Voices In My Head Podcast Episode 312: Matthew Clark

Welcome to Voices in My Head, the official podcast of me, Rick Lee James. I'm a recording artist, a singer, a songwriter, an author, a worship leader, and an ordained minister in the Church of the Nazarene. The Voices in My Head podcast is where I discuss music, movies, books, pop culture, theology, and more with friends, colleagues, and sometimes just by myself. Now make sure to let me know what you think of today's episode by leaving me a review on iTunes or by tweeting at me @RickLeeJames on Twitter. And please join my mailing list at RickLeeJames.com where you can receive an email every time a new episode is released. And by the way, in case you're interested in a daily dose of kindness and encouragement beyond this podcast, I also run the Twitter account @MrRogersSay. Where I post daily quotes from Fred Rogers, one of the voices in my head. Well, I guess that's it for the intro, so sit back, relax, and listen to the latest episode of Voices in My Head.

Welcome back to Voices in My Head. As always, I am your host, Rick Lee James. I'm very glad you could be here with me today. We have an incredible singer, songwriter, a Bible teacher, a lover of literature, His name is Matthew Clark, and I'm so glad to have a chance to talk with him today. Here is his quick bio for you. Singer, songwriter, storyteller, and Mississippi native Matthew Clark blends a thought-provoking narrative lyricism with well-honed guitar skills to craft songs that have been likened to the work of Andrew Peterson, Matthew Perryman Jones, and David Wilcox. Each fall, Matthew loads up his tiny house in a van, a converted Dodge Sprinter dubbed Vandolph the White, and travels all over the country playing concerts in homes and churches Matthew's engaging conversational performance style has led concertgoers to comment that the stories between the songs are as enjoyable as the songs themselves. Ultimately, Matthew's music is about weaving the strung-out strands of our lives into a fabric of hope and belonging in God. Matthew Clark, welcome to Voices in My Head.

Hey, so good to be here.

Well, I am thrilled that you had a chance to come on today, that you were able to fit it into your schedule. And I know how it is, sometimes they're very, very busy for musicians. And you do so many different things, and you do so many things well. I think the first time— actually, I know the first time that we met was this past year at UTR Media's Escape to the Lake. And I, I thought, man, what an incredibly nice guy. And then I heard your music, and I thought, what an incredibly talented songwriter. And then you started ripping out some Phil Keaggy type guitar solos, and I thought, dang, what an incredible guitarist. And then you led us in devotions one morning— maybe it was two mornings, I can't quite remember— I thought, wow, what a thoughtful, very centered, devotional-minded person that Matthew is. Then having a chance to do a podcast like this, it's always great because I get to cram everybody's music. When I have an author on, I get to cram for reading books. When I have musicians on, I get to listen to as much music as I can. This has been a great time of listening to your music. All that is to say, I'm so glad to have a chance to talk with you today because there's so much interesting about you and so much that our listeners are going to resonate with. So first things— oh, well, you're welcome. First things first, and I'm going to let you talk now. I didn't give you any advance warning about this, so you may have to think about it for just a second. But tell us something that most people probably don't know about you. And, you know, not like that you murdered somebody or something like that.

You don't have to do that part.

Yeah, leave that part out. But is there something that, you know, it's kind of fun about you that maybe most people don't know?

No, I'm not very fun.

You're not a very fun person.

You probably don't know where my favorite freckle is.

Okay, no, I'm certain we don't know that.

You don't know that. What else do you not know? Well, I think a lot of people around me do probably know this, but I'm kind of obsessed with Indian food. I had Indian housemates for about 8 years at one point. And they didn't like American food, so I ate almost only Indian food for about 8 years.

Wow.

And I love Indian food.

Well, I knew, I knew you must have loved it because it got actually into your longer bio, you know, about making Indian food on the road in your Sprinter van. Uh, that's terrific. Um, well, that's just kind of a fun little thing, but there's so much about you that I love, and it's, it's hard to know actually where to start. So I think we're going to just start with the music today because there's a lot we could share, a lot we could talk about. You've made several albums, and by the way, the artwork on all of your albums is just beautiful. Just from an aesthetic standpoint, that's one thing that I really think is lacking on a lot of albums today because everything's just kind of made for the digital age. There's not always a lot of thought put into the album covers. But from start to finish, even when I look at like your CD CD covers, they always have this beautiful artwork to them. So is that art that you yourself have done? Some of it? I just, I don't know for sure. I just thought I'd ask because you seem like the kind of person that would make art like that.

