I have mentioned previously that we moved to Southern Oregon when I was 10 years old. I never was big on David Cassidy or The Osmonds anyway, and there was absolutely no chance of getting hooked on them once radio reception became pretty much non-existent. Anyway, I was content to practice singing exactly like Mary Martin and Julie Andrews.

About the time I entered my teenage years, we moved even further into the mountains. We lost two of our three TV stations, and any semblance of a neighborhood or neighborhood kids. My mother must have felt sorry for me (or she got tired of hearing "Sixteen Going On Seventeen" again), because she decided to join a record club for me. A Christian record club.

Now I was raised Lutheran, and even went to Confirmation classes until our bad behavior (my bad behavior?) made the teacher quit, so I had no problem with this choice of music. In fact, one day I got the Selection of the Month from my music club (I never got to order anything--I just received the Selection of the Month, whatever it might be), and it was music like I'd never heard before. My mother was fairly scandalized. The album was 2nd Chapter of Acts, with Footnotes.

Oh, I could never hope to sing like this! Such tight harmonies, such unity of voice! Matthew Ward was trilling up and down the scales long before Mariah Carey hit the scene. Annie Herring was diggin' in like a jazzed-up Janis Joplin, and Nellie was hangin' right there in the middle holding it all together.

It's a real shame I wasn't truly listening to the words on that album, or on my other favorites by Phil Keaggy, Honeytree, Keith Green. Mentally I was running a million miles an hour, and because my parents saw me as a perfect child, my actions in my rather extensive private life ran completely unchecked. I was a pretty bad teenager, come to think of it.

Years passed, and I grew up. I went through attempted atheism, and the requisite assortment of religions that accompany the college years. I learned a lot more about the Christian Contemporary Music scene of the 70s. Seems there was a lot of hedonism in Nashville, where many CCM musicians made their home. Stories came out, and I wondered to myself about this group that had been my entry into that world. I had already learned that Annie Herring was a wild child, as she confessed to some pretty hefty misdeeds on her solo album notes. Judge Sally jumped to conclusions like nobody's business. Not that I loved the memory of their music any less, but I knew what they were about. Perhaps thinking such things made me feel superior in the light (or darkness) of my own many misdeeds.

Well time passed again, and thankfully God re-entered my life. But did Judge Sally go away? I'm afraid I have at times been as ugly a Christian as I was a non-Christian.

Recently I joined another Christian record club, and was happy to see a 2nd Chapter two-disc recording called 20 as one of the offerings. I couldn't wait to get it in the mail!

Well. Was Judge Sally in for some correction. My daughter, her best friend, and two or three boys sat in her darkened room, huddled on her bed watching a Chris Rock movie. I shut my door and headed to my little corner office (half my bedroom, actually) to enjoy a little blast from the past. I had reading material too, as a fairly thick booklet about the life and times of 2nd Chapter accompanied the discs. And slowly, as I turned the pages, I drank in another good dose of humility.

As it turns out, these kids didn't grow up Christian like I did and fall into the cesspool of 70s fame. Annie Herring was living the wild life in La-La-Land and about to sign a hefty record deal when she got saved. To the disbelief of the Hollywood movers and shakers, she turned them down. Soon after that, she lost her parents and took custody of two of her eight siblings, Nellie and Matthew. They discovered they could sing together. Beautifully.

I learned that 2nd Chapter of Acts was a ground-breaking group when they rose to fame, because they spoke to God instead of about Him. The grinding rock guitars, synths, and chunky drums didn't hurt either. But they were also the mountain in the middle of the stream. Where so many groups headed to Nashville and turned CCM into a commercial industry, this group felt led to stop asking for ticket receipts and rely on offerings. They declined all interviews and refused to let their photos grace popular magazine covers. They became an even greater player in the industry, bringing together several huge names for the How the West was One concert.

But I didn't mean this to be a big, boring music history lesson. There's a point here. First, one last milestone: At the height of their career, 2nd Chapter of Acts felt led to disband. They had a huge following, but with a nearly unannounced finale, they completed their last tour and turned to their own separate ministries. And this is where I get to my pearl.

Buck Herring, Annie's husband and a well-known CCM producer, mentions in the booklet that many people have approached him about breaking into a music ministry. He says, "I ask them, 'Do you feel you are to have a music ministry?' If they say, 'Yes,' I ask, 'Are you willing to have a music ministry even if you never leave your own church, or your own home town?' If they hedge here, I'll ask, 'Are you looking for a music ministry or are you just looking for a career in music?'"

I read all of that. I listened to the music that sang to God, not as if He were a faraway, distant hope. I thought of the kids that came to my house and suddenly remembered I had asked God to make my home a place of ministry. But was I looking to minister? And am I looking to minister here, in PearlSoup? Or am I looking for a career in writing?

I got up and opened my door, and the door to Elisabeth's room. I watched the movie for a little while. The kids put it on pause and looked at me, wondering if I was going to get into a hypocritical fit of parental self-righteousness and make them throw that video away.

I took a deep breath and told them about a man called Jesus.