Casting Crowns, Nicole Nordeman, Josh Bates Concert

Yesterday the Casting Crowns tour was in Springfield! It was refreshing and lasted about 3 1/2 hours... It began with Josh Bates, who I'd never seen before... He was quite good ; I was impressed and will have to pick up cd. We did not have floor seats, but we were on the side about 5 rows up... but the nice thing about being on the side was that I could actually see for once and did not have a lot of tall people in front of me :) so that was cool
(ok-before I post any pics, let me just confess that these did not come out too good as I have lost my camera book and only have the extra camera book in spanish! I do not remember enough espanol to make sense out of most of it but there were a few pics that came out ok... )
So here is Josh Bates...

He sang a few songs including Perfect Day and King of Glory, I really enjoyed him and thought he had good stage presence for being 'out there' all by himself.

Next Nicole Nordeman came out with a band (complete with big bass player); she sang several songs including Brave, What If, Hold On.... she has such a rich full pretty voice....Here is a pic of them...

Next it was Casting Crowns - love their music! They are so good and their lyrics so meaningful. I was of course singing very loudly as I figure the music was so good and loud no one could hear me anyway ;) I was trying to remember what all they sang.... Lifesong, Praise you in the Storm, Does anybody hear her, Stained Glass Masquarade, What if His People Prayed, If we are the Body, Voice of Truth, Who am I, American Dream, Praise you with a Dance... I love listening to Mark Hall... I have really loved the song Praise You in the Storm but he told the story of behind that song.... it came from their meeting of a little girl who danced to one of their songs and her family when they were in Raleigh...how they had come to be friends with the family and then the little girl became ill; that they continued emailing with her mother and that they could see the human side of suffering in her emails (sometimes full of faith, sometimes discouraged) but that in all her emails was the resolve to Praise God no matter what ...in the storm... that they had written this song for them...(I was at the Raleigh SCC, CT, CC concert last year and now I had to wonder if that little girl had been there) Also Mark Hall talked about World Vision and how he and his son had adopted a little boy born on the same day as his son... how this had really fostered praying for others in his little boy as they kept in touch with this child, which was really a cool thing to share... then Tony Nolan who I had never heard before who is the pastor on this tour shared a salvation message and I'm telling you it literally looked like hundreds stood when asking for salvation so that was wonderful to see!!

I'm trying to remember what else happened.... it must have been for the encore the drummer came back on stage with a huge big red ball that I think everyone thought he was going to kick into the crowd but instead he threw it on the stage and then did a big huge body bounce off the thing which was hilarious! During the encore they sang we give You Glory which seemed fitting :) It was a great concert, complete with many coming to salvation, what more can you ask for?