It depends on the album. I really do love the visual aspect. I'm not a very capable visual artist necessarily, but my brother is a visual artist. He's a ceramic artist primarily now, but he started out visual. And so I've always loved that. The, uh, the Bright Came the Word from His Mouth, I really wanted to do some art for that. And I looked on Etsy and I found a young Russian illustrator named Eugene Frost. And so he did all of the artwork for that album, which is kind of the orange Yeah, that stuff, uh, that's a Bible walkthrough album, and he was just brilliant. And he was, I think at the time that he illustrated that, he was 20 or 21. Wow, young, young guy. And I mean, he, when I say he's Russian, he lives in Russia.

Yeah.

And he did that, he did, um, 6 or 7 panels that illustrate the, the sequence of the Bible. And, um, and the first time I ever did that, I did an Easter album that's not in print right now. And, uh, Shannon, uh, Sigler, who actually works with the Brim Center in, um, up in the Pacific Northwest, she did these panels that walk through Holy Week. So that's kind of a tradition. I, whenever I make them, I like to find a visual artist if I can afford it. To make some kind of sequence. But you do miss that when you get into just purely digital.

Sure.

You miss tangible. That's kind of a shame.

Yeah, it is a shame. But that's the one thing, I mean, you're, to me anyway, at first, just even from the look of it, you're kind of taken in by the album. But then you hear the music and you're even more brought in. And I want to talk about the last album that you made today, Beautiful Secret Life. And the custom songs, and you made the album from personal stories that people sent in. Tell us a bit about the making of that album.

Well, it started out as I just, as a songwriter, I just wanted to grow in my writing. And something I've just learned about myself is that I will avoid work.

You know, that reminds me of Rich Mullins. He used to say, "God, whatever you do, please just don't let me work," you know.

Yes, I love to write and I love to avoid writing. And so I knew that I needed to create some kind of discipline structure that had a requirement from outside of me. An accountability structure for writing. So I set up kind of in the shape of a Kickstarter, or— and this was before Patreon came out, but where people could subscribe and I would do a monthly song and I would make a video documentary of that story behind that song. And then if you subscribed at a certain monetary level, one of the rewards, like on a Kickstarter, was you get a custom song. So I had about 15 or 16 people who subscribed at that highest level, and I had no clue how this was going to actually work out in real life. Yeah, but people sent me all kinds of different things, and some of them— what really surprised me is people sent me really very personal sometimes really heavy stories. And so I was expecting this to kind of just be a fun exercise, and it turned into this thing where I felt a lot of responsibility to handle people's stories as best I could. I didn't want to mess that up, you know. So that's what became a lot of those custom songs. And it really changed the way I thought about what I do, because I had never really seen songwriting as— it became for me a kind of intercessory prayer where I felt like, okay, people are inviting me into their stories., and I want to care for them, and I want to write this song as a way to bear with them in their story and give dignity to their story, sing their story back to them in a way that lets them know that God is tuned in and he's with them. And that was not something I had— that was not a real connection I had made before. So it was a big shift for me personally.

Sure. Well, I know you like to play in homes and you'll do house concerts and things. And when you talk about sharing these people's stories, I imagine that a lot of the stories that were included on this album probably came from some of these people that you had actually played concerts for and had been a part of their lives already. I imagine that part of how this all worked together for you was you were all in some way sharing your life together in this process. Would you say that's kind of accurate?

Yeah, a lot of the people that signed up for that year, the Song of the Month subscription, and sent in those stories were people that a lot of times people that had hosted, hosted me. And I've said it a few times, sometimes I think of touring this way, that music is just like a really complicated, elaborate excuse to drive around and hang out with people.

Yeah, that's a good description for sure. Yeah. Well, and I know you're going to be doing some of that again this fall, in August through October you had talked about. And I want to give people a chance to hear some of your music at this point. And before we do, the song that I'd like to play first that you sent to me, it is from the Beautiful Secret Life album, and it's the song Kumulo, which I believe comes from Cry the Beloved Country, if I remember the reference that you had said before. But was this a song that came about because someone asked you to write a story about it, or is this something that in your own that from your own heart and your own reading had come through to you.

Yeah, that was a part of that whole year, that same year. It was one of the songs of the month, so it was not a custom song. Pete Peterson mentioned in a podcast that Rabbit Room did that one of the most beautiful books in the English language was Cry, the Beloved Country. And I thought, well, that's a pretty Pretty good recommendation for a book.

Yeah.

