To Mercy I’ve Been called was written by Tony Gee and is sung on this recording by Laura Aspinal.

You can download the chord chart for To Mercy I’ve Been Called here.

Download Amazing God Chord Chart (pdf) 

Download Spirit Burn Chord Chart (pdf)

Dan’s song story in his own words…

Generally speaking, when I write a song it tends to start with a chord progression a melody and some mumbled nonsense. The first lyrics to creep out of my mouth were “Bless your church with tongues of fire, spirit burn right through. Leave no trace of mans desire”. So the direction of the songs was pretty clear from the get go. It wasn’t  completely random that these lyrics came out as we had started some revival prayer meetings at church and so I was trying to capture the attitude behind those meetings and possibly have a song that could be used in that setting. I wasn’t focused on writing a song specifically on pentecost and Acts 2 but that first line is obviously from that piece of scripture. I felt it was important to then round off the song with it not just being about God blessing us, but that it would give him glory, change us and “shine from us”.  After the initial inspiration with this song, it certainly took some beating into shape and with a bit of help from the brilliant dude that is Marc James we got there.  - Dan Wheeldon

Download Emmanuel Chord Chart (PDF)

Here is the story behind ‘Emmanuel’ in Joe’s own words…

“So this song as most of my songs do started as a conversation with God, while I was driving around in the van…. 

2012 was a really tough year for my wife and I because of lots of family stuff that just seemed to get worse and worse almost on a daily basis, it was just a horrible time, and a really testing one. It felt as if we were stuck in an endless storm that was smashing us around and we were both so tired.

In all honesty it was even hard, for me at least, to seek God in it (my wife has this awesome gift of seeking God, its almost like a reflex for her), but every time we did, His peace was an instant refreshing….

We are so thankful that we know this amazing God, Emmanuel who has been there for us to comfort us and to guide us. His faithfulness has been such a sweet relief in times of real hurt and heartache. 

I never want to take it for granted that I have this constant hope, my ever present King!

All of the lyrics came out in one worship time as i was driving the old van to the workshop one morning, and over that afternoon in bits and bobs. Although the song has changed quite a bit over the months with help from some better songwriters than I at songwriting retreats and with help from Casey Corum and Lano!”

Here are Joff’s thoughts on writing “You Are Faithful”…

‘For the last 18 months or so, me and my wife Jodie have been involved in planting a Vineyard Church in Tiverton, Devon. This song was written during the early months of us meeting together as a homegroup. I was so thankful to God for meeting with us as a group and I was feeling blown away by His presence and His faithfulness to us in all our different circumstances. It is a song which sums up our collective thankfulness to God and reminds us of His goodness.’

Download the chord chart. (pdf)

Here are Harmony’s thoughts on writing “Just To Be With You”…

“When the first draft of ‘Just to be with you’ emerged, I thought it was just a personal song between me and Jesus. It wasn’t until about 2 years later that it was used in a corporate setting. I was quite surprised that other people wanted to sing this song! My sense had been that the song was ‘too intimate’, but the reality was that Jesus was taking our whole community on a journey into deeper intimacy. What an amazing journey it has been!!” - Harmony Smith (Belfast City Vineyard)

Just to Be With You Chord Chart (pdf download)

Here’s a link to download a rough demo of the song recorded at home along with a chord/lyric sheet.

Download My Soul Finds Rest - Chord Chart (PDF)

This is what Hannah said about writing ‘My Soul Finds Rest’…

“One morning at church someone read out all of Psalm 62 before a time of communion and a few of the lines really stuck with me in the days that followed. I had been reading through the book of psalms around that time; I was struck by how they cover such a range of emotions and situations, and was reminded that many were originally written to be sung. Psalm 62 in particular contained some truths about God that I wanted to keep reminding myself of, so I read it over and over in different translations and used some of the words as the starting block to write this song.”

Please feel free to use this song in worship at your church or in small group.

