Dear [firstname],

Firstly, I wanted to say thanks for your prayers for me and the
family in the past.

Secondly, I wanted to bring you up to speed with news before I
email my main list.

Today, Tues 1st May 2007, is officially the first day of the
rest of my life, as the saying goes. I handed in my notice where
I worked as a financial adviser to move on to pursue the calling
of musician/worship-leader/songwriter etc.

Interestingly I have been doing both these roles (worship-leading
and financial advising) for about 20 years and it seems that the
time has come for the paths to diverge.

The right time to make this move, ie 1st of May, came as a
result of reading about Ezra and how King Artaxerxes authorized
and resourced him to return to Jerusalem to re-establish the
Temple and it's worship. It says that he left on the 1st day of
the 1st month and arrived on the 1st day of the 5th month (Ezra
7:8).

Now, I know the Hebrew calender is different to ours but I felt
strongly that this was the timetable I was to follow. It was at
the very start of this year that invitations started to come in
for various ministry opportunities after 2 years of very few
opportunities (outside of local church and our local Engage
event here in Coleraine). It was also on the 2nd of January that
I got a phone call from someone to say that God had told him to
contribute £10000 (about $19000) to help fund ministry for me
this year.

This means that I can spend on average about 60% of my working
week directly on music & ministry development with the remaining
40% working part-time to make up the difference in what we need
to live on.

I'm really grateful to God for his vision and provision.

I'd appreciate your prayers for the following stuff and anything
else that might spring to your mind!

I envisage 3 main areas of activity that I'd like to see
develop.

1. Just getting 'out there' and doing more events: worship
leading, prayer concerts and making prophetic music in the
mainstream (I've had a couple of invitations already to perform
at mainstream festivals here in Ireland this year). One of the
things I'd like to see happen is more ministry opportunities
opening up in the USA. This has been prophesied to me on a
number of occasions by different people and I'm wondering do I
follow through on this with looking for someone to arrange
bookings for me there? Any ideas on this let me know.

2. Developing songwriting partnerships and a songwriters on-line
forum. This will involve some website development work which I
only have limited knowledge of. I have this idea about
'opensource' songwriting where writers can share and develop
ideas and create songs and music that will be more effective
than if they had just attempted it on their own.

3. Mentoring younger musicians, worship leaders and artists. The
very first musician documented in the bible was Jubal in Genesis
4:21, it says he was 'the father of all who played the harp and
flute. It seems that as well as producing music he also
'fathered' or developed others. I have noticed this happening
naturally with some of the younger folks that I get to play and
hang out with. I guess I'm looking for wisdom as to how to
develop this more strategically.

Any input or prayer for all that would be great - ask me any
questions if I haven't made it very clear what's in my head.

Finally here is a list of events, mission trips and ministry
opportunities that I have lined up for the rest of the year so
far. Again your prayers for these would be so great.

Fri 4th May - Engage Intercessory worship

Sun 27th May - Global Day of Prayer regional event, Coleraine
(Leading worship)
http://transformations-ireland.org/index.php?id=4

Fri 1st June - Engage Intercessory worship

Fri 9th June - RiverFest festival Coleraine (this is a
mainstream gig at our local town festival)

Fri 6th July - Engage Intercessory worship

23rd-28th August - Vineyard missions trip to Kristiansand,
Norway

Fri 7th Sept - Engage Intercessory worship

Tues 9th-14th Oct Vineyard artists and musicians mission trip to
Lithuania

Oct 26 -29 - Spirit of Voice Festival, Galway Ireland
(mainstream world arts festival http://www.spiritofvoice.com)

7-11th Nov - Thailand for Pattaya Praise intercessory worship
festival and outreach. We're taking a band to both worship and
play in the bars of Pattaya - working with local churches and
YWAM base.

I'll add more to this list as it develops.

Once again, thanks for being on board this adventure with me -
you don't know how much comfort it brings knowing that you're
willing to pray.

God Bless you

Andy