June 30th, 2009 by Joe

As I fly home tomorrow, I will be flooded with emotion; it is unavoidable, but accepted. When on the missions field, be it on tour as a “musicianary” or as a pure evangelist, your spirit soars as you grow incredibly close to the Lord. As you return home, the reality of the world you live in at your house sets in, and there can be a period of let down. I do not regret these emotions, but rather embrace them as a sign that the time spent here has been time walking as close to the Lord as I can, and enjoying His daily embrace. I encourage you all to try it; go on a short term mission trip sponsored by your local church. Don’t listen to the lies the enemy will hit you with:

“I’m not that deep a Christian”

“They just want pastors”

“I can’t sing”

“I have nothing to offer”

“I don’t have the money or time”

“My friends think I am crazy”

Go for it – now – while you hear the quiet calling of God’s voice in you. You’ll not regret this at all.

June 30th, 2009 by Joe

Before I post the story of what happened out here, I need you to understand my viewpoint of the spiritual battle around us. I firmly believe that God – my God, is the God of the Bible, the father of Abraham, who exists as a triune God; a trinity of God the Father, God the Son, and God the Holy Spirit. If you do not believe that, you most likely will not agree with my interpretation of this post.

Over the past week, many of our team have had vivid dreams and visions; some of us have been physically injured. The ones who were injured were first attacked spiritually, either by dreams or words spoken to them from people for whom we performed. I firmly believe these were attacks from Satan – our enemy – because the Bible, which is where my God has spoken to me, assures me that Satan is indeed real and ready to attack all that is Godly. Last night, the apparitions and attacks became very real – two members of our team are injured physically, while others have been seeing what appears to be a cloaked figure walking out on the property with a red candle toward a building. Some members have been hearing screams in the middle of the night from the direction of the candle walker’s destination.

Sometimes, Satan becomes all too obvious. Twice this week, the local dogs began to howl as we prayed, and today – right as we celebrated communion – all of the dogs began to howl in unison…as if on cue. It was so obvious as to be laughable – but we do not mock our enemy to invite more attacks, but rather bind him in prayer and deliverance. We went out of our building at the end of our communion, and walked the local streets, singing praise songs and praying against the enemy’s presence here. I know some of you may be a bit “wigged out” on that thought, but ask yourself this:

“If I really believe in the God of the Bible, then I have to believe all that is in that Bible as well. The Bible assures us that Satan exists, and he prowls the earth looking to devour God’s people. If I believe that, and I know the Bible discusses spiritual warfare and tells us how to combat Satan, then why are we not fighting this battle on every front?”

Why do we not pray for our neighborhoods, praying against powers that have a stranglehold on our neighbors and their families? I submit we have authority, in Christ, through the Holy Spirit that God has dwelling in us, to combat these powers. First you must believe this, and accept Christ to be Lord of your life – ask Him to guide you daily…allow His spirit to live in you. When you have done that, you become members of the family of God, and his Bible – his love letter to you – tells you He has given you authority over all things on this earth.

Stop looking at the Bible as a list of do’s and don’t’s – instead view it as a love letter from your father; telling you the great history of your family, ways to live a more blessed life, and the power you have over all that comes against you. Become mighty warriors today!

June 29th, 2009 by Joe

Today was a day to recharge after the last three long days. During the morning I reflected on many people in my life that still wrestle with “religion” versus “relationship with Jesus”. I pray the video of our concert last night really strikes a chord with you all. God never wanted us to be about the rules sometimes constructed by people in religion; He only wants US – He wants our fellowship and love. He is a kind and loving Father that wants our time, much as we want time with our own children.

Yes…going to church is important, in that our pastor will challenge our walk and teach us properly. We also need to surround ourselves with like-minded (Christian) people to help sharpen our faith and help us when we struggle and fall. I fear too many people are lost, as well-meaning believers chastise them for missing a Sunday service, or dancing, or _____ …you can fill in the blank. We need to lift each other up, in love and understanding daily. As the Holy Spirit fills our lives, we will be compelled to come to church and seek that relationship with our awesome Creator, who longs to be with us every minute of the day.

