think it did, yeah.
4:22
SPEAKER_00: May the stories I partake of and the ways in which I engage with them make me, in the end, a more empathetic Christ-bearer, more compassionate, more aware of my own brokenness and need for grace, better able to understand the hopes and fears and failings of my fellow humans.
4:39
SPEAKER_03: Let's hear, for arriving at the ocean, a bit of that.
4:44
SPEAKER_08: We have travelled this day to the bounding sea, O Lord, to the far edge of the habitable land, as to the utter end of our own measure and ability and strength to find here reminders of your limitless presence extended immeasurably beyond us.
5:00
SPEAKER_08: In this place, may we recall our blessed smallness.
5:08
SPEAKER_03: And finally, not currently in this situation, but I can imagine this would be useful.
5:12
SPEAKER_03: For the loss of electricity.
5:15
SPEAKER_03: Power cut prayer.
5:16
SPEAKER_03: Yeah.
5:17
SPEAKER_03: Amazing.
5:18
SPEAKER_09: Power cut prayer.
5:21
SPEAKER_03: Use even little deprivations like this loss of power to reorient our hearts to the all-sufficient Christ, reminding us that we are not dependent upon comforts or conveniences for anything that truly matters.
5:37
SPEAKER_03: You are our everything, Lord Jesus.
5:41
SPEAKER_03: Brilliant.
5:42
SPEAKER_03: Well, there we go.
5:43
SPEAKER_03: I I'm sold at least.
5:44
SPEAKER_03: I really like the concept.
5:46
SPEAKER_03: I've I've never prayed any of them myself or read any of these books, but I feel like I might go out and and get a copy.
5:51
SPEAKER_08: Yeah, well, the nice thing as well, the third volume has um prayers from hundreds of years ago woven into it.
6:00
SPEAKER_08: Yeah.
6:01
SPEAKER_08: Which is lovely.
6:01
SPEAKER_08: So it's kind of a mixture of modern life, you know, for those who are flooded by too much information or cover the latest technology, but then also some stuff from Francis of Assisi.
6:13
SPEAKER_03: Right.
6:14
SPEAKER_08: And um Johannes Kepler.
6:16
SPEAKER_08: Johannes?
6:17
SPEAKER_08: Johannes probably.
6:18
SPEAKER_08: Uh Christina Rossetti, Dorothy Sayers.
6:21
SPEAKER_08: It's like, yeah, the third volume is pretty cool like that.
6:23
SPEAKER_08: But what yeah, what I particularly love, because I use various different prayer books for different things, and what I really like about these are that it like they're able to uh set this moment and this situation into the wider context of the narrative of Jesus' story and of the story of reality.
6:44
SPEAKER_08: It doesn't do the kind of joyful, hopeful thing and ignore sin and grief.
6:49
SPEAKER_08: And these prayers, the the the reason why I come back to them is because they help me to hold both things together and that is gold dust.
6:57
SPEAKER_03: There are lots of parts of every day that just feel quite boring and detached from the Christian life in that laundry and stuff is just something we all have to do.
7:08
SPEAKER_08: Yeah, yeah, for the for the laundry, for the paying of bills.
7:12
SPEAKER_08: There's one around um there's actually I think there are a few for changing diapers, as the Americans call them.
7:18
SPEAKER_08: Right.
7:19
SPEAKER_08: Changing nappies.
7:20
SPEAKER_08: Or for difficulty breastfeeding.
7:22
SPEAKER_08: There's like all kinds of scenarios there, you know.
7:24
SPEAKER_03: Yeah, and these are all things that because you know, as as Abraham Kuiper said, there is not a square inch of the cosmos over which Jesus Christ does not say mine.
7:33
SPEAKER_09: So I can't hear that.
7:37
SPEAKER_09: I've had like I can't hear that quote without thinking of the seagulls in finding Nemo.
7:43
SPEAKER_03: Mine.
7:44
SPEAKER_03: Yes, that's good.
7:45
SPEAKER_03: That's good.
7:46
SPEAKER_03: But again, yeah, even the seagulls in finding Nemo.
7:50
SPEAKER_03: Yeah.
7:50
SPEAKER_03: Um, all of these little details that feel quite mundane and irrelevant are actually highly relevant because they are part of this universe that God has created and we, as his image bearers, experienced.
8:03
SPEAKER_08: Yes, and controversially, perhaps, for a Speak Life employee, I wonder whether these books have been one of my favourite resources for seeing life through the lens of Jesus.
8:16
SPEAKER_03: Wow.
8:17
SPEAKER_06: Oh yeah, that is what we are all about at Speak Life, isn't it?
8:19
SPEAKER_06: The doors over there, now This is what happens when we record a podcast without Glenn.
8:26
SPEAKER_08: Um in that, what I wonder is I like I am very taken with 321, the course that that we do at Speak Life, and I think it is such a helpful and beautiful image of the big picture of life, you know, God, the world, and you, how it all fits together, zooming out and making sense of life through the lens of Jesus in that in that way.
8:49
SPEAKER_08: And then it's kind of like every moment holy helps me to zoom in and see like the smallest little bits of my life through the lens of Jesus.
9:00
SPEAKER_08: And so I wonder if we're kind of like, you know, siblings.
9:03
SPEAKER_08: If we're like kindred spirits in this whole see life through the lens of Jesus thing.
9:07
SPEAKER_08: It's like verifocals or something.
9:09
SPEAKER_08: That's I like that.
9:11
SPEAKER_08: We do long distance and they do the short.
9:17
SPEAKER_08: At Speak Life, we want to help deep thinkers navigate modern life, bringing clarity and joy by seeing everything through the lens of Jesus.
