BHBC D-Now

WOW! The room was packed. The students were energized. The Spirit was moving. We had a great night last night but there was something special about tonight. Maybe it was because my wife was with me (which has become more of a rare occasion in recent years) or maybe it was because I was with my normal players or maybe it was because Wade was speaking. Whatever it was, Matt should be real proud of the ministry he is building over at Burnt Hickory. He has a incredible group of students that was humbled and blessed to worship with again this year.

UISBC Ski and Share!!!

The students at this retreat are amazing!!! Very rarely do we see the kind of response in worship we have seen with these students. It is not only encouraging but it is inspiring. Mark and Debbie, y’all have a done a great job!

Now I have a request. I used up the battery on our camera taking shots of my wife on the slopes (shes editing a video so I’ll some of the awesomeness later) and didn’t get to take any pictures of the worship services. Any of you have any pictures you can email me? Shoot them over to will@willgoodwin.com.

You guys are awesome and I look forward to any opportunity to worship with you in the future.

Fire and Ice in Boston

Michael and I are in Boston, MA today taping a video for our Dominate series. While up here, we met some great guys from Fellowship Church who took us out to eat at one of the coolest restaurants I have ever been in. Apparently, up here, the type of buffet we are used to in the south is looked down upon so to get that great, all-you-can-eat buffet experience, they have to get creative. Enter Fire & Ice: An Improvisational Grill.

I took some pics with my phone to show you how it works. Imagine a salad bar with raw meat, noodles, and veggies.

They’ve got just about everything you can imagine – shrimp, pork, salmon, pork, tuna, chicken, turkey, sirloin, a half dozen differnt types of noodles, all your favorite veggies, potatoes, corn-on-the-cobb, fruits, and even a regular salad bar. There is even a separate section with ribs, meatballs, sausage, pulled pork, crawfish, and both meat and turkey patties for burgers.

Once your bowl is filled with the most ridiculous mixture of raw foods, you choose one of their 14 different sauces from sweet & sour to bold & spicy that’ll give your concoction the over-the-top unique flavor your taste buds are drooling over.

The last step is to take your bowl-o-grub to the giant donut looking grill in the middle of the room and watch the chefs perform a much less exciting variation of a traditional hibachi grill by lining your selection up along the mass of other orders they are cooking at the same time. When its, crowded, this grill completely full and the line waiting for the next spot gets uncomfortably long.

There is one of these opening in Birmingham, AL next Monday. Now, I’m not sure how Buckhead got overlooked in their franchising campaign, but I’ll mst defintely be taking my wife on a road trip to B-ham in a few short days.

GBC Student Winter Retreat – Ridgecrest, NC

We’re heading home from an amazing weekend in Ridgecrest, NC. It is one thing to go play and lead worship where the people in attendance know you and your songs and they sing loud and are overly responsive because they are fans of your music. It is a completely different experience when you show up somewhere and the people don’t know you or your music from Joe Schmoe’s garage band and their response in worship is triumphantly God-honoring. We were humbled and blessed to be with the students at this discipleship weekend and deeply appreciate Gordon’s commitment to create an environment that helps enrich the students relationship with Christ.

Though we didn’t get to hang out with him too much, we also made a new friend in Landon Dowden, pastor of Crosspoint Church in Baton Rouge, LA (I’d link to their website but it is getting some major renovations and is not quite ready for public viewing). It is always refreshing to work with a communicator who unashamedly promotes the importance of the Word. Very challenging sessions, but the best thing I walked away with this weekend was the statement he made about being more like Christ when you leave than when you came in. That applies everywhere – even the grocery store.

P.S. If any of you have pictures from this weekend that you took of us, we’d love to see them. You can email them to me or attach them in a comment.

Winter Xtreme – Pigeon Forge, TN

We drove through the night (well, rode actually) and arrived in Pigeon Forge at approximately 5:30 AM. We started loading our equipment in at 6:00 AM and had our soundcheck at 7:00 AM. We had stale sausage and cold biscuits and gravy for breakfast at 8:00 AM. Doors opened at 8:30 AM. The morning session began at 9:30 and we went on at 9:35 AM. The crowd helped us shout out Nothing But the Blood and started a jumping a bit during Let Them Know. It was a great way to start off a new conference and remind us and everyone listening to us that we want to people to believe what they sing and not be ashamed to daily carry their cross and boldly proclaim the glory of Jesus Christ.

