Discover?

So the past few weeks I've joined the Discovery Gospel Choir. What is it? Let me tell you. When I was back in Ireland for Christmas after coming back from Cambodia, I went to a special youth oriented Christmas service in Christchurch Cathedral (the oldest and biggest Cathedral in Dublin...I think). There was a small gospel choir there called "Discovery Gospel Choir." It was an integrated gospel choir about 60% african and 40% Irish from appearances. And ages we were told ranged from 7 years old to mid 80s. The music was good, not spectacular, but respectable- the thing that caught me about the choir though wasn't their sound, it was the what their leader, Philip said, to introduce them, he mentioned words like "gospel" "Christ's Kingdom" and "Racial Reconciliation" all in the same breath. After having been back from HNGR for a month already these words hit me like cold water on parched lips. It was like blowing oxygen on a burning ember, the flame started to burn again. Till this point, I didn't know of any "kingdom, or Shalom" oriented Christian expression in Ireland till that point, who understood these terms in ways that I had come to fall in love with. Philip was the first other Irish Christian who by his vocab seemed to understand.

Before I came back for this summer I searched the internet found a few email addresses and finally got put in touch with the choir. I first spent a day with the choir on an outing day where they were just taking a fun day trip down country. It was great just to sit, sing, and talk about God's heart for this land. I joined the choir and last week we sang in the Point Depot. The Point is a really famous concert venue, it's where all the West-end shows come when they're on tour and where most of the big bands come to play when they're in Dublin. We weren't there for some big concert or choir fest but for something better. It was the annual gathering of the Redeemed Christian Church of God (RCCG). The RCCG is a denomination that began in Nigeria in the 1950s and is now one of the world's largest African denominations. This is the first time they had such a gathering in Ireland. People from all overh the world were there and a choir of 80+ people was there from the UK leading some great gospel worship. I've never been surrounded by so many Nigerians in my life, it was a great thing, and makes me want to visit Nigeria. It was the largest gathering of Africans ever in Irish history, with over 6,000 people there.

We were asked to perform and Philip was asked to give a short message. He did a great job. He tried to encourage the Nigerians living in Ireland to see themselves as missionaries here, as sent by God to revitalize the Irish church and reach out to those who do not know Christ. And as like any good missionaries he encouraged them to love the people and their culture. He encouraged them to be involved with life here, to read the newspaper, to learn the Irish language to start thinking of here as home, and then he also encouraged the irish people in attendance to WELCOME people to make them feel more at home. It's a two way street. He was really well received and it set up well for our choir to sing, as we're trying to be an expression of that diversity, with Irish and African (mainly Nigerian) coming together in community and worship. Our first song, which was written by the members of the choir is called discovery, and it is half in English and half in Yoruba (a Nigerian language). When Solomon, our musical director broke into the first Yoruba solo, you should have seen the house shake, people cheered and I was overwhelmed it was amazing. I wasn't singing that night as I was put on playing piano for the group. Thankfully everything seemed to go well.

On a side note, it's kind of nice being back in the music thing. When I was at Wheaton, where everyone is seemingly extremely talented with everything, my piano playing and singing didn't really set me apart, everyone could do that, but now being back here music is becoming a lot more of my identity again, and I think I like that. I got to play one of my own songs at an open mic session and was asked to do a song at a creative church service the other night. It's just nice to have a side of me re-opened that had been closed for so long.

This picture is of the choir when they sang for Desmond Tutu.