Soulfire - Encounter

R
ich Harding is the guitarist and
singer for the band Soulfire Revolution.
Soulfire Revolution began in
Colombia, South America, at a
100,000-member
church
called
Mision Carismatica Internacional, or
MCI. They’re with Sparrow Records.
Their first album released in the summer of 2013 and featured guest vocalists like TobyMac and Kim Walker
Smith.
Rich is the only member of the
group who’s not from Colombia. His
parents were ministers in England.
When he was in his early teens, he
traveled with his family to visit MCI in
Colombia.
The experience was life changing.
“Being there was incredible,” said
Rich. “I went there and saw the youth
service. There were 20,000 young
people. About four or five thousand
people got saved. That changed my
life in that moment. I was like, This is
what being a Christian is about. It’s
about seeing God’s presence touch
people’s lives. I saw people saved
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though worship and the gospel. I
haven’t looked back since then.”
BAND BEGINNINGS
Several years later, he met a few
members of the band that would become Soulfire Revolution at a youth
conference in Miami, Florida.
“Lorena [the lead singer] said, ‘Do
you want to play some worship with
us?’” Rich said. “That was it.”
Today, the band ministers to people
both in South America and the United
States. They’d like to take their message of worship globally and reach
as many people as possible.
“Worship connects everyone who’s
a Christian by letting them come together to worship God,” said Rich.
“To go to different countries, different settings, different churches, and
different cultures is incredible. It reinforces your faith. You’re reminded
that we’re all in this together.”
It’s important for the band to worship in more than one language.
“Our heart is to see people touched
by the presence of God and to
ultimately see new people saved,”
said Rich. “That’s what we love. We
love to reach people who don’t know
Jesus through worship. For us, the
global scene is very important. There
are a lot of churches we’re connected with across the world. It’s important to see what God is doing globally
through His church.”
From a young age, Rich had impressed on him by his parents the importance of being missions minded.
“We’ve always been involved globally,” said Rich. “My parents have
always had that heart for other nations. They’ve always wanted to see
what God was doing in other nations so we could bring it back to our
church. That was the purpose in going to Colombia. We recognized that
the church there had something they
wanted. They had passion, love for
God, love for ministry, love for the
Word of God. They lived that out in
the daily life. We thought, we want
that in our church. That was the reason for going over there.”
MUSIC WITH A MISSION
The band named their new album
Revival for a very specific reason.
“We’re trying to capture, through
our worship music, the revival that
God is bringing to people’s lives,”
said Rich.
“It’s not a weird revival or one that
has to be different or against the
norm. It’s just people living our their
daily lives for Jesus in a way that enables them to pass that on to others.
It’s really simple. Anyone can do it. It’s
not like you have to be Billy Graham
to bring the revival. God is really moving through people’s lives when they
surrender everything to Him.”
Over the years, he’s learned quite
a bit about surrendering everything
to God—including his decisions. He
said that surrendering to God helps
him to make wise decisions.
“Probably the most important
choice anyone can make, other than
becoming a Christian, is who they’re
gong to spend the rest of their life
with,” said Rich. “For me, that’s
something where I really had to ask
ENCOUNTER // 09.21.14
God for wisdom—finding the right
person for my life and not making the
wrong decisions that lead to messing
your life up.”
Though teens may not be ready to
think about marriage, it’s never too
early to learn to guard your heart,
Rich said.
“The Bible says in Proverbs that the
heart is the wellspring of life,” said
Rich. “Guard your heart, your emotions, any type of relationships you
get into because they affect not only
your personal life but your spiritual
life as well.”
WISDOM FROM GOD
With wisdom, God has continued
to teach him about humility.
“For me, I think God’s always bringing us as Christians back to that
place of realizing that we’re nothing
in ourselves and we have nothing,”
said Rich. “I’m no different or better
than the person next to me. I have
nothing in myself to be able to offer
without God. Every day is that process of learning to be humble before
God and realizing that I need to leave
my life completely up to Him, and He
does the rest. It’s not who I am or by
my works or how hard I do things. It’s
totally up to Him. That’s something
that God works in my life over and
over again.”
The band’s song “Count the Stars”
is a powerful reminder that God is big
enough to handle our decisions. We
just have to lay them at our Creator’s
feet.
“‘Count the Stars’ has a real simple but powerful message that God
is so big and mighty that He created
all the stars,” said Rich. “Everyone
was there worshipping Him. It puts
everything in perspective that God is
this great huge God over the whole
universe, and that’s the God that we
come to worship.” E
To learn more about the band,
visit their website at:
www.soulfirerevolution.com
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