Urban Report

Three Angels Broadcasting Network

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Series Code: UBR

Program Code: UBR000257A


00:01 Stay tuned to meet a man who is mission minded
00:03 and musically gifted.
00:04 My name is Jason Bradley,
00:06 and you're watching Urban Report.
00:33 Hello and welcome to Urban Report.
00:35 My guest today is Kendol Bacchus,
00:37 and he is passionate
00:38 about utilizing his talents for serving the Lord.
00:41 Welcome to Urban Report, Kendol.
00:42 Thank you, kindly, delighted to be here.
00:44 I'm so happy to have you here, man.
00:46 We know one of the things that I've always wanted
00:48 to be able to do is play the piano.
00:52 I had the opportunity to hear you play the piano
00:56 and I was fascinated.
00:58 God has blessed you with a tremendous talent
01:00 and a tremendous gift,
01:02 and it's incredible to see you utilizing your gifts
01:05 and talents and returning those to the Lord.
01:09 I want to find out a little bit about your background.
01:13 Where were you raised? Where are you from?
01:14 And how are you raised?
01:16 Okay, well, I'm from Saint Vincent
01:18 and the Grenadines.
01:19 Okay.
01:21 Down in the Southern Caribbean.
01:22 And I was born and raised there in an Adventist family.
01:24 I'm the fifth child in that family.
01:28 And my parents were mission minded,
01:30 literature evangelists for a while,
01:32 and for a long while actually,
01:34 and so am I actually.
01:37 And that they were literature evangelists?
01:39 I mean, I'm also mission minded.
01:41 Yes, yes, yes, yes, yes.
01:43 And, okay, so you were born in the Caribbean, right?
01:48 That's right.
01:49 I know the food was amazing.
01:51 I know, I love food, so.
01:53 I know that the food was absolutely amazing out there
01:56 I would imagine.
01:57 That is true,
01:59 and I have the Indian flavors as well in my family
02:02 because I'm of Indian descent, you see so.
02:03 Nice, nice.
02:04 And so you were raised in the Adventist church?
02:06 Yes.
02:07 But somewhere in there,
02:09 there was some kind of
02:10 Hinduism intertwine...?
02:12 What...? Well...
02:13 How did that...?
02:15 Yeah. Yeah.
02:16 My ancestry goes back to India.
02:17 And my ancestors
02:19 came to the West Indies as indentured laborers
02:22 and so they were Hindu.
02:23 But I'm... praise the Lord,
02:25 third generation Seventh-day Adventist.
02:27 Amen. Amen.
02:30 How did you get involved in music?
02:32 Wow.
02:34 I think, I'd have to say that music sort of chose me
02:37 rather than I chose it.
02:39 From as young as I could remember,
02:42 I was drawn to music.
02:44 I was fascinated by it.
02:46 I wanted to be able to navigate the keyboard,
02:51 you know, as a child
02:52 and I wanted to be able to reproduce
02:54 stuff that I heard,
02:56 you know.
02:57 But it was the radio or people singing in church,
03:00 I wanted to be able to do it.
03:02 And I would say that God gave me the attitude,
03:07 a spiritual gift if you will for that.
03:10 And He does that, you know, with all His children
03:13 but we have to work at it...
03:14 Amen.
03:16 And develop that.
03:17 So I worked out hard at my music,
03:20 you know, and I found much joy in doing that.
03:23 How many hours would you practice a day?
03:26 Oh, well, growing up actually,
03:30 I didn't have like a set practice time.
03:32 The piano was there and in between
03:34 whatever was going on,
03:36 I will just jump on the stool and found out something,
03:39 you know, so that's kind of how it happened for me.
03:41 I didn't have formal lessons like most kids would.
03:45 Some, more or less self-taught.
03:49 But my sisters play.
03:51 I have four sisters and three of them
03:53 are proficient pianist, church pianists.
03:55 Wow.
03:57 And so I grew up hearing them, you know,
03:58 I'll play.
04:00 And so, yeah, you pick up little tips from them
04:03 and I stole their music
04:04 and try to read their music as well.
