Last year about this time, my wife and I were locked in a battle with the local school system over their planned changes to my autistic son’s class placement. If you are interested, you can read the blog post I wrote back then by clicking here. For a period of about six to eight weeks, we did everything we could think of to show those in authority that changing Jacob’s class was a bad idea. We attended school board meetings, talked to other parents and teachers, wrote letters and emails, made lots of phone calls, and prayed a bunch. Just when we thought we had run out of options and didn’t know what else we could do, we got a phone call that Jacob would be assigned to the same class and teacher the following year. God stepped in in a dramatic and powerful way so that it was clear that He was the one who handled it.
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As I posted last week, I’m excited to be going back to Jamaica for a second mission trip this summer. (Click here to read that post.) For those that are unfamiliar, we go down and teach young people musical concepts, how to play instruments, and how to lead others in worship. This year, I also get to take my oldest daughter with me, which is great but also means that we both have to raise financial support. Please consider supporting us financially – there are instructions at the bottom of this post.
I am so pleased to share that I have another opportunity to go on a mission trip to Jamaica this summer! As most of you know, last year I traveled to Montego Bay along with a team from my church and our Music Minister David Loftis (Teach412 Ministries) to hold a music camp for young people interested in leading worship at local churches. You can read my posts from that trip by clicking here. We had a wonderful time teaching some great teenagers how to play various instruments and sing. At the same time, we grew together in the Word. Our time there was culminated with an evangelistic concert which resulted in several people trusting in Jesus Christ for their salvation. Click here to see a video about this important ministry. Our trip is currently scheduled for July 25th through August 3rd, 2015.
I wanted to share with you a video of part of our Easter morning worship set at Pleasant Garden Baptist. The song we are doing is “Forever,” as performed by Kari Jobe. In the middle of the song, one of our pastoral staff comes out and reads a poem entitled “The Word” written by Isaac Wimberley which is really powerful. This was not our original idea, Kari Jobe had Isaac Wimberley do this in a live performance which you can find on YouTube. But it was something unusual for our worship service which really caused it to stand out as a highlight. I am playing bass guitar and singing some background vocals. One tangential remark: I rarely wear a suit to play in the praise band. Since I wear a suit every day at work, I enjoy not having to get quite so dressed up for church, but I was leading a couple of the other songs in the set and knew I would be up front next to Pastor David (playing the acoustic guitar) and he would be wearing a coat and tie. I joked that we should have done a Blues Brother thing and wore shades because that’s how I feel when I am playing bass in a suit. But I hope you enjoy the video. This is recorded through our new digital soundboard, which we have had for a couple of months and are still getting used to.
First, let me apologize – this isn’t the usual kind of post you expect to see on my music site. It was just easier to post it here than create a whole other vehicle to share this kind of commentary. So pardon the interruption and we will get you back to your regularly scheduled programming shortly…