RISE Above Music Festival

In what may go down as the longest day of my summer, I joined up with good friend and brilliant funny man Steve Hydeen, and emceed the RISE Above Music Festival on Saturday June 18th in Orange City, IA.

When Rob Roozeboom asked me to emcee last fall, I was esctatic. First of all, I love Rob and his ministry with RISE, and second of all, it was going to be an awesome chance to meet some of the Christian world's best bands, comedians and speakers.

I went into the day a little tired. It didn't help that I decided to see the late show of Batman Begins on the Friday night before, and then Steve pulled into town about 1 AM. I had to be at the festival by 5:30 AM on Saturday morning. So you can do the math on how much sleep I got.

The crew for the day was fantastic. The bands and speakers were fantastic. Musicians that specifically stuck out in my mind were Remedy Drive (great band with a little coldplay influence) and of course Jeff Deyo. Man, Jeff Deyo can not only sing, but the guy's an amazing speaker as well. It was great to get to meet and greet all the bands backstage, and I was pretty pumped to get to shake hands with The Apologetix and Go Fish for the first time in my life.

Old friend, and hilarious comedian Jay Laffoon was there for the afternoon. Jay is one of Christian comedy's premier performers, and he's also an exceptionally nice guy. I met him for the first time last year in Michigan where he sat down with me for a couple hours and gave me the ins and outs of Christian comedy and speaking. He was no less gracious this time, as he ate supper with Steve and I and gave us even more advice. Yeah, I love the guy.

He also introduced us to Ventriloquist comedian Taylor Mason, who I've been a fan of for a long time. Steve had never seen Taylor's show, so we found our way out to the crowd to watch his set. Taylor, as always, delivered, as he put on a hilarious set that had Steve and I laughing like crazy.

Another personal highlight was meeting freestyle skateboarder Tim Byrne. Tim travels the country performing and giving his personal testimony. He's working with the Living It tour with actor Stephen Baldwin. And he's just an all around great guy. He did some awesome tricks on the mainstage, and gave a great testimony. It was pretty cool to see how many young kids were there, holding their own skateboards, as Tim spoke.

The highlight of the day though, was getting to introduce RISE Ministries' head honcho, and close personal friend, Rob Rozeboom. I'll admit, I teared up a little bit as I brought him onstage. The guy, in just a few short years, has blown me away with what God has done through him. And it was great to not only introduce him, but then get to hear his talk and altar call. So many people came up and accepted his challenge, it was fantastic. Kudos to Rob and the whole crew for putting on such a great day. They better do in again next year!

And so, after the day finally ended around 10:30 PM, I loaded back into the car and headed up to Sioux Falls, SD where I'd be speaking for SERVE for the next week. (More about that amazing experience in the next entry.)

Highlights of the Day

1. Hanging out with Steve and getting to hold his gorgeous baby again. Steve Hydeen is a great guy, hilarious comedian, and a real class act. Getting to hang with him backstage all day was more fun than I should have any right to partake in.

2. Old youth group member, and current good friend Chris Bouwman surprised me when he showed up at the festival. We finagled him a special backstage pass and he got to come hang with us most of the afternoon. It's always great to see Chris.

Til next time,
Jason