04:07 So this is how it happened for me,
04:10 and I actually had formal lessons
04:14 for about two years, two and a half years.
04:16 Okay. Okay.
04:17 So you play by ear and you read music?
04:22 Yes, that's right.
04:23 Wow.
04:24 And which one came first
04:26 because I know that you said
04:27 that like you used to listen to the radio
04:29 and people in church
04:31 and you wanted to be able to play
04:33 what they were playing.
04:35 Were you playing by ear then or were you...
04:39 Did you get their sheet music and learn that way?
04:42 For me they happened sort of simultaneously.
04:45 Okay.
04:47 I would try to play everything by ear first,
04:50 especially before it was a piece
04:51 that I heard my sisters play.
04:53 So I will say it, I figure out what the key is from the score,
04:56 but there was always a temptation
04:58 to work it out myself.
04:59 So it took some doing for me to discipline myself
05:03 and actually try to play it from the score
05:05 as it was written.
05:07 And I saw value in that, you know.
05:10 You can do stuff by ear
05:13 and I said this to any talented musician,
05:15 there are some things that you just miss
05:17 if you don't get some music education.
05:20 So I see them as, you know, very important to produce
05:26 what you want to produce.
05:28 Got you. Got you. Yeah.
05:29 And how do you
05:32 tie in the music with evangelism?
05:36 Well, this is something that I kind of consolidated
05:40 the last several years of my life.
05:42 I always knew that...
05:44 I always had a sense that music was a powerful tool
05:48 for worship, not just for worship, however,
05:50 but for bringing people,
05:52 softening their hearts to receive the gospel.
05:56 But in recent years,
06:00 I discovered Christ method of reaching people.
06:03 Okay, and I did some missions overseas
06:06 for several years and that helped me
06:08 to practice using that method.
06:10 And I came to the conclusion a few years ago that, you know,
06:13 really, that's the only thing that gives true success
06:16 just like Ellen White says, you know.
06:18 So no matter how much music we give people,
06:21 it cannot replace Christ method of reaching them.
06:25 So I started to see that I needed to have my music
06:28 become some part of this method of reaching people.
06:33 So, yeah, music and missions
06:35 is all about how I use Christ method,
06:39 but then how I use my hat as a musician within that,
06:43 and how I use my hat as a missionary in music.
06:48 Got you.
06:49 All intertwined together, you know.
06:51 Yes.
06:52 And God, you know,
06:53 has led me on a journey of discovery of that.
06:56 Now, what are some of the places that you've been
07:00 in terms of doing mission work?
07:02 Right, okay,
07:03 so
07:06 South Korea.
07:07 Wow.
07:09 Yeah, when I was finishing my studies
07:10 at Andrews University,
07:13 I felt a call if you will to do overseas missions.
07:17 And I was interested in East Africa
07:22 and Thailand.
07:24 I can't remember why, right now.
07:26 And I didn't know anything about those countries,
07:28 but I prayed for a call and one came,
07:31 and it was very clear.
07:33 South Korea is where they wanted me to go.
07:35 And I further prayed,
07:38 so that things can work out for me to go there,
07:40 and they did work out for me to go there.
07:42 So I went there and I intended to stay for a year,
07:46 and I ended up staying for 14 years.
07:48 For 14 years?
07:50 Wow! That's right.
07:52 So that was a long time to be in that country.
07:56 But I would travel out every now and then
07:59 on holiday with other missionaries
08:00 to their countries.
08:02 I would see that people
08:03 coming from South Africa and Australia.
08:06 We had other missionaries in Thailand, in Japan,
08:08 and the Philippines.
08:10 So we would go visit them and they would come visit us,
08:13 you know.
08:14 So you got to experience a lot of different cultures?
08:17 I sure did.
08:19 Yeah. Yeah.
08:20 And so I would think that as a result of that,
08:24 you know, of that experience, experiencing
08:26 a lot of different cultures,
08:28 and how they live, and how they interact,
08:31 like that only goes to help you in the evangelism process
08:35 because you're able to reach so many more people.
