The bottom line is: that little moment of distraction cost me more than any video project I ever did with the possible exception of one. Just the “short bus” ride was more than the budget! Medical expenses as a precautionary check up came to 6K. All I had was some road rash on my left arm and an incredibly disfigured sense of professional pride. (no charge for that repair). But, being unconscious for I don’t know, a nano second, gave cause for further review of my condition. That, and Paramedics found me weeping over “Jezebel”, my Heritage Softail Harley Davidson in my bloodied condition. She took some 5K in damages herself.

I spent the next five hours in an ER, strapped to a back board and a neck brace (against my will of course). “the only pain I feel is coming from the jokes I’m hearing in the waiting room” I complained, speaking of my friends in  Black Sheep Harley Davidson’s For Christ who arrived within minutes of hearing. It’s amazing that a single twitter post can fire a shot heard round the world these days.

But the aftermath of a mistake is slow in taking shape, and so too is finding a way to pray about it. We’ve all heard about “learning from our mistakes” but here I’m talking about “turning a mistake”. “God causes all the things to work for good when we are called to his good purpose” a scripture roughly says. Learning can be seen as simple notes on paper applied to memory. But maybe God is saying something more about mistakes. He is not surprised by future events. He can still draw a straight line with a crooked stick as, Anthony Campolo, a theologian friend of mine likes to say.

This little story is probably the least of my mistakes I could share. I know you have your own, beyond embarrassing “falls”. If you have any time in faith at all you know yourself in God’s eyes. You know, why you need Jesus in the first place. I follow Jesus because he brings beauty from ashes. I follow him not just for the education but for the transformation! Taking our bricks and turning em into three point shots!

I read somewhere that some of the best inventions known to man were accidently discovered in mishaps. I don’t know why “Corn Flakes” comes to mind first but someone forgot to clean out a mixing bowl and the residue created a new product all by itself. That’s the short version. Google it if yer really that interested. Some of the coolest chords I’ve discovered in music too have been my ineptness at playing a three chord ditty, my thumb falling on the wrong key in my own mind. You know that surprise right? Wow that has a cool sound to it. And suddenly you’ve started a whole new song from an accidental discovery!

That’s not only learning from a mistake but turning a mistake into a triumph!, (or in my case a new Harley Davidson). In the insurance coverage, Jezebel will be born again.

But my mistake came with a deductible I had to pay as well. And by that I was given the opportunity to make a tax deductible investment in promotion. To repaint the bike in a custom color layout of the Hogwash Book Cover with it’s “when pigs fly” artwork making it a “Gorilla Marketing” billboard to be seen everyday where ever I go. (And the redemption story that comes with it). Something I had prayed about before but given up on a year ago as too expensive. Now because of an accident it has to be done anyway. It shall always be to me a reminder of transformation as a direct result of a mistake.

If change must come let us be forward thinking in our circumstances, seeing “What was meant for our destruction, God has now purposed for our good” (another rough application, of Genesis 50: 19-20.) I can’t tell you how that works in your disasters but I am sure that redemption and restoration are possible and not just in the surface paint of our proclamations but born of a victorious heart instilled in us by the Savior of our attitudes as well.

I was honored he would ask and ashamed that I hadn’t thought of it. it took almost another year to get this recorded for ourselves and actually get Devin in the studio to sing it.

We are offering this single as a free download to the buyers of Dear God..Really? book on line. and to anyone coming to my concerts.

This song is mostly about the message of what fathers and sons mean to each other in the road we must travel and the motivation we must find. It’s interesting how our perspectives change when we have children of our own.

let me say that Devin is my youngest of two sons, he’s an actor, writer, singer. and this tune is not in a phrasing that he would sing normally. (he screams alot more). But he wanted to do it for what it says! I’m so proud! he learns and finds the truth to apply, and loves to apply it even when it doesn’t feel quite comfortable! Me Too! and that’s where we became brothers in Christ as well. I gotta go now… I’m gonna tear up.

By Bryan Duncan

Kevin Thomson, Bass player and founder of the Sweet Comfort Band, died on May 30^th 2010. “ Knowledge is power” he used to say  “ the one who knows is in control”. I smile now because he never told the band where the gig was! “how much further is this gig?” we would ask and he’d always say “four more miles”. It became one of the standard “Kevinisms” we would quote for years when we didn’t have a clue.

