Another sporadic lapse in publishing articles for me. I’ve been so immersed in recording music for the Killstream demos and dealing with Digital TX/Prophecy matters that i find myself yet again playing the unending game of catch up and attending to the complaints of the masses. I put a few people on last warnings this week, and that generally means that you’ve done something that’s really fucking pissed me off and i don’t have the inclination to work it through. The unlucky ones will enjoy expulsion from my immediate life so it is problem-free whilst i need to focus. There’s a lot to be said for being discriminating. I don’t care if you find that harsh – you don’t live the life i do.

So i sit here listening to Body Count, nursing red sunken eyes and have some shitty Sly Stallone B-movie on in the background. It’s been a long and important day that’s left me shattered. As is becoming traditional i sought spiritual consultation and prayer with the wise greys of Acorn through the morning, and then put everything down to lose the afternoon hours at the simply wonderful L’Abri Fellowship centre. I knew today was coming but nothing could have prepared me for it. The thing is that it was always going to be good news, but news that introduced the burden i have been waiting to carry for most of my life.

That sounds very vague, i know. It’s not wise or appropriate for me to say any more, suffice to say those with wisdom will understand from what i have said already.  Until then the knowledge and understanding must be hidden because the time hasn’t yet come.

I actually learn more from playing with Zair in the gardens at Acorn then i do in the service or in the oracle of wise and inspired conversation that accompanies it. Zair has this obsession with running around in the dark pathways of the wild garden forest and taking me along for the journey. We figure out which way to go together and always have to make our way back to the church. I remember telling him not to do something, and then watching him do it regardless and fall down. But i wasn’t angry at all – i ran to pick him up, comfort him and get him back on his feet again. It was then that i suddenly saw things as i believe God does. I’m that child falling over, and so is everyone else. I didn’t condemn Zair for disobeying me, even though that’s what i expect God to, rather than run to pick me up with love.

It also teaches me so much about how powerful childish imagination is, and fuels my frustration that we lose it so easily. There we are, in the middle of a lawn, and Zair is fanatically telling me that the door in front of him is locked. Wtf? Zair? We’re in a fucking field? But that door to him is so very real, and only when i got the keys from thin air was he able to walk through. So very real to him – crystal clear and perfectly real. He gets scared if i’m not there with him and if he feels he can’t find his way back. I tell him not to fear, that i’m there, will never leave him and we will find the way back. His enthusiasm for it never ends and i’m so grateful to have that time to spend with him before i must go away. It’s almost as charming as his unnerving ability to pick up random books that mysteriously address what’s on your mind, without even realising.

I said to Kel this week that i just feel like i’m in the middle of a massive storm but totally at peace for no discernable reason. The world outside is smashing and crashing all around me but i can’t feel it; like i’m looking on as an observer whilst the wind batters the walls outside. It feels like i’ve stepped out of the ordinary life and looking into it as a huge class ball with my hands around its surface. It’s a strange feeling of being protected for a purpose – to consolidate what i have and who i am. Consolidation means to strengthen and solidify, and there is no doubt that this year has transformed me.

The tornado is certainly lashing violently. I rest where i am and can see it all tearing everything to pieces but i stand in the middle in the calm, watching over my family and seeing what’s to come. It’s wonderfully clear and dispassionate, and the peace comes from seeing the big picture. Watching it all come to pass, and what i can see will come to pass. Bittersweet vindication. When i look back to where i was last year i can’t believe i didn’t just walk away there and then. Love truly does blind you, but sometimes it blinds you for a purpose and that which is suffering is actually a tool to carve and mould you for something bigger. I lost my strength and sinned in my anger. I lost myself somehow.

An article i read this week quoted someone who said there were broadly 2 kinds of people – those that need to be entertained, and those that thirst for knowledge. Now i know which category i’m in, but i can’t work my godfather out. We’ve been waiting for him to die for a decade as his alcoholism has destroyed his body and mind so much that his liver and kidneys have stopped functioning. This weekend he was admitted to hospital because his refusal to attend dialysis left him unconscious. He’s now checked out so he could get a bottle of whisky , and still doesn’t recognise he has a problem. Such is the power of denial, and the evils of co-dependence that makes his mother buy him ethanol to stop the suffering of his withdrawal.

And that is testament to the destructive nature of not being able to forgive. Don’t be under any illusion – not being able to forgive will kill you. All you need to do is take one look at this wretched carcass of man, a music prodigy, and understand that he has never felt loved by his father, who is now within weeks of dying from the cancer that riddles him. I will take him to his father’s bedside so he can forgive, for that is the root of all of it. Forgiveness is an act, not a feeling. It is something you do, not say or feel. It is a commitment to releasing someone of their debt, and an ongoing reminding of yourself that you have forgiven when they inevitably fuck up again.

Such is the power of forgiveness that when you do truly and genuinely forgive (and most of us say we do, but we don’t, because if you still remain angry or feel morally superior it is false), you actually release others. Not forgiving them is a spiteful way of imprisoning them and keeping them under control. When you release them, they are free to change, grow and forgive you in return. The explosive force of forgiving cannot be understated. If only i’d been wise and brave enough i would have done it years ago. The paradox is that you are angry that they can’t or won’t change, but the only way for them to do that is for you to forgive them. You are in control already. You will know the nature of your feelings and character by the fruits and outcomes you seek.

