From ABC television cameraman, to worshipper, to fallen hero and bipolar sufferer, and back up once again as a grace-saved and more introspective writer-composer-believer – that’s how one might sum up Australian Geoff Bullock’s adult life. Though he accepted God’s grace in 1978, he was a senior cameraman with ABC, and thought that he’d eventually be a director or producer. Ten years later though, he was part of the Hillsong phenomenon, the first worship pastor at Hillsongs church in Sydney, Australia from 1987 until 1995. It was during this time that he wrote “Glory”, one of many songs he wrote that he now says were his expression of trying to draw closer to God. Bullock’s life has come through a valley, and now he sees the relationship with God from a different direction than when he wrote the song.
The song “Glory” was recorded on “The Power of Your Love” album in 1992, the first of the live performance praise and worship albums that the Hillsong worship ministry has produced annually. Just listen to the words of “The Power of Your Love”, perhaps Bullock’s most well-known song and a companion to “Glory” on the same record, and you sense Bullock’s life was intimately directed toward the Lord. The songs were sung at a conference for 1,000 people in 1992, a conference that grew to 5,000 by 1997, and then to 30,000 in 2006. This conference started with just 150 delegates in 1986 and its notoriety blossomed under Bullock’s and Mark Zschech’s direction. Seeing one’s life purpose succeed must have been exhilarating for Bullock, to sense that God’s glory was moving among a church, and even world community. The Hillsong church went international in 1992 as Hillsong Kiev began in Ukraine, the same year of “Glory”. In interviews that now look back, Bullock reflects that the early years of Hillsong were focused on how to experience more of God. He was striving to achieve God’s grace’, rather than receiving it, a misperception he now admits.
By 1995, Bullock left the Sydney church, and he struggled in his personal and spiritual life for a time; his marriage failed, he was diagnosed with a bipolar disorder, and he suspended his work in ministry. But, he’s come through all the aftermath of the Hillsong years, and now has a different slant on God’s work in his life. Now, it’s not so much trying to experience more of God, but rather thanking Him for what He’s done to extend grace in Geoff Bullock’s --and every believer’s--direction. It’s not just idle talk with Bullock. He’s taken some of his early songs and modified the lyrics (including those in “The Power of Your Love”) to reflect how he feels about this change in his spiritual walk. The key is what God has done, who He is, and not what I do, Bullock is saying. So, would Bullock revise “Glory”, to emphasize his discovery? It’s not really clear that Bullock has been re-engineering “Glory”, at least in interviews that he’s given since his reemergence into Christian music performance. And, perhaps the song’s changes would be minor -- maybe a praise of God for showing us His throne and His majesty, rather than a proclamation of what we see with unveiled eyes (verse 2). Yet, the names of God that Bullock stressed in the song’s original version are still true. He’s Lord, King, Emmanuel, Holy One, Prince of Peace…all as ‘spot on’ today as they were in 1992, and long before that. Geoff Bullock is just like the rest of us believers. Struggle might make me re-dig some wells, but God’s identity remains firm.
See the following site for information on Geoff Bullock: http://www.geoffbullock.com/
Many other links to information about Geoff Bullock via press reports, interviews, articles he has written and the album “The Power of Your Love” on which the song “Glory” appears, are at: http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Geoff_Bullock
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