I’d love to hear your thoughts on this…to join in on this blog, you create an account (very easy…I did it!), which keeps out the riff-raff…and post your comments. This blog, and this site, are meant to be a connecting place for us to discuss these ideas, share our faith, and share our lives together. Well…it’s after midnight out here, and the wonderful Hungarian people have flat-out worn me ragged as we toured the city of Budapest today! So, I bid you all a great night’s sleep; may our great God grant you a deep sleep, and a great week! Blessings.

Joe

June 29th, 2009 by Joe

What an incredible weekend we have had! I have not been able to write because of our crazy schedule! Saturday morning we left for Baja, around 4 hours away. We left promptly at 7 am, and made it just before lunch. We were to play at a Gospel festival in the city center, as the mainline act. It would be a 2 hour concert, with our evangelism oriented message, as opposed to the “Crowns” missions message.

The pastor in Baja is a unique man; born in Hungary, he moved to the US as a child, and ran a successful landscaping business for many years. As his passion for his homeland grew, he eventually sold his business and used the money to buy a house and building for a church in Baja. The building has an amazing story – in the basement, now converted to a church, was the last area the persecuted Jews hid out during the German invasion. His basement was where the Nazis found the last of the Jews in Baja, and took them away. As we sat in that room; which still resembled a bunker, you could see where the tunnel was that led to the Synagogue across the street. I could only imagine the fear they felt as they waited for their fate…

The band and dance teams were graciously received by the city – both by the large stage and excellent sound systems, as well as the general population! We had a standing audience of around 500-1000 at any given time, and the evangelism team handed out over 1000 tracks to passers-by. We had some good conversations with the people about our faith as well! We finished around midnight, then off to the Pastor’s house to meet and share. On the road at 1 am; we finally coasted back in around 4 am! What a day…

Up at noon, we then headed into Budapest to perform our “Crowns” message at Calvary Chapel. I cannot encourage you enough to check out the recording on the web. It was very professionally done, with 4 camera feeds and a stereo audio feed. If you want to really experience our presentation, I want you to go here:

 http://livevideo.golgota.hu/events/list/en/media_id/5591

The presentation takes a while to load, as it goes around 2 hours. You will see our band, the dancers, and hear Bill’s message…maybe it will inspire you to dig deeper in your life (I pray it will). The concert went exceptionally well, and then we toured part of Budapest, enjoying some magnificent views until almost 1 am!

Tragically, one of our dancers was seriously injured; severely straining her calf during her dance. Please pray for her (Shelli) when you can; pray for miraculous healing and strength. You will see her dance on “Olivia”; the song our bass player sings (I play bass on the song, and he uses my guitar). What an amazing dance she brought forth while in pain….

I will write more tonight, and try to write some deeper thoughts I have had out here, rather than blather on our trip report…I am almost grieving the process of coming back to the US again, where talking about Jesus is considered politically incorrect….how sad it is I have to leave the country to share my faith…..(sigh).

June 26th, 2009 by Joe

These past two days have brought high triumphs and some very challenging moments. On Wednesday, we took an impromptu trip to Esztergom, in Hungary. We saw two very beautiful cathedrals there. During our time in one of the huge cathedrals, Jill broke out in “Amazing Grace”, and the rest of us began to sing along. The acoustics, combined with the solemn song, brought many to a stop as they toured the building, and the sweet spirit of peace of the Lord was definitely brought in!

We then went to Parkany – in SLOVAKIA! Yes…we crossed the border, and set up a very impromptu street gig in a park there. It was amazing! We met with over 500 people and shared our faith, and had a few actually indicate through interpreters that they wanted to have a personal relationship with Christ, which as you can imagine is HUGE!

The sound system for the park gigs is very limited, and at one point Jon Simpson (our bassist/singer/songwriter) were performing songs from his new CD “Out of the Darkness” (plug…plug…buy it!) when we looked at each other and decided it was futile to go with the system. With a wink and a nod, we unplugged our guitars and ran out into the park plaza with our guitars, playing in unison and Jon still singing! The tone of the outreach changed right then and there; and the crowd sensed something very special was going on there.

But the enemy was hard at work – Jill dropped her guitar and cracked it (a small crack fortunately), and the sound system continued to fade in and out on battery power.

