Typically, when I'm setting a Scripture to song

I'll open up on my laptop, six different translations

in columns, and then I'll look for phrasing that

seems to sing. And then where I can't find anything

in the translations, I will paraphrase it myself.

You know, and then some people get, you know,

get really uptight, like: Oh, you don't want to

change the Word of God! Well, that's actually

not a very helpful way of thinking about it

because every single time we read a Scripture

or we read a new translation of the Scripture,

we're interpreting it through even just the way

we speak it, so we're constantly interpreting

and paraphrasing, but we're respecting the source

because we're going...our heart is to convey the

dynamic equivalent of what the people in the

first culture would have heard when they heard

that Scripture to what our people

and our culture needs now.

Brian is a songwriter, award-winning recording artist and songwriting instructor (founder of ‘Unlocking Your Songs’). His songs are known and sung internationally in faith communities of all kinds, including ‘Come Now is the Time to Worship’, ‘Refiner’s Fire’, ‘Hope Of The Nations’ and ‘The River’.

But most of all, he loves spending time with his high-school sweetheart Joyce (they have been married for 38 years.) Brian & Joyce have four adult daughters and two adult sons with Fragile X Syndrome.

In this episode, Brian gets very personal about his own faith journey, doubt, how he wrestles with Scripture to untangle it for himself, and offer it back to congregations in song. We think you are going to be richly strengthened by his reflections in this episode. Also, don’t miss the end of this episode where Brian plays a song for us that hasn’t been released yet!