And I know how to read English, so I thought—

Oh, gosh.

And it was— I love if a book can make me cry. I love if I can cry while I'm writing a song. That means that if it can't get to my heart, then what's going on? But that book was so beautiful. And one of the things that really touched me was the character Kumalo is this rural priest in a village and his kids go to the big city to look for jobs and they disappear. So he goes to look for them and he meets this other priest who helps him navigate the big city. This is all happening during South African period of apartheid. And they have this conversation at one point where Kumalo, the rural priest, says to Mzee Mangu, the city priest, like, "Oh, you're such a good man. Thank you for helping me." And Mzee Mangu turns toward him and just really sharply says, "No, Kumalo, I'm not a good man." And you get this sense of like, what is this guy's past? He's a priest, but he's got a past. And he's well aware that he is only in the place that he's in because of the mercy of God. And, and I thought, man, I've spent so much time trying to, trying to make Jesus available by making myself look good, because that's what, that's what I want. I want, I want to look good. And sometimes I want to use Jesus to make me look good. I'm going to use the name of Jesus to make a name for myself. And, um, And here's this guy, he's saying, "It doesn't work that way. I'm not a good man." And when I can be honest about that, that's when I think maybe, hopefully, Jesus becomes a little more available to people.

Well, let's take a minute and hear that incredible song. And I really do love it. Kumulo from the album Beautiful Secret Life. This is my guest, Matthew Clark.

I'm not a good man, what can I say? Only that the Lord has shown me grace. Only that the Lord has shown me grace. Reach your hands out, hands out. Even though you know where they've been, the Lord has made them gloves now, gloves now. They are hiding Jesus' hands. Hands. So reach out his hands in your hands. Kumalo, kumalo. I am not a good man, I'm not a good man. What can I say? Only that the Lord has shown me grace. Only that the Lord has shown me grace. Let them see you, see you, in every place you fear to be seen. And they will find his mercy, mercy. Say, surely if the Lord can save you, then he can set me free from all my sin. Kumalo, kumalo. I am not a good man, I'm not a good man. What can I say? Only that the Lord has shown me grace. Only that the Lord has shown me grace. Cuz I am the older son, I'm angry at my brother's welcome. Oh, and I am the Younger son, happy to be wallowing in love again. And I still fight to believe that the truest thing is that I'm rising with the sun from the river. When the Father calls, beloved, I am well pleased.

Kumalo.

Kumalo. I am not a good man, I'm not a good man, what can I say? Only that the Lord has shown me grace, only that the Lord has shown me grace. Kumalo, kumalo. I am not a good man, I'm not a good man, what can I say? It's only that the Lord has shown me grace. It's only that the Lord has shown me grace. Oh, kumalo, kumalo. I am not a good man. It's only that the Lord— it's only that the Lord has show me grace. Kumalo, kumalo. I am not a good man. Kumalo, I am not a good man. Kumalo, it's only that the Lord has shown me grace. Kumalo, kumalo. It's only that the Lord has shown me grace. Kumalo, kumalo. I am not a good man, I'm not a good man. What can I say? Only that the Lord has shown me grace. Only that the Lord has shown me grace.

And we're back, and that was Kumalo by my guest Matthew Clark. It's on his album Beautiful Secret Life. We are going to take a quick break because I have to pay the bills for this podcast real fast. So just a couple of quick ads and we will be right back with you once again.

This is Rick Lee James and the music you are hearing is from my new album, Thunder. The title track, Thunder, is a never-before-released song by the late Rich Mullins. There are also 12 other tracks made up of original music, hymns, and readings to guide the listener on a journey. You can buy Thunder today on clear vinyl and CD or stream it on Spotify, Apple Music, almost every other music streaming service. Thunder, hear it today at rickleejames.com. This episode of Voices in My Head is brought to you by Podbean. With Podbean, you can create professional podcasts in minutes without any programming knowledge. Best of all, everything is mobile ready right from the start. Visit podbean.com/voices to find out more. That's podbean.com/voices.

And we are back again with my guest Matthew Clark. It's so good to have him on the show today. You've been hearing some of his music. We heard Kumulo a few minutes ago, and that's just one of the many songs you'll likely get to hear if you were to bring him into your home or to your venue this fall or sometime this summer. And it's going to be a great time because I know, because I've seen Matthew live,, and he does a great job. Before we get into talking about this, this big thing that you are working on right now, I just wanted to let listeners know if they were interested in contacting you for a house concert, or if somebody listening runs a venue— we have a few of those here— how would they get in contact with you?

