The rejuvenation last year of the CoolyRocksOn Church Service held in the big marquee on the Collangatta boardwalk adjacent to Coolangatta and Greenmount Beaches on the Gold Coast has the team excited for this Sunday the 2015 service.
The CoolyRocksOn Church Service runs for one hour, from 8.30am to 9.30am on this Sunday, 7 June as part of the CoolyRocksOn celebrations in which last year saw an official count of 110,000 visitors. It's the largest such rock'n'roll nostalgic festival in Australia.
This annual June long weekend festival of 1400 vintage vehicles and rock'n'roll bands has been running for many years, this year it runs from Saturday 30 May thru to Monday 8 June. The original Church Service was held in the Anglican church building but when it closed the Church Service fell by the wayside.
It gained notoriety a few years ago when Little Pattie came and sang in the Church Service and then it fell in the doldrums for two years with the closure of the church. It happened that a CoolyRocksOn board member, who drove taxi's occasionally, took our fare from the Gold Coast air port to our home in Tweed Heads, spoke to me about reinstituting the Church Service.
Organising
That led to an initial meeting with the then CEO of CoolyRocksOn Bob Newman and over a period of time a strategy and plan was put in place. The Church Service was listed in the official magazine under "Events", a Melbourne rock'n'roll artist Bob Jolly and his band were assigned to this 'event' and all was set.
We organised Bill Parr from the Banora Point Baptist Church to play my wife Delma's key-board and we had two singers, Lisa Goetze from YWAM in Brisbane who hales from Canada and who was well and truly part of the scene as her own father displayed his vintage car at such Canadian festivals for many years. Delma my wife was the other singer.
CoolyRocksOn office printed off the hymns on 40 sheets for the 2014 reinstituted Church Service and to our utmost joy 150 CoolyRocksOn festival people attended. It was a hit for everyone. We had four well known 'rolling' hymns, a bible reading, a public prayer, Bob Jolly did three items and I preached for 20 minutes on the changing nature of public Christianity.
After the CoolyRocksOn Church Service final prayer I made a point of getting to the rear door to shake everyone's hand and welcome them back this year – 2015.
Ken Harris
Ken Harris from Beachside Baptist on the Gold Coast and the worship leader at his own church with his rock'n'role band, The Son Chasers, asked whether their Christian band might be of service for 2015, this was arranged and put in place.
Last Thursday Ken Harris, Bill Parr and I met for a final preparation meeting for the CoolyRocksOn Church Service for this Sunday 7 June.
This time Ken Harris and The Son Chasers are leading the hymns and singing three items. Bill Parr is doing the bible reading and again me as the preacher and service leader.
The CoolyRocksOn Church Service is back on track. Visitors and locals are welcome.
8.30am in the big marquee on the Coolangatta boardwalk.
Dr Mark Tronson is a Baptist minister (retired) who served as the Australian cricket team chaplain for 17 years (2000 ret) and established Life After Cricket in 2001. He was recognised by the Olympic Ministry Medal in 2009 presented by Carl Lewis Olympian of the Century. He mentors young writers and has written 24 books, and enjoys writing. He is married to Delma, with four adult children and grand-children.
Mark Tronson's archive of articles can be viewed at http://www.pressserviceinternational.org/mark-tronson.html