9:25
SPEAKER_03: Yes, we do.
9:26
SPEAKER_03: You'll find us on YouTube, Instagram, all the socials we get around.
9:31
SPEAKER_03: But here on the Speak Life Podcast, we slow down in conversation with each other, guests, and you, our audience.
9:39
SPEAKER_08: Yeah, you hear lots from us, but we would love to hear from you.
9:42
SPEAKER_08: So drop us a line, podcast at speaklife.org.uk, and give us your NFL stats, your name, a favourite thing, and location.
9:52
SPEAKER_08: So for example.
9:54
SPEAKER_03: Alright, um, I'm Thomas.
9:56
SPEAKER_03: I my favourite beetle is uh Paul McCartney.
10:01
SPEAKER_03: Okay.
10:02
SPEAKER_03: You didn't know I was going there, did you?
10:04
SPEAKER_03: And I am tuning in from my sofa.
10:07
SPEAKER_08: Or I'm Naomi.
10:09
SPEAKER_08: My favourite weather is cold and sunny, and I live in East Sussex.
10:13
SPEAKER_08: So give us your NFL stats, name favourite thing, and location, and then fire away with your question or comment.
10:20
SPEAKER_03: That's podcast at speaklife.org.uk.
10:23
SPEAKER_08: Back to the conversation.
10:27
SPEAKER_03: Hutchmoot is a bizarre word.
10:31
SPEAKER_03: It's a conference that is put on by the Rabbit Room, who publish these books every moment holy.
10:38
SPEAKER_03: They did it in the States for a while, and then people were like, this is great.
10:41
SPEAKER_03: We should do this in the UK as well.
10:43
SPEAKER_03: So for a few years now it's been running in the UK.
10:46
SPEAKER_03: I've the I think Hutchmoot 2026 was the third one I've been to.
10:50
SPEAKER_03: It was your first one.
10:52
SPEAKER_05: Yeah, newbie.
10:53
SPEAKER_03: It's called Hutch Moot because I suppose rabbits live in hutches, so that makes sense.
10:58
SPEAKER_03: So it's Hutch and then moot.
11:00
SPEAKER_03: I think they explained this at the conference.
11:02
SPEAKER_03: That means like a kind of hangout gathering meeting.
11:05
SPEAKER_05: Maybe.
11:06
SPEAKER_03: Yeah.
11:06
SPEAKER_03: So we're gathering in the hutch to moot.
11:09
SPEAKER_03: And the way I tend to describe it to people who ask, What the heck is this conference you're going to every year?
11:15
SPEAKER_03: I say it's kind of it's kind of a collective of Christians who are interested in art.
11:19
SPEAKER_03: So not necessarily Christian artists, because that could be quite intimidating if you feel you have to be a full-time artist in some capacity to go.
11:28
SPEAKER_03: A lot of the people are, or a lot of people are doing art as a hobby in some shape or form.
11:32
SPEAKER_03: But a lot of people who go aren't necessarily doing art themselves, but just appreciate it, want to find out more about it.
11:39
SPEAKER_03: And we just kind of hang out, go to seminars, go to evening events together, eat together.
11:44
SPEAKER_03: The conversations around the bar are always great.
11:47
SPEAKER_03: People have pipes that they're smoking.
11:49
SPEAKER_03: I'm not cool enough to be in that group.
11:51
SPEAKER_03: But you don't have to be a pipe smoker to go.
11:54
SPEAKER_03: But uh, this intersects with every moment holy because Doug McKelvey and Ned Bustard, who did the illustrations for it, were both there.
12:03
SPEAKER_03: They're regularly both there at Hutchmoot.
12:06
SPEAKER_03: And you had an opportunity to meet them, right?
12:08
SPEAKER_03: Your heroes.
12:09
SPEAKER_03: Yeah, oh yeah.
12:10
SPEAKER_08: Well, oh yeah, it was lovely.
12:13
SPEAKER_08: The strange thing about this conference, it was like, it was like, you know, I'm having a conversation with someone over breakfast, and then it's like, oh wait, oh wait, you're not just John, you're John Hendrix, you wrote the book I just read.
12:24
SPEAKER_08: Like wow, love myth makers.
12:26
SPEAKER_08: Thank you so much for writing that.
12:28
SPEAKER_08: That was awesome.
12:28
SPEAKER_08: Do you know what I mean?
12:29
SPEAKER_08: Like it was the kind of conference where everyone is very interesting and has done amazing things.
12:34
SPEAKER_08: And um, yeah, it was cool to get to meet Doug and Ned.
12:39
SPEAKER_08: And um Ned was teaching people how to do their little his little lino prints.
12:44
SPEAKER_03: Yes.
12:45
SPEAKER_03: Um and they they are quite beautiful, aren't they?
12:47
SPEAKER_03: Yeah, they're cool, yeah.
12:48
SPEAKER_03: I gather he spends several hours on each one kind of carving it out into a block of it.
12:54
SPEAKER_08: It's all very well thought through.
12:55
SPEAKER_08: It's I feels like it's I mean, I've not done enough reading and thinking about iconography.
13:01
SPEAKER_03: Right.
13:02
SPEAKER_08: But it feels may maybe you know a bit about this.
13:04
SPEAKER_08: It feels like it touches on that a bit.
13:07
SPEAKER_03: Well, I happen to go to Ned's session which was on uh some of the symbolism that he uses in these images because all the details are kind of relevant and linked to art from throughout church history.
13:23
SPEAKER_08: Okay, that's why it has that kind of vibe.
13:25
SPEAKER_03: Yeah.