They can a couple of ways. You can go to my website and there's a contact form on there, and also all kinds of information, uh, or my email is matthewclarknet@gmail.com.

Good information to have. I know when people hear your songs, they're going to want to connect with you on that. Now, this is something that I'm excited about, and I want you to kind of tell the story of where it all came about. And it's happening in Cincinnati, Ohio, just a few months from now. This is an art and faith retreat that you have orchestrated called Cofferstow, and it's got a unique name and it's got a unique premise, and I'd love for you to tell us more about it.

Yeah, so I, I did this retreat once before, about 3 years ago, 2016, and I wanted to gather some of the people, some of the artists and communicators that I thought were most encouraging and inspiring to me, um, who helped me believe in what God had called me to do in the arts. And, uh, and I wanted to bring those people together, and then I wanted to invite friends and anyone who wanted to come together around and spend a weekend talking about what does it be— what does it mean to be made in the image of God? And if God has called us to be joined to his life and the work that he's doing in the world, um, and to make this kingdom available, um, and to manifest— this has become a word for me— to manifest, to actually make, um, God's kingdom tastable and touchable and seeable, smellable and hearable in this world. And this is the invitation that God has said: I want you to be married wedded to me and us to be doing the same thing together at the same time, right? And so that's a creative calling because God is the capital C Creator and we get to be lowercase c creators with him. That's part of the image that he's made us in. And, uh, so we, we put this weekend together and Krista Wells, who's an amazing singer-songwriter She sang and she spoke. And Andy Gullahorn, who's another guy I just really admire his writing and, uh, and just being around him, he spoke and sang. And we had several others, and I spoke and I sang. And, um, so it was such a beautiful weekend, but it was in Mississippi and it was hard for people to get there. So I wanted to relocate it to a more central place in Cincinnati. So we're going to do that again June 14th through 17th, just outside of Cincinnati at a little retreat center.

Well, that's terrific, and I think a lot of people are going to be excited about that. Remind me, is it, is it coffestowe.net, the official site for that, or am I getting that site wrong? I want to make sure everybody has it.

It's .com.

Coffestowe.com. And that's spelled C-O-F-F-E-R-S-T-O-W-E. Erstowe.com. And we'll make sure and put all that information in the show notes for this podcast as well. But I know a lot of people might really be interested in this art and faith retreat and, and the theme of it this year, Only the Lover Sings. Tell us a little bit about that.

Yeah, I, um, this has been— you know, you know, sometimes when the Lord teaches you something over time and it just You know, a friend will bring something up in a conversation and then somebody else will recommend a book. And then later on you'll see this other— where the same thing just keeps popping up all over the place. And you think, like, "Okay, I should probably start paying attention to this." Well, somebody, my friend Joy Clarkson, recommended this book to me about 2 years ago called Only the Lover Sings. By Josef Pieper, and it's a 75-page kind of a little philosophy theology book. But the idea behind it is that it's very difficult in our culture to stop and take a deep breath and actually pay attention to anything deeply. And we do this with Jesus because, because we're afraid to spend any real time with him. If we— so we distract ourselves constantly. We're busy, we're busy so that we don't have to look him in the face. And the scriptures are always saying, don't, don't take the light of your face, don't hide the light of your face from us. But we're scared to look at his face because we're afraid that the look on his face will be something that will terrify us, right? That we will not be loved, will not be invited. So what Pieper says in this book is that we have to recover the ability to give God a chance to actually look in his face, and when we do if we will behold, if we'll stop long enough to look, we'll discover that actually the news is really good. The look on his face is that he has shown us in Jesus is that we are his beloved and that we are, it has been provided for, for us to be united to him. And so that's kind of the theme of Cofferstowe Weekend is that we want to come and say like, set this weekend aside and take the risk of looking the Lord in the face, because if you do, then you'll discover how much He loves you. And then, kind of John 4, the woman at the well, I think is a great instance of this happening in Scripture, where there's this woman, she's at the well in the heat of the day by herself, and she meets Jesus, and she kind of won't make eye contact with Him, but by the end of the conversation she sees his face and she sees how he is looking at her. And she's never had a man look at her like that before. She's had a lot of men look at her, if you know what I mean, but never like that. And everything changes, right? She goes knocking on doors and she goes singing. The lover sings. So I think all of us in our life where God is saying, sing with me, and the song is really beautiful, but we have to stop long enough to listen.

