Who knew that going to one church conference could not only change your life forever, but bring you into a group of friends that you may have only met face to face once or twice in your life, but yet you consider them some of your best friends.

When I started volunteering at church running Power Point I never knew the impact it would have on my life alone just in the friends I would meet. Most of them I talk through web forums or through instant messaging. I see their websites and get reminded on what they look like and it reminds me of how much they love life and the Lord.

After I started volunteering, I was asked to attend a conference in Bowling Green on using media in church. I grew up a Southern Baptist and had only attended churches that had organs and pianos. No Power Point, no videos and for sure no bands. I still had doubts on that last one. When talk of bringing a drum set in at church, I just didn’t know how it would fit in.

Before the conference started, the church had a worship service. When the first beat of the drum hit, I knew right then and there it fit in. It made the service that much better. I had taken Experiencing God by Henry T. Blackaby and he talks about Spiritual Road markers in your life where God speaks to you and you know it. It marks a point in your life where God has told you something and invites you to walk with him which leads you to a decision you have to make. That night was a road marker for me. At that point, I had to make a decision to jump head first into the technical ministry and go forward.

The class also mentions that these decision can and will bring you to a crisis which you have to make decisions about. Working in media really pulled me away from God at times as I was getting to the point where I was just “doing church” and nothing else. I didn’t worship and I wasn’t involved in a small group. I just wasn’t connecting to God.

Thanks to people I have met, again maybe only once face to face, through media ministry I was able to make it through and after about a year of “healing” I have started back in ministry. Not as a lead, but as a follower.

dj