13:26
SPEAKER_08: Like certain hand gestures or like halos around someone's head, that kind of Yeah, and the numbers of things are significant.
13:34
SPEAKER_03: So I don't want to give too much away because uh these are sort of fun details for people to figure out.
13:40
SPEAKER_03: But one is, for instance, when he draws a tree of life in the background of some of them, he'll put 12 fruits on it.
13:47
SPEAKER_03: And 12 is a significant biblical number.
13:50
SPEAKER_03: But my personal favourite piece of symbolism, which I hadn't heard before, the dolphin.
13:55
SPEAKER_08: Oh, I literally just flicked open to the this dolphin.
13:58
SPEAKER_03: There we go.
13:59
SPEAKER_03: So so the dolphin, believe it or not, actually appears in quite a few stained glass windows throughout church history.
14:05
SPEAKER_03: What do you think the dolphin represents?
14:07
SPEAKER_08: Oh man.
14:08
SPEAKER_08: How am I supposed okay right.
14:10
SPEAKER_08: See dolphins through the lens of Jesus.
14:13
SPEAKER_07: Well, okay.
14:16
SPEAKER_07: Let me have a think.
14:18
SPEAKER_08: So um things I'm thinking of include would it be like a happy alternative to the beast of the like Leviathan, like some kind of like uh, you know, the the sea monster, sea dragon.
14:36
SPEAKER_08: Like the sea kind of represents darkness and chaos, and maybe the dolphin is like a nice happy presence.
14:46
SPEAKER_03: And who could that be?
14:47
SPEAKER_09: Oh, the Jesus of the ocean.
14:49
SPEAKER_03: Is that yeah, so apparently the dolphin represents Jesus, and it it's because there were lots of stories, I don't know how true these are, of dolphins rescuing sailors that had fallen overboard.
15:03
SPEAKER_09: Oh, like little little mini saviours bobbing around.
15:07
SPEAKER_03: So how cool is it?
15:09
SPEAKER_03: Cool.
15:10
SPEAKER_03: So Doug and Ned were milling around talking about Every Moment Holy, talking about the imagery in Every Moment Holy, but it kind of culminated in an evening event called Every Moment Holy Live, which is apparently the first time they've ever done it.
15:25
SPEAKER_08: In the UK.
15:25
SPEAKER_03: In the UK, that's right.
15:27
SPEAKER_03: Yeah.
15:28
SPEAKER_03: So we all gathered in a room at the conference, and there were musicians playing songs, there were readings from Every Moment Holy from different people.
15:38
SPEAKER_08: I mean, you talked about it kind of going viral.
15:40
SPEAKER_08: I guess in some corners of the church, um, people are really enjoying this resource, and so it's gone from like one volume to three volumes, and then it's oh, I think there's another one as well, um, coming out about rites of passage, and then they're now turning them into songs and putting the words from Every Moment Holy into songs, and so that was kind of part of what that evening was.
16:03
SPEAKER_08: It was a funny mix between is this a performance?
16:06
SPEAKER_08: Is this like a kind of pseudo-church service?
16:10
SPEAKER_08: Um Yeah, because the musicians are so talented, but then sometimes we're singing, sometimes we're praying together as the kind of audience.
16:19
SPEAKER_08: Um, so there's about 200 people or so.
16:22
SPEAKER_08: And yeah.
16:23
SPEAKER_08: I would say I found it mixed.
16:26
SPEAKER_03: Yeah.
16:26
SPEAKER_03: How did you find it?
16:27
SPEAKER_03: I I think it was incredibly beautiful, much of it I found.
16:32
SPEAKER_03: The the diversity of the musicians, the lights were down, it was um it was heavy, and I think deliberately so, and they it they acknowledged that that this was focusing quite heavily on on grief, and so the the shape of the night had a real kind of down, and then eventually up, we got to new creation right at the end, but there was a lot of just kind of sitting in the reality of grief.
17:00
SPEAKER_03: So I do feel that the atmosphere was so thick in the room that you could cut it with a knife.
17:05
SPEAKER_03: And I know people who were there who have gone through a lot of grief recently who actually found it incredibly cathartic because it gave them permission to to mourn in a way that they maybe hadn't before in the busyness of life, that kind of thing.
17:22
SPEAKER_03: I think maybe for people who didn't know that that was what it was going to be, that might have come as a a surprise of just how heavy it was.
17:28
SPEAKER_08: Yeah.
17:29
SPEAKER_08: Yeah, definitely.
17:30
SPEAKER_08: I think that yeah, there if there's a few reasons why I felt mixed.
17:36
SPEAKER_08: One was that I I feel often quite conscious of um the overall narrative or kind of arc of an event or a film or a sermon or something, but also that you you only really take me with you on that journey if you can help me go from the highs of laughter to the lows of tears and do both.
17:59
SPEAKER_08: So it felt kind of like we were trudging trudging through the cross to get to the resurrection.
18:05
SPEAKER_08: Like we were we were doing the sh you know, the kind of a Jesus-y shaped story as we went through the evening, but I kind of I need some humour in order to then cry again.
18:18
SPEAKER_08: And does that sound really weird?
18:20
SPEAKER_08: Like the kinds of you know, it's like, oh, we just we need to acknowledge some lightness in this heavy, in this heaviness in order to really sit with the heaviness as well.
18:31
SPEAKER_08: I don't know.
18:32
SPEAKER_08: Is that a weird thing to say?
18:34
SPEAKER_03: No, that's that's an interesting point.
18:35
SPEAKER_03: It almost breaks the tension slightly.
18:37
SPEAKER_08: Yeah.