08:39 I really have a thing for diversity.
08:43 You know, recently I ministered a church,
08:46 and it was a very diverse church
08:47 right here in the US,
08:49 and I loved it,
08:50 you know, because we had people
08:52 from all different countries present there.
08:55 I think it's something worth getting
08:56 really comfortable with,
08:58 you know, as Seventh-day Adventist,
09:00 the idea of diversity.
09:02 You know, and diversity
09:04 in terms of religious backgrounds as well.
09:06 I come from a Hindu ancestry,
09:08 and I lived in a Buddhist country
09:10 for 14 years,
09:11 and then I was in Saudi Arabia,
09:12 so I saw what Islam was like, you know, firsthand for a year.
09:19 And I think all of these things help us to be wiser
09:23 and more informed about how we befriend secular people
09:28 with a view for bringing them to Christ.
09:32 Yes, yes,
09:33 well, that is the ultimate goal in mind too,
09:35 yes. Yeah, absolutely.
09:37 And I think if we become more successful at that,
09:40 we will become more successful at embracing diversity,
09:44 even music.
09:45 Which is important because and then
09:46 heaven is going to be a very diverse place.
09:51 So, you know, we've been talking about your music,
09:53 and we actually have a clip of you playing the piano,
09:58 and I can't wait for our viewers to see it.
10:01 Let's go to that clip.
13:01 Wow, see I knew you were musically gifted
13:04 when I heard you play and now today.
13:07 So that was a beautiful song.
13:10 Thank you. You're welcome.
13:12 So with the music, with the evangelism,
13:15 you also do evangelism seminars.
13:18 Yeah, that's right.
13:20 What types of seminars are, like, what do they look like?
13:24 Okay.
13:26 The one that I'm most passionate
13:27 about lately is a seminar
13:31 about Christ's method of six steps.
13:33 You know, we've had this methodology
13:35 over 100 hundred years ago, Ellen White wrote about it.
13:38 We can find it in gospel work as
13:43 Ministry of Healing, okay.
13:45 Christ method of reaching people
13:47 is the one that will give true success.
13:48 Okay.
13:50 Now for our viewers that don't know
13:51 about Christ method,
13:53 Bacch, what is Christ's method?
13:54 Okay.
13:55 So it says that Christ mingled with people
13:58 as one desiring their good, and He met their needs,
14:03 He sympathized with them, and He won their confidence,
14:06 and then He bade them to follow Him.
14:08 So that's the method right there, okay?
14:10 So I started to realize that my music making
14:17 didn't necessarily mean that I was involved
14:21 with the great commission using Christ method.
14:24 And a lot of artists in the church,
14:26 we function as pianists or singers.
14:30 All we do, the technical work, audiovisual.
14:34 Okay.
14:35 But we don't necessarily get into people's lives.
14:37 Okay.
14:39 But in Christ method, which, you know,
14:41 everybody is called to do the great commission
14:43 as long as they're follower of Christ,
14:45 it's not an option, it's not a suggestion,
14:47 you have to, Christ asked us to do that.
14:49 Absolutely.
14:51 And so we could sometimes feel
14:52 that our music making is enough.
14:55 Well, I started to realize that I had to get involved
14:59 with these six steps.
15:01 But then I further discovered that as a musician,
15:05 being involved in these six steps
15:07 was crucial to my dependency on Christ
15:09 because when we are involved
15:11 in evangelism using Christ method,
15:14 we develop a kind of dependency on Him
15:16 that we can't develop otherwise, okay.
15:19 Now, that is extremely crucial for artists
15:24 because we spend our lives trying to craft, you know,
15:28 improve our craft,
15:30 and to get better at what we do.
15:32 And so it could lead to a lot of introspection,
15:36 a lot of...
15:39 Even arrogance, selfishness, you know,
15:44 so that there lot of proficient musicians
15:46 in the church,
15:47 but
15:48 they don't always have a heart for people, okay?
15:53 So my seminar is about how it's very important for people
15:57 who do audiovisual, you know,
15:59 people in the booth, in the sound booth,
16:01 and people who are on the instruments
16:04 and even on the praise team that...