I watched this in stunned observance recently. My dad came to Acorn with us a few weeks ago after he lost his job, and was so hesitant about asking people to pray for him. I virtually commanded him to, and watched him humbly stand there as a small and frightened man. Afterwards i gave him a note that said “being strong enough to be weak made me proud to be your son”. Later at lunch i told my mum that i didn’t want anything from her when i criticised my stepdad, and she realised in a second that she was still projecting her overly-critical mum onto everyone, and trying to please her even though she’s been dead for nearly 20 years.

It’s amzing that just knowing someone is thinking of you makes you feel so strangely loved, no matter how small the gesture or moment. It can bring tears to run down your face. Just knowing someone cares. For many, it is more than they can bare as a little love is a dangerous and explosive thing.

The most incredible moment was when she so gently and innocently looked at me and said, “i just want you and Joey to like me. My mum never liked me”. It was a stunning thing to behold. Such incredible vulnerability and it humbled me. Isn’t that what we all feel and fear? I told her that i think we had just taken the dressing off her wound to give it some air. My dad came back and said that he’s lived for 50 years under the shadow of a memory from when he was 5 of running and hiding away in an abandoned school because he thought he was in trouble when he wasn’t. He is always frightened.

That was just over late morning and early afternoon. That’s half a day in my life, and it happens every day. Forgive them, and it releases them to change. If you want me to forgive you, just get your ass over to me and ask me. I’ll forgive you without question. Forgiving you will free you. It doesn’t matter how long ago, how bad it was or anything else. I will always pray with anyone, and do my damndest to forgive.

So where are we now? It looks like my sis and Marcos will be getting married this year. Everyone is having babies or getting engaged. I damn well won’t be for a long time, i can assure you, much to Kel’s eyebrow-raising amusement.  Virgilio now has a whole new technology platform to re-build Use Yours Ears onto (an electronic trading marketplace), and John will be completing his ITV/Spark application form this week. Spookily enough the money on offer (£200k) is exactly what the shelter needs. Prescience or coincidence? Your choice. I give them all i have free and they can’t really understand why.

The Rockstar site is almost done, and now Dan is fully equipped with all the video kit he needs to finish things off. Once it’s out there, it will be sent to 20,000 media people all over the world, syndicated on the front of magazines and music websites, as well as being freely available to anyone who wants. It’s the first of many annual projects i have in mind, the 2nd of which is even more ambitious. Killstream is coming on so fast i can’t believe it.

But most impressive of all is Prophecy. I can’t believe what has come from it and how powerful it is. Through this whole process i have been able to help so many other people bring their ideas to life, refine them and seek investment. Wherever i go, the door is already open and it is all falling into place with perfect timing as if it is being directed from somewhere else. I have absolute peace because i know it will come to pass. Even the investment network it is contracted with has changed their entire modus operandi to use it as the pilot material for a brand new finance TV channel that they’ve asked me to sit on the board for. This company confidentially holds the contact details of the 2200 most powerful people in this country. And i’m a friend on their board.

As it all whirs round i stand and look on, smiling. I know all that is out there for me, but that there are things i need to do that are bigger that means i must wait for those blessing and sacrifice them. I wouldn’t call that planning of any kind, just the warm understanding that all will be given and led to me in time. As they rest, i will work. As they wait, i will smash through to come for them. As they ponder, i will write what i learn and leave it there for them to read. All of these things must come to pass because my life is ultimately irrelevant. All that lives on will be what i do and the message it sends out.

It’s not that i feel invincible, have some kind of overload going on or am somehow not myself. I just have the most profound sense of personal strength i have ever experienced. I have no fear, and i rest knowing all will be well no matter hard things get. For this life of mine is not my own and not under my control. As long as i wait under the protection of the one who leads me, i will be safe and no weapon fashioned against me will prosper. They can’t prosper. If you look at my history, all attempts have failed, without fail. Not because of me, but because they are not permitted to harm me. And if they do, it is has been allowed for a specific purpose.

In old English law, a contract and/or agreement was known as a covenant. It’s an old-fashioned word but is still used in legalese today. It means a binding agreement between two parties, as opposed to an oath or vow that is an obligation made by one. A covenant is different in that both agree together. It strikes me that increasingly we become a people that demand things of people but do not agree something with them to act together. Stephen Covey would love me for saying that, as it’s a principle of interdependence.

It is also an act of nobility, something homo sapiens is renowned for and we again lose sight of in the midst of Hollywood movies and glossy celebrity magazines that have corrupted the idea of being renowned into vacuous idolatry. It is worth looking up the definition of “noble”.

Today i had the greatest answer to one of the greatest questions – that old chestnut of “Why me, Father?” The stunning simplicity, self-evidence and elegance of that answer was the best i have ever heard.

“I made you for it.”

P.S. I wrote little Zair a lullaby tonight. I have no idea why so don’t ask. It even has little words for his mummy to sing. Yes it is a little gay, but i’m his uncle, and someday i will have a son. If for some unknown reason you want it, you can download it here. I was tired.

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“baby, baby, don’t you cry
let me wipe that tear from your eye
if you get scared when it gets dark
then i’ll turn on the light
baby, baby, i’ll make it all alright”