"For King and Country"

"Burn the Ships" album cover 

If ever there was a time I needed to write, it was the last year and a half. It was the most painful of my life. Unfortunately, the content is not something for the public, so I've kept it hidden. The only thing that got me through was being rooted in my identity as God's beloved child. Someday I may be able to go back and share it, but for now, I'm looking forward, and writing about the good things. As "For King and Country" says, 

The time has come
to make a choice,
and I choose Joy.  

S is a huge "For King and Country" fan, and I love them, too, so I decided to take her to their concert as her birthday present since she's turning 14 in a couple of weeks. I bought tickets online about a month ago, and last night we headed to what will always be known to the locals as Sandstone Amphitheater. 

It's been a hot minute since I've been to a concert there, and when we got to the entrance, it was blocked off, and we were rerouted around to the other side along with a very long line of other cars. It had started raining, so at first, we were ok with being stuck in traffic. But as we'd left in time to arrive 30 minutes prior to the concert starting, the fact that it was 5 minutes after showtime by the time we got to the parking attendant was incredibly frustrating. As we got closer, I got nervous as I noticed everyone was paying with cash. I'd chosen to leave my purse at home and had just brought my phone, keys and ID holder which only held plastic forms of payment. When it was our turn to pay for parking, my fears were confirmed, and I couldn't keep a few tears from escaping as I apologized to S while exiting the lot and heading to the nearest gas station. She told me it was ok, we'd only miss a couple of songs. With her encouragement, I found my optimism. I said maybe there was an opening band, and we wouldn't miss them at all.

We ran to a nearby Casey's, grabbed some gum, and as I paid at the counter, the card reader gave me a chip error. Nooooo, I thought. The cashier said they'd been having issues with it and to try it again. I said a quick prayer and it went through. I got cash back, and we ran to the car. As we sped down the road past the line of the cars waiting for the VIP entrance where we'd mistakenly gotten stuck before, we saw a rainbow. I smiled and told S that this mishap had been a blessing because if we hadn't had to leave and come back, we would have missed seeing that colorful sign in the sky. We finally got inside the gate, parked and started the long hike to the outdoor amphitheater from the back 40. 

There was one more hurdle, and it was the one I was most worried about. When I'd tried to open the email that contained the electronic tickets right before we left, I couldn't find the barcode. While we waited in the ridiculous traffic for 45 minutes, S and I tried digging through all my old email and searching for new messages, as well as calling the phone number and clicking on the help link in the confirmation email to no avail. I'd decided we'd just have to go to the ticket window when we got there. 

Thankfully it had stopped raining by the time we got to the box office, and we were able to walk right up to an open window. Unfortunately, it turned out that I'd inadvertently fallen for a scam site when I bought the tickets, and they weren't valid, which was why we could never get to the barcode. "But it shows the confirmation and the seat numbers right here - Upper Section, Row W, seats 12 and 13." The guy was kind and sympathetic, but he couldn't give those seats to me. I was so embarrassed. And furious at myself since I was going to be out the money and not get to take S to see the show. As I was about to walk away, the guy said two people who were supposed to pick up their tickets never showed, and we could have their seats. I teared up in gratitude. 

Walking in, I was trying to pull myself together, saying to S, "There's no crying at Sandstone!" in my best Tom Hanks impression. We noticed that there wasn't any music playing yet, so we hadn't missed anything; they'd delayed the start of the outdoor show because of the rain. My spirits were lifted and I said a quick prayer of thanks. We were quickly distracted by the merchandise stand and able to move on with our night. As we walked away with our souvenir shirts, I checked the tickets and saw that we were now going to be sitting in the lower section, 10th row, left-center. Close enough to the stage to see Joel and Luke sweat in their long-sleeved jackets! To top it off, the woman sitting next to us works in radio and introduced us to a DJ we listen to on occasion. 

None of these amazing things could have happened if our night had gone the way we had planned. Throughout the show, Joel and Luke told the amazing story of how they came to America and the hardships they faced and spoke encouragement to all of us. Woven through the performance was the thread of trusting that God loves us and He's the one who's in control, all of which was made so evident through the events of the evening. It was an amazing performance. God just blessed us so much in this situation, and we felt His hand on all of it. So grateful I was able to share it with my baby girl.