| Wednesday, January 16, 2008 |
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Barry Blaze Interview part 4 of 4
Posted @ 10:08 AM :: 140 Views ::
0 Comments :: Soul Music
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In Part 1 of the interview with Barry Blaze, Barry discussed the reformation of Code of Ethics and the importance of ministry in his message. In Part 2, Barry discusses his early years in music, his time as a student at Liberty University, and his spiritual growth that lead to the formation of Code of Ethics. In Part 3, Barry discussd the end of Code of Ethics, and his entry into worship leader ministry in Florida. In Part 4, Barry discusses his recovery from his accident while he was leading worship at a church in Florida and the new Code of Ethics. A video with the music of the new Code of Ethics can also be seen in Part 4.
Did your time end at Chet’s before the accident or after?
I was there for two more years after the accident. While I was going through the surgeries and repair work, I was still there at Chet’s.
Was the church able to support you during your recovery?
They were able to support me, and they did a fantastic job. I was so headstrong in wanting to get back because I had never experienced anything like this in my life, because I was barely ever sick. I would start to feel better, and then I would have a surgery again, and it would be two steps back. Physically I was so beat up. Since it was internal, I looked fine from the outside. When people would look at me at the church, they could tell that things were wrong, but I looked decent from the outside. They would come up to me and say how good it was that I was getting better. In reality, I was in an extreme amount of pain.
I would get up on stage and could barely stand up straight. My ear bones had been crushed, and that is what keeps you balanced and enables you to walk. I would get up and do everything I could just to lead worship every week. When I would step down, I would try to sleep it off for a couple of days.
Finally, I think the leadership saw this and they told me I had to stop while I was having the surgeries. They said I could come back to work after it was done. They actually sent me home for six months, and they took care of everything. They just wanted me to rest.
Where did you find comfort?
Ha-ha. HOME!
After the accident I was at a point where I didn’t have a hearing aid. In the first surgery they had to start working on one of my eyes. I was blind. I told Cynthia to go to church so she could help with the production. She’s always been right there in that. I might be on stage, but she was making it happen in the production right there with me.
I had sent her to church, so I was alone, by myself. I was blind and since I didn’t have my hearing aid, I was deaf. I remember standing at my sink trying to see my image in the mirror. It all kind of hit me at one time. I felt so vulnerable at that moment. My world was spinning down in a spiral and I had no idea if I was ever going to pull out it. There wasn’t a rock big enough for me to hide under at that moment.
That’s when I got to the edge, and I cried out to God. I said that this was all that I could take physically. You say that you know what we can take and what we can’t. Here I am; I can’t go beyond this…this is it. I’m going to go crackers here in a minute if you don’t come and comfort me. And I just cried out to God that I need to feel his presence. I was all alone. I didn’t have my wife as a crutch. At that moment, I really did feel God’s presence. I knew that he would be with me and walk me through the process. I knew at that time that it was going to be a really, really long process. It wasn’t going to be this fast, over-night recovery. I began to write music again. And that’s where I found comfort.
It was a while before I could even pick up a guitar. The very first thing I tried to do was hear the pitch of my guitar, and it was impossible. Even still, if the pitch gets high enough up the scale, I can only hear semi-tones. That isn’t really the true pitch. I felt comfort in that God was handing me back a piece at a time. When I was able to get back up and lead worship on that Sunday, it was all I could do to keep from busting out in tears because it was such a beautiful, beautiful gift that God had given back to me.
I would be up there in front of a thousand people, but no one would know what was going on inside my head. It had a huge affect on our church. I know that God used even my accident as a source of strength for a lot of people in our church. I started recording again and writing again, and that’s when I discovered that this is who I was.
God made me a creative person after himself and I couldn’t deny it. I couldn’t hide it. I learned once again that my creative process was a wonderful thing. I thank God for it every single day and use it. He’s still rebuilding me. It’s a wonderful process that I wouldn’t trade it for anything.
I would actually like to write a book about the experience but, the thing about it is, that it’s like bumping a wound. But, when I talk about it, it reminds me of the pain. Those things that God uses to refine us really hurt emotionally and physically. It’s not that He wants us to hurt, but they tend to really shape us in His image.
What do you think helped motivate you to again start working again on Code of Ethics?
Maybe a year into the accident I was undergoing a lot of surgeries. I think I had almost 8 surgeries in the first year and a half. It would be kind of like taking one step forward and two steps back. I would try to get up and lead worship and it was so difficult physically. The church finally allowed me to take some time off which I did.
During that time I did some more soul searching. I asked God why this was happening to me and where He was going to lead me after the accident. I discovered that I had to be the artist that God made me to be. I can’t just snub that out and say I’m just strictly going to be working within the confines of the local church.
That was really denying who God created me to be. As I did that, I would think that I was about to pop internally because that creative pressure was building. From all of it I discovered that I had to have one foot planted in a local ministry and the other planted in the creative process that makes me who I am.
The big part of the healing is just knowing that it’s all part of God’s story.
Click HERE to watch the video with the music from the upcoming Code Of Ethics album that will be available by Spring 2008.
Click HERE to read the article about Barry Blaze that tells about the accident that he suffered in 2004 that nearly ended his life. |
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