Download My Soul Finds Rest - Chord Chart (PDF)

Last year’s area retreat was an amazing time with great extended times of worship together, teaching, ministry along with some great relationships forged across the area.

The overwhelming feedback was that it was a very valuable time together and that we really should do this again and so we are!

The retreat is open to anyone involved in leading and facilitating worship, including congregational worship leaders, band members, small group worship leaders and sound teams in churches in the East Anglia area.

There will be great teaching, forums, practical workshops as well as extended times of worship and ministry not to mention time to unwind and recharge.

Belsey Bridge conference centre is a sister conference centre of the Swanwick and High Leigh conference centres that have been used in recent years by the National worship leaders retreat. You can check out the facilities at http://www.cct.org.uk/belsey-bridge/venue and they really are very good, and include great food, beautiful grounds, an outdoor swimming pool (hopefully the weather will be good!), tennis court, football field and table tennis table as well as free Wifi.

If you want to come, firstly get your pastor’s permission before booking a place but there’s no limit on how many people can come from each church.

Its open for anyone involved with worship across the area regardless of ability, however we have put a lower age limit of 16, but if you want to bring a younger worship leader, please get in touch and we can discuss. We’re unable to accommodate young children but if you have a babe in arms, then bring them along too!

The subsidized cost of the retreat is £105 – full board. This includes supper on Friday evening through to lunch on Sunday, however if you can’t make the whole weekend then why not come just for the day on Saturday, as it is very close by. The aim is to gather as many worship people from across the area as we can.

Everyone will need to make their own travel arrangements, though we should be able to arrange pick ups at Norwich, Bury St Edmunds, or Beccles stations for those traveling by train.

To get a booking for for this event or for more information contact; Chris Perkins (Area worship co-ordinator)  chrisperkins@wsvc.org.uk

With this in mind Dave and I teamed up with our video director for the day James Green (jamesgreenphotographer.co.uk); who is a highly talented and creative freelance photographer; and his assistant Matthew Torrington  (Both James and Matthew attend West Wilts Vineyard in Trowbridge).

We all met with Samuel on the outskirts of St Albans at a beautiful 14^th Century barn (www.kingsburybarn.co.uk), where Samuel had in fact been married just a few years before. So it had a strong emotional connection with Samuel’s own journey in life.

With most of the UK in the grip of a deep freeze, conditions were anything but ideal for filming The Fire in a medieval barn that has no form of heating! The film crew wrapped up as warm as we could with all the artic clothing we had to hand. Samuel on the other hand had to brave the conditions with out such luxuries; only having a small electric heater to stand near in between takes. It’s amazing that he managed to get through the day, playing and singing as well as he did without succumbing to pneumonia or hypothermia.

The barn lent its self to creating a brilliant setting for the videos. The stunning wooden structure offered the perfect backdrop for these songs and from what we could see through the lens it all looked very cool indeed.

James worked as fast as he could to make sure we didn’t all freeze to death and we quickly managed to get some great takes of ‘You Are With Us’ and ‘O My Soul’, using just a combination of fairy lights and candles to add to the already great atmosphere in the barn.

Then it came to ‘Fiery Love’, and with daylight fading we knew we were against the clock. Typically it was then that we started to hit some problems, first we ran out of memory cards, then the batteries on the cameras began to fail one after the other and even Samuel’s guitar went out of tune mid take!

Our hands were now completely numb and Samuel had a serious case of the shivers, so we were all praying that everything would just work so we could capture this last song. Thankfully it finally all came together and we were able to find a warm pub and have some much deserved grub.

Despite spending the day in a medieval meat fridge it was really good fun to film these videos with Samuel, James, Dave and Matthew. I think we have been able to capture some great acoustic worship by Samuel and can’t wait to see the finished product.

The Fire will be released in the USA as a deluxe iTunes download on 14^th May and it will include these acoustic videos we recorded.