Well, speaking of stopping and listening, I want to play another song from your album Beautiful Secret Life. It's a song called You Are Loved. Let's stop a moment and listen, and then we'll talk about it.

gave your heart to save? Have you lost yourself, my beautiful friend? Oh, remember this when the darkness closes in. You have loved when all was hopeless, chased the truth despite the cost, whispered light to the darkness, held the broken and the lost. Now your gentle heart is shattered, frozen silence drowned your flame. Let my voice be borrowed embers, lent to light your holy name. Again, 'cause you are loved. You are loved. You are loved. You are loved. And I know you're tired. I know the grief has grown too strong. 'Cause the war dragged on till your own life seems like it's not worth fighting for. Every star goes back. You toss and you turn. Into that starving void. I will pray, let there be light. I've only brokenness to offer, the splintered tinder of my heart, and a prayer to spark the kindling, trembling truth to warm the dark. Again, you have loved all was hopeless, chased the truth despite the cost, whispered light into the darkness, held the broken and the lost. And now your gentle heart is shattered, those in silence drown your flame. Let my voice be borrowed embers, lent to light your holy name again. 'Cause you are loved, you are loved, you are loved. You are loved, you are loved, you are loved. You are loved.

And that was "You Are Loved" from the album Beautiful Secret Life. My guest is Matthew Clark, and that was his beautiful song. Tell us a bit about that song. We were just talking before we listened to it about listening and what that means. Tell us the story behind the song "You Are Loved." Well, I wrote that one for you, buddy.

You're loved.

I appreciate it.

Just wanted to let you know how much I love you.

I'm touched. Now tell us the real story.

So that was, it wasn't exactly a custom song, but it was a collaboration. That was a song, there's a lady named Rebecca Reynolds.

She's been on— yeah, you know, on this show actually. Oh really? Another funny thing, connection with Rebecca Reynolds. I actually, I love her book Courage, Dear Heart, and I almost never preach at my church. I lead music, but last Sunday I preached and I actually quoted, uh, from her book. So we, we are big fans of Rebecca Reynolds around here for sure. So yeah, so please continue. I didn't mean to derail you from what you were saying.

Hey, that's okay, you're loved. No, she's really wonderful and I met her through Rabbit Room and Hutch Mood and all that gang. But when I was doing that project, she was one of the people who subscribed, who signed up for that. And she wanted to put together a song for some friends of hers who— I don't even know the specifics and I don't know who it was. But somebody whose relationship was— they had tried and tried and tried and it was just crumbling. And so she sent me some stuff that she had written out and she said, "Can you sort of translate this into a song, song form? You can edit this or change it up." And so she sent me a base of lyrical ideas and And from that, that's where that song came from. And it's kind of a heartbreaking song, but then it lands on this thing of saying like, there's nowhere that Jesus cannot meet you. You know, you are loved this place.

Yeah, what a great truth for us to hang on to. And it's a beautiful song. You did a wonderful job. And actually the whole album is great. Even this morning I was listening through it again and it's just a very special album all around. You should be very proud of it, I think.

Thanks, Rick Lee James.

While we're talking about albums and music, any new albums in the works for you?

Well, you know, I've been— it's been, I guess, almost 3 years since I made one, and I've been writing here and there. I've got a lot of voice memos on my phone, you can imagine. But I've felt like I want to make a new album, but I want to— I want to go somewhere I've never really been before, or I want to— I want to dig in maybe more deeply than I have before and So I don't know exactly what that looks like, but I feel like it's time to start the process to make a new album. So I'm writing now, and I really want to try to start recording at the beginning of next year. And I'll probably do a Kickstarter maybe this fall. I'm not sure yet. So I'm really praying and kind of exploring song-wise what, what this next thing needs to be about.

Well, we'll be looking forward to it and watching for details about how we can help in the making of that as well. And speaking of helping, um, how can people help you if they wanted to raise support for you as a missionary? Because I know you have some of that as well, and there's a website that you referred me to, Matthew www.rickleejames.net/partner. But tell us a bit about the ways that people can go there and how they can be involved in helping to support you.

Probably the best thing you can do is send me just bags of frozen fruit, which I can make smoothies with. That will keep me alive.

Delicious. That's right. Foodism and Indian food supply you with as much Indian food as possible. That's great.

