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The Tropics and the Long Drive Home
We've returned home from the Australian leg of the 'Everlasting' Release Tour after driving 13,513km & completing 27 concerts/music-sermons in eight weeks. To say the least, there's a certain combination of burnout, joy and surrealism that accompanies a music ministry tour.
I have come to appreciate the small moments, the short spaces of time when a connection is made, a story is heard or a testimony is expressed with tear filled eyes. These are the moments scattered amongst the repetition, the rush and the tiredness that matter. These are the moments amongst the music, the words, the budgeting, and the countless emails that remind us of the reason why.
- A non-Christian husband who comes to church for the first time with his wife
- A lady having a particularly terrible day, being able to have a moment of rest
- A Bible study group's recent studies flowing perfectly into the concert's topic
- A young man, studying the Bible with the pastor, being emotionally moved to the point of conviction
- A lady, who randomly came to church after a series of bad circumstances, who was brought closer in her relationship to God as a result.
Please keep us in your prayers as we continue on with the 'Everlasting' Release Tour in Switzerland, Germany, Austria and the United Kingdom.
Don't Miss the Boat - Story Behind the Song
There’s something epically awe-striking and reverent about organ music in a grand cathedral with acoustics that are out of this world. An organ reverberating with choral voices, bouncing around a cathedral's high ceiling gives me shivers. Without fail it always leads me to think about the absolute grand scale of who God is and how small we are. The transition from organ to piano in the beginning of 'Don't Miss the Boat' musically represents how the swirling morality of the world can sometimes co-exists in our minds with truth of God. This song really was written to represent an aspect of the struggle that exists in the world between Truth and error, especially in regards to post-modernism. The song was written during a time when Monique was a high school Bible teacher. She was teaching an Ethics and Morality unit to several classes, which led to a lot of discussions with her students about their views of truth, morals, ethics, and how it relates to God. The base lyrics of the song was written rather quickly one afternoon after work in response to the heartache and turmoil Monique felt about the lack of certainty a lot of her students had in what is truth within their worldview. The first verse reflects this heartache and the chorus’ lyrics and the song's title are inspired by Matthew 24:37-39, which likens the second coming to noah’s ark, when the doors one day did close. The second verse reflects the answer to the uncertainty in the world that 'To find the perfect peace. In the Word of God. The answers to the questions. What's right? What's wrong?' It's a beautiful thing that in a world full of uncertainty, God offers us peace.
The Hot & Cold of it All
18 days, 5,407Km & 13 music ministry events
The last time we wrote a blog update we were in Mildura on the boarder of South Australia, Victoria and New South Wales. Since then, 8 days have past with 2500 km and 5 concerts (since writing this we have also driven up to Ayr!). We are currently driving through the outback on our way to Emerald Queensland for a concert tonight that will be our most outback concert we've done. We are excited about this AND it's T-shirt and shorts weather!!! Yes! Super excited to cross into Queensland and be experiencing their warm winters. We've put the air-con on, even though it's only 23 degrees Celsius as we're so used to the cold winter from down south. Our view currently is dry, brown bush and trees, a quarter of which are dead. The cows are getting thinner, the rivers drier and the drought is becoming more obvious.
This is in stark contrast to just two nights ago when were finishing off the after-concert pack up in 1 degree weather with the chill of snow in the air in Armidale. Waking up the next morning we were greeted with a wood-fire smoke filled valley with greenery and deciduous trees. This is Australia. We love our home! A country filled with diversity.
Our stops in the last week have included a church service in Bathurst and concerts in Griffith, Dubbo, Coonabarabran, Tamworth and Armidale. There have been both fantastic experiences and difficult moments that have continued in a cycle so typical of ministry ministry tour life.
After finishing set up and sound check for one concert, 7pm came and there was not one person. Zilch, nada, none. Talk about deflation. We felt a variety of emotions: surprise, depression, annoyance, self-pity, embarrassment, and thoughts of "lets just pack up". 7:10 rolled around and one person had arrived. We found out around this time that this church has a high population of Pacific Islanders and it's in their church culture to turn up later than on time. So with two people there, we decided at 7:20 that we would do the concert anyway. By the time we started 5 minutes later, there was a nice group who had trickled in and by the time we were finished the group had tripled. This concert ended up being one of the best concerts so far on the tour with the most financially supportive and responsive people. It's amazing how easy it is to begin to doubt when at face value the situation looks hopeless.
A lady at another church told us that she felt like all the words we spoke and the song lyrics were written exactly just for her. She expressed that our concert touched on exactly what she had been feeling discouraged about recently and gave immense encouragement. She said it felt like God brought us to her town at just the right time just for her; to encourage her. She thanked us for being so open with our struggles in our songs, such as in Temporary, as it helped her to not feel alone in her personal struggle.
Another exciting testimony that happened is that a woman, who previously hadn't been coming to church was invited to our concert, she loved it so much that when invited to a Bible study small group later that week she said "yes". Praise God!
After our concert at Coonabarabran Presbyterian Church on Sunday arvo, we had the opportunity to go look at the stars! Coona is the Astronomy capital of Australia and some people from the church got us in contact with Milroy observatory; the largest public telescope in Australia. We spent 2 hours looking at the stars and it was amazing! What an experience. The pics below are of just a few of the stars/planets we saw last night. The pics are taken through the telescope at Milroy. The pink nebula though was shades of dark blue and black as our eyes can't see the colours, but a camera can. We also were able to see a comet, alpha centauri & a few other stars. The whole experience made me more amazed at our Creator God and excited for His soon return! Now, when we sing our new songs, Orion & There We Rise, we're always going to have the sights from last nights experience in our minds. So brilliant, amazing and filled with wonder!!!
Photos by Milroy Observatory
As we leave Emerald after a wonderful concert last night, we're looking forward to our time in the tropical far north. But first a six hour drive, 4 1/2 hours of which with no town in between. If you would like to support our music ministry trip from where you're at, you can buy our NEW album!
Until next time! Blessings & love,
Eric & Monique