16:06 Yes, that's great that we do that in the church,
16:08 but we also need to get involved
16:10 in Christ method of reaching people
16:12 because that is crucial to the characters
16:14 that we want to build for the kingdom, okay?
16:18 And in turn that informs our music making.
16:23 We become more intentional
16:25 about the kind of music language that we use,
16:27 musical language that we use,
16:29 about the kind of elements of music
16:30 that we want to put out there
16:32 because we don't want the music to betray
16:35 the very message we want to give.
16:36 Absolutely.
16:38 And, you know...
16:39 Nothing to contradict.
16:40 Exactly. Yes, absolutely.
16:42 You know, so I could be saying something lyrically,
16:43 but my music is actually not supporting that...
16:48 Or that message can totally be missed
16:52 because people are enjoying the physical response
16:58 or emotional response to the music,
17:00 and not really indulging in the message.
17:02 Now, emotions are legitimate part of human beings, okay?
17:06 And I think God values that
17:08 'cause He wouldn't have given it to us
17:10 if He didn't, okay?
17:12 But we have to see everything, and the big picture, right?
17:16 And on top of that, I also found that as a musician
17:20 with secular people,
17:22 they are always drawn to the idea
17:24 that you are a musician or you run sound in a venue,
17:29 or you are behind the camera.
17:30 So technical people
17:33 and people who are involved in singing in a praise team
17:36 or behind an instrument,
17:37 they have a tremendous ability
17:40 to make friends with secular people,
17:42 and that's the first step in Christ's method,
17:45 mingling with people in a caring way.
17:48 Now, what you want is to get a number or an email address
17:51 because you're trying to build a relationship,
17:53 all right?
17:54 I also started to see
17:56 that we were very sensitive people, okay?
17:59 Musicians are very...
18:00 Oh, just talking about musicians, okay, okay.
18:02 We are very sensitive people.
18:03 So that allows you to have the ability to really empathize
18:07 with the pain of other people, okay?
18:10 So my main seminar is really about
18:12 how we use Christ's method.
18:15 A lot of people think
18:17 it's just for the medical missionary people,
18:19 but I'm trying to show not that...
18:22 No matter what your spiritual gift is,
18:24 you can fit it in to Christ's method
18:28 'cause everything else will fail.
18:29 And what we bring people
18:32 to the church with is ultimately
18:34 what we bring them to, okay?
18:36 So if we are trying to entertain people
18:38 into an interest in Christ, that might work for a while,
18:43 but we want people to stay,
18:45 and we want them to have
18:46 an authentic experience linking up with Jesus,
18:50 you know, not just come into a series
18:52 and on the very emotional altar call
18:57 given to us of Christ.
18:59 And we tick the box and say, "Okay, we have these numbers."
19:01 But then they don't really stay,
19:03 and then we don't nurture them.
19:04 Yes.
19:05 And I think you just hit the nail on the head
19:08 that we don't nurture them.
19:09 It's important when these newborn babes,
19:12 so to speak, come into the church
19:15 that we nurture them, that we befriend them,
19:18 that we get to know them, and their families,
19:21 and all that stuff, you know.
19:23 Because it's just like
19:25 when you introduce somebody to Christ,
19:26 how are you...
19:29 People sometimes hit people with doctrine
19:31 before introducing them to Christ.
19:33 And so, if you don't have that relationship,
19:36 why would you do this, that, and the third
19:39 for someone you don't even have a relationship with.
19:42 So you've got to get to know, I love what you're saying.
19:45 I think we're getting better
19:48 at understanding how this works.
19:50 You know, the church has existed
19:52 for quite some time,
19:54 and we should really take a hard look
19:55 at what really works and what our failures are,
19:58 you know.
20:00 So yeah, I agree. Absolutely.
20:01 So what are some of the other seminars
20:03 that you have 'cause I know
20:04 that you do a variety of seminars?
20:06 Right.
20:07 One of the most recent ones that I'm developing
20:08 is about how you deal with conflicts in the church.