18:38
SPEAKER_08: And I guess in a way, the book, so the book is able to do that in a funny way because it's so it sometimes feels so random.
18:45
SPEAKER_08: Like you can flick between um Yeah, okay, the morning of a medical procedure, yeah, and then you could flick over to um for the keeping of bees.
18:57
SPEAKER_08: Right.
18:58
SPEAKER_08: And like the first thing.
18:59
SPEAKER_08: That's an everyday experience.
19:02
SPEAKER_08: You know, you you go from a mixture of like shopping to um hearing bird song crumbs and experiencing road rage.
19:14
SPEAKER_08: And it's like you that it kind of captures in the book a bit more of the like going from heavy to light kind of thing that life does.
19:24
SPEAKER_08: Whereas it I my th my theory with every moment holy life is that they were trying to find the common ground that a room full of 200 people they've never met before would be able to resonate with.
19:39
SPEAKER_08: And if you don't all keep these and do your own laundry and breastfeed, and do you know what I mean?
19:45
SPEAKER_08: If you're not doing these things, they can't, there's lots of these prayers they can't use in a kind of a group setting in like that.
19:52
SPEAKER_08: But the things they can draw on are the common human experiences of loss and grief and hope.
19:59
SPEAKER_08: And and so I I think that's probably how it ended up being like that.
20:04
SPEAKER_08: Does that make sense?
20:05
SPEAKER_03: Yes, you can sort of see why they focused on that.
20:09
SPEAKER_03: But maybe it Yeah.
20:11
SPEAKER_08: But it was a little bit forced because I was like, I'm not it kind of made me think, am I supposed to be processing some really big thing in my life right now?
20:19
SPEAKER_08: But I'm kind of listening to the Lord trying to ask him, journaling a bit, and thinking like, there were some things coming to mind, but I it it wasn't quite what I was I was expecting to Yes.
20:30
SPEAKER_03: So that was almost a bit of an experiment for them trying it in the UK.
20:33
SPEAKER_03: And I do wonder if part of this is uh difference between UK and US and Essentially, yeah.
20:40
SPEAKER_03: How uh sincerity in the UK could be harder to come by to come.
20:46
SPEAKER_03: Do you have any other reflections or questions about every moment holy live or every moment holy as a phenomenon that has gone viral in certain very specific uh Christian circles?
20:59
SPEAKER_08: Um yeah, I do.
21:02
SPEAKER_08: I have I have questions and reflections, and I think so.
21:06
SPEAKER_08: Every moment holy live, the thing I think I actually found strange about it was um, you know, normally I'm praying these prayers either on on my own or with good friends, like gathered around a meal, going for a swim together.
21:21
SPEAKER_08: Um liturgy for those who sleep in tents.
21:23
SPEAKER_08: I've like printed it out and got a sm like a little copy of it so that when I'm bikepacking or hiking, it doesn't take up too much room.
21:29
SPEAKER_08: Um that's it.
21:30
SPEAKER_08: You know, I pray that so anyway, I'm not it's normally a moment of connection with people I already love.
21:43
SPEAKER_08: Or and and the strange thing was gathering in a room full of people to say some kind of liturgical prayers together.
21:51
SPEAKER_08: But I've never been to this conference.
21:52
SPEAKER_08: I don't really know the people who are sitting outside of me.
21:55
SPEAKER_08: And it really feels like we're doing a churchy thing, but not in church.
21:59
SPEAKER_08: And And to be kind of confessing grief and longings and sin alongside strangers.
22:09
SPEAKER_08: Like I think sometimes that can feel really beautiful and amazing, but other times like I felt it was a little bit odd.
22:16
SPEAKER_08: And it suddenly got me thinking, wait, is there is this out of place?
22:20
SPEAKER_08: Is there something that only the local church can and should do when it comes to kind of corporate prayer?
22:29
SPEAKER_08: Um, I've never really thought that much about that, but perhaps it's just it's been on my mind recently.
22:35
SPEAKER_08: Um in some of my studies in the theology diploma I'm doing, thinking about missions and the role of the local church in missions.
22:42
SPEAKER_08: And and one of the questions I've got at the moment is when I'm looking at different things, is this particular ministry or mission or practice or movement or whatever, is it focusing on the individual?
22:52
SPEAKER_08: Is it focusing on the global church, like the kind of big C capital C Kingdom of God?
22:58
SPEAKER_03: Right.
22:58
SPEAKER_08: Um or and or is it focusing on the local church?
23:02
SPEAKER_08: And I wonder if something like Every Moment Holy Um and Every Moment Holy Live focuses on the individual before God and the kind of global kingdom of God in that moment where you're standing side by side with people you've never met, but who share the same love for Jesus?
23:18
SPEAKER_08: But it's it's kind of jumped from individual to global church and missed the local church.
23:23
SPEAKER_08: Like, is there a place for liturgy that should actually just be reserved for local church?
23:28
SPEAKER_08: I don't yeah, it's a question I have, and I don't really have the answers.
23:31
SPEAKER_08: I don't I'm not sure yet where to look to think or debate or study that kind of question, but it's a it is a question that this weekend has raised for me.
23:43
SPEAKER_03: Yeah, and I gather that um Ned and Doug would be big believers in getting plugged into local church, absolutely, and that this is kind of supplementing the ministry of churches.
23:54
SPEAKER_03: But it is interesting.
23:55
SPEAKER_03: I mean, we have this challenge at Speak Life when we put on intensives, which uh, you know, lots of creative Christians come and gather in our building, and we do sing some worship songs and we do pray together, and that's a wonderful thing, but we're a parachurch ministry, we're not a church, and so we almost want to maintain a sense of these are brothers and sisters gathering together, this is great, but we want to take these riches and bring them back to our local churches.