 The one who knows is in control. Kevin followed Jesus Christ. His favorite SCB tune, of course, was the one with the longest bass solo in it!  * “Get Ready” was a staple in the band’s set through six albums and eleven years. We closed the show with it even to the last concert. The song is a proclamation of the return of Christ and perhaps the mission statement of Sweet Comfort Band. Get Ready!

 If our choice of food is any indication of who we are, “Kev” was an all meat burrito with extra sauce and a big gulp. But he was an evangelist above all. When I met him in 1972, he was doing a home bible study. I was a nominal student at Southern California College in Costa Mesa, and a clean cut run away from the east coast. He had an “afro” back then, and when coming to see me, stood out on the Christian campus like a hippie at the museum. The Jesus movement had caught fire in Southern California by then. I was singing solo at the circus tent they called Calvary Chapel. Monday night was a big bible study night there, maybe 3000 people, who could also hear the new Jesus music bands, Love Song, Children of the Day, Bill Sprouse, and Country Faith.

 He’d heard me play a couple of songs one Monday night and came to see me about singing with his brother and himself. I now don’t remember our first gig as “Sweet Comfort”, probably cause he didn’t say. But what followed was an every weekend trip to small churches, prisons, and high school lunch time concerts. Kevin was the booking agent, manager, and driver of the Winnebago, also the head roadie! He lifted all the heavy stuff, prided himself on his strength. Usually set up the P.A. system by himself, that we blew up almost every month, and in the earliest days ran the sound from the stage. I always thought the bass was too loud!  

 It was his vision to present the Gospel in a new way and every concert contained an evangelistic message from the Bass player! Sweet Comfort Band brought a new Jazz rock influence to Jesus Music but Kevin Thomson was pure hard rock at heart. Listening to bands like Mountain and Moby Grape. It wasn’t that he hated ballads so much as he just had an aversion to Whole notes. (too much down time for the bass player). You’ll notice in the song “I Love You With My Life”, the biggest Sweet Comfort Band Ballad of our career, that the bass line bounces all the way through, much like Kevin in real time.

 In concert, he would often deliver his favorite message. The story of Jesus in the Garden of Gethsemane, he would elaborate upon the size of the Roman soldiers and all their gear, who came to take Jesus, “but when Jesus said “I am” the soldiers fell backwards on their backs.”  He would quote from scripture.  “Jesus didn’t have to die for us” he would say “he could have just called out his name over and over and the troops would have gotten tired and gone home”.

 You could see Kevin’s inner strength most when he spoke of Jesus. “Jesus wasn’t a wimp” he would say. “Nobody takes a beating like that and then carries a cross most of the way to his own crucifixion”. In Kevin’s eyes, Jesus is the all knowing second person of the trinity, God in the flesh. “The one who knows”, and has all the control over life and death. He believed it, he lived it. Who knows, perhaps Kevin fell on his back too at the voice of Jesus proclamation, “I am”. There was no doubt who Kevin was listening to for the rhythm of life.

 In the end Kevin had his own cross to bear and yet some thought something might be wrong with him because he never went through the depression that comes with quadriplegia. But then maybe knowledge is power here too! Kevin knew that “the one who knows is in control” even to the end of his life he was steadfast in his trust of a savior who doesn’t explain our circumstances to us. “Sweet Comfort” was the description of Kevin Thomson’s hope in Jesus. There’s a new bass solo in the heavenly angel band.

Kevin Thomson Bass Solo SCB “Get Ready” http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=-EhcPuwBvZg

 To say there’s a down turn in the economy is an understatement, mumbled in low voice by some, because maybe, it’ll send a wave of panic through the stock market. Or in a smaller world, you’re afraid you might “confess” something and give it more power! Personally I think you can’t address a problem if you’re not talking about it.

I’m not gonna launch into some diatribe about what the President ought to being doing, or the government. And I’m not gonna start pointing fingers at the selfishness of corporate CEO’s. We are where we are. And I’m sure for more reasons than we can ‘appoint’.

 Bottom line is, most likely, your seeing a smaller bottom line this year. Or maybe you’ve stopped reaching a bottom line all together except that one at the unemployment office. But in the case of at least one “Self Employed” singer songwriter, honestly, I’ve never experienced anything like this. My mom says she survived the Great Depression. “I only have weekly ones so far, that I go through weakly” I told her.

