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This Past Weekend in WI & MN
Thu., Oct. 13. 2011 12:27am EDT
We had a lovely maiden voyage with our brand-new trailer this past weekend, even though it took a rental van to get us to our concerts in Orfordville WI and Monticello MN. As it turns out, a 15-passenger van hauling a trailer that size doesn't get that much more mpg than a bus, but it gets unbelievably more mph!
The late show Friday night (scheduled for 8:45 p.m.) in Orfordville, turned into the late, late show, because the high-school football game it was scheduled to follow went later than expected. We didn't get to play till about 9:30 p.m., but better late than never.
Speaking of better late than never, we got some great news seven years after the fact at the Orfordville concert. The same church that promoted Friday's show had also promoted our concert in nearby Footville WI in April 2004, an outdoor event at the "World's Largest Rummage Sale." After the show in Orfordville, the church's youth leader told us that two of the church's current elders say they first became Christians at that Footville concert.
We led off our concert the next night in Monticello MN with "Hurry Home Wayward Son," which is ironic because we had to hurry home after the concert, since we were driving almost 900 miles through the night back to Pittsburgh. Then we were ordered to evacuate the building after the second song when our fog machine set off the smoke detectors, so it might have looked like we were an even bigger hurry to get home. But we did come back and do the rest of the show, of course.
Maybe we were in too much of a hurry; Greg dropped a heavy mixing board lid on his foot Saturday night, which caused quite a bit of swelling and took him out of commission as a driver. He went to the doctor on Wednesday and was told that his foot is broken in a couple of places, but the doctor does not deem it necessary to do anything -- just to let it heal naturally. Greg is still black and blue but is able to walk on it. Please keep him in your prayers.
There is something really cool that happened after Monticello show, though. We were honored to meet the late Dr. Walter Martin's daughter, Jill Martin Rische and her husband, Kevin, and their two kids. Jill and Kevin have carried on the work of her dad, the original Bible Answer Man and the father of Christian counter-cult apologetics, and it was delight to hear stories first hand from them about what he was like. We had corresponded via email, but this was the first time we'd met them in person.
Here are some email and Facebook excerpts from fans in attendance:Thank you soo much for being such a blessing to me at everyone at tonight's concert! I was there to help sell tickets and had a terrible stomach ache, I was about to go home and I felt led in my heart that I was going to be there all night.
By the grace of God I made it through the night and your music and my praise and worship kept my pain down to nothing! Just wanted to tell all of y'all: awesome hearing you, and you probably heard a few amens being shouted and hands up in the air praising Jesus or the start of clapping, well that was me!
Jeanene Meyer Lewis
Hanover WI
Great concert! Thanks for you ministry. Hope to see next year.
Karen Witt
Just wanted to let you know how much I enjoyed the concert in MN on Saturday. Your energy and strong faith really come through and it was just a fantastic night. Considering we had to evacuate after the smoke alarms went off, that was then the longest encore ever!
Tony Marcello
Shoreview MN
C.J. and I headed to Monticello so we could have first pickings of seats for the ApologetiX concert -- front and center is the best! The band was smoking hot so much that they set off the fire alarms. We were kicked out after the second song for about 5-10 minutes. No one minded cuz as soon as we were let back in we hurried back to our seats to 'rock on.'
Great show! Two and a half years since ApologetiX was in Minnesota last time is too long to wait to see them in concert again, but it was well worth the wait.
The highlights of the 'show' was when CJ was looking down for a second looking at his camera and all of a sudden J. jumped off the stage in front of him! CJ jumped and threw his hands in the air since he was caught off guard! Another highlight was when my nephew was called up on the stage when Tom Milnes was sharing a great message. The other highlight was afterward, when we got to visit with the band members (whom we are proud to call our friends!). It was cool that they remembered us even though they meet many people each year!
Thank you all. Anyone who has a chance to see Apologetix will be in a great treat!
Janelle Hoeft
Owatonna MN
You guys were fantastic last night -- so glad we got to take in a concert finally and see you guys again! God bless :)
Melissa Eklof
Anoka MN Special thanks to:
Our concert coordinators: T-J Mohr (Orfordville) and Brian Ely (Monticello)
Our merchandise coordinators: Sherri and Alexis (Orfordville) and Heather and Paige (Monticello)
Our drivers: Keith, Tinch, and Greg
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