24:21
SPEAKER_03: We don't want this to become a church because the danger is that you could sort of we could sort of think, oh, you know what?
24:27
SPEAKER_03: Should we just start a new church with people who are interested in the same things as we are?
24:33
SPEAKER_03: And that can be a temptation when because you feel a sense of camaraderie, it's like, oh, we're all interested in similar things, you know, that maybe our local churches haven't been so interested in the arts, for example, but actually it's so vital to be thrown in with your your local church, yeah, yeah, because we trust that the body of Christ isn't supposed to just be a bunch of ears or a bunch of hands or feet or like we're supposed to be a mixture of things, and um we it's not just that we can then leave a conference like this and go back as you know full of life and joy and be a resource and a gift to our church, but it's that we go back to our local church as needy.
25:17
SPEAKER_05: Right.
25:18
SPEAKER_08: We actually and and we it's not just like, oh, well, we've been refreshed as Christian artists now.
25:25
SPEAKER_08: We're gonna go back and bless our church.
25:26
SPEAKER_08: They don't really understand our art, but but that's okay because like we're gonna be a blessing to them.
25:30
SPEAKER_08: And no, no, you go back to your local and your your church community, like you also arrive with things that you need from them, you're also dependent on them and have much to receive from those who are interested in things you're not interested in.
25:44
SPEAKER_05: Um but yeah, yeah.
25:46
SPEAKER_08: So that one kind of and it and it made me reflect because I um have been working in kind of parachurch context for the last six years and oh seven years, spent seven years now, and I have often encouraged bringing in bits of kind of liturgy, but it's kind of because it's been a discovery I've enjoyed personally.
26:07
SPEAKER_08: And so then I've encouraged people that I've been working with in different groups to do to do bits of prayers together.
26:15
SPEAKER_08: And now it's got me thinking, like, oh, is there should there be boundaries on when you do that outside of a local church context?
26:22
SPEAKER_08: Is that too much is that like a silly question to ask?
26:24
SPEAKER_08: Is it just like a oh it doesn't matter, you're praying, just crack on?
26:27
SPEAKER_08: Should there be a limitation to kinds of prayers that we do when we do them?
26:30
SPEAKER_08: And are there any prayers about situations we shouldn't be?
26:34
SPEAKER_08: Are there any situations that we shouldn't be praying about?
26:36
SPEAKER_08: I don't know.
26:37
SPEAKER_03: Like I was thinking about it's called every moment holy.
26:40
SPEAKER_03: Is any moment not holy?
26:42
SPEAKER_08: Is any moment ev any moment unholy?
26:45
SPEAKER_03: Yeah, because it's a bit like when people say uh all of life is worship.
26:49
SPEAKER_03: Yeah, I get that.
26:50
SPEAKER_03: Romans 12, verse 1, uh offer up your bodies as a living sacrifice.
26:54
SPEAKER_03: But at the same time, we still believe in meeting on a Sunday morning to worship together.
26:59
SPEAKER_03: So we want to keep that special.
27:00
SPEAKER_03: We don't want to say that everything is that because then nothing's that.
27:03
SPEAKER_08: Okay, yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah.
27:05
SPEAKER_03: Um so again, I don't think these are criticisms at all of Doug or you know, of of every moment holy or of Hutchmoot, but I think they're they're things to be that I'm certainly wary of in my own heart that when I I I can feel that tendency to gravitate towards people who are like me and then to view that as where my real community is.
27:27
SPEAKER_08: Yeah.
27:28
SPEAKER_08: Oh, we all do that, don't we?
27:29
SPEAKER_03: Absolutely.
27:30
SPEAKER_08: But that's that that's part of the distinctive nature of the the church, which is not shared really to the same extent in by anything in outside of the church.
27:39
SPEAKER_05: Yeah.
27:40
SPEAKER_08: Which is that you can literally have nothing in common, nothing in common with the person that you are like you, you know, if if you're united to Jesus, you're united to them, your brothers and sisters, even if you ha have like different age, different life experiences, different socioeconomic backgrounds, different hobbies, different accents, different languages.
28:05
SPEAKER_08: You then can't even speak to each other, you've got different languages like you literally could not be more different.
28:11
SPEAKER_05: Yeah.
28:11
SPEAKER_08: And yet your new life in Christ is exactly the same.
28:18
SPEAKER_08: The salvation you have in him, the restoration work he's done in you, and the hope you have for the future is exactly the same.
28:25
SPEAKER_03: I love that.
28:25
SPEAKER_08: That's like yeah, radical.
28:28
SPEAKER_03: Yeah, Bon Hoffer in Life Together, he says, if there is any other basis for our unity other than Christ and Him crucified, let it crumble.
28:37
SPEAKER_08: Yeah.
28:38
SPEAKER_03: And I think that's really helpful.
28:39
SPEAKER_08: I do I've got a bunch more questions about every moment holy.
28:42
SPEAKER_08: I can rattle them through, we don't have to talk about them.
28:44
SPEAKER_03: But if we don't necessarily need to answer questions, but we can raise Yeah, yeah, exactly.
28:50
SPEAKER_08: I used to um so ever since I did yeah, year of apologetics training, I basically just say to myself, um, that questions can have answers and responses, but like clouded, uncertain thoughts you can't really go anywhere with.
29:07
SPEAKER_08: So if I've got like a doubt or a niggling, oh not sure about this, instead of just being like, Oh, I'm not sure about this, can I can I pinpoint what my actual question is?
29:15
SPEAKER_08: Even if I can't answer it to identify the question is helpful.
