Books by Dale Harris

Books by Dale Harris
A Feast of Epiphanies

Though I Walk, A Novel

Daytime Moons and Other Celestial Anomalies, a book of poems

Second Wind

Second Wind
An album of songs both old and new. Recorded in 2021, a year of major transition for me, these songs explore the many vicissitudes of the spiritual life,. It's about the mountaintop moments and the Holy Saturday sunrises, the doors He opens that no one can close, and those doors He's closed that will never open again. You can click the image above to give it a listen.

The Song Became a Child

The Song Became a Child
A collection of Christmas songs I wrote and recorded during the early days of the pandemic lockdown in the spring of 2020. Click the image to listen.

There's a Trick of the Light I'm Learning to Do

There's a Trick of the Light I'm Learning to Do
This is a collection of songs I wrote and recorded in January - March, 2020 while on sabbatical from ministry. They each deal with a different aspect or expression of the Gospel. Click on the image above to listen.

Three Hands Clapping

Three Hands Clapping
This is my latest recording project (released May 27, 2019). It is a double album of 22 songs, which very roughly track the story of my life... a sort of musical autobiography, so to speak. Click the album image to listen.

Ghost Notes

Ghost Notes
A collections of original songs I wrote in 2015, and recorded with the FreeWay Musical Collective. Click the album image to listen.

inversions

inversions
Recorded in 2014, these songs are sort of a chronicle of my journey through a pastoral burn-out last winter. They deal with themes of mental-health, spiritual burn-out and depression, but also with the inexorable presence of God in the midst of darkness. Click the album art to download.

soundings

soundings
click image to download
"soundings" is a collection of songs I recorded in September/October of 2013. Dealing with themes of hope, ache, trust and spiritual loss, the songs on this album express various facets of my journey with God.

bridges

bridges
Click to download.
"Bridges" is a collection of original songs I wrote in the summer of 2011, during a soul-searching trip I took out to Alberta; a sort of long twilight in the dark night of the soul. I share it here in hopes these musical reflections on my own spiritual journey might be an encouragement to others: the sun does rise, blood-red but beautiful.

echoes

echoes
Prayers, poems and songs (2005-2009). Click to download
"echoes" is a collection of songs I wrote during my time studying at Briercrest Seminary (2004-2009). It's called "echoes" partly because these songs are "echoes" of times spent with God from my songwriting past, but also because there are musical "echoes" of hymns, songs or poems sprinkled throughout the album. Listen closely and you'll hear them.

Accidentals

Accidentals
This collection of mostly blues/rock/folk inspired songs was recorded in the spring and summer of 2015. I call it "accidentals" because all of the songs on this project were tunes I have had kicking around in my notebooks for many years but had never found a "home" for on previous albums. You can click the image to download the whole album.

Random Reads

The Worship Blinders, a devotional thought


There's this interesting place in 2 Kings 23, where King Josiah, in an effort to purge and reform the spiritual life of his nation, orders all the "articles made for Baal and Asherah" to be removed from the house of the Lord. The way the story's told, the impression it gives is that he brought all the people of Judah together (v.2), read the Book of the Covenant to them all (v. 3) and then, in plain sight of everyone, started bringing out all the idolatrous nick-knacks that had accumulated in the Temple.

What strikes me here is that, as far as the people were concerned up to that point, there was nothing especially wrong with the baalistic syncretism that had crept into their worship. It must have been quite shocking to stand there in that crowd and see all these articles brought out of the temple and find out that they didn't, after all, have any place in the House of Israel's God.

It sort of makes me wonder: "What would Josiah have to pull out of the North American Church in the sight of everyone, if he were to 'spiritually clean house' today'?"  It's probably not what we'd expect, any more than the people of Judah expected to see the altars to Baal and the Asherah poles thrown on the 'discard pile' of their worship practices.

It all leaves me praying that God would remove my spiritual blinders, and help me identify any idolatrous "clutter" that I've maybe let accumulate in my life with him; that he would do some spiritual 'house cleaning' in my worship of Jesus, and give me single-hearted devotion to him.

 

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1 comments:

Jon Coutts said...

Speaks to the need for the Word to be living and active, sharper than a double-edged sword, right there in the midst of, and always reforming, the Worship.

June 5, 2015 at 6:48 AM  

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