Tomlin, Redman, Giglio concert

Since Tammie and Tony were kind enough to post a comment... I guess I oughta give my take on the concert yesterday. Overall it was positive. Although I actually spent most of the time preoccupied with: 1). The family sitting in front of us. They had two pre-teen boys that seemed to be really struggling with some issues. I spend a lot of time praying for them. 2). Crying Stones Church. That really jumped out at me and wouldn't leave me alone. You'll hear more about this later (probably). 3). Miracles I'm hoping for. You'll probably hear about these later too. For a further run-down on the concert...

The positives:

• How can you not like a driving bass that physically moves your body? I had heard bad things about the venue (Grand Wayne Center), but I thought the sound was really quite good.
• I was glad "the show" wasn't overdone. They had the lights and fog, but it really did appear to be more of a "worship thing." I liked that. I also liked that it wasn't very "celebrity-ish" at all. Chris and Matt were both very down-to-earth.
• No altar call and they didn't try to make anybody buy anything!!! Good job, guys. (Not that I'm totally against altar calls, but...)
  
• I was pleasantly surprised by Lou Giglio's message. I've only heard him speak once, and let's just say I wasn't looking forward to the second time. But he had a great message. Could have been a tad shorter, but, yeah Tony, Laminin is cool!
• I think they said there were about 4,000 people. Sold out. Other than having to wind through the entire place to get in, it was a nice place for this type event.
• I got my "Amazing Grace" fix even though we didn't sing it at church today. I love Chris's version.
• I had forgotten there were actually other Christians who got really fired up about loud music; who enjoyed music in general; and who had a faith that was pretty fired up. I also forgot there were churches with youth groups who took kids to things like this.
  

Improvements:

• As with hockey... it would have been better if it were an hour shorter. I was expecting them to go into "How Great Is Our God" right after "Amazing Grace" and it would have been a good time to end. And what the heck is with taking an intermission??? Just give us the dang show, we can go pee on our own.
• The set-up wasn't the greatest. The screens were all too low, and weren't really very big. And in a long room like this, it would help to have some screens in the middle for those of us sitting in the back row. If I could see the stage I wouldn't need a screen.
• I had forgotten how stupid some people can be at Christian concerts (though that's not an exclusively Christian thing).
• I was disappointed with "How Great Is Our God." Oh, it was plenty good, but I was really hoping it would have sounded more like the way we do it. :)
  

I guess I'm glad I went. If nothing else I think it inspired me to want to see the Goo Goo Dolls in a couple weeks. :) Chris, Matt, and Louis were good though. It was better than I expected.