29:19
SPEAKER_08: Yeah.
29:19
SPEAKER_08: Um in Acts chapter 2 it says that the disciples devoted themselves to like the breaking of bread, it's a meeting together, I'm gonna find it.
29:33
SPEAKER_08: Acts chapter 2, verse 42, they devoted themselves to the apostles' teaching and the fellowship, to the breaking of the bread the breaking of bread and the prayers.
29:45
SPEAKER_08: Why doesn't it just say and prayer?
29:49
SPEAKER_08: Because it makes it sound like they are saying some kind of set prayer.
29:53
SPEAKER_08: The prayers sounds to me like they are they are saying some kind of set prayers.
29:58
SPEAKER_08: And so one of the questions I have is what prayers, what set prayers, what written prayers or you know, learnt prayers with an early church saying, What did the disciples say together?
30:09
SPEAKER_08: Um are they using anything outside of the psalms?
30:13
SPEAKER_08: If they're not using things outside of the psalms or quotes from scripture, should we be?
30:17
SPEAKER_08: Should we use any set prayers that aren't in the Bible?
30:21
SPEAKER_03: It's so tantalizing, you ask you all these questions.
30:26
SPEAKER_08: Um that's that's one cat what so I felt one category of my questions is about the local church, the basic liturgy in the local church.
30:32
SPEAKER_08: One category is about um liturgy as opposed to scripture.
30:36
SPEAKER_08: Why do we think we have a right to use to come up with our own prayers for things when actually the psalms cover like the whole wealth of human experience?
30:45
SPEAKER_08: Perhaps just in more general terms.
30:47
SPEAKER_08: Um are there some people who would think that you shouldn't be using even prayers of old saints and church fathers?
30:56
SPEAKER_08: Is it anyone that thinks that that actually you should just stick to prayers from scripture or from the psalms?
31:00
SPEAKER_08: What if phrases from every moment holy are forming my thinking more than the Bible is forming my thinking?
31:08
SPEAKER_08: Is that actually a false dichotomy because every moment holy is based on the Bible?
31:13
SPEAKER_08: So it is still forming my mind into biblical ways of thinking.
31:18
SPEAKER_08: So that's one area, it's kind of its relation to scripture.
31:21
SPEAKER_05: Yes.
31:22
SPEAKER_08: Um another area that I'm asking questions about is its relationship to culture.
31:29
SPEAKER_08: So I wonder, could things like every moment holy be part of an antidote to the meaning crisis?
31:36
SPEAKER_05: Whoa.
31:37
SPEAKER_08: Hot take.
31:40
SPEAKER_08: What if what if in our searching for significance in like having some big things that we're living for and looking inside ourselves to figure out an identity, all that kind of stuff, and to make meaning for ourselves?
31:53
SPEAKER_08: This, what every moment holy does, is helps us to find and not to just not to just like make little mundane things meaningful, but to rediscover that there is meaning in them.
32:07
SPEAKER_08: Does that make sense?
32:08
SPEAKER_03: Yes.
32:09
SPEAKER_03: Okay, yes.
32:09
SPEAKER_03: We're not meaning making the context of a wider story.
32:13
SPEAKER_08: Yeah.
32:13
SPEAKER_08: Yeah.
32:14
SPEAKER_08: We're not meaning makers.
32:15
SPEAKER_08: These little things find them a sense of meaning because they're in a bigger story.
32:19
SPEAKER_08: So anyway, that's one that's just a little thought in the back of my mind.
32:23
SPEAKER_08: Does this really help with a sense of purpose and significance?
32:25
SPEAKER_08: Because every little moment could be seen as being part of a bigger story, but it's not me.
32:31
SPEAKER_03: Every little helps.
32:34
SPEAKER_06: You just do a test scope value, but these are great questions.
32:40
SPEAKER_03: I feel each one could be a whole conversation.
32:42
SPEAKER_03: But we're not going to answer these questions, we're just throwing them out there.
32:45
SPEAKER_08: Something else I've been thinking about for a couple of years is whether the shift that I think I think I personally have seen, just in myself and in friends around me within kind of charismatic traditions, um, a shift for those who are from you know free spirit, um, kind of structureless, charismatic settings, desiring liturgy and structure in prayer.
33:11
SPEAKER_08: I think I've seen I've seen a bit of a shift of that, and I'm wondering whether that is what is reflected in wider culture of um of people who are going from kind of the secular world shifting off anyway, letting go of anything to do with religion, and are actually creeping back into wanting some kind of order and rules and religious structures to follow.
33:35
SPEAKER_08: That is interesting.
33:36
SPEAKER_08: That's something I'd like to think more about.
33:38
SPEAKER_03: Yeah.
33:39
SPEAKER_08: A desire for structure to feel held in the midst of this chaotic world that we see in an embracing of the liturgical and in the secular embracing of religion, even if they won't embrace Christ.
33:52
SPEAKER_08: Um could every moment holy be evangelistic?
33:56
SPEAKER_08: Could it be something that helps to introduce people to um to Jesus?
34:00
SPEAKER_08: Are there ways that you could use it?
34:02
SPEAKER_08: Like I think we heard a story of someone who um who was there this weekend who is an actress and she has printed off the liturgy before taking the stage and then they like pray that together in her drama group, and she's I think the only Christian in her group.
34:18
SPEAKER_08: And they kind of pray that together before they go on the stage.
34:21
SPEAKER_08: Stuff like that.
34:21
SPEAKER_03: It's like, oh, maybe this could could it be No, could you go up to someone at an aquarium looking at dolphins and go, Oi, look at this.
34:30
SPEAKER_03: This is every moment holy.