 What I do know is that there are some great things about lean times. Number one, it sharpens your focus. It also has an incredible impact upon your motivations. Humility too becomes more necessary. I find myself looking for ways to get things done by offering more services! I’m now willing to do a concert AND pass out flyers at the door! I’ll even clean up the sanctuary when we’re done and lock up.

 You have to be aware that your promoter friends and outreach ministry personnel are experiencing a backlog of undone work. They’re probably doing the jobs of people they had to let go to stay afloat themselves. Sometimes what they need most is some outside encouragement even on the phone when they’re telling you “Maybe next year”. Don’t get too near sighted in all this. Pursue whatever you might contribute with encouragement and conviction.

 Here’s a chance to see God work a miracle. The one where your prayer life gets really sincere! In the last two years I’ve learned the first and last names of everyone I work with across the Globe. My conversations with “co laborers” are longer than they’ve ever been. I’m seeing a true relationship where you actually know what a ministry is doing and how much that is costing. You might even know who the volunteers are. In fact YOU may have to be one.

”A famine in the land” can also produce a famine of encouragement. The one thing that has to happen before changes come is to see the goal beyond the obstacles. Attitude may be the only thing to keep your circumstances from overwhelming you. The best way to maintain a good attitude is to apply encouragement to others even in your own dilemmas. Kind of like sharing the gospel with a tooth ache!  Here’s where you find out for real if your faith is real! Can you believe that God has your back? Can you believe that his process for all of us is exactly on schedule, that there are no coincidences? Easy sometimes to sing about Trusting God, but God forbid we should actually have to do it.

 In hardship we get to strengthen our song material before it’s written. “if I didn’t have a problem, I wouldn’t know that God could solve them” sings Andre Crouch. I personally don’t think that was his last problem he was singing about either. Success is mostly guided by a supply and demand mentality. Maybe we could apply that now to “encouragement” as a real product. It might be in shorter supply than quality musicianship at this point. An attitude of encouragement is like singing or writing music. You don’t need a budget to do that part!

 Here’s what else you can do with absolutely no money: make your prayers real. Look to encourage others before the contract is signed. Make relationships that are based on common ground. Find people you “resonate” with. Look for ways to be authentic! And lead by example. And trust others with your life! It’s not just God that will get you through. He uses relationships!  You can’t turn the sail boat if it’s dead in the water. And without God’s unseen power, like the wind, we will reach no destination worth arriving at.

 Purification is not a fun process. But the end result is more valuable. Gold and Silver is what we use to purchase what we really want. But it’s not the prize itself! You have the prize when you find your focus in pursuit of your passion. Christ will redeem your hardships! See that! Believe that. And watch it come true.

 We both know you could have prevented it if you wanted to. But you didn’t. I know that there is an appointed time for all of us with eternity. I just wish you could have scheduled her appointment a little farther down the road. We could discuss the ramifications of free will that you’ve gifted everyone and how it impacts all of us. But that doesn’t bring any one back from the dead.

 I’m nearly speechless here. I’m filled with a wild mixture of love and pain, resentment, sadness, and one giant question mark about your plans. Right away I feel responsible to speak for you about why you allow this kind of tragedy. But even an accurate answer would not change the aching of hearts broken. And seeing a nine year old lying in a coffin will never look right to me.

 Personally I can see how you move most of us along as a direct result of the current pain we’re in. Nothing seems to change without the pain of loss. It’s the only way we overcome our fears of changing the way things are. I pray her sacrifice is not wasted. That what needs to change in our lives here will be brought to pass. And I pray that children lost will speak to us from their shortened lives that we are responsible to love those we love deeply with all the immediacy that this moment brings.

 A friend of yours told me there’s a difference between endurance and perseverance. The first is a matter of toleration while the second is a real pursuit, a moving forward in the belief that “love” will always win, truth will overcome, and darkness will dissipate. I’m picking what’s behind door number two in this case.

 Take care of Erica for us, give her some hugs and kisses too. Let us rest in the pleasure of knowing that she is in your arms, safe and secure from all alarm.

And give us the strength to live fearlessly because we knew her to be that way. Until we meet again Erica, we’re leaving a light on for you down here!

