FamilyChristian.com Exclusive Interview
FFH Has Something To Tell You ...continued

FamilyChristian.com: This fall, you're headed out on tour with Point Of Grace. What are you most excited about with that tour?

Jennifer: Shopping. Shopping with the girls.

FamilyChristian.com: That's going to be kind of nice for you to be around some estrogen bonding.

Jennifer: Well, Allison, Brian's wife is with us on the road so I have her but it's going to be pretty nice. I have a feeling they know where to shop. [laughs]

FamilyChristian.com: So are you guys looking forward to shopping too?

Michael: I don't really know what we're going to do. We're not going to have much of a say in this, I don't think.

Jennifer: He's going to babysit.

Michael: We'll probably play whiffleball or something, football. We play whiffleball, football. We run and work out. We kind of do our own thing a lot of times anyway.

Jeromy: And I don't want to say it's going to be easy because then you get out there and it's the hardest tour of your life. We're not carrying the show; they are. It's kind of nice because we just are kind of an added aspect of the show. They asked us to take a break from our fall tour and be part of theirs. It really wasn't a hard call.

FamilyChristian.com: It's a good match.

Jennifer: It's kind of a dream we've always wanted to do. We met and whenever they were singing and we were going. It like, "Man, if we could ever go on tour with Point Of Grace."

Jeromy: 4Him and Point Of Grace and we've got 4Him done and now Point Of Grace.

Jennifer: It's really cool. Plus it will be neat to see them every night. [We'll] probably learn a lot because they're really good.

Michael: They can learn how to eat from us.

FamilyChristian.com: I've heard you're a really picky eater. Or are you just a habit person?

Michael: No, I'm a picky eater. That's the only way to describe it. I'm allergic to some stuff but I'm pretty picky. I don't eat real healthy and these guys eat real healthy. Brian eats just about anything. But I think I take the cake on the unhealthy part of eating. When we're on the road, I eat a hamburger from McDonald's and I order french fries, every day.

Jeromy: That's not so much because you love McDonald's either. It's just because we know.

FamilyChristian.com: So even when you're not on the road, you get McDonalds?

Michael: No, not a whole lot. I try to stay away from McDonalds when I'm off the road. I'll eat a steak or chicken fingers or something, pizza.

Jennifer: That's pretty much it. Pizza with no sauce.

Michael: I'm allergic to tomatoes.

Jeromy: And condiments. And he likes people to believe he's allergic to vegetables.

Michael: When they try to make me eat salad, I'm allergic to vegetables.

FamilyChristian.com: You're doing is venturing into publishing with your book, Stories from the Road.

Jeromy: The book is going to be cool. We're excited about it. It's stories. It's not an artist devotional series type thing. It's kind of more along the lines of a Chicken Soup.

Jennifer: Stories that have happened to us on the road and things God's taught us through people we've met.

Jeromy: I mean, it's not stories like what kind of toothpaste do we use? We had a really close friend, when we were on our tour last year, die in a car accident. Brian writes about that. We had a youth pastor's wish for the fellow who was dying from a rare form of cancer was for FFH to come to his church and sing "One of These Days" in Sunday morning worship and we made it out to do it two months before he died. The only time he stood up that week was during that song. That's one of Michael's stories.

One of the stories I wrote was about a time where God pulled the plug on one of our concerts because I decided not to do an invitation. Jennifer wrote about a time, like a day like this, like a [trade event] when everything was going wrong and then some lady walked up to us and said, "My husband got saved at one of your shows."

We incorporated a bunch of stuff in there too. We're hoping that people that may not listen to a Christian CD might read a book that just says Far From Home on the front, Stories from the Road. We've got some letters in there too that people have sent to us.

Jennifer: Like about songs that have touched their lives.

FamilyChristian.com: Did you read each other's stories?

All: No.

Brian: Allyson, she actually cried [when she read] a few of the stories.

Jennifer: They're like Chicken Soup-y.

Jeromy: They are. My mom got the book in Pennsylvania. I was visiting up there and it got to her late. They were supposed to go to me. She didn't even know we were writing a book. I didn't tell her, which is so me. She goes, "I got your book today." I said, "Oh yeah, we're writing a book." She said, "Can I read it?" And I said, "Yeah." She said she could only get halfway through it. She just bawled her eyes out. Part of that's because she knows me so well.

Brian: It's so hard to write. It's so different than performing music.

Jeromy: It's hard to pick those few instances too. I mean, ten years of stories and we only picked, what, 12 in this book. But who knows? If one person reads it and gets saved, it was worth the whole printing of it.

FamilyChristian.com: What is God teaching you now?

Jennifer: Well, God's been kind of teaching me the same thing but He's really been convicting me about my speech, just encouraging people with, especially on the bus because we're brutal with each other. Just joking around. I'm terrible and I find myself really joking too hard. In Ephesians it talks about coarse joking.

Jeromy: She doesn't have a foul mouth or anything.

Jennifer: No, not like that. Brian and I really joke a lot because we're a lot alike. I've just been really convicted about that lately. And to be more encouraging rather than discouraging. Even though it's joking, it still doesn't glorify God.

Brian: God teaches us something new every day. I've been going through a Larry Burkett study. Larry Burkett, being the money man, he talks about tithing a lot but not just tithing your money, tithing your time. That's something that's really convicted me. I need to be spending quality time when I can be in my bunk and be able to read and study and pray.

Michael: I've been kind of doing a study called The Man That God Uses by Henry Blackaby. One day, I was doing my devotion and listening to the radio and a Phillips, Craig & Dean's "Let My Words Be Few" caught my attention. I kind of listened to it and thought about it for a little while. And then a couple days later I was flipping through Thessalonians and I went to 1 Thessalonians 4:11, "Make it your number one ambition to lead to lead a quiet life, mind your own business and keep your hands busy all day." God has just been bringing that up over and over and over again in my mind. You know, lead a quiet life and mind your own business. Keep your mouth shut when it doesn't need to be open and take care of yourself and keep your hands busy all day. Don't sit around asking somebody else to do something when you can do it yourself. You've got to go through life doing your thing. That's what God's really been teaching me, just to stay busy and keep my mouth shut, I guess.

Have I Ever... by FFH

Jeromy: Right before you started that book, I finished that book. I've read that verse in Thessalonians too and I'm reading some verses to about letting your words be few and making your gentleness be evident to all.

I think the Lord's trying to have me just be okay with my own identity and stuff. God's been trying to tell me not to be somebody I'm not. My father-in-law traveled with us for three years. With the stuff with my parents and being married now for six years in November, I think the Lord's just wanting just to teach me about who I am in Him, not really who I try so hard to be. Just to find my own identity and to be okay with that. I used to think about how fun it would be to do other things, like be a youth speaker, a youth pastor or music minister somewhere. Just this past year, God's been totally taking that stuff off of my heart. He's like, "This is what I want you to do. You're a singer and you're a songwriter and you're a husband and hopefully someday you'll be a father." I'm not responsible for FFH. I am the leader but I'm not responsible for it. I'm the leader of my house but I'm not responsible for Jennifer's spirituality. I'm responsible for me and my relationship with the Lord and that's it.

Jen Abbas, a writer in Grand Rapids, Mich., originally conducted this interview for Family Christian Stores' All Access music catalog.

< Previous Page

Click Here To Read More Interviews

Corporate Informations:
About Family Christian Stores® |  Jobs
Information / Official Logos For Business Partners / Suppliers

© 2008 Family Christian Stores®, Inc.