CCM Thursdays: The Geoff Moore Concert

It was supposed to be the greatest day in the history of student ministry at the First United Methodist Church of Kissimmee.  It was a day we planned for over a year, that we poured our hearts and souls, our prayers and resources into, in the hopes that we could make a major impact for Jesus in our community.  This is the story of that day, and how it all went wrong.  Until God made it right, that is....

I met Geoff Moore & the Distance (GMD) at the National Youth Workers Convention in 1995, when we wound up sharing a table at the hotel restaurant for dinner.  I didn't know much about them at the time, but they were great guys with huge hearts for serving God, and I liked them immediately.  Once I began listening to their music, I was completely hooked.  About a year later our Youth Ministry Team began to dream and pray about bringing a major Christian concert to Kissimmee.  We wanted to do something huge for Jesus.  GMD had a big hit with Home Run around this time, and after much discussion we decided to contact their management and see what could be worked out.  We decided on July 10, 1997- a Thursday that was part of our Youth Week.  Our youth were very fired up, both to be part of such a major event and because they loved the music.  We had a concert video of GMD that we played all the time, always talking about how they were soon coming to us!   We decided we would host them at the nearby Tupperware Convention Center (TCC), a 2000 seat venue that had been home to many concerts, including Willie Nelson and The Moody Blues.  After securing the arena and setting ticket prices, we knew we needed to sell 1000 tickets in order to break even.  A full house would earn us around a $10,000 profit to use in our ministry.   All systems were go.

Except that all systems were NOT go.  The TCC would not let us sell tickets, except for a few hundred they gave us on assignment.  This meant people had to go to the box office to buy tickets that were more expensive than the ones we were selling.  We sold ours at church, and sold them all.  The TCC sold almost nothing.  We had also planned to save some money by doing the load-in and set up ourselves.  Again the TCC said no, saying that only union members were allowed to touch incoming or outgoing equipment.  We had planned to advertise on Z-88.3, the local Christian radio station.  Another concert promoter, hosting a concert at Universal Studios that same night, blocked us from running any ads until the week before the show.  We tried to get the word out (I remember Pete Lynes riding around with a concert poster taped to his car window for a couple of months!) but we just didn't sell enough tickets.  By the day before the show, after my final meeting with the folks at TCC, it was clear to me that we were going to lose a lot of money.  Maybe as much as $8000.  I went into Pastor John Willis's office ready to resign (you can read that story here).  I was very depressed.  Instead of the greatest day ever, it was looking like one of the worst.  I went to bed that night praying for a miracle that my weak faith was certain would not come.  (to be continued)

Because of Jesus,