We were supposed to play tonight, but Chris Tomlin was feeling well enough to perform so they bumped our set and gave us a longer one tomorrow morning. Fine by me. I’m going to be there to here Tony Nolan bring the word so if something happens last minute, we’ll be on standby.

Today I Autographed a Stuffed Duck

We are just finishing up here in Branson, MO and about to get on the bus and head to Pigeon Forge. The crowd was amazing. The spirit was moving. Hundreds of students came forward to give their life to Christ. It was a powerful display of God’s majesty closed out by a short Chris Tomlin concert that almost didn’t happen (he had a kidney stone yesterday – ouch – and postponed his set to this morning).

Amidst all the God-elements and powerful, convicting words from Wade Morris, David Nasser, and Tony Nolan, there are always a few people who like to collect autographs – even from the band that is no one has ever heard of (namely me). And on occasion, those people like to collect autographs on anything they can get their hands on. I personally provide free pictures so anyone can have something that makes sense to have a signature on it. But it never fails, someone will ask you to sign their wrist band, shirt, jacket, whatever.

Today I signed some of the strangest things I have ever signed: 1) A pair pants. Not that someone was wearing. just a pair of pants someone brought to me to sign, 2) A cell phone. I signed one this summer, but this was like a whole youth groups cell phones, and 3) a stuffed animal – specifically a duck. It wasn’t a duck with my name or face on it nor do I sing a song about ducks. It was just a duck someone happened to have with them. 4) a dollar bill. Not sure of the legal ramifications but it sure would be cool if I ended up seeing it again some day.

But I don’t care. If someone is interested enough in my ministry to ask for an autograph, I’ll sign just about anything. It’s not about me and I know that. I just hope those people asking for the autographs know that too. Besides, I’m pretty sure they’ll be disappointed if they try to make some side cash on eBay.

Winter Xtreme Branson, MO

We’re up here in Branson, MO for Winter Xtreme and it is ridiculously cold. I wish it would snow. I also wish my wife and family could be up here with me. I miss them very much. Nevertheless, we are excited to leading worship again for this event. Of all the Xtreme locations we have had the privilege of playing at, this is by far our favorite (or at least mine). It is the venue and responsiveness of the audience mostly. They are always supportive, interactive, and with us from teh first note to the last – even when we only have a ten minute set.

However, the best part is my having a voice. Last year, I growled through every song with a scratchy, barely audible whisper that was painful to listen to (and sing with). It is always nice to actually be able to sing seeing as that is what I do.

Real Washington Pics

These pictures I actually took from real life unlike the fake one from the previous post. My wife has put others I took on her site. Go have a look. I’ve got some others I’ll post later. I’d actually like to figure out how to do a slide show instead of a long scrolling picture display.

Pictures From Arlington Cemetery

Yes, I did take these pictures. I can show them to you on my camera. But I didn’t take the originals. They were all hanging in the Arlington Welcome Center and looked great on my camera so I thought I might try some trick photography and see if I could fool anyone. Can’t give credit to the original photographer because there was no mention of who it was.

Grove Level Baptist “Sold Out” Weekend

Just got back from playing up in Dalton, GA for a middle school retreat. As chance would have it, my pastor was the speaker for this event and I didn’t have a clue until the day before. In fact, we were invited completely separately and Tom (the Student Pastor) had no idea we were working at the same church.

We had a blast with the students. They took while to warm up to us, but eventually started really getting into the songs and freely worshiping. That is always exciting to see. Not a ton of time to hang out, but we did just about puke watching them play their disgusting rec games. I’m so glad I’m not a youth. If I had to swallow a mouth full of maple syrup and drink coffee grinds and sugar straight from a coffee filter soaked in water, well…I’m just glad I’m not a youth for many reasons.

The weirdest thing about the weekend was what we ended up doing for about an hour Saturday afternoon. After we left the rec time, we stopped by a CVS to pick up a video tape to film a video for church the next morning. Next door to it, there was a hole in the wall pizza joint that looked really good. We had just eaten lunch and weren’t really hungry, but it looked so good. Next thing we knew, we were sitting in an abandoned Winn-Dixie parking lot, munching on some Luigi’s finest, watching Seinfeld in my conversion van. How good can it get?