 Thanks for letting me share… amen

 I thought building a fan base on line was the new way to validate my career until I saw a 13 year old girl’s twitter page the other day. She had 20,000 followers! And she doesn’t sing or play an instrument. They tell me if you can amass 1000 followers you can make money! I wouldn’t know that for sure. I can only talk to maybe a hundred people a day even limiting myself to 140 characters. That’s also the number of “characters” that follow me should the truth be known. Granted that’s a larger audience than Ali Baba had with the 40 thieves. But eliminate the social media experts, real estate agents and positive affirmation gurus. Then see how many followers are junk twitters with pretty face twit pics attached to make you think yer talking to some hot young thing. You then discover yer true followers start to round off closer the numbers you might find at a Tupperware party.

 I was disappointed to find that two of my followers were actually the same guy with two accounts! And now I’m feeling like Gideon has surrounded me with just 300 of his finest but they all have matching torches. Now if you sit for five minutes in front of the home page where your followers post their incomplete sentences @someoneelse, you get the feeling of watching the river run. There are no ripples when you throw a pebble into a babbling brook.

Twitter mania gives me this visual of a hail storm on a lake. It’s an awesome sight! But then no one is focusing on any one splash. I can still remember being told you weren’t serious about your career if you didn’t have a website! Now my website is just a junk drawer where I post my twitters for those who missed em on Facebook. And with the new tech I can now have my twitters broadcast to any number of web configurations. Have you ever been in a restaurant when suddenly the volume goes up because everyone in the place has decided to start talking at the same time? You can’t hear your own conversation at some point. It’s not long till you find yourself shouting “LETS GO SOMEWHERE QUIETER WHERE I CAN HEAR YOU.”

 Now don’t get me wrong here. The new social media has it’s place. But it’s also the equivalent of the hotel lobby some of you might remember during Gospel Music Association’s week long convention. If you’ve been there you are aware of how many times someone was talking to you and looking over your shoulder to see who else might be worth handing their service card to. Once again we must be reminded of individual relationship and personal attention. Seeing real people and hearing them as well. It’s an age old human defect, where our one mouth outperforms our two ears.

 The first time I listened to a twitter head was when I was looking for advice about how much time to devote to amassing a twitter following. Hop Hopkins of Oklahoma told me he spends maybe ten minutes a day taking an interest in one or two individuals. The one truth that I have seen floating through Twitterville is that everyone is looking for encouragement and motivation. It’s the new recovery group phone call when yer facing relapse. Coined phrases float across every page, words of wisdom and insight and in my case humor! I have real people sorted into group listings to keep up with followers who resonate with one or more passions: Ministry, motorcycles, rehab and recovery, readers and quote-rs, musicians, and business professionals.

 I see social media as a perpetual convention mostly. It beats handing out flyers in the parking lot by a nose. So, yes, meet and greet but don’t forget the eye contact. Work does come from the effort but not before the synergy of resonating with passionate souls. And who knows maybe you’ll find some like minds who don’t fall into your marketing demographic! If there’s one thing that inspires me about “on line fishing” is that every once in a while I’ll have a conversation with someone in Indonesia or Scotland who’s feeling the exact same sense of futility in tryin to talk to too many people at once!

Here’s where I don’t want God’s job, hearing all the prayers and direct messaging the entire worlds population. But I do believe it’s a whole new way of being “in the world” just as long as you’re not “full of it!”  

On Twitter I have only 140 characters before I’m through. Here I get at least 800 words! “OMG” It’s like 3200 tweets with no interjections!

But if you’d rather hear less of me, I’m at twitter.com/bryan_duncan  where you can find me immediately if you feel my take is not that ”GR8”, or just to “LOL”. Here’s a new one “GFAC”..(Go Forth And Conquer)

should you like to post comments and get a quicker response, I’ve found it easier to casually address individuals directly on Twitter.com!

go to www.twitter.com/bryan_duncan if you’d like a direct response. I’m on their almost daily at some point. even now I’m finding a new road in Social Media.

my website will still remain a home for pictures and longer reads and especially for sales of music and such. But like the world itself we are all finding an ever changing universe.

I have a harder time with change these days but after the initial complaints I’m discovering a whole new adventure. It’s not familiar territory but at least I’m not bored! 8). kinda like a roller coaster ride at some point.

