CREATION NORTHEAST 2011 was held from June 29 to July 2, 2011 at the Agape Farm near Mt. Union, Pennsylvania. The farm has become a second home to the tens of thousands who travel to the festival each year to attend, camp and to be spiritually enriched. Creation’s theme is “A Tribute to Our Creator.” From the moment you step on to the grounds and set up your camp, there is a sense that this place and this time is about Jesus. At times it feels like a family gathering because you get to meet and have fellowship with people from all over the globe who love the Lord. There are many activities, games, music and speakers, and of course those special times of fellowshipping with friends at your campfire.

 

A typical day started at 9:00 am and concluded at 11:30 pm. This year’s MAIN STAGE artists included some of the hottest bands in Christian music, with a wide variety of musical styles including first-time appearances by Lecrae, Brandon Heath and Owl City. Creation also provided inspiring speakers including Louie Giglio and Tony Nolan. Other highlights included fan favorites such as communion, candle lighting, baptism, fireworks, extreme sports and the like. The FRINGE STAGE was a place to rock out with the best alternative and up-and-coming bands including Hawk Nelson, Disciple and The Almost. The WORSHIP STAGE featured worship artists who gave you time to worship the Lord while providing free workshops and worship materials. THE KID’S STAGE ensured that young children had a good time with music, puppets, animals, games, face painting and more. A night at Creation 2011 was rounded out with the LATE NIGHT CAFE STAGE, which finished the day in an intimate setting including singers and comedians.

 

Three staff members from NRT were in attendance all four days of the festival, including NRT Founder Kevin McNeese who had a NRT booth with fun contests, giveaways and a Creation 2011 scavenger hunt. Also attending were NRT podcast host Bill Lurwick, who conducted sixteen artists interviews along with me. If you plan to attend Creation Northwest, come look for Kevin McNeese at our booth in the exhibit hall along with one of our event photographers, Michelle Gillatt. They are excited to meet as many people in person as possible.

 

2011 was the fifth time I’ve attended the Creation Northeast festival and the second time I’ve covered it for NewReleaseTuesday.com since I started writing NRT staff reviews and my “Behind The Song” devotional series. I was thrilled to arrive for the opening night’s set as Lecrae, Family Force 5 and Newsboys are three great artists with high energy songs. Over the course of the four days, I saw several incredible sets and for this article, I’m highlighting an artist who appeared on the main stage each of the four evenings that represent the diversity that spans the 60 artists who appeared at this largest Christian music festival in America. Over 80,000 people attended each of the evening main stage sessions.

 

Family Force 5 opened on Wednesday night with their mega-hit song “Love Addict,” and when they finished Soul Glow Activatur announced that this was their sixth time at Creation. “We’re a band that likes to have fun in Jesus’ Name, we hope you like to be ridiculous with us.” They introduced a new song called “Wobble,” where we were all asked to get jello-like. “Supersonic” got a great crowd reaction and is an incredible song. Before the set, we got the great opportunity to interview the band about “Fever” for an upcoming “behind the song” devotional and they gladly shared how although “fevers” in the Bible are about suffering and illness, they want people to be contagious Christians and spread their faith like a ‘fever.’ Soul Glow Activatur screamed out, “Party like it’s the last night. Nobody else is doin’ this!” That’s for sure, no other artists brought the type of intensity that we saw that night from FF5.  “Radiator” kept the party going and we were asked to “put your hands up if you’re not showering for the next 5 days!” The band rocked out to the hit song, “Get Your Back Off The Wall,” and every single song got a great response from the crowd. The crowd chanted over and over “One more song!” To our great delight, we got one final song, “Ghostride The Whip.” Soul Glow Activatur came out in an inflatable hamster ball and crowd surfed and sang their hit song while crowd-surfing on the capacity crowd. I’ve never seen anything like that and I was completely captivated by this party band from Atlanta. I was thrilled when after they finished they asked everyone in the crowd to remove their hats and they prayed over the crowd for people to come to know our Lord and Savior Jesus. For a band that has had mainstream success and whose lyrics aren’t overly spiritual, that was a wonderful way to finish the high intensity party-like atmosphere and set the tone for the remainder of the main stage acts in a classy and Christ-focused manner.