20:11 People who have convictions about jewelry and other people
20:14 who don't have that conviction
20:17 that, you know, they say you can wear them, you know.
20:19 These are what we call grey areas,
20:21 I'm not really sure if they're gray areas or not,
20:23 you know, people can decide.
20:24 But I found in Spirit of Prophecy,
20:27 a lot of counsel about how we deal with people,
20:31 you know, in a very tactful and loving way.
20:34 And, you know, myself, I'm learning to do that,
20:37 you know, so that's one of the seminars
20:39 I'm developing at the moment.
20:41 But before these two seminars,
20:44 I've been doing seminars on music and morality,
20:47 music and human physiology,
20:49 music in the context of the great controversy,
20:52 and musical instruments in the Bible,
20:56 you know, that sort of thing.
20:57 Give us a little taste of the music and morality?
21:00 Okay, so there are people that believe that,
21:03 you know, music is neutral,
21:04 so you can use any kind of music...
21:06 Meaning without lyrics,
21:08 so like music without lyrics is neutral.
21:09 That's right. That's right.
21:11 Okay, what people believe?
21:13 They see culture as the overwriting factor.
21:16 You know, if it's this culture, then, you know,
21:18 they should have their cultural preferences
21:20 with the music.
21:21 Well, while I think culture has a big part to play,
21:23 within every culture because culture is manmade.
21:26 There are fallen elements.
21:28 Man is fallen, you know, and God didn't exactly say,
21:32 "You have to have that culture.
21:33 I gave you that culture."
21:35 You know, these are traditions
21:36 that came down from our ancestors
21:40 and they have a lot to do
21:41 with the religions of our ancestors as well,
21:43 on what they saw as normal, okay?
21:45 So we have to take a hard look, I think at the musical language
21:51 that we use especially in corporate worship,
21:53 and for worship, you know, and evangelism,
21:57 and it takes a little bit of digging,
21:59 you know, the history of rock and jazz,
22:02 you know, it's important I think
22:03 to have a look at that a little bit,
22:06 you know.
22:08 So yeah, these music and morality,
22:11 important stuff.
22:12 How have you seen music impact people?
22:16 Oh, yeah, definitely, my first CD, Altar Call,
22:19 is because of that impact, you know,
22:21 I wanted to take people right back to the place
22:23 where I'm playing the piano for...
22:26 At the end of a night in a series,
22:28 and the minister has just given a sermon
22:34 about a particular aspect of Christianity.
22:37 And he's asking people to make a decision for Christ,
22:41 you know.
22:43 And when words alone
22:47 might not be able to soften somebody's heart,
22:51 you know, music,
22:52 because of the way we process it,
22:54 you know, it can bypass the center of reason
22:56 and go straight to the center of emotions,
22:57 and we don't want to abuse that.
23:00 The industry knows how to use that to get sales,
23:02 and a lot of musicians know how to use that to get fans,
23:07 you know.
23:09 But we want to make responsible use of that.
23:14 You know, there're places in an Altar Call
23:16 where I would stop playing completely.
23:18 Yes.
23:19 Especially during the prayer
23:21 'cause I really want people to engage what's been set,
23:27 you know, and not confuse them.
23:30 Not confuse that with a fuzzy atmosphere,
23:33 you know, where...
23:35 So the responsible use of music,
23:37 and as I said, at my first CD, Altar Call,
23:40 that I recorded in London around the 2016 3ABN campaign.
23:45 Yeah, because that was my next thing,
23:46 almost like, how did you get here?
23:47 But before we get to that, that song that we just heard
23:51 a couple minutes ago, what CD is that on?
23:56 That's on Sojourn. Okay.
23:57 Which is an album of Negro spirituals.
24:00 Okay.
24:01 And that has to do with human displacement.
24:04 I realize that currently in the world,
24:07 we have the highest incidence of human displacement
24:09 ever recorded.
24:10 Wow. Wow. Yeah.
24:12 So one statistic that I report,
24:15 that I read said that 1 in 131 people
24:17 on the planet are displaced.
24:19 Guess what?
24:21 My ancestors were displaced from India.