Every musician and artist goes through the highs and lows of popularity. But concerts as a way of outreach has been horribly discounted in recent years and with the decline of the music business in the way of hard sales of product due to downloading and theft  has left me in a position of attaching myself to what ever draws the audience.

I have spent countless hours before God, in anticipation of a new vision with regards to what I’m doing. Touring holds no passion for me these days. The road life was so unproductive for me as to leave me nearly corrupted. The cost was enormous! And my losses in the way of community and family have left me with a floundering sense of true purpose.

I’m incredibly slow at processing my dilemma’s. I remain stuck in my own denial. my persception is untrustworthy mostly. I become paranoid about what I believe to be happening. Is it merely my own decline? or is there a decline everywhere, that music is not the force that it once was.

Is it just that older people (like myself) just don’t have time to attend concerts? Unless drinks are served in a comfortable and entertaining atmosphere no one makes the effort.

true that one man will travel 8 hours to hear me sing. but those ten minutes away find some distraction that prevents them from attending.  and so I am relegated to participating in someone else’s agenda.

The information super highway has made it hard to get anyone’s attention for more than a few seconds and the demand for new material is almost oppressive. Headlines with little content continues to be the wave. Give me the readers digest version. I’ll check out “Whatever” for dummies and move on.

Clearly the world has drastically changed and I have not kept up. Typical old person feeling I’m sure. “the world went and got itself in a big damn hurry” says a convict getting out after a 20 year prison sentence. In the movie Shawshank Redemption.

“Either get busy livin or get busy dyin” they add in that story. I’m choosing life myself. but I’m also like the star character in this movie. Tunneling through 200 feet of stone wall with a small rock hammer!

Here’s prayin that we may find what God intends because all else is a waste of time. If it is darkest just before the dawn… then surely the dawn is at hand now more than ever!

 I’m a newlywed at Fifty Six! Raising two teenage daughters! Well I’m throwing money at the problems anyway. I wrote two books and had one published. My first acknowledgement that music might not be a sustainable compensation. My fingerprints are on file at the police station too. A true sign that I’m still not above the law and spiritual insights don’t always translate to appropriate behavior.

It feels like I’m changing horses in the middle of a stream. It’s uncomfortable sometimes but then there is a real sense of adventure again that I didn’t see coming.

I’m not sure the new Social Media circus I’ve joined is not corrupting my writing skills. The punch line has to come before the joke can be told. It comes with a realization that nobody pays attention to anything for more than a few seconds. I signed up for FaceBook and Twitter, posting everyday in hopes of rebuilding visibility for my work.

I tend to judge my worth by number of comments on my sites. Still lookin for validation in the wrong places perhaps. I read more books this year than ever but missed my goals by half.

I bought a car that I don’t drive. Lost all my back memory on Computer to a theft. “old things are passed away because I didn’t back it up”. I’ve tripled the list of  co laborers I know by first and last name.

I book most of my own shows and handle my own travel. I write and produce and look for true synergy. I started a non profit public charity for Radio Rehab. I’ve gone from “Singer/songwriter” to “content provider” in a single year.

The good news is, no body I know well died this year! (though a couple of friends tried). I’m still reasonably functional too, still walkin which became a problem several months back. I’m old enough to worry about not recovering from a health set back. I only got sick once. which is still once more than usual for me. But I watched my dad suffer a stroke and fight with Alzheimer’s at the same time. A not too subtle message of preparation for what comes before eternal life!

Amazing Grace continues to be my favorite song. I’m discouraged about my sphere of influence though it might be greater in a tighter arena. Most of the things I worried about this year didn’t happen. I still live in a spectacular home even though it is rented. And that is something to thank God for in this world of foreclosures.

I hope that I appreciate what others do for me, more than I have in the past. That success truly does have many fathers. “It’s a Wonderful Life” continues to remind me that friends are where the real wealth is. And the strength of family should not be discounted. And it all comes as a result of sacrificial giving first and placing the needs of others above our own is the only true way to survive.

I’m old enough to dream dreams that I might not realize but young enough to crave a vision for what I still might do that is a contribution to sanity in this life.

Disaster’s have a way of clearing a path for a new way of seeing the world. Hardship really is the pathway to peace. Thank God for a little more time: A new year with a new agenda is on the horizon. Seize the moment.