Fred Steele: What a blessing

Last night I got my sox blown off and I was blessed beyond measure.  Let me try to tell you the story.

You see, we are having a mission conference at our church in a few weeks.  The organizers of this conference wanted to have a special group or band to come for the musical part of the conference.  Being plans were being made relatively late it was difficult to find a group.  But one the planners had a contact with some gospel music guy that I had never heard.  Remember, I’m a “whitey” living in the suburban Twin Cities of Minneapolis and St. Paul.  I am familiar and comfortable with “regular” music.

So, the gospel music guy is supposed to be bringing his team of singers and he is going to be working with us for approximately 3 practices to get us singing “Black Southern Gospel.”  Man was I skeptical and I did not hesitate voicing my skepticism.  Then the day before he comes we hear none of his team is available so we will be singing southern music mostly on our own. Again, remember we are a bunch of Scandinavian that can’t even clap on 2 and 4.  I was dreading the whole thing.  It was going to be miserable.

So I got to practice last night with a pout on my face and feeling very grumpy.  Then I get the cell phone handed to me to give directions to this Fred guy because he is lost.  I admit I had to fight the thoughts of “What a looser”.  Can’t he check mapquest.com?  Well I was able to keep those thoughts under control and get him to our church.

Well, the learnin’ was about to begin.  The gospel guy is the incomparable Fred Steele.  He and his family are gospel music legends.  He bounds into church with a huge smile and the most amazingly catchy enthusiasm.  Then when he started to teach us how to sing gospel I knew I was hooked.  He taught us how to attack a song and how to sing it sassy.  He worked with us with patience and a gentle guiding hand and before I knew it, we were being sassy.

This night was the most fun I had practicing for singing in a long time.  We were all singing with all our heart and worshipping even during practice.  It was awesome.  My horizon has been expanded immensely and now I can’t wait to practice with him again and I certainly can’t wait for the mission conference.

I want to extend and invitation to all of you to come to this mission conference.  You will be blessed beyond belief by what is said at the conference and also my the incredible ministry of Fred Steele.

The conference will be at 7:00 pm Friday night 11/04/2005 at South Suburban Evangelical Free Church in Applevalley MN.

Thank you Fred for working with a negative doubter like me.  Thank you for your ministry.