Southern Gospel Music, Giant Organs, and Old Fashion Hymn Books

I recently attended FBC Jax annual pastor's conference. I was a newcomer to the conference and was pretty excited about attending. If you have never been to FBC in Jax it is an experience all its own. The church owns 11 city blocks downtown. It really is amazing. They have 3 existing and fully functional auditoriums, their main sanctuary being the largest topping out at almost 10,000 seats. Its not the largest church in the US, and probably not even on the top 10, but it is big by all standards of being big. The neat thing about FBC Jax is that they paid cash for everything they own. That is pretty awesome.

Jax also had very large organs in all their auditoriums. As beautiful as some people think organs are, I hate them. Nothing makes me cringe more than the sound of organ pipes blaring so loud it hurts your ears. When Jax built their auditoriums organs were cool...I guess...but they are not very cool any more...I mean when is the last time you turned on the radio for the sole purpose of listening to organ music? Southern gospel music was the music of choice for the conference. I like music. I like lots of varieties of music. Southern gospel is not one of those varieties. But to each his own. Hymn books? I thought those things went out with the invention of projection screens...not in Jax. I could not believe it when the Music Minister instructed us to, "turn in our hymn books." I could not remember the last time I heard those words. The funny thing is they had some of the best projectors I had ever seen. They were HD!! All their camera's were HD!! Why do I need to turn in a hymn book? Oh well...I had fun at the conference. I met lots of awesome people, and heard some great speakers...just not as enthused with the music as most were, but I guess it is just a matter of preference...I just don't understand why some prefer that, but I am sure the feeling is mutual with some of the music I enjoy.

Big church, lots of money, lots of nice things, lots of great people...lots of Southern Gospel Music, Giant Organs, and Old Fashion Hymn Books.