34:32
SPEAKER_03: And it reveals that the symbolism of a dolphin is Christ.
34:37
SPEAKER_03: So carry on.
34:39
SPEAKER_06: That was okay.
34:47
SPEAKER_08: I want to go write some more prayers.
34:49
SPEAKER_08: Yeah.
34:50
SPEAKER_08: That's one of the to be honest, that's one of the best things about these books is it makes me think, it makes me notice the gaps in it, and to think, oh wait, hang on.
34:58
SPEAKER_08: I'd quite like a a list you for really specific things that I do or encounter day-to-day that these books don't cover.
35:05
SPEAKER_08: That's pretty cool.
35:06
SPEAKER_03: It's funny, at our most recent intensive, I I sort of ended up writing something akin to this when I I wrote a prayer for social media content creators.
35:16
SPEAKER_07: Oh yeah, you did.
35:18
SPEAKER_03: Where was it?
35:19
SPEAKER_03: It's called social media prayer.
35:24
SPEAKER_08: A liturgy.
35:25
SPEAKER_08: A liturgy, yes.
35:26
SPEAKER_03: This is the liturgy for those who doff film things.
35:31
SPEAKER_06: And put them in a place where millions of people can see Those who doff film things.
35:42
SPEAKER_03: Um it's uh Father, we thank you for the gifts of cameras and microphones.
35:49
SPEAKER_03: Hello.
35:51
SPEAKER_03: Thank you that these can be used to share Christ.
35:54
SPEAKER_03: Please guide us to make things that are beautiful and honest and true.
35:57
SPEAKER_03: May we not work from a place of emptiness, seeking to climb the ladder of the world for our own personal gain, but may we instead flow from a place of fullness, knowing that in Christ we are truly nourished, and from that place in your arms may we overflow with that cross-shaped love out into the world.
36:14
SPEAKER_03: For those of us who are called to share Christ online, please give us the strength to do so boldly and creatively.
36:20
SPEAKER_03: By your spirit may doors be opened for our message, and yet may it also be our ambition to lead quiet lives.
36:28
SPEAKER_03: Keep us from getting caught up in the spectacle of social media.
36:32
SPEAKER_03: Challenge us and ground us if we ever fall into using technology as a means to dehumanize.
36:38
SPEAKER_03: We ask that our work would instead amplify and point to the intensely personal reality of Christ and his church.
36:45
SPEAKER_03: May the digital be a complement and not a replacement for the physical.
36:49
SPEAKER_03: May the tiny pixels of our screens be overwhelmed by the light of Christ Himself.
36:54
SPEAKER_03: Amen.
36:55
SPEAKER_08: Amen.
36:56
SPEAKER_03: There we go.
36:57
SPEAKER_08: That's brilliant.
36:59
SPEAKER_08: Oh, thank you.
37:00
SPEAKER_08: Yeah, I really like it.
37:01
SPEAKER_08: It's good.
37:02
SPEAKER_08: Well, I might submit it uh you should put it on the put it on the show description.
37:10
SPEAKER_08: Yeah.
37:10
SPEAKER_08: That would be nice.
37:11
SPEAKER_03: Yeah, because actually that came up by when I was doing a session at the intensive about YouTube, I was struck by often I speak on the technical aspects of doing video production at our intensives, and I thought actually I wanted to include a theological component because I I want to see my work more through this lens, I suppose, that I'm not just editing a video, that actually that is an opportunity to encounter Christ in the everyday of my life.
37:40
SPEAKER_03: Um and other media people too.
37:43
SPEAKER_08: So we want to see making media about seeing life through the lens of Jesus, through the lens of Jesus.
37:50
SPEAKER_03: Yes.
37:51
SPEAKER_08: Yes.
37:51
SPEAKER_03: I'm on board with it.
37:52
SPEAKER_03: Great, okay, let's go.
38:09
SPEAKER_08: Yeah, great.
38:10
SPEAKER_08: What have we got?
38:11
SPEAKER_03: I'm excited for this one because it actually comes from someone who was at HutchMook.
38:16
SPEAKER_03: So Rachel Redeemed listened to our episode we did with Nate, Nate's last episode about memorisation.
38:23
SPEAKER_08: What was it about?
38:24
SPEAKER_03: Memorization.
38:28
SPEAKER_03: So I think in that episode we mentioned John Redeemed's stuff, Rachel's husband, about how he has memorized big chunks of scripture and it's amazing.
38:38
SPEAKER_03: And so she replied, she commented on the Spotify episode, it so happened John Redeemed's wife is an avid enthusiast for this podcast.
38:47
SPEAKER_03: So I can indeed confirm if you search Bible Trainer in the app store, you can download a free app for memorising.
38:55
SPEAKER_03: Or send a carrier pigeon and he can come perform a bunch of psalms or revelation with or without associated music for your church, etc.
39:03
SPEAKER_03: It's bonkers intense but good for the soul.
39:06
SPEAKER_03: Love the pod, gang, Rachel.
39:09
SPEAKER_03: P.
39:09
SPEAKER_03: S.
39:10
SPEAKER_03: We were listening together, and he's up for requests of the next Bible book he should memorize.
39:15
SPEAKER_08: Oh, okay.
39:16
SPEAKER_08: Genesis is cool.
39:17
SPEAKER_03: Yeah.
39:18
SPEAKER_08: It's so dramatic.
39:19
SPEAKER_08: It is like the soap opera of the Bible.
39:22
SPEAKER_03: I like that.
39:23
SPEAKER_03: I was gonna suggest Hebrews because I've been looking at Hebrews with a friend recently, and some people think that it might be a very ancient homily.
