A Day in the Sun....

On Saturday I took my daughter (Gloria) and a friend (Dawn) to a large contemporary Christian music festival in Zion, Illinois (about 90 minutes from our home). The music festival is called Ignite and is a 3 day event but we went just for the 2nd day which had a number of artists that we really enjoy.

The festival was an outdoor event and held at a minor league baseball park. The stage was setup in right center field against the fence and the audience mostly either sat on blankets in the outfield, sat in the stands (further away) or stood in front of the stage. We brought a nice heavy denim quilt that we use for picnics for our blanket. Little did we know that the ground was wet and sitting on the blanket meant that you were soon wet as well. Most people had brought tarps to put under their blankets but this is something that we missed. After about an hour, Gloria and Dawn ran to a store right outside the ballpark and grabbed a vinyl table cloth and a shower curtain liner. Between these two items we had a nice waterproof pad below our blanket and didn't have any more issues with the wet ground the rest of the day.

The concerts started at noon and went until around 10:45 that night. There were 10 groups and as the day went on the groups became more and more well known and had more and more stage time. The final group of the day was Switchfoot, a group that Gloria and I are really big fans of. I updated Facebook throughout the day and posted the following comments after each of the groups:

• At Ignite, Finding Favor playing. Never heard of them but they sound very good.
• Josh Wilson was great and Stellar Kart was a lot of fun.
• Bldg 429 just finished. They grew on me and then clinched it at the end by singing a cover of I Won't Back Down by Tom Petty.
• Disciple was loud but good. Christian rock.
• Jars of Clay was very good. First time I have seen them in person. Really enjoyed the songs that I knew. They wrapped up w/ I'll Fly Away. Great stuff!
• Rebecca St. James was great. Lots of praise music. She finished with Blessed Be Your Name. Very nice.
• I don't know why I forget how much I like Matthew West. He was great.
• 10th Avenue North was great. A couple aspirin and an extra allegra are working wonders but no more clapping from me.
• I took off from the concert and headed home (90 min drive) without giving my final entry for the day. Switchfoot was great! My favorites for the day in order were Switchfoot, Matthew West and Josh Wilson. I had seen all 3 in concert before and today even with the great lineup these were my favorites. Though some of the others were very very good as well. (posted after getting home)

The concert really was fun. Gloria and Dawn spent most of the time on their feet whereas I mostly hung out by the blanket which was in a nice location not too far beyond the people standing. We were all exhausted by the time we got home around 12:45 but we had a lot of fun.

One thing that I figured out after later reading my Facebook entries is that someone stole my thesaurus and I use the word "great" way too often. Gloria described the day as one of the best days of her life. :) I wouldn't quite go that far but the day really was excellent between all of the wonderful music and hearing many of the artists share their hearts about Jesus. It is funny that Disciple was the one "Rock" group that we saw (Sunday was an all-Rock day but the one group was enough for us) and their music was very loud yet the lead singer from Disciple was one of the most effective and well spoken speakers in sharing the gospel and other scripture. We had seen this group a couple years ago and even on that occasion I remember him sharing scripture. I was very pleased that they were included in the Saturday lineup.