See More Photos From Creation Northeast 2011 Here  

My favorite Chris Tomlin songs have generally been the new live recordings found on the Passion worship collections, going back to "We Fall Down," "Enough," "How Great Is Our God" and "God Of This City." Thursday night at Creation was my second time seeing Chris Tomlin in concert and as I hoped, the event was more of a worship experience than a concert as the focus of the night was completely on our Lord and Savior. Chris opened with “Our God,” the anthemic declaration of faith that spent numerous weeks on top of the Christian radio charts. The bridge of the song is the basis of the album title And If Our God Is For Us… Next, the hooky guitar intro led to Chris belting out “Your Grace Is Enough.” Musically, this event was top notch as the level of musicianship was unparalleled and if anything I might have gotten a little spoiled considering that I normally sing these songs along with an acoustic guitar and djembe. Mega-hit song “I Will Follow” took it up a notch with the heavy synth-rock style and harmonizing by the other band members. “Forever” kept the upbeat praise and worship going. The next set of acoustic worship songs were a highlight of the evening for me. Just Chris and his guitarist sat down and treated us to a great selection of songs, starting with acoustic guitar led performances of “Indescribable” and “Holy Is The Lord.” Next we all sang “I Will Rise,” which finished with the full band rejoining on stage and had the crowd back on our feet singing the amazing bridge, “I hear the voice of many angels sing, Worthy is the Lamb.” What I loved was how I was getting a glimpse of eternity singing to our God forever and ever. 
 

 After that, we all sang the worship anthem “Sing, Sing, Sing.” I had always liked the song before, but this was a big song of the night with the crowd all dancing and belting out our praise to our King like David dancing before God in the Bible.  We all sang “I Lift My Hands,” which musically reminds me of “Unchanging.” Chris closed with a heartfelt rendition of “How Great Is Our God.” There wasn’t a person at Creation who wasn’t lifting their hands and we were singing out the words of the award winning worship song with all of our being. The crowd kept cheering for our Savior and King Jesus as Chris and the capacity crowd joined in and sang the verses of “Amazing Grace” combined with the chorus “My Chains Are Gone.” As we weren’t ready to finish just yet, Chris finished with a rocking performance of just the chorus and bridge of “Our God.”  I can’t say I’ve ever heard louder singing and seen more hands raised than at this worship event. If you like singing these songs in church, then you’ll love singing these worship standards with thousands of fellow believers.  The theme of the night was how the bigger “church” of the world is united by these songs and clearly no matter your church denomination, these songs cross all boundaries and bring our unified belief in One Triune God together as we all sang these songs of the faith “together in one accord.” Amen.

 

Friday night featured Christian music artist Francesca Battistelli who has had a fun, fast paced ride on life's roller coaster the last few years. Her debut music album, My Paper Heart was a major hit. She was awarded back to back GMA Dove Awards for Female Vocalist of the Year and is the reigning 2011 Artist and Female Vocalist of the Year. She got married and last September gave birth to a beautiful baby boy, Matthew Elijah Goodwin. She's on top of the world and currently is touring in support of her second album entitled, Hundred More Years.

She opened with the hit single from her album, “This Is The Stuff,” which was released to Christian radio in January. In traditional Francesca Battistelli style, she tells it just how it is and all the things that drive her crazy. The main message of the song, despite all the little things that drive us all crazy, is to remember we are blessed.  Francesca writes and sings about relatable subjects and her lyrics and melodies are completely infectious. The ukulele and mandolin part reminds me of “Hey Soul Sister” by Train The bridge of “This Is The Stuff” also summarizes my prayer as a Christian: “To break me of impatience, Conquer my frustrations, I've got a new appreciation, It's not the end of the world...” Amen.

Francesca continued with “Constant” and “You Never Are” which are also catchy pop songs. Every song includes at least one lyrical phrase that completely hits me where I am. “Constant” is about God’s love and Francesca sings “Okay I really don't like change but I can't stop it, I'm moving forward with the promise, You are the anchor for my soul, That's all I need to know." Francesca then moved to some of her big hits, “It’s Your Life” and Dove Award winning “Beautiful, Beautiful.”

Before her set, we interviewed Francesca about her current single “Motion Of Mercy” for an upcoming “behind the song” devotional which grabs me with Francesca’s sincere prayer, “God give me strength to give something for nothing, I wanna be a glimpse of the Kingdom that's coming soon.” Francesca called out to the crowd “are there any girls here named Emily? This song’s for you.” She continued with “Emily (It’s Love)” and when she finished a boy yelled out “you should sing a song named “Justin.” Francesca and the crowd laughed. She continued with “Angel By Your Side” which is a ‘beautiful, beautiful’ ballad with a catchy guitar part and features Francesca’s gorgeous vocals. The balance of her upbeat songs and ballads was a highlight as the songs flow perfectly together. Francesca surprised me with a stellar vocal performance of the standard “Someone To Watch Over Me.” She closed with her mega-hit song “Free To Be Me.” Complete confidence in and reliance upon the grace of God is the theme of her great songs and her incredible new album. Don’t miss any chance to catch her in concert.
 

