Ichthus 2009

This weekend, the little town of Wilmore, KY hosted the Ichthus Festival. This festival brought in roughly 20,000 people over the span of three days. This just blows my mind because Wilmore's total population is around 6,000 most of the year. I'd heard of Ichthus, but I'd never had the opportunity to attend since it's about 800 miles from Jacksonville. Luckily for me, I'm spending my summer working at the seminary so I had the opportunity to volunteer. Volunteering is a great way to see the festival since 9 hours of your time gets you and a friend $119 wristbands good for the weekend.
I was initially going to volunteer as an Alter Minister. Alter Ministers are the people who sit and pray with those either after an alter call, or if someone just wanders up to one of the prayer tents. This didn't sound totally up my ally, but I figured that I should be able to handle this since I'm in seminary and they work hard to recruit seminarians for the job. One of my good friends from the dorm, Tom, has volunteered that past several years with Ichthus, so I asked him if he'd done it and asked what he thought of it. He said it was an interesting experience, but that last year he worked as a Stage Chaplain. He went on to say that working as a Stage Chaplain was an amazing experience and he wished he could do it again this year (which was not possible since he's doing his CPE in Indiana). He explained that Stage Chaplains are there to minister thru prayer at each stage, and that they're particularly there for the bands and crew. He told me a couple of stories and really piqued my interest in it. But, there were only 14 Stage Chaplains last year and I figured it'd be impossible for me to do that. But while arranging this might have been impossible for me to do, nothing is impossible for God.
A couple of week later, another friend of mine, Brent, asked me while we were at work if I'd like to be a Chaplain. One of his friends is the Head Chaplain, and he was short several people. This is because this year was Ihcthus' 40th anniversary and they had decided to have 7 stages instead of 4. Brent and I talked about it, and I told him to sign me up!
A few days later, I went to a training session. That training session left me with a sense of great inadequacy. This little voice in my head kept telling me there was no way I could possibly fill this role. I was a mere first year Seminary student with a long way to go, no experience, and some issues in my life that would have to stop me from doing this. As I talked with Tom a little bit about what the role would entail, he encouraged me that I could do this job and it would be a lot of fun.
Boy was Tom ever right. I worked all day today as the Chaplain at Indie Stage #1. I was initially pretty bummed about this assignment. Whoever was working the Main Stage got to meet and pray with groups like Kutless, Skillet, and Delirious. Some of these groups were paid as much as $70,000 to play a show and many are extremely famous in the Christian community. Those on the Indie stage, however, were not getting paid big bucks to play. Almost all are practically unknown, and many actually paid to play there. I was thinking, "Awww man, some of the Chaplains are hanging with famous people, and I'm hanging out with nobodys." Last night, God pointed out to me that these groups loved Him too and wanted nothing more than to play some great music for some people and share the love and gifts God had given them.
As I prepared to go to work today, I was praying for God to use me to touch some lives. What a selfish prayer for he knew that's not what I needed.
You see, I've been really doubting my call. Most of my friends are extremely confidant that they know exactly what God's called them to. Many of them have scholarships, and many more seem to have a confidence I just can't seem to find. Today really turned that around for me.
When I first arrived at Ichthus, I set out to locate my boss, Robert. He wasn't around, but I was early so I decided to go explore some more. Within a few seconds, he and Lisa, another Chaplain, "stumbled" upon me. They gave me some instructions, got me my badge, clipboard, and meal tickets (that's right, they PAID for my food today!). The prayed over me and then took me to my stage. I spent about 5 minutes wandering around feeling pretty lost and then decided to introduce myself to the crew. After all, I was going to be there all day and so were they so we might as well meet. Plus, I was hoping they'd let me pray for them. While the engineer declined, Chuck, one of the roadies showed me around and started chatting with me. Chuck told me that he and the other roadie/stage tech Kyle were from Ohio and a part of a Christian rehab group recovering from addictions. Chuck was a blessing and a half! He always had a smile, would chat with anyone, and immensely helpful answering my questions. I started walking around at introducing myself as the stage chaplain and told everyone to get me if they needed anything, especially prayer since that was the primary focus of my job. The first band I met was a group named Forerunner. The lead singer, Ryan, started chatting with me and asked where I'm from. Turns out he's also originally from Florida, and that he recently recieved his M.Div from Wesley Biblical Seminary and is ordained. He then told me that another guy also had his M.Div and ordination, and that the other two were Licensed Local Pastors and working on their M.Divs. Talk about an intimidating bunch. Here they are working in a church, playing all over the place, and I'm supposed to be there for THEM?! Thankfully, they were all super friendly and encouraging. While they were unloading, the first act came up and started to get ready to play. They were older and just didn't seem like they were going to be good musicians. Before they started their set, the asked me up on stage and I prayed a short prayer with them all the while feelign very out of place. Once again, I was wrong. Casper, the lead singer, was an AMAZING guitarist. Seriously, he was good! After they were done, Casper came up to me, gave me a hug, and thanked me for praying with them and being there for them. I was not ready for that. It gave me confidence that maybe I was where I was supposed to be that day. They may have only had a few people there to watch, but they touched me not through their music, but through their interaction with me.
As the day progressed, this seemed to happen again and again. Every single group blessed me in some way, and they continued to give me confidence. Later, I got to chat with a couple of other Chaplains, and they mentioned that on the bigger stages they only got a few seconds with each group. I, on the other hand, got to spend a lot of time with some of the groups. Each one showed me somethign special and really encouraged me that just maybe I was on the right track.
I know that God must have known exactly what I needed at this point in my life. While I'm still unsure of where God will take me, or what he wants me to do, I'm positive I'm on the right track. Today reminded me of several things.
The first is the power of prayer. While I may not feel that my prayers were any good, or very effective, I know that God heard them and used them in ways I cannot immagine.
The second is that ministry is not about doing things. It's about building relationships with people. Had I been on a bigger stage with a tighter schedule, bigger named bands, and more people, I wouldn't have expereinced what I needed. The extended interaction with some of these groups really gave me a new expereince.
The third thing I that I do not need to worry about where God will place me. He may give me an opportunity far outside my comfort zone much like today, but that his plans are always going to be better than mine.
Wow! That was really long and rambling. I just needed to get this down before I forgot or the "high" wore off.