But besides that, no, I got the beginning of last year. I came back from traveling and my living situation had changed a little bit. I live with my brother Sam. And, but he had taken a job where he, he was working away from home. So basically, I was living alone. And for the first time in a really long time. And I was exhausted from having been on the road for months and months, and it was a really hard season. And but one of the things that the Lord challenged me with during that time was I had— I was learning to, to ask for help. Does that make sense? Um, I was learning to to say, hey, I need, I need somebody to come be with me in this. And so I reached out to some people at church and I said, um, can, can we just start meeting? It was like just 3 people. Can we just start meeting maybe once a month? I need some help thinking about what I'm doing, and the way I'm doing it right now is not sustainable. Financially it was just— I had, I had all these kind of unusually large bills come in kind of at the same time and all attack me. And so the bottom kind of fell out that year and it was really stressful, um, you know, circumstantially, financially. And then also it was kind of a real lonely season personally.. And so all these things converged that just, that were kind of miserable, but they pushed me out to where I had to connect to my community and ask them to, to walk with me. I love to do everything by myself because it feels so safe. You can control everything. And I had to— I couldn't do that anymore. And so I started meeting with these friends, and one of them is a missionary in Asia, East Asia. And she said, look, you're doing ministry, why are you not raising support? I said, why, I don't know. And she said, well, you, you need to learn how to ask people to— for help, and you need to learn how to let people participate in your life. You know, and so what I realized is that raising support, or the fact that I wasn't raising support, was actually my pride because I was not comfortable letting people participate in that way. So, in my little kind of board of directors, they said, "Yeah, that makes a lot of sense. You should start doing that." So I started looking into that, and this past summer I set up two different avenues. One is through Artists in Christian Testimony International, which is a sending board, a missions sending board, and they can provide nonprofit status if, if someone needs to donate, needs a nonprofit to donate through. And then I also just have a form on my website at matthewclark.net/partner where you can do a monthly support. And most people give, you know, $15, $20, $25, something like that a month. But that has been a game changer. Not, not just because it's financially helpful, which it is hugely, but because it has connected me to this, uh, this, this group of friends who— I'm not doing it by myself like I was before. And now I send prayer requests out and I get to— it holds me accountable to, to say this is what I'm doing and working on. And I feel like I have people with me now and I'm with people.

I love that.

I really love that. And I think that's, uh, I think you're board of trustees or whatever you would call them that meets together here for accountability. I think that was very wise of them. And I can tell you that's something I struggle with as well as an artist, because it is hard to ask. And oftentimes when you ask, you don't get sometimes either, but sometimes you do. And people are more generous sometimes than you would allow. And something that I'm learning, and it sounds like you're learning through this too, that You know, the Bible tells us it is more blessed to give than to receive, but it doesn't say that it's not blessed to receive. It's just, it's just a different blessing, and sometimes we need that support for sure. So I want to make sure everybody has a chance to do that. And again, we're going to put these links in our show notes at voicesinmyheadpodcast.com on this episode when it releases, but you can also go to matthewclark.net/partner And you can also go to— I want you to go online, everybody, and check out kofferstowe.com. And I'm going to spell that one more time: kofferstowe.com, because it's a really cool-sounding art and faith retreat. And I think it's something that many people are going to benefit by. Well, as many as first come, first serve can get in there, right? But, um, but this has been a real joy to get to talk to you today. I'm glad we finally made it happen and that that we were able to get to hear some of your music on the podcast today. And always one of the great things you can do to support an artist is to go listen to their music, buy their music. I mean, it's really not that hard if you want to know how to support an artist, buy their stuff. I mean, that's really one of the ways that you can help and you can do that. But I would encourage you as listeners I'm talking to now, because I have been with Matthew and I've seen him not only play, but I've sensed his heart as he shared what was on it and the, the good message that he has. If you were able to bring him in for a house concert or to your church or to a venue near you, you will not be disappointed with the ministry that comes with Matthew Clark. And you can hear just from having him on the show today the way that God's heart shines through his, I believe. And so all that is to say, as we close this show as I say to my guests every time as they have been on here. Matthew Clark, thank you for being one of the voices in my head this week.

Thank you for joining me here this week on Voices in My Head. I hope you'll visit me on my website at rickleejames.com where you can find out more about me, get my music on vinyl and CD, follow my blog, and even schedule me for a concert or a speaking engagement. Better better yet, even a book signing in your neighborhood. You can find all that and more at rickleejames.com. Also, it would mean a great deal to me if you could write a review of this podcast on iTunes. The more positive reviews that we receive, the more visible this podcast will be online. And now for the benediction: May the God of hope fill you with all joy and peace in believing, so that by the power of the Holy Spirit you may abound in hope. God bless you, and thank you for listening to Voices in My Head.