Woulda, Coulda Been A Meltdown

So, what if they have a worship service and the soundboard doesn't show up?

Well, it happened this morning.

It was eight minutes till the 9:30 service was to start and we had no amplification in the auditorium. The soundboard was completely fried, beyond redemption. ("Fried", by the way, is apparently the technical term).

No sound. At all.

We had to make a quick call, the only choice really. Relocate the service to the Student Center. Move hundreds of people over. Move the Middle School worship service to the parking lot. Get files and sound equipment over and chairs set up for a standing room only crowd. With literally no time to spare and the lobby bursting with people waiting to get into the auditorium.

And it happened. Somehow, someway we started only fifteen minutes late, ended only five minutes late, and had another deposit in the collective cool crazy NLC memory bank.

Only it didn't just happen.

Here's what happened:

Dozens of volunteers and staff mobilized en masse.

Kevin Kennedy singlehandedly got the sound up and running.

Harrison and his band relocated, checked the sound, had a killer set.

The rest of the production team transferred files and somehow had worship lyrics up.

Students and adults threw chairs up, handed out newsletter and connecting cards, welcomed people.

Jared and the students had an impromptu worship service in the parking lot, complete with what appeared to the untrained eye to be some really odd bodily contortions.

And no one stressed, snapped, complained, or prima donna-ed (I may have made that word up).

And House of Blues went off with nary a hitch.

I have never been more proud of a team than I am of ours - volunteers and staff.

You guys were amazing today. Pulling together, doing what it takes, living out the mission...even on an inconvenient morning where apparently only the fog machine was working right!