Yesterday we went into Budapest for another street gig in a major train station. I was able to share a Gospel message to the people in between our performances, and we met over 1000 people with tracks! A few heckled us but were actually willing to listen to our message before moving on. The enemy struck hard yesterday, though – both of our vans had there oil pans cracked in two different occasions. At the train station, one of the drivers went over a curb the wrong way and cracked the oil drain plug out of the pan, resulting in that van going out of service. Then, after dinner, we had a huge thunderstorm roll in, complete with hail and street flooding downtown! Our drive home is through a very winding and mountainous road – with all of the flooding and trees down, it was a difficult drive at best. As we rounded a curve, a large boulder was right in the middle of our lane. We avoided it, but the van behind us did not, and the rock ripped the oil filter right off the engine, disabling the vehicle.

We immediately got the van free from the rock and coasted it to a parking lot, leaving a huge oil slick behind us in the rain. We assembled one half of the team and the working van drove them home while the band members stayed behind (just the boy members! We sent Jill on with all of the dancers and evangelists). When our lone operating van returned for us, we rigged up a tow rope and towed our battered van home to the college in Domos (around 8 km away). All said, we finally returned home after midnight, safe and sound, thanks to the prayers of all the team waiting for us.

Today we head to Fót, in Hungary, for our first concert. Now our band team is ready to do what we do most of the time – bring a full on evangelism concert to a stage. We have our provided gear in hand, and will see our sound system this afternoon for the first time. There is an air of excitement and determination to not let the events of the last two days rattle us at all. We are ready!

June 22nd, 2009 by Joe

Today was really cool. We set up in a subway station. It had a large area for stores – very open, but underground (good thing – it was raining!), and we just set up right in the middle. We played multiple acoustic sets with variations of players. We had the dancers with us as well and all were very well received. We played/danced/gave testimonies for around 2 ½ hours, and handed out almost 500 tracts – pamphlets with the Gospel message on them – to passers-by. We were only heckled a few times by the same two men, so I am pleased to say it was a relatively peaceful affair!

Tomorrow we are going to work on the format for this style, as today was really the first time we have ever engaged in this style of street evangelism. The next time we’d like to be even more polished and have some “crossover” songs – like Coldplay – to offer. The Coldplay song we played, “Yellow”, was well received and encouraged us to add a few more. Our job is mainly to attract onlookers by playing high quality music, and allow the evangelism team to hand out the tracts.

The weather has been cold and rainy, but the trend is for warmer weather in the coming days. Hungary – particularly the area we are staying in – is very pretty. We are on the Danube river, in the town of Dömös. The people are very friendly, and Christianity is growing at a fairly rapid pace. It’s exciting to be a part of this!

June 20th, 2009 by Joe

I write this as my wife and I fly from Amsterdam to Budapest on a Malev airlines flight. Our flight from Atlanta to Amsterdam was very good; the flight attendants were enthusiastic and interested in our trip/tour to Budapest. God had been good; the flights have been open enough to get on and stretch out to get rested, and everything has run smoothly. Both guitars and our luggage have arrived with us in Hungary – Praise God! Tonight we stay downtown at a nice hotel on the river; the rest of the team arrives tomorrow and we head to Domos, on the north side of Budapest, to stay at the Bible College for the duration of the tour.

As I alluded to yesterday, the enemy definitely threw us some curves as we prepared to depart! Our dryer has died (no sweat; I’ll fix it when I get home…) and I found a crack in our refrigerator freezer section (some sweat – but covered by warranty). Somebody (who shall remain nameless…) ran over the septic tank cover while mowing the lawn, chewing that up as well! Michelle has also come down with a doozy of a cold…We just laid those things at the Lord’s feet as we left, knowing full well He will provide the time and process to clear it all up.

Sunday we will build our team and bond, then we go to work Monday – street evangelism downtown in Budapest. This is a whole new tour concept for us, and I am excited about it. Normally we play outdoor venues and concerts when we go overseas, but this tour we actually will spend some time on the streets with acoustic guitars and dance team members doing interpretive dance. This will be very cool, and I am excited to see how the Lord works as we do this!

