Craig McQueen

The Misunderstanding of God’s Plan

I’m a Christian, yet I sympathise with people who think the message of the churches isn’t that appealing. Specifically, I'm referring to the doctrine of hell defined as the eternal, conscious punishment of the wicked (refer to Wikipedia article for an overview of Christian hell doctrine). The message has problems that aren’t answered. But here’s the thing – is the problem with the message that we can find in the Bible, or is the problem with the message given by the churches? Perhaps a fresh look at the Bible will find something with a lot more appeal. We should hope so.

Heaven and hell—a staple doctrine of Christianity. And yet, surely this doctrine turns people away from believing in a loving God. Is it right? Is it true to what the Bible says? A small number of Christians believe the Bible actually reveals a very different story—one that is much more exciting and encouraging—one that reveals a truly loving God.

Well, a stra­nge twist of fate has landed us in Japan - for a couple of years it would seem. We're now residents in Numazu, as of about 3 weeks ago. Should be interesting!

Here is a collection of interesting links for Numazu life...

Three-part for SAB

This is a well-known hymn. I decided to try to write some nice chords and harmonies for our choir, plus a nice-sounding piano accompaniment. It's still a pretty simple arrangement. Our choir has only a few men, so I've arranged it for just one men's part.

A Subway store manager wanted to invent a great new sub sandwich recipe – one that would make customers sing for joy and become regular patrons.

After considerable thought, he concocted an ingenious invention – a system for discovering a great recipe. Here’s how he did it.

Flying has always fascinated me. Humans have only managed free flight for a few hundred years. For “heavier than air” flight (i.e. not a hot-air balloon) we’ve only done it for a little over a century. It took hard work for humans to make it happen. But birds, mammals, insects and even the occasional fish have been flying long before humans ever ever achieved it.

I have worked for several years as an engineer, making gadgets of various sorts. For years I’ve sat in front of my computer, studied diagrams, scribbled notes, attended meetings, and worked with a team of sometimes dozens of people, to produce something that will be useful to people. The end result is usually satisfying, and we know we have worked well to design something good. Someone looking at our work probably would not appreciate everything that we did to make it work. But they would know that humans created it.

This is 4-part SATB harmony, "a capella". A joy to sing.

I'm not sure of the origin of this piece. My wife learned it by ear from a friend at church. Years later she sang it to me, as well as harmonies, from memory. I transcribed it with modifications.

I arranged this well-known piece for 4 men. Nothing too fancy, just 4-part harmony. One of the harmonies is above the melody (I guess you'd call it a descant).

I wrote this piece in 1998, but only recently managed to fully transcribe it.

It roughly covers the themes of God's holy days described in Leviticus 23.