Family Sings A Bluegrass Prayer
The Bulla Family crowded under umbrellas and concentrated on keeping their cowboy boots underneath them on the wet stage.
More than 500 people, most of them also in cowboy boots, sat in the rain, listening to the Northport family praise God with bluegrass music.
Gospel Sunday was welcomed to Colville’s annual festival with toe-tapping, hand-clapping approval, in spite of constant rain.
A few residents had complained that city officials were crossing the line by sponsoring the Christian music event as part of the three-day Colville Rendezvous. Sunday, there was nothing but praise for the performers.
“You don’t have to be a Christian to like the music,” said Grant Dotts, who lives just south of town. “You can just enjoy it for its entertainment value.”
The Rev. Chuck Yost of Grace Covenant Fellowship, said he was stunned when city officials asked him to organize Gospel Sunday as part of the annual celebration in Colville City Park.
He holds special Sunday services for children and teens at the park every weekend during the summer. Yost also has donated the church’s stage and sound system to the Rendezvous in the past.
“To find a civic group looking for the Gospel message at all is pretty wonderful,” he said. “God’s given us an unprecedented opportunity here.”
The Colville Rendezvous is organized by a committee of civic leaders and government officials. Yost said he heard some “grumbling” about the Christian theme of the Rendezvous, but dismissed it as coming from a vocal minority.
While Yost, who’s lived in Colville four years, wouldn’t describe the town as a Christian enclave, he said it is one of the most politically conservative areas of the state.
“It seems like there are some flaming liberals, a lot of flaming conservatives and nothing in between,” he said. “With that kind of mix, it is amazing that we could pull off something like Gospel Sunday.”
Yost assembled six acts from throughout the Northwest. All agreed to perform at the event for free, he said.
The most popular was the Bulla Family. Luke, 15, and Jenny Ann, 14, are national fiddling champions. For one number, 7-year-old Jed, 5-year-old Jesse and 3-year-old Hannah joined the teens, their parents and the umbrella-holders on stage.
“Well, that’s just enough to melt anyone’s heart, even a non-believer like me,” said Jeri Green, of Spokane. She was skeptical about joining her sister at the community celebration Sunday.
“Just call me a die-hard liberal heathen,” she said. “But it is good music, even if you don’t like the words.”
Yost said his ministry is focused on youth and young adults. He hoped Gospel Sunday would appeal to the same groups.
Bands of teenagers and hordes of toddlers were testimony to his success.
Performer Teddy Ray Jones pointed out it wasn’t that long ago that city-sponsored gatherings almost always had a Christian theme, especially in frontier towns.
“I think since then, the religious community got way too religious inside their four walls, and the secular community got to where they don’t want to hear about any religion,” he said. “Hopefully, a function like this will restore what we have lost between the two groups.”
, DataTimes