Please pray for Chelle’s health to improve!

June 18th, 2009 by Joe

Right before engaging the enemy, soldiers will dismantle their weapons; inspecting the firing mechanisms, feeders and any other item that could inhibit the proper operation of their most important piece of equipment.  So it was tonight that I sat down with my guitars, re-stringing them, checking the operation of the switches and pots, checking the cables, batteries, and any other piece of my spiritual weaponry – including my bible – to ensure I have everything I need to be the best I can be for the Lord on this tour, for which I leave tomorrow.

You may think this is a weak analogy, this soldier vs. "musicianary" analogy I have made, but is it really?   Ephesians 6:12 tells us "For our struggle is not against flesh and blood, but against the rulers, against the powers, against the world forces of this darkness, against the spiritual forces of wickedness in the heavenly places".  The battle is REAL – I have seen it first hand!  We have had demonic manifestations on our tours; the first time you see it, you realize how real this battle is.  Every day we must be ready to do spiritual battle…when giving our testimony to others, we must guard it and present it as we would any word from the Bible.  The enemy will try to trip you up with distractions.  For example, do you think it is a coincidence our dryer is dying tonight as we prepare to leave?  Are our finances bothering us as we leave?  How about our children’s health and well being?  These all seem like miniscule events, but the enemy will use them to focus our attention on ANYTHING but God, and our calling.

Tonight we checked the flights again, and tomorrow we will leave for Amsterdam, then over to Budapest for our 10 day tour with the Bill Drake band.  My wife, Michelle, will be by my side and part of our team.  Pray for us; pray for our children and their health as we go – the enemy would love to use them to distract us.  In fact, I humbly ask you to pray for all of our family; my Mom, Michelle’s Mom & Dad, our brothers and sisters and their children; that all would be well and they would be kept safe and healthy while we are gone.  Pray for our finances; that more donations would come through to fund our tour – this is a ministry, not a living for me, so I do not ask for pay when I play with our Christian bands.  I only ask our expenses can be covered – which we solicit donations to Operation Mobilization for (www.omusa.org) our tour expenses, which the Lord always seems to cover!

I would love to share with you on that – how a young musician friend of ours toiled for hours laying sod, and then gave us the money he earned toward our tour!  This young man sacrificed his earnings to help us fulfill our mission in Budapest!  May God pour a double dose of Blessing on you, John-Todd, for that!

My next post will be from Budapest on Saturday; thank you for following our progress, but most of all, thank you for your prayers!  God Bless all of you.

Joe

June 1st, 2009 by Joe

I write this post from Dakar, Senegal, where it is a stunningly beautiful day!  Yesterday (Sunday) I spoke at our church about how personal ministry can grow your faith.  Over the past 6 years as a "musicianary", I have had countless occassions to see the Lord change lives as people loosen their grip on controlling their lives and give the reigns to Jesus.  Just as importantly, I have watched my life change as I did the same, then rebelled back and tried to take control myself.  For the last 3 years, I have suffered the consequences of taking a job change promising more money, due to concerns about my main job (not music…).  That job change completely destroyed my ministry by all but eliminating my opportiunites to use my musical gifts for the Lord.  I worked all of the time, chasing the elusive security the world has to offer.  By robbing me of my time to use the precious gift the Lord gave me, my spiritual journey began to suffer.  My walk was not as strong, and I could definitely feel the Enemy (Satan) beginning to attack both me and my family.  Perhaps in future blogs I will also write about the reality of the spiritual war we are in.

Does this sound familiar to some of you?  I pray it does, and if so, please read on…and walk with me through redemption.  This past month i took a new position, which will cut my pay around 25 percent, but will liberate my schedule for my family and my ministry.  Almost immediately, opportunities have begun to pour in – I have not posted all of the dates I have been invited to play, just because I am just getting back into this!  It is as if the Lord is saying "Welcome back, soldier, there is much work for you to do…".

If you truly want to see God at work, and feel His presence in your life, then ask Him to show you the special gift He has given you to use for His glory.  Be prepared, because you will soon be in for the ride of your life!  Go for it – only through supernatural faith did Peter step out of the boat – and became the only mortal man to walk on water!  WOW!