Saturday night featured the highly anticipated debut Creation appearance by Owl City. The current album All Things Bright And Beautiful released June 14th and features twelve new songs. All Things Bright And Beautiful is the follow-up full-length studio album to Owl City’s platinum-selling debut Ocean Eyes. Ocean Eyes’ sales were led by the runaway single “Fireflies” which is currently quadruple platinum in the US. On All Things Bright and Beautiful, the music and lyrics conspire to make listeners feel as if they were stepping into another world — a musical dreamland where “reality is a lovely place, but I wouldn’t want to live there,” as Young sings on the opening track “The Real World.”  That statement sums up the theme of this album well. Adam seems to write and sing songs that are mostly about living for something greater than this world. About how music and his faith merge, Young says, “Music is something that is fused to who I am. It allows me to breathe deeply, it lets me feel, imagine, aspire and dream in the most beautiful ways imaginable. Music is something that I can't imagine living without, and though it means more to me than the world itself, there is something that weighs significantly heavier on the scale of all things valuable and important in my life, that being my relationship with Jesus Christ.” 

 

Owl City’s band included a violin and a cello player, a drummer, two keyboard players including Breann Duren, and lead singer Adam Young who also played guitar. They opened with “The Real World,” and then “Cave In” from the album “Ocean Eyes,” which includes the refrain “I’ll keep my helmet on just in case my head caves in.” That was followed by “Hello Seattle” and then “Angels,” which had a cool xylophone extended introduction. Adam simply announced, “I have a song about angels.” Maybe 20% of the crowd seemed to really know the songs. Adam continued with “here’s a bit of an oldie, God bless.” This turned into the highlight of the entire evening as some youth groups starting flash mob-style line dancing. At first we saw dozens of kids and adults start to join in and as the 10 minute version of “Umbrella Beach” continued the dancing started to spread throughout the crowd as the extended dance music kept going. Owl City and the crowd sang "home is a box car and its’ so far out of reach, hidden under an umbrella beach, I’ll spread out my wings and fly.” “Creation can I see your hands again?” By the end of the song, literally thousands of people were dancing. 

 

Adam said, “Here’s a song about bugs called “Fireflies.” Thousands of cell phones went into the air as Owl City started playing a cool extended dance mix of the massive hit song “Fireflies” started. Hands waved back and forth all song, and for the last chorus just the crowd sang. That was followed by “Dreams Don’t Turn To Dust.” Adam continued by saying “this is a worship song,” which led to him singing “I desperately need You.” Like everyone else, I was hooked by “Fireflies” and “Vanilla Twilight” from Ocean Eyes. At the time, I didn’t even know Adam was a Christian and then he recorded a brilliant cover of “In Christ Alone,” and I’ve been a huge fan ever since. Adam continued with “Jan 28, 1986” which led into current hit song “Galaxies.” Owl City once again played an extended dance mix and most of the capacity crowd started clapping and the same flash mob-style dancing accompanied the prayerful chorus” “Dear God, You’re The Only North Star I Would follow this far...He is the saving grace of the galaxies.” Some of the most Christian focused lyrics on the new album are found in my favorite song “Galaxies,” which is right after Adam plays a sound clip of President Ronald Reagan speaking about the victims of space shuttle Challenger that exploded on January 28, 1986. In the sound clip, Reagan pays tribute to their bravery and how they “touched the face of God.” I got the great opportunity to interview Adam about the song for my “behind the song” devotional series and we spent time discussing these lyrics in “Galaxies”-“For He is the saving grace of the Galaxies! He is the saving grace of the Galaxies! Dear God, I was terribly lost, When the galaxies crossed, And the Sun went dark. Dear God, You're the only North Star, I would follow this far.” He shared that the song is from the perspective of the astronauts before the explosion and is a prayer to God expressing his devotion to Him as “the saving grace of the Galaxies.” Amen.

The closing songs were hit song “Alligator Sky” which started with the track of Shawn Chrystopher rapping, and then Adam came back and belted out, “where was I when the rockets came to life and carried you away?” Owl City finished with current hit song “Deer In The Headlights” and closing song “The Yacht Club.” Something about Owl City’s music that I’ve consistently enjoyed is the ability to escape daily stress and pressures while listening to the songs. Adam Young has a unique gift to make catchy and optimistic songs while still challenging me intellectually. 

Booking Owl City for this Christian music festival where many of the capacity crowd didn’t seem to know the songs or the lyrics was a risky move and for many it may not have paid off. In my opinion, it was the right move because the line between Christian music artists and Christians in a band is starting to cross more and more, which is a good thing in my opinion. If this festival was only for believers who already know Christ, then there would only be edifying of the body. The power of this festival is the great blend of entertaining musical acts with unashamed Gospel Truth.

 

Our prayer for Creation Northeast 2011 was that people would be changed, restored, and encouraged to serve the Lord and to make a difference in this world. God blessed us with amazing sunny weather each of the 4 days. Over 1,000 children were sponsored through Compassion International and over 1,000 people made a commitment to Christ along with over 300 people getting baptized. The festival was everything we hoped and prayed for, and the purpose of Creation was completely served which is to present the Gospel through music, teaching and any other creative means so that those attending will be drawn to salvation and discipleship in Christ. We came together by the thousands to "Give Tribute to Our Creator" and to allow His Spirit to birth many as "new Creations" in Jesus Christ who will love and serve Him. (Colossians 1:15-18)