24:23 They were brought to the West Indies
24:24 as indentured servants,
24:26 you know, which is another
24:27 fancy word for slavery, actually.
24:28 Yes, yes.
24:30 But as a result, I'm a Seventh-day Adventist.
24:31 Praise the Lord for that.
24:33 And this is exactly
24:34 what happened to the descendants of slaves.
24:36 Yeah.
24:37 They got Christianity,
24:38 and so the only sojourn of music
24:40 I can think of on earth that came out of displacement
24:45 and Christianity would be Negro spirituals.
24:47 So I wanted to present them again
24:51 not just as a tag to black identity
24:55 or black history, you know, or history.
24:58 But I wanted to show that they're relevant today
25:00 to people who are displaced
25:01 because they speak to the same brokenness,
25:04 you know.
25:06 That's deep.
25:07 And the solution for that brokenness
25:08 is found in Christ.
25:10 So there are texts in the Bible
25:11 that talk about we are sojourners on the earth.
25:14 This is not our real place, this is not the real deal,
25:17 you know.
25:18 So that birthed my album Sojourn,
25:22 so Deep River is one of those spirituals.
25:24 Okay, nice.
25:26 And so how do people, if they want to get your album,
25:29 how do they...
25:30 Where do they go to get it?
25:32 Right.
25:33 So Sojourn is a new release.
25:35 Okay.
25:36 People can go to KendolMusic.com.
25:38 KendolMusic.com.
25:40 That's right.
25:41 Okay, and that's K-E-N-D-O-L Music.com.
25:44 Okay. That's right.
25:46 And there they can request the CD.
25:50 So they can actually order Altar Call
25:53 from a link right there.
25:54 Okay. Okay.
25:56 And
25:59 they can write to me. I live on St. Vincent.
26:01 So I'm not here in the US physically at all time.
26:04 Okay, okay, you know.
26:05 And so if they want to write to you, how do they...
26:07 Where do they write to?
26:09 Okay, so there's a contact page on my website.
26:11 Okay.
26:12 They can also reach me at Kendolb,
26:14 that's kendolb@hotmail.com
26:17 Okay. All right.
26:19 And how do they book you for the evangelism seminars.
26:24 Do they go on KendolMusic.com?
26:27 They can do it there through the contact page
26:30 or they can just email me.
26:32 Yeah, I'm easy to find.
26:34 I got you, I got you.
26:36 Now, in the short, in about 30 to 45 seconds,
26:39 tell us how you made it to 3ABN.
26:41 Oh, well, so I was in Australia on vacation
26:45 and I met Sandra Entermann.
26:48 Okay, she's very nice.
26:50 Yeah.
26:51 And we ended up doing some music down together,
26:53 we ended up in the studio
26:54 recording four songs down there,
26:55 and then she had an appointment to come here,
26:58 they needed a pianist.
26:59 So I was brought onboard, and then the next thing I knew,
27:02 I was here at 3ABN recording with her.
27:07 Of course, there was a series of events that led to all of,
27:10 you know, in between,
27:11 but I'm giving the short version.
27:13 Yes, yes. Absolutely, absolutely.
27:14 And then we heard about you at Dare to Dream,
27:17 and then we wanted to interview you as well.
27:20 So happy that you could make it out here,
27:23 and that you made it safely, this was a long journey.
27:27 And so thankful
27:29 that you took the time to come out here
27:30 and thank you for everything that you do
27:32 for the cause of Christ.
27:33 You're welcome, Sir. Yes.
27:34 It's been a pleasure.
27:36 Oh, praise the Lord.
27:37 And we want to thank you so much for joining us.
27:39 You know, one thing about ministry
27:42 is there are so many different avenues
27:45 for you to get involved with.
27:48 Take a look at the talents that God has blessed you with
27:51 and see how you can utilize those talents
27:53 for His honor and glory.
27:55 Well, we've reached the end of another program.
27:57 Thanks for tuning in. Join us next time.
27:59 And remember,
28:00 it just wouldn't be the same without you.


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Revised 2018-07-16