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Frank Viola | Beyond Evangelical

Frank Viola | Beyond Evangelical

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You Don’t Have to Imagine

Welcome to another Thursday UNFILTERED blog post, the only blog that always laughs when it receives a flyer because when a person hands you a flyer they’re simply telling you, “Here, YOU throw this away.”

Over two decades ago, I was part of a Christian fellowship where the sisters in the assembly put on a simple yet creative production for the brothers.

They took the popular song “I Can Only Imagine,” remixed it, and preformed it in an innovative way.

I was one of the men in the audience who watched the production, and it moved me to tears.

As the years rolled on, I never forgot the production and the affect it had on me.

I didn’t want it to die in the archives of my memory, so years later, I contacted one of the women who helped rewrite the song. And I asked her for the lyrics.

She had to do some digging to find them, but she came through.

My intention was to resurrect the song.

Consequently, during the 2018 Deeper Christian Life Conference, I asked for 30 volunteers in the audience who were willing to learn and perform the tune.

The sisters who responded only had a short time between ministry sessions to learn the song.

I explained how to perform it, and they only rehearsed for about an hour.

After five years, we’re unveiling the video publicly for the first time.

As you’ll see, the video explains how the sisters performed the song and the rewritten lyrics are displayed.

(I slightly revised the lyrics from the original recreation.)

When the song was performed, some of the men in the audience lost half their body weight in tears. 🙂

Since the recording can’t possibly capture the power of the moment, my hope is that it will convey some of it.

The theme of the conference was the Beautiful Pursuit, and the revised lyrics reflect our experience that weekend.

To them God has chosen to make known among the Gentiles the glorious riches of this mystery, which is Christ in you, the hope of glory.

~ Colossians 1:27

 

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Category: Rethinking

About Frank Viola

Frank Viola is a best-selling author, blogger, speaker, and consultant to authors and writers. His mission is to help serious followers of Jesus know their Lord more deeply so they can experience real transformation and make a lasting impact. To learn more about Frank and his work, go to 20 Years of Projects. To invite Frank to speak at your event, go to his Speaking Page. Due to a new problem with persistent spam that we haven’t figured out how to control, comments are closed for the present time. To contact Frank, use the “Contact” page in the top menu.

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Frank Viola

Frank is a bestselling author, speaker, podcaster, and blogger. He helps serious followers of Jesus know their Lord more deeply so they can experience real transformation and make a lasting impact. His blog – frankviola.org – is regularly ranked in the top 5 of all Christian blogs on the Web and his podcast – Christ is All – has ranked #1 in Canada and #2 in the USA on Apple Podcasts. He and his conversation partners also host The Insurgence Podcast. Frank’s books have sold over 600,000 copies and they’ve been translated into many languages.

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