Things That Happen in a Bar

I read a blog entry of a friend's, and felt compelled to respond.  Bill got back to me and suggested we meet for breakfast to discuss it.  A couple of weeks later, we did.

While there, we never got around to discussing the content of his blog entry.  Instead, he told me a fascinating story about some things currently going on with John Thompson, who, with Micheal Card, wrote the song "El Shaddai", which was recorded by Amy Grant and others.

John now lives in the area.  Among other things, he writes and performs with a local group "The Reminders" along with Ed Shockley and Kevin Short.  A while back, John had told a story about the song "El Shaddai" on Bill's morning show on 88.7 The Bridge (listen on As heard on The Bridge, January 27, 2011 and April 13, 2012). The story involves John going on a risky trip to the Soviet Union in 1985 to meet with Vladimir Slepak, who at the time was part of a group of Jews who had been denied exit visas and were being repressed by the Soviet government.

Bill filled me in on the details of how that story was about to be made into a movie.  Part of those details involved Christian recording artist John Waller, who was being considered for the part of John Thompson in the movie.

Near the end of our breakfast, Bill asked what I was doing Friday morning.  He was going to shoot a screen test for Waller in a little bar in Bridgeville, DE - Jeff's Tap Room.  The scene was meant to portray one which would have occurred in 1985 in the Bluebird Cafe in Nashville, TN, with John Thompson describing his trip to Russia and singing a song which captured the essence of that experience.  Bill said he might need some extras sitting in the audience.

Friday morning, I found myself joining Andy Mason who was in the process of helping Bill set up his equipment.  We were soon joined by John Thompson and John Waller and his son Bailey.  Bill decided that John needed a small audience to speak and sing to, so Bailey and I sat in front of Waller as he told the Slepak story as the character John Thompson, and then sang Thompson's song "Love Has Spoken".

The song touched something in my spirit.  What I heard was not just John Thompson's experience, but an experience of humanity as a whole. I took the story and the song to be about the motivation for people doing extraordinary things without reasonable explanation.  It gave that experience a title - calling it "Love Speaking".

The idea of "Love Speaking" is a universal theme familiar to many.  While the underlying source of the sentiment may be a little different depending on the person, the key is that the effect of it is extraordinary.  A believer in Christ would call that source God living in the hearts of His people, and He speaks His presence into the world.  It is God speaking, not some emotion we call “love”.

That's the kind of life most of us desire to live.  Anything less is just common.