39:32
SPEAKER_03: A sermon, basically.
39:33
SPEAKER_03: Oh which I'm quite on board with that theory.
39:35
SPEAKER_03: So I have a feeling John Redeemed proclaiming Hebrews from memory could be really cool, actually.
39:41
SPEAKER_03: Oh, your laptop has magically appeared.
39:44
SPEAKER_03: Presumably with some listener correspondence.
39:47
SPEAKER_08: Yes, yeah, we've got an email to our podcast at speaklife.org.uk.
39:52
SPEAKER_08: This is from Samuel.
39:53
SPEAKER_08: Um he is comparing Christianity to an app.
39:58
SPEAKER_08: He's saying, is Christianity an app on the phone of life, or is it more than an app, more than even an operating system?
40:05
SPEAKER_08: Is it more like having a whole new phone?
40:09
SPEAKER_08: Wow.
40:09
SPEAKER_08: That's quite cool.
40:10
SPEAKER_08: I like that question.
40:11
SPEAKER_08: I probably wouldn't say it's just an app, as in like, I don't you can't just add Jesus into the mix of other things going on in your life.
40:18
SPEAKER_08: But I think probably we have a tendency to consider it like an operating system, like like the kind of the software you upload onto the hardware that is, well, I'm just like human experience or society or something.
40:29
SPEAKER_05: Yeah.
40:29
SPEAKER_08: Is this kind of neutral thing?
40:31
SPEAKER_08: I think we actually would say is that this has been God's world all along.
40:35
SPEAKER_08: It's not like you're some kind of neutral phone human thing.
40:40
SPEAKER_08: So thanks, Samu, for your question.
40:42
SPEAKER_08: I'm not sure we've really answered it, but like we said earlier, we're probably better at asking questions than we are at responding.
40:47
SPEAKER_08: So keep asking questions with us, right?
40:50
SPEAKER_08: Ping as your questions.
40:51
SPEAKER_08: We might not, we might not have the response, but um, we love to hear them.
40:54
SPEAKER_08: And would love I'd love to know if anyone listening has some favourite prayers from every moment holy or from other resources, other prayer books, other church prayers you pray.
41:06
SPEAKER_05: Indeed.
41:07
SPEAKER_08: Does anyone have does anyone have a list G for recording a podcast?
41:11
SPEAKER_08: And would anyone like to write us one?
41:12
SPEAKER_03: Oh yeah, that'd be wonderful.
41:14
SPEAKER_03: That'd be awesome.
41:15
SPEAKER_03: Doug, if you're listening.
41:17
SPEAKER_06: Write us poems.
41:19
SPEAKER_06: Yeah, absolutely.
41:22
SPEAKER_03: So being at Hutchmoot Naomi got me thinking about, yeah, Speaking Life does a something a bit like that, doesn't it?
41:30
SPEAKER_03: And we've mentioned it already.
41:31
SPEAKER_03: And it's called the Intensive.
41:33
SPEAKER_08: The Intensive.
41:34
SPEAKER_03: And there's one I've got here coming up quite soon, 18th to the 20th of June 2026.
41:41
SPEAKER_03: Here.
41:41
SPEAKER_08: Well, it's soon if it's soon for us now.
41:44
SPEAKER_08: But someone might listen to this in a year's time and then it's it's not soon anymore.
41:49
SPEAKER_03: That's a good point.
41:50
SPEAKER_08: Anyway.
41:51
SPEAKER_03: Yeah.
41:51
SPEAKER_03: Well, at the time of recording, it's soon.
41:55
SPEAKER_03: Join us in person at the Speak Life Studios in Eastbourne for our creative evangelism training with Glenn Scribner, who's on this podcast as well, sometimes.
42:05
SPEAKER_03: Often.
42:06
SPEAKER_03: And Nate Morganlock, he's coming back.
42:08
SPEAKER_08: He's coming back.
42:09
SPEAKER_03: For this.
42:10
SPEAKER_03: And we've got a special guest joining us as well.
42:13
SPEAKER_03: We do.
42:13
SPEAKER_03: Martin Shaw.
42:14
SPEAKER_09: Yeah.
42:15
SPEAKER_03: Are you sure about that?
42:16
SPEAKER_03: And the theme for this one coming up, do you know what it is, Naomi?
42:20
SPEAKER_03: No, you don't.
42:21
SPEAKER_03: It's Tell the Story, Teach the Face.
42:29
SPEAKER_06: Sorry.
42:29
SPEAKER_03: No, it's okay.
42:30
SPEAKER_06: I have a meeting in half an hour about the intensive, but I'll be able to tell you all about it after that.
42:34
SPEAKER_03: I mean, you know, you're I'm sure you're well prepared for the other elements of it.
42:39
SPEAKER_03: To find out more or to book a place on the Speak Life Intensive 2026, go to speaklife.org.uk forward slash intensives.
42:47
SPEAKER_03: What is it, Naomi?
42:48
SPEAKER_03: SpeakLife.org.uk.
42:51
SPEAKER_03: Yes.
42:52
SPEAKER_08: Okay.
42:52
SPEAKER_03: I'll just rascal through a few final details about this.
42:56
SPEAKER_03: Early bird ticket 135 pounds.
42:58
SPEAKER_03: Standard ticket 160 pounds.
43:00
SPEAKER_03: Supported ticket 240 pounds.
43:01
SPEAKER_03: Please note accommodation isn't included.
43:03
SPEAKER_03: Terms and conditions do apply.
43:04
SPEAKER_09: Oh.
43:06
SPEAKER_09: Great.
43:06
SPEAKER_09: See you there.
43:07
SPEAKER_09: See you there.