So often we tend to think of organising events from scratch using our own ideas and resources. We threw out our plans for our own Girls Night Out event when we saw that our local theatre had booked the London Community Gospel Choir to come and do a one-off concert.Fantastic! I had heard the choir years before and knew that their blend of upbeat music, strong visual performance and gentle faith would have a wide appeal. The tickets were expensive so we contacted the theatre and negotiated a group discount, the theatre were delighted that we were palnning to bring a big group.
Then we went to our church leadership and asked that they subsidise the tickets further. We bought 50 tickets and emailed all of our regulars and anyone else who we felt might be interested. As always, we had a rush of keen girls who bought a few, then a complete lull when we thought we would be seriously out of pocket with lots of unused tickets! We contacted the choir and asked that one of them could come after the show and chat to us and the director Bazil said that he would. We then sent out a reminder email with this new information and an invite to meet at the next door pub for a drink before the show. This brought the ticket sales up a little. The week before is always a flurry of phone and text messages with people needing extra tickets just as often as others are cancelling.It always brings us to a point of desperation where the only choice is to hand the whole evening over to God, wondering why we hadn’t done it earlier!
On the night about 20 of us gathered in the pub for a drink then made our way over to the theatre where another 37 were ready to go in. The tickets, money and seating worked out perfectly just as the curtain raised.
The choir were amazing, uplifting and fun with a strong worship thread. There was lots of audience participation and I noticed that my nonchurched guests were the first on their feet to join in. At half time loads of people queued for cds and a chance to chat to the choir members.
When the performance ended Bazil came up to the balcony and spoke to our assembled group for a few extra minutes, sharing some of his own faith story with humour and no jargon – just perfect!
One of the best nights we have had as a group, with very little effort and supporting our local community theatre too!
Look out for the LCGChoir on their tour of small theatres,www.lcgc.org.uk or maybe other choirs and similar theatre groups that you could tap into. Sometimes we don’t have to invent the wheel all by ourselves – keep your eyes open for what the local community is already doing.
